O-xU 
 
CONQUEST 
 
CONQUEST 
 
 BY 
 
 GERALD 
 O'DONOVAN 
 
 AUTHOR OF "father RALPH " 
 
 LONDON : CONSTABLE AND 
 COMPANY LIMITED . 1920 
 

CONQUEST 
 
 PART ONE 
 
 I. 
 
 The old white pony, wall-eyed but sure-footed, ambled 
 slowly down the hill. On Thursdays for twenty-two years 
 he had borne Father Pat Daly to the market at Lisgeela. 
 When Father Pat had controlled the pony they covered the 
 four and a half miles from Drisheen in half an hour ; but for 
 many years the pony had taken control, and drew up at the 
 door of the Presbytery at Lisgeela exactly an hour after 
 Father Pat had made his sole contribution to the journey 
 in a jerk of the reins and a " Go on, will you, Whitey !" in 
 the yard of his house at Drisheen. At eleven they started ; 
 at half-past eleven Whitey had finished his drink at the 
 stream by Phooca cross-roads, and Father Pat had 
 appraised his cattle out on grass on Devoy^s farm beyond 
 the stream; at Devoy's farmhouse the old, crazy, open 
 weighted clock in the kitchen, which through the week was 
 roughly set by the sun, was corrected to the infallibly right 
 time as Father Pat shouted, in passing, a stem " God save 
 you all," to the open doorway; and as the Cathedral bell 
 tolled the Angelus at twelve Whitey was licking a tired 
 fetlock beside the kerb in front of the Lisgeela Presbytery, 
 while Father Pat, standing on the footwalk, his white head 
 bared and bent, said the Angelus. 
 
 To-day, till Whitey was at the foot of Hill Street, the 
 
2 .^ /;'.,. ;;',;' 'conquest 
 
 most bedraggled* of -all the-' frowsy approaches to Lisgeela, 
 nothing very unusual happened. 
 
 Father Pat's old housekeeper, Julia Feeney, had harnessed 
 the pony, renewing the splice on the left trace with a fresh 
 piece of string, " for fear it'd give on the way." 
 
 " It's a queer turn-out for a man of God," she said, her 
 arms akimbo, including, with a single disapproving sweep 
 of her hard grey eyes, the pony, the harness, the trap, and 
 the priest himself. 
 
 "Whist, woman!" Father Pat said sternly. 
 
 His eyes wandered slowly over his once black clothes, 
 now green and threadbare from much wear — the clerical 
 coat and waistcoat yellowed in front by snuff, the trousers 
 baggy at the knees, and shrunk at the frayed ends almost 
 to the tops of the patched and shapeless elastic-sided boots. 
 He took off his silk hat, discoloured a greenish-brown, 
 ruffled where it was not napless, looked at it whimsically 
 and rubbed it with his sleeve. 
 
 "What the dint of brushing could do for it, I done," 
 Julia said reproachfully. " 'Tis I'd turn you out clean and 
 decent if you'd only put it in my power. But what can a 
 woman do and you not getting a stitch of new clothes this 
 twenty year ? Don't I put a shine on your boots that you 
 could see yourself in ? And your shirt and collar is as 
 white as the driven snow; and sorra one'd know they're 
 badly gone without looking close at 'em." 
 
 "Amn't I well enough?" he said, with a shrug of his 
 broad shoulders. 
 
 " Is it with that old garron of a beast ?" she said, shrilly 
 contemptuous. 
 
 " Poor old Whitey," he said gently, patting the pony's 
 neck. " He's almost as faithful as you are, Julia — and — 
 and he's dumb," he added hesitatingly, with a wry smile. 
 
 " You grudge me the bit o' blacking I put on your boots 
 and the trifle of starch for your collars, and now you're 
 
Conquest 3 
 
 grudging me my tongue, that don't cost you anything," she 
 said angrily, wiping away an imaginary tear 'with a corner 
 of her apron. 
 
 He winced, and gathered up the reins preparatory to 
 mounting into the trap. 
 
 " Maybe to stumble, and you getting into the car with 
 them in your hand," she said, snatching roughly at the reins. 
 " Let me hand 'em up to you. The poor dumb beast !" she 
 went on. " It's well for him that it's dumb he is, for if he 
 had the use of the tongue like a Christian, he couldn't 
 contain himself at all at all, meeting the whole world within 
 in the market of Lisgeela, with them winkers and a crupper 
 that's tied up with tin-tacks, and his collar all patches with 
 me striving to keep the hair inside it, and a piece of rope and 
 string here and there ; and never a clippers put neaf him in 
 the memory of man, and only a lick of a currycomb when I'm 
 not pressed. And he to have trapesing behind him that 
 jingling skeleton of old iron and dirt, that a tinker wouldn't 
 misname by calling it a car. You poor animal, you ! it's 
 ashamed you'd be to be seen dead in a ditch with it, let 
 alone passing a throng of decent people in and out of the 
 market, and you alive." 
 
 " It is a bit outlandish," the priest said moodily, rubbing 
 
 his chin with his forefinger. " I must get it repai " He 
 
 hesitated, and added, " I must throw a few buckets of water 
 on it when I come home." 
 
 " Is it to expose the nakedness of it by taking the blessed 
 mud off it you'd be ? And it hiding the shame of the old 
 pieces of tin cans I nail't on to the sides and to the dash- 
 boards till they cried out against it and wouldn't hold 
 another nail. Glory be to God, you're that close that you'd 
 make two meals off a wren. Wouldn't I wash it myself only 
 for the shame I'd bring on it ?" 
 
 A swarthy flush overspread his face. His lips twitched. 
 He straightened his heavy body to its full height of over six 
 
4 CONQUEST 
 
 feet and frowned at her sternly. She faced him resolutely, 
 her hands again resting on her hips. 
 
 " And you a priest of God, too !" she threw at him venge- 
 fuUy. 
 
 His features relaxed and the frown passed off. With a 
 half shamefaced smile he said : " Whitey and the old trap 
 are good enough for me, and they'll last my time. Anyway, 
 the Son of God hadn't even an ass and cart under Him." 
 
 " The pride of the man," she said with a gasp, " likening 
 himself to the Lord God. But sure it's kind for you, and you 
 with the pure blood of the Dalys in you," she added proudly. 
 
 " None of that," he said angrily. With a contemptuous 
 look, he climbed laboriously into the trap. 
 
 She quailed under his eyes, but shrugged her shoulders, 
 and muttered as he turned his back : " And him not for- 
 getting it for a minute, night or morning. There he goes 
 now, the handsomest man in seven counties. If it wasn't for 
 the saint he always was, it's the devil's play he'd have with 
 the women — hussies they are! Him with the pride of 
 Lucifer in his eye and the way he holds himself. Sure it's 
 in rags he could go and not a bishop in the land could hold a 
 candle to him. And him that big a skinflint of a miser that 
 he'd skin a flea to sell the fat. And him, too, that wouldn't 
 wrong man, woman or child, or the brute beast, and wears 
 out the knees of his breeches with the dint of praying. It's 
 a contradictory world, glory be to the Almighty, and it's 
 Father Pat himself is the queerest man in it." 
 
 When he had settled himself into the seat she handed him 
 the reins. " You might bring home a scrag end of mutton in 
 the car with you. I could cook a chop of it for your dinner," 
 she said doubtfully. 
 
 " I might then, if it wasn't a conference day. But I'll be 
 dining with his lordship and all the priests. Such a waste 
 of meat and drink," he muttered thoughtfully, "and we 
 have to pay dear for it, five shillings a head and vail of a 
 
CONQUEST 5 
 
 shilling to the servants. Enough to support a man in luxury 
 for a week." 
 
 " Sure we'll be in need of the meat for to-morrow," she 
 persisted. 
 
 "Hear the woman now, and to-morrow a Friday. Is it 
 heathens you'd be making of us, Julia Feeney ?" 
 
 " There's the. long week before us, and not a scrap of 
 butcher's meat darkened the door since the bishop was here 
 for the Confirmation," she said with failing confidence. 
 " Nine months ago it was." 
 
 " We had enough then to last us a twelvemonth, feasting 
 every day for ten days we were on what was left over.'* 
 
 " You'll have your fill to-day, anyhow," she said angrily. 
 
 " It's on the point of eleven, and I must be going," he said 
 evasively. " I suppose I'U eat it as I'll have to pay for it," 
 he added to himself. " But every bite'U near choke me, 
 knowing the cost of it." 
 
 He looked round the yard, at the tumbled-down out- 
 houses, at the worm-eaten doors, and again at the horse. 
 
 "Whitey's been a good friend to me, Julia Feeney," he 
 said gently, his eyes softening as he looked at the old 
 woman. " But you've been a better. Five and thirty years 
 you have served me in fair weather and foul, and there 
 isn't a better servant living this day." 
 
 The old woman fingered her apron nervously, curtsied, 
 her yellow parchment face flushed. She tugged at the 
 strings of her white goffered cap, as she said, " Sure I never 
 hoped to live to hear your reverence give me such praise as 
 all that. There isn't the likes of you in all the living earth." 
 
 He looked troubled and lifted up the reins as if to give 
 them a jerk. 
 
 He hesitated. A generous look came into the hard eyes 
 under his white, bushy eyebrows. 
 
 " I might bring that scrag," he said. 
 
 " And why would you, your reverence ?" she said eagerly. 
 
6 CONQUEST 
 
 " Sure there's plenty of fine food in the house, a scrap of 
 bacon no less. And there's sure to be an egg before the 
 night, or maybe two." 
 
 " That's true," he said in a relieved tone. " Butcher's 
 meat is a sinful waste, and all that fine food about. You 
 might pull up a stalk of the new potatoes — they're ripe by 
 this — for your dinner. And take a trifle of butter with 'em. 
 Not much," he added, pursing his lips. " It's a rich food 
 and goes to the head." 
 
 " You can trust me to go slow on it, your reverence," she 
 said gratefully. 
 
 He jerked the reins. " Go on, will you, Whitey !" he said 
 mechanically. The pony started after a strained pull. The 
 old woman ran to the rickety gate and held it open. 
 
 " And Julia, as the day is hot, and there won't be much 
 cooking to do, you might be sparing on the turf." 
 
 " Out the fire'll go, when the praties is boiled. And you'll 
 be careful of your health. Father Pat, agra," she said 
 anxiously. " There's a flushed look on you for some days 
 past that can't be wholesome." 
 
 " Nonsense, woman," he said, sitting upright. " I feel as 
 sweet as that hawthorn bush in the hedge beyond." 
 
 " Good luck to you, and a good price on the bullocks," she 
 shouted after him. 
 
 " I told Devoy not to let 'em go at a penny under nineteen 
 five," he said over his shoulder. 
 
 " There's a farmer for you ! " she shouted admiringly. 
 " Not another man in the barony'd have the courage to ask 
 eighteen pounds for 'em. But then they haven't his eye for 
 a beast. And he'll get it too ; and the odd five shillings to 
 cover the luck penny. It's generous he always was in luck 
 pennies." 
 
 The voice became indistinct and trailed off. The reference 
 to luck pennies annoyed him. Half-a-crown would be ample. 
 And Devoy said he'd run the risk of losing the sale because 
 
CONQUEST ; 
 
 of the extra five shillings. But a pound couldn't be broken 
 for a luck penny ; and his pride wouldn't let him give less 
 than five shillings. The Dalys never gave less. And wasn't 
 he a real Daly ? The whole world knew it. Wasn't he born 
 in Dalyhouse? He fumbled in his waistcoat pocket and 
 took out a gold hunter watch and looked with glowing 
 eyes on the crest, a wolf dog, and the motto " Dum spiro 
 spero." The watch was nearly all that was left of three 
 parishes and the town of Lisgeela. But there was the motto. 
 Aye, while there was life there was hope. And he was only 
 seventy. He put back the watch in his pocket. The pony 
 jogged along. The soft summer air was heavy with the 
 scent of spirea and privet. He drew in a deep breath. There 
 used to be a privet hedge along the sunk fence at Daly- 
 house. How well he remembered it, though he hadn't seen 
 it since '35, sixty-one years ago, and he only nine years old. 
 And his grand-nephew, Jim, was nine years old this very 
 June. To-morrow was it ? Yes ! he must give him a present. 
 He shuffled in his seat and frowned. He sniffed the delicate 
 scent of new-mown hay. 
 
 " You've kept it standing two days too long, Richard," 
 he shouted over the hedge. 
 
 "That's God's truth, your reverence. 'Tis you have the 
 eyes on you. Father Pat. And how is the health, sir ?" 
 
 " Never felt younger or better in my life. A good crop 
 to you." 
 
 "And the best of every good luck to your reverence. 
 Sure 'tis you that deserves it." 
 
 Whitey kept his even pace, raising a trail of white dust on 
 the soft limestone road. The priest flicked neatly a horse- 
 fly off the pony's neck and replaced the whip in its rest. 
 No, he wouldn't give Jim a present. There was nothing 
 good enough for him in Lisgeela, and Dublin was too far 
 away, and a present would cost too much. He couldn't 
 afford it. Besides, Jim would have everything one day. 
 
8 CONQUEST 
 
 He had the Daly nose and chin, and was a fine upstanding 
 lad. But had he the spirit? The boy*s father had it. If 
 Jim only turned out to have the go and courage of his 
 father, Theobald ? He was a man for you, a Daly of the 
 Dalys. If Theobald had only had a fair chance ? But he 
 hadn't — and to die at thirty-four ! Thank God he died like 
 a gentleman, broke his neck taking the sunk fence in the 
 Daly house demesne, and he following the hounds on a 
 spavined horse. And they called him a peasant. Scovell 
 had sneered at him in the coffee room of the Daly Arms at 
 Lisgeela, and at his mount, had called him "the peasant 
 Daly." Scovell, the grandson of the upstart who had fore- 
 closed the mortgage in '35 and taken Dalyhouse and every 
 acre and chattel that the Dalys had to their name, except a 
 hundred acre farm Pierce the Rake's wife was able to hold 
 on to — Scovell, a mere Cromwellian settler. 
 
 He leant forward in the trap as Whitey climbed the short 
 hill at Culleen. It would be a bad job if the harness went ; 
 but there was the hammer and tacks and bundle of string in 
 the bottom of the trap in case of accidents. How cool the 
 Lissyfad woods looked. The day was a scorcher to be sure. 
 And he was feeling the heat. He took off his hat and wiped 
 his forehead with a red bandanna handkerchief. That was 
 a queer throbbing in his temples. He looked at his hat with 
 a wry smile. He had seen better on a scarecrow. And all 
 his scraping and gathering had been for Theobald; and 
 Theobald was dead. He hadn't given him the money, but 
 he would have, had Theobald not been killed. A furtive 
 look crossed his face, and he shrank from the thought as if 
 he were afraid. He would have given it the moment it 
 could have been useful. Theobald was a man. Hadn't he 
 snatched Arabella Levin of Lissyfad from under Derek 
 Scovell's nose? Eloped with her to Dublin, where she 
 became a Catholic and married him. How the Orange pack 
 raged and shut their doors on her — left her to stew in her 
 
CONQUEST 9 
 
 Papist peasant muck was how her father, Dick Levin, put 
 it. Arabella might have been a Daly in blood she held 
 her head so high in the little house at Scarty. And the 
 Levins had only come to Ireland in the train of Dutch 
 William — upstarts of yesterday. 
 
 According to custom, Whitey stood for a few minutes on 
 the level, and nibbled at the lush June grass on the road- 
 side. Away on the left, in the woods, beyond Lisgeela, a 
 great whitish-grey limestone house faced the sun. The old 
 man's eyes blurred. He took out his Book of Hours. As 
 there was a conference he would anticipate Vespers and 
 Compline. He held the book open, but he could not read the 
 print. What matter, he knew it all by heart. He mumbled 
 the prayers till Whitey started again, but his mind was back 
 sixty-one years. From that time to this, except from the top 
 of CuUeen Hill, he had never seen Dalyhouse. What had 
 come over him to-day ? The house seemed gaunt and for- 
 bidding. Had he been wrong in his attachment to it ? . . . 
 His grandfather had begun the trouble by breaking the 
 entail. But it was his father. Pierce the Rake, who mort- 
 gaged everything and played the fool. He was Pierce the 
 Rake at Dalyhouse, and he was Pierce the Rake afterwards 
 at Scarty; only instead of getting drunk on wine, he got 
 drunk on poteen whisky. He used to sit in the shebeen 
 near Scarty and sell the trees, one by one, for drink, and 
 boast of the days when he rollicked with the Regent. And 
 his poor mother stuck in the house, ashamed to be at home 
 to the few callers who remembered her in misfortune, spend- 
 ing her time praying at the little altar in her bedroom, or 
 sitting in the parlour discussing the inferiority of the 
 Scovells. . . . 
 
 Whitey had his drink at the Phooca cross-roads. Father 
 Pat, without looking at the house, said, " God save you all " 
 in passing Devoy's. Mrs. Devoy ran out into the road and 
 shouted after him, " Tom got the nineteen five for the 
 
10 CONQUEST 
 
 bullocks, your reverence;" but he never turned his head 
 " That's two hundred and eleven pounds clear profit on 
 'em," he murmured listlessly to himself; and in a moment 
 he was thinking of his brother Pierce, who was only five 
 when they left Dalyhouse. Young Pierce had no memories 
 of the place after a few years and worked at Scarty like a 
 farm hand. By the time he was sixteen he was running the 
 farm, weighed down by his father's debts and his, Pat's, 
 expenses at Maynooth. It was queer that Pierce, who 
 hadn't a drop of peasant blood in him, had no pride in his 
 Daly blood, took naturally to the ways of a peasant, and 
 married Ann DriscoU, the daughter of a tenant farmer; 
 while Theobald, in spite of his mother's blood, was a throw- 
 back to the pure-bred Daly. . . . 
 
 And now up at Scarty were his brother Pierce, Arabella 
 and Jim. Three generations of 'em without maybe a thought 
 of the Daly name. Theobald had it. But Theobald was 
 dead. Jim must have it — he must be made to have it. He 
 mustn't grow up a peasant" and be led astray by his grand- 
 father. . . . 
 
 He had intended to help Theobald. Who was it saying 
 that he hadn't helped him ? It was true that he had refused 
 to lend him fifty pounds to buy a horse, although he 
 encouraged him to hunt. But it was all for his good. He 
 was to have had all the money one day when he could strike 
 a blow for the Daly name. What was the cold sweat on his 
 forehead? And Theobald had been killed by an old 
 spavined horse gone in the knees. . . . 
 
 He wasn't a miser. Careful maybe. And who wouldn't 
 with such an end in view ? Maybe to make the Dalys once 
 more a power in the land ? Jim'd do it. Jim must do it. 
 And he'd help him. Not at once perhaps. But when the 
 right day came there'd be all the more for Jim to get. There 
 was no use in wasting money. And Jim'd have it all one 
 day or another — every penny. There were still things he 
 
CONQUEST II 
 
 could cut down. Piles and piles of money he could make 
 by saving — enough to buy back Daly house, to keep twenty 
 horses in the stables. . . . 
 
 Whitey ambled slowly down the hill. The priest's eyes 
 were fixed on the grass and wild mustard that crowned the 
 dilapidated thatched cottages on his right — a sea of gold 
 they seemed to his gloating eyes ; a sea of gold coins rolling 
 in billows to his feet. . . . 
 
 At the foot of the hill there was a check on the reins. 
 Whitey hesitated. It was opposite Mallon the grocer's, 
 where he had sometimes stopped on the way home. There 
 was no repetition of the check, so he ambled on and halted 
 at the Presbytery door. 
 
 The Angelus bell tolled. A priest on his way to the 
 conference stood and prayed beside the trap. His eyes 
 strayed to Father Pat still seated, his head thrown slightly 
 back. He stared at him as if fascinated for a few seconds, 
 muttering a " Hail Mary," then jumped forward, caught his 
 hand, and turning round, said, " May God have mercy on 
 his soul." 
 
 2. 
 
 The Most Reverend Dr. Deehan, Bishop of Lisgella, knelt 
 on the dining-room armchair in which he was afterwards to 
 preside at the conference. The priests of the conference 
 district knelt in varied attitudes on chairs all round the long 
 dining table, now merely a desk for tattered copies of Gury's 
 Theologia Moralis. The lower end of the table, farthest 
 from his lordship, was congested. The bishop had finished 
 the Angelus and had begun to call on the Holy Ghost to 
 assist at the conference when the door of the room was 
 violently shoved open. A priest rushed in, pale of face, and 
 in a scared voice said : 
 
 " My lord, my lord. Father Pat Daly is dead in his car at 
 the door." 
 
12 CONQUEST 
 
 Every eye in the room was fixed on the herald of death. 
 Mouths hung open. Father Tom Nulty felt that for once he 
 had gained the ear of the bishop who always snubbed him, 
 and of his fellows who treated him as a butt. His face 
 flushed with excitement. 
 
 " The Angelus bell caught me — Fm sorry I was so late, 
 my lord — beside his car, and I off with my hat and I hadn't 
 * The Angel of the Lord * out of me when I saw there was 
 something wrong. There he was leaning back like a drunken 
 man, and he doesn't take a sup, the pale face of him as 
 purple as your lordship's soutane, and his eyes staring out 
 of his head. I thought at first it was only a fit, but when I 
 caught hold of him he was stone dead." 
 
 The florid face of the bishop went pale under the 
 eyes. He put his hand to his heart. Reassured, he said 
 solemnly : 
 
 " May the Lord have mercy on his soul." 
 
 " Amen, Amen, Amen," responded from all over the room. 
 
 There was a clattering of chairs as the priests hastily got 
 to their feet. The bishop dropped heavily into his chair at 
 the head of the table. The younger priests at the end of the 
 table crowded round the two front windows and gazed at 
 the dead man in the trap. 
 
 " That puts the lid on any work at this conference, thank 
 God," Father Dunphy said, in a low but relieved tone. 
 
 " Aye, begannies," Father Crehan said, rubbing his hands. 
 " And the lord'd have downed me to-day in the Justice 
 tract as sure as a gun. He fixed me with his glary eye as 
 soon as he came into the room. How funny old Pat Daly 
 looks with his old topper cocked like that." 
 
 A tall, thin priest, in a caped soutane, his thick brown 
 hair turning grey at the temples, pushed Father Crehan 
 aside, saying : 
 
 " If you have no feeling, at least have some dignity — if you 
 can," and he pulled down the thin hoUand blind. As he 
 
CONQUEST 13 
 
 made his way, with difficulty, to the second window, Crehan 
 looked at him malevolently and said : 
 
 " Lysaght is too big a boss." 
 
 " He's the Administrator anyway, and it's his house," 
 Dunphy said, good-humouredly, " and no doubt he wants to 
 get into the lord's eye so as to be in the running for Drisheen. 
 Anyhow, to give him his due he was a friend of old Pat's." 
 
 " Friend in my eye," Crehan said bitterly. " Could any- 
 one be the friend of a man who never proffered a soul a glass 
 of punch except at a Confirmation — ^when he had to ? You 
 hit the right nail on the head at first, Dunphy. It's after 
 Drisheen Lysaght is." 
 
 " You're a bitter devil, Crehan," Dunphy said amiably. 
 " Lysaght isn't that kind, and old Pat Daly was as straight 
 a friend as ever walked. No doubt you're after Drisheen 
 yourself." 
 
 "And if I am, who has a better right?" Crehan said, 
 drawing himself up pompously. " Lysaght is only an 
 Administrator and I've been a P.P. for seven years — in a 
 poor parish with only half the dues of Drisheen, and I've 
 the right of grass for only nine bullocks agin thirty-five in 
 Drisheen. If there's any fairness in man I'll get it." 
 
 " Let old Pat get cold first anyway," Dunphy said, with 
 a shrug. 
 
 " If you take your seats, gentlemen," Father Lysaght said 
 firmly, " I'll see to poor Father Pat. Would you come with 
 me, Father Breslin and Father Brophy ?" 
 
 Three priests left the room. The others took their 
 seats. 
 
 " Poor, indeed — and him with the grass of thirty-five 
 bullocks," Father Crehan mumbled. 
 
 The bishop drummed the table unconsciously with the 
 fingers of his left hand while he tugged his limp Roman 
 collar away from his wet neck with his right. His face was 
 as purple as his stock. His undershot lower jaw hung open, 
 
14 CONQUEST 
 
 exposing gaps in his big yellow teeth. His eyes were fixed 
 vacantly on an engraving of Robert Emmett making his 
 dying speech. 
 
 " Father Pat had the better of me by three years — Fm 
 only sixty-seven and a young man yet," a fat, undersized 
 priest said querulously, adding hastily, in afterthought, 
 " God rest his soul." 
 
 " Oh, but. Father Lynch, the corpse, God give him a soft 
 bed, was two stone lighter than you, and near a foot taller," 
 a spare old man with grizzled hair said brutally. " There's 
 death, maybe, for a fat man in every step he takes," he 
 added, with a calculating glance round the table. 
 
 There was shuffling of many feet. Father Lynches 
 pendulous cheeks shook. His protuberant waistcoat rose 
 and fell to his short pants for breath. 
 
 " There's no fear of me — ^not for ten years to come," he 
 quavered valorously, wetting his lips with his tongue. He 
 looked round for sympathy and found the spare old man's 
 eyes fixed on him appraisingly. 
 
 " A watched pot takes a long time to boil," he wheezed, 
 pulling himself together. " Father Griffin always had a 
 liking for my parish, my lord. But sure it's the lean men 
 often goes first — the heart it is. A sort of worm gnawing 
 at their innards — and flop, off they go." 
 
 This cryptic excursion into physiology relieved the 
 tension. There was a general laugh. 
 
 The bishop sighed, rapped the table loudly, and 
 said : 
 
 " Order, order, gentlemen." 
 
 " You're a fine, full man yourself, my lord, may God bless 
 you. But there's little fear of you yet," Father Lynch said 
 ingratiatingly. 
 
 "Tut, tut, Fm a young man," the bishop said, in an 
 annoyed tone, opening the top buttons of his soutane, and 
 mopping his forehead with his handkerchief. 
 
CONQUEST 15 
 
 " He's fat and red about the gills," Father Griffin muttered 
 gloomily to the table. " I wouldn't give much for the 
 chances of a man of fifty-nine with his lining." 
 
 " What's that, Father Griffin ?" the bishop said sternly. 
 
 " Only that you're likely to live down the youngest of us, 
 my lord," Father Griffin said morosely. 
 
 " Hum, hum," the bishop said, drumming the table 
 nervously. " The sudden death of Father Daly, gentlemen, 
 in the fulness of years and priestly virtue though it be, is a 
 lesson to all of us. Death comes like a thief in the night — 
 but I needn't labour the point to men who always live in the 
 presence of God. Father Daly died in harness." 
 
 There were sounds of much trampling of feet in the hall, 
 as of men bearing a burthen. 
 
 " He had thirty-five bullocks in the market this morning," 
 Father Crehan murmured enviously. 
 
 " As I said," the bishop resumed, " he died in harness, 
 doing the work of God. Father Daly came to the conference 
 and has gone to his reward. He was an example to all of 
 us. A man of very old family, he had all the humility of the 
 humblest of us. In his obedience to my slightest wish he 
 was a true son of holy church. In his, ahem, frugality of life 
 he was a beautiful example of holy poverty." 
 
 " He was saving up, you may be sure, for the new 
 Cathedral, my lord," Father Lynch said unctuously. 
 
 " Being a man of God, I've no doubt he has remembered 
 the house of God generously," the bishop said, with equal 
 unction, his thick lips relaxing to a smile. 
 
 " Any man with Drisheen parish would," Father Crehcin 
 said piously. 
 
 "Any priest of any parish in the diocese should," the 
 bishop said sharply. " It is easy to be generous with other 
 people's money," he added, with a pointed look at Father 
 Crehan. 
 
 Father Crehan blushed, fiddled with the gold cross on his 
 
i6 CONQUEST 
 
 watchchain, hesitated, as if drawing back on the point of 
 making a plunge, made up his mind and said with an air of 
 reckless courage : 
 
 " I was going to tell your lordship laterlhat I'm going to 
 give another hundred to the building fund. If I only had 
 the means," he added significantly, " it might be five times 
 as much — but Leemagh is a poor parish, my lord." 
 
 The bishop's grey-brown eyes gleamed. 
 
 " Make a note of that. Father Carberry," he said drily, to 
 his secretary. " Father Crehan promises a hundred pounds 
 to the Cathedral building fund." 
 
 " Crehan couldn't play a pinkeen let alone a big fish like 
 the lord," Father Griffin said gloomily. 
 
 " Diddled," Dunphy giggled. 
 
 " You're lucky to have such, a rich parish as Leemagh, 
 Father Crehan," the bishop said suavely. " If I were a man 
 of your status and had such a parish I'd expect to stay there 
 for — " he pursed his lips and frowned thoughtfully, " well — 
 for ten years at least. But to come back to Father Daly." 
 
 " I hope to God Daly'll do the bastard in the eye," Crehan 
 muttered savagely, with no care for the accuracy of his 
 epithet. 
 
 " Out of respect for the dead we'll do no business to-day," 
 the bishop went on, " except dinner, which will, of course, be 
 at the usual hour. The deceased deserves all the considera- 
 tion we can show him. The body will be taken to the 
 Cathedral to-day and will lie there in state till the Requiem 
 at 9 on Saturday." 
 
 " The lord must have wind of the will. He's getting a 
 big wad, no doubt," Father Griffin muttered. 
 
 *' There is a will, I suppose, my lord?" Father Lynch 
 asked innocently. 
 
 All ears were pricked. The bishop gave a self-satisfied 
 smile. 
 
 " Certainly. Father Daly was punctilious in regard to 
 
CONQUEST i; 
 
 the diocesan regulations — in everything indeed. As are all 
 your wills, it is lodged with me. You might fetch it, Father 
 Carberry, from the palace. This is a suitable occasion to 
 open and read it." 
 
 " As if he hadn't steamed it and read it long ago," Father 
 Crehan muttered. 
 
 " He, he, he," Father Lynch laughed. " It'd be a joke if 
 it was like mine — a blank sheet of paper. The bulk of 'em 
 are I believe." 
 
 There was a titter among the group within hearing of the 
 whisper. 
 
 " No levity, gentlemen, on so solemn an occasion,'* the 
 bishop said sharply. 
 
 " I wonder how much he left, my lord ?" Father Lynch 
 asked eagerly. 
 
 " I've no idea," the bishop said, in a tone that invited 
 discussion, curiosity in his eyes. 
 
 " He got Drisheen — let me see — it was the year of the 
 Deasy Land Act I think — or was it the year after? Yes, 
 thirty-five years ago it was," Father Griffin said medita- 
 tively, in morose enjoyment, "and it was then he took that 
 miserly turn." 
 
 " Frugal, Father Griffin, frugal is the more fitting word — 
 in a priest," the bishop said gently. 
 
 " Would you believe it, my lord, he gave up drinking and 
 smoking — there was a hero for you," Father Lynch said, in 
 ecstatic wonder. 
 
 " Two hundred a year clear off the g^ass alone," Father 
 Crehan, drawn back to Drisheen as by a magnet, calculated, 
 " and thirty-five times that is seven thousand, and then there 
 was interest, and interest on interest and what not — on the 
 score of the grass and the bullocks alone there must be at 
 least twelve thousand." 
 
 "And all that only an extra as it were," Father Griffin 
 said gloomily. " There were the dues and the masses and 
 
i8 CONQUEST 
 
 the regular pickings in births, marriages and funerals — 
 Drisheen is no barren cow." 
 
 " There was his upkeep to be taken out of that/' Father 
 Crehan said carelessly, with an effort to conceal his anxiety. 
 
 Father Lynch laughed shrilly. "An old nanny goat'd 
 cost more to keep," he wheezed. " Whitey was fed on the 
 parish — Lenihan gave him the lock of oats and hay free. 
 Julia Feeney had about four pounds a year for most of her 
 life — maybe six or eight or ten latterly. And the food ! I 
 wouldn't be surprised if old Pat didn't make a profit on the 
 presents he got. And the house cost him nothing. It's as 
 rich as Croesus the old miser was, and if he'd only the sense 
 to take a glass o* punch or two a night it's alive maybe he'd 
 be now to enjoy it." 
 
 " Put it at thirty thousand altogether at the underside," 
 Father Griffin said moodily. 
 
 " Compound interest and all, it's more I tell you," Father 
 Lynch said, combatively. 
 
 The whole room held its breath. Father Crehan emitted 
 his in a long, deep sigh. 
 
 The bishop gazed at the ceiling abstractedly. " Drisheen 
 is a very desirable parish," he said, after a long pause. 
 
 " You bid too low, Crehan, my boy," Dunphy whispered, 
 with a chuckle. 
 
 " Whist, can't you ? He might give a hint as to how the 
 land lies," Crehan murmured excitedly. 
 
 " It's not in your direction, anyhow," Dunphy said con- 
 solingly. "You headed yourself off it, sonny. And he 
 didn't even say ' thank you,' for the ha'porth of tar." 
 
 " It's time Father Carberry was back," the bishop said, 
 looking at his watch. " I must take advantage of the 
 unexpected respite to clear off some work before dinner. 
 And no doubt," jocosely, " some of you rich farmers will 
 like to have a look at the market. I seem to be the only poor 
 man among you." 
 
CONQUEST 19 
 
 He smiled broadly, and added, widi a nice mixture of 
 fun and seriousness. " If you are maJcing such large 
 revenues I think your contribution to me should be 
 increased." 
 
 There was some hollowness in the laughter that greeted 
 the episcopal sally. Legs and arms wriggled uneasily. 
 
 " Sure all rivers flow into the sea in the end, my lord," 
 Father Lynch said, with enthusiasm. " No doubt Father 
 Pat has remembered you handsomely. It's a temptation 
 we'd all have in making our wills. No doubt he's left us all 
 a little solatium to say masses for the good of his soul, but 
 the bulk of it is sure to go to your lordship." 
 
 " He was a good priest," the bishop said blandly. 
 
 " He might have thought of his family," Father Grif&n 
 said lugubriously. 
 
 " His family !" Father Lynch said hotly. " He never gave 
 'em a stiver and he alive, and it's thinking of his soul he'd 
 be and he dead. No fear. Did he do a hand's turn for his 
 brother, young Pierce, and he up to his neck in Scarty with 
 Pierce the Rake's debts ? And Theobald that he doted on — 
 he wouldn't give him a flve-pound note to save him from hell 
 — saving your pardon, my lord. No, take my word for it, 
 it'll all go to God — to his lordship here and to the building 
 fund and to the Seminary, ajid a little lock to us for the 
 masses that'll keep his soul easy." 
 
 The door opened and all eyes turned eagerly, but it 
 was only Father Lysaght. 
 
 " Well ?" the bishop asked 
 
 Father Lysaght took his seat. "Apoplexy and a weak 
 heart," he said quietly. " The doctor thinks an inquest 
 unnecessary. I've seen the police inspector and he 
 agrees." 
 
 " Of course," the bishop nodded approval. " That was 
 to be expected — fitting deference to the Church. The 
 authorities are always to be relied on." 
 
20 CONQUEST 
 
 " ril consult the family before making arraingements for 
 the funeral and " 
 
 Father Lysaght began, but the bishop interrupted 
 caustically : 
 
 " The family are of no importance. I have made the 
 arrangements. Father Carberry will give you the details. 
 He should be here now with the will." 
 
 " Surely the family " Father Lysaght said, with a 
 
 frown. 
 
 The bishop interrupted him sharply : 
 
 " I don't need to remind you that I am the bishop — but 
 here is Father Carberry." 
 
 Father Lysaght shrugged his shoulders and gazed grimly 
 at the polished table. 
 
 The bishop tore open the envelope, and unfolded the 
 smgle sheet of foolscap. Gradually a heavy frown gathered 
 on his brow. His purple face paled, then went a deeper 
 purple. The paper shook a little in his hands. He con- 
 tinued to gaze at it in horror long after he had finished 
 reading it. He rose abruptly from his seat, crumpling the 
 will between nervous fingers. Seizing his biretta, he threw 
 the will on the table, said roughly : " Read it to them you. 
 Father Carberry," and stalked, as majestically as his 
 angry bulk allowed, out of the room, slamming the door 
 behind him. 
 
 " What the hell's wrong with the old man ?" lisped Father 
 Carberry, a fair, slim young maji, in a very high clerical 
 collar and very long white cuffs. 
 
 " Read it, man — read it, read it," Father Lynch said, 
 rising in his seat. 
 
 "The will — the will!" was shouted from all round the 
 table. 
 
 Father Carberry took up the will gingerly, pushed up his 
 cuffs, smiled tolerantly at a " Damn the ass, why doesn't he 
 read it ?" and ran his eyes quickly over the paper. 
 
CONQUEST 21 
 
 " Why don't you read it aloud, man ?" Father Lynch said 
 vehemently, stretching out his hand as if to grab. 
 
 " No, you don't," Carberry said quietly, stepping back a 
 pace. " There's nothing to fuss about really," with a sur- 
 prised look at the eager face. " It's all quite simple. 
 Everything goes to the boy, Jim Daly. His mother and 
 Lysaght there are executors." 
 
 The flies, buzzing about the room, could have freely 
 entered a score of priestly mouths. 
 
 " Nothing to the bishop or the Cathedral or the 
 Seminary ?" Father Lynch said, in a series of gasps. 
 
 " Not a rap. He mentions the Cathedral rather funnily. 
 Says it's an eyesore and unnecessary and a reflection on the 
 Dalys who built the old one, and recommends Jim to sub- 
 scribe towards pulling it down if he ever gets the chance." 
 
 " There's some sense in that anyway," Father Griffin said 
 with a dreary chuckle. 
 
 " No trifle even for masses ?" Father Lynch said in an 
 exhausted tone. 
 
 " He says he's sure you'll all say them for him of your 
 charity," Carberry said with a grin. 
 
 " The bloody miser," Father Lynch managed to say, with 
 a last effort. 
 
 " Dinner at three, gentlemen," Father Lysaght said coldly. 
 
 The Owneybeg river, emerging from the hills through 
 Rath valley Glen, descended by gently sloping uplands to 
 the rich plain that stretched south to Lisgeela. At the 
 juncture of plain and upland, on the right bank of the river, 
 the Daly house demesne ran upwards, the house standing 
 about a mile and a half from the Lisgeela gate. Across the 
 river on the left bank, marching with the river and alto- 
 
22 CONQUEST 
 
 gether in the plain, was Scarty farm. The main road from 
 Tubber to Lisgeela had Dalyhouse on its left, crossed the 
 river and had Scarty on its right. A good thrower could 
 cast a stone from the white wooden gate of Scarty cottage 
 to the limestone wolf-hounds that surmounted the pillars of 
 the wrought-iron gates of the Lisgeela avenue of Dalyhouse. 
 
 Most people who passed by Scarty called it a charming 
 cottage. It stood back about sixty yards from the gate, was 
 thatched and had mansard windows in the roof. In June 
 the front of the house was a mass of roses. Thirty yards 
 from the entrance the short drive forked off on the right to 
 the farm yard which was hidden by a thick hedge of juniper. 
 Since Theobald Daly's death the drive to( the yard was prac- 
 tically unused and grass-grown ; the farm, except the lawn 
 and garden, having been let at three pounds ten an acre to a 
 Lisgeela butcher for grass fattening. The cottage was four- 
 square with a diminutive open court in the centre. On three 
 sides the house gave on the lawn, which ran to the river 
 on the side opposite the main entrance — a ridiculous little 
 Gothic porch trellised in roses. 
 
 Two old cedar trees, with wide-spreading branches, stood 
 between the house and the river, and under the shade of one 
 of them, in an old wicker chair. Pierce Daly sat, reading the 
 Freeman* s Journal. In a similar chair, only more decrepit, a 
 few feet distant from him, sat Arabella, his daughter-in-law, 
 busily tacking a boy's navy blue pants which she had 
 apparently just cut out on the small deal table in front 
 of her. 
 
 " I seem to make them and make them," she said, with a 
 smile, half cynical but wholly tender, on her curved lips. 
 
 " You do then," he said gently, laying the paper on his 
 knees and looking at the river. " Sure they run through a 
 power of *em at his age. Stick to the corduroy, Arabella. 
 It lasts." 
 
 He glanced approvingly at his own corduroy knee 
 
CONQUEST 23 
 
 breeches, grey woollen stockings and black brogues, soiled 
 with garden clay. 
 
 She bit off an end of tacking thread, held up the garment, 
 and screwed her sad but smiling face to take in the pro- 
 portions. 
 
 " I always get it wrong — the right leg is longer than the 
 left. Why, you bought the stuff yourself, father." 
 
 "Did I then? Well, well. He's a fair caution, that 
 gossoon. A good licking with an ash plant he wants. What 
 did he do yesterday morning before you were up but climb 
 the big elm beyond to the nest on the top." 
 
 " Oh," she said, with a little shiver. " I hope you spanked 
 him well." 
 
 " He was that disappointed that the young ones had gone 
 away that I hadn't the heart to do it," he said shamefacedly. 
 " And, would you believe it, Arabella ?" pleasure and pride 
 creeping into his voice, " I used to try for the nest on the 
 top of that very tree when I was his age and sorra one of me 
 could do it — not till I was near twelve. And I was no bad 
 hand at them kind of tricks. And it's not any the easier 
 with the growth there's on it since." 
 
 " He's a handful," she said, in a resigned tone. 
 
 " You're too soft with him, Arabella, too soft. We must 
 be severe. It's the only way in the long run. What's 
 keeping the boy at all ? He ought to be home long ago. 
 I must go and trim up that row o' peas." 
 
 She sewed steadily. He took up the paper again, read a 
 few lines, put it down, and got up restlessly. 
 
 " I think I'll have a look down the road to see if he's 
 coming," he said apologetically. 
 
 " Do. But he's all right. And we'd hear the pony, 
 anyhow." 
 
 She put her sewing on her lap and watched him walk 
 across the green turf to the copper beech from which there 
 was a view of the Lisgeela Road. He was the best looking 
 
24 CONQUEST 
 
 of the handsome Dalys. An icy hand seemed to touch her. 
 She shivered and crouched a Httle in her seat. She clenched 
 her hand resolutely. She must train herself to think of 
 Theobald without this — and after four years too. Yes, 
 Theobald would have been like his father. Father Pat was 
 a handsome man but they were slimmer and harder. What 
 would Jim 
 
 She heard a faint sound of galloping hoofs and smiled. 
 The old man hurried back, the ends of his white flannel 
 bawneen loose and flapping. His blue eyes gleamed above 
 a complexion fresh as a boy's, shaded to the tip of his fine 
 nose by an old rush hat. 
 
 " He's coming," he said carelessly, sitting again, and 
 taking up the paper. 
 
 " He was told not to gallop on the road," she said severely. 
 
 " If s a way childre have of forgetting things," he said, 
 wriggling uneasily. 
 
 And he was a stern old man, too, not really old, of course, 
 she thought, placidly sewing her thoughts into the stuff. 
 He was still lithe and active. He had been strict and stern 
 with Theobald to the end. But never with her. And with 
 Jim ? That was a great joke. Were all strict fathers weak 
 with their grandchildren ? 
 
 " What ! " she said aloud, in amazement. 
 
 A pony came round the corner of the house at full gallop, 
 took the path leading to the vegetable garden and the 
 herbaceous border in a flying leap, shedding a boy's cap 
 on the top of a brilliant anchusa. The fore feet stopped dead 
 within a foot of the table. 
 
 " Really, Jim, this is going beyond the beyonds," his 
 mother said angrily. 
 
 " It's — it's a bit uncalled for," his grandfather muttered, 
 with an admiring look at the flushed boy. 
 
 " What is, mother ?" the boy asked, his blue eyes opening 
 in wide innocence. 
 
CONQUEST 25 
 
 The blend of surprise, mild worry, and entire unconscious- 
 ness of any offence made it a struggle to maintain her 
 sternness. 
 
 " You know it's not allowed — and all your grandfather's 
 trouble with the flower beds." 
 
 " Oh— I forgot." 
 
 There was sorrow in his voice and look. Then, to his 
 grandfather, in protest : 
 
 " As if Crabbit could make a mistake !" 
 
 " He cleared it by at least two feet," his grandfather said 
 proudly. 
 
 " There, mother," Jim said, without too much triumph. 
 
 She held him by love. When she gave reasons she failed, 
 she meditated, her eyes drinking in the colour at the nape 
 of his neck, where the light gold of the short silky hair 
 shone on the brown-gold of the tan. She passed her fingers 
 through the thick tousled hair falling anyhow over his 
 forehead. 
 
 " There, now. I forgot with all the fuss," he said abruptly, 
 excitement in his eyes. " I wouldn't have galloped on the 
 grass, of course, only for that. Uncle Pat is dead. The 
 whole town is full of it. Died sitting in his trap in front of 
 Father Lysaght's door. They had it in the college before 
 play-time. Tom Dillon whispered it to me at French lesson. 
 And at play-time a lot of the boys ran down the town to 
 catch a sight of him, but they had him gone. The funeral's 
 on Saturday. I didn't go down to see 'cause you told me 
 not to be gallivanting round, grandfather. Father Mac- 
 donald came in for a Latin lesson after play-time and he 
 called me up and told me. * You, young shaver,' he said, 
 * you're left a pot of money.* " 
 
 " Poor Father Pat. So sudden, too," his mother said. 
 
 His grandfather stared at the river with a set face, and 
 said nothing. 
 
 " It was sudden. Father Macdonald said, but, of course. 
 
26 CONQUEST 
 
 being a priest, not unprovided," Jim continued eagerly, 
 treating the " unprovided " with care and watching his 
 mother to see how she took it. As it seemed all right, he 
 went on breathlessly : " And Mr. Mallon, the grocer, ran 
 out and caught Crabbit by the reins and I passing home, 
 and said, as sure as death, he was the only one that saw it 
 happen through the corner of his eye through the shop 
 window, only it didn't strike him at the time. He saw 
 Father Pat fall back a little over the back rest of the trap, 
 and Whitey make as if to stop. And he said to himself if s 
 a queer thing to stop and he only coming into town. And 
 then he bethought him that it was only last week he had the 
 half pound of tea and the two pounds of sugar, and that he 
 wasn't due for a month again — the custom being hardly 
 worth handling only for the honour of serving a Daly and he 
 a priest too. And just at that very minute he got a big 
 order for bacon and took his eyes off the street, and when he 
 looked again Whitey was gone, and, in the hurry of the 
 market, the )vhole thing passed from his mind. And he'll 
 regret to his dying day, he said, the chance that Providence 
 proffered him of being the first to discover him lying there 
 dead in the car. And he said, too, that I was left heaps of 
 money and the whole town was glad of it, though the bishop 
 took it badly. But what could you expect of a man, though 
 he was a bishop itself, that dealt for the bulk of his things at 
 MacGinty's — and the less said about MacGinty's groceries 
 the better." 
 
 He paused, conscious of inattention. He looked, a little 
 resentfully, first at his mother, then at his grandfather; but 
 his mother's sad eyes were fixed on his grandfather, and his 
 grandfather was staring at the river, neither, seemingly, 
 listening to a word he said. 
 
 He pitched his voice higher: "And I passed Father 
 Lysaght on the road, driving out here on Fagan's side-car." 
 
 " Did he give you any particulars ?" his mother asked. 
 
CONQUEST 27 
 
 " I asked him if he was bringing me out the pot of money, 
 but he only said : * Trot on home, you young gadfly,' and of 
 course I galloped, and that's why I tore across the lawn and 
 jumped the beds." 
 
 His mother kissed his firm cheek at the ear, brushing the 
 soft down lightly with her lips. She drew him to her and 
 buried her face for a moment in his hair sticky with sweat. 
 
 " Run away now," she said, with a sudden push, as if she 
 had to wrench herself from him. " Put up Crabbit, and have 
 your meal. *You may have a cup of tea with us here after- 
 wards, and tell Susan to bring a cup for Father Lysaght." 
 
 " Do you think, mother, that he has the pot of money in 
 the car ?" 
 
 " Run away, now, child," she said firmly. 
 
 He looked expectantly at his grandfather, but seeing no 
 encouragement there, sighed deeply, gathered up the reins 
 and led Crabbit across the grass. 
 
 She looked again at her father-in-law but he had not 
 moved. She took up her sewing and stitched rapidly. 
 Theobald was like that — ^he thought a thing out and then 
 he might speak or he mightn't. The Levins talked first and 
 thought, if they thought at all, afterwards. She was happy 
 — as happy as she could ever be without Theobald. But if 
 there was that money ? She wished Father Lysaght would 
 come. Would it be enough to send Jim to a good school ? 
 He was wasting his time at that ridiculous college at 
 Lisgeela where Father Macdonald, who couldn't pronounce 
 a word of it properly, taught French — and Latin, and other 
 things. She supposed he knew Latin — there was such a 
 lot of it in the mass. But to call it a college — it was more 
 like a hedge school. 
 
 " I think I'll go now and do them peas," Pierce Daly said, 
 without moving. 
 
 "Do. Unless you wait and have tea first. Father 
 Lysaght is coming," she said gently. 
 
28 CONQUEST 
 
 " Poor Pat, 'tis he was always the queer fellow. He was 
 a good man enough but he had no proper pride in him," he 
 said meditatively. 
 
 She laughed : " He was the proudest man I ever knew. 
 With him a Daly ranked above the Cherubim — if not 
 higher," she said slyly. 
 
 " Pooh,'* he said, half tolerantly, half contemptuously. 
 " Scraping and gathering he didn't well know for what, till 
 in the end he was fonder of a sovereign than he was of the 
 name and blood he was toiling and moiling for. What did 
 he ever do for it except to get the name of a miser ? God 
 knows I had more respect for my father that often wasted 
 near as much in a year as Pat gathered in a life-time. He 
 had the open hand of the Dalys. What matter if he drank 
 himself to death ? He used to sit there despising me for the 
 way I worked early and late to keep a roof over his head, 
 and not caring a thraneen for all he had lost. And old 
 Bertram Scovell was afeared of him, and gave him the road 
 till the day of his death. Poor Pat's pride ! It never led to 
 anything but to make a scarecrow of himself to frighten the 
 birds with between Drisheen and Lisgeela, with his old hat 
 and his old pony, and he afraid to look at a beefsteak for 
 fear he'd be tempted to buy it. May God forgive me for 
 speaking light of the dead — the Lord have mercy on him. 
 And, sure, if he hadn't any real pride in him, he'll have the 
 less to answer for before the Throne of God. You wouldn't 
 think I had any pride in me, Arabella?" he added, after 
 a pause. 
 
 " I'm not so sure," she said gently, with an afiFectionate 
 smile, letting her eyes wander over the unbent figure, the 
 long, straight nose with slightly curved nostrils, the taut 
 muscles of the bronzed throat, unrestrained by a collar. 
 
 " Being full of proper pride yourself, of course you'd 
 understand," he said admiringly. "Well, I have — I'm as 
 chock full of it as an egg is full of meat. Poor Pat'd have 
 
CONQUEST 29 
 
 been Daly of Dalyhouse and he did nothing all his life but 
 whistle down the wind after it. But I had the solid earth of 
 Scarty under my feet and I tried to make the most of it I 
 had my own freehold, but I made up my mind to be a peasant 
 and cock of my own dunghill, and not be hanging on the 
 skirts of the gentry. I was one of 'em, you see, so it didn't 
 hurt me to despise *em. My mother, God rest her, used to 
 have fits over my way of talking that I picked up from a 
 servant man we had by the name of Paudheen Mick — 
 Herlihy I believe his real name was — and it soon became 
 second nature to me. I wore a flannel bawneen instead of a 
 coat, except on Sundays or maybe at a Fair, and the same 
 with a collar. I married Ann Driscoll, the rose of Dunkerrin 
 they called her, and a good wife she made for me. It was in 
 her blood to hate the landlords and the English — they were 
 all one to her. With myself I never rightly knew whether it 
 was love of Ireland or hatred of the Scovells that moved me 
 most, for I never forgot the dirty trick Bertram Scovell 
 played on my father over the mortgage, and they bosom 
 friends as it were. Within in the parlour you see hanging up 
 the Act of Parliament of Queen Anne's time indemnifying 
 the Dalys agin the penal laws because of their kindness 
 to poor Protestants in the Jacobite wars before Dutch 
 William could come to their aid. It was how the Daly of 
 that time took over Tullyfin, the property that Cromwell had 
 made a grant of to the Scovells, and handed it back to 'em 
 without a penny missing when the troubled times were over 
 — all through friendship. Thick as thieves they were, and 
 sure, it's little better than thieves either the Dalys or Scovells 
 were in them days, but fast friends for all that. If the Dalys 
 lent a hand to the Scovells in the reign of James, the Scovells 
 did the same by the Dalys in the reign of Anne. And so on 
 down to '35, when a bad strain showed in Bertram Scovell. 
 It wasn't the loss of Dalyhouse for a song my father minded, 
 for sure he had his day, but the heart-scald of a friend going 
 
30 CONQUEST 
 
 back on him. There was a trifle, I believe, of my father 
 beating out Bertram Scovell over my mother in the way of 
 marriage. My father made light of it and was as friendly as 
 ever, but Bertram nursed his grievance in his black heart 
 and struck when he got the chance. And my father never 
 made any effort to gather the money to meet the blow of the 
 foreclosure, not believing it could happen till it was all over. 
 My father soon forgot it all in the fumes of poteen, and my 
 mother and Pat talked and talked but broke no bones. But 
 from the day that I was able to think for myself — and I 
 began it early — IVe been paying back the Scovell score. 
 Never in the way of meanness or trickery, for I'd scorn the 
 like, but always in open fight. Three generations of 'em 
 Fve been up against and now the fourth is growing around 
 Derek Scovell's knees. I've hurt *em in their pride and in 
 their pocket, in their politics and their religion — wherever I 
 thought one of 'em'd feel the blow most. I used to go to 
 Repeal Meetings and I hardly able to walk the ten miles to 
 Tubber and back because Scovell tried to keep the people 
 from going. I was a Young Irelander in '48, and a Fenian 
 in '65. Well I remember how young Bertram, who ruled 
 there then, had Daly house barricaded with iron shutters. 
 He was near out of his mind with terror, and the people 
 laughing at him, knowing well that no matter what 
 happened I wouldn't let a stone of Dalyhouse be touched. 
 I tell you we put the fear of God into the English, but it 
 was their garrison here, the Scovells and the Levins and the 
 like, that had to bear the brunt of it — no doubt you heard 
 tell of it in your father's house — and wherever there was 
 trouble for the English or a landlord I was at the head and 
 front of it, and glad the people were to have a Daly for a 
 leader. Poor Pat'd never have got the pleasure out of 
 Dalyhouse that I got out of Scarty. The Scovells hated us 
 to be in it from the very first. There we were sitting at their 
 gate, as it were, and holding our heads higher than ever they 
 
CONQUEST 31 
 
 could lift theirs as far as the people were concerned. I made 
 the house and place an eyesore to them. I learnt thatching 
 and a power about flowers and I grew the things they 
 couldn't grow just to spite 'em. If scowls could wither the 
 place it'd be blasted long ago, and their eyes never off it and 
 they in and out to Lisgeela. And when young Bertram — 
 you remember the crooked nose he had to the day of his 
 death ? I gave him that in fair fight and I about Jim's age. 
 Well, when he married Lady Alice Travers that was great 
 at the proselytizing, I put up that statue of the Blessed 
 Virgin in the niche in our wall near the bridge, and Ann 
 Driscoll, God be good to her, used to put fresh flowers in 
 front of it every day. For many a year Lady Alice couldn't 
 bear the look of it and used to drive into Lisgeela by the 
 Tubber Gate and go by Lisheen, a round of six miles and a 
 bad road. 
 
 " But these were small things. It was over the land that 
 I got back on them most. Davitt or Parnell or Dillon or 
 O'Brien, whichever of 'em struck the hardest blow I 
 favoured, and I carried the people with me. The Daly- 
 house tenants always abided by my word and the Scovells' 
 own old tenants at Tullyfin weren't backward. I couldn't 
 tell you how many years' rent the Scovells lost through the 
 Plan of Campaign and the like. It wasn't the money they 
 felt so much, for they had plenty of it, but the blow to their 
 pride and the breaking of their power, and the knowledge 
 they had that I was in it all. That's no bad record, Arabella, 
 but the hardest blow ever struck by a Daly on a Scovell was 
 when Theobald brought you in here on the floor to me. I 
 felt, with the heart-break it was to Derek Scovell, that God 
 in His goodness could hardly^ do any more for me." 
 
 His blazing eyes softened as they rested upon her. 
 
 " So I was just a red rag to the Scovells," she said, with a 
 slight shudder. 
 
 " You were all that," he said grimly. " But sorra much 
 
32 CONQUEST 
 
 Theobald thought about it and he head over ears in love 
 with you. And, God forgive me, it's little enough I thought 
 about it after the first month or two and you the best 
 daughter ever a man had. But that must be Father Lysaght 
 coming — Vd know the Saturday canter of Pagan's old mare 
 anywhere. Poor Pat — poor Pat ! I mind once when he gave 
 me his old pen-knife with the broken blade that I had for 
 twenty year, and he not having another. 'Tis he was the 
 generous lad." 
 
 Arabella folded up her sewing, her eyes on a turbulent 
 little stream that merged quietly near the bridge into the 
 broad, smooth-flowing Owneybeg. It was so that hatred 
 sometimes lost itself in love, gently, almost without effort. 
 How she had ignored Theobald, despised him, hated him — 
 and then ? There was her father-in-law with his little bundle 
 of hates ; and her own father at Lissyfad with his : mere 
 bundles of Green and Orange misunderstandings and pitiful 
 spites. They were blind and couldn't see. How alike they 
 were, too, in all essentials, generous, lovable, different though 
 they thought themselves. Would love, the solvent, ever do 
 for tliem what it had done for her ? 
 
 " I must go and find out what's keeping Susan with the 
 tea," she said, with a mothering smile at the old man. 
 
 4. 
 
 Jim Daly stormed into the kitchen where Susan Roche, 
 her overflowing body mainly kept together by her tight 
 apron-strings, was " lifting " a crisp cake from a bastable 
 on the open hearth. 
 
 " You near made it drop from my hands, you young 
 ruflian, you," she said amiably. 
 
 " My ! What a scrump, Susan, and raisins in it," he 
 said breathlessly, wriggling on one foot, and sniffing 
 
CONQUEST 33 
 
 appreciatively. " I can have a piece with my dinner, can't 
 I, Susan?" 
 
 " Is it me to broach it, and under the eyes of the Missis 
 too," she said severely. 
 
 " Oh," he said dejectedly, making a quick change to the 
 other foot. 
 
 " But maybe," she said with a relenting smile, " if you'd 
 ate your dinner hearty, it's a young puppy of a cake that I 
 baked all for yourself on top of the cover, that you'd be 
 finding on the comer of the dresser beyond." 
 
 He made a jump for the dresser, gave a lon^-drawn " Oh, 
 Susan — thanks, thanks," seized the cake, and, admiringly, 
 held it up level with his eyes. " Now that I've a pot of 
 money, we'll have plum cake every day," he said, nibbling 
 a raisin. 
 
 "Whatever is the boy romancing about?" Susan said, 
 busying herself with a covered dish beside the fire. " Run 
 away into the room, now, and don't be keeping the fine 
 dinner cold that I'm bringing into you this blessed minute." 
 
 " * Bold Robert Emmett, the hero of Ireland,' " he sang 
 with thoughtful slowness. " And I tell you what, Susan," he 
 broke into prose, " I'll buy the black and white rabbits Dick 
 Kavanagh reared, even if he charges sixpence apiece for 
 'em, and a hat for my mother, and maybe a shawl for you, 
 and some books about the traitor English for my grand- 
 father. There's sure to be enough money for all that," he 
 added doubtfully. 
 
 " More power to my young Fenian," Susan said 
 delightedly, her red face glowing over the dish which she 
 held in her hands. " Sure 'tis you'll give the dirty English 
 a dig in the ribs one day — and it's richly they'll be deserving 
 of it. And isn't it kind grandfather for you to be down on 
 'em^the cowardly priest hunters. But come along now, 
 agra, and be eating your dinner. You, with your talk of 
 spending all that money, and there's neither sight nor 
 
34 CONQUEST 
 
 leavings of your tuppence a week the evening of the day 
 you get it. A shawl for me indeed ! But sure it was the 
 good heart in you that thought of me though you hadn't 
 the money itself. And I didn't stick another lock of raisins 
 in your cakeen beyond what I mixed in the dough." 
 
 " My Uncle Pat is dead," he said absently, examining 
 the cake. 
 
 She opened wide her mouth and eyes and gave a deep 
 sigh. " The best of news is bad for a weak heart," she said, 
 releasing one hand from the dish and supporting her heaving 
 bosom. " You ought to have told me at the first go off, and 
 not break it to me all of a sudden. The poor man ! May 
 heaven be his bed this night. To think of him doing any- 
 thing half so decent as to die in the end. And to leave his 
 money to his own kin too, and not for baptizing naygurs in 
 foreign parts. I don't grudge him the shilling he never left 
 in my palm, and he going in and out of this house as long 
 as I can remember. Sure it's the grand funeral he'll have, 
 and all the Scovell tenants marching behind him, just as if 
 they was his own, as heaven knows they ought to be if he 
 only had his rights, with the makings of a linen shirt on 
 their shoulders, and a yard of handkerchief round their hats 
 in respect for the dead. It'll be a great sight, glory be to 
 God. But come on, agra — a dinner, and it off the fire, 
 won't keep hot for the living or the dead." 
 
 Jim raced through his meal with intense excitement. He 
 ate plum cake with meat with evident enjoyment. He 
 decided, if the pot of money hadn't come by them, to 
 deposit his pen-knife with Dick Kavanagh early on the 
 morrow as a lien on^the rabbits. He rushed out into the 
 kitchen to warn Susan that Father Lysaght was coming for 
 tea, and wondered, as he said a hurried " Thank God for a 
 good dinner," why people wore the makings of shirts on 
 their shoulders, in respect for the dead. 
 
 Munching the remains of his cake, he ran to the front gate 
 
CONQUEST 35 
 
 to await Father Lysaght. He swung the gate in and out to 
 test its swing. He then swung himself nimbly over the top 
 bar, held on to it by his toes, his head close to the ground, 
 and swung briskly to and fro. The game was to jerk the 
 gate open again between the warning click of the fastening 
 and the actual catch. He had scored eleven when with an 
 " Off that, you young imp," Father Lysaght lifted him by 
 the neck and dropped him on to his feet. 
 
 " Have you the pot ?" Jim asked eagerly, shoving back 
 his hair from a highly congested forehead. 
 
 " You callous young brute," Father Lysaght said with a 
 smile, patting the tousled hair, " and your uncle lying dead." 
 
 " Oh, but Father James, do tell me. Really and truly 
 have you ?" Jim wheedled excitedly. " Fm very sorry and 
 all that of course." 
 
 " Cut away now," the priest said with a laugh. " You 
 needn't put up the horse, Dempsey, Fm driving to Drisheen 
 in a few minutes." 
 
 " For the pot ? Can I go with you. Father James ?" Jim 
 said in an awed tone. 
 
 " The boy is a young savage," the priest said with a half 
 admiring shrug. "Where are your mother and grand- 
 father?" 
 
 " Under the big cedar. It*s that the rabbits may be gone ; 
 or he mayn't hold 'em for the penknife," Jim said thought- 
 fully. 
 
 The priest considered this and said gravely, " Of course 
 that is a reason. Perhaps you may be let come. We'll see." 
 
 "Oh, you'll manage it. Father James," Jim said con- 
 fidently, hanging on to the priest's arm as they turned the 
 corner of the house on to the river front. " They know all 
 about it, Fve told 'em of course," he added with a nod 
 towards the cedars. 
 
 " That's good," Father Lysaght said in a relieved tone. 
 
 His mind set at ease by this mark of approval, in an 
 
36 CONQUEST 
 
 outburst of gratitude Jim whispered, " 111 show you two 
 late nests before we go — if we have the time — it's a little 
 way off," he added doubtfully, a fear of missing the drive to 
 Drisheen oppressing him. 
 
 " Well have more time another day," the priest said with 
 an understanding smile. "No, don't get up, Mr. Daly. 
 This was all very sudden. Jim says he told you," he added, 
 shaking hands with Pierce and Arabella. He sat on the 
 wooden seat, close to the tree trunk, took a cup of tea from 
 Arabella, with a nod of thanks, and said : 
 
 " We haven't troubled you about the funeral arrangements 
 — it was the least we could do for one of our own cloth. The 
 bishop thought first of mass in the Cathedral, but later he 
 changed his mind. Drisheen, Father Pat's own church, is 
 certainly more suitable. The Drisheen people will expect it. 
 With all his " he hesitated a moment to find a word. 
 
 " With all his reserve," he said tentatively. 
 
 " Humph," Pierce said grimly. 
 
 " The people loved him," the priest said firmly. 
 
 " Pat had his good points," Pierce conceded. " He was a 
 good farmer for one thing — better than me and that's saying 
 a good deal. And he wasn't saving in advice anyway, and 
 the people profited by it." 
 
 " He took what they gave perhaps," Father Lysaght said 
 defensively. " But he never pressed them. The dues were 
 low — he never raised them the whole time he was there. He 
 might have been hard on himself, but he was never hard on 
 the people, and he was at their service night and day. No 
 priest in the diocese did his duty as well as he did his," 
 
 " He did all that," Pierce said grudgingly. " But it was 
 the least that was to be expected of a Daly." 
 
 " And having taken the body to Drisheen, and the mass 
 being there, the bishop thinks it will be more suitable to 
 have him buried there — among his own people. It would 
 certainly be more convenient than to bring him back again 
 
CONQUEST 37 
 
 all the way to Lisgeela," Father Lysaght said with the air 
 of making a case and being doubtful of the result. 
 
 " He will not be buried there," Pierce said decisively. 
 
 " But the bishop ?" 
 
 " Bishop or no bishop, he will not, I say. Take his body 
 to Drisheen if ye like and wake it there. He'll feel more at 
 home being waked in his own little chapel than in that big 
 raw barn of a new Cathedral. And have the mass at 
 Drisheen — all that is fitting. But buried he'll be in the 
 Daly tomb in the old Cathedral at Lisgeela if he had to be 
 brought by road a hundred miles to it. And carried too on 
 willing shoulders, you'll find he'll be, every step of the way. 
 He was head of the Dalys and it's his due — it's to turn in 
 his grave he would if he was laid anywhere else. And I'm 
 head of the house now, as Jim here'll be after me, and I'll 
 see that it's done." 
 
 " The bishop," Father Lysaght insisted doubtfully. 
 
 " The bishop ! Who's the bishop ?" Pierce said con- 
 temptuously. 
 
 Father Lysaght looked meditatively at the handsome, 
 fiery old man, at the old rush hat, the flannel bawneen, the 
 collarless flannel shirt, open and thrown back at the neck, 
 at the horny, toil-stained hands, at the stern face. 
 
 "Well, that's rather a feudal idea, Mr. Daly, isn't it? 
 And you're a great democrat," he said with a suspicion of 
 a smile at the corners of his lips. 
 
 " Democracy's all right in its own place, and I'm all for 
 it, but in Lisgeela "he'll be buried," Pierce said calmly. 
 "And talking of feudalism," he went on argumentatively, 
 " why it's the church " 
 
 " Oh, I'm sure the bishop will give way at once, when he 
 knows your feelings in the matter," Father Lysaght inter- 
 rupted hurriedly. 
 
 " Give way or no, it's settled here and now," the old man 
 said autocratically. 
 
38 CONQUEST 
 
 Father Lysaght bowed and held out his cup for more 
 tea. 
 
 " Can I do anything ?" Arabella asked. 
 
 " I think not," Father Lysaght said gently. " You and I 
 are the executors, but there's no reason why you should be 
 troubled now. Everything's left to Jim." 
 
 Jim, who had been steadily munching cake, pricked 
 his ears attentively. 
 
 " How much is there ?" Arabella asked carelessly, her 
 heart beating fast. " Enough to send him to a good 
 school ?" 
 
 " Enough and more, I should say." 
 
 " And to the University ?" 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 Her sad eyes glowed and a faint pink tinged her pale and 
 somewhat worn cheeks. 
 
 " There's no use in hoping that there would be enough to 
 put him in the Diplomatic Service ? A Levin was always in 
 it. Uncle Silas is. And he's my only relative who hasn't 
 thrown me over. He lives out of Ireland you see. He could 
 get him a nomination. I used to dream of this," she trailed 
 off, the sad look again in her brown eyes. 
 
 " I've no doubt it could be done, if you think it best for 
 him," the priest said with a quick look at the old man who 
 was gazing sternly at the river. 
 
 " But it takes four hundred a year ?" 
 
 " Even so." 
 
 She sighed contentedly. Pierce grunted half angrily. 
 Jim thought it all very disappointing. It didn't seem to 
 bring him any nearer to the rabbits. And wasn't he already 
 at the best school in Ireland ? The college at Lisgeela was 
 that. Father Macdonald said so. There was nothing 
 higher except Maynooth, but that was for priests, and he 
 wasn't going to be one, his mother had said. He wasn't 
 quite sure yet what he'd be. The engine driver of a train 
 
CONQUEST 39 
 
 had a fine life with no one to say a cross word to him, no 
 matter how black his face was. And the Sub-Inspector of 
 Police at Lisgeela, when he rode with sword and helmet and 
 blew his silver whistle — but his grandfather had put an end 
 to that dream. The police were in English pay, and of 
 course no one could take blood money. Then there was the 
 drum-major of the Lisgeela brass band. 
 
 " I'm driving on to Drisheen now," Father Lysaght said 
 after a pause. " There's no one in the house but his old 
 servant. I have his keys. He may have left some instruc- 
 tions besides the will. Td like one of the family to be 
 present — I hope you'll be able to come, Mr. Daly." 
 
 " Sorra foot'U I go," the old man said vehemently. " I'll 
 go to the mass and I'll go to the funeral, and drive first 
 behind the corpse, with Arabella and the boy in Pagan's 
 old mourning coach. And we'll have the pair of horses, 
 though that spavined hack you drove out on is a holy sight 
 and not fit to be seen in a Christian funeral. But next or 
 nigh his house I won't go. Though he came in and out here 
 at his will, and was always welcome to a bed and whatever 
 was going, he never asked me to a bite or sup at Drisheen ; 
 and once when I called after a League meeting he never 
 asked me had I a mouth on me. Where I wasn't welcome 
 and he alive, I won't be found scavenging round and he 
 dead. And if you take my advice, Father Lysaght, you'll 
 put whatever money you find in Pat's house in a sack, and 
 tie a rock round it, and sink it in the bottomless pool of the 
 Owneybeg below the Lisgeela waterfall. No luck'll come of 
 it to this house, or to anyone in it. For myself, I'd rather 
 be dead than touch it with a hay rake. Aren't you happy 
 without it, Arabella ? and what good'll it do for Jim ? 
 What's the difference between a good school and a bad 
 school, and no school at all, except to make a man have a 
 bigger conceit of himself ? And to think of putting the boy 
 into the service of England to learn tricks and deceit. I never 
 
40 CONQUEST 
 
 heard the like. Would you let *em turn you into an English- 
 man, boy ?" he added fiercely, turning to Jim. 
 
 " Never," Jim said sturdily. " And say, grandfather, it's 
 a great idea to put the money in a sack — it's nearly as good 
 as a pot. But there's no sense in throwing it into the river ; 
 and I want to buy some rabbits with it to-morrow from Dick 
 Kavanagh. I'm sure he wouldn't have the face to stick out 
 for more than two shillings," he added pleadingly. 
 
 " After all, the money is Jim's," Father Lysaght said drily. 
 " And boys are sometimes wiser than their grandfathers." 
 
 The old man's lips twitched and his eyes twinkled as he 
 tried to frown. 
 
 " I'd better take Jim with me to Drisheen," Father 
 Lysaght added. 
 
 "Say yes, mother; say yes, grandfather," Jim said 
 excitedly, hopping now on one foot, now on the other. 
 
 " Must he go ?" Arabella asked doubtfully. 
 
 " It'll do him no harm," Father Lysaght said, standing 
 up. " Come Jim, look lively." 
 
 Jim made a spring for the herbaceous border, and rescued 
 his cap from off the anchusa. 
 
 " Come along, Father James, hurry. I'm ready now," he 
 shouted. 
 
 "I wash my hands of the whole of ye," Pierce said 
 moodily. " I must go and do them peas." 
 
 He stood up. Arabella sprung lightly to his side, and, 
 standing on tiptoe, kissed his chain. " Neither money nor 
 anything else will ever come between us, father," she said 
 earnestly. 
 
 He patted her brown hair. "As it's a long drive to 
 Drisheen with that old broken-down horse, and the boy 
 might be out in the night air, you'd better put a coat in the 
 car for him," he said, patting her hair again. 
 
 She ran towards the house. 
 
 "What's keeping you, Father James? We'll be hours 
 
CONQUEST 4» 
 
 and hours late," Jim shouted from somewhere in front of 
 the house. 
 
 Pierce shook hands with the priest, saying, " No priest 
 should ever leave a penny piece." 
 
 Father Lysaght shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " I suppose that's not all that hurts me, though it's part 
 of it," Pierce said, answering some criticism in the priest's 
 eyes. " It's that I can't bear herself or the boy to be beholden 
 to anyone else in the world except myself — not even to Pat. 
 Not that I think they're beholden to me — it's the other way 
 round." 
 
 5. 
 
 More than once on the way to Drisheen Father Lysaght 
 was tempted to regret having brought the boy. They sat 
 together on one side of the jaunting car, the driver on the 
 other. Before they were half way to Lisgeela the priest 
 wished that he had put Jim on the opposite side and 
 Dempsey on the dicky. He had no desire to bring the boy 
 home a corpse, and, among other things, Jim seemed bent on 
 breaking his neck. Jaunting cars were not the safest vehicles 
 in which to do trick riding, and Fagan's car was a terror 
 even to the experienced. Whatever chance there was of 
 bringing Jim home alive was by keeping him where he could 
 be clutched in crises of extreme peril. The seat inclined 
 lengthwise to the back at an angle of forty-five degrees, and 
 also sloped outwards. Safety lay as a rule in sitting steadily 
 with feet firmly pressed on the footboard, hands clasping 
 the end rail. Not for a moment did Jim sit steady, his feet 
 did not reach the footboard, and he disdained the rail. He 
 broke all rules by not breaking his neck. He bumped into 
 Father Lysaght, slid ofF the seat on to the footboard, yet 
 the car, swaying like a small boat in a choppy sea, never 
 succeeded in pitching him on to the road. His mind was as 
 
42 CONQUEST 
 
 restless as his body. The priest blessed his stars and his 
 celibacy. Life wouldn't be worth living with a son who was 
 an endless series of interrogation marks. Yet — now and 
 then perhaps. He was always such a jolly little chap. 
 What was the proper price of black and white rabbits? 
 Why were bishops nearly always fat ? Did all Orangemen 
 hate Catholics ? Was it wrong to bathe six times in one day 
 in the Owneybeg when one's mother said once only and 
 sewed up one's shirt cuffs tight, not because she didn't 
 trust, but just for fear, and there was no harm done, mothers 
 knowing little about bathing, and not even the tiny weeniest 
 of a lie spoken, Susan sewing up the cuffs again with the 
 same thread so that no one would dream of suspecting, and 
 advising strongly the least said the soonest mended ? Was 
 Parnell a bad man or the best man that ever lived ? How 
 could he be a good man and he a Protestant ? Was divorce 
 a worse sin than being a Protestant ? Was it only Orange- 
 men who were fried in hell ? 
 
 Father Lysaght was glad of a short respite at Lisgeela 
 while he quietly but firmly argued a stormy and disgusted 
 bishop into again changing his mind as to the burial place 
 of Father Pat. The bishop said that he had already spoken 
 and that that was the end of it. Father Lysaght was 
 placidly afraid that the end was only the beginning of this 
 particular difficulty : Pierce Daly had also spoken, and he 
 was a violent man when roused. The bishop, not to be out- 
 done even in violence, didn't give a snap of his fingers for 
 all the Pierce Dalys in the universe — ^besides. Pierce Daly 
 was a Catholic and knew his duty to his bishop. In calm 
 moments no doubt. Father Lysaght agreed, but who could 
 count on a Daly to be calm. Moreover, Pierce Daly had a 
 big following among the Leaguers, and his lordship had 
 that little dispute with the League over the nuns* grass 
 lands at Brehony. If a conflict arose, say, in the church 
 after the mass for the possession of the body — Father 
 
CONQUEST 43 
 
 Lysaght shrugged his shoulders and watched with absorbed 
 interest the brilliant colours of the bishop's turkey carpet 
 as the westering sun penetrated the half open slats of the 
 drawn Venetian blinds of the study windows. The bishop 
 bit his nails but did not find them to his taste, walked with 
 rapid stride up and down the long room, his hands clasped 
 behind his back, and cooled his temper by heating his body. 
 He stopped abruptly, said that he had a cold coming on 
 him and would probably be in his bed on Saturday. The 
 Vicar General could preside at the mass. Anyhow he was 
 glad to wash his hands of the whole business, being sick of 
 people who were neither one thing nor another but who gave 
 more trouble than a duke or a thousand ordinary people. 
 
 When the priest got back to his car, Jim, with a demure 
 look, was sitting unusually quiet, 
 
 "Fm sorry I kept you so long," Father Lysaght said 
 pleasantly, "but I succeeded all right. You become a 
 bishop, Jim, by swallowing facts, no matter how much you 
 dislike them.** 
 
 "Rabbits like milk thistles," Jim said, with a glance at 
 the well of the car. 
 
 " As quickly as you can now to Drisheen, Dempsey,** the 
 priest said, taking his seat. "You sat in the car all the 
 time?" he added, with a suspicious look at Jim, who was 
 gazing thoughtfully at the kerbstone. 
 
 " Well — ^not all the time," Jim replied modestly. 
 
 " What mischief were you up to, then ?" 
 
 "Oh, no mischief at all. I thought I might as well be 
 doing something while you were in with the bishop. I only 
 intended just to see the rabbits — just to make sure that they 
 were there. So I pelted off, and luck of luck Dick Kavanagh 
 was at home. And hadn't he heard all about Father Pat, 
 and me having tons of money. Say, Father James, isn't it 
 a fine thing to be rich even if you haven't a penny in your 
 pocket? Dick almost forced the five rabbits on me, and 
 
44 CONQUEST 
 
 himself mentioned two shilling's, or even less if I thought it 
 ^oo much, though he was asking half a crown as late as 
 playtime to-day, and I had my mind made up to it — and he 
 wouldn't even take the penknife in pledge." 
 
 " Where ^re they ?" the priest asked severely. 
 
 ' " In the well of the car. Won't you ask Dempsey to stop, 
 and have a look at 'em ? Do, Father James. I'm sure you're 
 aching to see 'em." 
 
 " Are they all right there, Dempsey ?" the priest said, with 
 a frown. 
 
 " As snug as a mouse in a haycock, your reverence," the 
 driver said, with a grin,_ 
 
 "As if I didn't know how-to look after rabbits!" Jim 
 said, aggrieved. "I brought two up from Dick's in my 
 pockets and the rest in my cap. I was just getting Dempsey 
 to spread out the feed of oats in the bottom of the well and 
 put the sack on top of it for a bed for them when I thought 
 of the bishop's hay. I ran round to his yard — you see you 
 delayed so long — and took some put of the stable, and the 
 garden gate being open I pulled some carrots for a feed, 
 and as luck would have it, on my way back through the 
 yard, there I saw some milk thistles. There was plenty of 
 time and I had 'em bedded and fed easily by the time you 
 were back. Do let's'itave a look at 'em. Father James — just 
 to see how they're getting on ?" Then doubtfully : " I 
 suppose the bishop wouldn't mind about the carrots — not, 
 anyway, if he knew they were for the rabbits ?" 
 
 " Certainly not if he knew it was a Daly took 'em — ^he's 
 loving you all so much to-day," Father Lysaght said, with 
 a snap. 
 
 "How is it rabbits never need water? Do let's have a 
 look at 'em. Father James. They may get hurt with the 
 jolting of the car." 
 
 " Sorra bit of 'em," Dempsey said. 
 
 " Anyhow, you should have thought of that before putting 
 
^ CONQUEST 45 
 
 them there," the priest said, making- a desperate plunge at a 
 moral lesson. 
 
 " Is it to leave them behind when I had such a chance ?" 
 Jim said, surprised by the priest's lack of sense. 
 
 Father Lysaght took out his breviary. " Not another 
 word now, till I have read Matins and Lauds for to- 
 morrow," he said severely. "Not one syllable, mind." 
 
 Jim sighed disconsolately, but watched two cocks fight- 
 ing till the mare shook off the strain of the climb up Hill 
 Street and began her canter. He tried balancing on 
 the edge of the seat, his feet in the air, but this soon palled. 
 He thought again of the money which everybody said was 
 his. Indeed, from the way Dick Kavanagh acted, there was 
 no doubt about it. Lots of it too. He fingered in his pocket, 
 his knife, two glass marbles, the case. of an old silver watch, 
 a pencil, a piece of sealing-wax, and felt round for a farthing 
 which he had clung to for weeks in the hope of another 
 farthing turning up — nothing less than a ha'penny was a 
 negotiable coin for a boy of nine. With lots of money he*d 
 perhaps have shillings in his pockets. He saw a vision of 
 Andrews' confectionery shop in the Main street, of the 
 beautiful wedding cake in the glass case in the window, of 
 the rows of little glass dishes on the glass shelves and their 
 burthens of cakes and sweets and buns. The dark red, 
 square-cut jujubes lasted longest : and the Lisgeela Beauty, 
 a bun with large, succulent, stoneless raisins, always piping 
 hot out of the oven at three on Thursdays and Mondays, 
 made one's mouth water even to think of. And he had been 
 able to go to Andrews' only once a week, and not even, then 
 if there were other things to buy for his twopence. And it 
 was always a struggle between an ounce of jujubes which 
 took the whole twopence and a bun which left a ha'penny 
 over, and one couldn't ask for a ha'porth at Andrews', though 
 one could at Curley's. It was foolish of Father Macdonald 
 to try and make the boys spend their money at Curley's when 
 
46 CONQUEST 
 
 the whole world knew their things were stodge, the Miss 
 
 Gurleys being always j)laying the piano and singing songs 
 
 with Father Macdonald, or driving down to the sea with 
 
 him to Beekawn all through the summer. If the Miss 
 
 Curleys brought their own cakes what a stodge the tea 
 
 must be. There wasn't a boy in the College that didn't 
 
 prefer the Protestant cakes at Andrews', and have them too, 
 
 except Mick Tuohy, who was a voteen, and said that 
 
 Protestant cakes always stuck in his throat while Catholic 
 
 cakes went down like butter — like bad butter, Dick 
 
 Kavanagh, who always paid a visit to Andrews' at playtime, 
 
 said. And now, perhaps, he'd be able to go to Andrews' at 
 
 playtime instead of eating, day after day, in the corner of 
 
 the playground the bread and butter sandwiches his mother 
 
 made up for him. They were good, of course, because she 
 
 made 'em, but one got tired of good things, and they weren't 
 
 Andrews'. And, of course, the very first thing, he'd buy 
 
 ounces and t)unces of jujubes and a whole paper bag full of 
 
 cakes for his mother. He took out the old broken watch-case 
 
 and wondered whether he'd have a real watch of his own. 
 
 He wriggled and wriggled and watched Father Lysaght. 
 
 Why did Father James always read his office just- at the 
 
 most interesting times? He looked hopeful as the priest, 
 
 as if making a dash for the winning post, said : " per omnia 
 
 saecula saeculorum." But there was only a look out of the 
 
 corner of his eye and a smile and he went on again in a 
 
 steady murmur, his eyes fixed on his breviary. Money or 
 
 no money, to-morrow would be a great day. On birthdays 
 
 there was always a surprise, one greater than another, from 
 
 his mother, and a half-crown tip from his grandfather, and 
 
 Susan made a cake that nothing, even from Andrews', could 
 
 equal. Was the surprise going to be a fishing rod this time ? 
 
 There were signs that it was, but there was no knowing. 
 
 " Stop ! stop ! Draw up th' old mare I'm telling you. 
 Patsy Dempsey. And I wanting to speak to his reverence. 
 
CONQUEST 4; 
 
 It's a regular racer old Saturday's turning into," an elderly- 
 man with a scraggy grey beard shouted, rushing out from 
 the Devoy farmyard. 
 
 "Amn't I pulling her up as fast as I can, Mr. Devoy," 
 Dempsey said, with a show of restraining the only too 
 willing horse. 
 
 " It's ginger you put under her tail out of respect of his 
 reverence, no doubt," Devoy said sarcastically. 
 
 " It isn't then. It's the nature of the beast to have great 
 speed in her," Dempsey said, aggrieved. 
 
 Father Lysaght took a verse of a psalm in a flying leap, 
 sighed, arranged a marker and shut his book with a sigh. 
 
 " Sure I wouldn't be interrupting your reverence for all 
 the world in the blessed office, but there's a trifle of business 
 that I wanted to talk to you about," Devoy said, lowering 
 his tone. " It's here in my inside pocket this minute — a 
 matter of six hundred and sixty-flve pound all in notes, the 
 price of the bullocks I sold for Father Pat this morning, not 
 counting the eight pounds fifteen I gave back in luck penny. 
 I used always hand him anything of the kind and he 
 passing home of an evening, but sure to-night," he shook his 
 head sadly, " it's a sight better occupied he is elsewhere I 
 hope — though it is a good price, sorra better in the market. 
 And if he liked the money itself, it was the honour and 
 glory of being the top price that warmed him most. Wasn't 
 he a Daly first and last when aU is said ? His grandfather, 
 the story goes " 
 
 " That's all right, Mr. Devoy," Father Lysaght inter- 
 rupted hastily. " If you take it to the National Bank and 
 lodge it to his account I'd be obliged." 
 
 " "\yhatever you say is law. Father James, and you having 
 the management of things with the mother for the boy there, 
 I'm told," Devoy said, grasping the rail of the car firmly, 
 the light of gossip in his eyes. " It's the black night this'll 
 be for the parish of Drisheen, and the best priest that ever 
 
48 CONQUEST 
 
 reigned over it gone to his reward. 'Tis he that could speaks 
 comfort to the dying, or warn a young girl without hurting 
 her feelings, and come down with a heavy hand on the drink 
 without taking the bread altogether out of the mouths of 
 the publicans — moderation he preached, and it's a great 
 thing, glory be to God, for them that have the courage for 
 it. And if he met a young couple coming along the road in 
 decency 'tis he could look the other way as well as another. 
 And no woman that ever handled a rolling pin had a 
 lighter hand for the money. The grass of four bullocks he 
 had off me, and when the good times came, what with the 
 reduction in the Court and the Arrears Act and the like that 
 your grandfather, Mister Jim, and more power to him for it, 
 helped to squeeze out of the grasping English, I proffered 
 him the grass of another bullock. ' No, Tom,' he said. 
 'Four is my right and four I'll have,' he said, 'and not a 
 beast more. And I'll see with my own eyes that you put 
 'em on the best grass too,' he said, with that in his eye that 
 you never knew whether it was serious he was or joking. 
 As if it wouldn't be a sin past forgiving not to give the best 
 grass to the stores he chose that'd put on fat on thistles, not 
 to say what they did on the best grass I could give 'em. 
 Take no less than such and such, Tom, he'd say, never in 
 his life bothering to see a beast of his sold. And sure 
 enough I'd get it. But he was the devil and all, God forgive 
 me for swearing before your reverence, to please, and he 
 buying the stores. He always left the price to me, but baste 
 after baste he'd cast for this point or that that another man 
 in the fair couldn't see. Your grandfather has a bit of the 
 same gift, Mister Jim, but he was never in the same street as 
 Father Pat. His only weak point was politics, but sure 
 your grandfather shone there bright enough for both of 'em. 
 A great man he was, God rest his soul this night. Sure it'd 
 be easier to grow a score o' bishops than to find his like 
 again for Drisheen parish." 
 
CONQUEST 49 
 
 "I have five rabbits in the well of the car," Jim said 
 proudly. 
 
 For once Father Lysaght welcomed the rabbits and said 
 with a sigh of relief : " We've a lot to do and must be 
 hurrying on. Many thanks, Mr. Devoy." 
 
 " You haven't then ?" Devoy said, his mouth wide open, 
 volubility gone in astonishment. 
 
 " Oh, but I have. Black and white. Would you like to 
 see them ?" 
 
 "Good-bye, Mr. Devoy. Drive on, Dempsey," Father 
 Lysaght said firmly. 
 
 " Beauties they are sure enough," Devoy said, lifting the 
 well board. " God grant it's the same eye for a baste you'll 
 have as your granduncle." 
 
 The horse moved off. Devoy replaced the well-board 
 reluctantly, and continued to hang on to the car, gasping as 
 he ran : 
 
 " I'm off this minute to lodge that money with Mr. 
 Murphy — it's after hours but he'll take it from me. It's 
 uneasy the dead might rest to-night and he thinking it was 
 knocking about in any loose place." 
 
 Father Lysaght waved a hand, said " thanks " and busied 
 himself again with his breviary. 
 
 Jim looked behind, watched Devoy lumbering off, and 
 wondered how any man could carry so much money in his 
 breast pocket. If it was Father Pat's, did any of it belong 
 to him ? Imagine him not knowing before that Father Pat 
 was such a great man — ^he seemed such a shabby old 
 man. . . . 
 
 The country here was new to him and he looked about 
 with interest. Mooncon mountain seemed to have two peaks 
 instead of one; and he could recognize the Bit of Dawlish 
 beyond Tubber, but they were the only familiar objects. 
 He leant back, his elbow on the well board, and grev/ pink 
 with excitement. Devoy hadn't fitted in the board properly. 
 
50 CONQUEST 
 
 and through the open space in front the noses of several 
 rabbits peeped out. 
 
 He was thrilled by their cool touch on his fingers. 
 
 At the top of Culleen hill Dempsey whispered : 
 
 "Look behind you and you'll see Dalyhouse — the grey 
 house in the trees far away on your left." 
 
 " I see it, I see it," Jim whispered excitedly. " I never 
 saw it before." 
 
 " Imagine that now," Dempsey said, " and beyond there 
 in front of you on your left — ^you see them trees ? That's 
 Lissyfad, your grandfather, Colonel Levin's place." 
 
 Jim frowned. " I've no grandfather but grandfather 
 Daly," he said hotly. 
 
 " Do you hear that now — and him Colonel of the mileesha 
 too," Dempsey said, with a pious look at the sky. 
 
 " He's an Orange dog and an English traitor," Jim said, 
 his anger betraying him into a loud tone. 
 
 " There you are — talking again. And who are you giving 
 this beautiful character to ?" Father Lysaght said, looking 
 up with a smile. 
 
 " My mother's father," Jim said doggedly, but a little 
 abashed. 
 
 The priest frowned. " Your grandfather, you mean. For 
 shame. What would your mother say ?" 
 
 " Susan Roche says he is." 
 
 " Susan Roche says more than her prayers. When I've 
 finished Lauds I'll give you a bit of my tongue for this, and 
 perhaps a thrashing." 
 
 Jim smiled composedly as the priest resumed his reading. 
 Long experience had taught him that Father Lysaght was 
 never so harmless as when he threatened, and as for thrash- 
 ing — ^he looked at Dempsey to share the joke. But Dempsey 
 had even a better one. He was holding up. a biscuit, 
 pointing at the rabbits and making a pretence of eating with 
 his lips. Jim smiled intelligently, took the biscuit, and, 
 
CONQUEST 51 
 
 before the rabbits had nibbled it all, was in front of the 
 priest's house at Drisheen. 
 
 " Here we are at last/' Father Lysaght said with a final 
 sign of the cross, jumping briskly on to the road. 
 
 " What a shabby place. Is that my uncle Pat's house ?" 
 Jim said, disgusted. 
 
 " It's a battered shell with a gold kernel," Father Lysaght 
 said drily. " Come along in." 
 
 " Oh," Jim said, looking for some new wonder. " You'll 
 pick some dandelions, won't you, while we're inside," he 
 whispered to Dempsey. 
 
 " It isn't far I'll have to go to look for 'em," Dempsey said, 
 nodding towards the neglected garden which, choked with 
 rank grass and weeds, fronted the long, low, single-storied, 
 slated house. A low wall surmounted by an iron railing 
 surrounded the narrow strip of garden. The plaster on the 
 garden wall and on the front wall of the house had peeled 
 off in irregular patches. The iron railings had corroded till 
 many of the bars had fallen asunder. The small entrance 
 gate, both hinges rotted away, stood permanently open. 
 There was no trace of the gravelled path froin the gate to 
 the door, beyond a less dense growth of grass and a denser 
 growth of weeds slightly trodden down. Hollyhocks, 
 nettles, roses, dandelions, docks and immense tree lupins 
 flowered in tangled masses. The door and windows were 
 askew from rotting posts and lintels. The paint had either 
 peeled off or had been washed away to the priming. One 
 whole sash had been replaced by an outhouse door. Broken 
 partes had either been left untouched or had been repaired 
 with pieces of brown cardboard. The door knocker, its 
 hinge gone, was fastened with a piece of bent wire. The 
 limestone doorstep was spotlessly clean; and on it was a 
 beautiful Persian cat, on his back, his head between his 
 fore paws, gently licking his belly. He stood up as Father 
 Lysaght approached, arched his back, and sidled his long 
 
52 CONQUEST 
 
 body luxuriously, from his ear to the tip of his tail, against 
 the priest's trousers. 
 
 As the priest was about to knock the sound of sobbing 
 and of heavy footsteps came from the iiall. The door 
 opened with a grating noise, and Julia Feeney, half hidden 
 behind it, her apron to her eyes, said tearfully : 
 
 " Sure I saw ye coming from the window of the kitchen, 
 and I making a cup o' tea for myself to drown my grief. 
 Och, Father James, asthore, and is it young Mister Jim 
 Daly you have with you that he*d give his heart's blood for ? 
 And where's his own brother, Mr. Pierce, and he not with 
 ye this day ? Ochone, ochone o, sure it's crying him within 
 in the Cathedral at Lisgeela he must be, and he not with ye. 
 At one o'clock and I lifting the praties off the fire Bessy 
 Neil came to me with the news, bringing it hot foot from 
 Lisgeela as fast as the ass could carry her. Turned into a 
 stone I was, with the pot in my hand, and the blood froze 
 \n me, till the tears came, and then my hand went limp and 
 the pot and the blessed spuds scattered themselves trawn-a- 
 hela everywhere about the floor. Sorra such tears Bessy 
 says she ever seen since she waked her own mother. And 
 wasn't he father and mother to me, the best and the most 
 generous and the most flahool master that ever drew breath. 
 Them that'd say he wasn't let 'em say it to my face," she 
 added, angrily, lowering her apron, and throwing out her 
 chest. 
 
 " No one says it," Father Lysaght said mildly. " Jim and 
 I have come to look over his papers— he may have left some 
 directions that may have to be attended to at once." 
 
 " Sure you're heartily welcome. Father James. 'Tis you 
 always understood the good heart he had, and his own blood 
 is doubly welcome. But if it was some of them others came, 
 even if they wore a belly-band itself, I take my solemn davy 
 it's to slam the door in their face I would as sure as my 
 name is Julia Feeney." 
 
^ CONQUEST 53 
 
 " Now, now, Julia, none of that," Father Lysaght said 
 quietly. 
 
 " Oh, I'll listen to you. Father James, none readier, both 
 as a friend of the dead and a good priest of God, but as to 
 what I'll do or wiU not do I'll follow my own counsel in that." 
 
 " You're in his house, and you won't J3e — what he never 
 was — ^rude to anyone high or low." 
 
 " Indeed and I wouldn't demean myself so far," she cried, 
 hesitating. "And you're right there, he wouldn't like it. 
 But a remark or two by the way of no harm ?" 
 
 " Not even a remark," he said £rmly, his lips twitching a 
 litde. 
 
 " It's a hcird and bitter penance you're putting on me," 
 she said with a deep sigh. " But in memory of the dead I 
 promise you to abide by it. But there's no bar, thanks be 
 to God, to chanting the praises of the dead and letting the 
 world know his virtues." 
 
 She opened the door wide to allow the priest and Jim to 
 enter. " There's that thief of a cat," she said, with a catch 
 in her voice, " waiting him on the doorstep and he never to 
 cross it again unless he walks, which God forbid — though 
 sorra afeard even of his ghost I'd be. It's many a tit-bit he 
 threw you. Prince agra," she added resolutely, resting a 
 hand on her hip, and facing Father Lysaght unblinkingly. 
 " The one great failing of the dead was that he was so 
 wasteful and extravagant of the food. Not that he'd eat 
 much himself, for 'tis he Wcis the dainty feeder. 'Put on 
 that saddle of mutton for the dinner to-day,' he'd say to me. 
 * Wouldn't a couple of chops off the loin be enough for you, 
 there being no company ?' I'd say — for it's few were good 
 enough for him and he couldn't abide riff-raff. * No,' he'd 
 say. ' Roast the saddle, Julia, cind we'll have the loin to- 
 morrow unless you think the piece of beef more tasty ?' And 
 not even by dint of roasting or boiling a joint a day could I 
 get through all that he'd order in. Just a pick he'd take off 
 
54 CONQUEST 
 
 it, and a plateen full for Prince and then 'twould be * Take 
 it away, Julia, and don't let me see it again.' It's to bury it 
 in the garden I used so as not to let on to the neighbours the 
 power of food we misused. It was his one and only sin and 
 I hope God won't be hard on him for it." 
 
 She faltered a little and her half-defiant look softened and 
 became worried. Father Lysaght held out his hand. She 
 looked at his sympathetic face unsteadily for a moment, 
 wiped her hands on her apron, took his hand, knelt and 
 kissed it twice. He helped her up. 
 
 " You mean that God is big enough to overlook a trifle ?" 
 she said brokenly, smiling through her tears. 
 
 " I do," he said firmly. 
 
 " Then heaven is his bed to-night," she said, with a sigh 
 of relief. " But what's on me at all, at all, to be keeping 
 your reverence and Mister Jim standing on the doorstep ? 
 It's glad I am that you came, for there's that in the room 
 there," with a mysterious nod towards the door on the left, 
 " that I'd rather ye'd take away with ye and I all alone in 
 the house. There's nothing in any other room that ye need 
 bother yeerselves with. The dining-room is shut up — it was 
 the luck of God the window fell in after the Confirmation 
 and not before it. And there's nothing of any value there 
 but the porringer he used to ate out of and he a child. The 
 rag and bone man wouldn't give five shillings for all that's' 
 in his bedroom — a few rags of clothes and an old truckle 
 bed that's as hard as the sky of heaven in a winter 
 wind. And not a stick in any other bedroom except me 
 own, and only a few odds and ends of things in the kitchen. 
 And not a scrap of his papers anywhere except in the room 
 within. Whatever there is is all before ye in there, and 
 nothing locked up. He carried keys about with him, for it 
 was a trick he had of playing his fingers on them. And it's 
 to go and get ye both a cup of tea now I will — ^by dint of 
 contriving I can get it easy for ye." 
 
CONQUEST ' 55 
 
 Father Lysaght made no effort to keep her, but he watched 
 her as she clattered down the flagged hall in her heavy 
 shoes, her head bent forward. 
 
 " What a funny old woman," Jim said, half awed. " And 
 the whole world knowing that my uncle near starved 
 himself." 
 
 " You've a lot to learn, my boy," the priest said. 
 
 " Everything is bare and mean, but she keeps it as clean 
 as a new pin," Jim said, with a look round the spotless flags, 
 the highly burnished brass knobs to doors that somehow 
 looked clean and polished though half the paint had peeled 
 off, and the absurd white, lime-washed dado on a faded and 
 worn red wall paper. 
 
 " More than that," the priest said, interested. 
 
 " She was very fond of him," Jim said thoughtfully. 
 
 " Thaf s better " 
 
 " And she's a brick to stand up for him like that." 
 
 The priest smiled, said nothing, but ran his fingers 
 through the boy's hair. 
 
 " Let us go in," Jim said eagerly. 
 
 " We must settle about Julia Feeney first," the priest said, 
 watching him. " I'm going to tell her a lie." 
 
 " You wouldn't do that, Father James — it wouldn't be fair 
 to her," Jim said indignantly, firing up. 
 
 " I prefer your way to George Washington's," the priest 
 said with a chuckle. " We were always good friends, Jim, 
 but we're going to be better. You may put a score of rabbits 
 in the well of the car if you like. But I'm going to teU Julia 
 Feeney that lie all the same." 
 
 Still frowning Jim's face took on a puzzled, inquiring look. 
 
 " It's this way," the priest said calmly. " Father Pat 
 didn't remember her in his will — I don't believe she has a 
 penny piece — and I'm going to tell her that he did." 
 
 " Oh," Jim said, his face clearing. " I understand," he 
 added, with a smile. 
 
56 CONQUEST 
 
 " Not much — a few pounds down, and enough to keep 
 her year by year. You agree? It all comes out of your 
 money." 
 
 " You bet," Jim said enthusiastically. " There's enough 
 I suppose ?" he added, with a shade of regret for toppling 
 dreams. 
 
 " Heaps," Father Lysaght said emphatically. " You 
 could give it to her yourself, of course — ^but it would never 
 be the same thing to her." 
 
 Jim thought this over for a few seconds and then said an 
 eager, " I see." 
 
 " We must consult your mother, of course, but she's sure 
 to agree." 
 
 " Sure to — my mother sees everything at once," Jim said 
 confidently. 
 
 The priest patted his shoulder, took away his hand 
 abruptly, said harshly : " Let's go in now," and led the way 
 into the sitting room. 
 
 A roughly made roll top desk stood in a corner by the 
 front window, almost filling the space between the window 
 and the empty grate. At the other side of the grate was a 
 rickety mahogany bookcase, reaching from the floor to the 
 low ceiling, but in two of the shelves only were there any 
 books. A glass door, one pane patched with cardboard, led 
 to a broken-down greenhouse of which hardly any of the 
 glass remained. ' Opposite the bookcase was a cupboard let 
 into the wall. A cheap Brussels carpet, old and f)atched 
 and darned, covered the floor. The chenille table cover 
 on the small square table was neatly patched with stuff 
 evidently cut off the ends of the cloth itself. The flimsy 
 Nottingham lace curtains hanging from dejected looking 
 bamboo poles over the window and the greenhouse door 
 were darned till little of the original lace remained. The 
 shiny, horse-hair armchair standing between the table and 
 the empty grate and three forlorn chairs in a row along the 
 
CONQUEST 5; 
 
 opposite wall were patched with black cloth. The patches 
 on the armchair had themselves been darned. The bur- 
 nished fire irons had lost all useful parts. An oleograph of 
 Pope Leo XIII. — a calendar advertisement, five years old, 
 of a firm of Catholic educational publishers — was tacked 
 over the mantelpiece. On the opposite wall was a farmyard 
 scene of Morland's, shiny and German, emblazoned with the 
 Christmas compliments of Mallon and Son, grocers. Hill 
 Street, Lisgeela. The wall paper, repaired in a variety of 
 colours, was faded to an indistinguishable pattern which 
 left a doubt as to what was damp and what was pattern. A 
 pair of slippers lay against the broken bar of the fender. 
 A copy of the Lisgeela Weekly News was on the table, 
 unopened, beside a paraffin lamp trimmed for lighting. 
 
 "Julia Feeney has just managed to keep the place from 
 falling to bits," Father Lysaght said, after a quick glance 
 round the room. " If you look through the cupboard, Jim, 
 I'll see what's in the desk." 
 
 He drew a chair in front of it, sat down, and rolled back 
 the unlocked top. 
 
 " There's nothing in the cupboard but three big tins of 
 Jacobs' biscuits and a half pound tobacco box," Jim called 
 out, disappointed. 
 
 " Have you looked inside 'em ?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 "Well, do." 
 
 "Oh," Jim shouted. "Do come here. Father James. 
 Half-crowns and two-shilling pieces and shillings and six- 
 pences — stacks and stacks of 'em. The biscuit tin is so 
 heavy I'm afraid to try and lift it out." 
 
 " What's in the other tins ?" Father Lysaght asked, with- 
 out looking round. 
 
 " Silver in one — chock full — and the other's about half full 
 of coppers. And the tobacco box — oh, if it isn't packed with 
 sovereigns and half-sovereigns." 
 
58 CONQUEST 
 
 " Put the lids on, shut the cupboard and come here and 
 help me," Father Lysaght said in a matter of fact tone that 
 chilled Jim's growing spirit of adventure. It was more 
 exciting than playing at Red Indians or Protestants, and 
 here was Father James taking it coolly and half spoiling 
 everything. 
 
 " There's nothing else in the cupboard," Jim said mys- 
 teriously, in a sort of whispered shout, " but if we lifted up 
 the boards we might get something underneath." 
 
 "Shut the door, and come here," the priest said im- 
 patiently, as he went on sorting papers. 
 
 Jim, in sheer disgust, felt an inclination to slam the 
 cupboard door — Father James wasn't playing the game. A 
 glance at the greenhouse door restrained him. Out there a 
 robber or a highwayman or a pirate might be crouching 
 with ears pricked. He shut the door of the cupboard gently, 
 made a cabalistic sign with his finger to the back of the 
 priest's bent head, and, with carefully chosen steps, walked 
 on tiptoe towards the desk. Still on tiptoe, he peered, his 
 hand shading his eyes, over Father Lysaght's shoulder. 
 Pshaw, no treasure there — only a confused mass of papers. 
 Yet, were these cheques and notes ? 
 
 " Lord, but he was a queer man," the priest said, breaking 
 the spell. " Just thrown in anyhow and forgotten. I'll have 
 to take out all these drawers," pulling out two pink slips 
 from behind a drawer. " Hundreds and hundreds of pounds 
 in uncashed cheques and dividend warrants — several years 
 old, some of them — just as if he got tired of the game, or 
 got bored — everywhere I stick in my hand I find a bundle 
 of greasy notes; and securities thrown in anyhow. But I 
 can't find a list of securities or a bank book or account book 
 anywhere. Have a look through the bookcase, Jim, and see 
 if you can find anything — any account book or copybook 
 or paper with writing in it." 
 
 " I'm sure it's under the boards you'd find 'em," Jim said 
 eagerly. 
 
CONQUEST 59 
 
 " What is the boy thinking of ?" the priest said, leaning 
 back in his chair and looking at Jim with a weary smile. 
 " Hidden treasure, eh ?" pinching his ear. He waved his 
 hand over the desk and added seriously, "And all this 
 lying about for anyone who cared to lift the lid. Run and 
 look through the bookcase like a good boy, or we*ll be here 
 all night and IVe a lot to do — it's twenty past six." With a 
 sigh, and unconvinced, Jim went at once, while the priest 
 bent again to the sorting of cheques and dividend warrants, 
 notes and securities. 
 
 " * Diseases of Cattle * is no good, I suppose ?" Jim 
 called out. 
 
 " No." 
 
 " Nor ' All about the Horse ?' " 
 
 " Only books in handwriting or with written figures," the 
 priest said with a patient smile. 
 
 "Oh," Jim said, turning over rapidly, "'Clover as a 
 Fattener * ; ' The Complete Farrier * ; a devotional book by 
 St. Francis Liguori ; * The Georgies ' ; Gury's * Casus Con- 
 scientiae'; Crabbe's Poems; *The Absentee'; three volumes 
 of the Roman Breviary ; ' Castle Rackrent ' ; ' Speeches from 
 the Dock ' ; * The Treatment and Cure of Murrain ' ; * The 
 Parents' Assistant ' ; ' Irish Land Laws * ; ' Hell opened to 
 Christians ' ; ' The Key of Heaven ' ; * Sermons by Vicesimus 
 Knox ' ; ' Bleak House ' ; ' The History of the Daly Family 
 from the Creation of Adam, with Frequent Reference to and 
 Quotations from Original and Authentic Documents and 
 Many Notes and Appendices.' 
 
 " Say, Father James," he shouted. " Here's a find — a 
 History of the Dalys." 
 
 "Oh, that!" 
 
 Jim revenged the priest's indifference by banging 
 Sidney Smith's complete works with the "Curiosities of 
 Literature." 
 
 " There's only a ' Ready Reckoner ' and * The Spiritual 
 
6o CONQUEST 
 
 Exercises of St. Ignatius* and a bundle tied with string 
 left," he said petulantly. 
 
 " Untie it then'." 
 
 He cut the string with his pen-knife, dropped the pen- 
 knife and string on the floor, and shouted excitedly : 
 
 " Here they are ! — The Reverend Patrick Aloysius Daly — 
 I never knew he had that frump of a name — in account with 
 the National Bank, Drisheen Chapel Accounts, and two 
 other little pass-books with writing and figures in them." 
 
 " That's all right then," Father Lysaght said, with a 
 calmness that annoyed Jim and damped his elation a little. 
 Father James was a good sort but he was getting old — forty 
 if he was a day. It wasn't his fault, perhaps, that he wasn't 
 any good at a game like this. Now his mother — she always 
 said and did the right thing — and in the very rightest kind 
 of a way. 
 
 Father Lysaght took the books, turned them over rapidly 
 one by one, said "Yes, yes," drew a notebook and pencil 
 out of his pocket, and, bent over the desk, began a more 
 detailed examination of the books, scribbled occasionally in 
 his notebook, and seemed to forget that there was anyone 
 else in the room. Jim fidgeted from foot to foot, pulled the 
 tail of the cat, yawned, tried to open the greenhouse door 
 but found it was nailed up, thought of the rabbits, and was 
 eyeing the cupboard door irresolutely and gathering courage 
 to have another look at the buried treasure — ^wasn't it all the 
 same as buried in there in the dark? — ^when there was a 
 knock, and Julia Feeney, bearing a tray, entered the room. 
 
 " With the help of Mrs. Costigan, a real laughy woman 
 she is, above at the public-house in front of the chapel gate, 
 I fixed up the tea grand," she said proudly, putting down 
 the tray on the table. " But the eggs is our own, and the bit 
 of butter, as luck'd have it, Mrs. Devoy sent up only 
 yesterday." 
 
 " Is there a Gladstone bag or an empty trunk in the 
 
CONQUEST 6i 
 
 house? Or a clean sack would do. And some string or 
 rope and a piece of sealing-wax?" Father Lysaght asked, 
 without looking up. 
 
 " IVe some sealing-wax in my pocket," Jim said quickly, 
 scenting fresh excitement. 
 
 " There was my own box," Julia Feeney said, fingering 
 her apron thoughtfully, " but sure I broke it up long ago for 
 kindling the fire with, and there's his trunk with the cow- 
 hide cover on it as good as new that he had in Maynooth 
 with him, but I use that for a chest of drawers to keep his 
 few things in; and there's the carpet bag that he used to 
 take to the retraites with him and into Lisgeela if ever he 
 slept there for a couple of nights during Holy Week, but it 
 was seldom he did it — that's empty. And there's string 
 enough and to spare — put by off an odd parcel and the like, 
 and it's little of it Whitey'll need any more. But what in 
 the world would you be wanting them for. Father James ?" 
 
 " To take away some papers and the money to the bank," 
 he said directly. 
 
 " I'll run and get the bag," she said gladly. " Sure every 
 time I used to look at them cake tins in the cupboard — it's 
 mass offerings and baptisms and the like they are — it's to 
 cry my eyes out I used, and him not getting an ounce or a 
 drop of comfort out of 'em — a ton weight on his heart the 
 money was, squeezing the good nature out of him." 
 
 " I can't see that he owes a penny," Father Lysaght said 
 when she left the room. " And the church account owes him 
 about twenty pounds. There's roughly about thirty-seven 
 thousand pounds worth of securities, averaging five per cent, 
 or a little over — about forty thousand altogether with what's 
 piled up on the desk here and his bank balance and what 
 Devoy has — and your find," he added with a smile. 
 " About two thousand a year." 
 
 "Is that as much as the Scovells have?" Jim asked, 
 interested. 
 
62 CONQUEST 
 
 The priest stood up, yawned, looked at the boy whim- 
 sically and said, " Perhaps your grandfather was right, and 
 it might be better to pitch it all into the Owneybeg." 
 
 " What is the sealing-wax for ? Is it to seal it all up in 
 the bag ?" Jim said, ignoring irrelevancies. 
 
 " We must make some pretence of taking tea, I suppose, 
 seeing that she's gone to all this trouble about it," the priest 
 said with a smile at the japanned tray which had a bottle 
 and a recommendation to drink Power's whisky painted in 
 bright colours in the centre. " But we can't manage these 
 eggs after all the cake we've eaten at Scarty." 
 
 " Oh," Jim said, a little perturbed. " If you don't mind, 
 Father James, I think I could manage to eat an egg or two." 
 
 6. 
 
 Mrs. Scovell was worried. Her frequent laughter had a 
 trick of breaking off suddenly; and now there was a long 
 pause in her brisk talk while she pricked her ears to listen. 
 Durkan, the butler, had ridden into Lisgeela on his bicycle, 
 and had promised to be back at seven, for dinner at a 
 quarter past eight. It was twenty-seven minutes past eight 
 and he hadn't come — at least he hadn't announced dinner. 
 She wouldn't have worried but it was Mr. Brownlow's first 
 visit, his first dinner, too, for he had only arrived before 
 tea. He seemed quite nice and simple, but being English 
 and official, he was sure to be particular. She had herself 
 heard Mr. Dasent, the Chief Secretary, say that his private 
 secretary ran the Lodge, and there everything was well 
 done. Of course, Mr. Brownlow would say nothing, no 
 matter how wrong things went;. but her brother Hamilton 
 was sure to make remarks — the Pakenhams took a pride in 
 the directness of their remarks, especially their remarks 
 about what they called the Southern Irish. Thank God, 
 she no longer lived in Antrim, much as Hamilton thought 
 
CONQUEST 63 
 
 of Ulster. And Lord Drumbeg? She shivered a little. 
 Right or wrong, the Scovells were not important enough to 
 escape his censure. With the governess to dinner, too ! 
 
 Miss Fraser, accustomed to the Bohemian ways of 
 Dublin, wouldn't mind, and there v/as only Mr. Lentaigne 
 outside the house-party. He was a neighbour and would 
 understand. Happily it was a beautiful evening, and 
 there had been no difficulty in inducing everyone out on 
 the west terrace to admire the sunset. But if Durkan 
 wasn't at his po3t by half past, she'd trust Conroy — he'd 
 do very well with Betty's help. It wasn't as if it was a 
 large party. 
 
 "Doesn't it recall angels looking out of the gold bar of 
 heaven, Mr. Brownlow ?" Miss Grayson, the English 
 governess, said sentimentally. 
 
 "Not half bad — splendid," Brownlow said with diffi- 
 culty, working himself up to enthusiasm. 
 
 " Mr. Brownlow has used up all the jewels and lots of his 
 poetry with me," Miss Fraser said maliciously. "It's just 
 a June sunset over Mooncon and there's nothing more to 
 be said." 
 
 " We've far finer sunsets in Antrim. You should see 'em 
 from my place at Ballywilliam," Hamilton Pakenham said. 
 
 " Too Orange for me," Miss Fraser said sweetly. " Look 
 at those red golds and greens and amethysts — not a tinge 
 of yellow anywhere." 
 
 " Not - in it with an Antrim sunset," Pakenham said 
 stolidly. 
 
 "I'm getting damn peckish, Theo," Derek Scovell, large 
 and fat, his blue eyes sparkling in a ruddy, clean-shaven 
 face, said pleasantly, in an undertone to his wife. 
 
 " It's Durkan," she said in a hoarse whisper. 
 
 " What ! Not " he paused, with a humorous tilt of 
 
 his eyebrows. 
 
 " I hope to goodness, not," she said in sudden distress, a 
 
64 CONQUEST 
 
 smile struggling with a tear, her hands falling limply by 
 her sides. " No, I'm sure it's only a puncture or something. 
 He knew there was a dinner on," she added pleadingly, 
 crimson mounting to the gold of her hair. 
 
 "Better order up dinner without him — and don't worry, 
 old girl," he said with a shrug, resting his hand for a 
 moment on her shoulder. 
 
 "Dinner is served, milady," Durkan said in a carefully 
 measured tone, as if in stern reproof of the caress. 
 
 " How could you, Durkan ?" she said reproachfully. The 
 "milady" instead of "ma'am" didn't always make him 
 quite impossible, but it was a danger signal. 
 
 " I assure you, milady, I amn't," he said carefully. " I'm 
 as steady as a judge or as the master there himself." 
 
 She was very much distressed. Her tall, slender figure 
 quivered and her lips trembled pitifully. He was all right, 
 but he must be humoured. She hoped Drumbeg was out of 
 hearing. What would Hamilton say, and Mr. Brownlow 
 think ? Anyhow, to prevent worse happening she must 
 face it. 
 
 " What was it then ?" she said cheerfully, bracing herself. 
 
 "It was all on the head of Father Pat Daly, milady. 
 The time slipt past me, and I within in the snuggery at 
 Mallon's with a few of the neighbours and Mrs. Mallon 
 herself leaning across the bar, with her elbows on the 
 counter, full of the news. 'Tis the fine-looking woman she 
 is yet, God bless her, and you too, milady. It wasn't 
 anything extra in the way of drink we had beyond a glass 
 or two — but one person after another kept coming in with 
 a fresh item. Struck sudden he was in front of the Presby- 
 tery door. 'I'm dying,' he cried, and out rushed the 
 bishop and the priests that were gathered for the confer- 
 ence. Head and feet they lifted him in on the conference 
 table, and they had only just time to clap the holy oils on 
 him when he gave up the ghost crying out, *I call ye all 
 
CONQUEST 65 
 
 to witness that I leave everything I have or might be 
 having in the way of worldly wealth to my own grand- 
 nephew, Jim Daly of Scarty/ 
 
 " They say how the bishop and a scattering of the priests 
 went tearing mad at getting none of it. But sorra ha'penny 
 they'll touch, for the dying word of a priest is more bind- 
 ing than a book oath, Mrs. Mai Ion says. There's a divarsity 
 of opinion about how much he left, but there's no doubt 
 that there was ten thousand pounds found hidden away 
 under the seat of the trap. Father James Lysaght found 
 it with his own hands. What the whole amount is, nobody 
 knows. Father Griffin swore to Mrs. Mallon that it was 
 over thirty thousand. Up and up it's been going since, 
 till, at half-past seven, Tim Davis put it at not a penny less 
 than a hundred thousand — and I wouldn't be a bit sur- 
 prised with all that happened after. Just at that minute 
 Mrs. Mallon asked me by the way of no harm if we were 
 going to have any dinner at all at Dalyhouse to-night. I 
 lepped, milady, and it's God's truth that I laid down the 
 glass that I was lifting to my lips and left it there on the 
 counter, and it not half empty, and whipped off on my 
 bicycle" 
 
 " The dinner is being spoilt," Mrs. Scovell said feebly. 
 
 "Sorra bit of it, milady. They're busy in the kitchen 
 over the news that I gave 'em a glimpse of on my way 
 through; and Mrs. Lacy timed anything that might be 
 spoilt for a quarter to nine, through her own good nature, 
 and knowing my ways, and I not in at seven." 
 
 " Thank . God, the dinner's safe," said Scovell with a 
 sigh of relief. 
 
 "Remember I've had no tea, Theodora," Hamilton 
 Pakenham said icily, with a disapproving glance at hus- 
 band and wife and butler. 
 
 "There's one thing more, milady," Durkan said im- 
 perturbably. "As I whipped past the National Bank, 
 
66 CONQUEST 
 
 there was Fagan's car just drawn up, and Dempsey the 
 driver on the dickey, and Father James Lysaght and 
 young Jim Daly together on one side, and the other side 
 piled as high as my head with bags and boxes with a rug 
 thrown over 'em. And Father Lysaght knocked and Mr. 
 Murphy the manager himself came down, arid they col- 
 logued together awhile on the doorstep, and then them- 
 selves and Dempsey lifted the things in, a biscuit tin alone 
 being that heavy that Dempsey near sank into the pave- 
 ment under it. Sure 'twas easily known 'twas gold was in 
 it. Three of them there were and a carpet bag, only that 
 was lighter, full o' paper money it was no doubt." 
 
 " And you were whipping by all the time ?" Scovell said 
 drily. 
 
 " No, it was standing I was, your honour, leaning on my 
 bicycle, waiting to see if I couldn't get in a word after- 
 wards with Dempsey. The dinner is served, ma'am," he 
 wound up, suddenly and sternly. 
 
 "He's quite all right now, Derek," Mrs. Scovell whis- 
 pered joyfully. 
 
 "You mustn't think, Brownlow, that a scene like that 
 could occur in my part of Ireland," Pakenham said with 
 emphasis, as they made their way along the terrace to a 
 French window opening into the dining-room. "In the 
 North, I assure you, we don't gossip with our servants in 
 front of our guests." 
 
 " It was extremely interesting," Brownlow said hurriedly. 
 
 "And so characteristic," Miss Grayson said gushingly. 
 " Not that I ever saw it happen before, but it strikes exactly 
 the right note of colour, with the accent, and the sunset 
 and things — ^just what one would have expected." 
 
 "It's the slackness of the Southern Irish — even the 
 Protestants have it. Theodora used to be as hard as nails, 
 
 but now " Pakenham shrugged his shoulders, adding, 
 
 "it's the climate I suppose." 
 
CONQUEST t7 
 
 "He's explaining how the Northern Catholics are such 
 fine fellows," Miss Eraser laughed. 
 
 " That's different/' Pakenham said hastily. 
 
 "The Ulster climate is a purely Protestant virtue," 
 Lentaigne, a Vandyke bearded man of thirty, said mock- 
 ingly, taking his seat at the round table. "It stiffens 
 Orange backs, but leaves the Catholics weak-kneed." 
 
 " It's race in Ulster," Pakenham said stubbornly, 
 
 " Blood — always blood," Drumbeg said. 
 
 "More than half of the Ulster Orangemen are Celts," 
 Lentaigne said drily. 
 
 "We can't forget that we're a conquering race," Paken- 
 ham said loftily. 
 
 "Who did you conquer ?" asked Miss Eraser. 
 
 " The Irish," Pakenham said. 
 
 " They seem to have a kick in them still — nine lives like 
 a cat, I suppose," Miss Eraser said, with girlish simplicity. 
 " I'm shockingly ignorant of history, but I read somewhere 
 of James Stuart running away, some broken treaty or an- 
 other, and the desertion of an unarmed peasantry by their 
 leaders — the Tirconnels, the " 
 
 Drumbeg, at Mrs. Scovell's right, was perceptibly 
 stiffening. 
 
 "The Drumbegs always found themselves on the win- 
 ning side, if it was sufficiently respectable," Lentaigne in- 
 terrupted with a laugh. "But Drumbeg dislikes to be 
 reminded that his fathers were once Loyalists — I beg his 
 pardon — rebels, I mean. The king is dead, long live the 
 king." 
 
 Drumbeg was blushing to the roots of his sensitive red 
 hair. He drew himself up to his full height, the top of 
 Mrs. Scovell's delicate pink ear, offended dignity in his 
 thin pursed lips and sharp nose, and in his glazed, grey- 
 brown eyes. 
 
 "I never let ancient history interfere with my dinner," 
 
68 CONQUEST 
 
 Derek Scovell said pleasantly. " What matter if a Drum- 
 beg was once or twice attainted and thought better of it. 
 With all Pakenham's loyalty his grandfather worked 
 against the Union, and said some nasty things of England 
 and Farmer George, and Pitt ; and his father threatened to 
 fling the poor old Queen*s crown into the Boyne if the 
 Irish Church Bill was passed. She*s still on the throne, 
 God bless her, and Hamilton thinks she's a good Orange- 
 man because the Home Rule Bill was defeated. This is 
 excellent salmon — we'll whip that pool in the glen again 
 to-morrow, Drumbeg. Care to come Brownlow? I can 
 give you a rod. Lentaigne is nibbling at Home Rule," he 
 continued amicably, "though his family has one of the 
 rottenest tar-and-feather records in the whole country. 
 They scare children to bed about here, Brownlow, with 
 tales of what his great-grandfather — * The Bloody Butcher ' 
 he's called — did in the rebellion of '98." 
 
 "All of 'em true too, very likely," Lentaigne said 
 equably. 
 
 "Mine was a patriot then," Scovell went on. "Yes, 
 Durkan, a little more salmon — the fat part. The mob used 
 to take the horses from his coach and drag it, cheering, 
 through the streets of Dublin. He was nearly broke, and 
 he sold his vote and his country to Castlereagh, for 
 twenty-five thousand. He preferred all cash to part pay- 
 ment in a peerage. 'Twas a lot of ready money to have all 
 at once in those days, and it cured his extravagance. He 
 gave up politics after that — the mob pelted him home for 
 five miles along the Kildare Road. But where am I, 
 Theo ? I seem to have lost the point somewhere." 
 
 "What matter," his wife said cheerfully, Durkan's 
 masterly control of_hiniself and of the dinner having com- 
 pletely restored her spirits. 
 
 "You are explaining Ireland to Mr. Brownlow," Miss 
 Eraser said ironically. 
 
CONQUEST 69 
 
 " Anyhow the money was still at Tullyfin in my grand- 
 father's time. He took a mortgage with it on the Daly- 
 house property and " 
 
 "Did the Dalys in the eye," Lentaigne suggested 
 smoothly. 
 
 Scovell laughed heartily. "All that's as dead as the 
 Butcher Lentaigne," he said with a grin, "and I have 
 Daly house." 
 
 "Old Pierce the peasant reminds you of it occasionally," 
 Lentaigne said. 
 
 "The dear old peasant patriot, with the face and grace 
 of a duke," Miss Grayson murmured. 
 
 "He does, damn him," Scovell said moodily. 
 
 "Derek!" said Mrs. Scovell with affectionate reproach. 
 
 "Who wouldn't curse an old meddlesome peasant that 
 robbed one of two years' rent ?" Scovell said, holding up 
 his hands appealingly. "I had my tenants well in hand 
 till that damned old Fenian put in his oar and lost me 
 twenty thousand." 
 
 His face brightened again. "But, thank God, those 
 days are gone. The Parnell split has broken the Nation- 
 alists to bits, and a landlord can breathe freely again — for 
 my time at least. But speaking of political records, I have 
 the cleanest of any of you. My family helped to make the 
 Union, and the Union made them. So naturally, I'm a 
 Unionist — for the rest I try to live and let live." 
 
 "Even Pierce Daly?" Lentaigne smiled. 
 
 " I'd hang all agitators on the nearest tree," Scovell said 
 angrily. "What's the Castle up to, Brownlow, leaving 
 people like him at large ?" 
 
 Brownlow's thin lips smiled tolerantly, and his brown 
 eyes showed a faint interest. 
 
 "I agree with you, Scovell, that the Irish question has 
 petered out in the Divorce Court — 'Kilt' but, perhaps, 
 not * Kilt dead,' in one of the expressive phrases I've added 
 
70 CONQUEST 
 
 to my store, since I've come amongst you. Now we wish 
 to kill it dead, to stamp it out once for all. While the 
 Parnellites and Anti-Parnellites are squabbling among 
 themselves we come in with a constructive policy." 
 
 "Blessed word," Lentaigne murmured. 
 
 "Repression has been tried," Brownlow continued un- 
 moved, "not quite successfully, I'm afraid — not per- 
 manently successfully, anyhow. In the present propitious 
 lull we have given a sudden swing to the pendulum, and, 
 are trying kindness — putting the blind eye to the telescope 
 for minor political crimes, building light railways, piers, 
 harbours and things of that kind, encouraging small indus- 
 tries. A whole host of things." 
 
 "The Kicks and Doles policy," Lentaigne said. 
 
 "Not Doles," Brownlow said hastily. "Constructive 
 help — helping the people to help themselves. The Irish 
 are a sentimental people, and they're sure to respond to 
 kindness." 
 
 " They have beautiful manners," Miss Grayson said. 
 
 "Kick an angry woman black and blue, till she 
 thoroughly hates you, then give her a chuck under the chin 
 and a ha'penny bun, and she'll lick your hand with grati- 
 tude," Miss Fraser said pensively. 
 
 " Once you take your heel off their necks, you'll have the 
 devil to pay," Pakenham said vehemently. 
 
 "Quite so, quite so," said' Drumbeg with the timid 
 aggressiveness of a flurried rabbit. 
 
 "Railways won't do any harm," Scovell said medita- 
 tively. " A free grant, I suppose ?" 
 
 Brownlow nodded. 
 
 "That's all to the good," Scovell said approvingly. 
 "It'll bring money into the country and do good to all of 
 us. And I don't want the Government to be too hard on 
 the people — but the landlords must be protected. Put 
 down the agitators, and the people will be as quiet as 
 
CONQUEST 71 
 
 lambs. It's a disgrace to any Government to leave that old 
 ruffian Pierce Daly loose at my very gate." ^ 
 
 "Stand up for your cousin, Drumbeg," Lentaigne said 
 maliciously. "Old Pierce is a relative of yours." 
 
 " I don't know him," Drumbeg said stiffly. 
 
 "His mother and your grandmother were first cousins." 
 
 "I don't know him," Drumbeg repeated icily. 
 
 "There !" Scovell said, with triumph, addressing Brown- 
 low. "You see the sort Daly must be, when Drumbeg, 
 who's his cousin, won't acknowledge him — a rebel with 
 only a hundred acres of freehold, and the Government are 
 afraid to lay a hand on him." 
 
 "How can they — if he has done nothing illegal?" 
 Brownlow said coldly. 
 
 " As if that ever stood in the way," Scovell said despair- 
 ingly. "You'll probably be giving him one of your damn 
 soup tickets next — a light railway to his hall door or a pier 
 in his garden. The Owneybeg is nice and convenient. 
 God be with the old times when only landlords had these 
 little attentions. Though we never had much done for us^ 
 except to have the county road from Lisheen brought up 
 to the Tubber gate. And my father was chairman of the 
 Grand Jury then." He laughed heartily. "He always 
 said it was to convenience my mother he did it, but even 
 then, when the landlords had it all more or less their own 
 way, he was afraid of old Pierce's eye — he disliked driving 
 past Scarty." 
 
 "But you say the man is of small importance — a mere 
 peasant," Brownlow objected, slightly bewildered. 
 
 Lentaigne laughed and said, "He has twice the power 
 in the county of Scovell and myself." 
 
 " It shows how far agitation has gone outside Ulster," 
 Pakenham said gloomily. " Dasent should tighten the rein 
 instead of. loosening it. A Coercion Act now, or martial 
 law." 
 
72 CONQUEST 
 
 "Perhaps it's because he*s Lord Drumbeg's cousin. 
 Naturally the people would take that into account," Miss 
 Fraser said innocently, with a smile at the self-conscious 
 peer, whose freckles st9od out like brown islands in a crim- 
 son sea. 
 
 " This strawberry shortbread is rather dry, Theo," 
 Scovell said, spluttering. 
 
 "He's so picturesque — sometimes I think I love him. 
 Lord Byron would have made a hero of him," Miss Gray- 
 son lisped. " The old rebel I mean — not Lord Drumbeg," 
 she explained. But the explanation was lost in Derek 
 Scovell's laughter. 
 
 "He's no more a peasant, of course, than you or me," 
 Mrs. Scovell said gaily, addressing the table through 
 Brownlow, who, with a quick memory of the little green- 
 grocer's shop in a back street of Wakefield, the board 
 school, a scholarship at Wakefield Grammar School and 
 the glories of a Magdalen Demy, hastily nodded assent. 
 " He married a peasant. Of course, that was the last straw. 
 A dreadful woman, whose brother was in jail as a Fenian, 
 and whose nephew got six months a few years ago for a 
 speech against the Carngarth Evictions — Driscoll is the 
 name. They are tenants of Derek's at Tullyfin. But I 
 must say for the old man, that if we won't know him, he 
 won't know us. Not even Hamilton has half his pride, nor 
 Mr. Lentaigne, who tries to hide his under a thin cloak of 
 Fenianism and rights of the people and all that. He was 
 born in this very house. You can't see the Daly arms very 
 well in this light, in the top panels of the windows, with 
 a Drumbeg quartering too. So Lord Drumbeg is his 
 cousin on both sides. Derek dislikes him partly because 
 he's a Daly. There's not the least use in trying to deny it, 
 Derek, or in making faces at me like that. Of course. 
 Pierce the peasant has been a dreadful nuisance about the 
 land and deserves to be shot for it. But the real reason of 
 
CONQUEST 73 
 
 Derek's dislike — see how he blushes — is Arabella Levin. 
 She refused him and married Theobald Daly, old Pierce's 
 son. That was before Derek met me, of course. I've 
 always been dying to meet her, just to find out what he saw 
 in her, but I've never had the chance. Her own people cut 
 her and, of course, everyone else had to follow — the 
 Scovells would have in any case. Though there isn't one 
 in the county to-day who could tell whether they're cutting 
 her or she them. Derek doesn't care for her any more — 
 she only rankles. But he hated Theobald and doesn't love 
 the old father. Nonsense, Derek, it is quite interesting, 
 and it's not time to go. You'd like' to have coffee here, 
 Helen ?" 
 
 "Rather," Miss Fraser smiled. 
 
 Brownlow was feeling very much at sea, and ate a creme 
 de menthe sweet, which he disliked, in a mental struggle 
 for his bearings. They were all children, these Irish, land- 
 lords and tenants, and needed a leading string. 
 
 " You'll go to the funeral, of course, Drumbeg ?" Len- 
 taigne said. 
 
 Drumbeg fidgeted, blushed and said coldly, " I'll send a 
 carriage. I always send a carriage to parish priests' 
 funerals — within a convenient distance. It's due to my 
 position as the leading Catholic in the county." 
 
 "Cave," Scovell said cautiously. "That will do, Dur- 
 kan. You can all go now. Leave the liqueurs and the 
 port on the table. It's all right to discuss politics before 
 the servants," he added when they had left the room, " and 
 even one's family affairs," with a chiding look at his wife, 
 "but religion's never safe. I'd be inclined to send a car- 
 riage myself but I'd be afraid of old Pierce — as likely as 
 not he'd kick it out of the funeral. Father Pat was a decent 
 old man. He had the grass of two bullocks from me off a 
 farm I have in Drisheen, and there never was a word be- 
 tween us. He didn't meddle in politics." 
 
74 CONQUEST 
 
 "He must have been a damned old scoundrel — they all 
 are," Pakenham said warmly. "Y9u'll excuse me, Drum- 
 beg — Irish priests I mean. I know you don't hold a brief 
 for 'em. English priests are different— Unionists and 
 gentlemen, the few of 'em I've met. And this story Durkan 
 told — I don't admire the way you deal with your servants, 
 Theo, but I had to listen. What was it — a hundred thou- 
 sand pounds ground off the faces of the poor." 
 
 "It only grew to that in Mallon's snuggery," Scovell said 
 tolerantly. "And Durkan was pretty sure to round it off 
 ■ — say, twenty thousand. He never spent a penny." 
 
 " What a sound Unionist he was," Lentaigne said mock- 
 ingly. "Why he deserved an Orange crown, Pakenham, 
 to take all that money from Catholic Nationalists, who 
 might otherwise have spent it on agitation." 
 
 " There's something in that," Pakenham admitted. 
 
 "I think there must have been some exaggeration," 
 Brownlow said, a little eagerly, glad to have an oppor- 
 tunity of disclosing his knowledge of the country. " Even 
 the amount you suggest, Scovell, is impossible. Happily 
 my information is official and beyond question. Some 
 fussy persons made a row about Irish priests not paying 
 income-tax. Dasent 'consulted — why Lord Drumbeg, I re- 
 member it was your bishop here. Dr. Deehan, a most con- 
 vincing man. I was present, and he made it clear to us 
 that no Irish priests came within the taxable limit. The 
 whole' story must have arisen in — what was the excellent 
 epithet ? — Mallon's Snuggery." He gave an assured 
 laugh, but a little regretted his triumph in the evident 
 discomfiture of all his listeners. 
 
 " Don't be stopping the sun in its course, Lentaigne," 
 Scovell said, purple from the repressing of a choking in his 
 throat. "The port is freezing at your elbow.*' 
 
 Lentaigne said "Oh," as if waking from a dream, and 
 Drumbeg's ffsh-like eyes twinkled. 
 
CONQUEST 75 
 
 " The poor priests ! and we all supposed them to have at 
 least the income of carpenters," Miss Eraser said languidly. 
 
 "If he left any money it goes to the people at Scarty," 
 Lentaigne said, with a glance at Brownlow, as if begging 
 forgiveness for the assumption. 
 
 "Gad, I forgot that," 'Scovell said gloomily.. "If old 
 Pierce has the handling of it, he'll only kick up more 
 trouble." 
 
 "Tm glad for the boy's sake — he seems nice," Mrs. 
 Scovell said tolerantly. " He'll have a chance of some 
 education." 
 
 " They tell me Pierce is bringing him up a Fenian like 
 himself. Education will only make him worse," Scovell 
 said angrily. 
 
 The Irish, even the best of them, were an extraordinary 
 people, building all sorts of superstructures on purely 
 imaginary hypotheses, Brownlow thought. "A legacy of 
 nothing won't help him much," he said playfully. 
 
 "Nothing could be truer than that," Scovell said 
 solemnly, with an appraising look, as if Brownlow were a 
 museum specimen. 
 
 " I always said that Ulstermen are needed at the Castle," 
 Pakenham said with suppressed anger. " Or even a loyal 
 Catholic like you, Drumbeg — I'm not bigoted." 
 
 "God bless me — Pakenham isn't weakening on the 
 English connection," Lentaigne said with a horrified 
 expression. 
 
 "Dasent is as good as the rest," Scovell said with a 
 laugh. "Orange, or green, or red, or Lentaigne, whatever 
 colour he is — we all treat the priests the same. We mayn't 
 like them — even Drumbeg hasn't a good word for them — 
 but wherever I have a grass farm I give the parish priest 
 his due of bullocks. It pays in the long run. And occa- 
 sionally you get a bishop like Deehan who's a real trump. 
 Perhaps Dasent didn't make much of a mistake in giving 
 
;6 . CONQUEST 
 
 way to him about the income-tax. No doubt he likes to 
 get a good deal, but he spends it freely, and he's a good 
 friend to the landlords and to England." 
 
 "He's not an archbishop yet," Lentaigne said drily. 
 "You've a lot of influence in Rome, Drumbeg ?" 
 
 " I have the honour of knowing His Holiness, who deigns 
 to discuss spiritual matters with me on occasion," Drumbeg 
 said primly. 
 
 " Then no doubt you discussed Deehan — he's a spiritual 
 matter of some weight." 
 
 "He's an excellent prelate with a profound belief in the 
 rights of property," Drumbeg said reprovingly. 
 
 " He keeps a foot in the other camp for safety," Len- 
 taigne said laughing. 
 
 Drumbeg frowned. "Only as a restraining influence I 
 assure you. He convinced me " 
 
 "As he did Dasent about the income-tax," Lentaigne 
 interrupted. "He's able enough. He was a moderate 
 Home Ruler when Gladstone was in. He's a moderate 
 Unionist now. I expect to see him a Republican some 
 day. Do you see much of his priests, Drumbeg ?" 
 
 "I'm as likely to see my peasants," Drumbeg said, half 
 shrinking, half shuddering. "They are too impossible. 
 When they don't drink they snuff, and few j6i 'em change 
 their linen." 
 
 "Deehan does, I suppose," Lentaigne said coldly. 
 
 "Dr. Deehan is a bishop," Drumbeg said with a shrug- 
 
 " Then of course he doesn't need to. If you won't meet 
 your priests or the peasantry, how can you call yourself thq 
 leading Catholic in the county ?" 
 
 "I am a Catholic, therefore I am the leading Catholic," 
 Drumbeg lisped with all the patience of an infant 
 teacher. 
 
 "You spoke of a Republic, Lentaigne," Brownlow said 
 mildly. " Rather far-fetched, isn't it ?" 
 
CONQUEST 77 
 
 "Far-fetched but not impossible, if you drive 'em to it," 
 Lentaigne said thoughtfully. "This is a country where 
 we speak of our great-grandfathers as you do of men of 
 your year at the 'Varsity. In England you live in the 
 present. Your past is a record, and a fine one, of a more 
 or less ordered procession of liberty. You beheaded a 
 king and deposed another, but you can look on it all now 
 without passion. What seemed crimes to Royalists and 
 Jacobites are now only landmarks of political change. 
 But the Irish have a sort of timeless memory of England 
 as an ogre, a sort of shameless and unscrupulous tyrant 
 who robbed them of liberty and oppressed them relentlessly. 
 Henry the Eighth, Elizabeth, Cromwell, William of 
 Orange, are merely steps in your political evolution. You 
 forget their crimes, if they were crimes, in the good they 
 did — for England. In Ireland they are murderers and 
 pillagers who have never died. They live on as symbols 
 of England. You progress from Tory to Whig, from Whig 
 to Radical, from Radical to Socialist, in a pleasant kind 
 of see-saw, but deep down in Irish minds you are all 
 still the bloody Cromwellian murderers who bore bleeding 
 children through the streets of Drogheda on pike tip, over 
 two hundred years ago. Your heroes are their devils and 
 their devils are you. Even the good-natured Dasent is a- 
 bloody tyrant bearing Greek gifts. I shouldn't be at all 
 surprised to find people who really believed that his light 
 railways were traps in which to maim or kill people," 
 he wound up, with a huge laugh. 
 
 "But this. is sheer madness," Brownlow gasped. 
 
 "It's the normal condition which an English historian 
 who knew anything of psychology would expect to find — 
 has frequently found, in fact — in any subject country not 
 subject to England. In the Italian provinces and Bohemia 
 under Austria, in the Poles under their many masters, 
 m the Christian races under Turkey." 
 
78 CONQUEST 
 
 "But, good Lord, to speak of us in the same breath as 
 the Turk," Brownlow said in indignant astonishment. 
 
 Lentaigne shrugged his shoulders. "You should hear 
 Pierce Daly," he said with a smile. "He gives you credit 
 for all the vices of the Turk, tind adds to them a special 
 brand of hypocrisy of which, he says, he'd be ashamed to 
 accuse the Turk." 
 
 " This can't be true ?" Brownlow asked, with a helpless 
 look round the table. 
 
 " They hate you, right enough," Scovell said with a laugh. 
 "But there isn't much vice in them at the bottom. Keep 
 on dribbling little things to them and they'll keep quiet. 
 Only you must protect the landlords— they're the bul- 
 warks of England." 
 
 " If my estates weren't here I'd never come to Ireland — 
 the people are so damnably vulgar and ungrateful." Drum- 
 beg lisped in his piping, shrill voice. " Often I feel ashamed 
 of sharing their religion. Even the priests are savages. I 
 frequently bring over an English chaplain with me to avoid 
 listening to a degradation of our beautiful holy Catholic 
 service." 
 
 Pakenham sniffed a little at this, but he controlled his 
 contempt and said vehemently, "Hear that, Brownlow. 
 Drumbeg, one of the best and oldest Catholics, can't stand 
 them. They hate you and they hate us. The only way 
 with them is to keep a heavy heel on their necks. Only an 
 Orangeman can understand an Irishman — Dasent is too 
 sentimental. Gifts are no use. The Irish always snap at 
 the hand that feeds them. Resolute government is what 
 they need, and plenty of it. There's no real lull in their 
 politics — there never is in hate. It will all break out 
 again. I appeal to Lentaigne." 
 
 Lentaigne pulled his trim beard, a mocking light in his 
 blue eyes. " It's all hours, and I've to drive six miles. You 
 promised to play for us, Mrs, Scovell, and Miss Eraser to 
 
CONQUEST 79 
 
 sing, and we're boring you with fusty politics. What are 
 we to do ?" 
 
 "The stroke is with you," Miss Fraser said with an 
 encouraging smile. 
 
 " Then I'll bore you with another speech," he said with 
 a sigh. 
 
 "Hear, hear," she said gaily, "and give it hot to the 
 Orangemen and the English." 
 
 " And you were born in Ulster," Pakenham said gloomily. 
 
 "But I'm not condemned to die blind," she said with a 
 shrug. " Go on, Mr. Lentaigne," fixing him with her large 
 brown eyes. He looked at her with half-closed lids, and 
 she lowered her eyes quickly. 
 
 " I'm a moderate man on a fence, trying to use my eyes," 
 he said, his eyes still on Miss Fraser. 
 
 " Indeed," Mrs. Scovell said derisively, with one implica- 
 tion. 
 
 " You're seeing from the other side of the fence already," 
 her husband said, thinking of politics, 
 
 "I agree with Pakenham that the Parnell split hasn't 
 killed the Home Rule demand — it's about the only thing 
 in which we agree. Little disputes between Parnellites 
 and anti-Parnellites hardly touch the issue. Redmond 
 and Dillon, O'Brien and Tim Healy disagree about means 
 — a mere surface disturbance on a deep sea. These storms 
 in a teacup don't lessen the passionate sense of wrong of 
 Ireland against England, nor the passionate feeling for 
 liberty that has survived a hundred defeats. They may 
 change the form of an organization, pull down one figure- 
 head and exalt another. The bishops fuss about sin and 
 Gladstone about the Nonconformist conscience, but in the 
 long run all England gets out of it is an added reputation 
 — if that were possible — for hypocrisy. It doesn't surprise 
 me in the least that there are people in Ireland who believe 
 that the Government faked the divorce case. All Ireland 
 
8o CONQUEST 
 
 in a few years will believe that England killed Parnell. 
 You break a whip in one man's hand and sow a whole 
 country with scorpions. There's not even the lull you 
 speak of. The whole country at this moment is seething 
 with a new life — this new-fangled co-operation, a movement 
 for keeping alive the language, for studying history, for 
 promoting Irish industries, and they are only a few of the 
 many symptoms of a new spirit of self-reliance. My dear 
 Brownlow, you may as well try to stop the Shannon with 
 a sieve, as hope to kill the Irish demand for liberty with 
 the gift of a railway. If you keep an innocent man locked 
 up manacled in a dark cell, you can't expect gratitude for 
 the gift of a chocolate cream. There's only on^^way of 
 earning his gratitude — and if you get it then it is because he 
 is magnanimous — and that is by letting him out. That's 
 the only kindness that will kill Home Rule. If the English 
 were an imaginative people, and not merely sentimental, 
 they'd free Ireland to-morrow in reparation and remorse 
 for wrongs and injuries. Happily the Irish are imagina- 
 tive and can admire and respect the bold gesture — they 
 may even forgive you. There is just one glimmer of hope 
 in the whole sorry business. Pakenham says the Irish hate 
 you. They don't. They think you hate them. They can't 
 believe that the cumulation of wrongs you've done them can 
 come of anything but an intense, persistent hatred — even 
 their imagination fails to fathom English stupidity. Oh, 
 I know you don't hate them — you needn't trouble to say it. 
 I only tell you what the Irish think — with some reason too. 
 If there is any hatred at all it is with us so-called Loyalists 
 here — a bitter frightened hate that is capable of any sort 
 of insanity." 
 
 "By God, he's gone over to the rebels," Pakenham said 
 furiously. 
 
 Drumbeg's slender body seemed to shrink as he mur- 
 mured, " To those vulgarians." 
 
CONQUEST 8i 
 
 Scovell s.wallowed a glass of port hastily, a troubled look 
 in his open face. "You don't mean all that, you know, 
 Lentaigne," he said with a worried 'laugh, slightly banging 
 his empty glass on the table. "You are just pulling 
 Brownlow's leg and taking a rise out of Drumbeg and 
 Hamilton. They rise to any old fly. But I'm too old a 
 friend not to know you. You're as English as I am, and 
 a good Protestant — we don't wan't any Orangemen down 
 here. But there's reason in everything. Live, and let 
 live, I say, but stick to your class. Lentaigne is a devil for 
 views," he added, with a sweep of his hand to his other 
 guests; "he was just airing them." 
 
 Brownlow flicked the ash off his cigarette medita- 
 tively. 
 
 "Very picturesque — reminds me of a Magdalen brekker 
 when we were all younger," he said, half with a cool in- 
 solence, half admiringly. " Dasent would be interested in 
 the point of view. It's a distortion of history of course, but 
 interesting for its survival value. What civilization the 
 Irish have, we gave 'em. They repaid us with outrage and 
 rebellion, but as befits a great empire, with large respon- 
 sibilities towards subject taces, we've been patient, infin- 
 itely patient. And we are getting our reward. Despite 
 what you all say, things are growing quieter. Dasent and 
 I have been keeping our eyes open, and we know. Ex- 
 perience in administration gives one skill in reading the 
 signs. The people are coming round slowly but surely. 
 Only yesterday a bishop proposed a vote of thanks to 
 Dasent for the Ballycourcey railway. A few — poets mostly 
 — give expression to extreme views, but poets break no 
 bones. We are even thinking of extending the bounds of 
 freedom — what was it Tennyson said ? — and make the 
 bounds of freedom wider yet ! We have been elaborating 
 a new conception of the Union. What is Ireland after all 
 but an English county ? All the people speak English — 
 
82 CONQUEST 
 
 at least of a sort. Why not give them county councils on 
 the English model ?" 
 
 " And destroy the power of our Grand Juries," Pakenham 
 said, horrified. 
 
 Lentaigne laughed. "Have you read Anatole France's 
 *L'Etui du Nacre,' Brownlow? The first story — a tale 
 about Pontius Pilate — is the portrait, for all time, of an 
 Irish Chief Secretary." 
 
 "I never read novels — but Dasent might be interested," 
 Brownlow said condescendingly. 
 
 "How long have you been in Ireland, Mr. Brownlow?" 
 Miss Eraser asked pertly. 
 
 "Three months." 
 
 " Wonderful ! To have learnt more about, us than we 
 know ourselves — in such a short time," she said ad- 
 miringly. 
 
 " It's the bringing of a fresh mind to bear on your prob- 
 lems. Miss Eraser, and — if I may say so — an open mind," 
 he said, with a mixture of modesty and pride. 
 
 Mrs. Scovell stopped the retort that was twitching on 
 Miss Eraser's lips by a sharp — 
 
 "Come, let's all go to the music room, Helen. Mr. 
 Lentaigne must have your song before he goes." 
 
 There was a movement of chairs, a patting of skirts, a 
 pulling down of waistcoats, and a vague muttering : 
 
 Drumbeg to himself, "Even one's own class in Ireland 
 is becoming impossible — they are little better than peasanta 
 —all of 'em." 
 
 Pakenham, half aloud, "I'm damned. Lentaigne too. 
 A halter is too good for him." 
 
 Mrs. Scovell to Miss Eraser, "Weren't you bored to 
 death, my dear?" 
 
 "I'll give the fellow a talking to when I get him alone 
 — ^knock all the nonsense out of him," Scovell muttered 
 fiercely to his napkin as he pitched it on to his chair. 
 
CONQUEST 83 
 
 "What would become of the country if the landlords 
 turned rebels ?" 
 
 "All very characteristic — very Irish. Dasent will be 
 amused," Brownlow formed on his tongue behind expres- 
 sionless lips. 
 
 " These political discussions are most useful/* Miss Gray- 
 son said aloud to no one in particular. " They bring the 
 two peoples closer together. I always suspected that the 
 Irish were really English, and Mr. Brownlow has con- 
 vinced me — a little more picturesque, perhaps." 
 
 Lentaigne drew abreast of Miss Eraser as she reached 
 the door of the long dining-room. 
 
 " You meant it all ?" she said eagerly. 
 
 "To start with, I don*t know. But it grew on me. I 
 suppose I've been feeling like that for some time." 
 
 " I knew it all along." 
 
 " I never see you," he said, interested in a pink profile. 
 
 In the big stone hall, the walls hung round with rifles 
 arranged in fans, she said irrelevantly : 
 
 "Pray for a south wind for me to-morrow. I'm fishing 
 over Grange Con reach in the afternoon — only Diana." 
 
 " Oh," he said reflectively. 
 
 " I wonder what that woman at Scarty will do now that 
 she's got some money," Mrs. Scovell said to Drumbeg at 
 the music-room door. "The boy is quite presentable." 
 
 7- 
 
 Jim Daly opened his eyes to a column of sunlight falling 
 slantwise across his bed from the circular pane at the top 
 of the window on his right, to a silver disc on the wall- 
 paper. His eyes, heavy with sleep, closed again. He 
 stretched his legs and wriggled his toes luxuriously, dimly 
 conscious that it was late. He opened one eye cautiously 
 
84 CONQUEST 
 
 and counted the little sprigs of rose on the wallpaper from 
 the corner of the room to the bright patch. He was late, of 
 coiirse, for the sun should have been coming through the 
 window by the washstand. Eight, nine, ten — plenty of 
 time for breakfast. A wagtail pecked at a pane beside 
 him. He looked at it for a moment, heaved back the bed- 
 clothes suddenly and, with a kick and a boimd, was on the 
 floor. His birthday — and to forget it like this. He ran 
 to the small dressing-table and gave a long sigh of satis- 
 faction. He took up a new half-crown, spun it into the 
 air, and, as it rested in his palm, sighed again, but this 
 time with faint regret. Well, there would be sixpence 
 over. He'd pay Dick Kavanagh his two shillings the first 
 thing. The rabbits — oh, bother ! He had promised thenr 
 a feed at seven and it was now a quarter past eight if it 
 was a minute. He stared dismally at a tin of hot water. 
 He looked round the room carefully. There was nothing 
 except — he handled new knickers contemptuously — and 
 he big enough for trousers, too. He smiled confidently 
 and continued his examination of the room-^his mother 
 wasn't likely to make a whole birthday out of new clothes. 
 They just happened. Was it something too big to bring 
 upstairs ? Or maybe it was in her own room ? He walked 
 on tiptoe to the open door leading to his mother's room, 
 and peeped in. She had beaten him out to-day — it was 
 that old drive to Drisheen did it all. Though it was fun^ 
 driving home with Dempsey all alone and it almost dark 
 — after nine, the latest he had ever been out. It was no use 
 — there was nothing there either. Would it be in a case, 
 or would his grandfather have fixed it up — a fly on and 
 all ? If only his Uncle Pat hadn't died at such an incon- 
 venient time he'd have been downstairs long ago and seen 
 it. It was fine though, sitting up till long after ten, and 
 eating a supper as if he were a mother or a grandfather, 
 and his mother giving one every chance to describe every- 
 
CONQUEST 85 
 
 thing down to the putting the money into the safe at the 
 bank, and his grandfather listening to every word though 
 he pretended to be reading a speech of John Redmond's. 
 He hadn't yet said his prayers. He wandered back 
 disconsolately to his own room, derived a momentary 
 pleasure from catching, with a sweep of his hand, a blue- 
 bottle which had buzzed in through the open window. He 
 listened to it buzz for a moment in his shut palm and, with 
 a sigh, let it fly up the wide chimney. Should he say his 
 prayers first or wash first ? With another sigh he knelt on 
 the strip of carpet beside the bed, shut his eyes firmly, and 
 got through the "Our Father" with no other distraction 
 than that the rabbits wanted cleaning out. At the " Hail 
 Mary " his eyes had somehow opened, had fixed themselves 
 on the half-crown thrown carelessly on the bed, and he was 
 wondering just how new it was. Inextricably mixed with 
 a hissing expression of belief in the mysteries of the Creed 
 was a firm conviction that the wheel would be silver — not 
 real silver, of course — and not brass. He confessed his 
 sins with wandering eyes — it folded up so small that it 
 might have fallen down somewhere and got hidden. He 
 began the act of contrition with a feeling of despair, mut- 
 tering aloud, "Oh, my God, I am heartily sorry," stopped 
 suddenly, his eyes glued to the open window by the wash- 
 stand, swooped up from his knees with a long-drawn, in- 
 credulous "Oh," and in a second was fingering tenderly, 
 eyes and mouth wide open, the top of a fishing-rod. He 
 leant out so as to get a full view of the glistening idol 
 resting on the doorstep — fixed up and all, with a silver 
 wheel and a fly tied on — it was his grandfather did that. 
 And the bait-tackle in its little wooden frame sitting as 
 quiet as quiet on the rush-bottom chair. And the new 
 basket slung on the arm. It was the very rod that he had 
 shown his mother in the window of Lanigan's shop at 
 Lisgeela. Wasn't she a brick to know that he was dying 
 
86 CONQUEST 
 
 for it, and he not letting her know that he wanted it even 
 one tiny bit — and it hfteen shillings, too. Talk about 
 wonders — why, he had hardly dared to hope. He hadn't 
 hoped, he had just only thought, and there it was. He 
 craned his neck out farther — yes, and there was the brown 
 canvas case almost hidden by the roses. Standing stiff, 
 too; it must have in it the extra strong top-length of rod 
 for bait fishing. 
 
 "What's up with the boy at all and he so late?" his 
 grandfather grumbled from within the depths of the door 
 opening on the lawn. 
 
 "I suppose I must get him up for school," his mother 
 said regretfully. "He was up too late last night" 
 
 " Yerra, and what does it matter about school ? Let the 
 boy have his sleep out," his grandfather said pettishly. 
 
 "Caught out. Coo-ey — coo-ey, mother, grandfather," 
 Jim cried delightedly. "Oh, tha-anks, tha-anks, mother 
 and grandfather," he shouted, as the tops of their heads 
 appeared beneath him. " I've never seen anything grander 
 than the rod — nor than the half-crown, either," he added 
 valiantly. " I'm a grown man now." 
 
 "I wish the day was darker and that he could try the 
 rod with some chance of a fish," his grandfather said, 
 anxiously peering at a cloudless blue sky, " and what wind 
 there's in it is from the east," he added regretfully. 
 
 "For shame, father. Do you want rain for the hay- 
 makers ?" Arabella said chidingly. 
 
 " Well, maybe you're right," Pierce said half-heartedly. 
 
 "As if I wouldn't try the rod in any case. There's sure 
 to be fish in any weather with a rod like this," Jim said 
 hopefully. 
 
 "Not dressed, lazybones. And breakfast almost on the 
 table," his mother said reprovingly. 
 
 "Oh, I forgot — but," as an extenuating plea, "I've said 
 my prayers; I'll be down in a jiff. I suppose you couldn't 
 
CONQUEST 8; 
 
 pass the rod up to me, mother ? Tm afraid of lifting it by 
 the top for fear of breaking it." 
 
 "Certainly not!" she said sharply. "Do hurry down, 
 Jim." 
 
 With a last, fond look at the rod he turned away, sigh- 
 ing. He took the can of water in his hand, but put it down 
 at once and ran again to the window. 
 
 "Say, mother, you haven't wished me a happy birth- 
 day," he said reproachfully. 
 
 "The boy is incorrigible," she said, wafting him a kiss 
 with a smile. 
 
 He washed and dressed hastily and was struggling with 
 his tie when he thought of Cornelius Nepos — ten lines and 
 not one done. He hadn't even opened his satchel — that 
 was Father Pat again. But perhaps Father Macdonald 
 wouldn't call him to-day. The day was so warm the Miss 
 Curleys would probably go to the sea and there would be 
 no lessons at all. He took the stairs at a headlong pace, 
 two steps at a time, and ran into Susan at the bottom. He 
 saw a kiss and a hug in her eyes and outstretched arms 
 and wished she wouldn't. But there was sure to be a sur- 
 prise to-day in his luncheon packet which she had in her 
 hand. He wondered where she had hidden the birthday 
 cake — and submitted. Susan was an old dear, and her 
 cakes the best in the world, but her kisses were hot and 
 sticky, not nice and cool like his mother's. He made 
 straight for the garden door and the rod, tested it over a 
 flower bed and caught a petal. He looked at the river 
 doubtfully, but his mother's warning voice made him put 
 down the rod with a reluctant sigh. He kissed his mother 
 and grandfather perfunctorily, lost in a calculation of when 
 at the earliest, and where, he could fish in the afternoon. 
 The long willow pool in the glen above Grange Con, where 
 his grand-uncle's land meared the river, was a famous 
 place, shaded even in the heat of the day. He could easily 
 
88 CONQUEST 
 
 get to the Driscoll's by five, leave Crabbit there, have an 
 hour and a half where, as grand-uncle Teige Driscoll said, 
 " Trout as long as a gossoon's arm, and twice as thick, are 
 plenty as starlings, and one or two of 'em'd be sure to rise 
 if you'd only coax 'em enough." He ate hot scones — an 
 unusual treat — as if they were a daily happening. Sud- 
 denly he shot out of his chair with a cry : 
 
 "The rabbits — I must feed 'em." 
 
 "They're fed long since," his grandfather said drily. 
 "Better have another hot cake." 
 
 "Oh, these are hot scones. How jolly," he said, sitting 
 down and attacking them afresh. • 
 
 There wasn't really much fear of Father Macdonald 
 keeping him in after hours even if he missed all the lessons. 
 Once in an age, perhaps. How could they go on talking 
 about the funeral with even the possibility of being kept in 
 in front of him— ^to-day, of all days. 
 
 "I'm off, mother; I couldn't eat another scone," he said, 
 jufcping up. 
 
 "He has left you none, father," she said ruefully. 
 
 "It's the making of a boy to have a good appetite," 
 Pierce said gleefully. "Sure the loaf bread is the safest 
 for an old man. And be sure to be back at four, Jim avick." 
 
 "Oh, that old cake," Jim said from the door. "I don't 
 bother about that now. But not one iota of a minute later 
 than four for tea, mother. I've ,to be at Tullyfin by five at 
 the latest, and 'twill take Crabbit half an hour from here." 
 
 " What new madness is this ?" his mother said, be- 
 wildered. 
 
 "The soundest of sound sense," his grandfather said 
 admiringly. " It's the fish is running in the .boy's head, 
 and it's there he'll get 'em, if they're to be got at all, on 
 a day like this." 
 
 But Jim had not waited for either verdict. After an- 
 other look at the^rod, he picked up his cap and satchel in 
 
CONQUEST 89 
 
 the hall, made sure that his luncheon was packed, but re- 
 sisted a temptation to see what was the surprise. He had 
 a moment's remorse in the stable on finding Crabbit not 
 only fed — his grandfather always did that — but rubbed 
 down and ready for the road, impatiently champing a 
 newly-polished bit. This gave him a spare half-hour. He 
 opened his satchel, hesitated between the Nepos and 
 " Quentin Durward." He chose the novel, and was so thrilled 
 by the reception of the herald that, though he galloped, 
 he was a quarter of an hour late by Burdett the watch- 
 maker's clock as he entered Lisgeela. By Crabbit's doing 
 his very best through the Lisgeela streets, and the luck of 
 finding Looney himself lounging under the sign-board, 
 "Patrick Looney. Entertainment for man and beast," he 
 was only seven minutes late as he opened the door of the 
 one small room of Father Macdonald's house, known as St. 
 Stanislaus College. Father Macdonald raised his eyes for 
 a moment from the damp page of the Lisgeela Weekly 
 Fulminator — which, on Friday, contradicted flatly all the 
 opinions and most of the news of the rival Thursday 
 Weekly News — suspended the operations of his gold 
 tortoiseshell toothpick, said: "Late again, Mr. Daly," 
 yawned and gave his attention to the street which his desk 
 overlooked. A dozen or so of curious pairs of eyes watched 
 Jim as he took his seat at the first of the two battered desks 
 that ran along the back of the room. He took out his 
 books with a contented sigh — it was always a favourable 
 sign when Father Mac. began the day with a newspaper 
 instead of Latin Grammar — opened his Nepos and Smith's 
 Smaller Latin-English Dictionary. 
 
 " Have you a sixpence ?" he whispered sibilantly to Dick 
 Kavanagh. 
 
 "I have." 
 
 A half-crown and a sixpence were exchanged. 
 
 Jim looked up a word in the dictionary. " Come to 
 
90 CONQUEST 
 
 Andrews* at playtime and have a threepenny ice," he 
 said. 
 
 "I will then," Dick Kavanagh said, licking his lips, 
 adding half admiringly, half enviously : " I suppose you're 
 very flush of the coin ?" 
 
 "That sixpence is all I have." 
 
 "Tell that to the marines," Dick said, with an incredu- 
 lous face, " and the whole world knowing ye found a gold 
 mine in the back garden and put it in the bank." 
 
 " Rot," Jim said, with all the importance of exact know- 
 ledge, looking up the same word again. What was the use 
 of giving thf ee or four meanings to a word when one never 
 knew which to choose ? With his fingers still marking the 
 page in the dictionary, he relented and gave Dick 
 Kavanagh a full account of the treasure hunt. 
 
 "And you didn't bag a fistful?" Dick said contemp- 
 tuously. 
 
 " I never thought of it," Jim said half regretfully, " and 
 
 " Oh, you're only an old molly-coddle after all, Jim Daly. 
 Sure I thought you had some spunk in you. Afraid of 
 Father Lysaght, no doubt ?" 
 
 Jim fired up and said with cold fury, "I'll blacken your 
 two eyes for that, Dick Kavanagh, the minute we get out." 
 
 "Silence, gentlemen," Father Macdonald, disturbed in 
 his reading of an unusually strong libel even for The 
 Fulminatory muttered pettishly, without looking up. 
 
 Jim scowled at the dictionary, took out his penknife, and 
 having found with difficulty on his portion of the desk a 
 clear space not already marked with his name, began to 
 cut vigorously. 
 
 "I was only joking," Dick Kavanagh cringed. "Sure 
 everyone knows you have courage in you for anything, let 
 alone a trifle like that. And it's not going back on the ice 
 you'd be?" 
 
CONQUEST 91 
 
 Jim considered gravely this new aspect of the case and 
 said magnanimously : " Well, of course, if you're sorry. 
 But I haven't told you about my new rod." 
 
 The discussion swayed pleasantly over the whole field of 
 wet and dry fly fishing, ground bait, the possibility of 
 greenheart in a fifteen-shilling rod, till Father Macdonald, 
 with a yawn that threatened for a few delirious moments to 
 leave his jaws permanently wide apart, said : 
 
 " In five minutes I'll take the first Latin class," expanded 
 his chest, blew a long breath from bulged cheeks, got up 
 impatiently and, his hands in his soutane pockets, lounged 
 in front of the window by his desk, with an abstracted gaze 
 at the street. 
 
 " Do you think he will ?" Jim said with a doubtful look 
 at the Nepos. 
 
 "He might," Dick Kavanagh said moodily. 
 Father Macdonald said : " Ah," and hurried out of the 
 room, making a vain attempt to cover his pleasure with a 
 heavy frown. 
 
 Dick Kavanagh vaulted over the front desk, rushed to 
 the window and peered out. 
 
 " Down books, boys, for the day. It*s the Miss Curleys 
 going to the sea," he rhymed excitedly. " They're talking 
 to him. But sure they have him persuaded beforehand ? — 
 see it in his eye. He's saying he will. They're coming in 
 to wait for him in the sitting-room." And after a few 
 minutes : " There, what did I tell you ? I hear him in his 
 bedroom, changing out of his soutane." 
 
 Dick had barely got back to his seat when Father Mac- 
 donald came in, fastening a stud in a clean, white cuff, too 
 wide for the sleeve of his coat. Having succeeded in ad- 
 justing the cuff to the sleeve he stood gravely at his desk, 
 rubbed his closed lips with the middle finger of his right 
 hand, sighed, rested both his hands on the desk, gazed at 
 them for a moment and said : 
 
92 CONQUEST 
 
 "Gentlemen, we are accustomed in St. Stanislaus Col- 
 lege to pay some token of respect to the memory of the 
 deceased clergy of the diocese. As to-morrow is a free day 
 in any case, I feel that I cannot do better than give you the 
 remainder of to-day in honour of such a revered and 
 venerated priest as Father Pat Daly." 
 
 "Hurrah," Dick Kavanagh shouted, waving Jim's dic- 
 tionary. 
 
 " It's not an occasion for levity," Father Macdonald said 
 with a frown. 
 
 Jim felt that his Uncle Pat was not such a bad fellow 
 after all, and hurried to Looney^s with Dick Kavanagh 
 talking incessantly in his wake. No ices were to be had at 
 Andrews' till one o'clock, but sixpence worth of chocolate 
 at Mai Ion's went a long way between two, and a slab of it 
 in a man's pocket was a generous thing against starvation 
 and he out fishing. And he'd go in for it, if Jim was un- 
 easy about leaving the pony. Not that he was ever back- 
 ward in spending his .own money, but he couldn't break in 
 on the half-crown which was as good as mortgaged in his 
 mind for an ass that he was saving up for. 
 ''"An ass," Jim said pityingly, stroking Crabbit's quarter. 
 
 "Oh, but he's a prize ass," Kavanagh said eagerly. 
 "And likely to win in the Lisgeela sports in August, and 
 maybe far and wide," embracing the universe in an elo- 
 quent gesture. 
 
 Jim admitted the difference readily and discussed age, 
 height, speed, and weight-carrying capacity. An invita- 
 tion from Dick to view the ass, "my own ass I might say, 
 and me only seven shillings off him," was hard to resist, but 
 the rod, not having yet been used, was still more attractive. 
 A proposal to go shares in the ass to the extent of seven 
 shillings found favour at first, but the difficulty of putting 
 together seven shillings seemed an insurmountable bar. 
 Dick pooh-poohed this, claiming, as the son of a solicitor. 
 
CONQUEST 93 
 
 to know everything. Any man with the name of money 
 could draw money out of a bank. Jim knew all about 
 cheques, of course, but no cheque that was ever written 
 could draw Father Pat's money from behind the big iron 
 door Mr. Murphy clanged on it. Dick said the word had 
 only to be said and his father'd have the law of Mr. Murphy 
 for it. Jim thought Mr. Murphy much too nice and quiet 
 to have the law of, but Father Lysaght would know. Dick 
 begged, for the love of heaven, to keep the ass dark from 
 Father Lysaght — it wasn't as if the ass was what you could 
 swear to as a prize ass, he never having actually won a 
 prize, only he had the cut of an ass that might easily win 
 one if he only got the chance. And as Jim hadn't the 
 money in his pockets and, so to speak, at liberty, it might 
 be as well to let the whole thing, ass and all, drop, for fear 
 worse'd come from Father Lysaght hearing about it, and, 
 maybe, his father. 
 
 The chocolate having been bought and divided fairly, 
 Jim set out for home. If only he had brought the rod with 
 him he could save a mile by. going direct to Tullyfin by the 
 Lisheen road. Providence had given him the whole day 
 for fishing in the glen. Yet his mother seemed sometimes 
 to have a strange disregard for Providence. And to-day's 
 gift was unduly complicated. The obvious intention of 
 Providence was that he should get his rod, ride straight to 
 the glen, run the chance — which was no chance at all but a 
 dead certainty — of getting a meal or meals at the Driscolls*, 
 spend the whole enchanted day in filling his basket with 
 fish, and be home just in time for supper. He had a 
 momentary thought of helping Providence in its intention 
 by slipping in quietly to the cottage, securing the rod and 
 slipping out again without a word said and no one the 
 wiser. But Crabbit's steady trot hammered a sustained 
 objection to this. It wasn't so much that it couldn't be 
 done that moved him, for difficulty was only another at- 
 
94 CONQUEST 
 
 traction, but the memory of a look in his mother's eyes 
 when she looked down her nose at him. There was nothing 
 for it but to face all the risks — only his mother must give 
 way about dinner. It was simply impossible to waste one's 
 time at Scarty waiting for dinner till half-past one — he was 
 determined on that. 
 
 A spirited argument ended in a compromise. His 
 mother made no difficulty about dinner, but she insisted 
 on tea — she'd put it off till five or half-past, but he must be 
 back. When he realized that the birthday cake was really 
 a treat for his grandfather he gave in at once. A grand- 
 father who never forgot anything, who had actually un- 
 screwed and packed the rod "so that there'd be no delay 
 on the boy," who had fitted a shoulder strap on the case 
 and provided a new landing net, was one to be considered 
 and coddled. 
 
 At half-past twelve Jim, dismounted, the reins in his 
 hand, was undoing the hasp of the gate opening on the 
 bawn of his grand-uncle Teige's house. 
 
 " It's Jim Daly that's in it as sure as I'm alive," a flushed, 
 stoutish, brown-eyed woman shrieked from the door of the 
 long, low, thatched farm-house. 
 
 " It is, Mrs. Con," Jim said, with a timid obviousness. 
 
 "Well, now, if that isn't the luck of the world," she said, 
 wiping her hands in her rough brown apron and pulling 
 down her turned-up sleeves, a little girl hanging on to her 
 skirt. "Sure it's you that can tell us all about it. Con 
 brought the news home from the market, but it was that 
 sketchy that there was no satisfaction in it. It's the great 
 man entirely you're going to be, I'm told — it's making a 
 priest of you they'll be, or something grand like that, or 
 turning you into quality like your mother." 
 
 "I hope Uncle Teige will let me have a day's fishing," 
 Jim said, bewildered. 
 
 "Sure he will and a hundred of 'em. I'm blessed if it 
 
CONQUEST 95 
 
 isn't the quality breaking out in him already," she laughed 
 good-humouredly, as she wrung his hand. "Is it afeard 
 of your own cousin you are, Betsy ? It isn't kind mother 
 for her to be shy, but you never know how childre'll turn 
 out. Run away then, agra, and caU in your father to his 
 dinner. If it was them other thieves of the world, Mike 
 and Sarah Anne was in it, it's lepping about you they'd 
 be, but it's in school they are, thank God, if they aren't 
 mitching. Tie the pony to the latch o' the door, and Con'll 
 take him round. Your grand-uncle is within. In with 
 you, now. And wasn't it lucky, Mike laid a cross line last 
 night, though his father is agin it, so it's a salmon we have 
 for the dinner. Sure it's God always provides for the 
 Friday. Father-in-law, here's your sister's grandson 
 coming to see you," she shouted, slapping Crabbit away 
 from the door, and pushing Jim into the kitchen in front 
 of her. 
 
 "It's not as deaf as all that I am, woman," Teige Dris- 
 coll quavered through toothless gums. " Didn't I hear you 
 telling it to the whole barony out on the bawn there. I'm two 
 years older than the man that's dead, but it's the full use of 
 all my senses I have yet, thanks be to God. But sure it's 
 heartily welcome anyone of your name is to this house, Jim 
 Daly," he added, with grave courtesy, taking the boy's 
 hand. 
 
 " Shout up to him, Jim, boy, sure it's as deaf as a post he 
 is," Mrs. Con said placidly, preparing another place at the 
 table already laid for a meal in the right-hand corner of 
 the kitchen, between the settle and the open hearth. 
 
 "My mother and grandfather sent you their love," Jim 
 shouted. 
 
 "Think o' that now," the old man said, his hand to his 
 ear. " And she a Levin and all that, and she once a black 
 Protestant. It's many a raking I gave her father and his 
 father before him on a platform and the like. And it's 
 
96 CONQUEST 
 
 Pierce Daly is the decent man. Sorra better Irishman 
 there is in the whole country, though he married my own 
 sister. I wish I could say the same for the man that's 
 dead. It's a good priest he was, I'm told, and that might 
 get him past Saint Peter, but it's little help he'll have in 
 getting to heaven from all he ever done for his country." 
 
 "It's too much speechifying is running in this family," 
 Mrs. Con shouted, as she lifted half a salmon from a big 
 pot on the hearth. 
 
 " Maybe it's a salt herring or only an egg itself you'd be 
 having for your dinner this day if it wasn't for the speeches, 
 and not a fine salmon like that," he said triumphantly. 
 
 "Hear him now, and it Mike the ruffian with a cross- 
 line," she said with a shrug. " What did a speech ever get 
 for a man but jail or to be thrown out of house and home ?" 
 
 "At it again, Sally. Sure it's a fine hand you are at the 
 speeches yourself, God bless you. It's jealous she is, 
 father, at not seeing the inside of a jail herself," Con Dris- 
 coll said pleasantly from the doorway. 
 
 The old man drew himself up and looked at his son 
 admiringly. Both men were clad alike in frieze, white 
 flannel bawneens, and white linen shirts open at the neck. 
 The red hair, firm jaw and mouth, the stocky but wiry 
 figure of the son could all be traced in the father. Lack of 
 teeth made the old man's jaws sharper and compressed his 
 lips, and years had slightly bent his shoulders, but his 
 blue eyes were as bright and clear as his son's. 
 
 "A woman is too weak a vessel for such a high level of 
 honour as the jail, with the treadmill and the oakum pick- 
 ing and the skilly we had in my time," Teige said proudly. 
 
 "Don't be frightening young Jim off it before his time 
 comes," the son said with a laugh. It's fine metal he'll be 
 for any league that's in it in a few years' time. And the 
 cause'll be none the worse for the cartful of sovereigns I'm 
 told Father Pat left. Though it's little honour there is in 
 
CONQUEST 9; 
 
 the jail now compared with my father's time, with your own 
 clothes and the best of eating and drinking from outside. 
 It's some dirty trick of the English to try and cure us of the 
 jail by making it pleasant for us." 
 
 " Yerra, give the boy some peace from the English," Mrs- 
 Con said, half emptying a pot of new potatoes into a large 
 wooden bowl. " As if he hadn't enough of that with Pierce 
 Daly. It's a trout the boy wants to kill and not the 
 English." 
 
 "When I grow up I'll fight the English," Jim said calmly. 
 
 " You wouldn't lay hooks for a salmon, Jim ; it's to fight 
 the English clean you will," Con said, with a wry look at 
 the fish. 
 
 Jim blushed. " I only fish for trout," he said evasively. 
 
 "Let ye all sit down," Mrs. Con said good-humouredly. 
 "What if the fish was poached itself — sorra one'd know it 
 from the taste. I never met such a man. He'd melia-mur- 
 der the English — in his talk anyway — and he goes into the 
 tantrums if an innocent boy lays a crossline for a Friday 
 dinner." 
 
 "Women is women," Con shouted despairingly to his 
 father. 
 
 " They are, the poor things," his father said with a com- 
 miserating nod. 
 
 "You can't be with your father for one minute, Betsy, 
 without dirtying your pinny," Mrs. Con said by way of 
 retort. "Run away into the room at once and put on a 
 clean bib. But sure the men are all alike. Take some 
 butter, Jim, with the new potatoes — they're like to hang 
 heavy on the stomach without it. It's to save Con a jour- 
 ney you did by coming in on us to-day, It'd ill befit a 
 Driscoll not to be at the funeral of any one of the Dalys — 
 though it's a distant man Father Pat was in his ways — and 
 Con was going to ride into Lisgeela to find out about the 
 funeral, though he has a cow going to calf on him and a 
 
98 CONQUEST 
 
 field of hay in windrows and only God above knowing 
 when the weather mightn't break. But sure you'll be able 
 to tell us that and more besides — the whole ins and outs 
 of the will and everything. Betsy'd be a better warrant to 
 bring home the rights of a story than Con there, and it 
 happening, as you might say, under his eyes within in the 
 market. A hundred questions I put to him if I asked him 
 one, and only got back for my pains *The man died sud- 
 den, I tell you, and Jim's got the money,' just as if he 
 hadn't a tongue on him nor an eye nor an ear in his head." 
 
 " It's paralysis of the tongue she'll be getting next," Con 
 said with a resigned shrug. 
 
 " Eh, what ?" the old man said with his hand to his ear. 
 "You're right. Con. The dead man was no Nationalist. 
 Never paid a penny to a league nor stood on a platform in 
 his life, and when Parnell himself was at a meeting near 
 Drisheen, sorra outside his door Father Pat'd step to bid 
 him the time of day. Looking down on him to-day in 
 heaven Parnell is for it IVe no doubt." 
 
 Mrs. Con looked doubtful. "It's a great man entirely 
 Parnell was, surely," she shouted. "But as for him being 
 up in heaven now, and he a Protestant and no better than 
 he should be, so they say, I wouldn't put him past purga- 
 tory myself." 
 
 " It's high among the saints of God he is," the old man 
 said sternly. " Didn't he die a martyr, or as good as one, 
 the way Gladstone and the English harried him from pillar 
 to post; and don't the catechism itself say that the blood 
 of a martyr blots out every sin ? Every man that died for 
 his country, be he a Turk or an atheist, let alone a Pro- 
 testant, gets a high place in heaven. Wolfe Tone and 
 Robert Emmett and Lord Edward Fitzgerald, though they 
 were Protestants itself, are wearing crowns as bright as 
 St. Patrick himself. The Pope may deny it to them — may 
 God forgive him for being in the pay of the English — but 
 
CONQUEST 99 
 
 sure God knows better, and the people know better, being 
 one and the same, for doesn't the whole world know that 
 the voice of the people is the voice of God ?" 
 
 "It's your father is the great theologian. Con, may God 
 bless him," Mrs. Con said admiringly. "He has a better 
 grip of it than any priest I ever heard. And sure it's not 
 for the likes of me to meddle in high matters of the kind. 
 Have another taste of the salmon, Jim, and tell us all about 
 Father Pat." 
 
 Jim, at the start, was almost as unresponsive as her 
 husband, but he yielded more to a detailed questioning. 
 Happily Con remembered the cow at about a quarter to 
 two, and broke short Mrs. Con's fiftieth eager question 
 about the biscuit tins which had moved her to deep emo- 
 tion. Jim got up from the table with a sigh of relief. He 
 had enjoyed the attentive audience, but there had been 
 moments when tears were near his eyes at the thought of all 
 the fish he was missing. Con examined the tackle with 
 minute care, fixed the rod, tied on a new fly and presented 
 Jim with half a dozen, " never known to fail." " If it wasn't 
 for the cow and the hay I'd go with you myself," he said 
 regretfully. " The sky is clouding up a little and you may 
 have a rise or two. And as you've to be back home at half- 
 past five, you say, I'll send Mike down to the bridge at 
 Grange Con to meet you with the pony." 
 
 Jim whipped the willow pool up and down without 
 getting a rise. He saw several fish, deep down, almost 
 motionless, or moving lazily, but could not tempt them to 
 the surface, though he tried fly after fly. Excitement lapsed 
 into boredom. His right arm was tired and he felt the 
 heat intensely. He picked out the notes of the different 
 birds and was tempted to put down his rod and look for 
 nests. The buzzing of insects and a faint, distant gurgle 
 of water lulled his senses till he almost slept standing. The 
 top of his rod touched the water several times. But each 
 
100 CONQUEST 
 
 time he braced himself, determined to stick it out. He 
 remembered the luncheon which he had transferred from 
 his satchel to the fish basket, decided to try another fly, 
 and opened the luncheon packet in the process — one bread- 
 and-butter sandwich, two jam sandwiches, a hard-boiled 
 egg, and a slab of butterscotch. Susan was a brick. He 
 kept the sweet for last and rolled the rectangular slab, 
 whole, round and round in his mouth appreciatively as he 
 tried another cast. He crunched the sweet as he heard 
 voices approach down the glen on the opposite bank. 
 Round a willow came two men, one in waders, followed by 
 a man carrying two salmon rods and a landing net. He 
 recognized the man with the long, bushy beard as Blake, 
 Scovell's water bailiff, a famous fisherman. He mustn't be 
 caught lagging. He swallowed the sweet quickly and gave 
 all his attention to his cast. 
 
 "The rottenest day I've ever had — to come home with- 
 out a fish," came down the river. That was Scovell him- 
 self. He gave them a rapid glance. And the other was 
 Red Drumbeg, one of his cousins who wasn't a cousin — 
 a freak who was no good for man or woman or God or 
 King or country, his grandfather said. He blushed a little 
 and stiffened. 
 
 "That's the youngest of the brood of vipers," Scovell 
 said, with a shrug. 
 
 "What? That boy?" Drumbeg lisped. 
 
 "Pierce Daly's grandson," Scovell said. 
 
 " But he's fishing your water," Drumbeg said indignantly. 
 
 Jim turned his head and stared at them with level, steady 
 blue eyes. He lengthened his line and the fly fell within 
 a foot of the opposite bank. 
 
 "The impudent young beggar," Drumbeg said angrily. 
 
 Scovell laughed. " He's game enough, anyway," he said 
 ruefully. "It is my water, I suppose," he added without 
 lowering his voice as they moved off. " At least, it used to 
 
CONQUEST 101 
 
 be, but one never knows where one staridstJaes^idayfe*'' HiS' 
 grandfather's people-in-law, the Driscolls, are my tenants 
 along that bank, and they claim the fishing — they even 
 warned me off it a couple of years ago. It was too much 
 trouble to tes't the matter so I let 'em have it." 
 
 Their voices floated back for a while against the silence 
 of the glen in mutual recrimination on landlords' rights, 
 and on letting the country go to the dogs in not keeping 
 tenants well under. With the voices, Jim's ardour for fish- 
 ing died. If Blake, who knew the wiles of fish and the 
 Owneybeg in all her moods, had failed, it was simply all 
 up. He fished down towards Grange Con bridge, but with 
 a lack of interest that allowed frequent searches for wild 
 strawberries on the grassy ridge rimning almost parallel 
 to the river but fifty yards back. It could not be much 
 after four, he guessed by the sun, when he got to the bridge. 
 Sitting on the parapet, on the Lisgeela side, he dawdled 
 over his fly-book, unfastened several flies from his cap and 
 put them in the book. He chased a butterfly, wished he 
 had brought "Quentin Durward," packed his rod, debated 
 whether he'd go back to Driscoll's for Crabbit or wait for 
 Mike. He sat on the parapet again, let himself down to 
 a ledge from which the low arch sprang, tried to touch the 
 water with his boot, holding on the ledge with his elbows, 
 failed, but succeeded in regaining the parapet after 
 slipping twice back on to the ledge. He traced the river 
 far below Lisgeela by the glint ofsilver on the water. Scarty 
 was hidden away somewhere at the foot of the upland, but 
 that was the Daly house demesne stretching away in front 
 and to the right, though he couldn't see the house. And 
 there was a woman fishing down on the Dalyhouse side. 
 How foolish of her on such a bright afternoon. The little 
 girl by her side, chasing butterflies with the landing net, 
 had more sense. A man with a peaked beard rode up on 
 a bicycle. It was Mr. -Lentaigne of Derrylim — a landlord, 
 
102 CONQUEST 
 
 ? |>i^73|ife,6fithe.bes't€)f-a bad lot, grandfather Daly had said 
 one day after an argument with him in the Lisgeela Post 
 Office. And always afterwards Mr. Lentaigne had nodded 
 and smiled at Jim when they passed one another in Lis- 
 geela. But to-day he seemed to look through him without 
 a trace of his funny smile ; with a sort of glazed, searching 
 look that seemed to wander down the river. He made an 
 exclamation as he passed, and Jim turned towards him 
 thinking that he had spoken to him. But Lentaigne, tak- 
 ing no notice of him, jumped off his bicycle, half threw it 
 against the side of the bridge, jumped the low wall at the 
 side and walked rapidly down the river bank towards the 
 woman and child. Jim was interested in Lentaigne's 
 shadow. He thought of giants and seven-leagued boots. 
 If Lentaigne were Quentin Durward he'd be engaged in 
 some adventure. Perhaps he was. There was the lady, 
 but there were no ruffian soldiery about. In ambush, per- 
 haps. He jumped off the parapet and his eye caught the 
 bicycle. A bicycle was one of his dreams. He examined 
 it closely — a sprightly, American machine with yellow 
 wooden rims and a perky little saddle, and geared to 
 seventy-two. He stood back a little and looked at it 
 scornfully. It was too flimsy — his own, with a deep sigh, 
 if he ever got one, would be a Humber. What was keeping 
 that lazy Mike? But it wasn't nearly five yet. He sat 
 again on the parapet. Did anybody ever pass over the 
 Grange Con bridge? He was like Alexander Selkirk in 
 Juan Fernandez — and there were the savages coming 
 nearer. It was the little Scovell girl — Diana they called 
 her. They must be acting a play. It was very like the 
 play he had seen in the town hall at Lisgeela. Little 
 Diana had the rod now — it was too funny how she held it, 
 just as if she were bait fishing. But little girls were like 
 that — they knew nothing about anything. And she looked 
 as important as if she could catch a fish. She was just a 
 
CONQUEST 103 
 
 doll — a rather nice doll. But it was Mr. Lentaigne and 
 the lady who looked most like the people in the play. 
 There they were, away back from the river, under the shade 
 of the old elm, just like the tree on the stage, with patches 
 of light quivering on the grass. And the lady was stand- 
 ing quite still, her hands by her side, her head bent a little 
 to hide her blushes, and her eyes were fixed on the sunlight 
 at Mr. Lentaigne's feet. He was looking at her with the 
 very eyes of the man in the play, and talking quickly too, 
 his beard making little funny movements, his hands rest- 
 less. It would soon be time for her to look up ; but he had 
 to take her hand first. There — he had taken it. Now — 
 yes, there she was, looking up at him with that sort of look 
 in her eyes that one didn't know whether she was going to 
 cry or laugh. And now he'd put his arm out and she'd fall 
 on to it, but with her head turned so that he could kiss 
 her. There — but they did it far better in the play. And 
 now his godmother would die and leave him a fortune, and 
 her father would relent, and they would be married and 
 live happy ever after. And there they were off now, wan- 
 dering down by the river just as if she had no rod to look 
 after, and he no bicycle lying on the side of the road 
 for anyone to run off with — but they were always like 
 that. 
 
 Jim watched them disappear with a look of tolerant con- 
 tempt which deepened to disgust as his eyes fell again on 
 Diana. She was now sitting on the bank, the rod held 
 under her arm, its top bobbing in the water, while, with 
 both hands, she was making a daisy chain. Making daisy 
 chains was all little girls were good for. 
 
 She shrieked and made a grab at the rod. 
 
 " Miss Fraser, Miss Fraser," she called excitedly, looking 
 round bewildered. 
 
 "Let it run free — don't jerk him," Jim shouted, as he 
 raced along the top of the parapet. 
 
104 ' CONQUEST 
 
 " The line is all running away. Oh, boy, boy," she said 
 despairingly. 
 
 " Let it go free — run along the bank with him." 
 
 He was at her side in a few seconds and had firmly 
 taken possession of the rod. -. * 
 
 "IVe caught a fish — I've caught a fish," she shouted, 
 making wild leaps. 
 
 "Maybe — if you haven't lost him," he said grimly, try- 
 ing to control, as befitted a man, excitement even deeper 
 than hers. 
 
 "He's on it all right," he shouted joyfully, after a few 
 seconds' despair over a slackened line. "A monster he is, 
 too." 
 
 " Is it a salmon ?" she asked in an awed tone. 
 
 "A pound-and-a-half trout if he's an ounce," he said, 
 too excited to be contemptuous. "Run back for the net." 
 
 She hung about him, hopping from leg to leg and wav- 
 ing the net excitedly. "It's my fish — not your fish nor 
 Miss Eraser's. I caught it," she said determinedly. 
 
 " It might get off yet," he said, with a smile. 
 
 "Oh, don't lose him," she begged. And then with a 
 frown and a stamp of her foot : " If he goes it's you lost 
 him, and you'll be a horrid boy." 
 
 He gave an effective answer to this by landing the trout 
 without the net on a little patch of sand. She swooped 
 down on the fish, held it up in her hands triumphantly. 
 "Father didn't catch a fish, Miss Fraser didn't catch a 
 fish. Lord Drumbeg didn't catch a fish. Did you catch a 
 fish ?" with a note of doubt in the paean of joy. 
 
 "I didn't," he said gloomily. 
 
 " Hurrah ! Only I caught a fish," she chanted, as she 
 jumped about in a sort of Indian war dance. 
 
 "You're like the pink fairy in the play," he said, "only 
 you dance better." 
 
 He gazed at her, his mouth a little open. 
 
CONQUEST 105 
 
 The mischievous look in her blue eyes and her mutinous 
 lips sobered down. She stood quite still and stared at him 
 solemnly. " I didn*t quite altogether catch the trout — you 
 helped me," she said. 
 
 "Oh, that was nothing," he said loftily. "Tm nine — 
 this is my birthday." 
 
 The corners of her lips drooped a little. "I'd be seven 
 if my birthday was now, but it isn't till December," she 
 said doubtfully, adding with more confidence : " IVe a 
 pony and two canaries and a goldfinch." 
 
 "IVe a pony for ages and ages, and five rabbits and a 
 trout-rod of my own," he said half-heartedly, a little 
 ashamed of throwing such glories in the face of a girl who 
 was only six and a half really. 
 
 "Your pony is a common pony," she said disdainfully. 
 "IVe seen him often. You're the common little boy that 
 we don't know that lives in the cottage near our gate and 
 your mother suicided herself." 
 
 He flushed hotly but restrained his anger. If she were 
 a boy — but he couldn't hit even a boy of that age. And 
 she was only a girl and didn't know what she was saying. 
 He shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 "And I'm a Protestant and you're only a Catholic, like 
 the servants," she said, making a last dash for superiority. 
 "They adore idols and go to hell — granny says so," she 
 added in explanation. 
 
 He laughed with a calm certainty. The whole world 
 knew that it was Protestants who went to hell. The retort 
 was on the tip of his tongue but he checked himself. She 
 was too like one of the angels to go to hell — one of the 
 cross ones. She was wriggling a pink toe through a hole 
 in her sandal. The sun caught a strand of hair falling 
 down from under her broad hat and turned it into gold. 
 The freckles on her proud little nose were like specks of 
 gold dust. The slight tan on her face only made it a 
 
io6 CONQUEST 
 
 cooler and firmer creamy pink. He had never seen any- 
 one so nice and cool. If she weren't a Scovell and a 
 Protestant and a landlord and English she'd be fun to 
 play with. x 
 
 He sighed. " There's Mike above on the bridge ; I must 
 be going," he said regretfully. 
 
 " That's your pony. Oh, do give me a ride, won't you ?" 
 she said eagerly. "Oh, bother," she added, stamping her 
 foot angrily. "There's old Grayson and granny coming 
 to fetch me and Miss Eraser to tea at Tullyfin. And now 
 I can't have my ride." She turned her anger on Jim. 
 "And granny will give it to you hot if she finds you 
 poaching on our land." 
 
 The unfairness of this staggered him a little. "I'm not 
 afraid of the old souper," he said angrily. 
 
 "What's a souper? She's not a souper — she's my 
 granny. Lady Alice Scovell," Diana said, divided between 
 curiosity and indignation. 
 
 "She steals Catholic babies and sends them away to 
 Dublin in baskets to be brought up Protestants," Jim said, 
 stalking away. 
 
 " Oh, how nice — and then they're not on the road to hell 
 any more," Diana said in a glow of excitement over the 
 attractive information. "You're not a very horrid little 
 boy, and you can take the old fish if you like," she called 
 pleadingly. 
 
 He was already climbing the slope to the bridge. This 
 was the last straw and helped him to set his face in that 
 "proud, impudent look," which, Susan Roche had taught 
 him as a child, was "the fit face for a Daly to meet a 
 Scovell with." 
 
 Lady Alice Scovell, however, saw no impudence in his 
 fearless, boyish face as he passed the landau. She watched 
 him through her lorgnette. "I know the lout with the 
 pony," she said to Miss Grayson. "The son of Driscoll, 
 
CONQUEST 107 
 
 one of the worst ruffians on the Tullyfin estate. But who 
 is the attractive child that was speaking to Diana ?" 
 
 "He*s the grandson of the darling old patriot, Pierce 
 Daly," Miss Grayson said warmly. 
 
 "Fudge," the old woman said, clicking her glasses 
 to. " What a common-looking boy ! And his mother was 
 once a lady. You must be more careful of your young 
 charge. Miss Grayson. She mustn't be allowed to come in 
 contact with such riff-raff. Sentimentality is to be ex- 
 pected in an Englishwoman, but to call a murderer — or 
 what is just as bad — a patriot is a little too much. You'll 
 be giving them Home Rule next. And where's that Miss 
 Eraser ? To go off and leave the child alone. She's a 
 Eraser of B ally o wen, but since she's taken to flirting with 
 rebellion she's not to be trusted in anything." 
 
 "She's coming up the bank with Mr. Lentaigne," Miss 
 Grayson said, glad to free herself from attention. 
 
 "Oh," Lady Alice said, with a grim smile, again fixing 
 her lorgnette. "Perhaps Mr. Lentaigne is why she's a 
 rebel — he's not safe I'm told." 
 
 " What sort of a day had you, Jim ?" Mike Driscoll said, 
 as he handed him the reins. 
 
 "A rotten day," Jim said, gruffly, discharging some of 
 his anger on the unoffending Mike by jerking away the 
 reins. 
 
 8. 
 
 Arabella Daly sat sewing in her own sitting-room. It 
 was the room in which the wife of Pierce the Rake had, for 
 several dreary years, bewailed the fortunes of the Daly 
 family. At her death it had been shut up, and had re- 
 mained unused during Ann Daly's time. A few days 
 after Arabella's marriage Pierce had given her the key, 
 saying that the south room'd be some place for her to go 
 into when she was tired of the voices of the men in the 
 
io8 CONQUEST 
 
 parlour. The three windows in the bow looked on to the 
 juniper hedge, trellised with roses, dividing the lawn from 
 the garden, and gave a glimpse of the river beyond the 
 cedar trees on the right. Another window at the side gave 
 a view of the Lisgeela road. 
 
 In her first months at Scarty Arabella sat oftenest by the 
 window overlooking the road. She had accepted Theobald 
 with a full realization of his narrow life and had never re- 
 gretted her choice. But this did not prevent longings and 
 regrets for many of the things she had given up. She 
 watched the road day after day, hoping that her mother 
 would come. Once, as she sewed a dress for the baby she 
 was expecting, she saw the Lissyfad horses turn the bend 
 with Tanner on the box. She pressed the garment to her 
 breast and waited, her heart beating violently, till she got 
 a side view of the Victoria. Her heart almost stopped as 
 she saw her mother, her face white and strained, gazing at 
 the house. Her tears fell freely on the white muslin. Of 
 course her mother had felt how much she wanted her and 
 was coming. She rushed to the front door, but as she 
 opened it the carriage passed by. She struggled to the 
 gate and watched, with numbed body and eyes that barely 
 registered an impression, the carriage cross the bridge and 
 drive in at the Dalyhouse gate. 
 
 Nothing mattered very much after that. No stab ever 
 went so deep again. Her father rode by often on his way 
 to meets at Ballyfahey and Knockeen, sitting his horse 
 stiffly, never even looking at the cottage. Her brother 
 Jasper always walked his horse past and stared half 
 shamefacedly, half contemptuously at the house. Peter 
 with his regiment in India — ^how would he treat her? 
 And of all her relatives and friends Uncle Silas was the 
 only one that had called. It hurt, but she felt no bitter- 
 ness, though she took to sitting in the bow overlooking the, 
 river. 
 
CONQUEST 109 
 
 With a sort of tender irony, her mind went back over the 
 past as she sewed a tuck in the sleeve of one of Jim's shirts. 
 She was still in the hastily improvised black dress which 
 she had worn at the funeral, and caught a glimpse of her- 
 self in an old mirror set in the panelling between the win- 
 dows. What had it all mattered to her ? She smiled 
 faintly with her lips, but there was no change in her sad 
 eyes. She had had Theobald and now there was Jim. The 
 room breathed of Jim. There was the little old oak table 
 at which she had taught him his first lessons, and the hand 
 sewing machine with which she had made almost every 
 garment he had ever worn, and the little shelf with his 
 books. She snapped a thread. Was he to be snapped 
 off from her just like that? What were her own plans for 
 him but just that ? Was her father-in-law right after all ? 
 There was a loud knock at the door and Susan bobbed in 
 her head. 
 
 " It's Father Lysaght come to see you, ma'am. Will I 
 bring in the tea now or wait till the master and Mister Jim 
 come back ?" 
 
 "Bring it in now," Arabella said as she put aside the 
 sewing. "It's very good of you to come so soon," she 
 added, shaking hands with the priest. " I was afraid you 
 couldn't get away from the dinner." 
 
 "My dear lady, I'd keep an appointment with His 
 Satanic Majesty to escape carving beef for twenty-five 
 hungry priests on a hot June day. What's worrying you ?" 
 
 "It's Jim," she said meekly. 
 
 "There's a novelty now," he said mockingly. 
 
 " We must settle about him before I begin to waver," she 
 said pleadingly. 
 
 "Wavering?" he said drily. "You must give me some 
 tea to strengthen me to say 'Ditto' to all the foolishness 
 you have already decided on. A funeral's a thirsty 
 business." 
 
no CONQUEST 
 
 "You know I always ask your advice," she said demurely. 
 
 "And always follow your own whims." 
 
 "Considered judgments," she suggested. 
 
 "Far be it from me to fight for the last word with a 
 woman. And here's Susan with the tea." 
 
 " There's four cups for your reverence, without calling on 
 the water," Susan said, with a bob towards the priest, " and 
 fine and strong too, to your liking." 
 
 "Not even our tea is safe from you — I like mine weak," 
 Arabella complained. 
 
 " You can water yours down, ma'am," Susan said primly, 
 as she left the room, "but sure, the clergy must have every- 
 thing to their taste." 
 
 "Undue influence again, I suppose," the priest said 
 derisively. 
 
 " I don't criticize my priests," Arabella said ironically, 
 adding more seriously, "Anyhow I forgive them a lot for 
 the beautiful sermon the bishop preached to-day. It was 
 wonderful. 
 
 "Very," Father Lysaght said drily. 
 
 "Who's critical now?" Arabella laughed. "And to get 
 up out of bed too, with a bad cold ! It was a remarkable 
 funeral." 
 
 " It was," Father Lysaght said with a chuckle. " It was 
 reported that the bishop had a convenient cold and in- 
 tended to snub Pierce Daly by not attending his brother's 
 funeral. That big gathering of people had little to do 
 with poor Father Pat, though it was his funeral. It was 
 partly a political meeting in honour of Pierce, and partly 
 a snub to the bishop." 
 
 "But no one could have spoken more highly than Dr. 
 Deehan did of my father-in-law — called him the grand old 
 man of the land war, a model patriot and what not ?" 
 
 Father Lysaght nodded and swallowed his second cup 
 of tea. " Father Carberry got wind of the demonstration. 
 
CONQUEST III 
 
 and the bishop made a marvellous recovery from his cold. 
 Even Mallon the grocer, who organized the funeral, admits 
 that the bishop carried off all the honours." 
 
 "I intend to send Jim to an English school," she said 
 after a short pause. 
 
 He lifted his eyebrows whimsically. "Beaumont or 
 Downside or Stonyhurst ?" he asked, holding out his 
 cup. 
 
 "No, not to a Catholic school. Winchester — if I can 
 get him in. I want you to tell me what he knows — 
 whether he must go to a private school first or have a tutor. 
 What has he learned at the college ?" 
 
 "Now, Mrs. Daly, that's hitting below the belt. Re- 
 member I'm a priest and a governor of the college — may 
 God forgive me." 
 
 " Well ?" she said with a smile. 
 
 "I must have another cup of tea to give me courage. 
 There was a saying in Maynooth in my time, with which 
 we used to make mincemeat of Darwin and the evolu- 
 tionists — nemo dat quod non habet. You can't knock 
 blood out of a stone, it means. It didn't hurt Darwinism, 
 but it has its application to the college." 
 
 Father Lysaght shrugged his shoulders. Mrs. Daly 
 looked meditatively at the river. After a while the priest 
 said, "But you needn't worry about the boy; he knows 
 more than most boys of nine. He was well grounded by 
 Begley the schoolmaster and yourself." 
 
 "I wasn't worrying. I was trying to decide between a 
 preparatory school and a tutor. I want to be fair to him, 
 but I want to see as much of him as I can." 
 
 "Then you have decided," he said with a smile. 
 "A year or two at a good day school with a good tutor 
 as well — he has lee-way to make up — might be best," she 
 said thoughtfully. 
 
 " That will mean your going away ?" 
 
112 CONQUEST 
 
 "My life is his. Now that that's settled, the rest is all 
 clear. I shall take him abroad for all his holidays. ■ He 
 must know languages, and that's the best way. He has a 
 smattering from me already of French and Italian and 
 German. He must know them well and pick up some 
 others." 
 
 "My God. You'll muddle the boy's head." 
 
 "Oh no, I won't. He laps up a language, and I shall 
 like it myself, too. I've been shut up here for ten years," 
 she added after a pause, her eyes again on the river. 
 
 "You're a wonderful woman," he said simply. "A.'m a 
 bit worried though," he added hastily, "about that 
 English Protestant school. Pierce won't like it because 
 it's English, nor the bishop because it's Protestant." 
 
 "My father-in-law is a difficulty," she admitted. "I've 
 spent the greater part of the last two days worrying about 
 him. I don't see any way out that won't hurt him, and 
 he's done more for me and for Jim than anyone but you 
 could ever understand. I'd sacrifice myself willingly for 
 him, but not Jim. He lives in the boy, but so do I. I've 
 seen too many children sacrificed to their parents to lay 
 mine on any altar." 
 
 "He'll say you're bringing him up English and anti- 
 Irish," he said moodily. 
 
 "Parnell was educated at English schools and Hugh 
 O'Neill was brought up at the court of Elizabeth," she 
 said with a smile. 
 
 " There's a point in that," he Said seriously. 
 
 She laughed. "Even the best of priests are Jesuitical. 
 I suppose I can be too — for Jim." 
 
 " It might appeal to Pierce," the priest laughed heartily, 
 " to send the boy to an English school to learn their tricks 
 and be able to turn their own weapons against 'em." 
 
 "I hope that Jim will see the foolishness of many 
 English and Irish prejudices," she said gravely. 
 
CONQUEST 113 
 
 " And be a man of the world, like your Uncle Silas/' he 
 said slyly. 
 
 "God forbid," she said earnestly. "Jim will always 
 have beliefs and convictions. He's too much of a Quixote 
 and a Daly not to — but his prejudices must be his own. 
 I'm determined that he shall see and hear all sides." 
 
 "In religion too?" he said gently. 
 
 " I'm his religion now," she said calmly. " Some day, if 
 it's going to mean anything in his life, he'll have his own." 
 
 "Converts never slough all their heterodoxy," he said 
 with a sigh. 
 
 "And priests must be professional," she laughed. "But 
 you know well what I mean. And you needn't worry 
 about the Protestantism of English public schools — they 
 are just schools. They're so tolerant that they coddle 
 Catholics as they would a rare medieval relic. Jim will 
 find himself more in the hands of priests than he'll like. I 
 wish he could be as well protected against other things, 
 but he'll be no worse off at Winchester than in a Catholic 
 school." 
 
 The priest nodded gloomily. " All the same it's a dan- 
 gerous experiment. Perhaps it's sacrificing him on some 
 little private altar of your own you are." 
 
 "It's no experiment — it's simply the best I can do," she 
 said with a patient sigh. "Though I suppose all educa- 
 tion is an experiment — and a very poor one at that, I'm 
 afraid. If I'm trying an experiment it is the outcome of 
 my own experience. If I have any certainty about Ireland 
 it is that children are deliberately educated to misunder- 
 stand one another. You were brought up in a watertight 
 compartment, a good little Catholic whose first duty in 
 life was to despise Protestants. I was brought up in a 
 tank on the other side, where all Catholics were anathema." 
 
 "Yet you saw the truth — you came over," he said 
 triumphantly. 
 
114 CONQUEST 
 
 "I saw Theobald," she said softly. "Once in a way 
 love gets a chance and resolves all hates. But I want 
 something more than a rare miracle which has no bearing 
 on the question. Till I was twenty-two I heard all the 
 Protestant twaddle about Catholics. For the last ten 
 years I've heard all the Catholic twaddle about Protestants. 
 Honestly I can't say which is worse. Both sides are 
 grossly unfair. Suspicions, innuendoes, lies — any vile 
 stick is good enough to beat one another with. It's not 
 religion, it's blasphemy," she added bitterly. 
 
 "That's a hard word for your own religion," he said 
 gravely. 
 
 "I'm not speaking of religion," she said with a smile, 
 "but of the irreligion that unfortunately goes with it. I 
 love my religion but I refuse to accept hatred and misrepre- 
 sentation of Protestants as part of it." 
 
 "Your own people threw you over when you married a 
 Catholic," he said grimly. 
 
 " The pot calling the kettle black," she laughed. " But 
 I don't quarrel with it — it fairly represents the two churches 
 in Ireland. I'm not attacking either side. I'm merely 
 defending both — from themselves. I have been in both 
 camps and I've found the same sort of decent people in 
 both. Their God is the same and their love of Him is the 
 same. They have similar faults and similar virtues. Yet 
 each side attributes to the other some sort of horrible 
 demonology. Susan Roche thinks the Protestant God is 
 a savage Orange-evicting Unionist landlord who tortures 
 Catholics. Tanner's idea of the Catholic God is a blood- 
 thirsty, rebel peasant in some vague trappings of the Pope 
 of Rome. Either would willingly accept the other's God 
 as her or his own devil. And you keep up this criminal 
 farce. Father Lysaght." 
 
 " I ?" he said indignantly. 
 
 " Yes, you and the other priests and parsons. You keep 
 
CONQUEST 115 
 
 the people apart, you bring the children up in separate 
 schools. You are a Home Ruler. If you get control of 
 the Government do you mean to ride roughshod over all 
 the Protestants ?" 
 
 "What nonsense," he said pettishly. 
 
 "Then why don't you allow Catholic children to go to 
 school with Protestant children ? They might each at 
 least find out that the other doesn't wear a tail and horns 
 and hoofs, and who knows but they might discover a 
 common humanity." 
 
 " Now, now, Mrs. Daly, we must protect the young 
 from " 
 
 " From having common sense," she interrupted. 
 
 " What has come over you at all ?" he said, distressed. 
 " It can't be that you're not happy in your religion." 
 
 "Perfectly happy. But I wish religion in Ireland, on 
 both sides, wasn't so mixed up with land and politics and 
 racial and class hatred." 
 
 "That all comes from the Orangemen. There's no 
 harm in the Catholics. They use hard words occasionally, 
 but it's the Orangemen " 
 
 She laughed. " I heard almost the same words, with the 
 religions reversed, from our rector when I was a child." 
 
 "That's very odd," he said meditatively. 
 
 " I wonder how Jim will turn out," she said after a pause. 
 
 "Oh, he'll hold his own," the priest said proudly. 
 "With his own size and weight or a bit above it he'll be 
 able to give a good account of himself and his religion 
 anywhere." 
 
PART TWO 
 
 I. 
 
 Sir Silas Levin, K.C.B., gazed pensively at the tired and 
 wilted trees of the Green Park. The world of inner politics 
 and diplomacy was disturbed, and he had had what he 
 called a stiff morning, but there was no trace of worry in 
 his impassive face. 
 
 A club acquaintance wandered into the large bow, looked 
 hesitatingly at the erect trim figure that showed no sign of 
 age beyond whitened hair and moustache, rattled keys in 
 his trousers pocket, and said, with a look at the open 
 window shaded by gay sun blinds : 
 
 " This is the coolest room in London in August." 
 
 " So," Levin said, with the well-known intonation, correct 
 and polite, which few bores survived. 
 
 Buller moved ofE with a sigh. And Levin would have 
 been interested in that elephant hunt in the eighties recalled 
 by this blasted quivering heat, but no doubt he was worried 
 over the state of Europe — things were said to be dicky. 
 
 Had he known Sir Silas intimately he would have recog- 
 nized the slight movement in the left eyebrow as a sign of 
 intense irritation. Buller had opened conversation with his 
 innocent platitude dozens of times on most days — "coolest" 
 became " cosiest " in cold weather, and the month changed 
 with the calendar — for thirty years. Sir Silas knew it as 
 well as he knew the Green Park, and had hitherto received 
 it with a responsive smile. Buller might be a bore about 
 big game, but he knew more about the interior of Africa 
 than any man in London, and Sir Silas had a thirst for 
 
 ii6 
 
CONQUEST 117 
 
 exclusive information. It was the collocation of '* London" 
 and "August" that almost moved him to the unbelievable 
 solecism, of " damn the fellow." Happily neither lips nor 
 eyes betrayed his emotion. It was enough to rile a saint or 
 slightly provoke a diplomatist of sixty-one. Not even 
 during the Boer War had he been kept in London and 
 missed the twelfth. Without moving an eyelid he roundly 
 damned a then friendly power. His letter to the duchess 
 had been temporizing ; and she had been more than kind — 
 for tlie twelfth, too — in leaving the invitation open, but 
 nothing short of a sudden drop, of which there was no 
 sign, of the political temperature would now make accept- 
 ance possible. 
 
 He glanced at the clock on the mantelpiece, and his 
 methodical mind was occupied for a moment with a more 
 immediate wrong. The sole he had ordered for luncheon 
 would be spoiled if Jim Daly wasn't here in five minutes. 
 He looked down his slim body with a smile. It was rather 
 a joke that fellows at the office took the hefty young giant 
 for his nephew. The " Uncle Silas " deceived them ; or, 
 more likely, his own youthful appearance. After all, he 
 was still young, so much younger than his brother that he 
 was more like the brother of his niece Arabella. The hock 
 would be too cold if Jim wasn't punctual. . . . 
 
 He had shown some lack of discernment in having had 
 misgivings about the boy. But then the whole circum- 
 stances were so peculiar — the queer menage at Scarty — 
 even now with a comfortable income. And that dreadful 
 old peasant with no sense of humour in politics. The boy 
 was dogmatic, too, and viewy; a bit bumptious perhaps, 
 but that was youth and would wear off. It wasn't every 
 youngster whom Draycott noticed; and to say that Daly 
 was a leg-up to the Foreign Office was enthusiastic for 
 such an austere chief. It was double-edged, like most of 
 Draycott's compliments, to add that diplomacy couldn't 
 
ii8 CONQUEST 
 
 boast of many double-firsts. It was so like Draycotfs 
 bookishness to harp on mere intellectual equipment in an 
 office where knowledge of men and of the world and a 
 facility in languages were the prime necessity. He drew 
 himself up serenely. If Jim had only his knowledge of the 
 world he would do well in the service. It would do him no 
 harm, of course, to have the intellectual link with Draycott, 
 and he could jabber languages thirteen to the dozen. He 
 glanced at the scare heading running across the front page 
 of an evening newspaper with a smile of superiority and 
 murmured, "So theVe got it at last — the wrong end of it 
 too — three days late." 
 
 " Sorry if I'm late," Jim Daly, tall and broad-shouldered, 
 said in eager apology, having caught the last word. 
 
 " Bless me, Jim, you're a tornado. But youVe saved the 
 sole." 
 
 " Mine or yours ?" 
 
 " Both. For I'd have damned your soul in another minute 
 to the detriment of my own," Sir Silas said with a chuckle 
 appreciative of the thin witticism. He was slightly hurt 
 that Jim didn't laugh. But the boy was looking round at 
 the antlered heads, fish, and primitive weapons that lined 
 the walls. 
 ' " A comfortable crib this — looks sporting." 
 
 " It tiot only looks it, but it is — the club, perhaps, of the 
 kind in the world," Sir Silas said a little pompously. 
 
 " Not much in your line, eh. Uncle Silas ?" 
 
 Sir Silas meditated a snub, but decided against it. The 
 boy was so jolly in his loose tweeds. And the air of 
 negligence came of a first-class tailor. Those young fellows 
 had no reverence, and there was a twinkle, too, in the large 
 blue eyes. There was very little appearance of the student 
 in the straight back and tanned face. He laughed quietly. 
 
 " I find myself telling you all my secrets, my dear boy," 
 he said, taking Jim's arm. " But let's be going down — the 
 
CONQUEST 119 
 
 hock will be just right. This is a refuge," he went on con- 
 fidentially. " In a crisis my other two clubs are impossible. 
 Bishops and third secretaries are equally inquisitive. But 
 here " — he waved a hand towards the heads in the hall — 
 " not a man who has an idea of the British Empire but as a 
 game preserve." 
 
 " Jolly near right," Jim said. 
 " Eh, what ?" Sir Silas said sharply. 
 " I did hear there was a rumpus on," Jim said imperturb- 
 ably. " There was a vague rumour of it in the nursery, 
 where Fm fed on pap and the alphabet. What's the row, 
 Uncle Silas ?" 
 
 Sir Silas pursed his lips slightly and shook his head with 
 a condescending smile. "I mustn't breathe a word. But 
 it's very important — ^very. Something more than a rumble. 
 But it will pass — it shall pass. We will see to that." 
 
 " Some day the Rads will have your neck. Uncle. Hugger- 
 mugger diplomacy, ending in some rotten job, and a let in 
 for the country — so they spoke of you at the Union." 
 
 Sir Silas smiled. " Youth will have its fling. I was a bit 
 of a Rad once myself — not since I arrived at responsible 
 office, of course. Precedent and compromise, my boy, are 
 the wheels of our almost perfect machine." 
 
 " Flummery and evasion," Jim laughed, helping himself 
 liberally to sole. 
 
 "Well, well, perhaps, just a little," Sir Silas said 
 tolerantly, " and there's always the big stick behind. How 
 do you find that hock ?" 
 " Not half bad." 
 
 " You young cub," Sir Silas said with the indignation he 
 reserved for the most important things in life. "There 
 isn't another hock like it in London. A nice discrimination 
 in wine is as important in diplomacy as an apt quotation. 
 I remember once, a very ticklish affair it was, bringing the 
 French plenipotentiary over to our side by a delicate 
 
120 CONQUEST 
 
 appreciation of Moselle — rank stuff it was too. But he was 
 one of those mad regional fellows — you know the type in 
 Ireland. A smack of my lips — a bit vulgar, perhaps, but 
 the interest of the Empire was at stake — a few judicious 
 words, a tag of Horace, and the thing was done. You'll find 
 life in the F.O. extraordinarily interesting. At first, of 
 course, while you're cutting your teeth, it will be largely 
 social. But in twelve or fifteen years, when you've learned 
 your way round and have begun to be let into things — 
 always provided you show tact, of course — you'll have the 
 ball at your feet. Brains are well enough in their way, but 
 tact is the thing. And don't neglect women. Wives count 
 most in England — others abroad generally. Bear in 
 mind that no German woman has any influence; and 
 American women are so busy in making a social position 
 that they take only a superficial interest in politics. But a 
 nice punctilio is necessary with all women. Few only can 
 help, but all are able to hurt. And don't get entangled. 
 I'm not a prude, but it complicates things and plays the very 
 devil — in England. Your career simply can't afford it. In 
 a Protestant country your religion would seem to be against 
 you, but nothing could be farther from the truth — it's a 
 vulgar error of the herd and of Irish Protestants. Well, we 
 don't regard the Pope exactly with the eyes of Belfast 
 Orangemen. There's no official connection, of course, but — 
 well, you know how things are done. There's a subtlety 
 about ecclesiastical diplomacy that's very fascinating." He 
 sipped his hock reminiscently. "On the whole, I should 
 say, you'll find your faith a distinct asset." 
 
 " Thanks for the lecture. Uncle Si. Diplomacy sounds a 
 bit piffle, don't you think? But the hock's bully. May I 
 have another glass?" 
 
 Jim poured himself out a glass as he spoke. 
 
 Sir Silas regarded him with mixed feelings. Tact was 
 distinctly lacking, but, on the other hand, to appreciate that 
 
CONQUEST 121 
 
 wine at twenty -four was something. " A little more care in 
 the choice of words perhaps," he suggested vaguely. 
 
 " Oh," Jim said with a nod of intelligence. " We're such 
 chums, you know, Uncle Silas. But I'll turn on another tap 
 if you really wish me to." 
 
 The slight tone of patronage made Sir Silas say hastily, 
 "With me, my boy? Quite absurd. But with others, 
 perhaps," he hedged a little. "Well, you've entered a 
 service which demands a certain gravity — always with a 
 light touch, of course." 
 
 " It's my work, I suppose," Jim said with a shrug. " I 
 feel like a kid at an infant school doing silly things that 
 lead nowhere." 
 
 "In time, my boy, in time. / did those things — and 
 well, I have arrived," Sir Silas said with a complacent 
 smile. 
 
 If Jim meant anything beyond respectful attention by his 
 level look it was admirably concealed. Sir Silas admitted to 
 himself as he disposed of the remainder of the bottle. The 
 boy had undoubtedly a certain poise. Would he protest 
 against the full glass ? Sir Silas poured slowly, but it 
 wasn't till the straw-coloured liquid was almost level with 
 the top of the glass that Jim drawled " thanks." Sir Silas 
 rather ruefully poured what remained into his own glass, 
 murmuring to himself that the boy had nerve. 
 
 " I'm tempted to chuck the whole thing and go in for 
 politics," Jim said meditatively. 
 
 "Good Lord!" Sir Silas said with the finest shade of 
 irritation. " Would you exchange the substance for the 
 shadow, legitimate pride for a hollow vanity, real power 
 for " 
 
 " You mean you fellows are the real trick riders, while the 
 political blighters are the clowns who smirk and scrape and 
 pretend they've done it ?" Jim said blandly. 
 
 " Precisely — though I eschew circus metaphors." 
 
122 CONQUEST 
 
 " I forgot — you prefer 'em church," Jim said gravely, as he 
 finished his hock. 
 
 " We'll have some coffee," Sir Silas said austerely. 
 
 As he stood waiting his turn to pay his bill he gazed 
 thoughtfully through the glass doors at Jim's back. The 
 rogue knew, of course, of his weakness for the Hippodrome 
 and that he never went to church except at Lissyfad. There 
 was a careless assurance that promised well in the set of the 
 boy's head and shoulders. There were faint indications of 
 the rapier even now, though his natural weapon seemed to 
 be the bludgeon. And those honours didn't show through. 
 
 "You'll stick it out, Jim," he said with more of appeal 
 than was his wont, and a confidential squeeze of an arm, as 
 they made their way to the smoking-room. 
 
 " Got to — for a few years, anyhow. Promised the mater." 
 
 Sir Silas forgot his shallow probing for the moment in a 
 more generous human liking. The boy was made of good 
 stuff. And his mother deserved it, too — she had made him 
 what he was. 
 
 " When do you cross ?" he asked. 
 
 "Night mail," Jim said, his eyes lighting up. "Better 
 come. Uncle Silas. Leave all this jabber here, and I'll give 
 you some fishing. Thank God for the F.O. — I've got two 
 months of Ireland in front of me. Do come. We'll have a 
 ripping time. I can't believe the old F.O. is ever worried 
 about anything. You can come if you want to." 
 
 Sir Silas gave him the smile that betokened depths of 
 incommunicable knowledge, but thought it well to explain 
 a little. 
 
 " My dear boy, I haven't missed a twelfth in Scotland for 
 thirty years. So you can imagine how I feel at being kept 
 in London in this heat, and the extreme gravity of the affairs 
 that keep me here. But apart from the political atmosphere 
 — many thanks for the invitation — I'm as likely to be found 
 in the Sahara in August as in Ireland. Not a decent grouse 
 
CONQUEST 123 
 
 moor in the country. I'm blessed if it breeds anything but 
 difficulties." 
 
 He touched a bell, pointed to a deep armchair, and sank 
 into another. 
 
 ''Not that one escapes Ireland by staying out of it," 
 he began with a sigh. " I ought to have nothing to do with 
 the damned island — officially I mean — yet it's a big part of 
 my worry now. It has a whole machinery of Government 
 all to itself, but do you think it sticks there? It invades 
 every Department. It bobs up all over the world — in 
 America, in all the colonies, in Egypt. It has more than 
 once prevented an advantageous treaty. All the Chan- 
 celleries of Europe twit us with it. An unspeakable young 
 Turk had the audacity, at a conference of the Powers, to 
 bring it up as a precedent for Armenian atrocities. If we 
 mention the Congo someone murmurs Ireland. Germans 
 make comparisons with — good God ! — their humane treat- 
 ment of the Herreros." 
 
 He stopped and watched meditatively the approach of a 
 waiter. " I must have a liqueur as a sedative. You won't 
 join me ?" 
 
 He gave an order, lit a cigarette, and puffed thoughtfully. 
 
 " It's a malignant disease dangerous only to British 
 interests, and it finds out the weak spot everywhere, at home 
 and abroad. When we think we have stamped it out it 
 crops up afresh, only more virulently. It's like influenza." 
 
 " Its pathology is simpler," Jim murmured. 
 
 " Eh, what ?" Sir Silas said sharply, but as Jim made no 
 reply he went on : " I'm so used to Ireland as a ghost at 
 every feast that I'd almost think it a hallucination if at this 
 moment it didn't threaten to break up the Empire." 
 
 " put with it, uncle," Jim said coolly. " What's the whole 
 fuss about ?" 
 
 " Cabinet secret," Sir Silas almost snapped. " And even 
 if it weren't I'm not sure that I'd discuss the subject with 
 
124 CONQUEST 
 
 you. I forgot the rebel strain in you — I thought you had 
 shed all that." 
 
 " I can't shed my mind," Jim laughed, " unless, indeed, 
 the F.O. reduces it to pulp. Come now, uncle, confess. 
 Doesn't the whole trouble come of the muddled incompetence 
 of the old Government ?" 
 
 " A Liberal Government is apt to drive the ship on the 
 rocks," Sir Silas said moodily. 
 
 " And a Tory to keep it there," Jim jeered. 
 
 " Pup," Sir Silas said tolerantly. " Perhaps even the 
 Tories do interfere too much with the permanent officials." 
 
 " Oh, they\^ as blind as bats," Jim said fervently, adding 
 a little hastily but with some aplomb, " But you've pulled 
 *em out of many a hole. Uncle Si — you're sure to pull 'em 
 out of this — whatever it is." 
 
 " Thank you," Sir Silas said urbanely, but with a slight 
 flicker of an eyelid. " There's only one thing left for 
 Ireland, and that's to sink it," he added, sipping his fine 
 champagne. 
 
 "You've tried so many brilliant solutions with such 
 gorgeous results ! Yes, why not try sinking it ? From very 
 cussedness it'd drift over and block up Liverpool and 
 Bristol. It's such an impracticable country," Jim said 
 gravely. " But we're forgetting the snipe shooting over 
 Looskey bog," lie added with a twinkle. " You wouldn't 
 sacrifice that. Uncle Si ?" 
 
 " I won't have my leg pulled, sir," Sir Silas said severely. 
 " You're all a pack of foolish children- — Orange and Green 
 alike." 
 
 "We're getting on," Jim said placidly. "A Protestant 
 Irishman (a responsible official, too) admits — it would be 
 * violently asserts ' but for the diplomatic manner — that 
 Orangemen are foolish. Carson too, of course ?" 
 
 " There is no Scotch question," Sir Silas said gloomily. 
 
 " Oh, you can always bag a Scotchman with a job — it 
 
CONQUEST 125 
 
 only gives an Irishman funds to push his grievance. 
 Besides, they won't all take jobs." 
 
 " They took the land." 
 
 " Their own, and they're paying for it.'* 
 
 " Railways, harbours, labourers' cottages — it would take 
 me hours to go through the list of gifts." 
 
 " Restitution you mean, and only half-hearted at that. 
 There's excess taxation in a century of over three hundred 
 millions." 
 
 " The same old platitudes." 
 
 " It's not Ireland's fault that they're rather time-worn 
 truths." 
 
 " What in God's name do those people want ?" Sir Silas 
 said with a shrug of exasperation. 
 
 " Their country," Jim said shortly. " They've said so 
 once or twice in eight hundred years," he added with a 
 humorous twinkle. 
 
 " Pooh-pooh !" Sir Silas said with a wry face. 
 
 " Fie, Uncle Silas — and you're teaching me diplomacy. 
 Is that an expression to use in a discussion ? Is it tactful ?" 
 
 " You impudent young ruffian ! You'd try anyone's 
 patience. Ireland a nation ! It's too silly. I'm broad- 
 minded," he added with a quick recovery of his pompous 
 manner. " I wasn't against Gladstone's Land Act, though 
 I couldn't approve his Home Rule Bill. Gerald Balfour's 
 Congested Districts Board was a step on the right path. 
 Horace Plunkett is a good fellow. His co-operative work — 
 admirable. His Department of Agriculture — sound. Much 
 sounder than Horace himself, I'm afraid. He moves too 
 fast. Has too much conscience for a party man — it might 
 lead him anywhere. I had hoped that poor George Wyndham 
 would have settled everything with his Land Act that made 
 English farmers' mouths water. He'd have gone farther, 
 and I'd have been with him, only the Orangemen did him in. 
 His idea was some sort of council. McDonnell brought the 
 
126 CONQUEST 
 
 idea from India, and Birrell afterwards bagged it. But the 
 Liberals have no art in these things — didn't use bait enough 
 for the bishops. The Rads did better with their University 
 Act — showed a good deal of tact, too, in swallowing their 
 principles. Birrell advocating a sectarian university was a 
 sight for the gods, but we have a certain dexterity in things 
 of the kind, thanks to our Indian experience. It's dis- 
 heartening, though, that we have got very little gratitude 
 for all these magnificent efforts in sound constructive states- 
 manship. And now we're up to our eyes in the whole mess 
 again. Don't breathe it, but the whole of Europe may be 
 at one another's throats any moment, and Ireland again 
 threatens to split the country when we need, as we never 
 needed before, a united front." 
 
 " Good ! " Jim said approvingly. " That explains the 
 federal tosh then ?" - 
 
 " Hum, hum ! It's an idea. It has to be explored — Royal 
 Commission and all that. It may smooth over things." 
 
 " Won't wash," Jim said with decision. 
 
 " As I said, I wish the damned island were out of the way," 
 Sir Silas said fretfully. " It's an old man of the sea dragging 
 at our ankles. Those pig-headed Orangemen are as bad as 
 the Nationalists. All sides are suspicious. There's some 
 new extreme set with an unpronounceable name egging 
 Redmond on; and Carson is like a melancholy devil's 
 advocate spitting venom. They all distrust us." 
 
 " The consciousness of shining virtue will console you," 
 Jim said with a grin. *' It's a help, too, to see other people's 
 sins so vividly." 
 
 " By Jove, it's three o'clock, and I've a conference," Sir 
 Silas said with a meditative and not altogether approving 
 glance at his grand-nephew. 
 
 In the cloakroom he said abruptly : 
 
 " I'm not sure that 1 like your attitude of mind about all 
 this, Jim. A little Socialism or anything of that sort is 
 
CONQUEST 127 
 
 pardonable, but the Empire is sensitive about its boundaries. 
 However, the young know everything. What would 
 you do ?" 
 
 " Find out what they want and give it to them." 
 
 " I must say I expected more of you. You err against the 
 first principle of sound statesmanship — give subject peoples 
 only what's good for them." 
 
 " No wonder they love you dearly," Jim said with a laugh. 
 " Good-bye, Uncle Silas. And be sure and settle the Irish 
 question while I'm away." 
 
 " The young scamp — a rebel to his finger-tips," Sir Silas 
 said to himself with a shrug, lazily swinging a gold-headed 
 malacca as he crossed to the Green Park. "Well, well, we're 
 a tolerant people." 
 
 2. 
 
 Jim took the Greenore boat-train partly because the lack 
 of work at the office was more irksome than usual, with 
 Ireland looming so near; partly because it gave a thin 
 illusion of getting him home sooner than the Kingstown 
 boat-train, which left Euston more than an hour later : also 
 one dined with more comfort, and there was the extra sleep 
 on the boat. 
 
 It was still light outside when the train got into the open 
 at Willesden. He stood in the corridor, out of the glare of 
 the electric light, and watched the line of red fire on the 
 horizon in the west. Over there somewhere was Ireland 
 and Scarty, the Owneybeg and Looskey bog. By some such 
 light he remembered it, only much more wonderful. The 
 bronze ball in the south, hung between the tree-tops, was 
 only a Japanese lantern compared with the August moon 
 rising above the shoulder of Mooncon. Was it really so, or 
 had he only imagined it ? Something seemed to tear at his 
 heart, and the vivid colours were blurred. It was fifteen 
 years since he had seen it, and how could one remember ? 
 
128 CONQUEST 
 
 But he remembered. He was sure he remembered. He could 
 see it all now with his eyes shut. The valley opening out 
 from Grange Con bridge, the Owneybeg winding like an 
 immense silvered snake through the green, lush plain, with 
 Lisgeela shrouded in a golden smoke haze huddled up 
 within one of the coils, the windows of the Cathedral throw- 
 ing back at the sun a brilliant flame, the purple heather on 
 the near hills, the deep blue of the mountains, and the brown 
 stretch of Looskey bog. And the mater had kept him from 
 all this, and now he was a Foreign Office clerk. 
 
 He laughed, and the opal sky had a more tender look. 
 She was the best mother in the world, and he had had a 
 ripping time. His grandfather had been great fun. How 
 he had fumed and groaned on the first journey ; and after- 
 wards his eagerness, like a child's, for new places. And his 
 row over the English with the old Garibaldian revolutionary, 
 with whom he had made friends at Verona — "the great 
 lovers of freedom !" the Garibaldian shouted excitedly, 
 " and their great leader Sir Palmerston, the friend of man 
 and of Italy ! " It was in vain that his grandfather shouted 
 "Tyrants !" and "Bloody Whigs !" for old Felice shouted 
 him down, and in the end was convinced that he was an 
 Austrian spy. And his almost similar experience with a 
 Czech at Prague. But it had only made his grandfather 
 believe all the more firmly in the depravity of the English, 
 who "scattered the gold they squeezed out of Ireland like 
 dust to blind the eyes of the world to their own wickedness." 
 And there was the irony of it all, which only grew^ on him 
 gradually, that at the very tables at which his grandfather 
 was thundering against England, he himself was picking 
 up languages for the service of England. And how he did 
 work — worked harder, he saw it now, in the holidays than 
 at school or at Oxford ; but his mother had made it such a 
 game. Whether it was a ski or a Slav dialect there was no 
 slacking. It was hard work, but it was work that was 
 
CONQUEST 129 
 
 always play with those wonderful backgrounds — Naples 
 and Sorrento from Capri, Rome from any of the hills, the 
 Black Forest, the Rhone Valley, Aries in the moonlight, the 
 choleric face of the old colonel on the deck of the steamer 
 going up to Constantinople, with his hand to his ear : 
 " Troy did you say, sir ? I can tell you even at this distance 
 that it's a damned bad fort." Winchester was work and his 
 fight with Bateson and those first miserable days when they 
 called him Mike — but he had fought an end to that. And 
 Balliol was work and the boats and his first briar. And 
 there was Uncle Silas bobbing in and out everywhere — 
 Uncle Silas who was almost English but just wasn't. And 
 there were friends, many of them. Bateson still, though he 
 would bear the mark of that split ear through life. Such 
 friends, too ! They wore well, though Phipps said, " Oh, 
 Ireland," as if it were a cannibal island. Their reserve sat 
 somewhat consciously on them and sometimes broke out in 
 shy, unexpected enthusiasms that never seemed real. They 
 were like a March sun with moments of brilliant heat — good 
 to travel with. They v/ere as certain of discarded German 
 philosophies as they were of England. And they were still 
 more certain about Ireland, of which they never tried to 
 know anything. 
 
 A white-coated attendant warned him that dinner would 
 be off in a quarter of an hour. He hurried through a meal. 
 It was absurd how anxious he was to get across. The long 
 wait for the mails at Holyhead would be dreadful. He was 
 sure he couldn't sleep. He should have taken the later 
 train. He nodded over a book in his corner seat. It was 
 some sort of game of which he had lost the key, this taking 
 the Greenore train for the Kingstown boat. The light from 
 the ceiling made a curious pattern on the moving lips and 
 beard of the man opposite. Voices seemed to come from 
 long distances. 
 
 " Carson will teach 'em." 
 
130 CONQUEST 
 
 " Nothing will ever teach the Irish." 
 
 One of the voices was the man opposite talking into his 
 beard, and there was a grotesque shadow of the other. It 
 was like a game of battledore and shuttlecock played with 
 sharp, staccato words. 
 
 " Not a foot of Ulster soil, I say." 
 
 " If we can keep the six counties, perhaps " 
 
 " No, not a foot, I say. We must have the nine." 
 
 " There's talk of only four counties." 
 
 " I'm loyal to my King and the Orange flag, but if the 
 English did that I'd turn machine-guns on 'em." 
 
 Jim tried to rouse himself. They were Orangemen, and 
 the point of view might be interesting. But he nodded 
 again. 
 
 ". The country is going to the dogs in any case. Devils of 
 Radicals — gave a judgeship to a Nationalist and a papist. 
 One couldn't expect justice from such people." There was 
 a series of rumbles, a blank, and then : 
 
 " Let the southern Protestants stew in their own juice, I 
 say. They're not Protestants at all — no backbone in 'em, a 
 weak-kneed, milk-and-water lot of givers in." 
 
 " Plunkett ? I always suspected Plunkett. No man could 
 appear to be so reasonable and not have a cloven hoof." 
 
 "Ssh!" 
 
 " Who cares ? But he's asleep, anyway." 
 
 And as if it were a hypnotic suggestion he fell asleep. 
 At Crewe the sudden stillness of a stoppage made him hear 
 the man in the beard profess a readiness to " die in the last 
 ditch." At Chester the shadow had become vehement on 
 the six-county solution. Ulster had become the Key of 
 Empire in the Menai tubular bridge. A harsh shout of 
 " Greenore boat, Greenore boat," broke in on a dream in 
 which Carson and Redmond, their arms about one another's 
 necks, waving unsteady champagne glasses, were singing at 
 the top of their voices, " Orange and Green will carry the 
 
CONQUEST 131 
 
 day !" Jim rubbed his eyes and stared wonderingly at his 
 two companions, who stood, bags in hands, and apparently 
 very angry, waiting for the train to stop. 
 
 " God spews the lukewarm out of His mouth," the man 
 with the beard muttered. The shadow, who was a mild man 
 turned passionate, said heatedly, but with an effort at 
 sarcasm : ^ 
 
 " God is an Orange gentleman and not a bravo." 
 
 " You'll rise a better Orangeman after a night's rest, 
 George," the bearded man said more mildly. 
 
 " I don't want more than the six, and I'll have no less if 
 I slept for a hundred years," the mild-looking man said in 
 a determined tone. 
 
 When the train stopped both turned to Jim and said 
 pleasantly, " Good-night," the bearded man adding : " You 
 had a fine sleep, sir. We were rather wakeful, but we wiled 
 away the time with a friendly little chat over politics. It'd 
 be a dreary world without it." 
 
 From the platform, as the train moved off towards the 
 Kingstown boat, Jim heard in the mild man's voice : 
 
 " I'm as good an Orangeman as you are, Sam, but if every 
 drum in Ulster was banged in my ears I'll not yield on 
 the six." 
 
 Jim lounged about the empty compartment, examining 
 the photographs of Irish scenery. Did Englishmen ever 
 get excited over politics ? In a way, yes. But calmly, as if 
 certain of their assured position in the sun. He regretted 
 that he had not listened more attentively. Prosperous 
 business men, he decided, and they discussed not shop but 
 politics from London to Holyhead. His grandfather was 
 the same. He carried Ireland with him everywhere, sat 
 unmoved amid historic monuments and the most beautiful 
 scenery in Europe till he came across some peasant who in 
 an American or Cockney accent revealed another Ireland, 
 generally under Austrian rule. Then only did the place 
 
132 CONQUEST 
 
 live. Was it something in his own blood that made him 
 somewhat similar? Made him such an autochthonous devil, 
 as Phipps said, made him take the history school after 
 Greats because history might throw some light on Ireland ? 
 What was history but a record of prejudice ? One got from 
 it what one brought to it. Froude and Lecky were to him 
 handbooks of revolution — Froude only made the facts more 
 glaring by his bias. Yet Phipps found in every English 
 effort salve for the marvellous English conscience — the 
 effulgent sun shining on half the world could ignore its 
 spots. . . . 
 
 He asked the steward to call him when land was sighted ; 
 and it seemed that he had only turned over on his pillow 
 when he heard : 
 
 " Land, sir," and the steward was standing at the side of 
 the berth, with tea on an outstretched tray. 
 
 He saw Ireland first as a grey trail on the horizon, scarcely 
 distinguishable from the soft haze. A hill or two soon stood 
 out more solidly. He tried to identify them. No, he had 
 never really seen them before. Fifteen years ago he had 
 looked at them from the deck of, perhaps, this very boat, 
 looking back then instead of forward, but he hadn't seen 
 them. He had looked as an excuse for keeping his face 
 hidden from his mother, but everything had been a mere 
 blur. All the more as his whole attention had been bent on 
 the effort, not quite successful, of keeping the tears in his 
 eyes from betraying themselves in his voice. 
 
 As the sun rose higher out of the sea in the wake of the 
 boat the thin curtain of mist seemed to waver and break. 
 Suddenly he remembered his mother's voice, her very words. 
 The islands were Lambay and Ireland's Eye, and the bold 
 headland was Howth. The smoke smudge in the flat was 
 Dublin. Bray Head was the sentinel on the left. The blaze 
 of glittering light between was the series of little terraced 
 towns, Dalkey, Killiney, Kingstown, Blackrock, their 
 
CONQUEST 133 
 
 windows reflecting the sun. They danced — seemed even to 
 sing from sheer joy and happiness. For a moment he had 
 a choking sensation in his throat, a mist seemed to have 
 again shut out the hght and colour. He shrugged his 
 shoulders, murmured " pish," went below, and busied him- 
 self with his luggage. 
 
 A fat woman blocked his way to the gangway. " My 
 heart is all a-flutter, ma'am," she confided to a dried-up 
 little woman who seemed to resent the confidence. " ' It's 
 not Margate this year, Joan, my lass,' my 'usband says to 
 me. * It's Ireland,' he said. * If you're bent on a foreign^ 
 land, John,' I said, 'why not make it Dieppe where the 
 natives aren't more savage than you might expect, and the 
 sands'd remind you of Margate.' Not but what John him- 
 self is a mild man — nothing wild or savage in his ways, 
 though he comes from Ireland. ' Tugging at his heart- 
 strings,' he said it was after thirty-four years, and Ireland 
 it had to be, my dear." 
 
 On the quay Jim bought an Irish Times and a FreemarHs 
 Journal with a feeling that " tugging at one's heart-strings " 
 was not a far-fetched image. 
 
 "You've both sides there, your honour," the old news- 
 vendor said, "but if you want 'em more bitter here's the 
 Daily Express and Sinn Feinr 
 
 Jim was satisfied with the milder brew and read "The 
 Blessings of British Civilization" in one paper, and "The 
 Blight of English Rule" in the other, as the train jolted to 
 Westland Road. Instead of going round to Kingsbridge 
 by the loop-line, on the advice of a porter he took an out- 
 side car across the city "to enjoy the fresh air." Having 
 crossed the lower end of Stephen's Green the driver plunged 
 through a network of rough cobbled streets, noisome, with 
 dilapidated, frowsy houses on either side. Jim protested 
 against the route, but the driver explained with a grin : " It's 
 the way I always take the English. Sure it does 'em good." 
 
134 CONQUEST 
 
 "I'm not English." 
 
 "Hear that now," the driver said, unconvinced. "It's 
 making fun of me your honour is." 
 
 " No." 
 
 " It's, maybe, one of them Liberals you are that's promis- 
 ing us some sort of Home Rule, devil's skewer to it." 
 
 "I'm Irish." 
 
 "Sure it's tired your honour must be then of seeing 
 Trinity and the Bank," the driver said lightly. "And the 
 air of the Liffey is a bit heavy on tender nostrils at this 
 time of the morning and the tide out. Sure there's no loss 
 on this way at all, and I'll take you through Francis Street 
 where the gentry used to live in the old times." 
 
 It was Naples from Ischia, of which, Jim decided, the 
 view from the boat had dimly reminded him. And these 
 foul streets were like the back streets of Naples over which 
 the dead hand of the Bourbons still lingered, only less 
 dignified. 
 
 " It's the fine houses them used to be before the Union," 
 the driver said tentatively. 
 
 "Indeed," Jim said. 
 
 "I once drove Sir Edward Carson himself in this very 
 car," the driver said, making another effort. 
 
 "You've got a good horse," Jim said. 
 
 The driver's face brightened hopefully. "But sure it's 
 John Redmond is the flahool man. It's never less than a 
 two-shilling piece he ever proffered me for a drive within 
 the boundary. And more than once it was half-a-crown 
 itself, and he maybe only going from Westland Row to his 
 own house in Leeson Park." 
 
 But Jim was again thinking of Scarty and made no re- 
 sponse. The driver whipped up his horse with a despair- 
 ing murmur, " There'd be more foolish talk in him if he was 
 English. But sorra one of me's sure what side he's on and 
 it's seldom it failed me. He's that dark he's not unlike 
 
CONQUEST 135 
 
 one of them Orangemen I'd sometimes be driving to 
 Amiens Street." 
 
 He softened, however, under the tip, and said fervently, 
 "God put your honour on the right road anyway, though 
 it's there you are already, maybe, with the help of God." 
 
 The train flew swiftly along the wooded river valley 
 and was well out on the rolling plain of Kildare by the 
 time Jim had finished breakfast. The names of stations as 
 they seemed to fly past awakened half -forgotten memories : 
 Leixlip, where the bitter-tongued Jennings sister congratu- 
 lated James Stuart on having won the race when he com- 
 plained that the Irish had run away; "the Curragh of 
 Kildare, the boys will all be there, with their pikes in good 
 repair ;" Silken Thomas. There was a thrill even in seeing 
 names of places he had heard so much of. He opened a 
 map and traced out the familiar names. They seemed to 
 be part of him — to live in his memory. 
 
 "It's your first visit, sir," his one companion in the com- 
 partment, a florid-faced man of about fifty, who had for 
 -some time been fidgeting with his newspaper, said 
 pleasantly. 
 
 " In a way, yes.'* 
 
 "Not a fellow official by any chance? I belong to the 
 Land Commission." 
 
 "I suppose I am an official — a novice though, and I've 
 shed it all for two months. Not an Irish official; I come 
 from London," Jim said, with an eff^ort to anticipate some 
 of the questions he saw coming. 
 
 "I knew it. You worried me a bit at first. He has the 
 cut of one of us, I said to myself. But the moment you 
 spoke I saw you were English. My name is Jackson. I 
 know most of the men from the other Departments and 
 couldn't place you. Of course new men bob up every day 
 now, thick as blackberries, but you're not exactly the type 
 — queer lot some of 'em. We can breathe here to-day, but 
 
136 CONQUEST 
 
 as a rule we fill the first-class carriages. Last night there 
 were twelve passengers in the saloon carriage coming up — 
 eleven of 'em Government officials, and the twelfth doubtful. 
 The railway companies ought to pay us a heavy commis- 
 sion for swelling their dividends. Ton my soul, though, 
 some of these new fellows should be made to travel third. 
 God be with the good old days when all Irish officials be- 
 longed to our class. But nowadays I expect one of 'em at 
 any moment to spit on the floor. It's a serious state of 
 affairs, but what can you expect with a Liberal Govern- 
 ment ? I've two sons growing up myself, and they'll prob- 
 ably have to go to the colonies. You have to pass exam- 
 inations for the Civil Service in England I suppose ?" 
 
 "As a rule, I believe," Jim said. 
 
 "That's the devil of it," Jackson said gloomily. "Just 
 like a second-class clerk here. And my boys weren't 
 brought up to it. Any decent Government would recog- 
 nize the people who have a claim. My family have filled 
 responsible positions in Ireland for two generations — got 
 a job for the asking, I might say. No damned examina- 
 tions — it ran in their blood. Set them down anywhere in 
 a job with any decent sort of screw — it didn't matter what 
 position — Clerk of the Peace, Secretary to a Grand Jury, 
 Resident Magistrate, Local Government Inspector, a-com- 
 missionership or the like — they drew their pay with credit 
 to themselves and to England. But to-day — with so many 
 new jobs going, too — my dear sir, it's enough to make a 
 loyalist sick. And to think what we've done for this 
 damned country. But, please God, we'll have a Tory 
 Government back again some day. Though even they're 
 not what they were," he added with a deep sigh. "Going 
 far, sir ?" 
 
 "Lisgeela." 
 
 " You're a lucky man. I'd rather my work'd bring me there 
 than to any other part of the country, though I manage to 
 
CONQUEST 137 
 
 pick up a day*s fishing in most places. You have a rod, I 
 see. An Owneybeg- salmon, sir, is something to remember. 
 Nothing like 'em on the Breedeen, where Tm dividing land 
 to-day, but a Breedeen salmon isn't bad, either, and I may 
 get a few even in weather like this. I'm getting out here. 
 It's been very pleasant meeting you. Who knows but I 
 may come across you some day in Lisgeela. We've some 
 trouble down there. Oh, no, not with the salmon, thank 
 God," he added with a laugh, in reply to Jim's inquiring 
 glance. "Only over land. The Scovell estate. The sale 
 is held up by an old agitator with one leg in the grave. 
 I'm sorry for Scovell, of course, but if those things must 
 happen, let it be near a good salmon river I pray. And 
 there are worse hotels than the Daly Arms. You change 
 at Ballybawn. A pleasant journey to you." 
 
 He waved a friendly hand from the platform. Jim re- 
 membered Phipps and his jibes, and laughed as the train 
 moved off. All Irishmen were autochthonous. There were 
 no such differences between Irishmen of any class or creed 
 as between Irishmen and Englishmen. Uncle Silas and 
 this Jackson were so like Susan Roche. Even the Orange- 
 men in the boat train had more in common with the Catho- 
 lic peasant than with Phipps or the average Englishman. 
 And he himself felt at home with the jarvey. What made 
 the Irish-English Irish and not English? Climate, pro- 
 pinquity, the inevitable mixture of race behind the other 
 influences ? The two-nation theory was a bogy. Catholic 
 and Protestant in Ulster were, racially, as like as^two peas. 
 Many of the most violent Orangemen were Irish Celts, once 
 Catholic, now Protestant. The others, Scotch-Irish and 
 English, had become North-Irish Celts in temperament. 
 Wealth was no key to the problem. Protestants every- 
 where in Ireland were no more industrious than Catholics. 
 In Rathvalley glen Catholic peasants tilled a barren hill- 
 side with an industry unsurpassed by the hardest workers 
 
138 CONQUEST 
 
 in Europe. Neither history nor biology was responsible 
 for the myth of the Protestant industrious apprentice. It 
 grew entirely from the vanity of. a privileged class. Privi- 
 lege gave the Protestant in Ireland power and position, 
 but it flattered him to attribute his superiority to virtues of 
 character and race. Protestants had got all the best land : 
 CatHolics were driven on to the waste lands and bogs to 
 starve or live as best they could. Protestants had been 
 protected in their prosperity; Catholics harassed in their 
 pitiful struggle for life by every ingenious device of oppres- 
 sion. . . . Even the industries of the North were only a 
 happy accident. 
 
 The rolling grass lands had become stained here and 
 there with patches of brown. The vivid green now gave 
 way altogether to dingy tracts of low-lying arable which 
 were soon lost in the golden brown of an immense stretch 
 of bog-land. The train drew up at Ballybawn on the out- 
 skirts of the bog. 
 
 " Ballybawn, Ballybawn. Change here for Droosky and 
 all stations on the Droosky line. Be careful that you don't 
 lose yourselves. The first train doesn't stop anywhere at 
 all. The next train pulls up everywhere," a porter bawled 
 at the top of his voice. 
 
 " The express surely stops at Droosky ?" an excited 
 tourist asked. 
 
 "Amn't I after telling you it does," the porter said, 
 scratching his head. " Is it into the Atlantic it'd go ? 
 Though it does that same an odd time when Tim Clancy, 
 the driver, has a drop of drink in him. ^But sure the salt 
 water never gives anyone a cold. It cheers 'em up, the 
 poor creatures," he added confidentially to Jim as he col- 
 lected his luggage. " They expect something after their 
 long journey, maybe from Manchester or Birmingham, and 
 it's little in the way of entertainment there is to offer them. 
 Sure the people can't be always shooting landlords to 
 
CONQUEST 139 
 
 please 'em, and Fm worn out inventing outrages. Not but 
 what Tim Clancy'd have my life if he heard that I put the 
 name of the drink on him, and he one of them teetotal 
 cranks. Well now, just think of that," he went on, gazing 
 abstractedly at an incoming train. " If that isn't the slow 
 train after beating out the express. It's sorry I am to dis- 
 commode your honour, but you must run for it." 
 
 Jim and his luggage, amid the excitement of station- 
 master, guard, and several porters, were bundled into a 
 compartment, empty but for one passenger. His porter 
 hung on to the footboard as the train moved off. 
 
 "Left behind you'd be," he explained, "only I told the 
 guard that you were the son of the chairman of the line. 
 It's making a record he is to-day, and he only ten minutes 
 late, and he's trying to keep it up. The top of the morn- 
 ing to you, miss. Sure I didn't see you, and you hid there 
 behind the paper. Old Ireland for ever, and more power 
 to your silver tongue. 'Tis you that's able to put the fear 
 o' God into the Sassenachs." 
 
 Jim's eyes met the woman's eyes for a moment — blue, of 
 an infinite depth, calm, slightly mocking, half questioning, 
 half condemnatory. He was being judged and condemned. 
 But for what ? 
 
 "I fear he has thrown my things on some of yours," he 
 said, lifting a bag on to the rack. 
 
 "The English possess the land," she said with what she 
 may have meant for contempt. The slight curl of the 
 short upper lip disclosed pearly teeth. It was as if a rose 
 expanded for a moment and showed the white at the centre. 
 She lowered her eyes and fixed them on her newspaper. 
 He took his seat in the corner diagonally opposite. The 
 porter was wrong about her tongue. Silver was too sharp 
 and tinkling for such charm of sound. There was gold in 
 the hair under the boat-shaped hat that accentuated the 
 slight tilt in her nose, the curve of the upper lip and the 
 
 K 
 
140 CONQUEST 
 
 firm rounded chin; gold in the few freckles which she 
 seemed to wear for effect, as eighteenth century beauties 
 wore patches, on the cool ivory tan of her face. It was not 
 tan at all. It was some miracle of the sun that preserved 
 all the warmth beneath. The blue in her hat, and of the 
 linen coat and skirt, fitted to her figure, was a vivid splash 
 of colour against the brown of the bog. Autochthonous, 
 too ? What had such radiant beauty to do with politics ? 
 What a wonderful effect the long curled eyelashes had on 
 her face. 
 
 " The winds blow politics in Ireland," he said 
 maliciously. 
 
 " They sing liberty to slaves," she said, letting the paper 
 fall on her knees. 
 
 "I haven't seen any," he said with an effort to conceal 
 his admiration. 
 
 " The English see nothing anywhere but the perfection 
 of their own rule," she said demurely. 
 
 An obvious retort tempted him, but he left it unsaid. 
 It would, at least, be premature. So, he was English 
 again. He would be a Turk or a Hottentot if it only made 
 her talk. 
 
 " Slaves ?" he said meditatively. " Since IVe left Lon- 
 don I've met an Orangeman who hypothetically cursed 
 England, a newsvendor who sold me the newspapers he 
 thought good for me, a jarvey who drove me where I didn't 
 want to go, a masterly railway porter " 
 
 "And a Sinn Feiner whom you English put in jail," she 
 said proudly. 
 
 " You ?" he said incredulously. 
 
 "Me," she nodded. "I bashed a policeman of course. 
 But then he shouldn't have tried to "srrest me. All I said 
 was that no nation on earth touched the English for 
 hypocrisy and perjury." 
 
 There was fire now in the blue depths of her eyes. How 
 
CONQUEST 141 
 
 any policeman could have arrested her ! But that Irish 
 policeman was clever. He had the pleasure of being 
 bashed by her and of bearing her off to the lock-up. In- 
 dignation made her the more irresistible. If he could 
 only keep that look on her face. 
 
 "Rather hard on a Government that's doing its best to 
 pass Home Rule," he said with a judicial air. 
 
 "A Liberal?" she murmured with a look, and in a tone 
 that seemed to lay him bare as some vile thing on a dis- 
 secting table. "Thank God the Sinn Feiners aren't 
 hypnotized like Redmond and his people. We know 
 what the word of Englishmen is -worth. They promise 
 freely enough when they are in difficulties and then edge 
 out of performance." 
 
 "The Land Act?" 
 
 "They fatten their slaves in order to tax them 
 higher." 
 
 " Can nothing good come out of England ?" 
 
 " Nothing," she said vehemently. " I trust the Liberals 
 even less than I trust the Tories. The Tories hate us, but 
 the Liberals patronize us. I prefer hate to patronage. One 
 would think we were naughty children or slaves." 
 
 "But you said you are slaves." 
 
 "No doubt you think we are," she said with a regal in- 
 difference, again taking up her newspaper. 
 
 He topk out a book and tried to read, but found himself 
 looking at her again. Two parsons, one a dean, got in at 
 Bally vore. She nodded to both coldly, but the dean in- 
 sisted on shaking hands, saying with a laugh : 
 
 "My dear lady, though you have been in jail you mustn't 
 be too proud. I christened you, you know. When the 
 evil day comes you'll give me warning, or sprinkle my 
 doorposts, or whatever the republican way of exempting 
 one from destruction is ?" 
 
 His companion said "Humph." 
 
142 CONQUEST 
 
 The dean laughed. " Lefroy comes from the North and 
 takes these things seriously. We know better," he said 
 with a smile at the now indignant young woman. 
 
 "Mr. Facing-both-ways," she said impudently. 
 
 "A good definition of Mr. Dean," the dean said lightly. 
 "Lefroy would agree with you there. A dean is a ridicu- 
 lous person, stoned at once by the bishop and the chapter. 
 But then, I control the structure. Don't force me to fly the 
 republican flag," he said in mock horror. 
 
 " I shall send you one. Who knows how soon you may 
 need it," she said with a malicious glance at the horror- 
 stricken Lefroy. 
 
 " The Union Jack is the emblem of our King and coun- 
 try," Lefroy said indignantly. 
 
 "I always thought it was the Orange party rag," she 
 said innocently. 
 
 "Lefroy dots all his i*s," the dean said suavely. "But 
 how are your good father and most excellent mother ? Not 
 exactly approving, eh ?" ^ 
 
 " A state of truce with me, but otherwise as obstinate as 
 ever." 
 
 " The tenants haven't given in ? Your influence in that 
 direction would be most meritorious." 
 
 " I stopped 'em painting the cattle green — it was cruel to 
 the animals, as they licked the paint and it made 'em ill. 
 But dad must fight his own land battles. • He ought to be 
 grateful that I don't take to the platform against him. But 
 it would make things a little more strained at home, and 
 my friends are tolerant and don't expect it. I did advise 
 them," with a smile at Lefroy, "to practise some of the 
 Orange virtues. 'No Surrender' had immense success." 
 
 Lefroy seemed to threaten apoplexy. His lips worked 
 painfully. Before he could find expression for his deep 
 feeling the dean interfered gently. 
 
 " But you'll excuse us, my dear lady ; I promised Lefroy 
 
CONQUEST 143 
 
 to discuss with him matters in connection with the Susten- 
 tation Fund." 
 
 The girl again took up her paper. Once when he looked 
 at her Jim caught her eyes fixed on him. She turned over 
 the paper impatiently and frowned. There was something 
 vaguely familiar about the frown, something about the set 
 of her eyebrows and the rather petulant lips that recalled 
 some memory. Had he ever seen her before ? He shut his 
 eyes and tried to remember. Scraps of the parsons' con- 
 versation reached him. The dean severely, " My dear 
 fellow, one must live. What if the man is broke? You 
 won't get your full contribution from the fund otherwise. 
 Fifty pounds you say ? Keep his name down by all 
 means. It's done every day." 
 
 A hoarse whisper from Lefroy. "Do you think she'll 
 become a pervert in religion as well as in loyalty ?" 
 
 The train slowed down. "It's been delightful to have 
 this pleasure, Miss Diana," the dean said effusively. 
 
 "Good-bye, Miss Scovell," Lefroy said heavily. "May 
 God direct you." 
 
 "I'm blessed," Jim murmured under his breath. "She 
 — and a rebel." 
 
 3. 
 
 Jim forgot his luggage in watching her progress down 
 the platform. The only two porters were in smiling at- 
 tendance. A smiling stationmaster, cap in hand, hung by 
 her side. Passengers, taking the train for Droosky, waited 
 by the doors to salute and smile as she passed. A one- 
 legged beggar, supporting himself against a lamp-post, 
 called out, with a magnificent sweep of his battered hat, 
 " More power to you. Miss Diana." A grim, bearded man, 
 who had smiled and saluted with the others, asked, " Miss 
 Diana who ?" 
 
144 CONQUEST 
 
 "Miss Diana, of course. Sure the whole world knows 
 her — Miss Diana Scovell," a frieze-coated young farmer 
 said in a tone of wondering contempt, his eyes glowing. 
 
 " Her ?" the bearded man said, with a condemnatory 
 frown. 
 
 " Have you anything to say agin her ?" the farmer asked 
 aggressively. 
 
 " No, no," the bearded man said hastily. " She's a most 
 attractive young lady." 
 
 " It's well for you," the young man said in a disappointed 
 tone. "There's many a man in the town of Lisgeela'd 
 have hit you at once for putting that face on you," he 
 added, as if regretting his own moderation. 
 
 "Your luggage, I think, sir?" the dean said with a 
 tolerant smile. " There's not much use waiting for a porter, 
 with Miss Diana about. Since she's been to jail she's 
 become a sort of royal personage-^the local Joan of Arc." 
 
 "She's very beautiful," Jim said. 
 
 " That, too, of course," the dean said with ironic suavity, 
 helping with the luggage. 
 
 The train moved off. Jim, standing beside his luggage, 
 again sought the lissom blue figure. She was standing by 
 the booking office door talking, with a flushed eager face, 
 to a tall, thin, white-haired priest, her attendants, now in- 
 creased by all the station loungers, hanging back in a 
 smiling half circle. A dull cloud obscured the sun, but 
 her vivid face seemed to radiate its brightness not only on 
 the group of people around her, but on the dingy station 
 buildings — transfigured them, Jim thought. She looked 
 towards him for a moment. The priest turned round and 
 stared at him. The stationmaster took a bag from one of 
 the porters, who started towards Jim with a run. 
 
 " Sure if we only knew it was you, it's not left standing 
 like this you'd be," he said, seizing a luggage truck and 
 pulling it towards Jim by one handle. " Sure it's hard to 
 
CONQUEST 145 
 
 have an eye for anyone but Miss Diana, may God bless her, 
 Protestant and all. Though it's loth she'd be herself to 
 leave Pierce Daly's grandson stranded high and dry on 
 the platform without anyone to carry his bags. 'It's to 
 meet Mr. Jim Daly I came,' says Father Lysaght after 
 talking about this and that. 'Then it's him I must have 
 come down with,' Miss Diana says, flustered like. 'Gimme 
 them things, Davie Mulcahy, and run for your life,' says 
 Mr. Duffy the stationmaster, and off I hopped like a hare. 
 Sure you must remember me, Mr. Jim ? 'Tis often you let 
 drive at me with a switch and I hooshing after your pony 
 down the Tubber road, and you coming in and out to 
 school at the college — Davie Mulcahy." 
 
 "Perfectly," Jim said with decision, his eyes fixed on 
 the blue figure now disappearing through the station 
 door. 
 
 He sighed and looked at the porter who was grinning 
 broadly, his white teeth gleaming against a freckled face 
 almost as red as the shock of hair protruding from under 
 his cap in front. 
 
 " Oh, yes, of course," Jim said struggling with a memory. 
 "Davie Mulcahy." It was not the name he remembered, 
 but the mischievous eyes and the freckles and the carrot 
 hair. It all came back in a flash. 
 
 "It was you who frightened Crabbit into Spillane's 
 shop," he laughed. 
 
 " The very one — and him trampling the baskets of pota- 
 toes and apples and the like all round the floor; and Mr. 
 Spillane, God rest his soul, raging like a lion, and you fol- 
 lowing me down the road at full gallop as mad as a hatter, 
 till I legged it over the wall into Mick Tracey's garden. 
 It was great entirely — and my mother leathering me when 
 I got home for leaving the seat of my breeches atop of the 
 wall," Mulcahy said delightedly. 
 
 " Hullo, Jim. Do you know me, boy ?'* 
 
146 CONQUEST 
 
 "Td know your voice anywhere, Father James," Jim said, 
 turning round and taking the priest's outstretched hand. 
 " You haven't changed in the least." 
 
 "You won't see my grey hairs, and you can't see my 
 rheumatism. Well, well, to think that this giant of a man 
 is Jim. I never felt old till this minute. I used to pat 
 your head almost without lifting my arm, and now I have 
 to look up at you," the priest said huskily. " Hurry with 
 the things on to my car, Mulcahy. I'm coming with you, 
 Jim." 
 
 As they drove through the town Jim tried to adjust his 
 memory to what he saw. Lisgeela seemed to have shrunk 
 and grown shabbier. Tawdry new buildings emphasized 
 the meanness of the old. In the main street a glaring red- 
 brick bank made an ugly blotch of colour against the softer 
 pinks and greys and drabs of the older houses. The new 
 plate glass and mahogany shop-front of Mallon's made the 
 house behind it the more dingy. Andrews' confectionery 
 gave him a shock — was his memory of the cakes as unreal 
 as his memory of the shop ? The new convent vied in ugli- 
 ness with the lunatic asylum and the new Presbytery with 
 Delaney's terra-cotta pub, which might have been designed 
 by the owner in a fit of delirium tremens. 
 
 " And that ?" Jim asked, pointing to a pile of gimcrack 
 villa Gothic. 
 
 " The new college," Father Lysaght said. " The bishop 
 is letting himself go in stone and mortar." 
 
 "I suppose it's progress," Jim said wryly. 
 
 "When they made Macdonald a Monsignor he wasn't 
 satisfied till he got a new college," the priest said with a 
 shrug. " He has a couple of priests helping him now to do 
 nothing — professors they call 'em." 
 
 The Tubber Road, a draggled streamer of grass-grown, 
 rotting thatch and green, slimy walls, trailed off into the 
 plain. 
 
CONQUEST 14; 
 
 " The Church seems to have the best of it," Jim said with 
 a laugh. " My grandfather used to be pretty hard on you 
 for screwing the people so much." 
 
 "Since Deehan missed the Archbishopric he's grown 
 more Nationalist," the priest said meditatively. "It an- 
 noys the Government and the Vatican, no doubt, but he has 
 given up expecting anything more from them. He's all for 
 pleasing the people now — within limits — and they let hi^a 
 have his fling. He helps them a little with Home Rule 
 and they give him a plaything or two." 
 
 "The Church hasn't much in common with democracy," 
 Jim said. 
 
 " Sorra much." 
 
 " Does Deehan really want Home Rule ?" 
 
 "I'm no good at conundrums," Father Lysaght said 
 drily. " He mayn't have much fear of Home Rule coming, 
 or he may be a better Irishman than he's a churchman in 
 his old age. Even a bishop, Jim, is a man hrst and last, 
 and it's hard to plumb any man's heart." 
 
 Jim lost all interest in the bishop at the sight of thin 
 spirals of smoke ascending through the trees ahead — beech 
 and oak and elm and the two black cedars on the lawn, 
 and the giant fir near the garden gate. For a moment 
 there was a white gleam through the thick leaves; then 
 chimney flues and a strip of brown thatch. At last, with 
 an ache at his heart he saw the house, with masses of late 
 crimson roses and purple clematis glowing against the 
 white of the walls. The juniper hedge glistening in the 
 sun, a solitary bird note, the drowsy hum of bees, brilliant 
 red admirals and peacocks flitting over the cool green of 
 the sward or adding to the blaze of colour in the beds, the 
 deep shadows under the trees, the gleam of the river be- 
 yond, reproduced a memory he had carried with him in all 
 his wanderings for fifteen years. Everything was the 
 same, except the drive to the stable, which was no longer 
 
148 CONQUEST 
 
 grass-grown. The scene absorbed him, yet when he spoke 
 it was of nothing in his conscious thoughts : 
 
 "It's odd about the Scovell girl being a Nationahst." 
 
 "She's a fine girl, Miss Diana," Father Lysaght said, 
 urging the horse up the sHght incline to the gate. " What's 
 odd about it ? Isn't she an Irishwoman ? There's Tom 
 Durkan holding the gate open; he wasn't here in your time." 
 
 "I've heard all about him from my grandfather," Jim 
 said with a smile. 
 
 "You would," the priest said grimly. "He keeps Tom 
 as much in order as he does the League. Not a leaf must 
 be changed from how you left it. You must be very nice 
 to your grandfather, Jim," he added gravely. " He's a bit 
 hurt about you going into the Foreign Office." 
 
 " It's rather a good joke," Jim said lightly. 
 
 "I'm afraid he doesn't take it as a joke. He " 
 
 " A hundred thousand welcomes, Mr. Jim," from Durkan, 
 cut short the priest's explanation. 
 
 A trim parlourmaid standing in the porch was violently 
 pushed aside, and Susan Roche, fat, florid and unwieldy, 
 rushed out excitedly. Jim jumped off the car and held 
 out his hand. She gazed at him bewildered, her mouth 
 wide open, then seized his hand and kissed it several times. 
 
 "Sure it's the breath you took out of me for a minute," 
 she said joyfully, "and me expecting the gossoon I sent 
 away. Did you ever see a finer figure of a man. Father 
 James, agra ? But sure it's signs on him and he always 
 giving the promise of it. Here I am myself, just the same 
 as you left me," she laughed, generously ignoring an addi- 
 tional four stone of superabundant flesh, " and with all the 
 changes about the place, sure you're the biggest of 'em all 
 yourself. I'll be bound you won't find the place any cleaner, 
 and we having a parlourmaid and a housemaid no less this 
 many a year to help other to dirty it. God be with the 
 good old times when I hadn't to clean Up after them. It's 
 
CONQUEST 149 
 
 a favour you'd think the mistress was proffering me when 
 she brought them into the house with their caps and aprons 
 and all ; a heart scald they are to me day and night. And 
 Tom Durkan doing the boots and knives the way Td be 
 ashamed of doing 'em in my sleep." 
 
 Father Lysaght, with an impatient shrug, entered the 
 porch. Jim made a movement to follow, but Susan put her 
 hand on his arm. "Let him go, alannah," she whispered 
 with an elaborate screwing of her lips and eyes. "Sure I 
 was only marking time, till I made his reverence tired of 
 my old talk. 'Tis a private word I wanted all along to 
 have with yourself alone. Run away now, Peggy, like a 
 good girl, and be helping Tom Durkan to bring in them 
 bits of things." '~ 
 
 She waited till the parlourmaid had disappeared with 
 a bag. " It's hoarse in the throat I'm making myself, talk- 
 ing to your mother about it," she said in an earnest whisper. 
 "But sorra'd one of her'd budge an inch. It's not com- 
 mon sense, she'd say, after me wearing out my tongue to 
 no purpose. The poor mistress ! as if common sense would 
 move man or mortal to anything good or bad." 
 
 " What is it ?" Jim asked patiently. 
 
 " Amn't I leading up to it ? It's the. master. Sure it's 
 the heart that's broke in your grandfather. Mister Jim, and 
 you a Government^aah. Didn't I turn my back on my own 
 sister's son ten years ago and he disgracing me by being 
 made a peeler. 'Tis well I know what Mr. Pierce must be 
 feeling and his own blood doing something of the kind. 
 Sure I'd have it against you myself only my heart is as 
 soft as dough at the very thought or sight of you." 
 
 " If you don't mind then nothing else matters," Jim said 
 airily. 
 
 "The same obstinate set of the jaw that all the Dalys 
 have," Susan muttered half reproachfully, as she watched 
 him rush down the narrow hall to meet his mother who 
 
150 CONQUEST 
 
 had come in from the river front. "Sure they never heed 
 one another to say that he'd heed the hkes of me." 
 
 "At last," his mother said pushing him back a Httle, 
 her hands on his shoulders. "What does it feel like, 
 Jim ?" 
 
 He screwed his lips and glanced whimsically at the low 
 ceiling which his head almost touched. 
 
 " Like a plant wrenched from its pot when it's been put 
 back again — feeling round trying to make out what it all 
 means. But it's more restful than the other thing. Hallo, 
 a grey hair; let's have it up." 
 
 " Poor old Jim. You felt like that all the time ?" she 
 said sadly as he fiddled with her hair. 
 
 "Not I. I enjoyed every minute of it. There, that's 
 better. It's younger you get you know." 
 
 "I'm forty-seven." 
 
 " Fibber. We were born the same day," 
 ' She blushed like a young girl, looked at him keenly, 
 and removed her hands from his shoulders. 
 
 " I did it all for the best," she said with a sigh. 
 
 "Of course you did — and it has been for the best, and 
 it is," he said with a firm set of his jaw, "And now what's 
 all this nonsense about my grandfather ? Where is he ?" 
 
 " Under the cedar tree. Father James is with him. But 
 we must have a talk about him first. Let me show you 
 your room and the house." 
 
 They wandered about from room to room. It was all 
 changed, but it was still the same — not a jarring note any- 
 where. The picture rails had not been there before, but 
 they were just right and gave height to the low rooms. 
 The old furniture was all there. Jolly good it was too — 
 must have been bought by his great-great-grandmother 
 Edwardes, 
 
 " Ever hear of an Edwardes in the family ?" he asked. 
 
 His mother knitted her smooth brow. 
 
CONQUEST 151 
 
 "Your grandfather's grandmother on his mother's side," 
 she said with a smile. 
 
 "Right Dick Edwardes told me all about it. He's a 
 descendant, too. Was up all the time with me and claimed 
 the attenuated relationship as we were coming down. Tm 
 going to see him — somewhere near Belfast — Castle 
 Edwardes. Orange, with a streak of Balliol, though his 
 people are the real thing. Says they'll hang me for a 
 Croppy. If my grandfather doesn't hang me first for 
 a traitor," he laughed. 
 
 " You've heard then ?" she said, blenching a little. 
 
 He laughed again. "Don't you worry. You told me 
 twenty times that month in Munich — by not telling me. 
 And your letters — my young mumsy is as clear as crystal 
 when she tries subterfuge. And his not coming since I got 
 the nomination — not even to Laibach which he longed to 
 see. Besides, Father James gave me a hint, and Susan 
 has already fired a broadside." 
 
 She sat down in the armchair in his bedroom, clasped 
 and unclasped her hands. Through the window he saw 
 the cedar tree and a table laid for luncheon. Father 
 Lysaght was standing by the table, rubbing his chin with 
 his right hand and speaking earnestly to his grandfather, 
 who was half hidden by a sv/aying branch. 
 
 "I hurt my father, and now I have hurt your grand- 
 father, who's more than a father to me," she said in a flat 
 monotone. 
 
 "Your father hurt you, you mean?" Jim said quietly. 
 
 "I'm morbid to think of him now. For that was some- 
 thing I couldn't avoid. I would do it all over again to- 
 morrow with full knowledge of the consequences. I 
 couldn't regret it no matter how hard I tried. But this is 
 different. I foresaw the danger from the first. But I 
 built on his affection for you, for me. It wasn't as if your 
 going into the Foreign Office was something inevitable like 
 
152 CONQUEST 
 
 my marriage with your father. That was fate, destiny, 
 what you will, and I was ordering only my own life. But 
 you'll another matter," She paused, her eyes fixed on the 
 cedar tree. 
 
 Jim was distressed. He wriggled from foot to foot, and, 
 when he noticed it, stood rigid, watching his mother in- 
 tently. This was the first sign of weakness he had ever 
 seen in her. He would give anything to save her one 
 twitch of her long nervous fingers. If he could only shift 
 the worry somehow from her shoulders to his own. 
 
 "I shouldn't have sent you into the Foreign Office," she 
 said miserably. " But it wasn't a mere whim. I had some- 
 thing more in view than giving you a job or a position. 
 Behind it was a vague dream that perhaps some day you'd 
 help to break down barriers — built only on ignorance and 
 misunderstanding — between England and Ireland I 
 mean." 
 
 " Are you sorry I'm in the Foreign Office ?" he asked 
 gently. 
 
 She hesitated. " No ; I'm not. I'm sorry for your grand- 
 father, and I'm a little afraid of you. It would be different 
 if you had chosen it yourself." 
 
 "But I did choose it," he said firmly. "We must 
 straighten out this tangle, mother. I owe you more than 
 I can ever tell you. You've sacrificed the best part of your 
 life to me. But if you wanted me to leave the Foreign 
 Office there'd be a row. I went there because I wanted to, 
 and I mean to stay there — for the present, at least." 
 
 She stared at him, a little bewildered, but he returned 
 her look unflinchingly. 
 
 " I intended it from the very first — I did my best to in- 
 fluence you," she said falteringly. 
 
 " Then you were as wise in that as in everything else," he 
 said, stroking her hair. "My grandfather doesn't blame 
 you^ I suppose ?" 
 
CONQUEST 153 
 
 " No, he doesn't blame me," she said listlessly. 
 
 She had got what she wanted — yet it seemed a defeat. 
 This was some new Jim whom she didn't know. Her boy 
 had slipped away from her, and in his place was this man 
 with set lips. In a moment their relations had changed. 
 What was it she had lost ? It wasn't his love. She could 
 see it in his eyes, and feel it in the touch of his fingers on 
 her hair. She couldn't live if it was otherwise. Nothing 
 mattered, not her father-in-law, not anything as long as 
 she held his love. Yes, she saw it all now. Thank God it 
 had come without any conflict of will. The pained feel- 
 ing gradually ebbed away and only joy remained. He stood 
 apart from her now, a man. The colour again came back 
 to the day and she gave a glad sigh. She had escaped 
 some horrible danger. Had their relations not only been 
 changed but reversed, she should be glad. 
 
 "It's that silly bed," she said, standing up. "None of 
 us seems to have realized how you'd grown. I must have 
 it changed." 
 
 " It is rather short," he said ruefully. " Shall I face my 
 grandfather now ?" 
 
 " Let's," she said with a sigh. 
 
 But she lingered on the way, hanging on his approval. 
 When he said the little Paul Brill was jolly good, she 
 showed all the pleasure of having painted it herself. 
 
 Jim felt some change in her. She had grown younger. 
 She was really more beautiful than Miss Scovell — in a 
 different way of course. If she hadn't pitched him into the 
 damned Foreign Office she'd be perfect. 
 
 "You'll be nice to him?" she said, pressing his arm as 
 they walked across-to the cedar tree. 
 
 "Why, of course," he said grimly. 
 
 He could not take his eyes off his grandfather's, of which 
 he was conscious from the moment he left the door — two 
 pin-points of light under white shaggy eyebrows. 
 
154 CONQUEST 
 
 " Hallo, grandfather," he called out, more cheerfully than 
 he felt, when he was halfway across the lawn. 
 
 The eyes blinked once, but there was no change in the 
 fierce accusing stare. Jim stood in front of the rush arm- 
 chair, his lips set as tightly as the old man's, his hand 
 stretched out. 
 
 Father Lysaght stood by the side of the chair, his lips 
 pursed in a noiseless whistle. 
 
 Pierce lowered his eyes, and looked hungrily at the out- 
 stretched hand. With a spasmodic sigh that shook his 
 whole huddled-up body he raised his right hand from 
 where it rested on his knee and touched Jim's hand limply, 
 muttering, "YouVe disgraced your name." 
 
 Suddenly as if the touch had galvanized him, his body 
 became taut, his hand gripped Jim's fingers tightly. He 
 looked up, his lips twitching. 
 
 " How are you, boy ?" he said fiercely. 
 
 " Pretty fit. How are you, grandfather ?" 
 
 "Poorly — only poorly, and how could I be any other 
 way?" he said, glaring at Jim reproachfully but giving 
 another squeeze to the hand, which he let go reluctantly. 
 His head again sank between his shoulders, but his angry 
 eyes followed Jim's movements. 
 
 " Here's luncheon," Arabella said with a sigh of relief. 
 
 " I've no appetite for my dinner. How could I and " 
 
 Pierce began. 
 
 "Well, I have," Father Lysaght interrupted hastily. 
 " I'm as hungry as a wolf." 
 
 Pierce watched gloomily the preparation of the table. 
 
 "Now, father," Arabella said. 
 
 "Well, now that I see it, I'd maybe be able to pick a 
 bone," he said rising with some difficulty. "I'm as firm 
 as ever on my feet ; the trouble is to rise to them," he said 
 accepting Jim's help. He kept hold of his hand as they 
 walked to the table and then dropped it suddenly. 
 
CONQUEST 155 
 
 "I keep forgetting- things," he said with a frown. 
 
 " It's by forgetting things that we keep young," Father 
 Lysaght said with a laugh. "I forget my rheumatism 
 whenever I can. When Fm out here I forget that Fm a 
 sort of perpetual curate with the bishop's foot always on 
 my neck." 
 
 " You don't forget your country," Pierce said, pausing in 
 carving a chicken, and glaring at Jim. 
 
 "I would and welcome if you'd only give me a drum- 
 stick or something to forget it with. And there's Jim as 
 hungry as a hawk after his long journey. But with all our 
 forgetting, we mustn't forget that he's a sort of a stranger 
 and a guest among us all." 
 
 Pierce said "Humph," but he carved more quickly. 
 
 " Did you bring your rod with you, Jim ?" he asked 
 quietly, after a while. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " A salmon wouldn't rise to a fly in an August like this un- 
 less he did it in a dream," Pierce said, his stern face relax- 
 ing into a smile. "Anyhow I warned Con Driscoll that 
 you'd be coming about now, and he's keeping his bank 
 warm for you." 
 
 "It's rumoured that the Tullyfin tenants are settling 
 with Scovell," Father Lysaght said tentatively. 
 
 "There's many a thing rumoured," Pierce said placidly. 
 " But not a Tullyfin tenant '11 buy till Con Driscoll releases 
 him, and Con'll make no sign till I give the word." 
 
 "It's a great strain on Miss Diana to be living in the 
 house and this fight going on, seeing the side she's on," 
 Father Lysaght said thoughtfully, fingering a wineglass. 
 " I saw her at the station to-day and she wasn't looking — 
 well, as well as one might expect." 
 
 Jim wondered vaguely if it were possible to paint the 
 lily. 
 
 "She's an Irishwoman for you/' Pierce said admiringly. 
 
156 CONQUEST 
 
 "It's the inside of a jail she's under a compliment for to 
 the English Government. That's the only job she'd take 
 at their hands/* 
 
 " It's into her coffin ye might send her if ye go on worry- 
 ing her," Father Lysaght said gravely. 
 
 "She told Con Driscoll she didn't give a thraneen one 
 way or another," Pierce said stiffly. 
 
 "That's the sort of girl she is — to go on grieving her 
 heart out in secret till the harm is done," Father Lysaght 
 said with a shrug. "And what's between ye after all? 
 Scovell asked twenty-two years' purchase, and he's come 
 down to twenty. The tenants offered sixteen and have 
 gone up to seventeen. As Miss Diana said to me to-day, 
 the sporting thing to do would be to split the difference." 
 " She said that ?" 
 
 "Or words to that effect," Father Lysaght said with a 
 shrug of indiflPerence. 
 
 "Would Derek Scovell take eighteen and a half?" 
 "He would." 
 
 " Then I won't break her word," Pierce said with a sigh 
 of relief. "You can tell Mallon from me that he can settle 
 at that, and I'll send word to Con Driscoll. To tell you 
 the truth, since Miss Diana went to jail I'd be glad to be 
 quit of it. I saw her pass by, a few minutes before you 
 came and she never looked better, with all your 'words to 
 that effect.' I suppose Derek came to you or the bishop ?" 
 " He might," Father Lysaght said imperturbably. 
 " He was always a hasty man," Pierce said with a quaver- 
 ing chuckle. " If he'd only waited another two days we'd 
 ,have gone up a year to eighteen and then the split *d have 
 been at nineteen, which was what I always intended to 
 give. Have a glass of wine with me, Jim, boy." 
 
CONQUEST 157 
 
 Derrylinn, Simon Lentaigne said, was an indiscretion of 
 his youth. . His father had spent the dowry of his wife in 
 building on to a beautiful Queen Anne house elaborate 
 French Gothic stabling and out offices. At twenty-one 
 Simon spent the accumulations of a long minority in 
 pulling down the Queen Anne house and building an 
 elaborate French Gothic, castellated villa to suit the 
 stabling. Helen Fraser preferred to see in the raw lime- 
 stone monstrosity an obscure working of Providence, and 
 as Helen Lentaigne she always defended it with spirit. 
 Irish landlords, she explained to Diana Scovell, inherited 
 their ideas with their houses, vegetated for a few years, and 
 died. Simon had killed Queen Anne and all the moulder- 
 ing traditions of his class at a blow. By a happy impulse 
 he had built- a house which gave him artistic dissatisfaction 
 from the first, and sowed that discontent which opened his 
 mind to new ideas. His mind walked, she said. One 
 could trace the steps : in the Constable, which he inherited 
 but clung to; in the Ingres, which was his first reaction 
 from the house; in the Corots and Manets and Monets, in 
 the Degas and Cezanne; in the Sargent landscape and in 
 his latest purchases — a Tahitian study by Gauguin, and a 
 Matisse. And, of course, to a mind that moved in Ireland, 
 English institutions went the way of the Victorian painters 
 — to the cellar. 
 
 " It may have been the salvation of Simon, but it's beastly 
 ugly," Diana Scovell said, looking up at the house. 
 
 " How far is the kitchen from the dining-room in Daly- 
 house ?" Helen Lentaigne asked with a tolerant smile. 
 
 "Miles." 
 
 " Then a new house has compensations beyond the salva- 
 tion of one's husband's soul," Mrs. Lentaigne said cheer- 
 
158 CONQUEST 
 
 fully. "There are bathrooms and not makeshifts; and 
 Simon built when servants had begun to be considered as 
 human beings. You're out to kill to-night, Diana. That 
 green and gold with your hair. I thought blue and saffron 
 or something were the new national colours ?'* 
 
 " As if I hadn't outgrown dress," Diana said with a pout 
 at her shoe which matched the dull gold trimming of her 
 dress. ■^"'Jl 
 
 Mrs. Lentaigne glanced ruefully at her own rather full 
 figure. " In our coffins, my dear — perhaps," she said with 
 a sigh. " Even then our souls will be hovering round, 
 worried that we haven't been laid out properly. However," 
 more cheerfully, "black and the powder puff are still a 
 help. And Simon doesn't see me — he sees Helen Eraser." 
 
 "Fudge — fishing? But I only pay compliments to 
 plain women," Diana said with an admiring look. 
 
 "You dear thing," Mrs. Lentaigne said with a com- 
 placent sigh and a pat on Diana's fingers. "You should 
 have come to stay." 
 
 "A dinner with Uncle Hamilton is as much as I could 
 stand. What brings him here of all places ?- The Orange 
 moth singeing his wings on the rebel candle." 
 
 " I'm a cousin — he still clings to that rock. And he has 
 a fixed belief that anyone born Orange cannot become 
 permanently insane. He has even a faint hope of you, 
 though as you weren't born in Ulster you're a worse case. 
 Then as Simon hasn't joined a party he's not entirely un- 
 regenerate. Poor old Hamilton ! He's as uneasy as a 
 clucking hen. He really comes to try and find out what 
 the Liberals are up to. He's in luck this time — we have 
 Patterson, one of the Whips. Takes an interest in Irish 
 policy and hopes to succeed Birrell. If he didn't know so 
 much about Ireland and wasn't for ever airing his know- 
 ledge — you know the sort of thing — he'd be quite nice." 
 
 "Has he shown you round Derrylinn yet?" 
 
CONQUEST 159 
 
 "Worse than that. He knows all our thoughts and 
 motives." 
 
 "That kind of prize ass," Diana said with a shrug. 
 "Who else is there?" 
 
 " No women but ourselves. De Lacey the Sinn Feiner — 
 you know him. One of Plunkett's young men, Fergus Kane 
 — I think you've met him. The Dean. George Dale, the Red- 
 mondite M.P. — warranted not to quarrel with Orangeman 
 or Sinn Feiner. Dick Gazeley — the Meath Gazeleys 
 and a sort of cousin of yours — a moderate Unionist, but 
 firm I think, and the dark horse, Jim Daly." 
 
 " Scarty has broken its shell then ?" 
 
 "Not Arabella — yet anyhow. But she asked me to take 
 the young man off her hands for a few days. Old Pierce 
 is giving him a thin time — flings the Foreign Office in his 
 face a dozen times a day." 
 
 " Serves the fop right," Diana said emphatically. 
 
 " Fop ?" Mrs. Lentaigne said indignantly. " The last 
 thing Fd call him. Good looks — certainly. But his 
 strength saves him. A bit of a Hercules and as hard as 
 nails." 
 
 " The superior English type, I mean — patronizing and 
 all that. He tried it on with me — I travelled down with 
 him from Ballybawn." 
 
 "You're as prejudiced as old Pierce. The boy has abso- 
 lutely no side." 
 
 " Before I knew who he was I disliked him for being an 
 Englishman." 
 
 " And now you dislike him because he isn't. Is that the 
 logic of Sinn Fein ?" 
 
 "You've a weakness still, Helen, for the logic of the 
 Orange Lodge. I dislike him because he's an Irishman 
 who has taken an English job." 
 
 "A Foreign Office clerkship a job? Anyone less like 
 a careerist I've never met. Even Patterson who, like many 
 
i6o CONQUEST 
 
 Englishmen, confounds life with a career, says Jim has 
 thrown himself away. You don't know what he did at 
 Oxford ?" 
 
 "Became a prig probably. He wears an English 
 Government label — that's enough for me. Brought up a 
 Nationalist, too, and with such a grandfather !" 
 
 " Are you a little Unionist ?" 
 
 "Anyhow I don't like him," Diana laughed. 
 
 "Well, that's a solid reason at last. You're a silly 
 goose, Di. I'm starved. No wonder you're crotchety, dear, 
 at finding dinner put back half an hour. But Mr. Patterson 
 was so anxious to explain Ireland to the Beekawn fisher- 
 men that I hadn't the heart to refuse. You must blame him 
 for the delay and not Jim Daly. Let's hope the Beekawn 
 people won't hate me too much for the infliction. Oh^ 
 thank God, there's the bell." 
 
 "More round-table jabber, I suppose?" Diana said with 
 a shrug, as they made their way to the house. 
 
 "I've told you who's heije — you know the result," Mrs. 
 Lentaigne said cheerfully. "Simon still hopes for a 
 miracle. Some night during a discordant wrangle a hand 
 will write on the wall a heaven-sent settlement of the Irish 
 question. The wolves will lie down with the lambs and we 
 shall all be happy ever after. What a mercy Simon didn't 
 remake the park when he rebuilt the house," she added, 
 gazing wistfully at the wonderful pattern of black and gold 
 a clump of elms made against the sunset. 
 
 " Violence is the only method," Diana said truculently. 
 "Strauss is the only musician I can listen to. Harmony 
 with Uncle Hamilton and the English can only be got 
 through discords. The English will at least pretend to be 
 just if they're only made uncomfortable enough." 
 
 " My dear, the complacency of the English is like a stone 
 wall. The sun never sets on their self-satisfaction. They 
 carry the blessings of dulness to the ends of the earth. You 
 
CONQUEST i6i 
 
 bash your heads, and if they notice you at all you are 
 merely flies out of season." 
 
 " You're weakening, Helen. And it was here I learnt that 
 I was Irish." 
 
 " It's not the first time that a pupil got out of hand. I'm 
 not weakening, though I suppose I've outgrown the first 
 zeal of the convert. You can't knock down the British 
 Empire with a pop-gun, my dear. But if we only have 
 patience there must be some way of piercing its thick hide 
 or stirring its slow-moving brain. Walls of Jericho don't 
 fall now to the sound of trumpets. And you've only been 
 piping your penny whistle for a year. You won't intimidate 
 England by bashing an Irish policeman." 
 
 " I might strangle it with mixed metaphors," Diana said 
 viciously. 
 
 Mrs. Lentaigne laughed heartily. "Simon says I'm 
 pretty dreadful. It's the mixture of people I've been enter- 
 taining for the last fifteen years, I suppose." 
 
 "I explained exactly how they should view it from the 
 economic standpoint," came in a well modulated voice 
 through the open drawing-room windows. 
 
 Mrs. Lentaigne tripped up the steps to the churchlike 
 door and paused to take breath, making a grimace at Diana. 
 
 " Mr. Patterson again. We must rescue them, Di. Give 
 me a good old Tory rather than a philosophic Rad. Even 
 the Whigs knew better than to treat passion as a sum in 
 arithmetic. It's like curing a lovesick girl by telling her 
 to count ten and draw a long breath." 
 
 "I could see the self-evident truth sinking into their 
 minds, slowly but surely taking hold " 
 
 Dean Brereton escaped with a bound and met the women 
 almost at the threshold of the door opening from the hall: 
 
 " My dear lady, you basely desertect us. Happily Mr- 
 Patterson filled the gap, in so far as it was humanly pos- 
 sible, by one of his lucid But this is too charming. 
 
i62 CONQUEST 
 
 Diana. You didn't prepare me for this, Mrs. Lentaigne. 
 It will be a pleasure for you, Patterson." 
 
 Mrs. Lentaigne murmured an introduction. 
 
 "The latest convert to your policy of conciliation," the 
 dean supplemented suavely. 
 
 "Were you at the Beekawn meeting?" Patterson asked, 
 a glow of interest in his grey eyes. 
 
 "Centrifugal attraction, I am afraid," Simon Lentaigne 
 said with a laugh, taking possession of Diana, 
 
 Patterson, a slightly perplexed frown on his self-pos- 
 sessed, clean-shaven, hatchet-like face, looked at the dean, 
 who was gently stroking his silky brown beard. 
 
 "She's just come out of jail," the dean said blandly. 
 
 "Do explain. Dale," Patterson said to a slenderly built 
 man, who, though in correct evening dress, seemed to have 
 strayed down from the Renaissance through Louis Quinze 
 salons and Georgian withdrawing rooms trilling Sappho 
 and Ronsard and Herrick, the high bridge of his exagger- 
 ated Roman nose threatening him with the stake, from 
 which a hint of the dagger and the bowl in his sardonic 
 brown eyes and thin lips had perhaps saved him. 
 
 Dale shrugged thin shoulders gracefully, and said, tilt- 
 ing a black eyebrow, "The dean means that you've made 
 her an irreconcilable." 
 
 "We? What nonsense. Do be serious. Dale." 
 
 "Good Lord. And I've just listened to his speech at 
 Beekawn," Dale said, his white teeth gleaming against the 
 blue-black of his long, narrow face. His lips and nostrils 
 curled in a sneer, but the laughing eyes softened the sting. 
 "Unhappily she doesn't belong to my party. I didn't 
 know you had anything like her, De Lacey. I'm strongly 
 tempted to join you. Who wouldn't follow her? I don't 
 blame the Liberals so much for swallowing their principles 
 and suppressing free speech as for their blindness to beauty. 
 It's enough to strain the party friendship, Patterson." 
 
CONQUEST 163 
 
 " Do get to the point," Patterson said sharply. 
 
 " She got fourteen days for making a speech," De Lacey, 
 a short, bearded man in spectacles, said quietly. 
 
 "Be quite fair, De Lacey — for bashing a policeman," 
 Dale said with a grimace. 
 
 Patterson awoke from an abstracted stare at his pumps. 
 
 "An important distinction," he said brightly. 
 
 There was a movement towards the dining-room. Mrs. 
 Lentaigne led off with Diana, the men following in groups. 
 
 "You must introduce me, De Lacey," Dale said with a 
 friendly pressure of the arm. "There's that young Daly 
 sidling up to her. Damn cheek." 
 
 "She doesn't like the Parliamentary party," De Lacey 
 said with an impassive face. " Likes 'em about as much as 
 she does your friends the Liberals." 
 
 "Friends?" Dale said, rubbing his chin ruefully. 
 " Surely, not quite that. Working partners, shall we say ?" 
 
 "They get the swag and you the dishonoured promis- 
 sory note," De Lacey said with a chuckle. 
 
 Patterson and Dean Brereton sat on either side of Mrs. 
 Lentaigne at the round table. Lentaigne had Diana on 
 his right. Dale made a move to get beside her but was 
 forestalled by Jim Daly. Dale then made a successful but 
 unobtrusive flank movement and took the chair on Len- 
 taigne's left. Hamilton Pakenham, with a moody glance 
 at his niece, and a grunt in response to her "Glad you're 
 near me, Uncle Hammy," sat beside Dale. Gazeley weighed 
 the dean against Pakenham and chose the vacant place 
 between the dean and Jim Daly. De Lacey, in response to 
 a nod from Mrs. Lentaigne, took his seat beside Patterson. 
 
 " When I first married," Mrs. Lentaigne said, " I used to 
 try and arrange people at table. It worried my life out 
 and was never a success. Now — " she paused as a tall, 
 gaunt, clean-shaven man came hastily into the room. He 
 stopped abruptly and gazed at the table hesitatingly. 
 
i64 CONQUEST 
 
 "There^s no choice left, Mr. Kane. It must be between 
 the Orange Lodge and Sinn Fein," Mrs. Lentaigne said 
 with a smile. 
 
 " Couldn't be better. Am I not a sort of halfway house ?" 
 Kane said drily. 
 
 "Now?** the dean reminded Mrs. Lentaigne. 
 
 " Oh, well now, they fit themselves in anyhow. Fm not 
 worried, and it*s at least no worse than when I was.** 
 
 " I've quite lost my heart to the Beekawn fishermen. Not 
 even my own constituents could iiave been more responsive,** 
 Patterson said emotionally. 
 
 "He promised them a new pier,** Dale said, making a 
 bid with his eyes for Diana's sympathy. 
 
 " Good Lord ! A pier on shifting sand," Lentaigne 
 said, pulling his pointed grey beard. 
 
 "Bribery and corruption," Pakenham grunted. 
 
 "A Liberal Government is a government that bribes with 
 both hands," Diana said sweetly. "One day a sop to the 
 so-called Loyalists, the next a sop to the Redmondites. 
 Anything to stave off Home Rule." 
 
 "Pity an unhappy Redmondite," Dale said dolefully. 
 
 "How interesting," Diana said derisively. "I thought 
 you never came to Ireland." 
 
 " Always for fishing," Dale said with an admiring smile. 
 
 " I must say, Mr. De Lacey," Patterson said for the ears 
 of the table, " I don't quite understand your position. Do 
 you pronounce the word 'Sin* ? Oh, * Shin.' I must confess 
 I find Sinn Fein a little unreasonable. Ireland has already 
 an excellent body of representatives who have been most^ 
 useful to us in the House. They press the claims of Ireland 
 in season and out of season. But I'm glad to be able to 
 say that they have learnt the reasonableness which the very 
 atmosphere of the House always induces. They know the 
 worries of a big empire, more especially with the state of 
 Europe what it is, and are willing to wait." 
 
CONQUEST 165 
 
 " How long ?" De Lacey said with a smile. 
 
 Patterson pursed his lips. "We have our difficulties, I 
 admit. We must first get the House of Lords out of the 
 path — but the limited veto will secure that. And some of 
 our Nonconformist supporters are still more Protestant than 
 Liberal; they have fears for their co-religionists in Ulster. 
 Liberal Imperialists don't yet quite see their way. And 
 there is the fiscal question; there is a fear among some of 
 our staunchest supporters that you are not quite sound on 
 Free Trade. But these are all matters of adjustment and 
 balance. You must trust us." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 Patterson shrugged his shoulders and glanced round the 
 table as if seeking protection for his modesty and re- 
 ticence. 
 
 "A very interesting question," the dean said benignly. 
 
 "Help me, Dale," Patterson said appealingly. 
 
 " To damn us both ?" Dale said, with a grin. " Better 
 keep the half loaf hidden up your sleeve." 
 
 " And when Mr. Pakenham and his friends beat the big 
 drum I suppose another slice will go ?" De Lacey said quietly. 
 
 "Whole loaf or half loaf, we'll have none of it," Paken- 
 ham said threateningly. 
 
 "And we'll take only the whole loaf," De Lacey said 
 with a shrug. 
 
 "What is Sinn Fein but a mere group?" Patterson said 
 with a wave of his hand, as if brushing it aside. 
 
 " It's an eternal fact — the desire of a nation for freedom." 
 
 " I speak of practical politics," Patterson interrupted icily. 
 
 " And a determined will to get it," De Lacey finished his 
 sentence coldly. 
 
 "We have the representatives of the people with us," 
 Patterson said, with a smile at Dale. 
 
 "Indeed," De Lacey said ironically. "Do you believe 
 in their blessed bill. Dale ?" 
 
1 66 CONQUEST 
 
 " It's a rotten bill, but it's the best they can do, and the 
 best we can get," Dale said gloomily. "Half a loaf is 
 better than no bread." 
 
 De Lacey laughed and then looked grave. " There you 
 have the tragedy of the Redmondites," he said sadly. 
 " They are one of our grievances against you, Mr. Patterson. 
 You have corrupted them to the sanity and reasonableness 
 of your opportunist politics. In becoming good Liberals 
 they have got out of touch with Ireland." 
 
 " If I remember aright Sinn Fein has tried its strength 
 against them," Patterson said coldly. 
 
 " And was beaten," De Lacey laughed pleasantly. " But 
 then you hadn't shown your hand. Your wonderful gift was 
 still in the poke. When the next test comes things will be 
 different — very different." 
 
 "Dreams cut no ice in politics," Patterson said, with a 
 curl of his lip. 
 
 "But faith does," De Lacey said good-humouredly. 
 "You don't believe in your own bill. It's a mere move in 
 your party game. But it's a matter of life or death to us. 
 You may pass your bill, but Ireland can't be made to accept 
 it against her will." 
 
 " You haven't even a policy," Patterson said, with a shrug. 
 
 " Solviiur ambulando — England has never yet failed to 
 supply us with one," De Lacey said amiably. 
 
 " Your friend De Lacey may be a help to us in dishing 
 the Liberals," Pakenham said thoughtfully to Diana. 
 
 " Oh, he'll dish you with them," Diana said confidently. 
 
 " And us, I suppose ?" Dale said ironically. 
 
 " Oh, you ? You exist only in Westminster, and you'll 
 disappear at the next election." 
 
 " What the devil is Sinn Fein ?" Pakenham asked with a 
 frown. 
 
 "Just 'ourselves,'" Diana said airily. "Irishmen — we 
 don't exclude even Orangemen. No hanging on the tail 
 
CONQUEST 167 
 
 of the Liberal cart, no going hat in hand and cringing 
 to England, no sending of useless representatives to West- 
 minster," her eyes seeking Dale, who bowed and said : 
 "Thank you." "No taking of jobs — just standing inde- 
 pendently on our own feet, working out our own salva- 
 tion." 
 
 " And bashing policemen for recreation," Pakenham said 
 stolidly. 
 
 "I got a wigging for that," Diana laughed. "No, no 
 violence — passive resistance. We simply ignore England." 
 
 "Is it a joke or is it high treason?" Pakenham asked 
 doubtfully. " What do you make of it, Kane ?" 
 
 Diana laughed. "He won't acknowledge us, but Sinn 
 Fein as a political idea grew out of the co-operative move- 
 ment. Horace Plunkett and Mr. Kane and their friends 
 are really responsible for us." 
 
 "I won't be drawn into politics," Kane said with an 
 amused smile. 
 
 "Is the d — blessed thing spreading?" Dale asked irrit- 
 ably. 
 
 "Like wildfire. It's normal enough development of 
 the intellectual movement that has been going on for the 
 last fifteen years. IVe always told you. Dale, your party 
 was foolish in not backing the co-operative movement and 
 the Gaelic League." 
 
 " It has no political experience," Dale said oracularly. 
 
 " It has life," Kane said drily. 
 
 "What I deprecate is the extreme in political views," the 
 dean said, wagging his head impressively. " Take things 
 quietly, and everything turns out for the best. I'm old 
 enough to remember disestablishment. The Church was to 
 be ruined : we are stronger than ever we were. The Fenians 
 were to have cut our throats : they didn't. Then land- 
 lords were to be murdered or expropriated or both : they 
 either died in their beds or live happily in the receipt of 
 
i68 CONQUEST 
 
 higher and far more comfortable incomes from the funds. 
 My good friend, Dr. Phelan, the Roman Catholic bishop 
 of Droosky and I may be seeking heaven by slightly 
 different paths, but we have a pleasant word and a hand- 
 shake now and again on the way— at an asylum committee 
 or elsewhere. The Pope may have a bad name in Belfast^ 
 but he*s quite a pleasant person in Droosky." 
 
 "You couldn*t get the Protestant candidate elected 
 doctor to the asylum," Pakenham objected. 
 
 "My dear Pakenham, that was human nature and not 
 religion. The Catholic candidate had thirteen relations 
 on the committee, the Protestant only two." 
 
 "Of course, you*d have elected the Catholic in Belfast, 
 Uncle Hammy," Diana said impudently. 
 
 "Fd venture to say," the dean continued suavely, "that 
 I have less reason to quarrel with the Pope and his clergy 
 than Mr. De Lacey, who is, I understand, a Catholic." 
 
 "I get fewer smiles than you, anyhow," De Lacey said 
 with a shrug. 
 
 " Ah ! How is that now ?" Patterson said, pricking his 
 ears attentively. 
 
 De Lacey again shrugged his shoulders and said : " It's 
 one of the anomalies of our political system that the Catholic 
 Church owes much of its power in Ireland to the English 
 Government. England does its best to make us priest- 
 ridden by giving the Church control of education, and then 
 points to the power of the Church as a difficulty in the way 
 of self-government. It may be only stupidity, but it looks 
 very like malice. In no Catholic country has the Church 
 any such power. Catholics have always resisted these 
 secular claims of their Church. Orangemen shriek Home 
 Rule, Rome Rule. I and many Catholics have more Rome 
 Rule than we want, and it is English rule that imposes it 
 on us. Mr. Pakenham will not, perhaps, believe me, but I 
 would not lift a finger for Home Rule if it meant the poli- 
 
CONQUEST 169 
 
 tical rule of my own Church. Fd a thousand times prefer 
 the Union." 
 
 " You think the religious difficulty a bogy then ?" Patter- 
 son asked. 
 
 "I know it is. If I may retort the argument, the last 
 accusation an Irish Protestant. should make against Catho- 
 lics is religious bigotry. The only persecuting Church we 
 have ever had in Ireland was the Protestant Church. Let 
 us hope their religion helped Protestants in the next world, 
 for it certainly helped them in this. We've had a religious 
 tyranny hardly known elsewhere. A Protestant minority 
 was endowed with every political and economic advantage. 
 It was a narrow, bigoted theocracy, merciless and tyran- 
 nical. And England, the home of progressive liberty, 
 backed this moral and political crime with all the force of 
 its arms !" 
 
 "Why shouldn't it back the true religion against super- 
 stition ?" Pakenham said hotly. 
 
 Patterson smiled. The dean stroked his beard gently. 
 
 "It's the Orangemen and not Irish Catholics who share 
 the political ideas of the Vatican," De Lacey said with a 
 shrug. "But, happily, the world doesn't stand still either 
 for a Pope or an Orangeman. With the growth of political 
 liberty Italian Catholics threw off the secular rule of 
 the Pope, and Irish Catholics have tried to free themselves 
 from the Protestant incubus. The medieval autocracy 
 which England cynically maintains in Ireland has been 
 tottering for. years and is now in danger of falling. The 
 greatest spoils system in Europe could hardly appeal to the 
 English workman to maintain its economic and political 
 ascendency, so it squealed about the Pope and the danger 
 to Protestantism," he smiled at Pakenham. " The Orange- 
 men's fear of the Pope is made up of a memory of their own 
 sins, a fear of reprisals and a desperate clutching at the 
 remnant of the spoils." 
 
I/O CONQUEST 
 
 "That's a monstrous — nothing but a gross travesty," 
 Pakenham spluttered, his brick-red face going purple. " I 
 appeal to you, Kane." 
 
 " Every Church is tyrannical if it gets the chance," Kane 
 said cheerfully. 
 
 "We all know what the Pope is," Pakenham said 
 heatedly. 
 
 "He*s a fine old Orange gentleman," Diana said mali- 
 ciously. 
 
 " He doesn't bother us in Meath," Gazeley said, sipping 
 his wine. 
 
 " He does me infernally," De Lacey said moodily. " But 
 the English Government and Mr. Pakenham and his 
 friends won't let us deal with him." 
 
 "We'll muzzle him effectively in our bill," Patterson said 
 with decision. 
 
 "Exasperate us into defending him, you mean," De 
 Lacey said sharply. 
 
 " How"s feeling with your people in Meath about the bill, 
 Gazeley ?" Lentaigne asked hastily. 
 
 "Since we sold our land we're taking it quietly. Any- 
 how, it's not likely to be much worse than the sort of govern- 
 ment we're bound to have in England before long. You're 
 letting the Socialist tail wag the dog too much, Patterson. 
 We don't like the bill, but if we must have it I suppose we 
 must. And the priests will be a safeguard against 
 Socialism." 
 
 "Rank treachery," Pakenham growled. 
 
 Gazeley shrugged his shoulders. "Do you expect us to 
 fight England ? And if there's treachery anywhere it's in 
 the North. What's all this talk of partition ? If there is 
 danger you evidently want to save your own skins and 
 leave us in the lurch." 
 
 " Uncle Hammy loves the Radicals so much that he can't 
 be separated from them," Diana laughed. 
 
CONQUEST 171 
 
 "We*ll be driven to civil war," Pakenham said, with a 
 despairing gesture. 
 
 The dean stroked his beard. " My dear Pakenham," he 
 said suavely, "nothing is worse for a man than worry. 
 Never court difficulty prematurely. Irish disturbances 
 only happen in the newspapers and in the House of Com- 
 mons. Home Rule has been a pleasant subject for discus- 
 sion as long as I can remember, and there's every sign that 
 it will last out my time. We should decidedly miss it as 
 a topic. What are the prospects for the twelfth, Simon ?" 
 
 Mrs. Lentaigne stood up. Jim Daly moved back a chair 
 to allow Diana to pass out. 
 
 "You never uttered. Was it remorse for your desertion 
 of Ireland ?" she said half defiantly. 
 
 "I wondered how the poor country survives so much 
 discussion." 
 
 " You think of deeper things, of course," she sneered. 
 
 "Much," he smiled. "Do you remember the fish we 
 caught together below Grange Con bridge ?" 
 
 She gave him a quick sidelong glance. "So youVe 
 remembered that too," she said with more friendliness of 
 tone. 
 
 5. 
 
 Jim spent three days at Derrylinn, and as he was a good 
 listener he had Ireland dinned into his ears from half a 
 dozen angles. 
 
 Lentaigne was indignant with the Liberals. Their best 
 thinkers seemed to have no influence in the Government. 
 Administration in Ireland was a byword for inefficiency. 
 Birrell spoke beautifully of freedom in the abstract, made 
 cynical epigrams, and governed through a machine hardly 
 known in England under the Stuarts. The two depart- 
 ments of Irish Government with life in them— out of forty- 
 seven — the Estates Commissioners and the Department of 
 
172 CONQUEST 
 
 Agriculture, were the creation of a Conservative Govern- 
 ment. The Liberals hampered the one with pedantic 
 financial restrictions, and dismissed from the other its 
 founder and soul, Horace Plunkett, the only man in the 
 administration who combined a knowledge of the country 
 with broad sympathies and a constructive intelligence. 
 The proposed settlement was a parody on Liberal prin- 
 ciples, professions and promises. ^ It exasperated Orange- 
 men and Nationalists alike and was the crowning proof of 
 England's incapacity either to understand or govern 
 Ireland. Liberal love had created a deeper sense of dis- 
 trust than centuries of Whig and Tory coercion. The 
 Unionist said to Ireland : " You're a bold bad girl. I 
 must keep the manacles on your arms and legs, but I'll give 
 you a lollipop when you behave well !" The Liberal wept 
 on her neck and talked of striking off her handcuffs while 
 carefully tightening her leg chains. It seemed as if no 
 English Cabinet, Unionist or Liberal, would ever see Ire- 
 land but as an English interest. 
 
 Patterson took Jim for a long walk, asked his opinion 
 of the bill, and, without waiting for a reply, gave for two 
 hours his own views on Ireland and the bill. He quoted 
 Morley on Compromise, and deplored that Irishmen 
 hadn't a thorough grasp of the principles of the Manchester 
 school. The financial clauses of the bill were a triumph of 
 orthodoxy. Ireland couldn't stray from the true path 
 under such a strong rein. Her future depended on strict 
 adherence to Liberal principles. When Irishmen fully 
 understood the bill they would all jump at it, for it gave 
 Nationalists all they desired while it kept a firm English 
 control which would appeal to Unionists. Sinn Fein was 
 only a flash in the pan. Irishmen were, perhaps, a little 
 unreasonable, but, as he discovered at Beekawn, they were 
 open to conviction. He discovered everywhere the seeds 
 of a sound Liberalism. . , , 
 
CONQUEST 173 
 
 Dale deplored a wasted life in the House of Commons. 
 For an Irish Nationalist it was a sort of living grave — a 
 momentary hope, then indifference and apathy. Cynicism 
 was what saved him from despair. One couldn't hate 
 England, one could only pity her. She muddled Ireland 
 only a little more than she muddled herself. She had 
 bitten off more of the world than she could chew and 
 governed only in spasms. Ships and coal arid iron and 
 selfishness had made her rich and powerful and stupid, 
 with an occasional gleam of intelligence of which she was 
 ashamed and distrustful. Ireland was alternately a 
 nuisance, a joke, and a party stick. With big majorities, 
 independent of the Irish vote. Liberal and Tory cheerfully 
 forgot her. With dwindling majorities Tories took a 
 friendly interest in her ailments, and Liberals remembered 
 their principles, but always with discretion. No English 
 party gave anything to Ireland except under pressure of 
 threats or fear, and then only the minimum necessary for 
 party safety. The Irish question had never yet been dealt 
 with on its merits by any English party, and never would 
 be. It was a mere pawn in the party game to avert a danger 
 or secure an advantage. Both parties hated Ireland as the 
 worst of their many failures. The last person to be con- 
 sulted on a Home Rule bill was a Nationalist; and if he 
 offered advice it was always disregarded. England had 
 failed to govern Ireland for eight hundred years, but every 
 Under-Secretary was confident that he could, ia twenty- 
 four hours, draft a bill to settle the whole mess. England 
 would never let go her grip on Ireland : she hugged it as 
 men cling to a secret sin. 
 
 Jim complained of being a bit bewildered. 
 
 Dale pushed his thin fingers through his heavy black 
 hair and said that fifteen years of the bad ventilation of the 
 House had muddled his own brain till he saw all English 
 parties red, 
 
174 CONQUEST 
 
 " But youVe been defending the bill to De Lacey ?" Jim 
 said laughing. 
 
 "Defending our taking it, you mean? What else was 
 there to do ? Some of our fellows have been in the House 
 over thirty years — thirty years of bitterness and disap- 
 pointed hopes — listened to with impatience unless we 
 played the fool and amused *em in an after-dinner speech, 
 voted down on every Irish question. It's easy for De Lacey 
 and the Sinn Feiners to sneer at Redmond and Dillon and 
 the rest of us. But he hasn't been a pariah dog all his life, 
 kicked away from a bone or having it snatched from him. 
 We are all tired and sick and want to get away from it. 
 Some think this rotten bill the best we are ever likely to get 
 from English apathy, distrust, or active dislike. Others 
 are ashamed to come back home empty-handed. Others 
 see in the bill the certainty of failure and the possibility of 
 starting a new agitation on its breakdown." 
 
 "And you?" 
 
 Dale lifted his eyebrows whimsically and shrugged his 
 shoulders. 
 
 " I was brought up a Liberal and discovered my country 
 through what I believed were the principles of Liberalism. 
 I now know that Liberal principles rarely survive the taking 
 of office. Bad as this bill is I don't believe we'll get it. 
 Carson will bang the Orange drum, and the bleating of that 
 ass Pakenham will reach the hearts of the great British 
 people with their slumbering hatred of the country they 
 have wronged. Or Sinn Fein may raise a rebellion in a 
 potato patch, or Miss Scovell bash another policeman at 
 the critical moment. Any excuse will serve for dropping 
 us if the Liberals get afraid of the next election. We shall 
 be called unreasonable for crying for bread, and ungrateful 
 for not giving thanks for a stone. Patterson will drop Ire- 
 land like a hot coal and cheerfully take up the Armenian 
 question. Que voulez vous, Georges Dandin ?" 
 
CONQUEST 175 
 
 "The Liberal group when I was up weren't like that," 
 Jim protested. 
 
 Dale laughed cynically. " Nor my group at Cambridge 
 — they were idealists to a man. Some are now Ministers 
 with their ideals carefully locked up till they lose office. 
 The rest — any who kept their faith — are thin voices crying 
 in the wilderness, vaguely wondering where Liberalism has 
 disappeared to with a Liberal Government in office. De 
 Lacey thinks me a knave or a fool. Perhaps I am. Per- 
 haps I'm only a disappointed man trying to smile with as 
 little bitterness as the feeling of being in a sinking boat 
 permits." 
 
 De Lacey, Jim discovered, rather liked Dale, and thought 
 him merely a tragedy. 
 
 " The Parliamentary game had to be placed. Parnell did 
 it magnificently. He tore aside the veil of sentimental 
 Pharisaism that hides English ruthlessness, was as ruthless 
 as the English and didn't trust them. When Gladstone 
 got him in the heel his followers had no grit. The tragedy 
 was that they believed in English promises. The damned 
 House of Commons lulled 'em to sleep. They saw two 
 English parties playing see-saw over sewers and Board 
 Schools and thought that the party which shouted sym- 
 pathy with the oppressed of other nations was burning with 
 zeal to free Ireland. They forgot that there never had been 
 but one party in England when her own sins had to be 
 hushed up. For Ireland a Tory Government and a Liberal 
 Government have always meant exactly the same thing — 
 English oppression." 
 
 Jim smiled. 
 
 "There are differences in the pressure of the jack-boot, 
 perhaps," De Lacey growled. " Take my word for it, 
 England is all cant and hypocrisy. You were educated 
 there and you ought to know." 
 
 "That's perhaps why I'm not quite so sure as you are," 
 Jim laughed. 
 
1/6 CONQUEST 
 
 " You'll soon be if you stick to the Foreign Office," De 
 Lacey said confidently. "You'll join us yet. Before we've 
 done we'll paralyze English government in Ireland." 
 
 Jim found Kane, who professed to have no politics, as 
 political as any of the others. He spent the day flying 
 through the county on a motor bicycle, organizing or in- 
 specting agricultural banks, stores and creameries, and 
 stayed up half the night writing or talking and smoking. 
 One night Jim sat up with him till five in the morning in 
 a whirl of talk and smoke. 
 
 " They talk and talk," Jim said. " I make many of their 
 generalizations myself when I'm in England. Here the}> 
 seem too fluent, too easy. The effect on me is to make me 
 suspect myself." 
 
 " If they are about English stupidity, don't worry," Kane 
 said gravely. "They are the accumulated judgments of 
 eight hundred years' experience — a sort of racial memory 
 that breaks out instinctively in every Irishman." 
 
 " But it isn't true." 
 
 " It'^ true in Ireland for an Irishman. What the devil is 
 it to an Irishman if the Englishman is as wise as Solomon 
 at home ? In Ireland he has shown only his stupid tyran- 
 nical side, and by that he is judged. As nations stand in 
 the world I suppose England occupies a high place. It has 
 wealth and power and a high degree of culture, a long roll 
 of statesman and poets. But the Irishman sees none of 
 these things. He sees a big bully whom he has beaten to 
 his knees. Pakenham boasts of being one of a conquering 
 race while he whimpers for the backing of the bigger bully. 
 The English and their Orange garrison never conquered 
 Ireland. They killed and exiled and starved millions, but 
 the unconquerable soul of the country they have never been 
 able to touch. It mocks them from beyond the grave. It 
 despises them here. It is England and not Ireland that 
 has been conquered — conquered by an idea; though 
 
CONQUEST 177 
 
 England, which is groping after its own soul, lost in and 
 clogged by material success, doesn't yet see it. When 
 England has advanced some steps further on the spiritual 
 road and can see her own injustice as clearly as she now 
 sees the injustice of others she will right her wrong to Ire- 
 land. Individuals see it already. The various half-hearted 
 attempts at Home Rule show the working of the spirit in 
 wider groups. You can see it here among the garrison, even 
 in this house. Mrs. Lentaigne and myself were brought up 
 in the belief that God was an Orange gentleman who 
 austerely whipped the mere Irish into blacking His boots 
 and starching His shirt and graciously kicked them to hell 
 for their pains. We have given up the worship of that 
 fetish. So have Lentaigne and Dale. It shows what a 
 political cleavage religion made in Ireland when we are 
 known as Protestant Home Rulers. The pretty girl who 
 dined here, Miss Scovell, is a symptom of a more robust 
 awakening among women. Gazeley is a common type of the 
 Protestant landlord outside Ulster. He*s a Unionist more by 
 tradition than by conviction. The extremists on his own side 
 irritate him, and he's a little suspicious of extremists on 
 our side, but he wants peace. Ulster is England's worst 
 crime in Ireland, and will cause her most trouble in the end. 
 When the last Englishman is converted to Home Rule a 
 remnant of Orangemen will be found banging a drum and 
 proclaiming themselves the only loyal Englishmen. They 
 owe everything to England, but nothing will shake an 
 Orangeman's conviction that he keeps the British Empire 
 from crumbling to bits." 
 
 He smoked for a while in silence. " The whole thing is 
 very sad to me," he broke out again with a sigh. " Though 
 I have left the Orange camp and have no sympathy what- 
 ever with their political attitude, I was brought up among 
 them and I understand them. And where there is under- 
 standing there is always a certain amount of sympathy. 
 
178 CONQUEST 
 
 To understand them at all one has to put back one's mind 
 politically and religiously for over two hundred years. 
 They are the Scotch Covenanter and the English Puritan 
 living on into the twentieth century. In England and Scot- 
 land the dourness of the extremer forms of Protestantism 
 was softened by adversity. In Ireland they were top dog. 
 Both Presbyterians and low-church Protestants were equally 
 the chosen of God before the common enemy, the heathen 
 Papist and his god the Scarlet Woman, whom they did 
 their best to destroy with fire and sword. In intervals of 
 rest from smoking out Papists, Episcopalians and Presby- 
 terians fought out their own little rows. The Presbyterians 
 had a slim time, and many of them were forced to emigrate 
 to America to escape persecution. While the Papists were 
 crushed, Episcopalians and Presbyterians could afford to 
 fight among themselves. They even developed a sort of 
 top-dog nationalism and resented English interference. 
 The Union was carried by English bribery against the will 
 of the majority of Irish Protestants. Catholic emancipa- 
 tion again united Episcopalians and Presbyterians against 
 the common Papist foe. But the real political consolida- 
 tion of Irish Protestantism came with the agitation for the 
 repeal of the Union. The Pre-Union Irish Parliament was 
 entirely Protestant. An Irish Parliament after 1829 would 
 be predominantly Catholic. Irish Protestants who had 
 fought steadily against English aggression during the 
 whole of the eighteenth century forgot at once their griev- 
 ances against England and the differences among them- 
 'selves, remembered that they were an outpost of English 
 civilization and became more English than the English 
 themselves. The Orangemen, who had no love of England 
 while their heels were firmly fixed on the necks of the 
 Catholics, suddenly discovered their love when the Catho- 
 lics began to show their heads. The history of Ireland dur- 
 ing the nineteenth century is the story of the struggle for 
 
CONQUEST 179 
 
 political, economic, and religious equality of the Irish 
 Catholic against Irish Protestantism backed by England. 
 It was an unholy alliance. England with her boasted love 
 of freedom, with her progressive laws of liberty, deliber- 
 ately lent herself to maintain in Ireland the political and 
 religious ascendancy of a comparatively small minority. 
 Not only that, but England, with her own religious and 
 political ideas broadened by three centuries of progress, 
 upheld in Ireland narrow religious and political ideas which 
 she herself had been gradually discarding since the seven- 
 teenth century. The Irish Catholic was coerced, put under 
 martial law, deprived of his rights under Habeas Corpus, 
 because he strove to have the freedom of any ordinary 
 Englishman. He struggled for liberty according to 
 English ideals of the nineteenth century, and was dealt 
 with by English methods of the seventeenth, including even 
 the Star Chamber. England's share in the blame I leave 
 to God, to her elastic conscience, and to her historians who 
 find it hard to believe that she can do a wrong. I can 
 find no excuse for her. The Irish Protestant is less to 
 blame. English statesmen knew that they were acting 
 against their principles, but their Irish administrators had 
 no qualms. They got their power in the seventeenth cen- 
 tury because they were Protestants, and there has been no 
 change since then either in their Protestantism or in their 
 political ideas. Senator Tillman once said that no law of 
 the United States ever gave a vote to a negro or took one 
 away from a white man. Irish Catholics managed to grab 
 the vote, but Irish Protestants have managed to keep the 
 power. Eighty years after Catholic emancipation they still 
 run the country. They call on England to maintain a sys- 
 tem which gives them the privilege of defending the sound 
 Protestantism of John Morley against the wiles of the 
 Scarlet Woman and a Stuart Toryism against the sub- 
 versive political ideas which the Nationalists have borrowed 
 
i8o CONQUEST 
 
 from the textbooks of Oxford and Cambridge ! Then, of 
 course, the Union pays. Up to fi.ve or six years ago ninety- 
 nine per cent, of the jobs of any importance went to Pro- 
 testants. As Nationahst M.P.'s never take office the small 
 Ulster representation — nearly always lawyers — are sure of 
 jobs. The acceptance of the Union by Nationalists would 
 be as great a blow to good Protestants as Home Rule. 
 They even howl because the Liberals have given a few jobs 
 to the tamer Nationalists." 
 
 "The difficulty is deeper than mere spoils, I suppose?" 
 Jim said. 
 
 " I agree," Kane said with a shrug. " But the spoil 
 hunters have the loudest voices and do most to prevent a 
 settlement. The narrow fanaticism of the Ulster Protestant 
 also stands in the way. And men hate to lose power. But 
 there 'are glimmerings of reason. Ten years ago no 
 Unionist would admit the possibility of Home Rule for 
 any part of Ireland. Now it is admitted that Home Rule 
 is inevitable outside Ulster. There is even talk of dividing 
 Ulster. This splitting up of Ireland is so damned silly that 
 it might seem reasonable to the English mind. The worst 
 fanatics after the Ulster Orangemen are the Ulster Catho- 
 lics. You won't make them less bigoted by isolating them. 
 It's the politics of the parish pump and would only create 
 fresh difficulties. Economically the thing is absurd. The 
 National sentiment of Ireland one nation is sound through 
 and through. Belfast needs the southern hinterland just 
 as much as the agricultural South needs the manufacturing 
 North. Their trade and banking are inextricably mixed up 
 at this moment to their common advantage. I hate the 
 Union, but I'd rather have the Union than have a new 
 artificial barrier set up within the country. England 
 created the Irish difficulty and she has got to settle it, but 
 perpetuating it is not settling it." 
 
 He emptied his pipe, blew it clear, and put it in his pocket. 
 
CONQUEST i8i 
 
 "It's five o'clock and I have to be at Duncashin for a 
 meeting at nine/' he said with a yawn. "Belfast people 
 tell me that the South would ruin the industries of the 
 North, that the Southern Irish have no business capacity. 
 Duncashin is an agricultural parish with only three Pro- 
 testant families out of three hundred. It has a creamery, a 
 bank, an agricultural society, a co-operative store. There 
 isn't in Belfast a greater miracle of successful business. 
 Good God, I'm sick of Irish politics as it is served up at the 
 English breakfast table." 
 
 He lit a candle, blew it out again with a laugh as he 
 noticed the sun streaming through chinks in the shuttered 
 windows. ,^ 
 
 "I'm like an English statesman, peering at the Irish 
 question with a candle while the sun shines full on it. One 
 would be in despair if the miracle of the British Empire 
 didn't cheer one up. England teaches men liberty and 
 then tries to go on governing them like an old grand- 
 motherly schoolmaster. Wherever she goes she sets up an 
 Ulster and is a little shocked when it is kicked out or 
 slapped in the face. But she's not so stupid as when she 
 bungled America and lost it. She spanked her Ulsters in 
 Canada, South Africa, and Australia — when there was no 
 other way out of the muddles she and they had made. 
 Some day — but let's go to bed." 
 
 Late one afternoon Jim met Pakenham in a little ruined 
 church on the outskirts of the demesne. Pakenham was 
 examining the carved doorway. 
 
 "That's Norman, I suppose?" he said, with a friendly 
 •look. 
 
 " No, it's pre-Norman — Irish, in fact ; Celtic Romanesque 
 in the jargon." 
 
 " Hum, hum. They had some idea of architecture then ?" 
 
 "Ornament was highly developed; but the Norman in- 
 vasion seems to have arrested development in native archi- 
 
i82 CONQUEST 
 
 tecture. There was promise in it, but Irish Gothic is 
 second-rate." 
 
 " Humph. You should see some of our buildings in Bel- 
 fast. I must say I like our host's house, but Simon built it 
 before he went over to the enemy — when he had some com- 
 mon sense. But, good God, what a collection of freaks he 
 always has about him." 
 
 " I suppose we are," Jim laughed. 
 
 "I didn't mean you, of course. You're in the service of 
 your country. Damn plucky it was of you, too, to stand 
 out against the old man. Helen Lentaigne told me about 
 it to-day and I was proud of you. And you a Pa — a Roman 
 Catholic, too. It's a real pleasure to meet a man of sense 
 —a " 
 
 " Brand plucked from the burning," Jim suggested, with a 
 grin at the cliche. 
 
 Pakenham nodded gravely. " A loyalist I was going to 
 say. Beyond yourself and myself I don't believe there's 
 another in the house." 
 
 " Patterson is a minister of the Crown," Jim said drily. 
 
 " Queen Victoria would have strung him on the nearest 
 tree," Pakenham said angrily. "But this young King — 
 badly advised, too ? Not even Royalty is what it used to be. 
 And I can remember the time when Liberal didn't spell 
 * traitors.' Some quite decent Ulstermen used to be 
 Liberals, but, thank God, they saw the cloven hoof when 
 the Liberals went over to Home Rule. I wish I could say 
 the same of Conservatives in the South. There's Gazeley now. 
 I can remember when Gazeley was a decent man — as sound 
 as a bell on the Union. And now his loyalty isn't worth 
 six months' purchase. The South has gone to the dogs — 
 not even the Church is sound. There's the dean, veering 
 round like a weathercock. If Home Rule came in the night 
 he'd enjoy his breakfast in the morning just as if nothing 
 had happened. And — but I can't speak of her. Thank God 
 
CONQUEST 183 
 
 the property is in tail male and goes to a sound Unionist — 
 what the damn Nationalists will leave of it. She has only 
 a child's portion, and a damn sight too much it is for a 
 rebel." 
 
 " Your niece ?" Jim asked, with quickened interest. 
 
 "Niece? A changeling, sir. She can't have a drop of 
 Pakenham blood in her. Mad, sir. Mad as a March hare. 
 The whole world seems to be going mad, but, thank God, 
 Ulster is keeping its sanity. Even if Englishmen became 
 traitors to their flag, Ulster'd still be loyal. But the heart 
 of Protestant England is sound. It's only those damn 
 Liberals trying to deceive the world. Wait till we beat the 
 drum in every parish in England and explain our wrongs. 
 We have right on our side, and God is with us. England 
 can't have forgotten the walls of Derry and the memory of 
 her great King William. We'll wake her up from the sleep 
 with which the Liberals have drugged her. Orangemen 
 saved England at the Boyne and they'll save her to-day 
 from the cut-throat murderers who threaten her liberties." 
 
 " De Lacey and Dale are mild-mannered murderers," Jim 
 said with a smile. 
 
 " They're clever enough, I admit," Pakenham said sadly. 
 " But my dear sir, that's all put on to bamboozle that ass 
 Patterson. Anyone can fool an Englishman. It takes an 
 Ulsterman to see through the hypocrisy of the Nationalists. 
 They've even learned to talk their nonsense as if there was 
 some sense in it. But all the time they have a knife or 
 blunderbuss up their sleeves. What can one expect with 
 the priests and the Jesuits egging them on." 
 
 " But Dale is a Protestant," Jim objected with amusement. 
 
 "No Protestant in his senses could be a Nationalist," 
 Pakenham said with a frown. "Protestant Home Rulers 
 are either completely mad like that dreadful niece of mine ; 
 or a little touched," he tapped his forehead lightly with the 
 middle finger of his right hand, "like the Lentaignes — 
 
1 84 CONQUEST 
 
 decent people, but they've gone quite soft in the brain ; or 
 write poetry like Kane; or are concealed Jesuits like Dale. 
 I can see it in the fellow's eye. He's the most dangerous 
 sort." 
 
 They turned the corner of a shrubbery and came in view 
 of the front of the house. 
 
 "A telegram for you^ Daly," Dean Brereton called out 
 from the steps. 
 
 Pakenham went in by a side door, while Jim walked on 
 hurriedly to meet the dean. 
 
 " Dear Pakenham is rather trying," he said, as he handed 
 Jim the telegram. 
 
 " He was explaining to me all about Nationalists and 
 Catholics," Jim said, as he tore open the envelope. 
 
 "He would," the dean said, with a faint sigh. "The 
 dear fellow even suspects me of being a Jesuit because I 
 don't wear Orange spectacles." 
 
 Jim read : " Everything is now all right. Come home as 
 soon as possible. Mother." 
 
 " Something pleasant ?" the dean said, watching Jim smile. 
 
 " Some quiet fishing at least. It's a wonderful country, 
 dean." 
 
 " The pleasantest in the world," the dean said blandly. 
 
 6. 
 
 "How are things at home?" Father Lysaght asked 
 eagerly, as he shook hands with Jim in the main street of 
 Lisgeela, opposite a retiring Georgian house on which the 
 Virginian creeper was beginning to turn red. 
 
 " Couldn't be better." 
 
 "Good," the priest said, with a nod of satisfaction. 
 " I'm glad I got round the old man at last. It was a chance 
 remark your mother made to me fifteen years ago that did 
 it in the end — about Hugh O'Neill being brought up at the 
 
CONQUEST 185 
 
 Court of Elizabeth and using against the English them- 
 selves the tricks of government he learnt there. That, and 
 the fact that you spend more than you make out of your 
 job. Not but he was glad enough to find a bridge by which 
 to cross over to you. Are you coming in here ?" he added, 
 pointing to the brass name plate : "RICHARD' A. KavanAGH, 
 Solicitor," on the gate of the low iron railing in front of 
 the house. 
 
 "Yes. But I wish Dick had another dinner hour." 
 
 "So would Dick," Father Lysaght laughed. "Five 
 o'clock is a sign that Macdonald is dining with us. Since 
 he became a Monsignor he won't dine with anyone in the 
 town at any other hour. It's his idea of fashion, poor man. 
 The bishop, who can't wait a minute after three, and him- 
 self nearly had a row over it. But the laity have to give in." 
 
 They were kept waiting on the doorstep for some 
 minutes. Father Lysaght rang a second time and then 
 said apologetically : 
 
 " I oughtn't to flurry poor Kate. She's probably dishing 
 the dinner, and Dick gives her the rough edge of his tongue 
 if she answers the door without being spick and span in her 
 cap and apron. He's aiming at great style." 
 
 The door was opened by Dick Kavanagh himself in a 
 tweed coat, riding breeches, heavy boots, the tops of his 
 woollen stockings an elaborately designed tartan plaid of 
 vivid colours. He wore a huge gold fox-mask pin in his 
 white hunting stock. His swarthy face glistened from a 
 recent shave. His thick lips, stubby black moustache, 
 snub nose, small grey eyes under bushy black eyebrows, 
 large white teeth and thick wiry black hair shining with 
 brill iantine united in a broad grin of welcome. 
 
 "I'm glad you were able to come, Mr. Daly. How is the 
 world using you, Jim ?" he said, awkwardly. "You're wel- 
 come, your reverence. If I were you," to Jim again, " it's 
 not next or nigh this rotten three-ha'penny town I'd come, 
 
1 86 CONQUEST 
 
 out of the hunting season too. Only that I take a run up 
 to Dublin myself an odd time I'd be a regular old frowst. 
 Not but there are some likely little girls in Lisgeela, but 
 Father James-keeps a strict eye on 'em." 
 
 " It's time you settled down, Dick," Father Lysaght said 
 coldly. 
 
 "And a man having only one life and a short one at that," 
 Dick sighed, with an appealing look at Jim. "There's 
 room on the rack for your hats. Everyone is here now — 
 up with the dinner, Kate," he shouted down a stairway at 
 the back of the little hall. " You'll find everything rough 
 and ready, but what can you expect of a lone bachelor, and 
 I was sure you wouldn't mind for the sake of old times," he 
 said, holding Jim back as Father Lysaght entered a sitting- 
 room on their right, " I've got old Mac to meet you. He's 
 fat and fifty but a spry old boy still. He takes the Miss 
 Curleys to the sea as if he were only a three-year-old, and 
 they're no chickens now I can tell you, though they're fluffier 
 than ever, with golden hair falling down their backs. He's 
 as proud as Punch of you, and is always talking of some 
 examination or other you passed. But we'd better go in." 
 
 Monsignor Macdonald, in a dark purple caped soutane 
 and bright purple sash, trimming and buttons, separated 
 himself from the group standing in front of the empty grate, 
 and advanced to meet Jim with mincing steps, a smile on 
 his handsome florid face. 
 
 " My dear boy," he cooed in a rounded voice. " This is 
 a pleasure." 
 
 His lips curved in a smirk. The jaunty white curl on 
 his forehead, almost concealing his baldness, seemed to 
 smirk. He wrung Jim's hand heartily and patted his 
 shoulder. "You have done well, my boy, but you may 
 thank the good seed that was planted in you at St. Stanis- 
 laus College. It's a proud day for me to dine at the table 
 of one distinguished pupil to greet another — Dick doesn't 
 
CONQUEST 187 
 
 suffer from small jealousies on the academical plane — still 
 more distinguished." 
 
 "I passed my final by the skin of my teeth," Dick 
 muttered. 
 
 "But let me introduce yob>" the Monsignor continued 
 with a wave of his hand to the group round the fireplace. 
 "Mr. James Daly, gentlemen, who has shown Oxford 
 University what St. Stanislaus College, Lisgeela, can do in 
 belles lettres and the arts and sciences. Mr. Murphy, the 
 esteemed manager of our branch of the National Bank, who 
 lets us all overdraw our accounts in reason." 
 
 "I wish to God he did," Dick Kavanagh murmured as 
 he joined gloomily in the general laugh. 
 
 A tall, nervous man with sloping shoulders wagged his 
 ragged beard with a silent chuckle as he shook hands, 
 peering at Jim with weak but pleasant brown eyes over 
 spectacles low on his nose. 
 
 " Dr. Greany, who brought you into the world." 
 
 "A fine baby — scaled nine pounds and a quarter," the 
 little pompous doctor said, snatching at Jim's hand, with 
 an aggressive look around as if someone had denied the in- 
 teresting fact. 
 
 "Mr. Foley, our respected District Inspector of Police." 
 
 A small, clean-shaven man, who tried hard to look like a 
 groom but failed by a hair's breadth, bowed with a depre- 
 catory smile. 
 
 "Dick and Father Lysaght, who keeps us all in order, 
 you know. One of my assistants — Father Devitt," the 
 Monsignor added curtly, with a slight grimace at an 
 athletic-looking, black-haired young priest who smiled 
 cynically. With a return to his genial florid manner, the 
 Monsignor added blandly : " And last, but not least, Mr. 
 McEnvoy, who woos the law no less diligently than our 
 host." 
 
 "I may woo her, but it's to McEvoy she gives the glad 
 
1 88 CONQUEST 
 
 eye," Dick said, with a grin at the bright-eyed young man, 
 fair, rather fat, strong jawed but with pleasant lips, who 
 was shaking hands with Jim. "But if I don't get cases I 
 can always give a good account of myself at a dinner. I 
 had a squint at Kate taking it in. Will you lead the way, 
 Monsignor ?" 
 
 "With pleasure, my dear boy," Monsignor Macdonald 
 said cordially, taking Jim's arm. "You can see the lack in 
 this room — a woman's taste," he added with a wave of his 
 hand at the green baize covered centre table. "A nice 
 bunch of flowers now'd set that off, and a few antimacassers 
 on the backs of them lonely-looking chairs, and some vases 
 and china ornaments on the mantelpiece. Dick has good 
 taste in dressing himself, but it doesn't run to titivating his 
 house." 
 
 "You've noticed, I'm sure, Mr. Daly," Dr. Greany said 
 pompously, as Dick struggled with a large joint of roast 
 beef, " the immense improvements in our town ?" 
 
 "It has changed a good deal," Jim admitted. 
 
 "My father used to have it all his own way, and now 
 there are four solicitors taking the bread out of one another's 
 mouths," Dick growled, helping the Monsignor to beef. 
 
 "Sure the more lawyers the more law they say," the 
 Monsignor said feelingly, helping himself to mustard. 
 " Just a hint of that horse-radish sauce, Dick. It's wonder- 
 ful, glory be to God, the prosperity we're enjoying. Only 
 yesterday his lordship said to me : 'I doubt, Monsignor,' 
 he said, 'whether in the greatest age of the faith so much 
 stone and mortar was ever piled up to the service of God 
 in any small town as Lisgeela has seen during the last 
 twenty years.' *And so worthily, my lord,' I said. Dick, 
 the beef is done to a turn." 
 
 " The town and the country, as far as my rounds extend, 
 have progressed to an unexampled material prosperity," 
 Dr. Greany said enthusiastically. 
 
CONQUEST ^ 189 
 
 "Material and spiritual," the Monsignor cooed. "For 
 the first time in its history Lisgeela has a Monsignor as 
 president of its noble college. Honours of the kind are only 
 a trial of the flesh to a humble man like myself, but I can't 
 help taking a pride in it for the sake of the town." 
 
 "Jim can't help seeing that the town has got on," Father 
 Lysaght said drily. 
 
 "A new flourishing bank 4;hat hasn't diminished the 
 prosperity of the old — two blades of grass, as it were, where 
 one grew before," Dr. Greany said lyrically. "I appeal to 
 my friend, Mr. Murphy." 
 
 "We're doing well — very well, indeed. I'd rather have 
 the two blades in the National, of course. But as it is we 
 can't complain. No, we certainly can't complain. Indeed 
 I'd be almost inclined to admit three blades and that two 
 of them find their way to the National," Murphy said, 
 chuckling noiselessly. 
 
 " You hear that, Father Devitt, the country turning into 
 a gold mine and you can't leave well enough alone," Mon- 
 signor Macdonald said with a note of sternness. "Now 
 that the Scovell property is settled the whole country round 
 is in the hands of the tenants, and we want ease and peace 
 to enjoy our prosperity. You can fill the tumbler, Dick. 
 That claret of Mallon's is as soft as milk on the palate. 
 Was the country ever quieter, Mr. Foley ?" 
 
 "As quiet as a lamb, Monsignor," the Police Inspector 
 said cheerfully. "If the judges go on getting white gloves 
 at the Assizes the R.I.C. will be out of a job." 
 
 "Don't despair, Foley, the Government can always be 
 trusted to provoke a row," McEvoy said. "Believe me, 
 you won't be out of a job for long." 
 
 "I cannot agree with your diagnosis, McEvoy," Dr. 
 Greany said with a frown. "In the troubled times my 
 duty to my profession compelled me to steer clear of the 
 treacherous waters of politics — I had patients in every 
 
190 CONQUEST 
 
 camp. But the distinct leaning of our present Govern- 
 ment to the Nationalist side has altered the situation. It 
 is a Liberal Government in the best sense of the word, 
 some of the best plums of the legal profession and of my 
 own honoured calling having been given to moderate 
 Nationalists. I have become a member of the United Irish 
 League." 
 
 " Do you think, Greany, Fd have any chance of the Crown 
 Solicitorship if I became a member?" Dick Kavanagh 
 asked anxiously. 
 
 " I can see Home Rule looming in the distance," Greany 
 said oracularly. 
 
 "You can see through a pretty thick fog, then," Father 
 Devitt said sourly. 
 
 "Greany means that he sees a job," McEvoy said, with 
 a curl of his lip. 
 
 "I know no better earnest of the good faith of the 
 Government than that they should give office to sound 
 Nationalists of good standing in their professions," Greany 
 said, with offended dignity. 
 
 " The Orangemen see in it a proof of bad faith — you see 
 they don't get all the jobs — and they have a big pull in 
 England," McEvoy laughed. "You'd better hurry up, 
 Greany. It mayn't be fashionable to be a Nationc},list in a 
 year or two." 
 
 " I have perfect faith in the word of a government — they 
 are gentlemen," Greany said crushingly. 
 
 "Political gentlemen," McEvoy said lightly. 
 
 " I appeal to Mr. Daly," Greany said heatedly. 
 
 " A government has been known to keep its word," Jim 
 said cautiously. 
 
 " I hope to God they'll break it this time. But they're so 
 used to breaking it that there's little fear of their keeping 
 it," Father Devitt said vehemently. 
 
 "Moderation, Father Devitt, moderation," Monsignor 
 
CONQUEST 191 
 
 Macdonald said placidly, sipping his claret. " I have often 
 warned you that the only road to safety is in moderation. 
 A few glasses of claret at dinner and a glass of punch after 
 makes one see the world as it is, rosy and comfortable. 
 What can you expect of cold water but bile ? It makes a 
 sort of drunkenness in the mind that's worse than the 
 after effects of bad potheen whisky. If you'd only 
 take a glass of wine like a man you'd see less harm 
 in England." 
 
 "'T would take a good many glasses to make me see any 
 good in what they're offering us ripw," Father Devitt said, 
 with a gloomy smile. " I'd as soon trust old Nick himself. 
 But sure England and Machiavelli are one and the same 
 thing. I was reading * The Prince * the other day, and it's 
 a complete record of English policy in Ireland. If an 
 Englishman is honest then he's the greatest self-deceiver 
 under the sun. The Home Rule they're promising us — it 
 wouldn't at all surprise me but they'd try to keep their 
 promise this time — is nothing but another halter round our 
 necks. It's the biggest attempt they've made yet to bribe 
 the country by the offer of jobs. We'll go on taxing you, 
 they say, and you can spend the money without any re- 
 sponsibility. The thing'd break down in five yeats and 
 we'd be disgraced for ever. I think well of my country but 
 we're not angels out of heaven. It's not for nothing the 
 English are offering us Greek gifts : they want to prove 
 we're unfit for Home Rule by making it impossible for us 
 to administer it." 
 
 "You give them credit for unusual astuteness," Jim 
 laughed. 
 
 "They're either fools or knaves," Father Devitt said, 
 with a shrug. " They can take their choice of the dilemma. 
 The Orangemen are shrieking against the bill as if it was 
 only their skins were in danger. I have no great love for 
 them, but it'll be a! good job for the whole of Ireland if they 
 
192 CONQUEST 
 
 succeed in wrecking the bill which'd do us a sight more 
 harm than it'd do them." 
 
 " Then, please God, we can go on as we are and no harm 
 done," Monsignor Macdonald said, with a sigh of relief. 
 " No, thank you, Dick, I won't disturb the beef with any 
 apple tart, excellent as it is. But I hnd a shaving of cheese 
 not so deleterious — a help in fact. I picked up the habit 
 at Buxton, where I sometimes go for my health. An 
 Orangeman from Belfast introduced me to it. He was a 
 queer fellow, that Orangeman, and used to wrangle over 
 politics like Father Devitt there till I found out that he used 
 to go to Aintree as regular asi myself, and from that day on 
 we quarrelled peaceably over horses without another men- 
 tion of King William or the Pope. The dinner does you 
 credit, Dick, but it's a wife and not Father Lysaght 
 you ought to have sitting down there opposite you." 
 
 " Are you going to the Horse Show, Monsignor ?" Dick 
 asked uneasily. 
 
 " Am I going to my bed this night, young man ? What 
 about one of the Mallon girls for him. Father Lysaght ?" 
 
 " He'd have to go to daily mass," Father Lysaght said, 
 with a reproving look at Dick. 
 
 "That's a malady they'd grow out of if they married 
 steady men," the Monsignor said tolerantly. "One of 
 'em'd be better than politics for you, Dick. They're warm 
 girls with at least ten thousand apiece, and you might do 
 worse than not let the convent bag it. I see we're all 
 finished. What about having the hot water in the other 
 room, and a game of Nap in the name of God ?" 
 
 7. 
 
 Con Driscoll's snug farmhouse drowsed in the August 
 heat. The elms at the end of the bawn were as still as the 
 duckpond beside the gate. The lowing of a cow in the 
 
CONQUEST 193 
 
 near-by paddock seemed to come from afar. Sheep hung 
 together in Httle groups as if seeking protection from the 
 heat in the shadows of one another. 
 
 Mike Driscoll, standing in an empty cart, held up to his 
 father at the top of the ladder the last sheaf of wheat which 
 was to complete the stack. Con fixed it in position, patted 
 it fondly, and turning half round on the ladder looked 
 admiringly at the half dozen stacks on the outskirts of the 
 haggard. 
 
 "That's one more than we had last year and in half an 
 acre less ground," he said slowly, in a voice that seemed to 
 hang motionless and detached in the still air. 
 
 "It's the superphosphate did it," Mike said, wiping the 
 sweat from his tanned face with the already wet sleeve of 
 his cotton shirt. 
 
 " It had a hand in it, no doubt. But there was the fine 
 year that God gave us ; and the feeling that the land was as 
 good as our own so that we put our hearts into it. And it 
 is our own now, thanks be to God. You can see a great 
 change in the face of the country already." 
 
 " There hasn't been much time for a change to work in 
 Tullyfin yet," Mike said, gathering up the reins from the 
 back of the restless, pawing horse. 
 
 " What a man feels in his heart I suppose it's easy for his 
 eyes to see," Con said meditatively.-"" But sure even a blind 
 man'd see what a differ it makes to own your own land when 
 you look at Mr. Lentaigne's property that was, and 
 Brazier's and all the rest scattered about the country that 
 the tenants bought in these five or six years back. And 
 now we're going to put a crown on it all with Home Rule, 
 please God." 
 
 " It'll take some striving for that yet," Mike said with a 
 frown, jumping lightly out of the cart "As far as I can 
 see everything is ready here now for the threshing to-mor- 
 row. My mother might give us a cup of tea." 
 
194 CONQUEST 
 
 " She*s a good warrant for that, and I got a whiff of cake 
 from the oven a few minutes back," Con said, descending 
 the ladder. " Though it's only about four o'clock we've put 
 in a good twelve hours. As the last sheaf is up we'll take 
 a rest till Betsy brings in the cows." 
 
 Mike led the horse towards the stable, his father walking 
 behind the cart with a hand resting on the back shaft. 
 
 " Is there anything between Betsy and that young man of 
 the SuUivans ?" Con said, as Mike took off the harness. 
 
 " There might and there mightn't," Mike said, stolidly. 
 
 " I wish you went as slow in your notions of politics," his 
 father said drily. 
 
 " Politics is far easier to get at the rights of than a girl," 
 Mike said pensively, giving a slap to the mare. "Hurry 
 on into your box with you, Kitty." 
 
 " I wouldn't let Molly Jordan get the better of my temper 
 if I were you," Con said with a chuckle. 
 
 "I don't give a thraneen for Molly Jordan," Mike said 
 hotly, pushing the heavy cart into its shed as if it were a 
 toy. 
 
 " The sooner you make it up with her the better if Betsy 
 means anything, for your mother'll want some help in the 
 house," Con said coolly, lighting his pipe. " I like a little 
 fire in a woman myself. Your mother has a good spark of 
 it to this day. But it's all the more reason for a man to be 
 even-tempered or there might be a conflagration. Come 
 along in and have a cup of hot tea to cool you. If you 
 were only more biddable about politics now." 
 
 "You were very biddable to my grandfather, God rest 
 his soul," Mike said with a touch of his father's irony. 
 
 "We hadn't Home Rule in our hands in them days," 
 Con said, scratching his chin. 
 
 " It's on a far away bush it is still, and it's many a thorn 
 we'll get in scrambling for it," Mike said with a firm set of 
 his lips. 
 
CONQUEST 195 
 
 " Ifs in John Redmond's pocket." 
 
 "It's no more in his pocket than I am — nor within his 
 reach either. The Enghsh have fooled him like they fooled 
 many a good man before him." 
 
 " The grace of God has touched their hearts at last, I tell 
 you," Con said, stopping within a few feet of the kitchen 
 door and waving his pipe argumentatively. 
 
 "The grace of God'd shrivel up if by any accident it 
 came within a field's length of one of 'em," Mike said con- 
 temptuously. 
 
 "It has 'em in its grip now, I tell you," Con said con- 
 fidently. " See how they're putting a muzzle on the House 
 of Lords. At long last they're bent on doing us justice. 
 It's only the Orangemen that's giving trouble now. And 
 they'll quieten down,, the poor omadauns, when they know 
 that we don't mean them any harm." 
 
 " You're only dreaming, father," Mike said, with a sweep 
 of his hand and a crinkling of his brow very like his father's. 
 "For what would the Orangemen be kicking up all this 
 trouble if the English didn't put 'em up to it so as to give 
 themselves an excuse for slipping out by the back door 
 when they've no more use for the Irish vote ? What harm'd 
 we do an Orangeman no more than any other Irishman? 
 Didn't they profit by all the land agitation yourself and 
 my grandfather suffered for, and did we grudge it to them ? 
 And it's they were able to drive a hard bargain too, and get 
 more out of it than ever ye did. Isn't Miss Diana a Pro- 
 testant, and if her religion was as black as the hob of hell, 
 is there a Catholic within miles of us that wouldn't kiss the 
 ground she walks on ? It's the crookedness of the English, 
 I tell you, that's at the back of it all, and if they were in 
 earnest itself, which they aren't, I wouldn't wipe the clauber 
 off my shoes with the mean kind of Home Rule they're talk- 
 ing of giving us." 
 
 "It's all them Gaelic League classes, and the Co-opera- 
 
196 CONQUEST 
 
 tive, and them Technical Instruction lectures that's turned 
 your head," Con said good-humouredly. 
 
 " It isn't then — it's only kind father for him," Mrs. Con, 
 who had been for some time standing in the doorway, her 
 arms akimbo, her brown hair, showing a few strands of 
 grey, brushed smoothly away from a centre parting and 
 gathered in a bun rather low at the back of her head, cried 
 out with a laugh. " If ye aren't the dead spit of what your- 
 self and your father used to be. Con, over fi.ve-and-twenty 
 year ago. Only that God gives ye most times more work 
 than ye're able to compass I wouldn't have ease or peace 
 from yeer clatter about Home Rule. It's the wonder of the 
 world that ye haven't England swept off her feet long ago 
 with all yeer talk. And Mike'd kiss the ground Miss Diana 
 walks on, would he ? I wish to God Molly Jordan saw him 
 trying to do it. If he had the courage of a mouse it's kissing 
 Molly herself he'd be and bringing her in here on the floor 
 to me while I have any strength left in my tongue to advise 
 her about this and that." 
 
 " Hear her, now," Con said, with a forced sigh. 
 
 " It's one of them'-Suffragettes she's in training for," Mike 
 said, seeking sympathy from his father with a dry laugh. 
 
 Mrs. Con fanned her flushed face with her spotless white 
 apron. 
 
 " Will ye be going and washing yeer hands ? Don't ye 
 see it's dressed I am ?" she said with a grin, making way 
 for them. "If Mike is "such a daring fellow as he lets on 
 it's Miss Diana's fingers he'll have a chance of kissing in a 
 few minutes instead of her footstep. She's going up North 
 and she asked Betsy to look after a hound pup for her while 
 she's away. She sent word that she'd walk him over here 
 herself about four o'clock or thereabouts." 
 
 "Jim Daly isn't fishing our bank to-day by any luck?" 
 Con asked, with the flicker of an eyelid, 
 
 " I wish to God there was anything like that in it," Mrs. 
 
CONQUEST 197 
 
 Con said with a sigh. " But sorra eye she has in her head 
 for a man since she took to them figaries of politics. Ex- 
 cept for a dog or the like, or a crowd, she has no heart left 
 in her." 
 
 "Is it a Unionist you'd have her?" Mike said in- 
 dignantly. 
 
 " It's a woman I'd have her and not a hurdy-gurdy with 
 only one tune to it," his mother said with spirit. 
 
 " She goes to extremes with the flag-waving, no doubt," 
 Con said amicably. "But I wouldn't put it past Miss 
 Diana to give a good account of herself in more ways than 
 one. Anyhow she's taken lately to coming to Tullyfin by 
 the river bank instead of round by the road." 
 
 "Betsy seen young Daly down on the bank with a rod a 
 while back, and I put his name in the pot on the chance of 
 him dropping in for a cup o' tea," Mrs. Con said with a 
 studied assumption of indifference. 
 
 "Let us go and wash ourselves, Mike, in the name of 
 God," Con said with a chuckle. "Your mother is like a 
 tricky fish. When you've made up your mind she's gone 
 off with herself, there she's tugging at the line fresher than 
 ever." 
 
 8. 
 
 Mrs. Scovell sat in a corner of the Chesterfield in the bay 
 of the long music room at Dalyhouse. She held the Spec- 
 tator open in her lap but her eyes wandered to Diana, who 
 was swinging a mushroom straw hat to and fro as she knelt 
 on the end of the seat and gazed moodily through an open 
 French window. 
 
 " I was once as willowy as you are, Di," the mother said 
 with a faint sigh. 
 
 "What's wrong now?" Diana asked unfeelingly. 
 
 "I like a rest after luncheon," Mrs. Scovell sighed more 
 deeply. " I've had worry enough, but it doesn't seem to be 
 
198 CONQUEST 
 
 any help. I've had to have my dresses let out again — not 
 much, but it's distressing. And that Arabella Daly keeps 
 her figure. She's two years older than I am." 
 
 " Arabella is a dear. Heigh-ho," Diana said, jumping to 
 her feet. 
 
 "Dearer than your mother?" Mrs. Scovell said with a 
 confident smile. 
 
 " Don't be a goose, mummy darling. There," she stooped 
 down and brushed her lips on her mother's forehead. 
 "You're a brick, and your figure's all right — nice and soft 
 and comfy. Arabella is rather on the scraggy side." 
 
 Mrs. Scovell patted her slightly rounded bust com- 
 placently. "Have you seen her lately?" she asked with 
 eager curiosity. 
 
 "This morning." 
 
 " You didn't go in ?" her mother asked timidly. 
 
 "No," Diana said half defiantly. "This nonsense 
 about my not going there is a bit too thick though." 
 
 "Your father has been very tolerant about — the other 
 things," her mother said severely. 
 
 " Oh, you needn't worry. I'll keep my word." 
 
 She laughed gaily. " Poor old boy. He jibs at a gnat 
 and swallows a camel. I suppose I have been a bit rough 
 on him though. But now that the land's settled he might 
 withdraw the embargo and make friends with old Pierce." 
 
 "You know the whole county thinks he has been too 
 tolerant with you," her mother said with a slight frown. 
 "You should have heard him swear the night you were 
 coming back from jail. I've never seen him so angry. He 
 almost cried with vexation, said he could never hold up his 
 head in the county again and swore he wouldn't let you 
 into the house. Yet he took the car down himself to meet 
 you and mixed with that dreadful crowd and the tar barrels 
 and everything." ^ 
 
 "That's father all out," Diana said with a laugh. 
 
CONQUEST 199 
 
 " That's how he'll take Home Rule when it comes. You 
 should have seen him at the station. It was the first time 
 in his life he got cheered by an Irish crowd, and anyone 
 could see that he liked it. They had been denouncing him 
 that very day I heard, about the land, but they cheered 
 him more than they did me. It was a game thing to come 
 and meet me — and they saw it. He's more like them than 
 he thinks." 
 
 " Don't worry your poor father more than you can help," 
 Mrs. Scovell said weakly. "You know old Daly has 
 treated him badly." 
 
 " Nonsense. It was all a fair fight, and no one knows it 
 better than father. His row with Pierce Daly is just a 
 tradition : it came down to him like his Unionism, and he 
 doesn't know how to get out of either of 'em." 
 
 Mrs. Scovell sighed again: "It would be nice to know 
 Arabella — our nearest neighbour too. Even her sister-in- 
 law, Jasper Levin's wife, speaks well of her. But your 
 father will never give in — he was in love with her once. 
 Was it the boat ?" 
 
 " In love with her ? But I don't see how that matters ?" 
 Diana said with a puzzled look. "Pooh, what nonsense. 
 Yes, it was the boat," she added, her eyes sparkling mis- 
 chievously. "The only thing I learned by going to jail 
 was to interpret regulations strictly. ' Have you kept your 
 promise not to go within the gates of Scarty ?' * Yes, your 
 worship.' If father will be so stupid what can you expect ? 
 I drifted down in the canoe opposite the cedar trees — there's 
 a sort of backwater at that very spot. I kept well out from 
 the bank. Arabella sat on the bank and old Pierce hadn't 
 to move from his chair. We had a very comfortable talk." 
 
 "I don't know where you got your character from — 
 you're not like your father nor like me," her mother said 
 despairingly. 
 
 "Outside I'm mostly you, thank God. Inside I think 
 
200 CONQUEST 
 
 Fm mostly granny — Tallyfin, not Ballywilliam," Diana 
 said composedly. 
 
 " I had your hair certainly, and your complexion " 
 
 " Have/^ Diana smiled. 
 
 " I may not be quite a wreck, but I'm not such a fool as 
 that," Mrs. Scovell said with a pleased smile. "But your 
 granny Scovell to be responsible for the devil in you ! 
 She'd have a fit if she heard you." 
 
 " We took different turnings, that's all," Diana said con- 
 fidently. 
 
 " I once heard she had a liking for old Daly — she never 
 spoke to him. But it would have been grotesquely impos- 
 sible," her mother said with a puzzled laugh. 
 
 "What would ? They are very much alike," Diana said, 
 putting on her hat. 
 
 "Was the boy there to-day?" Mrs. Scovell asked, after 
 watching the operation for a few seconds. 
 
 " The English prig ? Thank goodness, no." 
 
 "Louisa Drumbeg has an eye on him for Sophie," Mrs. 
 Scovell said meditatively. " I've seen him, and I must say 
 he's quite distinguished looking. Louisa met him at the 
 Levins, who are making a fuss over him. Sir Silas writes 
 so enthusiastically of the boy's future that Jasper wants to 
 make up for his treatment of Arabella by making much of 
 Jim. Louisa even spoke of calling, but I warned her that 
 Arabella wouldn't be at home. Dear Louisa thinks she has 
 only to hold out a hand. Five daughters are rather diffi- 
 cult these days and Roman Catholic eligibles are few. I 
 mentioned the Driscoll connection — just to test her. But 
 she's prepared to swallow even that. She was quite sharp 
 with me, seemed to think I was putting difficulties in her 
 way, that I had an eye on him for you or something." 
 
 " Had you ?" Diana asked coldly. 
 
 "Of course you're very young. And there's Frank 
 Scovell ?" Mrs. Scovell said hesitatingly, flushing slightly. 
 
CONQUEST 201 
 
 " Not the property, thank you. I hoped you had dropped 
 him." 
 
 "I suppose I have, though Td have Hked you to have 
 Dalyhouse," Mrs. Scovell said with a regretful sigh. "So 
 would your father in spite of all your tantrums. It breaks 
 his heart to think of the place going to Frank." 
 
 " If I could marry Dalyhouse without Frank nothing 
 
 would please me better. But " Diana made a 
 
 grimace. 
 
 "I know. I feel like that about him myself. But it's 
 hard to give up the idea because of the place. If only I had 
 a son, or if Frank weren't such a dull stick," Mrs. Scovell 
 said plaintively. 
 
 "I'll never marry," Diana said decisively, arranging re- 
 bellious hair under her hat in front of a mirror on the wall. 
 " There are so many more exciting things to do." 
 
 Mrs. Scovell, undisturbed, watched her admiringly. 
 • "Your father is sure to meet him. Who knows but Jim 
 might be the means of healing the feud," she said medita- 
 tively. 
 
 " I'm tired of hearing him discussed," Diana said petu- 
 lantly, with a toss of her head. 
 
 " The Brazier girls are after him. You'll see they'll take 
 to cub hunting again this year. Durkan has it from his 
 nephew at Scarty that Simon Lentaigne is lending Jim 
 Daly some mounts," Mrs. Scovell said thoughtfully. " Even 
 the shopkeepers' daughters are setting their caps at him. 
 The little Mallon girls haunt the Tubber road on the mere 
 chance of seeing him." 
 
 "You'll quote Nanny next," Diana said ironically, but 
 with a slight blush. 
 
 Mrs. Scovell laughed cheerfully. " Dear old Rafter has 
 everything settled. It's the will of God, she says, that sent 
 him home to knock all the nonsense out of you. She may 
 love you because she nursed you, but a Daly is her Lord of 
 
202 CONQUEST 
 
 Creation. King Cophetua and . . . She has some tale of 
 meeting you in the glen " 
 
 "It was a pure accident," Diana said heatedly, flushing 
 from her neck to her hat. 
 
 "Of course," Mrs. Scovell said with a complacent look. 
 "But the servants will gossip, and Helen Lentaigne wrote 
 that he was decidedly attracted." 
 
 "Fm off to see granny," Diana said hastily. "If you 
 were a Sinn Feiner, mother, you'd know that we occupy 
 ourselves with other things." 
 
 "You cease to be men and women, I suppose?" Mrs. 
 Scovell said, getting up with a leisurely smile. "Well, 
 well. Tell granny that I'll come to see her every day while 
 you're away. This is the only room in the house that 
 doesn't shriek of the Dalys. Your grandfather made it by 
 roofing in the two wings." 
 
 She walked in silence down the long lofty room. 
 
 "I'm leaving the pup with Con Driscoll till I get back 
 from Ballywilliam. Rafter might make up some story 
 about myself and Mike," Diana said a little shrilly. 
 
 "I think not, dear," Mrs. Scovell said with a contented 
 smile. " But you have the queerest circle of friends, Diana. 
 Yaur father has the patience of a saint. Those Driscolls 
 were his bitterest opponents over the land. I don't know 
 how many years' purchase they have deprived us of." 
 
 " Prevented us from robbing them of," Diana said mock- 
 ingly. ^ •■ 
 
 " I never argue politics. Thank God there are more 
 sensible things to talk about. I hope someone will call. 
 Run away now child and enjoy your walk." 
 
 9. 
 
 Diana called the puppy to heel on Grange Con bridge. 
 Should she go by the road or by the bank ? She felt irri- 
 
CONQUEST 203 
 
 tated and worried. Always, before, she had known her 
 own mind and acted on it. But for the last three weeks — 
 it was too silly and disgusting. It had been such a relief 
 to get away from the gossip of man-hunting and do real 
 things. Was she doomed to fall into the rut of the Braziers 
 and the Beaumonts and talk and think of nothing but men ? 
 It was the thinking that mattered. She had talked at 
 school and at home — one couldn't escape from it, but this 
 was different. It had begun in the train, something that 
 vaguely disturbed her and put her on the defensive. She 
 leant on the parapet, staring down the Dalyhouse bank. 
 There, somewhere by the big elm, he had landed the trout. 
 Did she really remember it, or was it only because Helen 
 Lentaigne so often spoke of it? She crossed over to the 
 other side of the bridge and looked up towards the glen. 
 It was shorter by the road, but the grass was more 
 pleasant. That wasn't even hopest. The genteel little 
 Mallon girls were straighten Once it was an accident. 
 How many times had it been ? Five or six. And he ? He 
 had been there on a day when he was as likely to catch a 
 whale as a salmon. To-morrow she was going to Bally- 
 william. Somewhere in her breast she felt a little empty 
 ache, but she whipped her thoughts to combat it. She 
 should be at her real work again. She must prepare her 
 speech for the branch meeting in Belfast. It would be such 
 fun going there from Ballywilliam of all places. Things 
 and not people were her real interest. Ireland, her wrongs 
 and her rights, were the beginning and end of all her in- 
 terests. This other feeling happened in somehow, unin- 
 vited, unwelcome. It was some weakness which she had the 
 strength to overcome when she became conscious of its 
 presence. It was dangerous only when she was off her 
 guard. It was least harmful when she was with him, for 
 then her antagonism was keenest. . . . 
 
 She hesitated for a moment opposite the stile, walked on 
 o 
 
204 CONQUEST 
 
 a few steps, stopped, called back the pup, turned round, re- 
 traced her steps and crossed the stile. It was the last time 
 for some weeks, perhaps for ever. She wasn't afraid of him. 
 She thought again of her meeting in Belfast, of her speech. 
 She formed a few sentences. They seemed to ring hollow, 
 to trail off into nothingness among the reeds. The bul- 
 rushes seemed to look at her with his level eyes, neither 
 accepting her nor rejecting her, just weighing her in a 
 balance. He thought her a fool, laughed at her. Not 
 actually, but she knew he was laughing behind his eyes. 
 His reserve of judgment was all condemnation of -her. 
 Sometimes there was another look in his eyes. She felt hot 
 and uncomfortable, pulled off her light, unlined linen coat, 
 fanned herself with it, and slung it across her shoulder. 
 Love, if it meant anything at all, meant some respect for 
 one's ideas. That other look, which had appealed to her 
 weakness, was mere pity for her ignorance and folly — insult 
 added to injury. He was just an embodiment of the pity- 
 ing contempt the best type of Englishmen had for Ireland. 
 He would marry her for her hair and her eyes and her< silly 
 face — at least he thought it silly. Men did that and women 
 submitted to it. Marriage was a companionship, some com- 
 munity of thought and aim. The Lentaignes had it and 
 were happy. Her father and mother ? They were happy, 
 though it wasn't easy to see what they had in common. 
 Anyhow they didn't despise one another. She stood and 
 watched a water-hen dive quietly, the water rippling gently 
 in ever widening circles round the spot where it had disap- 
 peared. The pool among the reeds was quite still again. 
 He would go out of her life like that. She stared bleakly 
 at the smiling water, put her hand to her breast to try and 
 still the aching feeling. If she could only think. He 
 shouldn't look at her like that — it wasn't fair. It was a 
 mean attempt to sap her resolution. There was nothing in 
 common between them. She was Ireland. He had taken 
 
CONQUEST 205 
 
 his stand with England. She would make him see that a 
 woman could live her own life. If he wasn't a traitor — no, 
 she wouldn't call him that — he was blind, blind. He was 
 a hanger-on of a country that she must fight with all the 
 strength of her mind and body — fight him even, if it were 
 necessary. Ireland was right, England wrong. She was 
 on the side of right ; he, with all his cleverness, was wrong. 
 He was merely a temptation to her faith in Ireland. He 
 was a symbol of what had to be fought and broken. 
 
 Round a bend, in the shade of a clump of willows, she 
 came on him suddenly, lying on his side on the grass. She 
 caught his eyes fixed on her with the look she hated, half 
 smiling, half quizzical. She blushed. 
 
 "First blood," he said, pitching aside the book which 
 he held open, on the grass, and jumping up. 
 
 " Fishing ?" she said disdainfully. _ 
 
 " Waiting for you," he said with an admiring look. 
 
 She stubbed the book with her shoe and turned over the 
 front cover. 
 
 "Isaak Walton," she said with a little disconcerted 
 laugh. "You ought to be ashamed to read him with all 
 this pretence of fishing." 
 
 She glanced disapprovingly at the rod, the basket, and 
 landing net yards apart on the grass, as if he had pitched 
 them away impatiently. 
 
 " I've been doing something much sillier for the last three 
 weeks — pretending I'm not in love with you," he said firmly. 
 
 A Painted Lady hovered over a clover blossom. Her 
 eyes followed it hungrily. In some way the exquisite feel- 
 ing of happiness which filled her seemed to hang on its 
 movements. If only the whole world could be made to 
 stand still and remain for ever just as it was now. The 
 gurgle of water in the river, the faint chirping of innumer- 
 able grasshoppers, the sharp buzz of a bee, the whispering 
 of willow leaves seemed to blend with the glad beating of 
 
2o6 CONQUEST 
 
 her heart in a sort of divine harmony. The butterfly 
 flew slowly towards the river, and disappeared under the 
 bank. One of the sentences she had thought of for her 
 Belfast speech recurred to her, and she repeated it mechani- 
 cally. It was only the old weakness after all in a new form. 
 It could never, never be. Her heart beat painfully. The 
 joy had all gone and had left her weak and giddy. 
 
 "Let's sit down," she said numbly. She sank down 
 quietly where she stood, and sat upright, her palms resting 
 on the cool grass. 
 
 " Have I been too sudden ?" he said anxiously. 
 
 " This is some new game," she said, burying her hands in 
 the deep grass for support. 
 
 "Oh, be serious, Diana," he said, sitting down opposite 
 and crossing his legs. 
 
 "Diana?" she said mockingly to gain time. 
 
 "What else?" he said grimly. 
 
 "Oh, I don't mind. I'm serious though. Don't spoil 
 everything by this nonsense." 
 
 "But I love you^have loved you ever since I saw you. 
 All my life, I think." 
 
 "Is this a new way of jibing at my politics?" she said, 
 suppressing a desire to kiss the eager face. 
 
 " Politics. What have politics got to-do with it ? I love 
 you. I'm asking you to be my wife." 
 
 "My feelings don't matter, I suppose? But it's all in 
 character. England all over. She has only to hold up her 
 finger and the world must grovel at her feet," she said 
 angrily. 
 
 " Do you love me ?" he said imperturbably. 
 
 She flushed and laughed a little bitterly. "You're as 
 convincing in love as you are in argument," she jibed. " No 
 wonder England can't govern if that's how her diplomatists 
 make love. You should hear the perfect lover — a Sinn 
 Feiner of course. I'm Joan of Arc and Kathleen na 
 
CONQUEST 207 
 
 Houlihan. He's lyrical on my eyelashes and my fi.nger-tips. 
 I'm a blend of the Madonna and Venus. Tm a poem from 
 my ear to my instep." 
 
 " You haven't answered my question," he said. 
 
 "I won't marry you," she said firmly, though her lips 
 trembled and her eyes avoided his. 
 
 "There's someone else? You seem to have had experi- 
 ence," he said bitterly. 
 
 " Lots. But there's no one," she said, hesitating between 
 resentment and a desire to explain. 
 
 " You haven't answered my question. Do you love me ?" 
 he said gently. 
 
 " Don't," she said appealingly. 
 
 Something in his look roused her to anger, and she said 
 vehemently, "It's not fair of you to hector me like this. 
 You've done nothing but bully me and sneer at me. Why 
 should I love you ? Why shouldn't I hate you ?" 
 
 " Good God," he said helplessly. " Bully you and sneer at 
 you ? Why, I've worshipped you — do now, though you're 
 angry with me. Your frown only made me less happy than 
 your smile. Nothing mattered but you — to see you, to be 
 with you. And when that was impossible, to think of you. 
 I can't make you love me if you don't feel like it, but to hate 
 me. Oh, do be fair." 
 
 "There," she said triumphantly. "But you've so often 
 told me I'm prejudiced that it doesn't surprise me now." 
 
 " You are a bit, you know," he said with a puzzled frown. 
 " You're not thinking of our rows about politics ?" he added 
 after a pause, with a boyish laugh. 
 
 "An impassable wall divides us," she said with the 
 gesture of life and melodrama. 
 
 His slightest flicker of a smile added fuel to her flame, 
 and his words did not help to quell it : 
 
 " No wall is impassable. And it must be a tiny wall if 
 it exists at all. I've crossed it without noticing it." 
 
2o8 CONQUEST 
 
 "I haven't your agility and detachment of mind," she 
 said with a shrug of her shoulders, adding quickly as if 
 doubtful of the efficacy of irony, " I love my country." 
 
 " What makes you think I don't ?" 
 
 " If you do you dissemble your love pretty cleverly," she 
 said drily. 
 
 " There's too much at stake between us, Diana, to quibble. 
 What have I done ? You're not making a barrier of persi- 
 flage ? I've never had a serious political discussion with 
 you." 
 
 "Is it nothing to treat me as if I wasn't worth taking 
 seriously ?" she said angrily. 
 
 " But, good Lord, it wasn't that. I took you seriously. I 
 was thinking of you then and not of politics. If I must 
 dot the i's, I love Ireland rather too much for my peace of 
 mind. I was fed on her as a child, and I can't drop the 
 habit. I don't speak of her much, just as I can't speak to 
 others of you. But^he's there all the time in my mind and 
 in my feelings." 
 
 "Yet you became a Foreign Office clerk," she said in- 
 dignantly. " Why did you do it ?" 
 
 " Why indeed ?" he said with a shrug. " It's a rotten 
 job. But it pleased the mater and doesn't matter to me for 
 the moment." 
 
 " How could you feel in that way if you loved Ireland ?" 
 She clasped and unclasped her hands nervously. "At the 
 best it's sheer indifference. You simply don't care." 
 
 "But I do care — care tremendously." 
 
 "When I knew I cared I had to give up everything." 
 
 "And I admire you for it. But there must have been a 
 time when you were groping, saw no definite way out, were 
 trying to make up your mind. That's where I am-at the 
 moment. I'm trying to understand." 
 
 " But you've definitely gone over on the English side by 
 taking an English job." 
 
CONQUEST 209 
 
 "Isn't that condemning me because I'm not a Sinn 
 Feiner ? I won't press the point that all Sinn Feiners 
 haven't made up their own minds on the question — I've 
 met some who are civil servants. The Redmondites see 
 nothing wrong in my position. All that matters to me, 
 however, is that I see nothing wrong in it. The old 
 Foreign Office is the servant of the crown and people of 
 Great Britain and Ireland — even Sinn Fein hasn't yet 
 separated them. You're one of my masters, or you will be 
 when you get the vote. As for being English ! If you 
 marry me you'll hear me abuse England till you wish you 
 had never heard the name." 
 
 "You laugh at me for attacking her," Diana said petu- 
 lantly. 
 
 " You see her face all black. I see a white or a drab patch 
 here and there," he laughed. "You may be right, I may 
 be right. What does a difference of opinion in politics 
 about England matter if we love one another." 
 
 " It's impossible," she said fingering the grass thought- 
 fully. 
 
 " Is that the Italian impossible that means * Yes ' ?" he 
 said hopefully. 
 
 " Certainly not. Couldn't you join our party, Jim ?" she 
 asked eagerly. 
 
 " Do you love me ?" 
 
 She jumped up hurriedly and shouted "Lascar, Lascar ! 
 Where's that puppy ?" 
 
 Jim muttered " Damn the puppy," stood up and frowned, 
 "You haven't answered that question yet," he said 
 doggedly. 
 
 " If you were only half as persistent in groping your way 
 into being an Irishman it might be different," she said 
 regretfully. 
 
 " It's yes, then," he said joyfully, stretching out his hand 
 for hers. 
 
2IO \^ CONQUEST 
 
 " No, don't touch me. I couldn't stand it," she said ex- 
 citedly, moving away from him. " I mustn't. I've my work 
 to do here. It's more than religion to me — more than love. 
 I can't leave it, I can't. It would be worse than apostasy. 
 Don't make me miserable." 
 
 "Don't be afraid. I can wait — now," he said grimly. 
 "Next week you may be more of a woman and less of a 
 martyr. I'm going to stay with the Edwardes." 
 
 "You're an English brute. But I'm glad you're coming 
 up North," she said with a smile. "You see how impos- 
 sible it all is," she added, holding out her hand. 
 
 " Indeed ?" he said drily, a hungry look in his eyes, as he 
 clasped her hand. 
 
 "You may kiss me — but it means nothing," she said, 
 drawing him towards her. 
 
 "I'm damned if I do — on these terms," he said, shaking 
 off her hand roughly. 
 
 She smiled through half lowered lids. " There's more of 
 the Irishman in you than I thought," she said as he moved 
 away with a muttered " Goodbye." 
 
 "Don't forget your hat and your rod," she called after 
 him gaily. " Now, Lascar," patting the hound's head as he 
 tried to lick her hand, " we can have our tea in comfort." 
 
 10. 
 
 Jim and Father Lysaght sat in armchairs in front of a 
 cheerful fire in Father Lysaght's sitting-room in the Presby- 
 tery at Lisgeela. A bronze reading lamp, with a low green 
 shade, lit up the green cover of the centre table but left the 
 rest of the room half dark. Occasionally a flame shot out 
 from a hissing coal and revealed the furniture, mostly books 
 in open shelves, a few chairs, dark-green curtains on the 
 windows and the back of the door. The curtains, the 
 priest explained, were neither for ornament nor to keep out 
 
CONQUEST 211 
 
 draughts, but to hide raw pitch pine the look of which he 
 detested. Wind howled in the poplar trees at the end of 
 the Presbytery garden, and the rain pattered sharply on the 
 window panes. Jim sat well back in his comfortable chair, 
 his feet on the fender, drew long, slow, regular puffs from 
 his pipe and watched meditatively the figures made by the 
 glowing coals. The priest leant over the side of his chair, 
 held an open breviary so as to catch the light from the lamp 
 and read his office. His rapid muttering made a curious 
 undertone to the wind and rain. He shut the book with 
 a snap, knelt for a few seconds on his chair, made the 
 sign of the cross, threw the book on the table, stood up, 
 took his pipe and tobacco box off the mantelpiece, and sat 
 down with a sigh of relief. 
 
 " So much done," he said cheerfully. " You could easily 
 be in a worse place, Jim, on a night like this. I'm not sorry 
 we got out of the bishop so early. A short dinner with him 
 goes a long way if you knew all his stories byi heart twenty 
 years ago. We'll have a quiet smoke, and a cup of tea 
 later, and I'll drive you home about ten o'clock. I promised 
 an old man that's dying out your way to look in on him 
 then." 
 
 " I can get Pagan's car. It's a dreadful night for you to 
 be out," Jim objected. 
 
 " And have old Fahey complaining to St. Peter about me 
 if he died during the night," the priest said with a whim- 
 sical smile, crushing the tobacco into the bowl of his pipe. 
 " I'm not even sure of being left in peace till then, but let us 
 hope for the best, and the weather may cheer, up." 
 
 "You could get one of the young men to go ?" 
 
 " I suppose I could. But dying people are more cranky 
 than the rest of us, and that's saying a good deal. The old 
 ones like to have the old man they've used to to show them 
 the road in the end. One has to take the rough with the 
 smooth. Regularly about once a month, for the last ten 
 
212 CONQUEST 
 
 years, I've been called out of my warm bed in the middle of 
 the night to attend an old collogue who'll see me under the 
 sod yet. Young priests are apt to get sharp over trifles like 
 that, but when you're on the way to sixty you get used to it." 
 
 He lit his pipe and puffed for a while in silence. "I 
 suppose this is the last I'll see of you this side of Christmas, 
 but I hope you'll come back to us regularly now ?" 
 
 " Rather." 
 
 " The old man was hoping that there might be something 
 between yourself and Miss Diana ?" the priest said, watch- 
 ing a smoke ring intently. 
 
 " There was — a good deal of nagging," Jim said, empty- 
 ing his pipe in the fender. 
 
 " Nothing softer than that ?" ^ 
 
 "She's as sexless as a nun or a suffragette," Jim said 
 wrathful ly. 
 
 "There's a tender spot in many a nun, and I wouldn't 
 trust one of them suffragettes out of my sight," the priest 
 said drily. "A healthy amount of sparring between a man 
 and a woman is never a bad sign, and often wears out any 
 crust of difference there might be between 'em. She was 
 so bitter agin you to me that I was almost sure she was in 
 love with you." 
 
 " She has no heart," Jim said moodily. 
 
 "She's a daughter of Eve, and it's seldom one of 'em 
 hasn't a taste for the apple and for sharing it with a likely 
 man," the priest said genially. "These days she often 
 carries it in her pocket for a bit and plays with politics or 
 the like for a while. And with all the clatter and excite- 
 ment she might sometimes be under the illusion that her 
 heart was aching for a cause and not for a man. Sooner or 
 later foolishness like that wears away of itself, but it's liable 
 to burst any minute under proper pressure in season. You saw 
 a good deal of her when she was up North, she told me ?" 
 
 "Very little," Jim said bitterly. 
 
CONQUEST 213 
 
 "You could hardly expect to see her all the time. My 
 poor boy, you must be very hard hit. But it's only a matter 
 of time till her 'good deal' is your 'very little.' The 
 next thing I expect to hear is that she has a call to spread 
 the cause in London." 
 
 " I'm afraid you don't know her," Jim said gloomily. 
 
 " I saw her once meeting you suddenly opposite the post- 
 ofiice, and I haven't been dealing with women for thirty 
 years without learning about their ways. They come and 
 tell me this and that, but I have my own ways of judging. 
 *Twas only for a second, but I said to myself, ' There's a job 
 for you one day, James Lysaght.' At that stage it's more 
 the brake than the spur they generally need. Have you 
 asked her yet ?" 
 
 " She's refused me." 
 
 " Was it after last Saturday week ?" 
 
 "No. Before that." 
 
 "Then go on asking her," the priest said with a laugh. 
 "She'll be sick enough if you don't ask her again at 
 Christmas. It'll take her till near that to wear out the 
 novelty of being a sort of national hero. It's like a new toy 
 to her now, but she'll tire of it soon enough when you're out 
 of her sight for a while. Maybe I oughtn't to encourage 
 you to marry a Protestant, but she has a face that makes me 
 forget the heretic in her. And who knows, with the help 
 of God, but she may yet see the light. Anyhow the 
 children'll be safe." 
 
 " Don't separate us in the next world if we have the luck 
 to come together in this," Jim said ironically. 
 
 "You must take your risk if you marry a Protestant. 
 But if I were you I'd trust God to let her down light since 
 He made her a temptation. Anyhow, even the strictest 
 theologians have left a few back doors open by which a Pro- 
 testant may escape hell," Father Lysaght said, pursing his 
 lips and rubbing his chin. 
 
214 CONQUEST 
 
 " How considerate of 'em," Jim said drily. 
 
 "They're great men, the doctors of the church. I 
 wouldn't put it past them to square the circle yet," the 
 priest said with a laugh, settling himself back comfortably 
 in his chair. 
 
 " No wonder the Orangemen are suspicious of you." 
 
 " Did you find them very bitter agin us up North ?" the 
 priest asked eagerly. " They talk a power I suppose about 
 Home Rule, Rome rule ?" 
 
 Jim nodded. 
 
 " Do you think they really believe it, or is it only put on 
 to delude the British ?" 
 
 " Oh, they're quite serious — at least the ordinary rtm. Of 
 course it's a good catch-cry in Great Britain and is ex- 
 ploited for that by many who know better." 
 
 " The Irish never took their politics from Rome, and more 
 power to them for it — and they never will," the priest said 
 fervently. 
 
 He relit his pipe, puffed it for a while in silence and said 
 quietly, " It's the misfortune of the Church that she's loaded 
 down with a lot of rubbish of laws and rules and regula- 
 tions about her rights and powers that have come down 
 from the dark ages and that she hasn't the courage to rid 
 herself of. She's like an old woman, God forgive me foi 
 saying it, who keeps by her every rag of clothes she ever 
 wore since she was a baby in arms and goes on pretending 
 at eighty that she can wear any day she likes the bib or the 
 petticoat she wore at her mother's breast. She was nc 
 worse than her neighbours, better if anything, when she 
 made out that she had rights over the bodies of kings and 
 peoples, could set up kings or pull them down, and force 
 people from their allegiance. She burnt heretics, or gol 
 them burned when every Government in Europe killed 
 everyone who disagreed with them. It's many a long da}i 
 since she could burn a cat, let alone a heretic, even if she 
 
CONQUEST 215 
 
 wanted to do it, in the most Catholic country in the world 
 without being had up before a civil court for it. All those 
 things are as dead as Queen Anne, but Protestants can 
 fling them in our face because we go on pretending they're 
 alive. But what's the use of talking about that when an 
 Irish Catholic Nationalist wouldn't touch the politics of 
 Rome with a barge pole." 
 
 "The Church is a bit autocratic even in Ireland," Jim 
 said with a smile. 
 
 " It's a queer mix-up," Father Lysaght said with a laugh. 
 "You have the English Government hand and glove with 
 the Pope. They don't like him nor the reactionary politics 
 of the Vatican — in England. But, they say to themselves, 
 the Pope is the very man for us in Ireland. We may be a 
 progressive Government in England, but we're an autocracy 
 in Ireland. The Vatican doesn't believe in popular govern- 
 ment, so we'll use it as a tool to keep the rebellious Irish in 
 their place. The Pope claims the right of controlling this 
 and that. No Catholic country in the world now admits 
 his claim, but we'll admit it. We'll give him the schools or 
 the like and he'll keep the people quiet over the land and 
 Home Rule." 
 
 Jim laughed. 
 
 " No wonder you'd laugh," the priest said with a shrug. 
 "You go up North — you can hear it here from your uncle, 
 Jasper Levin — and the Orangemen say to you : ' See them 
 dreadful priests with the education of the country already 
 in their grip — they'll have our schools under the Pope the day 
 Home Rule comes. It'd be as good as a play if the country 
 hadn't to suffer for it. Whatever political power the Church 
 has in Ireland comes to it through the Union. There's 
 every fear that down it'll go flop when Irish Catholics get 
 control. Strange as it may seem, the harder the Orange- 
 men beat the drum and the longer they're able to keep off 
 Home Rule the better the Vatican will like it." 
 
2i6 CONQUEST 
 
 "What about the bishops?" 
 
 " Bishops are bishops all the world over, but all the same 
 Vd like to give the poor devils their due," Father Lysaght 
 said, resting his pipe on his knee. " It's a trying position 
 for a saint, let alone an ordinary human being. I know 
 nearly all the bishops, and on the whole they're not a bad 
 sort. Politically they have to balance on the edge of a 
 razor. They have to keep in with the people and they have 
 to keep in with the Vatican. Getting to be a bishop at all 
 is a sign of a safe man that knows his way round. Within 
 the memory of man none of *em was ever known to run the 
 risk of losing his job. A bishop who has ambitions to be 
 an Archbishop or a Cardinal inclines towards the politics of 
 the Vatican. Those that are satisfied with being merely 
 bishops, as soon as they've got their job, incline towards the 
 politics of the people. But, except in a fit of temper like 
 Deehan, they're all careful to avoid extremes. If you ask 
 me whether they want Home Rule or not I'd say that nearly 
 every one of 'em is tugged in opposite directions. They 
 have a certain amount of power now, and they know that 
 they run the risk of losing it by Home Rule. But in their 
 hearts they're all Irishmen and have at least a sentimental 
 hankering after Home Rule. It's pull devil, pull baker with 
 them. They have no love for England nor for medieval 
 Vatican politics, but they love their own power in spite of 
 their professional humility and'd hate to give it up. But 
 in a pinch I wouldn't put it past even a bishop to take a 
 risk for his country. In any case the Protestants have 
 nothing to fear from them. Under Home Rule they'd be so 
 busy defending their own power against their Catholic sub- 
 jects who are supposed to be under their thumbs, that it is 
 not thinking of worrying Protestants they'd be." 
 
 " Are the priests as sound Orangemen as the bishops and 
 the Pope ?" Jim asked derisively. 
 
 "The priests have the politics of the people. If they 
 
CONQUEST 217 
 
 haven^t they're soon made to feel it. There are overbearing 
 priests, and tyrannical priests, and avaricious priests, and 
 some may be no better than they might be, but for the most 
 part they're hard-working, decent men who have taken up 
 a job and do it as best they can. They're men and not 
 shining angels. The people take religion from them, but 
 turn their backs on their politics unless it's an echo of their 
 own. If a football can be said to lead a mob, then they're 
 often leaders. The people put up with a good deal from 
 them, but the one thing they won't stand from them is 
 politics made in England or made in Rome." 
 
 "Then you think Home Rule, Rome rule, all nonsense?" 
 Father Lysaght threw out his hands despairingly. "I 
 don't think about it, man. I know it as certain as that I'm 
 sitting here. One of the things, and the chief of 'em, that 
 keeps the church what it is in Ireland to-day, and not like 
 what it is in France or Italy, is that the country is still 
 under the foot of England. In the memory of the people 
 England still stands for religious as well as political 
 oppression. They love the priests that said masses for 
 them and attended the dying in the Penal times. But they 
 hate any clerical encroachment on their liberty. When the 
 country has a Parliament of its own, and political differ- 
 ences have to be fought out within the country and not 
 against England on the Home Rule issue alone, then the 
 priest will have to clear out of politics here as elsewhere. 
 The Irish are a religious people, but half their religion is 
 pride that it is the one thing England was never able to 
 take from them. The priests keep their heads above water 
 in Ireland to-day by forgetting ev£ry musty political prin- 
 ciple they learned at college. Like the people, thank God, 
 they take their politics from Ireland and not from Rome. 
 And Irish politics are liberty and equality and not clerical 
 domination. If the priests ever try to run Papal politics in 
 Ireland the Catholics'll give 'em shorter shrift than the 
 
2i8 CONQUEST 
 
 Orang-emen. The bishops have tried it scores of times, but 
 it has always ended in failure." 
 
 " Then unless the people themselves are bigots it would 
 seem as if the Orangemen could still breathe under Home 
 Rule ?" Jim said, preparing to light a fresh pipe. 
 
 The priest looked at the clock. " Don't light that yet — 
 the tea'll be in in a minute," he said with a laugh. " You're 
 a queer fellow, Jim, to be catechizing me like this and you 
 knowing more about the Pope and nearly as much about 
 the people as I do myself. The people are political bigots 
 if you like — if in this age of the world you can blame men 
 for thirsting for liberty and not being happy till they get it. 
 As for religious bigotry, youVe only to walk down the town 
 of Lisgeela to get your answer. Some of the best shops in 
 the place are Protestant shops, and there aren't enough 
 Protestants in the whole district to support one decent shop. 
 There's a lot of foolish talk among children, but it's only a 
 sort of lingering memory of the bad times. Two gossoons 
 may bandy words about the Pope and Proddy-woddies, 
 but religion doesn't keep a ha'p'orth of custom out of any 
 Protestant shop. And there's no more respected man in 
 the town than Mr. Ellison, the Protestant rector. I've read 
 in the Unionist papers of cases of religious intolerance 
 about here — the boycott of a Protestant or the like, but 
 everyone in the place knew he was boycotted for politics 
 and not for religion. Lord Drumbeg, who's more Catholic 
 than the Pope, was boycotted more than any man in the 
 whole country. But sure you know this well. Is your 
 grandfather a religious bigot ? Or your cousin Con Dris- 
 coll, or that ruffian Dick Kavanagh, or any Catholic you 
 know for that matter ? Except maybe Drumbeg, and he's 
 a Unionist. I don't say that there isn't some religious 
 bigotry up North. The religions there are more evenly 
 divided. They're like fighting cocks of more or less equal 
 strength, and the nuts from the shipyards are convenient 
 
CONQUEST 219 
 
 weapons. But it's largely a case of using religion to stoke 
 up their political fervour. The Catholics make a politician 
 of the Blessed Virgin and break Orange heads in her honour 
 on Lady-Day. The Orangemen break Catholic heads on 
 the twelfth of July in remembrance of a battle that wasn't 
 fought on that day at all, and to honour a Dutchman who 
 had an alliance with the Pope. Catholics are to blame as 
 well as Protestants. I once went to an archaeological meet- 
 ing in Derry, and one of the priests of the town pulled a 
 face on him as long as Carson's when I told him the name 
 of the hotel I was going to stay at — I picked it out of the 
 Railway Guide. *The Orange Hotel/ he said horrified. 
 'If they're top dog up here, as you say,' I said, *then I'll 
 probably get a good bed and a decent glass of whisky,' and 
 sure enough I did. Horace Plunkett and his co-operatives 
 were doing a good deal to do away with the bitterness on 
 both sides, and was getting Orangeman and Catholic, 
 priest and parson, to see that they had more in common 
 than hatred and a taste for breaking one another's heads, 
 but now the fat is all in the fire again. The English Im- 
 perialists have discovered Ulster as a weapon to smash the 
 Liberals. Carson has becoi^e an Orangman to save the 
 Empire. Bigotry is to be let loose in Ireland again. 
 'Pity the poor Ulster Protestant and save him from the 
 ravening maw of the wicked Pope,' will be shouted through 
 the length and breadth of Great Britain to rouse English 
 Protestantism to its duty of throwing over Asquith. We're 
 in for bad times, but sure it's only another page in the long 
 record of England's misdeeds. But I'm dry with all this 
 talk. Thank God there's the clatter of a tray outside the 
 door and we'll have our tea. Keep out of politics, Jim 
 boy ; it's a crooked game." 
 
PART THREE 
 
 I. - 
 
 "This stuff ought to be put on ice," Bateson said with a 
 bored look at the hock cup which he had mixed with care. 
 
 " That will do, I think," Jim Daly said with a critical but 
 approving look at the table laid for luncheon. 
 
 He moved some flowers unnecessarily. 
 
 " The Liberals are making worse than their usual mess of 
 Ireland," Phipps said from behind the Observer. "We 
 handed it over to them happy and contented and they've 
 turned it into a bear garden." 
 
 "Damn backwoodsman cheek — with your gun-running 
 Carsons and Tory mutiny in the army," Bateson said with 
 mild indignation, stifling a yawn. 
 
 " Let's clear out now. No, Bateson, you don't. No more 
 smoking. She ought to be here any moment," Jim said, 
 with a frown at Bateson and an anxious look at the table. 
 
 Bateson pocketed his cigarette case with a sigh. 
 
 "You should have taken her to the Savoy, or left all this 
 to Simpson," Phipps said with a withering look at the mess 
 Bateson had made on the sideboard. "However, some- 
 thing may yet be done," he added, touching a button near 
 the fireplace. "Amateurs interfering with meals are like 
 Liberals trying to govern." 
 
 " She wished to come here," Jim said moodily, still brood- 
 ing over the table. 
 
 " Who's doing the chaperon ?" Phipps asked. 
 
 " Mrs. Leggett." 
 
 " Another of those damn Liberal wives ! However, she's 
 pretty," Phipps conceded doubtfully. 
 
 " Yessir ?" a manservant said. 
 
 220 
 
CONQUEST 221 
 
 "Clear up all this," Phipps said with a vague wave of 
 the newspaper. " And see that everything's right." 
 
 "Yessir." 
 
 " Don't touch the table, Simpson," Jim said, again mov- 
 ing some flowers. 
 
 "Cut out," Phipps said, shepherding Jim and Bateson 
 out of the dining-room. He looked at Simpson, who said 
 with his eyes, " You can leave it to me, sir." 
 
 A friendship begun at Winchester and surviving Oxford 
 had led to the taking in common by the three friends of a 
 house in St James's Place. Profound diversities of opinion 
 were bridged by habit, a good-humoured tolerance, and a 
 common interest in social work. They were non-resident 
 members of an Oxford Settlement in Rotherhithe and ran 
 a boys' club near the Surrey Docks. Phipps was a Con- 
 servative member for Loamshire, vaguely supposed to be 
 promising. Bateson belonged to the left wing of the 
 Liberal Party, had the promise (which the party managers 
 always forgot when opportunities arose) of a seat. He 
 used the whip or the scorpion as the subject of his articles 
 in the advanced Radical Press was the Unionist Party or 
 the chiefs of his own party. 
 
 " Keep Mrs. Leggett near you, Phipps," Jim said, as they 
 crossed the hall to their common sitting-room. "She has 
 her knife in Bateson. I'll have Miss Scovell." 
 
 "I was wondering why the unusual thoughtfulness for 
 me," Bateson said drily. 
 
 "I've got Aunt Sarah for you — at least she may come," 
 Jim said cheerfully. 
 
 " Good of you," Bateson said with no excess of enthusiasm. 
 
 There was a ring at the front door. Phipps took up the 
 Nineteenth Century. Bateson's fingers again strayed to his 
 cigarette case. Jim flicked imaginary dust off the sleeve 
 of his morning coat, his eyes on the door. 
 
 " Mr. Dale." 
 
222 CONQUEST 
 
 Jim sighed but said pleasantly, " How d*you do, Dale ?" 
 
 Bateson lit a cigarette. 
 
 Dale fixed Phipps with his monocle. 
 
 " Thought you were in Ulster drilling ?" he said jeeringly. 
 
 " Smith .and Bonar Law have gone over. Phipps is an 
 Orangeman who has never been in Ireland," Bateson said, 
 exhaling a luxurious puff. 
 
 " Law-abiding Tories," Dale began. 
 
 "Major and Mrs. Levin." 
 
 "Glad you were able to come, Aunt Sarah," Jirn smiled 
 at the short, stout, placid woman who towed a tall gaunt 
 man in her wake. "Settled in at the War Office, Uncle 
 Peter?" 
 
 "Mrs. Leggett. Miss Scovell." 
 
 Jim shot past his uncle, g;-eeted Mrs. Leggett, a vivacious 
 little brunette, perfunctorily, and seized Diana's hand. He 
 had seen her yesterday driving a four-in-hand along Picca- 
 dilly in a Suffragette procession, but years seemed to have 
 divided Saturday from Sunday. Twenty hours at most, 
 and yet it had felt like half a lifetime. 
 
 " YouVe come at last," he whispered. 
 
 " No nearer," she said firmly, releasing her hand. 
 
 It was that first look of hers that always gave him a new 
 hope — something in the depths of her big blue eyes that 
 answered the hunger in his heart. But it was again only 
 the old illusion that had mocked him so often for three 
 years. 
 
 " She made the speech of the meeting" Mrs. Leggett said 
 enthusiastically. "It*s a pity she*s not as sound on the 
 Irish question as she is on Women's Rights." . 
 
 " I can't understand why women bother about politics — 
 such a pretty girl, too," Mrs. Levin said stolidly. "We 
 didn't in India, did we, Peter ?" 
 
 " No such rot," Major Levin growled. 
 
 "Fm in politics," Mrs. Leggett said with a look and in- 
 
CONQUEST 223 
 
 tonation that challenged the major and his wife to deny 
 that she was a pretty woman. 
 
 Simpson announced luncheon. On the way in Bateson 
 informed the Major, "Lifted old Leggett into the House 
 and is now^ pushing him towards the Cabinet." 
 
 " Sensible woman," the major said gruffly. " No damned 
 nonsense about the vote there." 
 
 "We are very angry with you naughty soldiers over the 
 Curragh incident," Mrs. Leggett said when they had taken 
 their places at table, wagging a playful hnger at the major, 
 
 " Soldiers shoot only Nationalists in Ireland," Diana said 
 sweetly. 
 
 " Don't see what else Gough could have done. An Irish 
 Protestant to shoot down other Irish Protestants ! It's im- 
 thinkable," Major Levin said with an uncomfortable 
 wriggle. 
 
 " The politicians were behind it, eh, Phipps ?" Dale said. 
 
 Phipps shrugged his shoulders. "We scored off the 
 Liberals anyhow," he said with a grin. 
 
 "A glorious victory," Dale said ironically. "Tories 
 used to boast of loyalty to the King and Constitution. 
 As a party they never had much vision, but they were care- 
 ful of their skins. Now they're slitting their own throats." 
 
 "Dale is playing the stage Irishman," Phipps jeered. 
 
 "I'm talking English politics," Dale said with a shrug. 
 " Try and imagine me a Tory with a little intelligence — if 
 it's not too fantastic to credit a Tory with intelligence. 
 What do I see ? My property threatened by the 1909 
 Budget, my privileges threatened by the veto on the House 
 of Lords. Hitherto the King and the Constitution have 
 been at once my privilege and my protection. My exist- 
 ence depends on their maintenance. Revolutions and re- 
 bellions are for wicked Radicals and the proletariat. I and 
 Arthur Balfour and the few Tories with a glimmering of 
 reason see all this. The ' have nots ' are getting the upper 
 
224 CONQUEST 
 
 hand of the ' haves/ They are the more numerous, but are 
 acting constitutionally. We are distressed, but we do not 
 get into a panic. The brakes are getting worn out, but 
 they can still keep back the wheels. But we reckon with- 
 out our backwoodsmen. They get into a panic. They get 
 an idea — the first in their lives — and like new wine in old 
 bottles it will burst them. Carson gave it to them. The 
 Smiths and the Bonar Laws are jubilant. With a whoop 
 they are flourishing the knife with which they are about to 
 cut the throat of Toryism in England. Carson's blessed 
 word ' hypothetical ' won't save the Tory Party in the day 
 of doom. And what is the magic ? You can see the Old 
 Bailey mind working behind the madness. How would the 
 lawyer put it ? We can't fight the ' have nots ' on the 
 straight issue of property and privilege. They are too 
 many for us. Let us confuse the issue, rouse their preju- 
 dices, divide them. Many of the *have nots' are still 
 sound, intolerant Protestants : let us appeal to their bigotry. 
 They have some sort of distorted idea of patriotism slum- 
 bering beneath their greed for a living wage : let us hypno- 
 tize them into the illusion that the security of England is 
 threatened. Ulster is the trump card that will win us back 
 what we have lost. We'll trip up the Rads on their Home 
 Rule Bill. Simpson, don't take away that beef." 
 
 "He thought you were lunching on your toshy speech," 
 Phipps said gruffly. 
 
 " My dear fellow, if your party had the sense to lunch on 
 my speech and digest it they wouldn't be committing hari- 
 kari," Dale said blithely. "If I'm longwinded it's because 
 I'm playing the part of a disillusioned Tory singing the 
 swan song of his party." 
 
 "Well?" Bateson said with a grin. 
 
 " Why labour the point ?" Dale said with a shrug. " Re- 
 sponsible leaders of the Tory Party are preparing an armed 
 rebellion against the Crown and Constitution." 
 
CONQUEST 225 
 
 "Against the damned Liberals only/' Major Levin said 
 excitedly. 
 
 "Against the Crown and Constitution of Great Britain 
 and Ireland," Dale said firmly. " They have gone farther, 
 they have corrupted the officers of the King's army to dis- 
 obeying the orders of the King." 
 
 " Come now," Levin said irritably. 
 
 " I'm speaking as a constitutional Tory. I recognize that 
 the King governs through his ministers," Dale said with a 
 smile. 
 
 " The Cabinet caved in," Levin grunted. 
 
 "Bateson may wish to defend them?'' Dale said 
 ironically. 
 
 " Not I — the weak-kneed crew," Bateson growled. 
 
 " They couldn't run the risk of breaking up the party," 
 Mrs. Leggett said defensively. 
 
 " At the moment I'm only tracing the nemesis of the Tory 
 Party," Dale said with a lift of his eyebrows. " I leave the 
 Liberals to Mrs. Leggett and Bateson. Anyhow, they have 
 given a moment's respite to my beloved Tories. Where 
 have I left Carson and Bonar Law and Galloper Smith and 
 the rest of my backwoodsmen ?" 
 
 "Aren't you making too much of what's largely bluff?" 
 Levin said uneasily. 
 
 "The backwoodsmen may be bluffing, but they have 
 raised an army in Ulster that's not all bluff, my friend," 
 Dale said seriously. "Ulster Protestants armed with 
 machine guns and rifles are not safe men to play hokey- 
 pokey with. They are capable of mistaking hypotheses for 
 facts and may precipitate the destruction of the Tory Party 
 at any moment. But whether Ulster fights or not, what 
 have the Smiths and the Carsons and the Laws succeeded 
 in doing for their party and for England ? They have 
 taught the *have nots* the methods and uses of direct 
 action. They have brought Parliament into derision. 
 
226 CONQUEST 
 
 They have justified armed rebellion. The upholders of the 
 Crown and Constitution have gone amok. In their mad- 
 ness they are straining every effort to destroy their only pro- 
 tection. If Tory idiocy drives England into becoming a 
 proletariat republic where a Tory d^nnot show his head, we 
 may expect to find there statues to Carson and Law and 
 Smith with inscriptions, * To the mad prophets who showed 
 us the way/ " 
 
 " We don't think so badly as that of Sir Edward Carson, 
 do we, Peter ?" Mrs. Levin said archly. 
 
 " I won't have a word said against Sir Edward Carson," 
 Diana said with a laugh. "If he weren't leading the 
 Orangemen we'd be glad to have him in Sinn Fein. He 
 takes no nonsense from England." 
 
 " Behold your first fruits, Phipps," Dale said drily. 
 
 "Oh, we owe Carson a great deal — ^we admit it freely," 
 Diana said. " While you Redmondites and the old stuffy 
 Liberals were talkee-talkee he was taking action. We got 
 the idea of the volunteers from him. And the gun-running 
 shows what a man he is. Very soon," she added myste- 
 riously, " we too may have rifles and machine guns." 
 
 " Good God," Levin said, " even Liberals wouldn't allow 
 rebels to arm ?" 
 
 "Only Orangemen are allowed to rebel with impunity," 
 Dale said, helping himself to wine. " In— — " 
 
 " You're not going to let Dale make another speech, Jim ? 
 What about coffee in the common room?" Phipps said 
 sharply. " He missed the Speaker's eye several times lately 
 — Lowther's bored, I've no doubt — and he wants to fire it 
 off here." 
 
 "Barring rhetorical trimming he seems all right," Jim 
 said moodily. 
 
 " My thanks to the Foreign Office," Dale said, with a 
 mock bow. "But they know something of Carson there, I 
 understand. His defence of the Empire is creating a cheer- 
 
CONQUEST 227 
 
 ful expectation of its downfall in more than one foreign 
 chancellery." 
 
 " Trust the Liberals, Mr. Dale," Mrs. Leggett said cheer- 
 fully, "when the opportune moment comes they will deal 
 firmly with the situation." 
 
 "Any fear of that Serbian business drawing us into a 
 European war, Jim ?" Bateson said irritably. " What 
 with Liberals who won't govern and Tories who have 
 created one rebel army and are provoking another into 
 existence, I see no other way out of the mess." 
 
 " What about coffee. Aunt Sarah ?" Jim said, with his 
 best imitation of his Uncle Silas's manner of ignoring awk- 
 ward questions. 
 
 Jim saw Diana frequently during the hot July days. 
 They rode together in the Park before breakfast, but 
 throughout the day she was occupied with some mysterious 
 business in the City. Once he lunched with her at Mrs. 
 Leggett's, and several times he met her out at dinners and 
 dances. She was mildly lionized, partly as a suffragette, 
 partly as an Irish patriot who gave trouble to the Red- 
 mondites, but mostly for her hair, her eyes, her wonderful 
 complexion and a mouth and chin that seduced even 
 Devereux, one of Carson's chief aids, from his drillings at 
 Portadown for a whole fortnight. 
 
 Jim counted the hours that kept them apart, but was 
 always restless and dissatisfied when they met. He was 
 not jealous, and had no reason to be, but she was as firm 
 as ever in refusing to marry him. He had made a hundred 
 resolutions never to raise the question again, but he could 
 not resist it when they were alone together. 
 
 For some years she had been quite frank about her love 
 for him. 
 
228 CONQUEST 
 
 " Don't spoil everything for me, Jim/* she said one morn- 
 ing, as they walked their horses, her eyes fixed vaguely on 
 the absurd Albert Memorial looming out of a golden haze 
 in the distance. " I love you. I've told you so a thousand 
 times. I love you so much that I'm afraid to touch your 
 hand. If I kissed you I should never let you go. It's as 
 much as that. It's no use talking to me of the inevitable 
 psychology of it. Inevitable psychology is all rot. I've 
 felt like that for three years. It has been hell, but I've 
 fought against it and won. It may be cruel to you, but I 
 hcLve suffered torture. I may be weak, but I can do it, and 
 I will. It may be unfair to you. It is unfair to you. But 
 I can't help that. It may not be the way women act in 
 books or in life either — other women. But I'm trying to 
 explain myself. I may be vain, I may be anything you 
 choose to say — you have the right to say almost anything. 
 If you give me up and marry another woman I can't blame 
 you. I'd probably hate her, but I'd go on loving you. I 
 don't mind grovelling to you. Though it isn't all grovel- 
 ling, for it shows me my own strength. Call it madness, if 
 you like. No, don't speak. You think I'm merely muddled 
 and vain. But I'm not. I may be in many things, but not 
 in this. I see something that I've got to do — that I must 
 do to keep my soul and my self-respect. It's not that I pit 
 a cause against you. I want you both. It's no use your 
 saying that I can have both together. If you knew what 
 I've been doing in London for the last fortnight you'd know 
 I cannot — not yet anyhow. We've failed to do things in 
 Ireland up to this through not sticking enough — enough 
 people didn't stick long enough, I mean. Some always 
 did, thank God, but never so much as now — nor so many. 
 Don't push me into despising myself. For that's what 
 would happen if I married you. I'd be a traitor not only to 
 myself but to all those I work with — to Ireland." 
 
 An impatient exclamation was on his lips but he checked 
 
CONQUEST 229 
 
 it. There was no use battling against the look that had 
 now come into her eyes — almost exaltation. 
 
 "Well, you haven't attacked me. That's a change for 
 the better," he said ruefully. 
 
 She laughed merrily. "Poor old England is so silly 
 when you come to see it at close quarters that I don't think 
 it can do you much harm,'* she said maliciously. 
 
 " What are you doing over here ?" he asked abruptly. 
 
 "What's the Foreign Office doing about Serbia?" she 
 asked demurely. 
 
 He laughed. " Don't burn your fingers," he said 
 seriously. 
 
 "I don't think they care enough to bother about us, no 
 matter what we do," she said contemptuously. 
 
 " The tail of an overfed lion can be pulled once too 
 often," he said sententiously. 
 
 " They give Carson rein enough," she said indignantly. 
 
 " Carsonism isn't Sinn Fein," he said with a smile. " It 
 doesn't mean separation. It doesn't seem to threaten 
 English security. It's a move in a party game. It's a 
 threat of a brick in a family row over Imperialism and a 
 hundred home party issues. It cuts deeper, of course ; but 
 England won't see that till the danger yawns open before 
 her, and then she'll muddle through. If we're drawn into a 
 war the Tory Imperialists will see their chance in another 
 direction and Carsonism will be put on the shelf." 
 
 " The English have no principles," she said with a sneer. 
 
 "They're always muddled about them, but they're there 
 all right. And she has prejudices that lie very deep. 
 Patriotism isn't an Irish monopoly." 
 
 " An Englishman will do anything for a price," she said 
 with a knowing look. 
 
 " So you've been buying arms — oh, you'll get Englishmen 
 to do that," he said with a frown. "But there are things 
 Englishmen won't do for a price — I've been seeing it for 
 
230 CONQUEST 
 
 the last few weeks — on principle, too. And there are things 
 they won't do from habit and prejudice — let you take Ire- 
 land off their hands, for instance. Less than any time in 
 their history they won't let you do it now." 
 
 "England's difficulty is Ireland's opportunity," she said 
 confidently. 
 
 "Perhaps," he said moodily. "But you have a better 
 weapon than a few discarded rifles." 
 
 She jerked her rein, urged her horse to a gallop and 
 threw over her shoulder : "What do they know of justice ?" 
 
 In a few minutes he drew abreast of her. The Row was 
 clear along the stretch by Knightsbridge Barracks. 
 
 " It's the only^place in London where I can breathe," she 
 said, giving her willing horse his head. 
 
 A policeman held up a warning hand. 
 
 " In Dublin he'd have fired at us," she said with a 
 grimace when their pace had again slackened to a walk. 
 
 " No. He'd have shouted : * More power to you. Miss 
 Diana. It's a fine race, glory be to God,' " Jim said with a 
 laugh. "Still I'm glad you can admire any English 
 institution." 
 
 " Admire ? I merely acknowledge in the English a cer- 
 tain orderly stupidity in dealing with themselves. In deal- 
 ing with others they're stupid tyrants.'' 
 
 " Is Bateson a stupid tyrant ?" 
 
 " You'd condemn that method of argument in me. What 
 is one man in forty millions ?" 
 
 "But there are thousands of Batesons — hundreds of 
 thousands a little less articulate — with all his passion for 
 liberty and honour and justice. Millions have it in a 
 muddled sort of way. I'd go further and say that the great 
 majority of Englishmen have deep down in them a sense of 
 fair play." 
 
 " Ireland ?" she said mockingly. 
 
 "I admit Ireland is an argument against me. It is 
 
CONQUEST 231 
 
 England*s ghastly failure. But Tm not going to let 
 it blind me to what is good in England." 
 
 "How can you defend her, Jim?" Diana said sadly. 
 "You know how she has treated Ireland. It makes my 
 blood boil. It shows what a chasm divides you and me." 
 
 "But I'm not defending her treatment of Ireland. I go 
 further than you in condemning the stupidity of it, the folly 
 of it — its wickedness if you like. Almost every mistake 
 that one country could make in governing another England 
 has made in Ireland. I'm merely trying to look over the 
 high wall of prejudice and misunderstanding — largely 
 built by England I admit — that divides the two countries. 
 I'm trying to see the English side of the question as Bate- 
 son and many Englishmen see the Irish side." 
 
 " Through English Society over your mess of pottage," 
 she jeered. "Well, what do you see?" 
 
 "Among other things that England has never been able 
 to govern Ireland, that it never can govern it, that it has no 
 right to try." 
 
 She pulled up her horse and stared at him. "Oh, Jim, 
 Jim," she said brokenly, her eyes swimming. Her horse 
 pawed the ground restlessly and backed out in the fairway. 
 When the two horses were walking side by side again she 
 said in a worried tone : 
 
 "But you're still in the Foreign Office?" 
 
 "If we tide over this mess — Draycott hopes we shall, 
 and he's doing everything that a man could do to keep 
 Europe from cutting its throat — I'm going to resign." 
 
 "Then you'll join us — it will be glorious," she said, her 
 eyes glowing. 
 
 " I don't believe in Krag rifles," he said drily. 
 
 "But they're Mausers — the latest pattern, and made by 
 one of the best German firms," she said eagerly. " They 
 were ordered by the Orangemen, but Fingelstein let us 
 have them cheap. He's in sympathy ** she bit her lip 
 
232 CONQUEST 
 
 and flushed. " I oughtn't to tell youthis — still it's different 
 now," she said nervously. 
 
 "IVe heard nothing," he said with a frown. "Except 
 that Germany is pretty thorough. For God's sake, Diana, 
 keep out of all this. You're playing with fire." 
 
 " You're not going to join us, then ?" she said with a cold 
 ring in her low pitched voice. 
 
 "Good Lord, no. I'm not going to play with pop-gun 
 revolutions. This shilly-shally Government are to blame, 
 of course. They should have stopped the Carson bluff. 
 But they'll stop your lot all right. It will be the same old 
 game over again — England provokes a revolution in Ire- 
 land and will shoot down the revolutionaries regretfully in 
 the name of law and order." 
 
 She looked at him, half furiously, half bewildered. 
 
 "You can see all that and you won't act?" she said in- 
 dignantly. 
 
 " There's a vulgar saying that a live dog is better than a 
 dead lion, and another that one doesn't save one's life by 
 committing suicide. Like all lying proverbs they have a 
 little truth in them. I'm not against rebellions. With a 
 just cause and even a faint chance of success I'm all for 'em. 
 We have a just cause but we have no chance of success. Not 
 even one in a thousand. Failure is a dead certainty. There 
 have been men, and there still are men, thank God, to whom 
 the knowledge of failure is no bar — they are the salt of the 
 earth, and have kept the idea of liberty alive in the world. 
 But I'm not one of them. I see other ways, and I can only 
 follow what I see. Why, England could put an army into 
 Ireland in a week that would drive both Sinn Fein and the 
 Orangemen into the Atlantic." 
 
 "She's tried it before and failed," Diana said con- 
 temptuously. 
 
 " What you're really counting on is that she won't do it," 
 he said with a shrug of his shoulders. " For years England 
 
CONQUEST 233 
 
 has had a struggle within herself between an idealism 
 founded on right and justice and morality, and Real- 
 politik — it comes from the mixture of Celt and Teuton in 
 almost every so-called Englishman. At her worst she was 
 never absolutely ruthless even in Ireland. Her best hasn't 
 come on top yet, but it'^s coming. At the moment govern- 
 ing England is a blend of the good element and the bad, 
 but the trend is pretty obvious. The Irish Home Rule Bills, 
 rotten as they are, are a sign. But every step towards right 
 rouses a furious reaction, and progress often has the ap- 
 pearance of a setback." 
 
 "Words, words," she said sadly. "Just to excuse your- 
 self for doing nothing. Your grandfather is right. YouVe 
 been corrupted here." 
 
 "Perhaps," he said resignedly. "But prejudice can't 
 blind me to all facts. A new way of looking at things is 
 arising in England. Don't be a party to spilling blood 
 uselessly for what England will give you freely in a few 
 years." 
 
 She laughed ironically. 
 
 " England yields to force and to nothing but force," she 
 said confidently. "She has only two weapons — hypocrisy 
 and the mailed fist. We've had both. We see through 
 one and aren't afraid of the other." 
 
 "Shall we have another gallop, or have you had 
 enough ?" he said with a wry smile. 
 
 " Thank God, my work here is done," she said bitterly. 
 " You talk of a new outlook, a new morality. I see nothing 
 but Tango teas and night clubs and Liberal hypocrisy over 
 a promised gift of a penny rattle to Ireland, and Unionist 
 gloating over Garsonism and some scoffing at Votes for 
 Women. 
 
 "Let's be getting back," she added wearily. "If you 
 won't be a man, Jim, what are you going to do ?" 
 
 " I shall try and help England to discern her conscience." 
 
234 CONQUEST 
 
 "A wonder worker," she jeered. "And how does the 
 magician set out to achieve the impossible? Preach 
 abstract ideas to the readers of the Referee and the 
 Winning Post — the English governing classes ?" 
 
 "That too," he laughed. "But I begin with a sugar- 
 coated pill. IVe been making it in my idle time — lots of 
 it — at the F.O. It*s a history of the Czechs, Slovaks, 
 Croats, and Slovenes." 
 
 " Who on earth are they ?" 
 
 "Irelands under Austria. The reactionary press will 
 swallow it whole as the tyrant is German." 
 
 " You mean England will pick up from it some new 
 tricks to play off on us. Jim, you're nothing but a child. 
 I suppose that's why I love you so much when I ought to 
 hate you. I must be off — but as you're a convert on the 
 way I'll make another effort to talk sense to you. Are you 
 free at four to take me for a spin ?" 
 
 " If only you had one spark of common sense," he said 
 severely. 
 
 She gave him a provocative glance and said demurely as 
 she moved off, "You wouldn't love me then, of course. A 
 man who hopes to influence England by abstract ideas 
 could only love a fool. At four, then, I'll expect you," she 
 called back over her shoulder. 
 
 3. 
 
 Jim had arranged to take his holidays early in July, but 
 Diana's visit made him exchange with Bunty Peveril, who 
 shared his room at the Foreign Office and wrote vers libre 
 while Jim struggled with his history of the Austrian Slavs, 
 Diana left suddenly at the beginning of the last week of 
 July with no explanation beyond a telephone message, 
 which Jim didn't get till hours after she had left town. 
 Fortunately Bunty's holidays were to have begun on the 
 
CONQUEST 235 
 
 morrow, so Jim decided to take his at once if he could be 
 spared from the office. He tore up a telegram cancelling a 
 long-standing engagement to attend Violet EdS^^ardes's 
 wedding, called up her brother Stephen on the telephone, 
 and arranged with him to go to Belfast the following night 
 by the Midland and Heysham. He then called up his 
 Uncle Silas, who damned him for interrupting his dressing 
 for dinner, but saw'no difficulty about an immediate holiday. 
 
 "The state of Europe is damn dicky — worse than ever 
 IVe known it. But the Austrians are gentlemen. They 
 always meet us half way. It's the Germans butting in. 
 But we see our way out of the wood. Thinking of resign- 
 ing ? What damn nonsense is that ? You expect too 
 much, Jim. Why, I was ten years older than you are now 
 before I got any work to do. Have patience and it'll come. 
 Yes, I know you have some special knowledge of Austria. 
 Thanks, my boy — very interesting indeed, very interesting. 
 But- 1 find it's safer in diplomacy to keep to certain main 
 lines and not bother about complicated detail. Enjoy 
 yourself. I'm going to the Duke for the twelfth as usual — 
 we'll have everything straight by then. No, I won't hear 
 another word about your resignation. Come and see me 
 when you get back and everything is quiet, and we'll talk 
 it over." 
 
 Jim hung up the receiver with a smile. The British 
 Empire was a wonderful institution. The old waggon 
 lumbered along creaking loudly at every joint, with axles 
 bent and wheels loose. In a bad rut the sleeping driver 
 woke up for a somnolent moment, cracked his whip more 
 from habit than for any purpose, and sank again into a 
 comfortable snooze on top of the heavy, ungainly, jolting 
 load, while the oxen plodded along heedlessly. 
 
 "It's all a jolly lark," Stephen Edwardes said, attacking 
 his second helping of roast mutton in the dining car of the 
 train for Heysham. 
 
 Q 
 
236 CONQUEST 
 
 "The drilling, I mean. It's pretty stiff on me though. 
 Swotting with a crammer all the week in London, and the 
 double journey and my company drill every week-end." 
 
 His fresh young face didn't show fatigue, but he sighed 
 heavily as he helped himself to red-currant jelly. 
 
 "What's it all for?" Jim asked. 
 
 " Hanged if I know— to spite the Government or the rebs 
 or something. But it sets up the fellows no end. They 
 used to be such a lurching lot of beggars, and see 'em now." 
 
 " The newspapers say wonderful things of you." 
 
 Stephen winked. "There's a lot of bunkum, but it's a 
 spiffing rag for all that. It's jolly bad luck on me to have 
 to leave it all and go to Sandhurst at the end of the hols. 
 The men are as keen as mustard." 
 
 " Have you arms ?" 
 
 " Good Lord, no. We form fours and all that, and route 
 marches and things. You can't do much in a day a week, 
 you know. Some of the Militia Johnnies and half-pays 
 who have companies do more, but I can't fit it in. There 
 are guns, I believe — ^but you've heard all about the gun- 
 running. Wish I was in it. But my fellows have never 
 seen a rifle. One hears talk — ^but I don't know. The fel- 
 lows love it. I bought 'em a miniature rifle range, and 
 there are tea parties no end, and flag waving and speeches. 
 We don't want to fight, but by jingo if we do, and all that. 
 Some of 'em are spoiling for a fight. They'll go to pieces 
 unless they can have a go at someone. The reb volun- 
 teers promise some sport, but they're worse off for arms than 
 we are. It's all great fun. There are big political issues 
 mixed up with it I'm told, but I don't pay much heed to 
 political tosh. Dick knows all about it, though he takes it 
 cool enough. And Duncan, Vi's intended, is up to his neck 
 with Carson and Craig and Galloper Smith and all that 
 talking crowd." 
 
 Belfast didn't show any excitement beyond its early 
 
CONQUEST 237 
 
 morning business as Jim drove through the half-awakened 
 streets, with Stephen at the wheel, on his way to Castle 
 Edwardes. It was a relief to get out of the half tawdry, 
 half squalid provincial city at a pace that defied all speed 
 regulations. In forty-five minutes — two minutes less than 
 he had ever done it before, Stephen said cheerfully — they 
 drew up at a long two-storied cut-stone house with a classic 
 portico. The castle, a low ivied tower, peered round the 
 corner of the house. 
 
 " No one down yet," Stephen said, with a glance at the 
 upper windows. "And a good job, too. Duncan is here, 
 and Fm sick of spoons. You'll have more than enough of 
 it. Tell you what. I've a route march for eight. Come 
 with me and you'll escape the cooing till evening. We'll 
 have a bath and brekker and be cleared out before anyone's 
 down. Most of the men are at work, of course, and there'll 
 be only a sprinkling, but you'll see what they're like. I've 
 two hundred and sixty altogether in my double company, 
 but it's the devil to get them all together. We'll be lucky 
 if we have thirty." 
 
 Jim was glad of the opportunity both to escape the 
 lovers and to see the volunteers. After a hurried bath, 
 change, and breakfast, equipped with webbed belt, haver- 
 sack and water-bottle, he went with Stephen, similarly 
 accoutred, to the Edwardes's farmyard, where he found 
 the local drill-hall in the big hay barn. A group of men 
 lounging about the door stood to attention and saluted. 
 Some wore khaki shirts, others football jerseys, but the 
 majority were in ordinary cotton shirts of many colours. 
 Each man, however, had a webbed belt, a haversack, and a 
 water-bottle, which seemed to be the official uniform. As 
 they were put through some elementary drill on the cobbled 
 pavement Jim counted forty-two men of all ages from 
 about sixteen to sixty or more. Stephen was nervous, 
 blushed a little when addressed as Captain, and left the 
 
238 CONQUEST 
 
 command to a sergeant who was evidently an old soldier. 
 The men were bronzed and hefty and very much in earnest, 
 but in bearing and movement would have cut a poor figure 
 beside the rifle team at Winchester. 
 
 " Pretty good, eh ?" Stephen said proudly in a low tone. 
 
 Jim nodded. It was pretty good. But what did it all 
 mean ? He wanted to talk to them, to ask them what it 
 was all about. Perhaps during a rest he'd have a chance. 
 The sergeant gave the order to fall in for the march. The 
 little patchwork column set out, the sergeant at the side, 
 Jim and Stephen in the rear. As they passed a roadside 
 farmhouse a dour-looking bearded man eyed them sourly 
 from the doorway. 
 
 " Them's a dandy lot youVe with you the day, Mr. 
 Stephen," he said in a sarcastic drawl. 
 
 "Aren't they ? You should join us, Mackenzie," Stephen 
 said pleasantly. 
 
 "I've my oats to attend to, praise the Lord. It's not 
 much time I have for play," Mackenzie said with a grin. 
 
 " He's one of my persuasion I suppose ?" Jim said when 
 out of hearing. 
 
 "Oh, no. He's a Presbyterian. He hates an Orange- 
 man only a shade less than he hates a papist. We're in 
 the majority, of course, but there are a good few of them 
 about. That's a workman of his just in front of you, and 
 Mackenzie's pretty sore with us for taking him away from 
 the harvest — humbugging, he calls it. Anyhow, for one 
 reason or another he'd hang Carson on the nearest tele- 
 graph pole." 
 
 " You haven't all the Protestants then ?" 
 
 " Not by a jolly long shot — a lot of our own people even 
 are lukewarm, and many won't touch us at all. Things 
 are better since the Curragh incident, as they know they 
 haven't to face the Army. But what we have are A i." 
 
 In the fields men were busy harvesting. A slight heat 
 
CONQUEST 239 
 
 haze softened the blue of the hills. Here and there a farm- 
 stead slept in the sun. Away on the right was the sea, the 
 white sails of a four-masted ship reflecting the light. The 
 thud, thud of the marching men rang out a challenge to 
 the deep peace that hung quiet but expectant over land jind 
 sea. 
 
 A rest was called and the men stretched themselves flat 
 on their backs on a heather knoll. An elderly man pulled 
 a tuft of heather, buried his face in it and drew a deep 
 breath. 
 
 "I'm growing old like for the march," he said grimly. 
 " But they won't let us alone." 
 
 "Who?" Jim asked. 
 
 "The English — giving way to the papists with their 
 Pope and that Joe Devlin. I knew 'em well within in Bel- 
 fast in the Falls road. The sly look of them priests. We 
 won't have 'em ruling over us. There's David Simes there, 
 he's put all his savings in a machine-gun. I know what I 
 know. It's our money and our land they want. The 
 North is the only part that has the money. They'd tax us 
 out of house and home. I know what Home Rule means — 
 the bloody robbers." 
 
 "Leinster is richer than Ulster," Jim objected. 
 
 " They're all beggars — beggars that live on Indian meal 
 stirabout," the old man said vehemently. " And there isn*t 
 a year I don't kill a pig of my own. I know what they're 
 after. And I'm used to my good oatmeal porridge, too." 
 
 By twelve o'clock some of the older men had begun per- 
 ceptibly to lag and the younger to limp. A halt was called 
 for a meal on a hillside overlooking a village. The men 
 scattered themselves over the grass, sat or lolled. Pipes 
 were lit and haversacks and bottles unslung. A few of the 
 younger men started a competition of hop, step, and jump. 
 
 " Eleven miles,'* the sergeant said. " k's as much as they 
 can do in reason, and some of 'em are done up." 
 
240 CONQUEST 
 
 After their meal the men stretched themselves out and 
 slept. Stephen pulled a textbook on drill out of his haversack. 
 
 " I must read up a bit to put 'em through some exercises 
 when they're freshened up," he said apologetically. 
 
 Jim lay jB.at on his back. Soon his pipe dropped from 
 his mouth. He made a movement to recover it, but his 
 hand stopped half way and he fell back asleep. When he 
 awoke again Stephen was still reading with puckered brow. 
 
 " These things are the very devil," he said in a worried 
 tone. " No sooner do I get them into my head than they 
 run out again. Say, Davis, get a few of the men to cut a 
 few score of osiers from the hedge over there." 
 
 The sergeant saluted. "It's not trespass, sir?" he said 
 doubtfully. 
 
 "It's all right. It's Freke's land," Stephen said with a 
 smile. "They're mostly Nationalists down there," he ex- 
 plained to Jim, pointing to the village, " and we must be 
 careful." 
 
 "An Ulster within Ulster," Jim laughed. 
 
 " They've -volunteers of their own, too. Dan Sugrue got 
 'em up. He was at Oxford with Dick." 
 
 "I remember him. But I thought he was a Unionist — 
 he was certainly a Protestant." 
 
 "He's a Protestant all right. But he's a Sinn Feiner 
 now, the damned turncoat," Stephen said pleasantly. " It's 
 a bit of a mix-up, but it's topping fun. He has only about 
 fifty men to my two hundred and sixty, but he was in the 
 Militia and turns 'em out well. They're mostly Roman 
 Catholics, but he has collared five or six Presbyterians, 
 damn his cheek." 
 
 The osiers were cut and trimmed, and distributed among 
 the men, who were now sitting up, yawning, stretching 
 their legs, and lighting their pipes. Stephen read on for 
 another ten minutes, put the book back in his haversack 
 with a sigh, and gave the word to fall in. 
 
CONQUEST 241 
 
 The men were divided into two companies, and a mimic 
 attack and defence of a small knoll followed, the osiers be- 
 coming rifles with fixed bayonets at the word of command. 
 
 A drum sounded from the direction of the village. There 
 was a pause in the battle, and every eye was turned towards 
 the approaching drum. A thin column of men in green 
 sashes, marching two abreast, advanced up the road lead- 
 ing from the village. 
 
 " It's Saturday evening and theyVe their full muster," the 
 sergeant said dolefully. " They're fresher than we are, sir. 
 They mustn't see us marching. Old Palmer is as good as 
 a cripple, and a few of the youngsters aren't much better." 
 
 " Break off for tea," Stephen said with a groan. 
 
 The men squatted again on the grass and drank cold tea, 
 but their attention was given more to the rival volunteers. 
 
 " There's no fear of a scrap ?" Jim said. 
 
 " It's not one of the days," Stephen said cryptically. 
 
 "That's the old drum they bought off us when we got 
 our new one," an old man said contemptuously. 
 
 "What are they but a lot of monkeys imitating us in 
 everything ? They never dreamt of the drill till we put it 
 into their heads," another said boastfully. 
 
 " They march straight enough for papists," a young man 
 said admiringly. 
 
 " They haven't twelve miles and a pitched battle to their 
 credit," one of the first speakers said with pride, and added 
 with deep contempt, " The whole lot of 'em in all Ireland 
 hasn't the courage to run in a cargo of guns." 
 
 " That's the truth anyway. Sure we could drive 'em into 
 the Lough or into the Boyne Water at our leisure," the 
 young man said with a grin. "Still I wouldn't be denying 
 them the little virtue they have — they can walk when 
 they're fresh." 
 
 " Shut up," the sergeant said authoritatively. " Let ye 
 not pretend to see them." 
 
242 CONQUEST 
 
 The men busied themselves with their tea, casting furtive 
 looks at the little column now almost abreast of them, but 
 about fifty yards, off. The drum continued to beat, and 
 the green-sashed volunteers marched past, with eyes front, 
 taking no notice of the group on the hill. 
 
 "They know you're here, I suppose?" Jim said with a 
 laugh. 
 
 " What else did they come processing up the hill for ?" 
 Stephen said ruefully. " If my men were fresh I'd take the 
 hill at the double and show 'em what's what. Let 'em get 
 ahead a bit, Davis, and then we'll cut across the road and 
 get home by Ballyowen. Nothing undignified, but we'll 
 give the beggars a sell — they're sure to wait at the Furka 
 cross-roads to have a jeer at us if we're limping." 
 
 It was ten to eight when the footsore route-marchers 
 reached Castle Edwardes. While Stephen provided the 
 men with beer and a scratch meal in the barn, Jim had a 
 bath and got to the drawing-room at the last stage of Mrs. 
 Edwardes's despair over a delayed dinner. 
 
 " It was too bad of Stephen to take you off like that," she 
 said as she shook hands warmly. 
 
 "Jim likes seeing things," Dick Edwardes said drily. 
 " He has seen something of the great army, eh. Bob ?" he 
 added to a smiling blond giant with a shrewd mouth. 
 
 "Bob Duncan — but you know," Violet Edwardes said 
 timidly, a faint blush mantling her finely cut face. 
 
 Jim vaguely congratulated Duncan, who glanced posses- 
 sively at Violet and said awkwardly, "Thanks, thanks. 
 Dick is always sneering at our little efforts in Ulster, Mr. 
 Daly. Of course, Stephen's lot out here are only a scratch 
 pack. But you can see the real thing in Belfast." 
 
 They went into dinner without Stephen, Mrs. Edwardes 
 murmuring in Jim's ear : 
 
 " That poor boy is killing himself. But he's so devoted. 
 And it is a great cause." 
 
CONQUEST 243 
 
 In her high black silk dress, entirely disdaining fashion, 
 she made an imposing figure at the head of the table. Her 
 straight back, the poise of her head, the little black lace 
 cap relieved with white on her half grey, brown hair were 
 reminiscent of an older generation. Her face had a dignity 
 that Violet's, for all its regular beauty, lacked. She was 
 slightly nervous about the dinner, of the manners of Violet 
 and Bob Duncan, which she rather tolerated than ap- 
 proved, of the absence of Stephen. Once when Bob 
 snatched a salted almond from Violet she gave a timid, 
 appealing look at Dick, calm and lazily cynical at the foot 
 of the table, which said plainly, "Of course one has to 
 expect it of Mr. Duncan, who is only a Belfast tradesman, 
 but Violet 1" 
 
 Stephen burst into the room as the fish was being re- 
 moved, and insisted on taking up the meal where it stood. 
 
 " Can't look at soup or fish — I've begun on ham and beer 
 in the barn. Dan Sugrue took the shine out of me to-day," 
 he added with a laugh, taking the vacant chair between Jim 
 and Dick. 
 
 "The disloyal ass — he's a disgrace to his family," Bob 
 Duncan said with a frown. 
 
 " Oh, rats. Dan is a decent chap," Stephen said gaily. 
 " I'd do the same to him. Paraded, as if his lot were the 
 Ulster army and we only interlopers." 
 
 " It's getting a little beyond me to make out who's loyal 
 and who's disloyal," Dick said grimly. " I used to think I 
 was a loyalist, but I'm hanged if I know where I stand now. 
 For the life of me, Bob, I can't see where you all differ from 
 Dan Sugrue. You, a member of the Ulster Council — a 
 major-general, I suppose — Ste drilling a company, and 
 my mother and Violet with their Red Cross section. Ifs 
 either play-acting or it's rebellion." 
 
 " Dick thinks that clever," Violet said scornfully. " Of 
 course we must stand by our men," with a smile at Bob. 
 
244 CONQUEST 
 
 "One in the eye for you, Dick, -old man. She means 
 she's Bob's man now," Stephen said cheerfully. 
 
 Mrs. Edwardes stiffened a little ; but as she never could 
 bring herself to disapprove wholly of anything Stephen did 
 or said, she smiled faintly and made an effort to support 
 Violet : 
 
 " You're forgetting the great cause, Dick dear. And we 
 couldn't let the poor wounded go unattended." 
 
 " You expect Stephen to be brought in to you on a gory 
 stretcher," Dick said with a shrug. 
 
 " Oh, never that. You shouldn't speak of such dreadful 
 things," his mother said with a horrified look. 
 
 "Oh, well, you might be saved that — he'll probably be 
 buried in jail — shot against a wall as a rebel," Dick said 
 cynically. 
 
 "I'll have another helping of the vol-a-vent," Stephen 
 said to the butler. 
 
 " I think it's very wrong of you to say such wicked things, 
 Dick — and to speak of your brother as a rebel — we, who 
 have always been loyalists," Mrs. Edwardes said half 
 sadly, half indignantly. 
 
 " Don't you worry, Mrs. Edwardes. I promise you it will 
 never come to that," Bob Duncan said placidly. " It's all a 
 matter of politics. We'll drive the Liberals out of office 
 and die peacefully in our beds." 
 
 "It's all a game of bluff, then ?" Dick said coldly. "It's 
 a dangerous weapon to handle, Bob." 
 
 "I wouldn't call it all bluff," Bob said thoughtfully. 
 "It's a risky game enough I know, but the stakes are big 
 and we must take our risks. I'm loyal to the King, but 
 Fve no loyalty to a Government that's playing ducks and 
 drakes with property and capital." 
 
 "That's all right with a vote, but what about machine 
 guns ? When you shoot, you shoot the King." 
 
 "We won't have to shoot/ The Government will get 
 
CONQUEST 245 
 
 cowed and throw up the sponge long before that," Bob said 
 confidently. 
 
 " I wish the Tory Party luck when theyVe got into power 
 with the lesson theyVe taught labour," Dick said anxiously. 
 
 " That's their lookout in England," Bob said cynically. 
 " They're helping us to stave off Home Rule, and we're 
 helping them to get back to power. Labour is quiet enough 
 in Belfast, thank God. That's where the religious ques- 
 tion is such an asset. The men forget their grievances 
 against us because we're fighting the Pope and the priests 
 side by side with them." 
 
 "You're even bluffing your followers," Dick said in- 
 dignantly. 
 
 "No, it's just our luck. We're as much afraid of Home 
 Rule as they are, only we're more afraid of injury to our 
 business than of the priests. In a way the threat of Home 
 Rule, so long as we're able to stave it off, is a sort of 
 blessing in disguise — it keeps labour quiet." 
 
 " And when you're not able to stave it off ?" Jim asked, 
 laughing. 
 
 " Oh, I believe we can. England will never coerce us." 
 
 "But if she does?" 
 
 "I suppose we'd have to put up with it," Bob said 
 moodily. "But I don't believe for a minute that she'll 
 desert the most loyal people in the Empire." 
 
 "Loyalist, Jim, is an Ulster synonym for armed rebel," 
 Dick said drily. " I'm a Unionist, and I don't want Home 
 Rule, but my family are making it inevitable. The 
 Nationalists can be trusted to imitate our Ulster loyalty. 
 Indeed, they're at it already." 
 
 Violet yawned. "The Larne Flower Show would be 
 better than this," she said with a frown. "What about 
 driving me over to-morrow. Bob ?" 
 
246 CONQUEST 
 
 " It's thankful I ought to be td God for giving me the use 
 of my legs at all, seeing the age I am," Pierce Daly said as 
 he walked slowly and painfully, with the aid of a stick and 
 Jim's arm, towards the cedar tree. 
 
 Arabella got up from the bench, smiled a welcome, and 
 arranged the cushions in the old man's armchair. 
 
 " Durkan was telling me," he said, when he had taken his 
 seat, "that there was a shipload of arms landed in the 
 night. The police are the only people in the county that 
 haven't heard a word of it yet," he added with a chuckle. 
 
 " Diana's work I suppose," Jim said ruefully. 
 
 " The police are sure to know. It's really too bad of 
 her," Arabella said fretfully. "It will mean jail again." 
 
 "Who'd tell them, in God's name?" Pierce said in- 
 dignantly. "We may breed many queer people about 
 here, but the barony never bred an informer yet. It ought 
 to open the eyes of the English to the respect the people 
 have for their laws. But sure, who'd expect sight from the 
 blind ?" 
 
 " I thought you were against rebellion ?" Jim said with 
 a frown, worrying about Diana. 
 
 " I was settled down in constitutional agitation," Pierce 
 said, staring at the river. " And I'm too old now to change. 
 I tried both the gun and the vote in my time, and England 
 beat us in the one and tricked us in the other. Since 
 Parnell died I haven't much faith in either of 'em, but I 
 stuck to Redmond for the sake of old times. I'm more of 
 the mind now of that Rooshian, Tolstoi, to sit still and 
 fold our arms in the face of whatever the English want us 
 to do, and not to take act or part in it. But it's only old 
 people'd have the patience to wear England out in that 
 way. The Sinn Feiners had a good notion enough of how 
 
CONQUEST 247 
 
 to set about it, but they've been led astray by Carson and 
 his Orangemen with the English Tories at the back of 
 them. I can't blame our young men for being suspicious 
 that England is preparing to sell them again, and making 
 ready for it. It's not the first time that she stirred up a 
 rising in order to set her heel more firmly on the neck of 
 the country." 
 
 "It's stupidity more than malice now," Jim urged. 
 " Millions of Englishmen intend well by Ireland." 
 
 "There's a limit to the lack of reason even in the 
 English," Pierce said drily. "They've put the comether 
 on you over there, Jim. I had hopes you'd see through 
 them better. If a man goes on bashing my head there's 
 not much good in telling me that he intends me well. 
 Anyway, if England lets in arms to the Orangemen I can't 
 blame any Nationalist for having a gun in the thatch. 
 England can't say that we began it this time, though I 
 wouldn't put even a bigger lie than that beyond her when 
 she's put to it. Anyway I'm not in it this time. It's the 
 first time in my life there was a move round here for free- 
 dom without me knowing of it. It's a sign that I have a 
 foot in the grave. Or it's maybe a punishment on me for 
 trying to make believe that we're ever going to get the pot 
 of skilly England is dangling now in John Redmond's eye. 
 They'll break his heart like they broke many a good man's 
 heart before him. But, thank God, they can never break 
 mine, for I never had any trust in them." 
 
 A maid came hurriedly across the lawn and said with an 
 air of mystery : 
 
 " There's a man outside the front door would like a word 
 with you. Mister Jim !" 
 
 "Who is he?" 
 
 " He's in a mighty hurry, sir," she said hesitatingly. 
 
 Jim shrugged his shoulders and followed her. 
 
 "It's Mr. Mike Driscoll, and I wouldn't doubt if it had 
 
248 CONQUEST 
 
 to do with the gun-running," she whispered over her 
 shoulder. 
 
 Jim frowned, but quickened his pace. At the front door, 
 faced towards the open gate, was his own little two-seater 
 Singer, its engine throbbing. Durkan stood sheepishly by 
 the front of the car, while Mike Driscoll, with set face, held 
 the door of the car open. 
 
 " I got Durkan to bring it round to save time. I thought 
 I could presume on you that much," he said, eyeing Jim 
 keenly. 
 
 " Your cap, sir," the maid said, rushing out from the hall. 
 
 Jim took it and laughed. 
 
 " Am I to get in ?" he said ironically. 
 
 " There isn't a minute to lose. Take the Beekawn road 
 as fast as ever you can pelt, and Til tell you everything as 
 we go along." 
 
 Jim looked at the serious face, kept back a retort, and 
 jumped into the car. 
 
 " Why this drill-sergeant manner, Mike ?" he asked as he 
 let the car go. 
 
 "Vm sorry if I was too stiff," Mike said shamefacedly. 
 "But I thought that if you wouldn't do it for us you'd do 
 it for Miss Diana." 
 
 " I won't be mixed up in any of your nonsense," Jim 
 said angrily, urging the car to its last inch of speed. 
 
 "And I wouldn't be beholden to a Government man for 
 the weight of a pin of help except for the sake of Miss 
 Diana alone," Mike said with dignity. 
 
 "I'm sorry, Mike. What is it?" Jim said in a gentler 
 tone. 
 
 "Do you know the Carngarth cove between Beekawn 
 and Ardglass?" 
 
 "Yes. Well?" 
 
 " And there's only one way down to it." 
 
 "I know that. Do hurry up." 
 
CONQUEST 249 
 
 "I want to give you the whole rights of it," Mike said 
 deliberately. "And you can't go quicker than you're 
 going. Well, anchored in the mouth of the cove about a 
 quarter of a mile from the landing is Mr. Travers' yacht, 
 and tied on to it is a Greencastle yawl with cases of rifles 
 and ammunition in it. We got off all the rest last night, 
 but we were short of one cart. Part of the last boatload 
 had to be left; and for safety they kept it in the yawl 
 instead of landing it. It was to be landed at half past 
 nine this morning." 
 
 "It's five past nine now," Jim said tritely, glancing at 
 the clock in the car. " But if you think I'm going to help 
 you to play the fool you're mightily mistaken." 
 
 Mike grinned. "Within on the yacht is Miss Diana. 
 She'll be in the yawl when it brings in the stuff," he said 
 gravely. "Well, the long and the short of it is that the 
 peelers aren't as big idiots as you'd have every right to 
 expect. Though if Thady Duggan hadn't failed with his 
 cart through his horse going lan^^, it's late for the fair they'd 
 be this time as usual." 
 
 " For God's sake get on with it," Jim said impatiently. 
 
 "There's five minutes or more yet before you get to the 
 Beekawn cross-roads where you must drop me, because the 
 peelers'd never let you drive to Carngarth with the likes of 
 me on the car," Mike said imperturbably. 
 
 " I'll stop the car if you don't tell me at once," Jim said 
 threateningly. 
 
 " My God, amn't I telling you. Isn't it impatient you 
 are. Well, the police got wind of it even at the tail of the 
 hunt. This very minute they're in ambush down in the cove, 
 and they're guarding the way down, and the cliffs round 
 about. They'd be on the yacht long ago, but there isn't a 
 boat in Carngarth but the yawl with the stuff in it, and 
 that's out of their reach. But the coastguards were warned 
 and they're rowing round from Beekawn and'll be at the 
 
250 CONQUEST 
 
 yacht shortly if they aren't there now. They started near 
 an hour ago. When the people in the yacht see them 
 coming as likely as not they'll make a drive with the stuff 
 for the shore, and in they'll walk into the mouth of Inspector 
 Foley and his men." 
 
 " Well ?" Jim said grimly. 
 
 "We could have rushed the police, but we don't want a 
 row — yet," Mike said meditatively. " They haven't the 
 brains of a tom-tit between them, the poor ownshucks, God 
 help them, and anyone they'd let down to the cove'd easily 
 circumvent them. Let me down at the cross-roads there." 
 
 Jim stopped the car and Mike jumped out. "I'm sorry 
 for disturbing you over your breakfast, but you can make 
 it yet by taking the Lisheen road this side of the turn down 
 to Carngarth," he said, looking up at the sky. "If Miss 
 Diana has to go to jail itself, it's fine weather she'll be 
 having there, thanks be to God." 
 
 "In jail you ought to be," Jim said angrily. 
 
 " That's as might be," Mike said philosophically. " But 
 you'd need to hurry if you don't want to be late — for your 
 breakfast," he added with a grin. 
 
 Jim frowned and started the car suddenly. The whole 
 world was swinging on the brink of a precipice, and here 
 was - drawing-room comedy. He was angry with himself, 
 with Diana, with Carson, with the Government. With all 
 their boasted civilization governments had hardly emerged 
 from barbarism. Deep down in their hearts they clung to 
 domination and conquest. England had emerged farther 
 from the pit than any of the great nations. At this 
 moment she was courageously upholding right and free- 
 dom in the councils of Europe. Yet here in Ireland she 
 was herself practising what she denounced, what she was 
 prepared to shed her blood to destroy. . . . 
 
 He passed the Lisheen turn and lowered his speed as he 
 approached the old by-road to Carngarth cove. As he 
 
CONQUEST 251 
 
 turned the corner two policemen, about ten yards ahead, 
 moved to the centre of the road and held up their hands. 
 He pulled up within a few feet of them and said to one 
 whom he had known for years at Lisgeela : 
 
 " Is the road closed, Cahill ?" 
 
 " It*s not what you'd call closed, Mister Jim," Cahill said, 
 scratching his head, and looking doubtfully at his com- 
 panion, " but we aren't letting anyone down it. It's a cruel 
 bad road on the tyres. It's split up on you entirely they'd 
 be." 
 
 "Sure Mr. Daly is high up himself in the Government. 
 What loss'd it be on the likes of him going down?" the 
 other policeman said sheepishly. 
 
 "Sure there wouldn't," Cahill said in a relieved tone. 
 " Only let you be careful, Mr. Jim, when you get beyond the 
 hazel bush. It's more like a track down to hell, it is, than 
 anything that'd be pretending to be a decent road." 
 
 " Right oh, and thanks, Cahill," Jim shouted as he 
 negotiated a bad rut, with a smile at the immunity of high 
 Government officials from burst tyres. 
 
 He took the steep decline at a pace that endangered the 
 car and his neck. The road was little more than the dry 
 bed of a mountain stream. Beyond the hazel bush it was 
 a mere track between boulders matted with blackberry 
 bushes and elder. A jutting cliff on his left shut out the 
 sea. Once he asked himself what he was going down for, 
 what he could do, what he would do even if he could do 
 anything, but a sudden jolt made him give all his attention 
 to the car. He seemed to hang in the air for breathless 
 minutes, and then, round a corner, about five hundred 
 yards ahead, the precipitous wall of limestone cliff that 
 marked the far side of the cove glittered in the sun. The 
 near cliff, glowering in the shade, still shut out the sea. He 
 slowed down, and could just make out that the man watch- 
 ing him from a projecting rock near the cove steps was a 
 
252 CONQUEST 
 
 policeman. He was soon joined by another, who levelled 
 binoculars on the car. In a few seconds he lowered the 
 glasses and handed them to the first policeman, who at 
 once disappeared behind a rock. The other took out a 
 case and had lighted a cigarette as Jim approached. 
 
 " Hullo, Daly. Going to have a swim ?" 
 
 " Morning, Foley. Glorious day for it. Are you ?" Jim 
 said, stopping the car and jumping out. 
 
 "No such luck. Have a lot of damned men with me. 
 Thought Fd knock the softness out of *em by some patrol 
 work, but theyVe no guts in *em, and Fm giving *em a rest." 
 
 Small blue eyes glinted humorously in the little tight 
 florid face, as he pointed towards a group of about twenty 
 men stretched in the shade of a mass of rock. 
 
 "Give them a swim. It would freshen *em^" Jim said 
 drily. 
 
 " Can't. There's a damned yacht out there, and I saw a 
 flutter of petticoats on it. They seem to be making up 
 their minds to come ashore. Tooks like Travers* yacht. 
 Wonder who they can be ?" 
 
 Jim walked along the uneven ledge towards the rough 
 steps hewn out of the face of the rock to low-water level. 
 From the top of the steps he got the first view of the little 
 bay widening out between lofty, sheer cliffs from the mere 
 point, giving barely space for a long boat, where he stood. 
 The sun cut diagonally across the water. A glittering 
 sheet of rose and silver shimmered and smiled with playful 
 malice at the deep, sullen greens and blues in the shadow 
 of the cliff. Jim caught his breath at the sight of the 
 yacht. He fumbled for his cigarette case. When he 
 looked again as he threw away the match there was some 
 commotion on the deck. 
 
 "There's a rowing boat coming round Beekawn point," 
 a voice called out. Foley gave a muttered " ha," lit another 
 cigarette, but didn't move from cover of the rock. 
 
CONQUEST 253 
 
 For a few seconds Jim watched alternately a six-oared 
 boat moving rapidly towards the yacht from the direction 
 of Beekawn point, and the action on the yacht itself. A 
 yawl was pulled round from the stern to the side. Six 
 men took their places at the four oars of the yawl and two 
 women sat in the stern. As the yawl was pushed off he 
 sat down at the head of the steps and said quietly : 
 
 " Those people are coming in off the yacht. I don't see 
 how I can bathe.** 
 
 "They're coming in off the yacht, are they?" Foley re- 
 peated aloud, but without moving from cover. " I don't see 
 how you can very well. A few hundred yards back there's 
 another cove — not at all a bad place," he added with some 
 enthusiasm. 
 
 " I think I'll wait and see who they are," Jim said, rising 
 and walking farther on on the ledge. 
 
 Foley shrugged his shoulders and threw away his 
 cigarette. "Wonderful weather for the harvest," he said 
 toying with a revolver case at his belt. 
 
 "Wonderful," Jim said, with a careless glance around. 
 The policemen had risen to their feet, but still kept under 
 cover of the rock. Foley lit another cigarette and kept the 
 match suspended for a moment to listen to the dull thud of 
 the oars striking the wooden thole pins of the incoming 
 yawl. He yawned, strolled back to his men and spoke in 
 a low voice to a sergeant. The coastguard boat was still 
 a long way off the yacht, while the yawl was within a 
 hundred and fifty yards of the steps. 
 
 Jim put his hand to his mouth and shouted, "Hallo, 
 hallo." 
 
 Foley said " Damn," with a frown. The sergeant moved 
 forward. Foley's face brightened. With a dry laugh 
 he put his arm in front of the sergeant and stopped 
 him. 
 
 " Recognized friends ?" he said pleasantly to Jim. 
 
254 CONQUEST 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " They'll be jolly glad to find a friend," Foley said with 
 a grin. 
 
 The boat pulled up dead. A woman stood up in the 
 stern and peered at Jim, shading her eyes from the sun 
 with her hand. 
 
 " Jim Daly," he shouted. 
 
 " Hallo. You ?" she shouted gleefully. "What brought 
 you here ?" 
 
 "To welcome you as you deserve, of course. Inspector 
 Foley has twenty of his men behind the rock here to give 
 you a guard of honour." 
 
 "Damnation," Foley said angrily, springing forward, 
 followed by his men. 
 
 "What's wrong?" Jim asked quietly. 
 
 "You shouldn't have said that, you know," Foley said 
 half doubtfully. 
 
 " I seem to have put my foot in it somehow," Jim said, 
 struggling with a smile. "It's a good jest to say you've 
 come to meet her — it's Miss Scovell — a sort of peace offer- 
 ing for putting her in jail once." 
 
 " She might find more than a jest in it," Foley said 
 grimly. "It's my own fault not to have warned you. 
 They're caught in a trap, anyhow, so there's not much harm 
 done. Show yourselves well on the ledge, men, and 
 Laverty, tell the look-out to shout to the coastguards. 
 Gun-running," he added laconically to Jim. 
 
 "They're not Orangemen?" Jim said, interested in the 
 manoeuvres of the yawl which was being backed steadily 
 out and sideways. 
 
 "No, Green. They're green enough to back out of 
 Scylla into Charybdis," Foley said with a grin. 
 
 " They're backing on to the Devil's Harrow," a policeman 
 said eagerly. 
 
 Four of the men in the yawl lifted a wooden case and 
 
CONQUEST 255 
 
 were preparing to sling it over the side, the remaining two 
 men and the women balancing the boat. 
 
 " Stop that or I'll fire," Foley shouted, drawing his 
 revolver. 
 
 " Pretty long range," Jim said drily. " And may you 
 fire ? What's the offence ?" 
 
 The case was let drop gently into the water, sinking at 
 once. 
 
 "The coastguards can drag for it — monkey tricks like 
 that won't save 'em," Foley said with a shrug. 
 
 " Sorra good a drag or a diver either'll do. A diver lost 
 his life once in it. It's as deep as hell except for the needle- 
 points of rocks. Within the memory of man not a thing 
 that was dropped there ever came to light again," a con- 
 stable said with evident enjoyment. 
 
 " Shout all of you to the coastguards to hurry. It's 
 neck or nothing between 'em now," Foley said with a 
 resigned "grin. 
 
 There was a wild shouting and waving of arms. The 
 coastguards stopped rowing, and while they were coming 
 to a decision gave a few minutes' respite to the men in the 
 yawl, who worked feverishly. Case aiter case was dropped 
 into the sea. The coastguards, having made up their minds 
 what to do, rowed rapidly towards the yawl. The police- 
 men stood silent, their heads stretched eagerly forward. 
 Once when a case slipped back into the boat a policeman 
 murmured " Bad luck." When the coastguard boat was 
 about a hundred yards off a case was thrown over the side 
 of the yawl with a shout. The crew in the yawl watched 
 the eddies for a few seconds, then sat down to their oars 
 and pulled quickly towards the steps. 
 
 " Drawn blank," Foley said ruefully with a half ques- 
 tioning look at Jim. " Call out to the coastguards to pull 
 back and search the yacht, Laverty. Not that they'll find 
 anything," he muttered. 
 
256 CONQUEST 
 
 " How kind of you to come and meet us, Mr. Foley," 
 Diana said mockingly as the yawl drew alongside. 
 
 Foley saluted smartly. "Hard work getting rid of the 
 ballast ?" he said with a grin. 
 
 " Russian egg cases," Diana corrected, smilingly. 
 
 " Eggs gone bad, I suppose ?" Foley laughed. 
 
 "Oh no, a little unwholesome to land," she said, taking 
 Jim's hand as she jumped lightly ashore. "Not badly 
 done for the Foreign Office," she whispered as her lips 
 brushed his shoulder. 
 
 5. 
 
 Before mid-day, by popular rumour, Jim had become one 
 of the principals in the gun-running escapade. In the 
 evening he was cheered loudly as he drove past the market- 
 house of Lisgeela, an old fishwife shouting : 
 
 " Thanks be to God the Daly blood has come to the top 
 in him at last. Wasn't he the prime leader of 'em all." 
 
 As he drove home he decided that he must resign his job 
 at the Foreign Office at once. It was not that he had done 
 anything wrong. The ridiculous rifles were lost, and he 
 knew that his intervention had prevented serious trouble, 
 for Mike Driscoll had made other plans that would have 
 taken effect had Diana been arrested. But certain formal 
 obligations had to be observed, and he had broken one of 
 them — in the letter anyhow. 
 
 At dinner his grandfather was in high spirits. Jim gave 
 an ironic account of the gun-running, but old Pierce would 
 have none of it. 
 
 "The finger of God is in the whole thing as plain as a 
 pikestaff," he said over and over again with glowing eyes. 
 " Sure I always knew he'd come right, Arabella. Didn't I 
 often tell you ? Now that everything is as God willed it, 
 it's a daughter-in-law he'll be bringing in on the floor to 
 you." 
 
CONQUEST 257 
 
 Though he hadn't drunk wine for a year he insisted on 
 opening a bottle of old Burgundy. His memory of the 
 intervening years seemed to have been blotted out, and he 
 dwelt altogether on Jim's childhood, recalling incident 
 after incident: the climbing of the elm-tree, Crabbit, the 
 death of his brother. 
 
 "'Tis he was the queer old man," he said meditatively, 
 " with his dreams of you getting back that big barn of a 
 Dalyhouse. But sure did I ever think myself that one of 
 the Scovells'd be like a daughter to me. Her eyes melted 
 any feeling of revenge I had against them out of me long 
 ago. The one dream of my life now is that ye'd come 
 together. And who knows what blow ye mightn't be able 
 to strike for your country and ye of one mind." 
 
 "Love is all that matters. They have that, and it will 
 bring everything right," Arabella said gently. 
 
 " Love was a good bridge for you, surely, Arabella," the 
 old man said affectionately. "But it's women's talk for 
 all that." 
 
 His hand trembled as he raised his glass to his lips and 
 sipped the wine. He put down the glass, his fingers cling- 
 ing to the stem as if for support, his eyes glowing. 
 
 " God knows I had the love of women in my day," he 
 said harshly, "and I'm blessed out of the common now in 
 my old age with the love of you and Diana. Far be it from 
 me to belittle it or ye, and I'm beholden to you, Arabella, 
 for nearly all the happiness I ever had. But above ye all — 
 though it has been nothing but a heartscald to me all my 
 life, I put my country — above Jim there, and he was always 
 like my heart's blood to me, above my religion if it goes to 
 that, may God forgive me. It's a queer twist God puts in 
 a man," he added apologetically. "Me to be talkmg like 
 this with no more strength in my limbs than a baby. Let 
 me lean on your arm up to bed, Jim boy. *Tis you're the 
 comfort to me this night." 
 
258 CONQUEST 
 
 " Will there be a war, Jim, do you think ?" he asked as 
 Jim bade him good-night. 
 
 " Uncle Silas thinks not. I'm not so sure." 
 
 " I hope to the great God there will be and that England 
 '11 come out of it broken," the old man said fervently. " A 
 good beating is the only thing that'll ever show her her 
 sins. God bless you, boy." 
 
 In the corridor Jim met his mother on the way to her 
 bedroom. She raised her candlestick and let the light 
 shine on his face. "I've a headache and must go to bed. 
 No, nothing to worry about," she added quickly, seeing his 
 look of concern. "It's been a trying day with all those 
 ridiculous rumours. What shall you do?" 
 
 "Resign." 
 
 " Must it be that ?" she said with a quiver of her lips. 
 " Have you read the papers ?" 
 
 " No." 
 
 " There will be war," she said tonelessly. 
 
 " Oh," he said staring through her. 
 
 " It makes a difference ?" she said tremulously. 
 
 He started and woke to her drawn face watching his 
 expectantly. 
 
 " The Foreign Office must overlook the gun-running," he 
 said with a hard laugh. 
 
 " You'll go back there ?" she said. 
 
 "Oh, that or something of the kind," he said evasively. 
 
 She leant her head on his shoulder. 
 
 " It doesn't seem to make you any happier," he said rail- 
 ingly, patting her hair. 
 
 She kissed him with a desperate attempt at a smile and 
 walked towards her room with dragging steps. He 
 watched her till she disappeared behind the closing door, 
 and from a jumble of vague thoughts said " If" aloud, and 
 turned on his heel. The same thoughts took more form on 
 his way to the study. The war, if it came, would be M^ war 
 
CONQUEST 259 
 
 between right and wrong. It was the final effort of Might 
 and Aggression and Conquest to dominate the world. 
 England was on the side of Right and Justice. She was 
 to fight for freedom, not only for herself but for the world. 
 
 He took the stairs three steps at a time ajid hurried 
 along the narrow hall. It meant the clearing away of the 
 mist at Scarty and the rolling back of clouds from pole to 
 pole. He laughed as he turned up the lights in the green 
 shaded lamps. It was seeing Diana to-day that made him 
 think of, the effects of a world war in the terms of a family. 
 But why not ? Where better could one see what it meant ? 
 Diana, his grandfather, his mother, himself should be at 
 one, all their differences gone. Ireland's claim to deter- 
 mine her own destiny was what England was about to fight 
 for on behalf of the world. England, the Conqueror, was 
 sloughing her somewhat spotted skin to lead in a brighter 
 world as a federator of free peoples. . . . 
 
 He glanced through half a dozen newspapers. War 
 seemed to be certain. There was no hedging on the main 
 issue. English diplomacy was standing unflinchingly for 
 Right. He sighed. All the implications of the war were 
 not yet fully realized by the press and people. In twenty- 
 four hours a new book of the world's history would open. 
 Yet the last page of the old was filled with recriminations 
 — Suffragette violence, disputes between Nationalists and 
 Sinn Feiners; attacks by both sections of Nationalists on 
 the Government for striking at the Howth gun-running 
 while allowing Orange gun-running to go on unmolested ; 
 Orange defiance, labour threats. It was the last wail of 
 the old order. In a day or two all these bickerings and 
 misunderstandings would fade away as the morning mist 
 before the hot August sun. . . . 
 
 He looked through a number of unopened letters. Bate- 
 son ? What had he to say ? " If we go in, we go in fairly 
 clean for once in our lives. Let's hope we come out clean." 
 
26o CONQUEST 
 
 Bateson hadn't much faith in millenniums — nor had he 
 himself for that matter. But this war was different. Even 
 Bateson admitted as much. Phipps's letter wasn't promis- 
 ing : " Let's hope that Ireland will keep quiet. We can't 
 afford trouble there while we're smashing Germany." But 
 a larger and nobler spirit must come. It meant under- 
 standing and peace between Ireland and England. It 
 meant Diana — it meant everything. . . . 
 
 He sat up late thinking out his position. His mind went 
 back to Winchester, to the excitement there during the 
 South African war. Volunteers went out then, and this 
 was going to be a bigger thing. He was sick of the 
 Foreign Office where the absurd system gave him no work. 
 To stick there, doing nothing, during a war was unthink- 
 able. His experience in the rifle team would be a help. 
 There was only one thing to do. . . . 
 
 Half awake during the night he saw himself as a symbol 
 of the new bond of friendship that was to unite England 
 and Ireland. . . . 
 
 He chafed under the conflicting telegrams next day, and 
 wired to Sir Silas to ask whether he was wanted at the 
 office. A curt, " No. We shall send for you if we want 
 you," made him angry with the stupidity of the Foreign 
 Office, which was evidently determined to muddle along 
 with the same owlish serenity in war as in peace. It re- 
 lieved him, however, of any qualms of leaving a diplomacy, 
 which he was not allowed to practise, for the army where 
 he could at least use a rifle. 
 
 With the news of the declaration of war his restlessness 
 increased. His grandfather was slightly ill, and Dr. 
 Greany, as usual, gave pompous instructions : 
 
 "My patient mustn't be disturbed under any circum- 
 stances. No one is to have access to his room but Nurse 
 Doran, whom I shall send out forthwith. No mention of 
 the war — of anything likely to interfere with equanimity 
 of temper." 
 
CONQUEST 261 
 
 Jim wandered from room to room, took a long walk up 
 the glen, avoided his mother, who seemed also to avoid 
 him, slept badly, and in the morning packed in readiness 
 for an immediate journey. 
 
 The arrival of the newspapers giving the speeches of the 
 party leaders in Parliament made him decide to leave as 
 soon as possible — that day, if Greany would allow hiin to 
 see his grandfather. Redmond had risen to the occasion, 
 and England could not be deaf to his appeal. After eight 
 hundred years of strife had come this miraculous healing. 
 His own duty was clear. As a man, since all other means 
 had failed, he had to fight for the freedom of the world. 
 As an Irishman he could do no less. . . . 
 
 He went out on the lawn where his mother was knitting 
 beneath the cedar tree. She put down her work and smiled 
 at him as he came near. He pulled a wicker chair close to 
 her and sat down. After a few minutes' silence she said : 
 
 " You're going ?" 
 
 He nodded. 
 
 She looked at him as if expecting him to say something. 
 
 " I'm going into the Army," he said. 
 
 Her hand moved towards his fingers clasped on the arm 
 of the chair, and touched them one after another as she 
 used to do when she played "Piggy-Wiggy went to the 
 market " with him as a child. 
 
 " I was afraid of that," she said listlessly. " I expected 
 it — hoped for it in a way. But one is always afraid. If I 
 hadn't sent you to England it mightn't have happened." 
 
 "You should read Redmond's speech," he said with an 
 assumption of gaiety, flourishing the newspaper with his 
 free hand. " Irishmen and Englishmen are one at last in a 
 common cause. Had I remained at home I'd be doing the 
 same thing." 
 
 "I don't know," she said with a faint smile. "But I 
 tried to act for the best. I'm glad about Redmond. I 
 
262 CONQUEST 
 
 always hoped for a bridge, for some common understand- 
 ing. What I was able to do, others, Irish and the English, 
 could do. Thank God, it has come. If only it weren't a 
 war. Oh, Jim, Jim." 
 
 She leant against him and wept silently. 
 
 " Don't, mother," he said awkwardly. 
 
 " When it comes to this nothing seems to matter but you 
 — not oppression, nor liberty, England, Ireland, anything," 
 she said brokenly. 
 
 "There's nothing to worry about," he said desperately. 
 And then, surprised, but glad of the interruption : 
 
 "Good Lord — my grandfather." 
 
 Pierce, supported by the nurse, came through the door- 
 way giving on the lawn. Arabella dried her eyes and 
 rushed forward. 
 
 "Oh, father — Dr. Greany," she said reproachfully. 
 
 "That fellow," Pierce said contemptuously. "Who 
 minds what he says. I'm as strong as a horse," he added 
 as he moved feebly towards his chair, his weight divided 
 between the nurse's arm and his heavy ash stick. 
 
 "She's a decent poor girl enough," he said with a dis- 
 tasteful look at the departing nurse as he settled himself 
 more comfortably in his chair, " if she wouldn't go on pre- 
 tending I was a sick man — with her * Dr. Greany said this,' 
 and ' Dr. Greany said that.' Who'd put any trust in what 
 the likes of him of a political trimmer'd say? Twenty 
 times he's put me on my death bed, and I always got off it 
 by doing the opposite of what he said." 
 
 He put on his spectacles and took up a newspaper from 
 the table beside him. 
 
 " She's going into it then," he said with a frown. " Listen 
 to this will you? * Protector of small nationalities.' The 
 damned hypocrites. Did you ever hear the like ?" 
 
 " Read Redmond's speech," Jim said. 
 
 "Redmond or anyone else couldn't change a devil into 
 
CONQUEST 263 
 
 an angel by the dint of saying it," Pierce said, resting the 
 paper on his knees. "Let her practise at home first what 
 she's so fond of preaching abroad for her own profit. Did 
 she give Home Rule to Ireland last night? Answer me 
 that." 
 
 "Principles were laid down that inevitably lead to it," 
 Jim said confidently. 
 
 " Pooh. What is a principle to England ? She's been 
 mouthing liberty all her life and practising tyranny. She 
 swallows her principles every morning with her eggs and 
 bacon." 
 
 He took up the paper again and began to read. An 
 angry frown gave place to a look of bewilderment. He 
 took off his glasses and wiped them with his handkerchief, 
 fingered the newspaper as if he doubted its reality. As he 
 read on, his pallid face became slowly congested. 
 
 "Am I here in Scarty or am I in the moon?" he said 
 feebly, letting the paper drop. " They've bamboozled that 
 poor man Redmond." 
 
 " It's the speech of a statesman," Jim said eagerly. " He 
 sees that this is a fight for world liberty. The British 
 Empire has taken its stand on the side of world justice. 
 He knows that England is now pledged to do justice to 
 Ireland." 
 
 "Talk, talk," Pierce said bitterly. "England never 
 made a pledge that she didn't find a way out of it. If 
 she's fighting for liberty, let her prove it here. With 
 all her talk, Jim, she's fighting to save her own skin and 
 for her own power." 
 
 " She's fighting for an ideal," Jim said stubbornly. 
 
 "Do you hear him, Arabella? As if England had an 
 ideal beyond her own pocket," Pierce said angrily. 
 
 "You know, father, that I've never believed that," 
 Arabella said with a smile. "She was wrong and blind in 
 Ireland, but she always had a finer side, and she has found 
 
264 CONQUEST 
 
 her true self now. It's a time for trust and not for remem- 
 bering- the past Tm glad Jim sees it — even though it 
 means taking him away from me again," she added 
 tremulously. 
 
 " Stuff and nonsense," the old man began angrily. He 
 stopped short and stared at her suspiciously. "What's 
 that ? Taking him away from you ? What do you mean, 
 woman ?" 
 
 "I'm foolish enough to want to fight for an abstract 
 idea," Jim said with an attempt at lightness. 
 
 " What are ye all talking about ? What's the boy saying, 
 Arabella ?" Pierce said feebly, moistening his lips. 
 
 " He's going into the Army," she said with an uneasy look 
 at the old man's face which seemed to have shrunk in a 
 deathlike pallor. 
 
 " The English Army ?" he muttered almost inaudibly. 
 
 She nodded, but he was no longer looking at her. He 
 lay huddled up in his chair, his eyes closed, his fingers 
 moving aimlessly over his knees. 
 
 Arabella rushed to him and put an arm round his 
 shoulders. " Father you're not well. You shouldn't have 
 got up. We'll help you back to bed," she said with a dis- 
 tressed look at Jim. 
 
 " Greany is right. I'm not fit for anything but the bed. 
 Things are getting beyond me," he murmured with a feeble 
 smile. "What's that they're saying about Jim being a 
 redcoat ?" 
 
 They helped him across the lawn. "What am I doing 
 in my Sunday coat and there being a lot of work to do ?" 
 he said, looking vaguely at the herbaceous border. "The 
 English never kept their word, I tell you, Arabella. Run 
 and call the boy or it's late he'll be for school. But maybe 
 you'd better leave him to have his sleep out. Did I tell you 
 how he climbed the elm tree ? There's a boy for you, and 
 he only nine." 
 
CONQUEST 265 
 
 "You're heartily welcome, Mr. Jim," Mrs. Mike Driscoll 
 said with relief, jumping up from the table in the kitchen 
 where the Driscoll family had had a hot argument over 
 tea. "How's Mr. Piercq?" 
 
 "Better," Jim said, shaking hands with a gloomy Con 
 and a gloomier Mike and Mrs. Con with the fire of battle 
 still in her eyes. " He*s able to walk about with help, but 
 Fm afraid his memory is gone. I came to say goodbye. 
 Tm off to-morrow." 
 
 " No wonder the poor man would be moidered in his 
 mind with this war that's setting the whole world mad," 
 Mrs. Con said with a truculent look at Con. " But if you're 
 off itself it's more sense you'd have than to enlist for a 
 soldier." 
 
 " That or a commission — it's all one to me," Jim laughed. 
 
 " What did I tell you ?" Con said triumphantly to Mike. 
 
 " What's that one way or another," Mike said vehemently. 
 " Isn't he a Government man already ?" 
 
 "Be easy with your father now, Mike," Mrs. Mike said 
 anxiously, as she poured out a cup of tea for Jim. 
 
 " Your father-in-law is well able to defend himself. And 
 if he's only a poor, weak, let-everyone-crow-over-him sort of 
 a man itself, I'm well able to stand up for him," Mrs. Con 
 said defiantly. 
 
 " Sure the whole world knows that," Mrs. Mike said with 
 a slight edge to her conciliatory tone. "Won't you be 
 giving Mr. Jim one of your hot cakes, mother? Sure he 
 knows well the lightness of them." 
 
 "Anyone'd think it's a row we were having," Con said 
 with a shrug and an appealing look at his wife. 
 
 " Is it me to raise my voice ? Glory be to God it's the 
 wronged woman I am," Mrs. Con said with a look at the 
 
266 CONQUEST 
 
 flitches of bacon hanging from the smoky ceiling as if 
 calling on them to bear testimony. " Did I say one word 
 above my breath but to try and put some sense into the 
 head of a man that's on the brink of sixty." 
 
 " I'm not, nor near it," Con said with resignation. 
 
 " He'd contradict his own wife for the sake of a couple of 
 years," Mrs. Con said with a despairing wave of her hands. 
 " Did you ever hear of the like of that man, Jim ? Talking 
 of joining the Army and he no more fit to carry a gun than 
 Mike's baby in the cradle there. He never had any sense, 
 and it's losing his reason he's altogether now. But sure 
 the poor man wouldn't be put to it if his son there had the 
 spunk of a mouse in him," she added with a sudden change 
 of attack. 
 
 " You well know it's his principles and not any fear that's 
 keeping Mike back," Mrs. Mike said sharply. 
 
 " The obstinacy of a jackass — that's his principles," Mrs. 
 Con said derisively. "I never knew any good to come of 
 'em. Con himself falls back on 'em as a sort of lean-to when 
 the argument fails him. They're less stiffnecked maybe 
 than Mike's, for they make him do one thing to-day and the 
 opposite to-morrow. One day they put him all agin the 
 English and drive him to jail, and the next they make 
 him all for England. To hear him talk about the war you'd 
 think he was a Sassenach born and bred. God help me, 
 ever since I married into it, and long before, this house 
 hasn't known rest or peace from principles with three genera- 
 tions of politicians in it, and maybe another growing up 
 there in the cradle. It's a poor time of it we have, Molly 
 Jordan, between us. What call at all, I ask you, is there 
 on either of 'em to go ?" 
 
 Her daughter-in-law shrugged her shoulders at this 
 change of front and said wearily, " Isn't that what I've been 
 holding all along ?" 
 
 "Whist, women," Con said impatiently, "Redmond has 
 
CONQUEST 267 
 
 committed the country to the side of England, and I'm 
 going to stand by him no matter what Mike may say or do. 
 Honour has woke up in England at last, and she's going to 
 fight for the weak and the oppressed. She's honour-bound 
 to do justice to us at the same time, and I'm going to trust 
 her. It's the one principle I stuck to all my life, and my 
 father before me — to do my best for the freedom of Ireland, 
 and the way to do it now is to back England in winning the 
 freedom of the world. I'm over old, maybe, to carry a gun, 
 but there's twenty men pledged to go already from this 
 parish, and one man must go from this house." 
 
 "It won't be me till I see some sign that England is in 
 earnest," Mike said stubbornly. 
 
 " Then it'll be me," Con said, setting his lips firmly. 
 
 "*Tisn't that I don't believe that England mayn't be 
 right in the main about this war," Mike said uneasily, his 
 face pale and strained. " God knows I'd like to fight with 
 her to-morrow in the cause she says she's fighting for. Only 
 let her give one sign that she's not going to trick us again 
 and I'll take the shilling the next minute. I don't care 
 what it is — even the rotten Home Rule Bill she has been 
 promising us these years past. A week ago I wouldn't 
 look at it, but I don't want to be hard on her and 
 she in trouble. If she means anything at all she'll give us 
 that at least. Can't you wait, father, till she shows her 
 hand ?" 
 
 " I'm not going to bargain with her," Con said doggedly. 
 " She's done a noble thing in coming into this war, and I'm 
 going to trust her word." 
 
 " She hasn't given her word to us," Mike said bitterly. 
 
 " She has given her word to the world and she can't go 
 back on it," Con said firmly. 
 
 "She went back on it often. And besides, it*s her deeds 
 we want," Mike said, pushing away his cup and standing 
 up. 
 
 s 
 
268 CONQUEST 
 
 He walked up and down the kitchen, his hands in his 
 trousers pockets, his head bent between his broad shoulders. 
 His mother and wife wept. Con munched bread quietly. 
 Jim counted the tea leaves floating in the bottom of his cup 
 and thought of Diana. Would she be as intransigent as 
 Mike ? He glanced at the grandfather clock beside the 
 dresser. Twenty minutes to six, and his appointment with 
 her at Lentaigne's was for six. The car would do it in a 
 quarter of an hour, but he must try to get away. Mike 
 stood and faced his father across the table. 
 
 " I can't do it. I'd give my life to be able to trust her, 
 but I can't," he said, wrenching out the words as if in pain. 
 
 "Don't let England divide ye at long last," Mrs. Con 
 sobbed. 
 
 "It's a struggle that's going on in many a house in 
 Ireland this night," Con said sadly. " If you can't, Mike, 
 you can't. God knows England is herself to blame, for it's 
 little reason she ever gave us in the past to trust her. But 
 I can't believe she's such a double-faced liar now. Any- 
 how, if she goes back on me you'll be to the good to call 
 her to account for it," he added grimly. "Here we are 
 airing ourselves and our little differences in front of Jim," 
 he went on with a laugh, "and none of ye asking him 
 would he have another cup of tea." 
 
 " Is it going from me you are, Con ?" his wife said chok- 
 ingly. " Don't let your father put shame on you, Mike. Is 
 it to let him risk his life you would, and you to stay at 
 home ? What did I rear you for ?" 
 
 Mike turned on his heel and strode out through the open 
 kitchen door. 
 
 "What can any man do but act on the light God gives 
 him," Con said angrily. "For God's sake, Sally, let the 
 boy be. It's a sight harder on him to stay than it is for me 
 to go.**- 
 
 The baby began to cry. Con and the two women made 
 
CONQUEST 269 
 
 a simultaneous rush for the cradle. Mrs. Con held up the 
 child with a triumphant, " Isn't he the dead spit of Mike ?" 
 
 It was five minutes to six before Jim was allowed to 
 break off his admiration of the baby, and a quarter past 
 when he- pulled up at Lentaigne's door. 
 
 The white, dusty road had seemed to stretch out inter- 
 minably, yet, while he was still shirking the thought of her, 
 here he was. Perhaps his long quest, too, was at an end. 
 
 He found Diana in the library. 
 
 " They're all at Beekawn — but you're to stay to dinner," 
 she said, shaking hands, her face half turned away from him. 
 
 " YouVe been crying," he said, still holding her hand. 
 
 She shook him off. 
 
 "Your mother wrote to me. Jim, how could you ? Your 
 grandfather — who was so devoted to' you ?" she said angrily. 
 
 "Any stick is good enough to beat me with," he said 
 bitterly. "Good Lord, do you hold me responsible for 
 that?" 
 
 " I do," she said defiantly. 
 
 "Then you're either grossly unfair or a little fool," he 
 said calmly, his lips hardening. 
 
 She flushed slightly, gave him a quick look and moved 
 towards the bow window. 
 
 "This is a new role," she said quietly, her upper lip 
 trembling. "Better sit down," she added, sinking into a 
 comer of the deep settee, "and smoke. It may help you 
 to keep your temper." 
 
 He opened a box of cigarettes, took one, and lighted it, 
 stood with his back to the wide tiled fireplace, blew smoke 
 rings, and looked at the book-lined walls with some in- 
 terest. She watched him from under half-closed lids. 
 
 " The man who painted that," he said, nodding towards a 
 small pastel hanging from the knob of one of the bookcases, 
 "died painting signboards in the East End." 
 
 " Drink ?" she said coldly. 
 
270 CONQUEST 
 
 "And some fool of a woman. I wonder I don*t take to 
 it," he said with a shrug. 
 
 "I prefer drink to fighting against one*s country," she 
 said scornfully, and added quickly with a sudden change 
 to a tone of appeal. " For God*s sake don't pose, Jim." 
 
 He threw the cigarette into the grate and sat on the end 
 of the settee. 
 
 "Tm off to-morrow for God knows how long or where. 
 Is it to end like this ?" he said moodily, tapping the leg of 
 the seat with his heel. 
 
 "I tried, Jim, but I can't," she said miserably. "The 
 other day at Carngarth you could have taken me into your 
 arms and ended it all. But you wouldn't. I was reading 
 one of Simon's books before you came in — the 'Antigone.* 
 It made me cry. It's like that with us — some fate that we 
 cannot escape." 
 
 " This is being morbid. We carry our fate in our hands 
 these days — or in our hearts," he said laughing, fingering 
 a strand of her hair and letting the light play upon it. 
 
 "An ideal drives you one road and me the opposite. 
 Love is no help — it only adds to the bitterness," she said 
 brokenly. 
 
 He drew her head towards him and kissed her lips. 
 
 "Our roads are the same now," he said joyfully. "Our 
 ideals were always the same. Our differences were about 
 the means of achieving them." He tried to kiss her again, 
 but she pushed him away gently. 
 
 " Don't, Jim. Don't make me feel again what has been a 
 torment to me for the last few days. I've wanted you so 
 much that I've grown numb from exhaustion. My feelings 
 are almost dead now. Leave them dead. What's the use 
 of making me miserable again when we're farther apart 
 than ever." 
 
 " But we're not," he said with a confident smile. "There's 
 only one thing to do now — to strike against the wrong with 
 
CONQUEST 271 
 
 which Germany threatens the world. The eyes of England 
 are open at last to the evils of conquest. You've read the 
 speeches in the House? Ireland is as good as free this 
 moment." 
 
 She shook her head sadly. " Tve tried to believe all that, 
 Jim. I wanted to believe it. I put all my love for you in 
 the scale to try and tip it down. But it was no use. The 
 politicians say that this is a holy war against German 
 aggression. In a way I believe it is. But what does 
 England ask us to do ? To take part with her in a war for 
 the freedom of the world while we remain slaves. And 
 slaves to whom? To England herself. Good God, was 
 there ever such a travesty ?" 
 
 "As your talk?" he said laughing. 
 
 "As English policy," she said warmly. "Is the German 
 tyranny she asks us to fight against any worse than her 
 tyranny to us ? The slave-drivers may differ in the degree 
 of their brutality, but they are the same in kind. Why 
 should Irishmen believe in England as the deliverer of the 
 human race ? If she wants us to have faith in her, let her 
 free us first." 
 
 "Give her time. She has to find the way," he said 
 doubtfully. 
 
 " The way out of doing anything," she said quickly. 
 "But this isn't a debating argument," she went on sadly 
 after a short pause. "It's too great a tragedy for that 
 England is on the right side in this war, but with all her 
 talk she's not going into it with clean hands. Let her do in 
 Ireland to-morrow what she says she wants to do for the 
 whole world, and every Irishman will be at her back. She 
 can do it by the stroke of a pen. She hasn't done it and 
 she won't do it, for the curse of conquest is on her. I've read 
 the speeches you talk of. If I were English they might fire 
 me with enthusiasm. But as an Irishwoman they only 
 make me hard and bitter. English blood boils at a recital 
 
272 CONQUEST 
 
 of the wrongs with which Germany threatens the world. 
 But it is a reminder to me of the wrong England is not 
 merely threatening, but is actually inflicting on Ireland at 
 this moment. She asks us to help her to prevent Germany 
 doing to her and others what she herself is doing to us. 
 My God." 
 
 She burst suddenly into a fit of sobbing. 
 
 "Don't, Diana," he said pleadingly. "YouVe worked 
 yourself up to this. What you say is only half true. There 
 has been a struggle going on in England for years between 
 two ideals of life and government. The ideal that has led 
 her into this war is the very opposite of the policy which 
 coerces Ireland — it hasn't killed conquest, but for the first 
 time it has prevailed over it. Freedom for Ireland is as 
 certain as that you're sitting there." 
 
 " At once ?" she said with an ironic smile through her 
 tears. ^ 
 
 " Of course," he said firmly. 
 
 " I wish I had your faith, Jim," she said sadly, drying her 
 eyes. "Though I fear the age of moving mountains by 
 faith has passed for ever. Like Doubting Thomas, I must 
 have visible proof. I have too much English blood in me 
 not to be suspicious of English good faith. I admit that 
 England is groping after justice. It was even a factor in 
 driving her into the war. But I see no sign that it is the 
 prevailing motive. That has yet to be proved, and her 
 treatment of Ireland is my test. I'll be with you, Jim, if 
 she only gives me half a chance." 
 
 " You promise ?" he said, taking her hand. 
 
 She made a movement towards him, but drew back 
 shivering and shook her hand free. 
 
 " You must go ?" she said miserably. . 
 
 " I must," he said sternly. " God knows I love Ireland 
 as much as you do, but there is something bigger than 
 Ireland in all this. The freedom of the world is in the 
 
CONQUEST 273 
 
 balance. I can't wait to bargain. I know England will 
 act decently." 
 
 " You think you are going to fight for Ireland ?" she said 
 harshly. 
 
 "Why, of course. Ireland is inseparable from what 
 England is fighting for now. Can't you see it?" he said 
 impatiently. "Redmond sees it. Twenty men are going 
 from TuUyfin at once. In a few months thousands of Irish- 
 men will be in the Army. Diana, can't you have a littie 
 faith ?" 
 
 She flung her arms about his neck and kissed him 
 
 passionately. She clung to him for several minutes, sobbing 
 
 convulsively. He kissed her hair and the back of her neck. 
 
 " Crush me, Jim. Break "me," she said in an exhausted 
 
 voice. 
 
 She lay quite still in his arms and then suddenly pushed 
 him away from her. She walked up and down the room 
 trembling. ^ 
 
 " That's the last of my weakness," she said, standing in 
 front of him, with a pitiful twitching of her lips. " Good- 
 bye now. No, don't touch me. Don't wait for dinner — I 
 couldn't stand it." 
 
 " I must dine with my mother in any case," he said per- 
 plexed. " But what do you mean ? I can't leave you like 
 this. I shan't see you again, and we must settle things." 
 
 " Why can't you go while I see only you ? I love you, 
 Jim. I will always love you. Do go, for God's sake." 
 
 "Diana, have sense. We must fix up about our mar- 
 riage," he said appeal ingly. 
 
 She flung herself down on the settee. 
 " Must we go back to that again ?" she said despairingly. 
 " Can't you see the yawning gulf betweer^ us ? You say it 
 isn't there. I pray night and day to make me see as you 
 do. But I can see no hope. I see you broken on the wheel 
 of your faith. You trust England, and I see her prepared 
 
274 CONQUEST 
 
 to betray you. I see the old evasions beginning already. 
 The England of conquest is not dead. She's only using 
 her idealists while they go her way. The reactionaries who 
 were stirring up civil war a month ago in order to prevent 
 Ireland from getting a trumpery measure of local govern- 
 ment haven't become apostles of liberty in a night. They 
 want to down Germany, and they have hopes of being able 
 to tighten the halter on us in the process. They are your 
 England and not a handful of idealists." 
 
 "This is blind prejudice," he said hopelessly. 
 
 " Your faith is a much blinder credulity," she said sharply. 
 
 " But if England proves Fm right ?" 
 
 "I'll marry you that day. There's Simon's car. Kiss 
 me. Oh, Jim." 
 
 "Hullo, Jim, where are you?" Simon Lentaigne's voice 
 boomed from the front hall. 
 
PART FOUR 
 
 A YEAR and a half of wax had left its mark on Jim Daly. 
 A wooden leg was the most obvious sign. The greyness of 
 his face under the eyes was the result of long months in 
 hospital and would probably wear off, but a harder set of 
 his lips and an introspective look in his eyes seemed to have 
 come for good. His look of boyishness had altogether gone. 
 His skin was stretched more tightly on his face, and sharply 
 defined his jaw and the bony structure of his forehead. 
 
 He sat in a low armchair, staring at the fire in his own 
 den in the St. James's Place house, his right leg, with its 
 perfect brown boot, resting stiffly on the end of the fender. 
 A review was open on his knees, but he had not looked at it 
 for half an hour. 
 
 Bateson, his feet on the mantelpiece, hunched up in an- 
 other armchair on the opposite side of the fire, was reading 
 a book. His uniform hung loosely from his shoulders, and 
 his face was thin to the point of emaciation. 
 
 "What's old Silas coming for?" he asked, searching 
 round for a pipe on the carpet. 
 
 " Don't know. They may want me back." 
 
 Having found his pipe Bateson groped for tobacco, also 
 on the carpet, and gave a sigh of satisfaction on finding it 
 without having to move his legs. 
 
 "As good as anything else I should think," he said, 
 filling his pipe. 
 
 "Six of one and half a dozen of another," Jim said moodily. 
 
 "Hope Phipps'll be in to talk to him — they both know 
 all about it," Bateson grunted. 
 
 275 
 
2/6 CONQUEST 
 
 " Dale's coming," Jim said, with some of the old gleam oi 
 amusement in the quiet eyes. 
 
 " He'll prick some of the humbug. Damned if they don't 
 think the war is run on cliches for the pleasure, of old 
 women at the clubs. Thank God I'm going back next 
 week," Bateson growled, taking up his book. 
 
 " Fit ?" Jim asked, with a doubtful look at the other's face. 
 
 "Fit enough for a bullet. It's about all they'll let me 
 get out of the war," Bateson snapped, burying himself in 
 his chair and book. 
 
 Jim stared at the fire. He huddled back more comfort- 
 ably in his chair and watched the changing figures a huge 
 lump of black coal made with the glowing embers under- 
 neath. A face which began as Diana suddenly became a 
 leering, toothless hag. The wind howled in the chimney, 
 and hailstones beat in gusts on the curtained windows. He 
 shut his eyes again and saw Diana smiling at him. In a 
 moment she was gone. He tried to recall the image, but 
 nothing came except an inky blackness. Where was she ? 
 In Dublin, his mother thought. She was to make an effort 
 to see her and would let him know. And his mother would 
 be in Dublin to-night on her way home. He listened to the 
 steady swish of a sleety rain on the window panes and 
 shuddered. Her letters brought her so near to him and 
 kept her so far off. She poured out love in one page and 
 in the next harped on the ever-widening gulf that divided 
 them. And it was always "I told you so," about the treat- 
 ment of Ireland, with no word of what she was doing except 
 that she was busy. She was half right in a way about the 
 treatment of Ireland. His lips hardened, and he gazed 
 sternly and steadily at the fire. It was one of the many 
 sickening things of the war. It had hurt him as he had 
 never been hurt before in his life. The hardships of the 
 trenches were nothing, nor his wounds nor the loss cf his 
 leg. It was the irresolution, the weakness, the cynicism, 
 
CONQUEST 277 
 
 the bad faith about Ireland that had killed his enthusiasm 
 and left him old and tired. No wonder Diana raged 
 against English hypocrisy when he found it so hard to keep 
 his faith. And he had memories of unselfishness, of sub- 
 lime courage to sustain him, while she, as she saw things, 
 had a perfect fulfilment of all her suspicion and distrust. . . . 
 
 "Let's wash," Bateson said, with a look at the clock. 
 " We musn't keep Sir Silas waiting for his dinner." 
 
 In the common room they found Sir Silas planted in 
 front of the fire, holding one hand behind his back to the 
 blaze while he emphasized an argument with a wave of the 
 other. The light gleamed on his shoes, his shirt front, his 
 newly-shaven face. Phipps, in the red tabs and crown of 
 a staff major, was appreciatively attentive. Dale, in a 
 somewhat worn uniform of an infantry captain, was 
 gloomily stubbing the stone guard of the fireplace with a 
 restless foot. 
 
 Sir Silas withdrew his left hand from the shelter of his 
 back and waved it towards Jim and Batesbri; but he went 
 on speaking to Dale. 
 
 " The result is certain if the facts are only put before them 
 — diplomatically, of course. When they once understand 
 the English position they're sure to come round. But we 
 can go into that afterwards. Indeed, it's my object in 
 coming here to-night. Not that I'm not always delighted 
 to drop in, but in these crowded and momentous days one 
 must combine work with pleasure. I see Simpson is an- 
 nouncing dinner. Jim, my dear boy, you want a sea voyage 
 to set you on your — ahem — in order completely to re- 
 cuperate." 
 
 He put a hand affectionately on Bateson's shoulder as 
 they crossed the hall to the dining-room. " Have you 
 decided to come to us ? Hard work, of course, but you'd 
 find it less trying than in the Army," he said suavely. 
 
 " The Army only tries my body," Bateson said grimly. 
 
2/8 CONQUEST 
 
 "Eh? You were on the Balkan Committee? We've 
 just the very job for you." 
 
 "More secret treaties ?" Bateson said with a sarcastic grin. 
 
 "My dear fellow, you must get rid of these pre-war 
 Radical suspicions. Look at the Front Bench — a model 
 of harmony. Come and join our happy family. You'll 
 find everything — ahem — quite above board." 
 
 " Too much of a shock after the Flanders' doss-houses," 
 Bateson said drily, edging off to his seat. 
 
 Sir Silas sighed and ate his soup in silence. He sipped 
 a glass of sherry appreciatively. 
 
 " The country that can serve a wine like this in the second 
 year of the great war is sure to win," he said confidently. 
 "It has reserves of strength. Even our hock at the Pen- 
 guins will outlast Kitchener's limit. Think of that for 
 foresight, Phipps." 
 
 " We'll wipe 'em out this year," Phipps said resolutely. 
 
 Phipps and Sir Silas kept up a brisk discussion of 
 strategy and tactics. 
 
 "I haven't been out, of course," Phipps admitted 
 modestly. " But when I can spare time from the House I 
 look in at the War Office — they know there." 
 
 Sir Silas lifted a doubtful eyebrow, but murmured : "Of 
 course, of course." 
 
 The three soldiers listened with varying expressions of 
 gloom. 
 
 " Anyone been to the revue at the Palace ?" Dale asked in 
 a pause. 
 
 Jim and Bateson showed a momentary interest. Phipps 
 looked at Sir Silas with the smile of aloofness from the herd. 
 
 "We have no time for frivolity. Sir Silas?" he said 
 austerely. 
 
 Jim laughed. "Why, I saw Uncle Si " 
 
 "Once with — ahem — ahem — a French Minister," Sir 
 Silas said hastily. " That reminds me of our conversation 
 
CONQUEST 279 
 
 before dinner, Dale," he added with a quick return to his 
 usual aplomb. "Now that we have dispensed with Simp- 
 son we can go on with it. We want you to go to America, 
 Jim." 
 
 " Good Lord. What for ?" Jim said, with a wry look of 
 surprise. 
 
 " You should never have left us," Sir Silas said in a tone 
 of mild reproof. " The centre of things needs all our men 
 of brains." 
 
 " You might risk one or two on top at the front," Bateson 
 said moodily. 
 
 "Over the top is their fate out there if you do," Dale said 
 with a grin. 
 
 "Those soldiers — those soldiers," Sir Silas said, in the 
 tone and with a nod of hopelessness. "Well, well, no one 
 can say they lack confidence in themselves. And at the 
 worst we can give them ideas from here. Damn pig- 
 headed though. But in your case, Jim, it was an unneces- 
 sary sacrifice. And we had some work for you at home 
 once or twice. However, it's all right now — IVe arranged 
 everything with the War Office. It's this perpetual Irish 
 question. We get constant reports from America that it's 
 playing the very devil with us all through the States. I 
 can't believe that the Irish there understand things. They 
 don't seem to know that we have passed a Home Rule 
 Act." 
 
 Dale laughed. "And put it on the shelf and promised 
 Ulster never to enforce it," he said bitterly. 
 
 " No, no. We promised not to coerce Ulster into accept- 
 ing it," Sir Silas said soothingly. 
 
 "The Irish have eight hundred years' experience in 
 interpreting English promises," Dale said with a shrug. 
 
 "You believe in us — you are wearing the King's uniform," 
 Sir Silas said with benign conclusiveness over the edge of 
 a glass of port 
 
28o CONQUEST 
 
 "Fm wearing it for my sins — I was fool enough to be 
 caught in a trap." 
 
 " If I were an Irishman I'd be a Sinn Feiner," Bateson 
 said with sullen emphasis. 
 
 " Come now, we couldn't desert Ulster," Phipps said with 
 an assured smile. 
 
 "You make me tired, Phipps, old man," Bateson said, 
 brushing him aside with a grimace. " Of course, you can't 
 desert Ulster. You can't desert your fellow conspirators. 
 You helped Carson and Smith and Law to foster rebellion 
 in Ulster. Instead of being in jail for it, or shot, you're all 
 on the Front Bench now or on your way there. You may 
 or may not have been play-acting, but Berlin took you 
 seriously and you precipitated the war. If we escape a 
 rebellion in Ireland during the war it won't be due to you 
 and your friends. You've taught the Irish a lesson they 
 won't forget, and you're egging them on every day to put 
 it in practice." 
 
 "A little Sanatogen, my dear fellow, is an excellent 
 sedative," Sir Silas said with a sympathetic glance at Bate- 
 son's strained, cadaverous face. " A dose night and morn- 
 ing will soon work wonders. And you must give up worry- 
 ing about the past. Liberal and Tory are one for the 
 duration of the war, and harmony mustn't be disturbed. 
 Carson went too far, but it's all best forgotten now." 
 
 " Ireland hasn't forgotten it," Bateson said harshly. 
 
 " A little ruffled, perhaps," Sir Silas said with a medita- 
 tive puff of his cigar, "but we can always manage her — 
 she's at our elbow, so to speak. Soothing is the best — a 
 little relaxation in the war restrictions isn't a bad idea. 
 But if necessary we can apply pressure. No, Ireland 
 doesn't worry me. It's the Irish in America. The Aus- 
 tralian Irish are giving trouble, too, but I think we can 
 manage them. We simply must get the American Irish 
 right. They're interfering with the output of munitions. 
 
CONQUEST 281 
 
 Unless they're checked they may prevent America's coming 
 into the war. In any case they seem to be delaying it. 
 Vour party might have done something Dale." 
 
 Dale's eyes lit angrily, but with an effort he restrained 
 limself and laughed ironically. 
 
 "One must bear even the last straw with a smile," he 
 said, making the attempt wryly. "You bind our hands 
 Dehind our backs and expect us to use them. At the out- 
 Dreak of the war my party declared itself in favour of the 
 kvar. We did it because you said you were fighting for 
 "reedom and the rights of small nationalities. We did it 
 ivith a good deal of risk, for we knew that many of our 
 people distrusted English professions and promises. The 
 Drinciples on which all English parties entered the war 
 Dound them to pass at once and put in force not only the 
 Home Rule Bill then before the House, but a far better one. 
 We didn't wait to make a bargain. We trusted you to act 
 Dn your professions. What happened ? I was brought up 
 ivith all the English distaste of plain speech, but there is 
 Dnly one word for it — you sold us. At no time in her his- 
 :ory was Ireland closer to England than at the beginning 
 Df the war. Practically all the Irish people believed you 
 lad undertaken a just war. Most of them believed you 
 mtered on it for the reasons you alleged. The rest only 
 ivaited for some proof. Well — you know what happened. 
 Phipps knows more of the backstairs intriguing that went 
 Dn than I do." 
 
 "We were anxious to do something," Phipps said un- 
 sasily. "But the Ulster men held out." 
 
 "You can apportion the blame as you will," Dale said 
 wearily. " But English honour was sacrificed. Instead of 
 the freedom which we expected we got a slap in the face. I 
 don't mind myself or my party. It has wrecked us. We 
 raised thousands of men to fight for you, but I hope I won't 
 be among the few who come back alive. When Ireland 
 
282 CONQUEST 
 
 realizes how she has been betrayed we shall have a thin 
 time." 
 
 "A gloomy view, Dale. Much too gloomy," Sir Silas 
 said cheerfully. "Pass him the port, Jim. Ireland must 
 be placated, of course. She's a little angry now perhaps. 
 But if you only give us time everything will be set right. 
 After all there is that Home Rule Act in the Statute Book. 
 You must impress that on them in America, Jim." 
 
 " What do you expect me to do there ?" Jim asked coldly. 
 
 " Have a look round generally. Find out what's in the 
 air and at the back of the minds of the Irish." 
 
 "I can tell you now." 
 
 "'Fraid I must be off. I have an appointment with 
 some Southern Slav revolutionaries. We have hopes of a 
 rebellion in Austria. See Gridley to-morrow, and he'll fix 
 up your credentials. It's a great strain. Dale, to keep one's 
 eyes always clear for a weak spot." And Sir Silas waved 
 himself out. 
 
 2. 
 
 Rough weather, a zig-zag course with lights out and 
 westerly winds prolonged Jim's voyage to New York to 
 twelve days. The boat was full of men, singly or in groups, 
 engaged on errands connected with the war. 
 
 An interview with Sir Silas had convinced Jim that his 
 mission was primarily for the good of his health. His 
 uncle had been vague as to what he was expected to do. 
 
 "They'll understand you and you'll understand them," 
 Sir Silas said with a smile at his finger nails. "You're 
 Irish. Englishmen, the dear fellows, never quite get there 
 in America. They have an ineradicable idea that people 
 who don't speak English exactly as they do are necessarily 
 inferior. This develops a sort of mental crust that is, to say 
 the least of it, a little narrowing. It's perhaps at the root 
 of the Irish question. It makes difficulties everywhere 
 
CONQUEST 283 
 
 abroad. The war is rubbing it off a little, but it lasts like 
 the British Empire itself. The Englishman thinks the 
 American crude. The American thinks the Englishman a 
 bit of an ass. Soothe them, my boy, soothe them. And 
 the voyage will pick up your health." 
 
 Tim protested that he himself needed soothing. Nothing 
 but the conviction that England was essentially right about 
 the war enabled him to tolerate the weakness or stupidity 
 or bad faith about Ireland. 
 
 " You do stick it, you see," Sir Silas said suavely. 
 " Thafs the main thing. You don*t let us down in essen- 
 tials. The war's got to be won and America has got to 
 come in — you're sound there. For the rest it's rather an 
 advantage that you don't think the British winged angels. 
 The Americans don't and won't. They'll feel more at home 
 with you, and they'll talk to you. Write me a report 
 — especially about the Irish." 
 
 " For the pigeon-hole ?" Jim said. 
 
 "I'll do what I can. But everyone is so busy. No one 
 has any time to read anything, much less to think. Good- 
 bye, my boy. Come back strong and we'll put you on to 
 Austria." 
 
 Jim made friends with an American who sat next him at 
 the captain's table — a tall, thin, wiry man, with a grey, 
 hogged moustache, who cloaked a cold mind with a tem- 
 perament strung with nervous energy. 
 
 "Kenrick, a lawyer — one of the leaders of the American 
 Bar," the captain told Jim on the second day out, 
 
 " America will come in I suppose ?" Jim asked, as he and 
 Kenrick walked together after breakfast. 
 
 " Sure to. Got that out there ?" Kenrick said as he 
 helped Jim on to the boat deck. 
 
 Jim nodded. "Rather a nuisance to everyone I'm 
 afraid. I'm not used to it yet." 
 
 "Good for you," Kenrick said heartily. "We're in the 
 
284 CONQUEST 
 
 war already. But politicians are politicians everywhere — 
 they'll begin to move after the November elections. We're 
 a mixture of races, and it hasn't always been easy to see the 
 wood for the trees. But we're all Americans at bottom. 
 Wilson, perhaps, could have handled the situation better, 
 but I don't know. He has a difficult job. It's hard to 
 disengage a big idea from its national trimmings. While 
 America is out of it, our Germans are in sympathy with 
 Germany, the Italians follow the lead of Italy, the Irish 
 are bitter against England, and even the New England 
 Americans don't love you." 
 
 "I'm Irish," Jim laughed. "Daly's my name." 
 
 " Couldn't quite place you. Went in with Redmond ?" 
 Kenrick said doubtfully. 
 
 " No, I'm an English official. But a Home Ruler for all 
 that." 
 
 Kenrick wiped his pince-nez with his pocket handkerchief 
 and took some time to adjust the information. 
 
 "Well, you'll understand how it is," he said with some 
 relief. " It's got to be an American war. It's for something 
 bigger than America, of course, as it's bigger than England 
 or France or Germany. But that's how the mass of our 
 people have to see it. I think the majority see it now — 
 though, perhaps, Wilson knows better. But the day 
 America enters the war, it's an American war, and 
 hyphenated Americans will put by their hyphens and be 
 Americans pure and simple." 
 
 He walked for some time with a troubled face. 
 
 " You're not making it easy for us, you know — England, 
 I mean," he said with some hesitation. " America is going 
 into this war for an ideal — to secure the freedom of the 
 world. I suspect a phrase of the kind generally, but it's 
 literally true. It's a moot question whether our interests 
 would be better served by going in or keeping out. But 
 that's a consideration that the mass of the people never 
 
CONQUEST 285 
 
 think of. We're going in because liberty is threatened. 
 Our Germans will fight Germany, our Irish will fight side 
 by side with England, not because they love England, but 
 because England says she is fighting for the same ideal." 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 "What about Ireland ?" Kenriclc asked coldly. 
 
 "What about it?" Jim said uneasily. 
 
 "I forgot you're an official," Kenrick said with a shrug. 
 " I'm Irish myself, far back — my grandfather. It sticks, I sup- 
 pose, but I'm speaking as an American. I've been in France 
 for the last twelve months doing Red Cross work. I'm 
 going home now to try and hasten America into the war. 
 I've a good deal of admiration for what England has done 
 and is doing in the war. She's on the right side, and I'm 
 with her till the world is free of the German threat. But I 
 tell you frankly that her treatment of Ireland is hard to 
 swallow. England talks very loudly about liberty, but it's 
 largely hot air. Or it's a liberty she tries to keep largely to 
 herself. She did her best to keep it from us. Her Colonies 
 had to browbeat her into giving them freedom. But the 
 worst case of all is Ireland. There's hardly an American, 
 even before the war, who didn't think England a tyrannical 
 bully in her dealings with Ireland. Since the war there 
 are few who don't think her guilty of playing rather a 
 crooked game. All the American-Irish, and many others, 
 think that England trapped Redmond into supporting the 
 war and then deserted him. Her Government was pledged 
 to Home Rule. They had their chance when the war came 
 of healing an old sore for ever. But did they do it ? No, 
 sir, they did a bunk. It flavoured too much of the gold 
 brick swindle for us. They handed Ireland, bound, into 
 the hands of Carson and his reactionary English backers. 
 England has got to act democracy as well as talk it before 
 she'll get people outside England to trust her." 
 
 " You don't believe in special treatment for Ulster then ?" 
 
.286 CONQUEST 
 
 " I believe in making her toe the line. I was bom in the 
 South — Georgia. My father fought in the Civil War — I 
 was a kid then. We were beaten and Fm glad of it now. 
 Our country had to be united. Ireland has got to be 
 united. Fm Scotch-Irish myself, but Fd damn well spank 
 Ulster into common sense. She*s got swelled head from 
 being too long the boss. Nobody in Ireland wants to hurt 
 her. If England only cleared out all Irishmen would be 
 friends in twenty-four hours. We can't help suspecting that 
 she doesn't want to clear out. She let Carson play the fool 
 before the war — or was it England's game ? And now he's 
 going to rule the roost." 
 
 "We didn't go into the war for that," Jim said moodily. 
 " And you're going to fight with us." 
 
 " Your young fellows that I met in France didn't," Ken- 
 rick said warmly. " They're bully. But Fm suspicious of 
 the old gang who're getting back into power in England. 
 I'm going to fight with them, but that doesn't mean that I 
 trust them. We have a common cause in this war, but 
 they've got to prove that their hands are clean. And their 
 treatment of Ireland makes them seem damn dirty. I have 
 been talking to some of that crowd over there," he added 
 with a grin, pointing to a group of Englishmen. " They're 
 coming over to explain the English position. They're 
 decent fellows, but they know as much about America as I 
 do about Arabia. If America wasn't going into this war on 
 her own they'd help to keep her out. They're that type of 
 Englishman that's the greatest God damn fool on the face 
 of the earth — who expects everyone to take him at his own 
 valuation. They've muddled on to the right path this 
 time, but we've got to keep them there and make 'em think 
 out where it leads to." 
 
 "Make them give Home Rule to Ireland," Jim said, 
 laughing. 
 
 "That's talking," Kenrick said grimly. "We will. 
 
CONQUEST 287 
 
 Those fellows tell me they want a union of the English- 
 speaking race. It's a climb down for the British lion, and 
 if she wants it she's got to pay for it by some straight think- 
 ing. The Irish question means a great deal to us. It's been 
 cutting for years across our own politics. Though I'm 
 Irish, I don't want an Irish question in American politics. 
 It's a damn nuisance. I have no bitter memories of England. 
 I come of Episcopalian Ulster stock, and have no reason to 
 hate England. My feelings towards her are only those of 
 the average American. But it's different with the great 
 majority of the Irish in America. The iron has bitten into 
 their blood, and they feel ten times more bitter against Eng- 
 land than the most extreme Sinn Feiner in Ireland. They're 
 the great bar to America's not coming sooner into the war. 
 They'll stand in the way till Doomsday of any real under- 
 standing between America and England unless England 
 plays the game decently with Ireland. They'll go into the 
 war because they're Americans. But up to the day America 
 goes in they'll intrigue against England. They'll hate her 
 while they're in, and they'll work against her with increased 
 fervour when they get out. England blames <us for not 
 being in the war sooner, but to a large extent it is she has 
 made our difficulty and we resent it. England says Ireland 
 is a private matter of her own. If that means anything it 
 means that she claims a free hand to play the bully. It's 
 not a plea I'd put forward if I were seeking an alliance on 
 the grounds of a common democracy. But Ireland can 
 never be a private matter of England while there are many 
 times more Irishmen in America than in Ireland, Many an 
 American President wished to God it was, but the Irish 
 won't have it, and they tell at the polls. If England stands 
 on technicalities of that kind it shows that she has learned 
 very little from the war, and means very little by all her big 
 talk. I don't know what you're coming over for, but the 
 best work you could do for England is to go straight back 
 
288 CONQUEST 
 
 and tell your people to settle the Irish question at once — to 
 do it generously and not in the haggling way the unwork- 
 able Home Rule Act you have in the cupboard proposes to 
 do it. Until she does that she can never be friends with 
 America, though we'll fight with her in this war whether 
 she does it or not." 
 
 Jim found other Americans on board less outspoken than 
 Kenrick, but in substantial agreement with him. They 
 were full of appreciation of England's effort in the war and 
 spoke confidently of the intervention of America. But 
 there was always an element of suspicion and distrust of 
 the ultimate aims of England; and Ireland invariably 
 cropped up as a test of her sincerity. 
 
 By the time the pilot came aboard Jim felt that he knew 
 as much as he needed to know about the Irish in America ; 
 but Kenrick told him that he ought to see some of the real 
 Irish, as he himself was almost unhyphenated, as were the 
 other Americans on board — mostly war workers who 
 tolerated England and worked for France. 
 
 Kenrick promised him letters of introduction to repre- 
 sentative Irish-Americans whose dislike of England kept 
 them at home practising a rabid pacifism when they were 
 not actively intriguing against England. 
 
 " Redmond has lost ground with them," he said regret- 
 fully. "They think England has fooled him. Between 
 ourselves it looks as though she had. I hope to God they 
 won't stir up a rising in Ireland. I couldn't blame them if 
 they did, but it would make it more difficult for us to come 
 in. I don't envy you your job if you're thin-skinned about 
 criticism of England. Come and stay with me when you're 
 sick of it." 
 
 The extraordinary hospitality of the Americans he met 
 on the boat made Jim almost admire the monstrous statue 
 of Liberty. They asked him to stay, offered to put him up 
 at clubs, and gave him letters of introduction. Kenrick 
 
CONQUEST 289 
 
 proclaimed him a friend and seemed to act as a magic 
 passport. When Jim tried to refuse a civility that was sure 
 to give a lot of trouble to the donor, he was met with a 
 laugh. "You're Bob Kenrick's friend, and I guess that 
 goes in New York and in most places out of it." 
 
 A brilliant sun was melting the last of the snow as the 
 boat made its way up the river. The cold harsh wind had 
 suddenly gone, and a breeze, soft as a June west wind at 
 Scarty, fanned his cheeks. A sun haze hid the dreariness 
 of the New Jersey flats, and glorified Staten Island, whose 
 trees and knolls already held the promise of spring. The 
 tall sky-scrapers beyond the Battery, as the sun caught their 
 windows, blinked a welcome in half derisive contempt of 
 the sullen, dwarfed houses at their feet. 
 
 At eight Jim dined with the Kenricks in their house in 
 the first block of 72nd Street, east of the Park. Mrs. 
 Kenrick, with a gleam of mischief in her brown eyes, asked 
 him what he thought of America. 
 
 " Noisy," he said grimly. 
 
 "Bob hasn't done his duty. YouVe been in New York 
 several hours and aren't lyrical about Grant's tomb and 
 Riverside Drive and the Pallisades. But here's Mr. Cronin 
 — you can't escape Ireland in this house." . 
 
 A tall, dark, clean-shaven man, with broad shoulders and 
 a strong mouth, shook hands warmly with Jim, said he was 
 pleased to meet him, and asked him what he thought of 
 America. 
 
 " So far I've seen only Ireland," Jim said with a laugh. 
 " The Customs officer was Irish. My taxi driver was Irish. 
 So was the policeman who held us up in Fifth Avenue. 
 The hotel porter is Irish. I'm not sure about the clerks at 
 the desk. But the liftman is, and the floor clerk and the 
 chambermaid." 
 
 " So are most of the judges that I've to argue cases 
 before," Kenrick said with a grin. "My chief grievance 
 
290 CONQUEST 
 
 against England is that she drove them out of Ireland. 
 And the Mayor and the Board of Aldermen and the Con- 
 gressmen and Murphy — damn 'em." 
 
 " Kenrick's a mugwump," Cronin said with a smile. " He 
 even forgets he's Irish when he remembers Tammany. Has 
 Yeats been writing anything ?" he added eagerly. 
 
 " Cronin's your man," Kenrick said later in the drawing- 
 room. "He's not in politics, but he keeps in touch with 
 everything. How he finds time for it I don't know. He's 
 a lawyer, and a good one, too, and up to his eyes in work, 
 but Howells would tell you that his only interest is 
 literature." 
 
 For a week Jim felt that Cronin's only interest was politics. 
 
 " You want to see English-Irish relations through Ameri- 
 can eyes ? Well, I'll show you," he said, taking up a pencil 
 and scribbling some notes on the back of an envelope, as 
 Jim breakfasted with him at his flat in the Washington on 
 the morning after the dinner at Kenrick's. 
 
 The demonstration was a procession of breakfasts, 
 luncheons, dinners, and suppers, in Cronin's rooms, at 
 Sherry's, at the Lawyers' Club, at the Century. Jim met 
 hundreds of representative men of all classes and opinions : 
 Dutch-Americans, descendants of the Pilgrim Fathers, 
 Scotch-Irish, unqualified Americans, Irish- Americans ; re- 
 publicans of all shades, democrats, Tammany democrats, 
 mugwumps, socialists of many hues. They disagreed 
 about America and American ideals. Many were vehe- 
 mently for the war, some neutralist, some pacifist. Many 
 spoke generously of England's action in the war. But 
 always, even with those who admired her most, was some 
 reservation. In nine cases out of ten the distrust arose in 
 connection with Ireland. Jim didn't meet a single man 
 who defended England's attitude. An old Republican 
 Senator said phlegmatically, "I haven't a drop of Irish 
 blood in my veins, though I'm one of the few so-called 
 
CONQUEST 291 
 
 real Americans who haven't I'm of pure English descent. 
 1 like England and English institutions. I try to stand up 
 for her in everything, but I can't say a good word for the 
 way she's dealt with Ireland. If it weren't for her blind- 
 ness America would be in this war long since. She's not 
 only keeping a sore open on her side, but she has spread it 
 over here. The future peace of the world is largely a matter 
 of American and English friendship, but, war or no war, I 
 see no chance of it here until England mends her ways in 
 Ireland." 
 
 On their last evening together Cronin said, as he drove 
 Jim to the Bronx, " I want you to see old Darcy. He was 
 arrested as a Fenian in '65 and escaped from jail. He's 
 very extreme. At one time he used to have a large follow- 
 ing, but the Pamell and Redmond movements drew most 
 Irish- Americans to constitutional agitation. Carsonism 
 and the shelving of the Home Rule Act have now so dis- 
 gusted even the moderates that Darcy is a power again. 
 He's always plotting abortive rebellions ; but in the present 
 temper of the Irish here and in Ireland he may give 
 England an unpleasant shock one day." 
 
 " He used to write to my grandfather," Jim said. 
 
 " That may help as an introduction," Cronin said doubt- 
 fully. 
 
 They found the old man huddled up in an armchair in 
 front of a gas stove. He stood up to receive them, a 
 curiously pathetic figure in an old grey dressing gown and 
 carpet slippers. Deep furrows lined a forehead brown as 
 parchment. His hair and scrubby beard were of a dingy 
 white. His cheeks had fallen in over toothless jaws. His 
 brown eyes, shy and placid, had an expression of youth 
 under their shrunken lids. 
 
 " I've brought a friend to see you, Mr. Darcy," Cronin 
 said respectfully. 
 
 " A friend of yours is as welcome as yourself, and that's 
 
292 CONQUEST 
 
 saying little of the regard I have for you, though you aren't 
 with us itself. Won't you take a seat ?" Darcy said feebly, 
 pointing to some wooden chairs covered with books and 
 papers. He supported himself by holding on to the back 
 of his armchair, and made a movement towards the chairs 
 as if to clear them. 
 
 " Leave that to me," Cronin said cheerfully, forcing the 
 old man to sit down, and tilting the books off two chairs 
 on to the floor. 
 
 "It's ashamed I am to welcome any stranger in a litter 
 like this," Darcy said to Jim with a rueful smile at the dust 
 and confusion of the room. There were books and papers 
 everywhere, on the deal shelves, on the floor, on a 
 small sideboard, on the rough table in the centre of the 
 room. 
 
 " I think you know Mr. Daly's grandfather — Pierce Daly, 
 of Scarty," Cronin said as they sat down. 
 
 " Pierce Daly is it ?" Darcy said, looking at Jim doubt- 
 fully. " He was a good man once — ^no better. But he 
 went wrong and took to moderation." 
 
 "There's nothing of the moderate about my grand- 
 father," Jim said, laughing. 
 
 " Maybe you're more moderate than he is ?" Darcy said 
 suspiciously. 
 
 " Mr. Darcy is all for physical force," Cronin said hastily. 
 " What can you expect of a man who sits here reading rebel 
 poetry all day ?" he added with a laugh and a humorous 
 look at the tattered, dust-laden books. 
 
 " It's for many a long year theywere all I had to keep the 
 fire alight in me," the old man said with a glazed look at 
 the smelly stove. "Only that I had to earn my bread to 
 distract me and had them to fall back on when despair was 
 gripping my heart, it's dead I'd be long ago. But it's 
 thankful to God and them I am that I'm alive this day," he 
 added, sitting upright in his chair, his eyes glowing. 
 
CONQUEST 293 
 
 "Well, well, we'll see — what we'll see," he said, after a 
 pause, with a half furtive glance at Cronin. 
 
 " You wouldn't play the German game," Cronin said with 
 a shrug. 
 
 " What call have we to interfere between two devils ?'* 
 Darcy said vehemently. "They tell me the Prooshian 
 devil is bad, but it was the other one that tried to throttle 
 me, and that throttled my country. Of the two I have less 
 hatred of the devil I don't know. But we'll pull the fangs 
 of the one that hurt us. The Boers near did it — anyway 
 they stood out three years," he added meditatively, his 
 eyes again fixed on the fire. 
 
 " They were thousands of miles off and had room to run 
 away," Cronin said drily, " and they had arms." 
 
 "Your father, Tom Cronin, wouldn't say that," Darcy 
 said with a pitying look. "Yankee caution has coloured 
 your blood. What greater crown could a man win than to 
 die fighting for liberty with a pike or a gun in his hand ? 
 If he fails itself, won't he die to keep the blessed light 
 burning ? And in His own good time God'll side with the 
 right. Who knows but it is now ? Even England has the 
 pluck to fight when her own liberty is only threatened. 
 We'll see. We'll see. The hardest blow that God ever 
 struck me is that I'm eighty-seven this day and can't use 
 my legs, but thank Him for His mercy He hasn't taken my 
 mind and my wits from me. And there are young men in 
 plenty — aye, and women too — that have seen the light and 
 are ready to follow it." 
 
 " I hope to goodness there will be no foolishness," Cronin 
 said with a frown. 
 
 Darcy 's eyes glowed, but he made no reply. He leant 
 back in his chair and stared at the fire with a quiet smile. 
 "They're making songs in Ireland again," he said after a 
 while. "It's always a good sign. It's fifty years since I 
 made a vow, and the last rocks of Kerry fading into the 
 
294 CONQUEST 
 
 mist, that I'd never go back only to help to set her free ; and 
 here I am now, when the day has come, talking of old songs 
 and " 
 
 He stopped suddenly, asked Jim would he like a drop 
 of something, and recommended him not to leave New 
 York without seeing Grant's tomb and taking a trip up the 
 Hudson to Albany. 
 
 " Are there any statesmen in England ?" Cronin asked 
 moodily, as he drove Jim to his rooms at the Plaza. 
 
 Jim shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " There's something in the air," Cronin said with a frown. 
 " It can only be a flash in the pan, but it may do infinite 
 harm here and to the cause England is fighting for now. 
 She could so easily make friends with all these people — 
 even with Darcy. The greatest joke in the world, if it 
 wasn't so serious, is what Englishmen mean by self-deter- 
 mination. You're going to Boston and Chicago? You'll 
 find it's the same story there. If you go right through the 
 country from Seattle to Florida you'll find everywhere 
 what you've found in New York : a growing desire to enter 
 this war in spite of distrust of England. If England would 
 only make the gjand gesture towards Ireland — not in a 
 year's time or in ten years' time, or when she's forced to 
 it, but now and freely — nine-tenths "^f American distrust 
 would be blown away. I'd almost be inclined to say all of 
 it would go." 
 
 Jim went to Boston and Chicago and got back to New 
 York at the beginning of Easter week. 
 
 " Wasted enough time in discovering the obvious ?" Ken- 
 rick, with whom he was staying, asked drily. 
 
 " How far would you go ?" Jim asked. 
 
 " As far as I could stretch with the will to go my farthest," 
 Kenrick said thoughtfully. "There's only one end to this 
 war and that's victory, and, I hope, peace and security. 
 Even before the war England would have been more secure 
 
CONQUEST 295 
 
 with a friend beside her than with an angry stepdaughter. 
 After the war, if we're not living entirely on hot air, the 
 talk of strategic security is all bunkum. Anyhow, the 
 cutting of a rotten political halter means the building of a 
 sound economic bridge. No two countries in the world 
 need each other more than England and Ireland. Let the 
 Irish themselves decide. They've got to feel the taste of 
 freedom first. Who knows — I think so myself — but in a 
 few years a real Union may be possible. But it must be 
 founded on friendship and not on conquest." 
 
 Cronin came quietly into the room with a set face. 
 
 " TheyVe started a rebellion in Ireland," he said 
 coldly. 
 
 " My God," Kenrick said despairingly. 
 
 Jim stared at them dumbly. He heard vaguely that the 
 news had come through to the American Government in 
 cipher. The newspapers knew nothing — probably a strict 
 censorship. Dublin seemed to be in the hands of the 
 rebels. There were few details. Jim watched Cronin's 
 movements : the taking of a cigar out of a box on the library 
 table, the lighting of it, his attitude in front of the open 
 grate, as if something vital hung on them. But what he 
 heard and saw made only a feeble impression. What really 
 reached his brain and filled it was Diana. He saw her 
 vividly in the smallest of Cronin's actions. If he missed 
 one of them he should miss her. It was as if she was his 
 power of thinking, and any attempt to give her an existence 
 separate from it would drive her away. 
 
 "It's sheer lunacy," Kenrick said. 
 
 "The clash of imagination with the unimaginative," 
 Cronin said. 
 
 " Provocative stupidity if you like — still, the Irish should 
 have had more sense. Nothing but evil can come of it," 
 Kenrick said harshly. 
 
 "If England could only see it for what it is — a gesture, 
 
296 CONQUEST 
 
 and rather a fine one — it might settle things," Cronin said 
 doubtfully. 
 
 "She won*t. She'll shoot," Kenrick snapped. 
 
 Kenrick*s sharp voice half awakened Jim. What were 
 they talking about? Some sort of silly debate. Shoot? 
 A cold sweat broke out on his forehead. It was too horrible. 
 
 " There were no names mentioned ?" he said coldly, with 
 dry lips. 
 
 " None," Cronin said, looking at him curiously. 
 
 For days he haunted the news tape at the University 
 Club, read every edition of every newspaper, called up the 
 Consulate for some possible inside news. It was such a 
 storrtl in a teacup compared with the war. Yet it seemed 
 to hold the few men he could not succeed in avoiding 
 almost as deeply as it held him. At least they talked of 
 nothing else. There was a general suspense of judgment. 
 In the club smoking room he listened apathetically to 
 endless discussion. 
 
 "It's a stab in the back," Bramton^an English journalist, 
 said. 
 
 " It's like my kid of three going out solemnly and attack- 
 ing with his fists the big policeman at the corner," Kenrick 
 said drily. " Let's keep our sense of proportion." 
 
 "But, my God, people have been killed. It's cold- 
 blooded murder," Bramton said, horrified. 
 
 "Let us hope English newspapers aren't taking that 
 note. It has too much of the foretaste of the pogrom," 
 Kenrick said gravely. "The world is not inclined to 
 acquit England of all blame for an Irish revolution. Least 
 of all will she be held blameless for this one. Eight hun- 
 dred years of misgovernment have occasionally been held 
 to justify another name for what you call murder. I dare 
 say there was a time when George Washington — with more 
 reason, for he suffered less — ^was called a murderer. In 
 fact we know he was : murderer, traitor, assassin even — all 
 
CONQUEST 297 
 
 the names you are now inclined to give to the Irish rebels. 
 He succeeded, so you give him other titles now. You know 
 America pretty well, Bramton, and you keep your ears 
 open. Have you heard an American call the leaders of 
 this revolt traitors or murderers ? You shake your head. 
 Well, ponder that. It would be well if England took the 
 fact to heart and reflected on it. The revolt is petering 
 out — is over perhaps this moment. We shake our heads 
 over the foolishness of these men, for they are going to fail. 
 But it is the shake of the head that has in it more admira- 
 tion than blame. We regret that this has happened in the 
 middle of the war. The war matters too much to America 
 to make us draw back from the position we have taken up. 
 But do you think for one moment that, because we are going 
 to fight beside England in this war, we shall echo her words 
 about this rebellion ? There's not a man in the club except 
 yourself — and Fm not sure about you ; from your vehemence 
 I see you have misgivings — who doesn't hold England 
 responsible for this revolt of a mere handful of young men. 
 How many are there in all ? Not more than twelve or 
 thirteen hundred it seems. The surprise to me is that 
 there aren't more. It's not a revolt of the ignorant. It's 
 a revolt of the educated. It's a revolt of the men who know 
 all your past from the day Strongbow landed in Ireland. 
 It's a revolt of men who knew they'd fail ! But the imme- 
 diate cause of the rebellion is that men are now sitting on 
 your Treasury Bench and governing Ireland who were 
 plotting against Irish liberty just before the war; who, at 
 the outbreak of the war, diddled Ireland out of a miserable 
 sop of self-government. And for God's sake, Bramton, 
 give up talking of Casement and a German plot. We all 
 know poor Casement. He's a picturesque ornament for 
 your propaganda; but it's a damned foolish sort of 
 propaganda here. It may go down in England, but 
 we know, too well, how little Casement was in the councils 
 
298 CONQUEST 
 
 of the Irish either here or in Ireland. The next few days 
 will be a critical time for England in the eyes of the world, 
 and especially here. You won't be blamed for putting 
 down the rebellion. But everything will depend on how 
 you do it. Those idealists have captured men's imagina- 
 tions. I'm sorry to inflict this tirade on you, but I feel the 
 whole thing strongly. I go back to my illustration of my 
 kid and the big policeman. What would the policeman 
 do ? England has an eleventh-hour chance. She could 
 win Ireland back to-morrow by a generosity which is the 
 
 only wisdom. Or " he shrugged his shoulders and 
 
 looked gloomily at the fire. "^ 
 
 " Or ?" Jim repeated the word as a question to himself 
 over and over, but shirked giving a reply. He was 
 oppressed by a feeling of almost physical fear. What was 
 it Cronin called the revolt ? A gesture. Surely England 
 would see it. The men he fought with in Flanders and 
 Picardy would see it — those generous men who always 
 applauded courage even in the enemy. Bateson would see 
 it, and Leonard and Hill. Even Phipps would be uneasy 
 and in doubt. The new spirit was there, the new outlook 
 on life. What then made him afraid ? He shuddered. 
 There was no use in trying to blind himself to the fact that 
 the new had not yet driven out the old. And the old spirit, 
 which only dimly understood the new, was in office and 
 was still governing by the old methods. 
 
 A waiter handed him a newspaper. He looked fever- 
 ishly for the latest telegrams. . . . 
 
 It was all over. Pearse, MacDonagh, Plunkett. . . . 
 He gave a sigh of relief. Perhaps she wasn't in it — 
 though there had been more than one mention of women. 
 Poets almost to a man, with ideals that were essentially the 
 same as those that drove the best Englishmen to heroic 
 graves. And it was unawakened England that prevented 
 them from fighting side by side. Surely the England that 
 
CONQUEST 299 
 
 was fighting for liberty would understand. He turned 
 over another page and came on a later telegram : Arrest of 
 Miss Diana Scovell and Michael Driscoll. The print 
 swam in front of his eyes. It was some minutes befpre he 
 could read the details. She had been in command of one 
 of the surrendered buildings. Driscoll was leader of a 
 country detachment. ... 
 
 He struggled out of the club and found himself, when 
 evening fell, in Central Park. He had walked round and 
 round for hours till his leg was numb, and the same argu- 
 ments went full circle time after time in his mind. 
 
 " You know some of them ?" Mrs. Kenrick said at dinner. 
 
 "All of them I think." 
 
 " The woman, too ?*' 
 
 He nodded. 
 
 " Surely they can't shoot her ?" she said sympathetically. 
 
 He stared at her. Something seemed to snap in him. 
 It was as if some impending horror had at last fallen. 
 
 " Surely not," he echoed coldly. He noticed that she 
 was looking at him curiously. He pulled himself together 
 and found himself speaking of the squirrels in the Park. 
 
 The days dragged on. The war had no interest for him. 
 The shootings began. 
 
 "A big mistake," Kenrick said. " But it's hot blood yet 
 and could be forgiven." 
 
 The shootings went on. 
 
 " England is mad," Kenrick said angrily. " There were 
 only a few men in this, but these cold-blooded murders 
 will drive every Irishman to fury, not only in Ireland, but 
 here, in Australia, everywhere." 
 
 When the wounded Connolly was shot, Kenrick was in 
 despair. "It's a crime against the peace of the world. 
 Have they any sense, any feeling ?" he said vehemently. 
 
 Jim had become apathetic. "England is no better nor 
 worse than she was a month ago," he said dully. " I'm sure 
 u 
 
300 CONQUEST 
 
 there's an outcry in England against all this. The majority 
 of Englishmen believe in liberty, and many of tjiem are 
 dying for it every day. But the machine of government is 
 the old machine of the conqueror, and the men who run it 
 can't shake off the old system — probably don't want to. 
 The soldier who's responsible for all this probably thinks 
 it a triumph of law and order." ^ 
 
 "He ought to be shot," Kenrick said furiously. 
 
 " No, he'll be decorated," Jim said with an attempt at a 
 smile. 
 
 He grew to fear the newspapers and read all day in 
 Kenrick's library or walked in the Park. 
 
 " Driscoll is the only man shot to-day," Kenrick said one 
 morning at breakfast. "And, good God, they've given a 
 woman penal servitude for life. Diana Scovell. What do 
 you say to that ?" 
 
 " He was my cousin, and she — I hoped to marry her," 
 Jim said dully. 
 
 " And you can take it like that ?" Kenrick said wonder- 
 ingly, after a long pause. 
 
 Mrs. Kenrick left the room, weeping. 
 
 "I have no feeling left," Jim said shortly. 
 
 " What do you mean to do ?" 
 
 "Write a report of what America thinks of her coming 
 ally," Jim said savagely. "Do let me alone, Kenrick," he 
 added gently. "You've been very good to me. Let me 
 find myself again. All this has nearly driven me mad." 
 
 " You won't give up England ?" 
 
 " Will you ?" Jim asked coldly. 
 
 "There's a big idea behind the war you see," Kenrick 
 said doubtfully. 
 
 " I'm a slave to an idea, too," Jim said wearily. 
 " England has done her best to kill it with one hand, but 
 with the other — well, I can't forget the men I saw die 
 beside me " 
 
PART FIVE 
 
 Sir Silas Levin watched pensively a few leaves fall, 
 flutter awhile, and turbillion gracefully along the Champs 
 Elysees. He raised his eyes, and with a half repressed 
 sigh gazed wistfully at the converging lines of vivid golden 
 yellow that stretched up towards the Arc de Triomphe. 
 From his second floor windows he had seen the bare black 
 trees of January change gradually to masses of pink buds, 
 to the tender green of the first leaves, to the heavier green 
 of June, to the frowsy green of the hot summer months 
 which made him long for Deauville, whither many of his 
 fellow-workers had fled; and now, as a parting gift, was 
 this austere blaze of yellow gold under a brilliant October 
 sun. He sighed, turned his back on the window, locked a 
 despatch case on a console, counted half a dozen small 
 cases on the floor and looked thoughtfully at Jim Daly 
 who lounged, reading the Temps, in an armchair in front 
 of the fire. 
 
 "You need a holiday, Jim," he said with a glance at the 
 reflection of his own fresh, pink face in a mirror. 
 
 "I'm going to have it — a long one," Jim said with the 
 flicker of a smile on his worn face. 
 
 "Scarty?" 
 
 "Yes, Scarty." 
 
 " It's a wrench for me to get out of harness after forty-six 
 years," Sir Silas said, sinking carefully into an armchair. 
 " Very thoughtful of 'em, though, to put me on the Lauder 
 Commission. A winter in the sun is not to be despised at 
 my age. Sorry you're not coming with us, my boy, but 
 
302 CONQUEST 
 
 these little plums are naturally reserved for old war horses 
 who need a sun bath. Someone is isure to know something 
 about the work, and it gives us all a well-earned holiday. 
 As I said to the P.M., it merges us honourably as well as 
 pleasantly into the ranks of the unemployed — damned 
 thoughtful of *em. -And to think that at the outbreak of 
 the war I was within a month of the shelf — fading out, as 
 it were ! And here I am in the eleventh month of peace 
 still at it. If s been a wonderful war. And youVe made 
 your mark, Jim. The ball is now at your feet. Within a 
 few days you'll rank as a first secretary — IVe seen to that." 
 
 " My resignation is there on the table," Jim said listlessly. 
 
 ," Eh ?" Sir Silas said with a frown, sitting up straight in 
 his chair. "You must-.^ive up that nonsense. Thought 
 you had given it up. Think of your career, man. Bless 
 my soul, are you mad ? Why, you put your back into the 
 work — too much so, if anything — in a way that convinced 
 me that you wanted to stay on." 
 
 " Hope dies hard — and, well, it helped me to forget," 
 Jim said wearily. 
 
 " If you're not satisfied with the first secretaryship perhaps 
 something better could be done," Sir Silas said hopefully. 
 
 " Good Lord, it's not that," Jim said bitterly. 
 
 Sir Silas lit a cigar and puffed it thoughtfully, his eyes 
 fixed on the fire. 
 
 " Ireland again ?" he said with a slight frown. 
 
 " That and other things," Jim said with a shrug. 
 
 Sir Silas looked at him sympathetically, hesitated, and 
 said quietly, " I've never spoken of it before — though I felt 
 deeply for you. Your mother told me all about it. About 
 Diana, I mean. It must have been the very devil." 
 
 " It was," Jim said harshly. 
 
 "You saw her?" 
 
 "Once in Aylesbury jail when I got back from America. 
 And again when they released her," Jim said tonelessly. 
 
CONQUEST 303 
 
 "I hope — well, that she saw the error of her ways," Sir 
 Silas said tolerantly. 
 
 " No," Jim said with a smile. " She only saw the error 
 of mine. I couldn't agree with her then," he said lighting 
 a cigarette. " I don't agree now — but I'm not so sure." 
 
 Sir Silas gave a sigh. " You couldn't have married her. 
 
 It would have been impossible — a revolutionary — a " 
 
 he hesitated. 
 
 Jim laughed bitterly. " I met her with a motor outside 
 the jail and wanted her to marry me at once by special 
 licence — I had it in my pocket." 
 
 " Good God !" Sir Silas said, genuinely shocked. "You 
 — an official. We couldn't possibly have tolerated " 
 
 "Remember the Czechs and the Jugo Slavs," Jim said 
 drily. 
 
 "They're different," Sir Silas said with a frown and a 
 wave of his cigar, but with a slight uneasiness of tone. 
 "Professor Masaryk is now President of a republic in 
 alliance with us. Dr. Benes is its Foreign Minister. Dr. 
 Trumbic is Foreign Minister of the kingdom of the Serbs, 
 Croats, and Slovenes." 
 
 " They deserve it. It's to the credit of England to have 
 helped to make them what they are by freeing their coun- 
 tries," Jim said thoughtfully. " But how are they different 
 from the men who were shot in Dublin ? They are men of 
 the same type, with the same ideals." 
 
 He looked at his wooden leg moodily for a few seconds, 
 smiled, lit another cigarette. 
 
 " My wooden leg will always be there to remind me that 
 I mustn't give in," he said confidently. "This war has 
 been fought and won for an ideal. Some day peace will 
 follow." 
 
 Sir Silas looked at him uneasily. "A good bracing 
 holiday is what you need to set you up. Why, we've signed 
 the peace," he said tentatively, as if testing Jim's sanity. 
 
304 CONQUEST 
 
 " Good Lord, you don't call that last kick of the world of 
 conquest a peace ?" Jim said derisively. " I don't wonder 
 poor Wilson is ill." 
 
 " We've done very well. Not everything that we wished, 
 but, on the whole, very well indeed," Sir Silas said pom- 
 pously. " And we have the League of Nations to carry on 
 the good work.'* 
 
 "Bad as the League of Nations is, it's a miracle that 
 anything so good escaped from that game of grab and 
 vanity," Jim said moodily. "When the men who really 
 won the war have repaired the League some good may 
 come of it." 
 
 " Bless my soul, it's almost time for dejeuner," Sir Silas 
 said with a glance at the clock. "You were always im- 
 practicable, Jim. The German menace has gone and the 
 world is breathing freely at last." 
 
 " Ireland ?" Jim said grimly. 
 
 " Ireland always makes you see red, my boy," Sir Silas 
 said, levering himself out of his armchair. " She's damned 
 troublesome for her size, but she's not the world. We suc- 
 ceeded, thank God, in keeping her out of the Conference." 
 
 " You heard enough of her though ?" 
 
 " Yes, damn her. And America is rumbling again," Sir 
 Silas said impatiently. " That was only an official ' damn,' 
 Jim, my boy," he said with a glance at Jim's pained face. 
 "I suppose it's because I'm an Irishman at bottom, or per- 
 haps it's because I'm enjoying an unwonted freedom from 
 office, but I've been thinking of Ireland very much to-day. 
 When I'm rid of this Commission I want to settle there. 
 Speaking unofficially as your old grand-uncle, she's been 
 our biggest failure in the war. I did my best when you 
 cabled me that time from America, but everyone seemed to 
 be paralyzed, and nothing was done till it was too late. 
 And then, as usual, what was done was wrong. It's a sort 
 of armed camp now, I believe. But what can you expect 
 
CONQUEST 305 
 
 from the sort of people we've sent to govern it. They learn 
 to lie crudely at the War Office. A diplomatist would have 
 settled the country in a week." 
 
 "It's too late now even for subtle lying. For once in a 
 way they might try honesty," Jim said with a shrug. 
 " Anyhow, I'm sick of criminal blunders." 
 
 "The Cabinet Committee Phipps is on might do some- 
 thing — the pressure from America is rather severe," Sir 
 Silas said doubtfully. 
 
 "Good Lord," Jim said hopelessly. "Come, Uncle Si, 
 let's feed." 
 
 2. 
 
 Jim saw Sir Silas off on his winter holiday, crossed to 
 London next day, and bade good-bye to the Foreign 
 Office. He stayed two days in St. James's Place, making 
 arrangements to give up his rooms, and waiting for Phipps 
 and Bateson who were to travel with him to Dublin — 
 Phipps in quest of a solution of the Irish difficulty, Bateson 
 to write up Ireland for the Thunderer. 
 
 "It's been a rum war," Bateson said, from his corner of 
 Phipps* reserved compartment of the Kingstown boat train. 
 " This war to end war : the war of universal liberty and 
 universal peace. And they say we've won 'em, too. Close 
 on a million British and Irish gave their lives to that tune, 
 not to speak of the many millions who have memories like 
 this," holding out his empty left sleeve, "or less con- 
 spicuous but quite as enduring marks of the siren. We 
 used to pipe that little ditty, Jim, even before the war, when 
 Phipps said it was all tosh. And now that they say it's 
 come true we're both broken men, and Phipps is in the 
 Cabinet. Am I Alice in Wonderland, or the Special Cor- 
 respondent of the Thunderer on my way to Ireland to 
 describe the operations of an army in the field ? That 
 over-fed reactionary opposite can't be governing us in these 
 
3o6 CONQUEST 
 
 days of liberty. I've had only a third of a bottle of Bur- 
 gundy, and we've just given peace to the world — the Prime 
 Minister says so 1" 
 
 " The burglars seized the house while the family were at 
 the war," Jim said gloomily. 
 
 " The country is sound at the core," Phipps said amiably. 
 " It knows its friends and naturally chose the men who won 
 the war to do the reconstruction." 
 
 " Good Lord," Bateson said a little shrilly. " They won 
 the war by staying at home and bagging hve billions by 
 profiteering I And the damned fools who risked their lives 
 and lost their limbs, and the widows and orphans of the 
 dead'll have to redeem the debt. What do you say, Jim ?" 
 
 " I'm going to sleep," Jim said wearily. 
 
 He shut his eyes, but he couldn't shut himself off from 
 the discussion. Two days had tired him of what seemed 
 to be an interminable argument between Phipps and Bate- 
 son. It had made him sick at heart, but as he listened now 
 it somehow gave him a gleam of hope. The England in 
 power had made Ireland a hell, but the England in power 
 was not the England that won the war. The England that 
 fought for and won liberty for the rest of the world was 
 herself not free. She had not yet broken the shackles of 
 the old order. Selfishness and lust of money and power 
 had entrenched themselves while generosity and love of 
 liberty were at the wars. This explained the paralysis at 
 Paris, the seething discontent in England, the misgovern- 
 ment of Ireland, the distrust of the world. But the doom 
 of the militarists, the profiteers, and reactionaries was 
 already presaged by by-election after by-election. With 
 a freer England, with the men in power in England who 
 believed in an ideal and had fought for it, would come 
 freedom for Ireland. 
 
 "Hear that, Jim," Bateson said derisively. "Old Phipps 
 is going to settle Ireland." 
 
CONQUEST 307 
 
 "How much are your people in earnest, Phipps?" Jim 
 asked, mildly interested. 
 
 " Oh, of course, we're in earnest," Phipps said doubtfully. 
 "We must do something. That damned Liberal Home 
 Rule Act comes into force on signing peace with Turkey, 
 and we can't keep putting that off indefinitely. It's all 
 damned awkward, though. Most of the Committee are up 
 to their necks in promises to Ulster. One can't quite trust 
 L.G. It may be a trick to round on us ? What ? Of 
 course he may be on the straight — America is pressing him 
 hard. But one never knows with him. Damned if I know 
 what to do. If America had ratified the peace treaties 
 things would be easier. But something may turn up. 
 What do you think is the least they'd take, Jim ?" 
 
 " The same old game," Bateson said with a shrug of dis- 
 gust. " But perhaps you're prepared to do something ? I 
 see Freddy Smith's been over. Going to round on his 
 Ulster friends ? Set a slim 'un to catch the slim is a sound 
 Georgian principle. I shouldn't be surprised, though, if 
 L. G. has only given you a halter to hang yourselves. He 
 sees you're played out and wants to creep back over your 
 corpses to something with more promise of life. Your 
 death bell's a-ringing, Phipps." 
 
 " I've been reading the report of the Convention — some- 
 thing might be done with that," Phipps said hazily. " Or 
 the new Federal Commission ?" he added with a sigh. 
 
 Bateson laughed. " The Convention helped you to trick 
 America into the war. When you got her in you never 
 even read the report. Try again. Rip Van Winkle. Good 
 Lord, and you're going to settle the Irish question." 
 
 "What do you say, Jim ?" Phipps said, ignoring Bateson 
 with a frown of offended dignity. 
 
 " I've been telling you for over twenty years but you've 
 never listened," Jim said quietly. "The beginning and 
 end of the Irish question for you and your party was that 
 
3o8 CONQUEST 
 
 you had conquered Ireland and would do as you pleased 
 with her. It wasn't for Irishmen to suggest anything — it 
 was for you to decide what best suited your own purpose 
 or convenience. That was the view of the English govern- 
 ing class down to the outbreak of the war. It wasn't the 
 view of aU Englishmen, thank God, but. it was the view of 
 those who pulled the strings and ruled. You held a big 
 slice of the world and you were determined to stick to it. 
 You never let go anywhere till you had to, and then only 
 by as little as you could. In 19 14 Germany challenged 
 your position. She threatened to conquer you. But she 
 also threatened to destroy liberty all over the world. 
 Enough people wouldn't go into the war to put or keep you 
 in power, but they would to defend liberty. So you had 
 to go into the war, not to maintain your position as con- 
 querors but to secure world liberty. That's how you got 
 your armies together. That's what men died for. That's 
 what the honour of England is pledged to." 
 
 "Pooh, pooh. Hyde Park oratory, Jim," Phipps said 
 with a forced laugh. 
 
 " Don't waste your breath, Jim," Bateson said angrily. 
 " They learn nothing and forget everything. Phipps and 
 his breed came out of the war just as they went into it — 
 mere party intriguers. They got us to fight for them, 
 sneaked office while we were away, snatched an election 
 before we got back, nobbled the Welsh evangelist to talk 
 liberty while they practised tyranny, and now the fools 
 think they're going to rule the roost till kingdom come." 
 
 " We are honourable men," Phipps said urbanely. 
 
 " The humour of it is that he believes it," Bateson said 
 with a grimace. 
 
 "We must do something to clear up this mess in Ire- 
 land," Phipps said with a frown at Bateson. 
 
 " Clear out before you've disgraced your country," Bate- 
 son grunted. 
 
CONQUEST 309 
 
 " The only way to clear it up is to act on the principles 
 on which you entered the war," Jim said quietly. " It's the 
 honour of England against pre-war party politics now. 
 Clear out your army of occupation arid let Ireland decide 
 for herself. It's that or holding the country by conquest." 
 
 " But surely there's a middle way — there are sane, 
 reasonable, patriotic men in Ireland," Phipps said im- 
 pressively. 
 
 Bateson laughed. "Sane, reasonable, patriotic," he 
 echoed derisively. " Men who think like Phipps." 
 
 " There were many middle ways till you broke them 
 down," Jim said patiently. "Almost any sort of Home 
 Rule that didn't mean partition would have made Ireland 
 friendly at the outbreak of the war. You chose to provoke 
 a rebellion. Your cold-blooded shooting of the leaders 
 threw the whole of Nationalist Ireland into the arms of 
 Sinn Fein. If, instead of misleading your Ulster dupes 
 you'd been in earnest about the Convention, you could pos- 
 sibly even then have imposed a settlement : Dominion 
 Home Rule — making Ireland, say, as free as Canada — 
 would have served. But instead you began the rake's pro- 
 gress. You promised Home Rule with your tongues in 
 your cheeks and threatened conscription — a promise you 
 never intended to fulfil, and a threat you were afraid to 
 enforce. Well, you see the fruits of your work now. YouVe 
 something like a hundred thousand troops in the country 
 armed with tanks and field guns and aeroplanes. You're 
 arming the police with hand grenades. You ask if there 
 are any sane or moderate men in Ireland. There's hardly 
 a Nationalist who doesn't think you insane or criminally 
 wicked." 
 
 " Read the returns of crime," Phipps said indignantly. 
 
 " I've read 'em," Jim said grimly. " You're not even able 
 to manufacture good propaganda. You exasperate a whole 
 people to fury and then point triumphantly to the mur- 
 
310 CONQUEST 
 
 ders you provoked in justification of your policy. Sinn 
 Fein and the Gaelic League and the Women's Organization 
 you've suppressed are as incapable of murder as the Carlton 
 Club — less so, since Ireland is the most crimeless country 
 in Europe." 
 
 " We must make ^em observe the law," Phipps said firmly. 
 " And the people were murdered." 
 
 " It's notorious that some of these political crimes were 
 acts of private vengeance," Jim said with a shrug. "You 
 were brought up with a sense of fair play, Phipps. The 
 situation is as old as conquest. The effect of military 
 tyranny is always lawlessness. Though you have won the 
 war for freedom it's not necessary to take over all the 
 methods of the Turk. These murders are deplorable, but 
 the guilt is between the Government and the irresponsible 
 people who committed them and not with the political 
 groups whose reputation your propaganda is trying to 
 blacken. You are blackening the good name of England 
 and not Ireland. Sympathy didn't go to the Turk and the 
 Austrian no matter how good their propaganda was. It's 
 true you haven't descended to a general massacre yet," he 
 added bitterly. 
 
 His lip quivered, and he gazed past Phipps at a view of 
 Chester. Phipps looked at him for a moment and said half 
 apologetically : 
 
 "Damn it, Jim. It's all only politics." 
 
 "Shut up, you ass," Bateson said roughly. "And you 
 needn't talk like a damned dull book, Jim. England's all 
 right this time — it's Phipps's damned Government. It 
 makes one almost ashamed of being an Englishman. But 
 we'll turn 'em out. See if we don't. And then we'll have 
 what we fought the war for. We'll have Ireland and 
 England drinking out of the one glass before you know 
 where you are." 
 
 "Massacre was unfair — perhaps," Jim said with a faint 
 
CONQUEST 311 
 
 smile. "You see it's not all what you call politics to me, 
 Phipps. We're not politicians at all in Ireland in your 
 sense of the word. I suppose because she's down she 
 matters too much. It can't be a game even on the surface 
 with us. We're particularists if you like to sneer at us. 
 But then, you've got there. I was brought up as a child to 
 hate you all indiscriminately. As a boy I said a hundred 
 times that I'd fight the English when I grew up. Instead 
 I went to Winchester and made friends with you both. 
 Being Irish, I can throw off my thin veneer of reserve. I 
 soon found that England wasn't all anti-Irish. It was made 
 up of a great mass of people who hardly knew that Ireland 
 existed, and of Phippses and Batesons — almost as many 
 Batesons as Phippses. And the Phippses even I couldn't 
 hate. I thought 'em wrong, but I could understand their 
 point of view. The evil was that most Irishmen saw 
 England as serried ranks of Phippses — not like our old 
 stupid Phipps, Bateson, but as a malignant oppressive race 
 that governed by hate. I was right in my view. But the 
 Irish people at home were right, too; for the government 
 they got was a government by malignant Phippses. It's 
 a curse of conquest that even the Batesons — like Swift's 
 bishops who, in crossing Hounslow Heath, were trans- 
 formed into highwaymen — ^when in Dublin Castle have to 
 wear the clothes and use the weapons of the worst of the 
 Phippses. Not even a Bateson could be anything but a 
 conqueror under the Union. My dream was that Ireland 
 would one day see England as I saw it. That England 
 would allow her to see it. And that England would see 
 Ireland as I knew it to be. But this could never happen so 
 long as they stood in the relation of conqueror and con- 
 quered — and conquered, too, only by persistent force, for 
 Ireland has never admitted she was conquered and has 
 always been in revolt, latent or open. It became a count- 
 ing of heads with me. When the Batesons in England 
 
312 CONQUEST 
 
 outnumbered the Phippses, Ireland and England would at 
 last be friends." 
 
 " What about the Ulster difficulty ?" Phipps growled. 
 
 " The Ulster difficulty, or nine-tenths of it, was either an 
 obsession or an invention of the Phippses, and would dis- 
 appear with them," Jim said, with a wave of his hand. 
 
 He sighed, and went on in a dull monotone : 
 
 "Well, the war came, and the Phippses shouted liberty 
 even more loudly than the Batesons. They condemned 
 conquest and the idea of conquest. They nailed the flag 
 of liberty to the mast and set off on the crusade for the 
 salvation of the world." 
 
 " With the Jolly Roger hid up their sleeve,"- Bateson said 
 drily. "Don't you worry, Jim, it's the last cruise of the 
 pirates." 
 
 " I believed *em," Jim continued tonelessly. " Redmond 
 believed 'em. Dale, with all his cynicism, believed *em. 
 Thousands of Irishmen swallowed their distrust and went 
 to their deaths through faith in Redmond. Well, Redmond 
 is dead of a broken heart. Dale was riddled by shrapnel 
 near Noyon. He was picked up by Reeve — one of your lot, 
 Phipps — and lived long enough to have a last sneer at 
 England. You remember that smiling sneer of his ? Reeve 
 told me he'd never felt so sick and ashamed in all his life. 
 Poor old Dale." 
 
 He paused a moment, looked listlessly at his leg, and 
 went on with a harsh laugh : " And now I'm going home to 
 see Ireland rejoicing under liberty." 
 
 "You ignore the rebellion," Phipps said in an aggrieved 
 tone. 
 
 "You didn't succeed in deceiving them" Jim said 
 roughly. 
 
 "That's all right enough, but we have a case," Phipps 
 said with a frown. " For our own protection we can't give 
 u^ Ireland. She's necessary to our defence^" 
 
CONQUEST 313 
 
 " The old excuse for conquest," Jim said drily. " And 
 whereas your League of Nations ?" 
 
 "Oh, the League of Nations !" Phipps said with a shrug 
 and a grin. "And our foreign policy is vital. We can't 
 dream of letting 'em have that." 
 
 "You manage foreign policy so well," Jim said with a 
 smile. 
 
 "And the police with the hand grenades?" Bateson 
 sneered. 
 
 "Loyalists must have protection," Phipps said pompously. 
 
 "What are you going to do?" Jim asked carelessly. 
 
 "Give him time," Bateson said, fixing his rug. "Jle has 
 never been in Ireland before, and he'll need at least a week- 
 end to confirm the prejudices of a lifetime." 
 
 " We'll impose an equitable settlement," Phipps said in 
 his best ministerial manner. " The Sinn Feiners won't 
 meet us or discuss matters." 
 
 " That is, Ireland won't meet you. Well, after ignoring 
 Ireland, what next ?" 
 
 "There are the moderate men," Phipps said vaguely. 
 
 "As they exist only in your imagination, we'll let you 
 have *em," Bateson conceded graciously. "Well?" 
 
 "It goes without question that we can't coerce Ulster — 
 some gentle persuasion, perhaps ; but we must bear in mind 
 the Two Nations. We'll be as fair as we can. We have 
 to carry all England with us, and let the world, especially 
 America, see that we mean to be just." 
 
 Bateson looked at his empty sleeve ruefully. "Are we 
 back in 19 14 ?" he said with a jeer. " I'm sometimes proud of 
 being an Englishman. But I must admit that such damned 
 drivel of self-complacency is only possible in an English- 
 man. Old Phipps was always a bit of a fool — that's why 
 
 he's a minister — but of all the asinine ** he shook his 
 
 head helplessly. 
 
 " Yqu mnsX kjaovAhajt }rou can't do it, Phipps," Jim said 
 
314 CONQUEST 
 
 with a return to some of his old eagerness. " Apart alto- 
 gether from the betrayal of the ideal for which we went into 
 the war, the thing is foolish. You can't impose a settle- 
 ment — and such a settlement — on a country against its 
 will. Especially on Ireland, on whom youVe never been 
 able to impose anything." 
 
 "They don't want a settlement. They want to repeal 
 the existing Home Rule Act and make Southern Ireland a 
 Crown Colony. Their peace is Partition, Coercion and 
 Re-conquest," Bateson said derisively. 
 
 The ministerial veil descended on Phipps's eyes. 
 " Nothing is decided," he said shortly. 
 
 " England isn't mad," Jim said to Bateson with a shrug. 
 
 "Only the Government. They're drunk with the delu- 
 sion that they've won the war. It's not Ireland only^ 
 They're straddling ineptly all over the world. An old 
 Admiral has said at least one wise thing — sack the lot." 
 
 " We've four years yet," Phipps said complacently. 
 
 "Give you four to one against it," Bateson said airily. 
 " Making peace in Ireland on your lines would diddle you 
 in a month. You couldn't do it with double your present 
 army of occupation, gas masks, bombs, hand grenades, tanks, 
 and all your other fertilizers of liberty. But, by Jove," he 
 added after a pause, with a grimace, " I'd better hedge. You 
 have a chance. If it became a question between Ireland and 
 office, George'd make it a Dominion — a Republic even — 
 rather than quit." 
 
 Phipps scowled and settled himself into his corner with 
 pursed lips and tightly shut eyes. 
 
 " If you were an Irishman you'd be sick of all this 
 juggling," Jim growled to Bateson. 
 
 "I'm sick of it as it is. So, I believe, are the majority of 
 Englishmen. But we must make 'em sicker," Bateson said 
 savagely. 
 
CONQUEST 315 
 
 The Dublin coast line that had smiled so often on Jim 
 was grey and apathetic as he stood by the gangway, im- 
 patient of the slow entry of the boat into Kingstown 
 harbour. The soldiers who thronged the fore-deck had 
 donned steel helmets and all the accoutrement of instant 
 battle. 
 
 "A hostile landing?" Jim asked. 
 
 " Hush," Bateson said gravely. " Phipps is the dove of 
 peace. They're his escort. You mustn't think there's an 
 unusual number of soldiers in Ireland — it's merely a good 
 training ground for an army in peace time. So the Chief 
 Secretary told an American journalist. A Chief Secretary 
 is always an honourable man noted for truth telling. He's 
 Phipps's colleague, and he's to be his mentor on the whole 
 truth about Ireland. The soldiers are only a pledge of 
 good feeling. Hope they'll have a tank to meet you, 
 Phipps." 
 
 On the landing stage, however, were only a smiling 
 official, a group of obyious detectives, and a background of 
 more soldiers in trench helmets, armed with rifles and fixed 
 bayonets. 
 
 Bateson firmly declined a seat in Phipps's motor car. 
 
 "Good-bye, old man," he said genially. "Jim and I 
 have still some shred of reputation left — we don't want to 
 lose it." 
 
 When Phipps had driven off, with two attendant mote 
 cars, there was a long wait while the train was being loadec 
 with military baggage. 
 
 "What papers have you?" Jim asked a newsvendor. 
 
 " There's one or two that isn't suppressed," he said with 
 a grin. " So you're in luck to-day, your honour. If it was 
 to-morrow now, there mightn't be one at all. It's an itch 
 
3i6 CONQUEST 
 
 they have on them for disturbing people, the poor creatures," 
 he added with a contemptuous leer at the soldiers. 
 
 There were soldiers at Westland Row Station. Soldiers 
 lounged in the streets leading to the hotel. At breakfast at 
 the Shelbourne the tables were mostly occupied by officers. 
 
 A boyish-looking major of about twenty-four, with 
 several wound stripes, jumped up hastily and came towards 
 Jim's table, his hand extended, and shouted " Jim Daly." 
 
 " Stephen Edwardes," Jim said gladly after a moment's 
 pause. 
 
 " Have only a minute," Stephen said, taking a seat. " Got 
 to prevent the Sinn Fein Parliament meeting to-day. 
 They've suppressed it, you know. Damned if I know what 
 they haven't suppressed. But the rebs have the laugh on 
 us every time. I'm about getting fed up with it. The war 
 was a clean job, but this " he made a wry face. 
 
 "We're doing our best to drive *em into another rebel- 
 lion," he added with a gravity that was new to Jim. "We 
 rounded up thirty-five men the other day who hadn't done 
 a damned thing, and they're in Mountjoy jail this minute — 
 handcuffed in their cells, by God. Why, we never did that 
 to the Germans ! And Dan Sugrue is in jail on suspicion of 
 shooting a policeman ! Dan Sugrue murder a peeler in the 
 dark ! He's just as likely to murder his own young son !" 
 
 " Perhaps good may come of it if it has made all the 
 Covenanters feel like you," Jim said. 
 
 "Oh, nothing'd stop 'em gibbering in Belfast," Stephen 
 said with disgust. " But I'm out of all that tosh. I've had 
 too much of the real thing. Believe me, very few of the 
 men who've been out'll ever dress up for Carson again. But 
 I must be off on this sickening job. See you again — don't 
 be surprised if you see me a Sinn Feiner one day — there's a 
 limit to what a man can stand of this," he muttered as he 
 waved a good-bye. 
 
 " That's illuminating," Bateson said. 
 
CONQUEST 317 
 
 Jim laughed. " Stephen is hardly a type. Many of thfe 
 more stalwart Covenanters are having- a go at Sinn Fein 
 now under cover of the King's uniform. The whole of 
 Ulster, I believe, is ruled by Carson's chief of staff. That's 
 the Government's way of promoting peace in Ireland. 
 However, Stephen's attitude is hopeful — he's not the only 
 decent man in Ulster. Let's go and see how they suppress 
 the meeting." 
 
 They strolled round towards the Mansion House. Ex- 
 cept for an unusual number of policemen and soldiers, the 
 streets were much as Jim remembered them. There were 
 amused smiles on the faces of some of the passers-by. A 
 nursemaid wheeling a pram in Stephen's Green, shouted, 
 "Sold again," to a passing detachment of steel-helmeted 
 soldiers. 
 
 Along the pavement on either side of the Mansion House 
 were massed large bodies of troops. A cordon was drawn 
 round the open space in front of the broad steps. Jim and 
 Bateson stood on the opposite pavement among a group of 
 grinning spectators. Anyone who tried to enter the Man- 
 sion House was challenged. 
 
 "There's De Lacey," Jim said, pointing to a bearded 
 man in spectacles approaching the cordon. 
 
 " You're a member of Parliament — you can't go in," a 
 soldier said. 
 
 " I wish to see the Lord Mayor on Corporation business 
 — I'm an Alderman," De Lacey said quietly. 
 
 " No go, you know," a second lieutenant said with a con- 
 fident laugh. " The lid is tight on the meeting of the sup- 
 pressed Parliament." 
 
 Jim and Bateson had come near. De Lacey turned 
 and saw them. 
 
 " You'll be able to tell them in England, Mr. Bateson, of 
 the efficiency of their Government," he said with a tired 
 smile. " How are you, Daly ? I was up all night," he said, 
 
3i8 CONQUEST 
 
 raising his voice for the benefit of the listening soldiers. 
 " The meeting these poor devils are here to suppress broke 
 up at three this morning, and most of the members are now 
 on their way home. All Dublin knows it except the 
 Government." 
 
 "Tell that to the Marines," the young officer said with 
 an uneasy laugh. 
 
 De Lacey shrugged his shoulders and turned away w4th 
 Jim and Bateson. "It's an impossible situation," he said, 
 as they walked towards Nassau Street, "for them," he 
 added with a smile. " They have only one choice. They 
 can put Ireland to fire and sword — they'll have to kill by 
 the thousand, and even then those that are left will breed 
 again — or else give us what we want." 
 "What do you want?" Bateson asked. 
 " Good faith first. You can't overawe us with tanks and 
 poison gas; nor with accusations of murder and burglary 
 and larceny. The only crime we're guilty of is the deter- 
 mination to make Irishmen as free in Ireland as English- 
 men are in England. If England thinks that a crime then 
 she has been mouthing lies to the world for the last five 
 years. However, it's not my business to make England 
 logical. Until her actions in Ireland bear some relation to 
 her professions of political principle, it is our duty to make 
 her Government ridiculous and impossible. We are doing 
 it and we will go on doing it." 
 
 " You would be friends ?" Bateson asked. 
 "To-morrow," De Lacey said with emphasis. "Only 
 remember this : you're not able to make us friends by force. 
 Much less can you make us friends by chicanery. You 
 tried that once too often. The men in Ireland who are 
 bitterest against you to-day are not the men who fought 
 against you in the rebellion, but the men who fought with 
 you in the war. You've only to look around you to see 
 why. But I must go in here." 
 
CONQUEST 319 
 
 He waved a hand with a smile and went into a book- 
 shop. 
 
 " When will God open our eyes ?" Bateson said moodily. 
 " It's heartbreaking, Jim. Phipps and Co. — good Lord ! 
 A stupid Government is the greatest scourge of God. I 
 believe this war has meant something overwhelming to us 
 — that England has found her soul. Yet we have a 
 Government that rules with more than the cynicism of 
 Waipole, degraded by hypocrisy of which he couldn't be 
 accused. Is the war and what we fought for all a delusion ? 
 Have we the Government we deserve, and are De Lacey 
 and all these people right in thinking us liars and hypo- 
 crites and tyrants ?" 
 
 A tank followed by a squad of soldiers in trench helmets 
 slowly lumbered up the street. 
 
 " Damnation," Bateson said wrathfully, averting his eyes 
 as it passed. 
 
 " Do you still believe in us, Jim ?" he asked, after a long 
 pause. 
 
 " It's hard to keep one's faith, but I do. In an England 
 invisible here — that, perhaps, doesn't exist," Jim said, star- 
 ing at the tank. 
 
 " Let's go back to the hotel," Bateson said with a note of 
 resolution in his voice. "I'm going back to London to- 
 night to raise a fiery cross. This is not a question of 
 Ulster, or of England and Ireland. It's a question of the 
 honour and good name of England. We can never hold 
 up our heads in the world again if we allow this thing to 
 go on. It's not a matter of pressure from America or un- 
 holy pledges to Orange politicians or a party deal or saving 
 our face before the world. It's whether England has a con- 
 science, whether she has any thought for her honour and her 
 word, for right and justice, for fair play, for the principles 
 for which Englishmen shed their blood in the war ; or is to 
 go down to history faithless and dishonoured." 
 
320 CONQUEST 
 
 Bateson's words rang in Jim's ears through the nighty 
 and above the noise of the train as he travelled to Lisgeela 
 next morning. Bateson was right. If he could only pre- 
 vail — and he must prevail. England had given too many 
 martyrs to liberty not to think clearly at last. . . . 
 
 A brilliant sun lit up the brown of the bogs, the yellow- 
 ing trees, the red earth of the fields turned up by the 
 plough. It glanced on the ploughshares, and glittered on 
 the bayonets of soldiers on the march beyond a hedge. . . . 
 
 Diana was right. She had not fought against the 
 England that loved liberty passionately. If one looked 
 into the heart of things she had fought for it. For she had 
 fought against that last remnant of tyranny which still 
 darkened the soul of England. . . . 
 
 At Ballybawn Junction there were soldiers, open-faced, 
 bronzed, and laughing. The old porter scowled at them as 
 he trundled Jim's luggage as close as he dared to their toes. 
 
 " One of them devils killed a man, and they put it down 
 on us," he said in a dull tone. 
 
 Soldiers lounged about the platform at Lisgeela. Father 
 Lysaght met Jim at the carriage door. 
 
 " It's all a bad business — a bad business," he said sadly, 
 as he wrung Jim's hand. • " Come here, Mulcahy. Be quick 
 and attend to Mr. Daly's things," he called out to the red- 
 headed porter. 
 
 Mulcahy gave a sour look at Jim's stiff leg and passed 
 on to attend to another passenger. 
 
 " That's what comes of your fighting for the English," the 
 priest said whimsically. " But come on. I want you to 
 come up the town with me. We'll send in Durkan to look 
 after the things." 
 
 " What's become of the market ? Isn't this the October 
 fair ?" Jim asked, looking round the deserted approach to 
 the station and at the empty cattle siding. 
 
 "Sure it is. But not a fair or market can we hold. 
 
CONQUEST 321 
 
 They'd be an illegal assembly. That's what I want you to 
 hurry for. Con Driscoll was talking to three or four men 
 on the street half an hour ago, and they've arrested him for 
 it. The whole life of the place is held up. What does the 
 Latin say about God sending people mad that He has a 
 mind to destroy? I wouldn't doubt if the end of the 
 English was at hand for they've gone clean off their heads. 
 Run in, Durkan," he said to the driver, as they approached 
 Jim's car, " and gather up Mr, Jim's things and pick us up 
 at the police barracks. And take care that you're not 
 caught talking with four people at once, for that makes a 
 felon of you, and these idle peelers," with a glance at the 
 blushing policemen at the station door, "'d be glad to get 
 some work to do, and might land you in jail. And let us 
 come away now to the barracks," he added, taking Jim's 
 arm excitedly. " Between the both of us we might be able 
 to make Inspector Foley see some sense and let Con 
 Driscoll out." 
 
 He almost dragged Jim along. " If we don't hurry they 
 might motor him off to jail. And there might be a riot or 
 something and people shot. For the best part of my life 
 I've striven to keep order in this town, and now the Govern- 
 ment is putting it beyond me. A policeman was shot near 
 here. I abhor the crime; but what can you expect under 
 military rule ? Soldiers and peelers break into thousands 
 of houses every week and breed crime in the name of the 
 law. The Government seems bent on blackening Sinn Fein 
 and jailing innocent men. So the whole district is pro- 
 claimed and put under martial law. The whole place is at 
 sixes and sevens. The people are exasperated to the last 
 limit, and the soldiers ctnd police are in the same state. 
 What'll happen, God only knows. All my life, Jim, I've 
 kept out of politics, but in my old age I'm sorely tempted 
 to take a hand agin a Government that could be guilty of 
 such a crime agin God and man." 
 
322 CONQUEST 
 
 A detachment of soldiers was drawn up in front of the 
 white and black police barracks. The steel shutters were 
 in place in front of the windows. Two policemen with 
 rifles guarded the door. No difficulty was made about 
 allowing the priest and Jim to enter, and they were shown 
 at once into the inspector's office. 
 
 "Bad luck about your leg, Daly," Foley said briskly, 
 shaking hands. 
 
 " Think of that now, and me never thinking of it. I'm 
 very sorry, Jim," Father Lysaght said with an affectionate 
 look. " But it shows how ye all have disturbed my mind, 
 Mr. Foley. What about Con Driscoll and the other poor 
 men you have arrested ?" 
 
 " What about 'em ?" Foley said with a defensive grin. 
 
 "You know they're as innocent of any crime as we are,'* 
 the priest said indignantly. 
 
 " They broke the law," Foley said firmly. 
 
 "You know that that law ought never to have been put in 
 force here," the priest said with a keen look. " You know 
 as well as I do why Gage was shot ?'* 
 
 Foley shrugged his shoulders. " My dear Father James, 
 the Lord Lieutenant has proclaimed the district. It's not 
 for me to question his acts. There's the law and I've got 
 to obey it." 
 
 "But you have some discretion in enforcing it? To 
 arrest Con Driscoll of all men — who all his life stood out 
 against crime of any kind !" 
 
 " His son was one of the leaders of the rebellion — shot 
 for it," Foley said drily. 
 
 "Father and son might differ," the priest said sternly. 
 " The day his son was shot, Con was fighting the Germans 
 on the side of the English. He spent four years at it and 
 was wounded twice." 
 
 "I know all that. It will no doubt tell in his favour 
 when he comes before the R.M. It's my business to arrest 
 
CONQUEST 323 
 
 him ii he breaks the law — extenuating circumstances are 
 for the court to consider." 
 
 "They were only discussing the price of a beast," the 
 priest said helplessly. 
 
 "They were breaking the law," Foley said in a tone of 
 finality. 
 
 Jim laughed. Foley looked at him suspiciously. 
 
 "What's the joke ?" he said sharply. 
 
 " It's too long and intricate to explain," Jim said with a 
 smile. " And it's as wide as the British Empire. You 
 know perhaps that Driscoll is a cousin of mine. May I see 
 him ?" 
 
 " Oh," Foley said wrinkling his brow and pursing his lips. 
 " Well, I can see no harm in that. You are loyal anyhow." 
 
 Jim shrugged his shoulders, a faint smile struggling on 
 his lips. Foley touched a bell and instructed the police- 
 man who answered it to show Mr. Daly to the prisoner 
 Driscoll's cell. 
 
 Jim followed the policeman across the hall, through the 
 guardroom with its gleaming, sandpapered white deal 
 furniture. Two men in handcuffs sat on a form in front of 
 the fire. Half a dozen policemen were lounging about the 
 room or reading newspapers at the table. 
 
 "Driscoll is in one of the cells," the policeman said 
 apologetically. "We had to separate 'em or maybe it's an 
 ' illegal meeting ' they'd be holding under our nose." 
 
 He took a key off the whitewashed wall, hung with rifles, 
 and led the way through a paved corridor at the back. He 
 unlocked a door and said : 
 
 "A visitor to see you." 
 
 By the faint light of a small window near the ceiling Jim 
 could make out the outlines of a figure lying on a narrow 
 bench at the back of the cell. 
 
 " Why, it's Jim Daly that's in it," he heard in Con Dria- 
 coll's voice, as the rug-blanket was pitched on to the floor, 
 
324 CONQUEST 
 
 and Con struggled to his feet, impeded by his manacled 
 hands. 
 
 "I'll wait for you in the corridor," the policeman said 
 shamefacedly, retiring and shutting the door behind him. 
 
 " There isn't a seat to offer you beyond the board-bed I 
 was lying on, but sure we can sit there," Con said apolo- 
 getically as he completed a difficult handshake. 
 
 " This is too bad," Jim said angrily as they sat down. 
 
 "There's no loss in it," Con said thoughtfully. "The 
 crops are all in but the swedes, and a touch of frost, if it 
 comes itself, won't harm them. It isn't for long they can 
 keep me locked up for this, and it'll reinstate me in the 
 good opinion of the neighbours. Some of 'em used to look 
 black enough at me since I came back from the war. But 
 a while in jail'll give me back my character. And it's w^ 
 I deserved to lose it for being such a fool as to believe in 
 the English. But the jail'll make me clean again. I'd be 
 thankful to you if you'd take a look in on Sally and Molly 
 Jordan and give 'em what comfort you can. Mike's death 
 tells hard on the both of them still, and they might be a 
 little upset over this." 
 
 "Poor Mike," Jim muttered. 
 
 " I try to keep the thought of him from me, but it's no use, 
 Jim. I wouldn't mind if they killed him in fair fight. But 
 to take him out and shoot him in cold blood agin a wall ! 
 The first I heard of it was from a piece of newspaper that I 
 wrapped my dinner in, and I in the front trench. It 
 flustered me like and they had to take me to the hospital I 
 was that light in my head. Captain Dale came to see me 
 — it's a sad man he'd be to be alive this day — and he tried 
 to make me see that it was the doing of some mad general 
 or other, and that I wasn't to hold all the English to ac- 
 count for the doings of one fool. It was hard doctrine, but 
 I tried to bow my head to it for the sake of Ireland. They 
 offered to let me home on leave, but I couldn't face Sally 
 
CONQUEST 325 
 
 and Molly Jordan while the memory of how Mike was shot 
 was fresh in them. For two years and a half after that I 
 did my best to help to free the world. And when they said 
 we'd set it free I came home to all this." 
 
 He held up his hands and rattled the chain of his hand- 
 cuffs. 
 
 "Was it a will o' the wisp that we were following out 
 there after all, Jim ?" he said with a puzzled frown. " And 
 they were so much in earnest. Sometimes I think it must 
 be a nightmare is on me, for it's hard to believe that the 
 same men who carried freedom to the Belgians, and the 
 rest, can be giving the lie to themselves here. The Lord 
 Lieutenant going across to England and calling us assas- 
 sins ! It's what the Germans used to do when they wanted 
 a©, excuse for murdering innocent people." 
 
 The door opened and a policeman said that Father 
 Lysaght was waiting. Jim was glad of the interruption, 
 for he didn't know what to say to Con. There was nothing 
 to say. 
 
 "You'll go and give a word of comfort to Sally and 
 Molly?" Con said again in a dull voice, "and maybe the 
 neighbours'd give them a hand while I'm gone from them. 
 Glory be to God it's a bitter bringing up He's giving to 
 them two young childre of Mike's." 
 
 The priest was waiting at the barrack door. 
 
 " Your mother asked me out to lunch, but I can't go," he 
 said with a worried frown. " I can't leave the town. The 
 Government is kindling a flame they'll never be able to put 
 out. Flesh and blood can hardly stand it, but I must stay 
 here and try and get the people to keep the law of God, 
 anyway. Though how the good God Himself stands this 
 sort of thing is a mystery." 
 
 Jim drove through the town with a set face. Small 
 detachments of soldiers and policemen paraded the streets. 
 At almost every door stood one or more of the occupants of 
 
326 CONQUEST 
 
 the houses with sullen, expectant faces. A boy trundled a 
 hoop along the almost deserted main street, but stopped 
 opposite the Post Office, to stare at a woman standing on 
 the edge of the pavement. Jim slowed down as soldiers 
 approaching on one side of the street and the boy on the 
 other blocked his way. He brought the car to a standstill 
 with a jerk, and lifted his eyes to meet a smile, half cynical, 
 half questioning, on the blushing face of Diana. 
 
 " You can walk, Durkan," he said ; " Til take Miss Scovell 
 home." 
 
 Durkan jumped off with a grin. 
 
 " Even with Durkan, we shouldn't be an illegal assembly," 
 she said drily. " You could let down the seat behind." 
 
 " I could, but I won't. Get in, Diana," he said resolutely. 
 
 "They have arrested Con Driscoll. I must see Father 
 Lysaght," she said irresolutely. 
 
 " I've seen both of them. Nothing can be done. It's all 
 damnable," he said angrily. 
 
 " Jim ?" she said breathlessly, her eyes glowing. 
 
 " I've come home for good. Whatever my work is, it is 
 here. Get in, Diana," he said, holding open the door. 
 
 She took her seat beside him, nestling up close as he 
 drove slowly towards the Tubber road. 
 
 " I believe this is only a last fit of madness before sanity," 
 he said, nodding towards a camp on the fair green. 
 
 "You dear old Jim," she said happily. 
 
 " Bateson says " 
 
 "I don't want to hear what Bateson says," she said, 
 putting her hand on his as they cleared the last straggling 
 house. "It's what you do. You've come back. I don't 
 believe in miracles. Yet, who knows ?" she added dreamily. 
 " Faith in England that can survive the last five years may 
 bring any miracle. I love you, Jim." 
 
 He put his arm round her and kissed her upturned lips. 
 
 She clung to him passionately. 
 
CONQUEST 327 
 
 " You don't know what it is," she said, releasing him as 
 the car swerved. 
 
 " Don't I ?" he said with a happy laugh. 
 
 " When I thought they were going to shoot me, and again 
 when I was sentenced for life,'* she said as if to herself, " it 
 wasn't of death I thought, or imprisonment, or of Ireland 
 even, but of you. And death was easier to face than the 
 life sentence. It meant a shortening of the intolerable 
 longing." 
 
 " Then why didn't you marry me when you came out ?" 
 he said bewildered. 
 
 She laughed happily. "With death near me there was 
 only you in the whole world. But when I got outside the 
 jail gate there was England again, and you seemed to be 
 England to me — then. Now — well, now your eyes are 
 open. Or is it only half open ? Anyhow, enough to marry 
 on. Hullo. There's your mother and your grandfather at 
 the gate. Has she told you that he thinks you were away 
 fighting the English ?" she said mischievously. 
 
 "Perhaps I was," he said grimly. "And I believe I've 
 won." 
 
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