Chapter XIII: Country Gossip

Mr. Pryor did not make a very long stay in Ireland. He merely remained a sufficient length of time to receive Mr. Connor’s numerous reports; to ride round his property; to point out a few improvements he wished made; to distribute much charity; to be blessed with blessings that were beyond reason as they were without stint; to drive out a few times; to renew his acquaintance with the Durrow fishermen, and to hear all the local news.

Considering that Mr. Connor had a whole year’s budget to unfold, the amount of information was not great, although it might be interesting. The gaugers had been over several times, and the constabulary, too, about the stills and the smugglers; “And one gauger was not afraid to say,” went on Mr. Connor, “that if you, sir, did your duty, there would soon not be a still in Durrow; and about the smugglers, the coastguard people declared I got share of the cargoes.”

“We can both bear such remarks, I suppose, Mr. Connor,” said Mr. Pryor, smiling.

“They are wild about it, that is the thing, you know, sir. Why, they do say that even Mr. Drewitt has turned against the stills, and is hunting them off his property there in the Joyce county. You would not know Mr. Maxwell, sir, if you were to see him now; he is all for law and order, and is making himself perfectly detested by everybody, high and low. He is abroad now, sir; travelling on the Continent with a Mr. Campnell from Oxford, who they do say is going to be his heir, and who, many people think, is something nearer even than that; and Lady Emmeline has left him—did you never hear of it, sir? She has left him and is gone to live with Mr. Vervensoe and his wife up at Cragantlet. The famine made a poor man of him, rich though he was once; and they are glad enough to have Lady Emmeline with them for the sake of what she pays. They do say the life he led that misguided woman, sir, lately was shocking—shocking. I could not tell you half the stories that are in everybody’s mouth about his wickedness, and his cruelty; and it all began, that is, the cruelty, because she refused to have this young man come to the house as her nephew, or come to the house while she was in it, in fact, at all.”

“One cannot wonder at her doing so,” remarked Mr. Pryor.

“No; but I am told he did—that he said, as she had no children, the least she could do was to let him have one of his own in the house; and then she threatened him—I could never rightly make out with what; and then he struck her; and then she got worse, and said she would leave him, and expose him; and after that he begged her pardon, and talked to her for more than an hour, and got somehow to the soft side of her; so that she said, at last, if he would let her go, and take what she brought with her, there might be peace between them.”

“That could only have come through the servants,” remarked Mr. Pryor, thoughtfully.

“It came to me, most of it, from my brother-in-law; but where he got it I cannot say.”

“And so Lady Emmeline is really gone?”

“Yes, sir. I met her the other day out driving with Mr. and Mrs. Vervensoe; and she looked ninety. And, indeed, I was sorry to see her,” finished Mr. Connor.

“I wonder if Maxwell Drewitt was married before he met with Lady Emmeline—secretly, I mean,” said Mr. Pryor.

“Not a bit of it, sir; there never was a man less in the marrying notion than that same Mr. Drewitt, if all I have heard from Ryan about his young days is true. And if you are thinking that he was married first, and then married Lady Emmeline afterwards, you may put that notion away altogether. He was always far too wide-awake to get himself into any mess of that kind. Have you been round by Kincorth, sir? He is putting up the handsomest entrance there is in this part of the country at all; and they do tell me the house is like a palace, and that the gardens are just a show. He has made a second avenue, leading out on Calgillan Road; so that the drive now goes right through the property. I heard say—but I don’t know whether it was true or not—that some young lady in England took a fancy to him, not knowing he was married; and that when he came home, he cursed and swore at Lady Emmeline for living too long, and standing in his way.”

“I think that story must be an invention,” answered Mr. Pryor; “at least, I give my countrywomen credit for more taste than that would imply they were possessed of.”

“I don’t know,” said Mr. Connor; “I fancy there is no way Mr. Drewitt cannot put on him when he likes. I am sure he came over here one day wanting gravel out of Durrow River, for his new avenue, and you would have thought I was Prince Albert, at the very least.”

“Who is living at the Headlands, now?” asked Mr. Pryor.

“A Captain Crabbe, his name is; and awful work he and Mr. Drewitt have about the place not being kept in good order; and about the cows getting among the plantations. I don’t wonder, myself, at Mr. Drewitt’s being vexed to see the grounds—you remember how he used to have them; and now they are as bad as Cragantlet. He says he will never let it to anybody again, unless an Englishman; and not to him, unless he signs an agreement to keep the place as it ought to be kept. He goes on dreadfully, though, when anything puts him out. When you are going along the Calgillan Road you can hear him cursing his men half a mile off.”

“What do you suppose is the cause of his ill-temper?”

“Goodness knows, sir! He never had much of a temper, and now it is worse than ever. Ryan says, he thinks it must be that the devil he has inside him wears away his patience, and that he is glad to break out on anybody. There is one thing sure, he has been worse since Mr. Harold died. My brother-in-law told me he shut himself up for a whole day when the news came over, and that no one durst go near him; and I believe he sent to Galway, and telegraphed over to Mr. Brian, would he like to bury him in Eversbeg. But Mr. Brian wrote back, he would not be indebted to him for enough ground even to lay a dog in, let alone a brother.”

“What an unforgiving set they are!”

“Yes, sir; and little though you might think it, Mr. Archibald Drewitt was just the same in some things. There was a man talking to me about him only the other day, a poor fellow of the name of Byrne, who was turned off one of Mr. Drewitt’s lots the time you stood for Duranmore. He would vote for you, and so Mr. Drewitt said he should go, and he got a farm under Mr. Waller; but someway, nothing went well with him, and then he took a place as labourer, with Mr. Maxwell. He had always liked Mr. Drewitt, for he had a kind, affable way with him, and a friendly look and a pleasant word for tenant and labourer just the same; and of course whenever he met Mr. Drewitt, for a while he touched his hat to him, expecting that Mr. Drewitt would give him time of day,[1] or say it was fine weather for the crops; or perhaps, how are the pigs? or is the wife getting better, Barney? But Mr. Drewitt never took the least notice of him, no more than if he hadn’t been speaking to him every week for the previous ten years. As you may suppose, Barney quit touching his hat; but he said that about two months before Mr. Drewitt’s death, he saw him creeping along the road, and that his mind misgave him the master was not long for this world. So he thought he would like to speak to him once before he went, (the old fellow cried when he told me about it), and he stood up close to the roadside of the footpath, so that Mr. Drewitt could not help seeing him; and he touched his hat, after twenty years, to his old landlord again, and says: “I was sorry to hear you had been bad, sir; I hope your honour’s better.” Mr. Drewitt looked him all over from head to foot, and the man was ragged enough; so perhaps, he thought his politics had not done much for him; but he never answered him, no more than if he had been dirt under his feet. Byrne never saw him after that, but he followed his coffin and saw it put in Eversbeg Abbey. I call a thing like that carrying hatred too far; but of course I am no judge.”

Footnote 1:

Meaning good-morning, or good-evening.

Mr. Pryor walked on for a few steps in silence, slowly, thinking of all his agent had told him while he walked.

Then he began showing Mr. Connor the alterations he desired to have made, remarking at the same time—

“It is very likely my nephew and Miss Geraldine may pay you a visit next summer, and I should like the place to look its best in honour of them.”

“Are they going,” began Connor, considering in what suitable form of words to clothe his question, “are they going to make a match of it?”

“They are talking of doing so,” answered Mr. Pryor, with a smile which he could not suppress.

“I am right glad to hear it, sir, if I may make so free as to say so. If Miss Geraldine is half as well as every one here wishes her, she will make him a good wife, and he will be a good husband to her!”

“Thank you, Connor.” Mr. Pryor said this simply, and as though he was thanking Connor for some compliment paid to himself.

“And you think they will come next summer, sir?”

“I hope so,” answered Mr. Pryor: but many things happened before that next summer which the barrister then had no idea the future could bring to pass.

He went to call on Lady Emmeline ere he returned to London, and found her what Connor had described—an old withered woman, bent and aged, but still rouged to the eyes, and dressed in the extreme of the fashion.

“I am so glad to see you, Mr. Pryor,” she said, entering the room with skirts so voluminous and crinoline so extensive that it was some time before the barrister could see which was woman and which steel and silk and lace. “It was so kind of you to come, considering all things, so very kind.”

Mr. Pryor ventured to think it was very kind of her ladyship to say so.

“It is the truth, it is nothing but the truth; there are not many who would come running after an old woman like me, though there was a time—” and Lady Emmeline stopped, and would have coloured had not the rouge on her face rendered such a performance as impossible as it was unnecessary. “Do you remember the election at Duranmore, Mr. Pryor? Ah! who that saw me then would ever have thought I could come to this?”

When a woman’s case is beyond flattery it is beyond consolation. Mr. Pryor felt this and held his tongue.

“You have heard, I suppose,” resumed Lady Emmeline, after leaving a decent space for compliment had he chosen to fill it up, “that unfortunate circumstances have compelled me to accept an asylum here. Ah! dear; to think my husband should ever have treated me as he has done: and I made him, Mr. Pryor; it was my money made him; and I did once think he was fond of me, I did indeed.” Poor Lady Emmeline! there was no falsehood nor affectation about those words; and although her tears might wear strange channels down her cheeks, giving her a generally wrung-out and draggled appearance about the face, Mr. Pryor did not feel inclined even to smile, but listened sympathetically while the neglected poetess proceeded.

“I often think of those sweet lines by Moore,” and she repeated—

“‘When first I met thee warm and true,
There shone such truth about thee,
And on thy lips such promise hung
I thought ’twere sin to doubt thee.’

“That was just my case, Mr. Pryor. I believed in him implicitly. I thought he could say nothing but what was good and true; that he was brave and honest. I have found how much mistaken I was since those days. But it is too late now for repentance, almost for regret;” and she went on whispering, as was her wont, the remainder of the lines—

“‘Go, deceiver, go—
The heart whose hopes could make it
Trust one so false, so low,
Deserved that thou shouldst break it.’

“So false, so low,” she said, shaking her head sadly; “aye, and so base and cruel, too.”

Thinking to divert her attention, Mr. Pryor asked her when she had been last in London, and when she intended paying it another visit, and in return got more than he bargained for.

In the spring she hoped to go to London again, but not till then, unless, indeed, dear Geraldine’s marriage took place first, in which case she should make a point of being present.

“I was so truly delighted to hear of the probability of her settling so well,” went on Lady Emmeline. “At one time, do you know, Mr. Pryor, we all thought you were to be the fortunate man. Shows how wrongly people may judge sometimes—even the cleverest people.” Which was a back-handed blow at her husband.

Mr. Pryor winced—the wound was still green—but the lady proceeded. “I was always very fond of Geraldine—fonder than of either of her brothers—though Brian was a gentlemanlike lad, and promised to grow up handsome. I thought Geraldine took most after her mother. I suppose she is greatly improved in her appearance since she went to London?”

The barrister paused for a moment before he answered. He was thinking of the Geraldine who had stood talking with him on the way to Durrow, and wondering in what way Lady Emmeline could imagine it possible for such a vision of loveliness to be improved.

“She is thinner,” he said; that seemed the truest and most unconcerned statement he could make, under the circumstances; “but otherwise I do not think her much altered.”

“Ah! Well, that would be an improvement,” said Lady Emmeline. “She was always a little too plump for perfect elegance.”

“Opinions may differ on that point,” Mr. Pryor would have answered, but he fortunately remembered that Lady Emmeline, who had always prided herself on her graceful figure and perfect elegance, was as thin as a thread-paper.

He therefore contented himself with saying, that when she came to London she would be able to judge for herself; and shortly afterwards took his leave, though earnestly entreated by Mrs. Vervensoe, _née_ Munks, to stop for dinner.

“I had five hundred and sixty-one things I wanted to ask you about,” said that energetic lady; “and I had twice as many, I know, to tell you; but, however, if you must go, why you must. It is treating us very shabbily, though; and I do not know what Mr. Vervensoe will say to me when he comes in, about letting you go.”

“You should tell him, ‘a wilful man must have his way,’ and then he can say nothing,” answered Mr. Pryor.

“But, really now, is not it mean and shabby?”

“It would be, perhaps, if I could remain; but as I cannot, you must exercise your charity, and think as well of me as you can.”

“There is no fear of our not thinking well of you. Good-bye, then, if it must be good-bye. Give my love to Geraldine, and tell her I shall expect a piece of the wedding-cake; she had a bit of mine to dream on, I know, when she was not three years old.”

With which pleasing reminiscence Mrs. Vervensoe allowed their visitor to depart; and accordingly Mr. Pryor rode away from Cragantlet, which, though twenty miles from Durrow, supposing Duranmore were taken by the way, was not more than fifteen, if the traveller turned up the lane leading past Regan’s, crossed the Calgillan coach-road, and then kept straight on for the ruins of Castle Cronach.

Under any circumstances it was a long ride, and a lonely; and Mr. Pryor had got very weary of his own thoughts before he reached the highway, with its many turnings and windings, along which they had trotted all four abreast the first day he ever beheld Durrow.

He had not gone a mile, however, past Castle Cronach, when a new subject for thought presented itself, in the shape of a jaunting-car, on which were seated two gentlemen, one on each side, with the driver occupying the position that of right belongs to him, but which in Ireland he seems never to assume, unless dire necessity compels his doing so.

One of the gentlemen was Maxwell Drewitt; the other, a dark moustached youth, apparently not more than two and twenty, though he had a beard that might have been growing for a dozen years.

“Mr. Campnell, I presume,” thought Mr. Pryor, as the car pursued its way to Duranmore and he to Durrow. “I wonder if he wears that mass of hair to prevent any one tracing a likeness to his father; if it be his father,” corrected the barrister.

“Where could they be coming from, Connor?” he asked during the course of the evening.

“Most likely from Castlebar. It is nearer from here to Castlebar than it is from Galway to here, and a nicer country to pass through too. And so you saw Mr. Campnell; and what kind of a looking young gentleman is he, sir, if I may inquire?”

“He is so covered with hair, it is almost impossible to say what he is like. He has dark eyes, as well as I could observe, and that is all I can tell you about him.”

“And he is only twenty-one, I hear.”

There was the rustling of a woman’s dress through the hall, and Mr. Pryor, turning round sharply, guessed that Mrs. Connor had been listening at the open door.

There was nothing in their conversation that he cared if all Ireland were cognizant of, yet the circumstance gave him an uncomfortable impression, and made him feel a little doubtful about Mrs. Connor’s entire trustworthiness.

While she, poor Jenny! she stole out to a field at the back of the house, where her children were playing in the summer’s evening, and sitting down on the grass, took the youngest to her heart, while she thought about the boy she had borne in the times gone by; whom she had never nursed on her knees; whom she had never folded in her arms; whom she had been forced to send away; whom she had never through the years set eyes on; who would never be told the name of his mother, but whom, she knew, was coming to Kincorth that day, to be, if he lived, Kincorth’s owner, when perhaps she and his father were both dead.