THE O'FARRELLY FEUD

Wairarapa Times-Age, 28 May 1940, Page 10

THE O'FARRELLY FEUD

COPYRIGHT. PUBLISHED BY SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT.

By

GEORGE A. BIRMINGHAM.

Author of “General John Regan,” “Up the Rebels,” etc., etc.

CHAPTER V.

Mousie was still clad in her dressinggown when Daphne returned to her room. She looked dejected and was evidently ready to apologise for some new example of her feeble helplessness. It was plain at once that a very abject apology would be required of her.

"Mousie,” said Daphne, speaking with a sternness which would have done credit to a head mistress admonishing a delinquent. “I thought I told you to put on your bathing dress.” She emphasised the word “thougnt with a sarcastic bitterness, as those who give orders which are not obeyed very often do. Mousie grovelled.

"And so I would,” she said. "I really would, Daphne, though I don’t in the least want to bathe. But I would have put it on to please you. But I can’t find it.”

The room she occupied, like all the bedrooms in Carrickduv, was very large. It was also abundantly furnished. indeed over-furnished after the Victorian fashion. There were thret large wardrobes, four regular chest: of drawers, besides several tables and cabinets which contained one or twe drawers each. In any of them the bathing dress might have been pu away by the zealous housemaid whe unpacked Mousie’s luggage. Daphne knew, better than her friend did. the ways of servants who unpack, especially well-trained servants who knew their job and like to do it thoroughly. A good footman or a good maid when unpacking lor a guest likes to put each garment, separately, into a drawer or a wardrobe by itself. This proles’ against overcrowding is not alway: possible; but in the case of Mousie’s clothes it was. The room was very large, the drawers available very 7 many and Mousie had a small number of garments. A good maid finding herself in such a pleasant position makes the most of ner opportunity. With a large choice of drawers she chooses the least accessible. If, as in the case of an evening dress, she finds it convenient to use a wardrobe, she chooses one in a far corner of the room, that into which the guest is least likely tc look.

Mousie was a little intimidated by the size of the room. She was bewildered by the number of recepticals for clothes and was sny of opening and shutting so many shining drawers and cupboards. She had done something in the way of searching for her bathing dress; but she had not done enough. She had opened and left open eighteen drawers and the doors of two wardrobes discovering here and there a pair of silk stockings and a pocket handkerchief; in one very large drawer the upper part of a suit of pyjamas with a bag of lavender laid beside it. At that point her courage, or perhaps her physical strength had failed her. Daphne knew the ways of efficient housemaids. She had learned by experience, gained during previous visits to Carrickduv, that it is no use trying to find what a housemaid had chosen to conceal. At this game of hide and seek —degenerating occasionally into “hunt the slipper”—the professional always gets the better of the amateur. She wasted no time in opening more,,drawers. She rang the bell.

"Sabina,” she said when the maid appeared, /produce Miss Mousie’s bathing dress at once.” “Is it her bathing dress, Miss?” said Sabina, with an air of injured surprise, excusable even in an efficient housemaid when faced with an unexpected and unreasonable demand.

“It is,’A said Daphne, “and there’s no use your saying that you didn’t deliberately hide it, for you did.”

At this point of the conversation an English housemaid would have sulked and interposed between herself and Daphne an icy barrier of class distinction. Sabina, being Irish, saw the comedy of being efficient at her job. She grinned cheerfully. “If it is hid, it is on her?” she said. “Sure I wouldn’t ever do the like, and if ever I’d thought the young lady would have been wanting it I’d have laid it out ready for her to put on. But who'd think of a young lady wanting to be going into the sea, when it’s no more than an hour ago that she was washing herself in hot water?” "Get the thing now," said Daphne, “and don’t talk any more.” The first part of the order Sabina was quite willing to obey. The second was probably beyond her power. She climbed on a chair and then, standing on tip-toe, opened the top drawer of a lofty tall-boy, and from it she dragged the bathing dress. “And what’s more," she said. “If I’d known the young lady would be wanting to wear it today. I’d have mended the hole that’s in it, just under the shoulder on the left-hand side." Mousie had no idea beforehand that her clothes would be minutely examined by a strange servant. She remembered other holes besides that in the bathing dress, and the memory caused her deep embarrassment. “I know there’s a hole,” she said miserably. “I mean to mend it but I hadn’t time."

Sabina, though an efficient housemaid. was a kind hearted girl. She did her best to console Mousie.

"What matters anyway?" she said. "It's no size of a hole at all. and without anybody would be looking for it, it wouldn't be seen. If I had a darning needle and piece of grey wool I'd mend it for you now while you undress yourself.” “You'll do nothing of the sort," said Daphne firmly. "We've wasted time enough already and if we waste any more that fellow O'Farrelly will be there before us." "Tiie Lord save us." said Sabina, genuinely started. “Is it with Peter O'Farrelly you’re going bathing. Well, young ladies do have queer fancies. If

it was me now I wouldn’t go bathing with Peter O’Farrelly not if it was the only way for me to wet my skin. But if that’s what's in your mind I suppose you’ll do it. Only I don’t think her ladyship will be overly much pleased when she hears about it. She has a terribly bitter hate of the same Peter O’Farrelly.”

“Her ladyship won’t hear of it until I tell her myself.” said Daphne. “Not unless you go and tell her ”

“Would 1 do the like?” said Sabina with fine indignation.

"And if you do,” said Daphne, “it won’t be true. We’re not going to bathe with Peter O’Farrelly. Mousie, are you going to put on that bathing dress or are you not? For if not you can come along and go into the sea with your clothes on. It’s either that or the bathing dress, and I should have though you’d prefer the bathing dress.'

Mousie, faced with that alternative,, put on the bathing dress. Then she stood for a minute in front of a long mirror, twisting her neck to see how large the hole under the left shoulder actually was. "Never mind it, Miss," said Sabina, still trying to comfort her. “Peter O’Farrelly will never need it. He'll know well enough that there’s worse holes in his own, if so be that he nas a bathing dress at all.” “Stop admiring yourself in the glass,” said Daphne, “and come along at once.”

At the back door Quinn met them. He had two large fishing baskets, a gaff and two landing nets. It was ample equipment for the expedition, but Quinn looked anxious. “If it’s lobsters you’re after Miss,” he said, “you will mind how you carch hold of them. Them ones can nip terrible hard. I heard of a man once that had his thumb taken off by the nip of a claw and what’s more the lobster ate it after. But, sure, that was a mighty big lobster —bigger than any you’d be catching.” ■ “We’re not going after lobsters,” said Daphne. “Crabs are pretty near as bad,” said Quinn. “It’s not crabs, either. It’s mullet.” “It’s not for me to be saying anything,” said Quinn. “But if it’s mullet you’re after, can you swim?” “I can, of course,” said Daphne. “I've been able to swim since I was six years old.” “I wouldn’t doubt you. Miss. I wouldn't doubt but what you could fly if you put your mind to it. It was the other young lady I was thinking about.”

“Mousie,” said Daphne. “Can you swim? Not that it really matters for this job.” "I can. a little, in a swimming bath.” “If you can swim in a swimming bath you can swim in the sea. And. anyhow, you won't want to. The water will be quite shallow. Ronnie said so. Still, it’s all well to know that you can swim, so that I needn’t waste time rescuing you if anything unexpected should happen.” Daphne walked off, satisfied by Mousie’s answer. Quinn, a faithful servant, was not content. When the girls had started he searched for and found an old lifebuoy. It had once belonged to a small yacht owned by the last Eustace Dare. The yacht had long ago disappeared, “sunk beneath the sea.” like the Royal George. The buoy survived, though it was likely enough, that it, too, would sink if put into the water.

Quinn, carrying the buoy over his arm, followed the two girls down to the creek.

Ronnie, faithful to his promise, was sitting on a rock at the end of the south shore of the creek. He had lit a pipe and might have been comfortable if he had not been nervous and anxious. From time to time' he glanced over the sea southwards, the direction from which Peter O'Farrelly was to be expected. He would come rowing in his boat, bringing with him his boy Dan and enough baskets to holdi the fish, which, would be left stranded by the outgoing tide. After each watchful glance over the sea Ronnie turned his eyes to the water in the creek. It was shallowing rapidly. Already the outward flow, strong and rapid as a river at half-tide, was beginning to slacken. Very soon the creek would be dry. save for- a few pools here and there. There seemed just a chance that Peter O'Farrelly might have miscalculated the time of the tide, and that Daphne might have finished her fishing before he came.

Ronnie saw the girls come from the house, and rather to his surprise saw Quinn following with a totally unnecessary lifebuoy hooked over his arm.

Daphne reached the shore of the creek'and stepped confidently from the grass to the seaweed. It happened that the wood at that particular place was of the smooth, slimy kind which clings to the rocks when the sea has left them. It was very slippery. Daphne's feet failed to find any grip. She stumbled forward and fell on her knees into a pool. She rose, dripping and laughing.

"H's a good job we put on our bathing dresses," she shouted to Mousie. who stood hesitating on the grass. Daphne plunged on towards the net which now hung like a curtain across the mouth of the creek, the greater part of it clear out of the waves. The mullet were making vain rushes against the meshes, attempting leaps into the air in the hope of clearing the obstacle.

Daphne staggered on. clutching her landing net. She stepped into waistdeep pools. She stood balanced on the top of rocks. She had caught sight off the fish. The spirit of remote ancestors who fished to win food awoke in her. Nothing would have stopped her then. (To be Continued).