The Storyteller

New Zealand Tablet, Volume L, Issue 21, 31 May 1923, Page 3

The Storyteller

(By C. J. Kickham.)

J T— r , ns Kn o ekii Mg'ow OB The Homes of Tipperary

CHAPTER XIV. — (Continued.) Veil, Jer, said Richard, “any chance of a wedding this time?” I . ' “We’re goin’ on wud a couple, sir,” replied Jer, “but 1 don t say they 11 come to anything. Everything was settled wud Miss Jane; an , hegor, there was no fear at all of the fortune they wor givin’ her. She was tryin’ on her weddin’ dress on Saturday, when I went to tell her he couldn’t marry her; an’ she tuck on terrible intirely.” Richard laughed, hut evinced no surprise. “The ould mistress an’ the young ladies is try in’ to bring it on again. But,” added Jer, solemnly, and as if he h ism elf were,the principal party concerned, “’twon’t do.” Richard explained to his friend that Mrs. Lloyd and her daughters lived in Kilthubber. “Devilish nice girls they are,” he added; “particularly the second.” “They’re anxious to have him settled,” Jer continued with a sigh, as if the settling were a great weight on his mind. “An’ sure God knows so is myself. But 'tis so hard to meet a shootable woman. I’m after promisin’ Tom Otway,” he continued, “that we’ll run down to the County Carlow in the course of the week to see his cousin. Himself is for goin’ by the coach; but I’m thinkin’ ’twould look better to drive tandem. What do you think?” he asked, as if he found it hard to decide. “Oh, the tandem, by all means,” said Richard. “That’s what I think myself,” rejoined Jer, as he left the room, followed by his dogs, except two that had got into the bed for a nap. “Is this all a joke?” Mr. Lowe asked. “No. Bob's wooings are always carried on in this way, and Miss Jane can hardly have been taken by surprise, for she had examples enough to warn her.”’ “And how does he escape the consequences?” “Do you mean why is he not called out? The idea of such a good-natured fellow as Bob Lloyd shooting anybody or being shot at! But he will tell you 1 the heaviest cloutin’ match ’ — to use his own phrase — he ever had, was with young Allcock for refusing to marry his sister, who declared that he had popped the question and been accepted in the most formal manner.” “But the law,” said Mr. Lowe. “Have you no such thing as breaches of promise in Ireland?” “They arc not quite unknown, though very rare, down here. But the immunity which Bob enjoys may in some measure be accounted for by the fact that the business is all done through Jer. Bob never writes letters; and, perhaps, as he would say himself, that saves his bacon.” It must not be inferred that writing was not among Mr. Lloyd’s accomplishments. He wrote a fair, round hand, and was fond of displaying his caligraphic skill whenever pen, ink, and paper chanced to come in his wayparticularly, and almsot exclusively, in the execution of the words: “Command you may your mind from play,” which he was wont to finish off with a flourish, and seemed ( ' 3 to derive great pleasure from the performance. “Can 'we get a shot without going into that infernal bog again?” Richard asked when they had returned to the. parlor. “Ay, faith,” Mr. Lloyd replied. “If I went out to that well beyond ten times a day, I’d be sure to meet a snipe there.” “Get your gun and come with us.” Mr. Lloyd strapped a shot-belt over his shoulder, and . was taking up his gun, when the door opened, and a stout, middle-sized man, with a. round face, unceremoniously walked in. * “ ’Morrow, Wat,” said Mr. Lloyd. } “ ’Morrow, kindly,” Wat replied, offering him a slip ofs paper.

“How much is it?” “Fifteen pounds eleven and sevenpence.” “I’ll see about it,” said Mr. Lloyd. “That’ll never do for me,” replied Wat. “There’s not a penny under the roof of the house;” said Mr. Lloyd. “The devil a foot I’ll stir out of this till I get it;” Wat rejoined. » “Have a drop of this,” Mr. Lloyd remarked, filling a glass from the square bottle. “No objection,” replied Wat, sententiously. Mr. Lloyd went to the side-board, and returned, holding a large dish, in one hand with as much ease as if it were a small plate, and grasping a loaf of bread avu the other. “Come, Dick,” said he, placing them on the table, “let’s have a bite. He culj some slices of bread and meat which Richard converted into sandwiches for himself and Mr. Lowe. “Wat,” said Bob Lloyd, with his mouth full, “I’ll see about that.” “Pay me the money, and let me go for the cow; that’s the seein’ about I Avant.” “What cow?” Mr. Lloyd asked. “A fat cow I’m afther buyin’ from your father,” said Wat, turning to Richard; “and he won’t let me take her Avudout the money. , So, shell out,” he added, turning to /Mr, Lloyd, with a sort of humorous sulkiness of voice and look. Mr. Lloyd, appearing to pay no attention to this speech, bit a semicircle out of his sandwich, and holding it between him and the light, seemed to admire its regularity. Wat, drawing an old arm-chair towards the window, thereby disturbing the repose of an old setter that had possession of it, deliberately sat down, and crossed his legs with the air of a man who was bent upon taking his ease, and had nothing on earth to trouble him. Mr. Lloyd advanced in silence, and presented a carving knife at him with a substantial slice of cold meat on the top of it. Wat took the meat between his finger and thumb, and acknowledged the civility by uncrossing his legs and sitting upright. , Mr. Lloyd then presented a carving fork with the other hand, upon which was a. chunk of bread. This Wat also accepted, if not graciously, at least without any show of reluctance. Having emulated his host in the biting line —with the difference that, the bread and meat being each in a different hand, he had to take two bites instead of one — remarked oracularly : “A pig’s head ates very handsome, Id.” “Kitty,” he called out to a servant girl who was flinging her cloak over her shoulders as she passed the window. The girl stopped and looked at him. Whereupon Wat raised the window an dasked was she going .to town. “I am,” replied Kitty. “Why so?” “Tell my mother to send me out an ounce of tobaccy,” said Wat, in the calmest and most self-satisfied manner imaginable. “Now, Wat, what arc you up to?” Mr. Lloyd asked. “Don’t you know if the money was in the house there wouldn’t be a second word about it?” “Well, to do you nothin’ but justice,” Wat replied, “I do know that. But you see two quarters of that cow are bespoke, and I can’t disappoint my customers. Moreover, when wan quarter is for a weddin’.” ' “Come to-morrow.” “ ’Twon’t do.” “Well, what do you want?” “D —n well you know what I want,” replied Wat. “An order on Tom Ryan. That’s money any day.” “There’s not a pen or a bit of clean paper in the '■ house,” said Mr. Lloyd. “Ketch me!” was Wat’s comment upon this objection. “I’m provided against accidents.” And he produced an ink-bottle with a leather strap attached to the neck, and (infolded half a- sheet of paper which was rolled round a well-worn quill pen.' Mr. Lloyd, seeing no . way .of escape, sat down and vfi wrote the letters I and C. The latter turned out such a ‘i model of a capital letter that Mr. Lloyd held it up for

the inspection of his friends. He then slowly and carefully wrote out the order, which ran thus: “I Command 3011 to pay Wat Murphy fifteen pounds sterling Money, which i will allow you out of your rent. “Robert Ormsby Lloyd. “To Mr. Thomas Ryan.” “All right,” said Wat, as he held the document to the fire to dry. -After putting it in his pocket, he pointed to the square bottle. “Would you have any objection?” he asked. ' \ Bob Lloyd held up the square bottle, and,' laying his hand along it, carefully measured the depth of liquor remaining. Seeming satisfied that he could afford to act on the very broad hint which Wat’s question implied, he filled a glass. “Healths apiece to ye,” said Wat, tossing off the whiskey as he passed the table, without stopping. He was immediately heard whistling to his bull-dog, who, with his back against the wall outside the hall-door, was keeping at bay quite a pack of hounds of various descriptionsbut among which there was not a single .‘mongrel” or “cur of low degree”—by the mere glare of his eye. CHAPTER XV.—A DAY'S SHOOTING LOST. The snipe was at the well, as Bob Lloyd had foretold, and the moment it rose, the doctor “blazed away.” But greatly to his surprise, the snipe did not fall with its wing broken. “He’s wounded,” the doctor exclaimed, on seeing the snipe pitch in the next field. “I’ll make sure of him the next time.” All three blazed away the next time; and when the smoke cleared off they saw the snipe quietly dropping into its old quarters near the well. Re-loading their guns they retraced their steps, and another volley woke the echoes of Mount Tempe. The snipe—as jack-snipes are wont to doflew a couple of hundred yards, and dropped again among the rushes in the next field. The affair now became quite exciting, and volley after volley made the unhappy fox among the flower pots shiver and creep from one corner to the other of its prison for a full hour and more. “Hugh is doing business,” said Bob Lloyd, on hearing the report of Hugh’s gun from the bog. “Ay, faith,” he added, on seeing him quietly walk forward and pick up his bird. “I’ll do that fellow’s job,” exclaimed Richard, through his clenched, teeth, as he rammed home the charge in the long duck gun with a very unnecessary expenditure of force. “Let me alone, if I don’t polish him off.” We trust we need not say he did not mean his brother, but the jack-snipe. But just as the doctor had put his gun on full cock, Bob Lloyd laid his hand on his shoulder. “Is it a duck?” Richard asked. “Ay, faith,” replied Bob. “The ice is broken on the pond, and he’s coming about it.” The wild duck flew round and round in a circle, and so low that the chances of a shot seemed not improbable. Bob Lloyd hurried to the corner of the field and stopped behind the fence. Richard and Mr. Lowe took up a position at some distance, and all three watched the wild duck with breathless excitement as it came nearer and nearer in each round of its flight. The doctor had his long gun to his shoulder at one time, and would have blazed away if Mr. Lowe had not stopped him. “Why don’t you let me tumble him?” the doctor asked, in a whisper. “I had him covered just when he was passing the sally-tree.” “Don’t you see,” Mr. Lowe replied, “that that tree •is fully three hundred yards from us?” ' The duck suddenly changed from its circular course, and shot slantwise like an arrow into the pond. This move took the sportsmen by surprise; but recovering them- > selves, all three hurried along the fence, with their heads on a level with their knees. On, on they crept till they reached the part of the fence nearest to the pond. There was the duck quietly swimming among the broken fragments of ice,-*but not within shot. - j “How are we to manage?” said the doctor.

“We’re at the end of our tether, Dick,” replied Bob » Lloyd. “I’ll get over the ditch and take him by surprise,” said the doctor. „• And suiting the action to the word he climbed over the fence, and walked quickly towards the pond. The wild duck seemed really taken by surprise, for it remained hid behind a fragment of ice till the doctor reached the brink of the pond. He .stood panting for a few seconds, with his gun half raised to his shoulder, but the duck never stirred. He advanced a step or two on the ice, and was beginning to think that the duck had got off in some inexplicable manner, when a tremendous splash and clatter in the water made him start. The duck rose so close to him that his first impulse was to step back. In doing this his feet slipped from under him, and he came ■ down with extraordinary celerity on the end of bis spine. The shock caused a queer sensation in his throat, and, in fact, he was much in the same* state as Mrs. Slattery when she implored Father Hannigan to inform her whether she was killed. ' “Why the blazes didn’t he lire:'” exclaimed Bob Lloyd. “And why doesn’t he get up!” Mr: Lowe asked, as he stood on his toes and looked over the fence. “Faith, he’s taking it easy,” said Bob Lloyd, “Let us come down to him." “What’s the matter, Dick!'" he asked, on reaching the pond. In reply Doctor Richard Kearney informed his friends in a quiet, matter-of-fact manner, and in the fewest and shortest words, that the part of his person upon which he had fallen was “broke." “Misfortunes never come alone, Dick," said Bob Lloyd. “Get up, and let us be at the jack again.” “Yes, tis the pleasantest,” replied the doctor. “Help me up. For, hang me if I’m quite .sure whether I can stand.” He found, however, that he had the use of his limbs; and then returned to the well in pursuit of the jack-snipe. But the jack-snipe was not to be found. In vain thev tramped through the rushes, and along the drains and ditches, and everywhere that a snipe would be likely to be found. The invulnerable jack had disappeared from the scene altogether. ‘He s dead. said the doctor. “I knew 1 peppered him the last time.” -v But it he was dead," Mr. Lowe remarked, “wouldn't the dogs find him?” The took one more round through the rushes; and then, as if moved by a single impulse, the three sportsiimn grounded arms. Bob Lloyd rested his elbow on the muzzle of his cun, and dropped his chin into the palm of his hand. Bad luck to that duck, said Bob Lloyd solemnlv. “We lost our day s shooting on account of it." What is Hugh up to? the doctor asked, pointing to his brother, who Mas standing on. a little bridge on the bog road, and waving his handkerchief to' them. “I think it is calling us he is," said Mr. Lowe. “Let have another glass of grog,” the doctor suggested. % ‘ Ay, faith, ’ replied Mr. Lloyd. “Come over.” J hey returned to the • house; and after another application to the square bottle, retraced their stems to the bog road, where Hugh was waiting for them. x “Ye had good sport it would seem,” Hugh remarked. “Game must be plenty in Mr. Lloyd’s preserves?” “Well, we didn’t meet much,” replied Mr. Lowe. “And we lost our day’s shooting on account of that duck, said Richard, putting his hand under Ins. coat-tails ; with a look suggestive of a disagreeable sensation. “If we cross over to the turf-ricks on the high bank,” Hugh remarked, “we may get a shot or two at the plover s, coming into the hog. They are flying low.” “I vote for going home,” replied the doctor. “I have got enough of it for one day.” “I dare say you will have a good appetite for your dinner.” _ >. ' “Well, rather; but we had lunch at Bob’s.” “What do you say, Mr. Lowe?” Hugh asked., “Shall we cross the hog and try and add a few grey Mover to our bag?” t ’ .

“Well, I confess, I’m inclined to vote with the doctor for home.” “Home is . the word,” said the doctor. And on seeing some country people approaching he managed to let the head and neck of his snipe hang out of his pocket, and, with the long gun on his shoulder, stepped out at a quick pace, looking as 41 if he had done wonders during the day. (To be continued.)