When Herbert and Clara reached the gate they found this mother with her five children crouching at the ditch-side, although it was still mid-winter. They had seen him enter the demesne, and were now waiting with the patience of poverty for his return.

"An' the holy Virgin guide an' save you, my lady," said the woman, almost frightening Clara by the sudden way in which she came forward, "an' you too, Misther Herbert; and for the love of heaven do something for a poor crathur whose five starving childher have not had wholesome food within their lips for the last week past."

Clara looked at them piteously and put her hand towards her pocket.

Her purse was never well furnished, and now in these bad days was usually empty. At the present moment it was wholly so. "I have nothing to give her; not a penny," she said, whispering to her lover.

But Herbert had learned deep lessons of political economy, and was by no means disposed to give promiscuous charity on the road-side. "What is your name," said he; "and from where do you come?"

"Shure, an' it's yer honor knows me well enough; and her ladyship too; may the heavens be her bed. And don't I come from Clady; that is two long miles the fur side of it? And my name is Bridget Sheehy.

Shure, an' yer ladyship remembers me at Clady the first day ye war over there about the biler."

Clara looked at her, and thought that she did remember her, but she said nothing. "And who is your husband?" said Herbert.

"Murty Brien, plaze yer honor;" and the woman ducked a curtsey with the heavy load of two children on her back. It must be understood that among the poorer cla.s.ses in the south and west of Ireland it is almost rare for a married woman to call herself or to be called by her husband's name.

"And is he not at work?"

"Shure, an' he is, yer honor--down beyant Kinsale by the say. But what's four shilling a week for a man's diet, let alone a woman and five bairns?"

"And so he has deserted you?"

"No, yer honor; he's not dasarted me thin. He's a good man and a kind, av' he had the mains. But we've a cabin up here, on her ladyship's ground that is; and he has sent me up among my own people, hoping that times would come round; but faix, yer honor, I'm thinking that they'll never come round, no more."

"And what do you want now, Bridget?"

"What is it I'm wanting? just a thrifle of money then to get a sup of milk for thim five childher as is starving and dying for the want of it." And she pointed to the wretched, naked brood around her with a gesture which in spite of her ugliness had in it something of tragic grandeur.

"But you know that we will not give money. They will take you in at the poorhouse at Kanturk."

"Is it the poorhouse, yer honor?"

"Or, if you get a ticket from your priest they will give you meal twice a week at Clady. You know that. Why do you not go to Father Connellan?"

"Is it the mail? An' shure an' haven't I had it, the last month past; nothin' else; not a taste of a piaty or a dhrop of milk for nigh a month, and now look at the childher. Look at them, my lady. They are dyin' by the very road-side." And she undid the bundle at her back, and laying the two babes down on the road showed that the elder of them was in truth in a fearful state. It was a child nearly two years of age, but its little legs seemed to have withered away; its cheeks were wan, and yellow and sunken, and the two teeth which it had already cut were seen with terrible plainness through its emaciated lips. Its head and forehead were covered with sores; and then the mother, moving aside the rags, showed that its back and legs were in the same state. "Look to that," she said, almost with scorn. "That's what the mail has done--my black curses be upon it, and the day that it first come nigh the counthry." And then again she covered the child and began to resume her load.

"Do give her something, Herbert, pray do," said Clara, with her whole face suffused with tears.

"You know that we cannot give away money," said Herbert, arguing with Bridget Sheehy, and not answering Clara at the moment. "You understand enough of what is being done to know that. Why do you not go into the Union?"

"Shure thin an' I'll jist tramp on as fur as Hap House, I and my childher; that is av' they do not die by the road-side. Come on, bairns. Mr. Owen won't be afther sending me to the Kanturk union when I tell him that I've travelled all thim miles to get a dhrink of milk for a sick babe; more by token when I tells him also that I'm one of the Desmond tinantry. It's he that loves the Desmonds, Lady Clara,--loves them as his own heart's blood. And it's I that wish him good luck with his love, in spite of all that's come and gone yet.

Come on, bairns, come along; we have seven weary miles to walk." And then, having rearranged her burden on her back, she prepared again to start.

Herbert Fitzgerald, from the first moment of his interrogating the woman, had of course known that he would give her somewhat. In spite of all his political economy, there were but few days in which he did not empty his pocket of his loose silver, with these culpable deviations from his theoretical philosophy. But yet he felt that it was his duty to insist on his rules, as far as his heart would allow him to do so. It was a settled thing at their relief committee that there should be no giving away of money to chance applicants for alms. What money each had to bestow would go twice further by being brought to the general fund--by being expended with forethought and discrimination. This was the system which all attempted, which all resolved to adopt who were then living in the south of Ireland.

But the system was impracticable, for it required frames of iron and hearts of adamant. It was impossible not to waste money in almsgiving.

"Oh, Herbert!" said Clara, imploringly, as the woman prepared to start.

"Bridget, come here," said Herbert, and he spoke very seriously, for the woman's allusion to Owen Fitzgerald had driven a cloud across his brow. "Your child is very ill, and therefore I will give you something to help you," and he gave her a shilling and two sixpences.

"May the G.o.d in heaven bless you thin, and make you happy, whoever wins the bright darling by your side; and may the good days come back to yer house and all that belongs to it. May yer wife clave to you all her days, and be a good mother to your childher." And she would have gone on further with her blessing had not he interrupted her.

"Go on now, my good woman," said he, "and take your children where they may be warm. If you will be advised by me, you will go to the Union at Kanturk." And so the woman pa.s.sed on still blessing them.

Very shortly after this none of them required pressing to go to the workhouse. Every building that could be arranged for the purpose was filled to overflowing as soon as it was ready. But the worst of the famine had not come upon them as yet. And then Herbert rode back to Castle Richmond.

CHAPTER XVII.

FATHER BARNEY.

Mick O'Dwyer's public-house at Kanturk was by no means so pretentious an establishment as that kept by his brother in South Main Street, Cork, but it was on the whole much less nasty. It was a drinking-shop and a public car office, and such places in Ireland are seldom very nice; but there was no attempt at hotel grandeur, and the little room in which the family lived behind the bar was never invaded by customers.

On one evening just at this time--at the time, that is, with which we have been lately concerned--three persons were sitting in this room over a cup of tea. There was a gentleman, middle-aged, but none the worse on that account, who has already been introduced in these pages as Father Bernard M'Carthy. He was the parish priest of Drumbarrow; and as his parish comprised a portion of the town of Kanturk, he lived, not exactly in the town, but within a mile of it. His sister had married Mr. O'Dwyer of South Main Street, and therefore he was quite at home in the little back parlour of Mick O'Dwyer's house in Kanturk. Indeed Father Bernard was a man who made himself at home in the houses of most of his parishioners,--and of some who were not his parishioners.

His companions on the present occasion were two ladies who seemed to be emulous in supplying his wants. The younger and more attractive of the two was also an old friend of ours, being no other than f.a.n.n.y O'Dwyer from South Main Street. Actuated, doubtless, by some important motive she had left her bar at home for one night, having come down to Kanturk by her father's car, with the intention of returning by it in the morning. She was seated as a guest here on the corner of the sofa near the fire, but nevertheless she was neither too proud nor too strange in her position to administer as best she might to the comfort of her uncle.

The other lady was Mistress O'Dwyer, the lady of the mansion. She was fat, very; by no means fair, and perhaps something over forty. But nevertheless there were those who thought that she had her charms.

A better hand at curing a side of bacon there was not in the county Cork, nor a woman who was more knowing in keeping a house straight and snug over her husband's head. That she had been worth more than a fortune to Mick O'Dwyer was admitted by all in Kanturk; for it was known to all that Mick O'Dwyer was not himself a good hand at keeping a house straight and snug.

"Another cup of tay, Father Bernard," said this lady. "It'll be more to your liking now than the first, you'll find." Father Barney, perfectly reliant on her word, handed in his cup.

"And the m.u.f.fin is quite hot," said f.a.n.n.y, stooping down to a tray which stood before the peat fire, holding the m.u.f.fin dish. "But perhaps you'd like a morsel of b.u.t.tered toast; say the word, uncle, and I'll make it in a brace of seconds."

"In course she will," said Mrs. O'Dwyer: "and happy too, av you'll only say that you have a fancy, Father Bernard."

But Father Bernard would not own to any such fancy. The m.u.f.fin, he said, was quite to his liking, and so was the tea; and from the manner in which he disposed of these delicacies, even Mrs. Townsend might have admitted that this a.s.sertion was true, though she was wont to express her belief that nothing but lies could, by any possibility, fall from his mouth.

"And they have been staying with you now for some weeks, haven't they?" said Father Barney.

"Off and on," said f.a.n.n.y.

"But there's one of them mostly there, isn't he?" added the priest.

"The two of them is mostly there, just now. Sometimes one goes away for a day or two, and sometimes the other."

"And they have no business which keeps them in Cork?" continued the priest, who seemed to be very curious on the matter.

"Well, they do have business, I suppose," said f.a.n.n.y, "but av so I never sees it." f.a.n.n.y O'Dwyer had a great respect for her uncle, seeing that he filled an exalted position, and was a connexion of whom she could be justly proud; but, though she had now come down to Kanturk with the view of having a good talk with her aunt and uncle about the Molletts, she would only tell as much as she liked to tell, even to the parish priest of Drumbarrow. And we may as well explain here that f.a.n.n.y had now permanently made up her mind to reject the suit of Mr. Abraham Mollett. As she had allowed herself to see more and more of the little domestic ways of that gentleman, and to become intimate with him as a girl should become with the man she intends to marry, she had gradually learned to think that he hardly came up to her beau ideal of a lover. That he was crafty and false did not perhaps offend her as it should have done. Dear f.a.n.n.y, excellent and gracious as she was, could herself be crafty on occasions. He drank too, but that came in the way of her profession. It is hard, perhaps, for a barmaid to feel much severity against that offence. But in addition to this Aby was selfish and cruel and insolent, and seldom altogether good tempered. He was bad to his father, and bad to those below him whom he employed. Old Mollett would give away his sixpences with a fairly liberal hand, unless when he was exasperated by drink and fatigue. But Aby seldom gave away a penny. f.a.n.n.y had sharp eyes, and soon felt that her English lover was not a man to be loved, though he had two rings, a gold chain, and half a dozen fine waistcoats.

And then another offence had come to light in which the Molletts were both concerned. Since their arrival in South Main Street they had been excellent customers--indeed quite a G.o.dsend, in this light, to f.a.n.n.y, who had her own peculiar profit out of such house-customers as they were. They had paid their money like true Britons,--not regularly indeed, for regularity had not been desired, but by a five pound now, and another in a day or two, just as they were wanted.

Nothing indeed could be better than this, for bills so paid are seldom rigidly scrutinized. But of late, within the last week, f.a.n.n.y's requests for funds had not been so promptly met, and only on the day before her visit to Kanturk she had been forced to get her father to take a bill from Mr. Mollett senior for 20 at two months'

date. This was a great come-down, as both f.a.n.n.y and her father felt, and they had begun to think that it might be well to bring their connexion with the Molletts to a close. What if an end had come to the money of these people, and their bills should be dishonoured when due? It was all very well for a man to have claims against Sir Thomas Fitzgerald, but f.a.n.n.y O'Dwyer had already learnt that nothing goes so far in this world as ready cash.

"They do have business, I suppose," said f.a.n.n.y.

"It won't be worth much, I'm thinking," said Mrs. O'Dwyer, "when they can't pay their weekly bills at a house of public entertainment, without flying their names at two months' date."