His hand went out to the shoulder of the peasant and rested there for a second in friendly feeling. Then the girl stretched out her hand also.

The old man took the two cups in one hand, and, reaching out the other, let Sheila's fingers fall upon his own. He slowly crooked his neck, and kissed her fingers with that distinction mostly to be found among those few good people who live on the highest or the lowest social levels, or in native tents.

"Ah, please G.o.d we meet again! and that I be let to serve you, Miss Sheila Llyn. I have no doubt you could do with a little help some time or another, the same as the rest of us. For all that's come between us three, may it be given me, humble and poor, to help ye both that's helped me so!"

Dyck turned to go, and as he did so a thought came to him.

"If you hadn't food and drink for us, what have you for yourself, Christopher?" he asked. "Have you food to eat?"

"Ah, well--well, do ye think I'm no provider? There was no food cooked was what I was thinking; but come and let me show you."

He took the cover off a jar standing in a corner. "Here's good flour, and there's water, and there's manny a wild shrub and plant on the hillside to make soup, and what more does a man want? With the scone cooked and inside ye, don't ye feel as well as though ye'd had a pound of beef or a rasher of bacon? Sure, ye do. I know where there's clumps of wild radishes, and with a little salt they're good--the best. G.o.d bless ye!"

A few moments later, as he stood in his doorway and looked along the road, he saw two figures, the girl's head hardly higher than the man's shoulder. They walked as if they had much to get and were ready for it.

"Well, I dunno," he said to himself. "I dunno about you, Dyck Calhoun.

You're wild, and ye have too manny mad friends, but you'll come all right in the end; and that pretty girl--G.o.d save her!--she'll come with a smile into your arms by and by, dear lad. But ye have far to go and much to do before that."

His head fell, his eyes stared out into the shining distance.

"I see for ye manny and manny a stroke of bad luck, and manny a wrong thing said of ye, and she not believing wan of them. But oh, my G.o.d, but oh!"--his clenched hands went to his eyes. "I wouldn't like to travel the path that's before ye--no!"

Down the long road the two young people travelled, gossiping much, both of them touched by something sad and mysterious, neither knowing why; both of them happy, too, for somehow they had come nearer together than years of ordinary life might have made possible. They thought of the old man and his hut, and then broke away into talk of their own countryside, of the war with France, of the growing rebellious spirit in Ireland, of riots in Dublin town, of trouble at Limerick, Cork, and Sligo.

At the gate of the mansion where Sheila was visiting, Dyck put into her hands the wild flowers he had picked as they pa.s.sed, and said:

"Well, it's been a great day. I've never had a greater. Let's meet again, and soon! I'm almost every day upon the hill with my gun, and it'd be worth a lot to see you very soon."

"Oh, you'll be forgetting me by to-morrow," the girl said with a little wistfulness at her lips, for she had a feeling they would not meet on the morrow. Suddenly she picked from the bunch of wild flowers he had given her a little sprig of heather.

"Well, if we don't meet--wear that," she said, and, laughing over her shoulder, turned and ran into the grounds of Loyland Towers.

CHAPTER II. THE COMING OF A MESSENGER

When Dyck entered the library of Playmore, the first words he heard were these:

"Howe has downed the French at Brest. He's smashed the French fleet and dealt a sharp blow to the revolution. Hurrah!"

The words were used by Miles Calhoun, Dyck's father, as a greeting to him on his return from the day's sport.

Now, if there was a man in Ireland who had a narrow view and kept his toes pointed to the front, it was Miles Calhoun. His people had lived in Connemara for hundreds of years; and he himself had only one pa.s.sion in life, which was the Protestant pa.s.sion of prejudice. He had ever been a follower of Burke--a pa.s.sionate follower, one who believed the French Revolution was a crime against humanity, a danger to the future of civilization.

He had resisted more vigorously than most men the progress of revolutionary sentiments in Ireland. He was aware that his son had far less rigid opinions than himself; that he even defended Wolfe Tone and Thomas Emmet against abuse and d.a.m.nation. That was why he had delight in slapping his son in the face, whenever possible, with the hot pennant of victory for British power.

He was a man of irascible temperament and stern views, given to fits of exasperation. He was small of stature, with a round face, eyes that suddenly went red with feeling, and with none of the handsomeness of his son, who resembled his mother's family.

The mother herself had been a beautiful and remarkable woman. Dyck was, in a sense, a reproduction of her in body and mind, for a more cheerful and impetuous person never made a household happier or more imperfect than she made hers.

Her beauty and continual cheerfulness had always been the joy of Dyck's life, and because his mother had married his father--she was a woman of sense, with all her lightsome ways--he tried to regard his father with profound respect. Since his wife's death, however, Miles Calhoun had deteriorated; he had become unreasonable.

As the elder Calhoun made his announcement about the battle of Brest and the English victory, a triumphant smile lighted his flushed face, and under his heavy grey brows his eyes danced with malicious joy.

"Howe's a wonder!" he said. "He'll make those mad, red republicans hunt their holes. Eh, isn't that your view, Ivy?" he asked of a naval captain who had evidently brought the news.

Captain Ivy nodded.

"Yes, it's a heavy blow for the French bloodsuckers. If their ideas creep through Europe and get hold of England, G.o.d only knows what the end will be! In their view, to alter everything is the only way to put things right. No doubt they'll invent a new way to be born before they've finished."

"Well, that wouldn't be a bad idea," remarked Dyck. "The present way has its demerits."

"Yes, it throws responsibility upon the man, and gives a heap of trouble to the woman," said Captain Ivy with a laugh; "but they'll change it all, you'll see."

Dyck poured himself a gla.s.s of port, held it up, sniffed the aroma, and looked through the beautiful red tinge of the wine with a happy and critical eye.

"Well, the world could be remade in a lot of ways," he declared. "I shouldn't mind seeing a bit of a revolution in Ireland--but in England first," he hastened to add. "They're a more outcast folk than the Irish." His father scoffed.

"Look out, Dyck, or they'll drop you in jail if you talk like that!" he chided, his red face growing redder, his fingers nervously feeling the b.u.t.tons on his picturesque silk waistcoat. "There's conspiracy in Ireland, and you never truly know if the man that serves you at your table, or brings you your horse, or puts a spade into your ground, isn't a traitor."

At that moment the door opened, and a servant entered the room. In his hand he carried a letter which, with marked excitement, he brought to Miles Calhoun.

"Sure, he's waiting, sir," he said.

"And who's he?" asked his master, turning the letter over, as though to find out by looking at the seal.

"Oh, a man of consequence, if we're to judge by the way he's clothed."

"Fit company, then?" his master asked, as he opened the heavily sealed letter.

"Well, I'm not saying that, for there's no company good enough for us,"

answered the higgledy-piggledy butler, with a quirk of the mouth; "but, as messengers go, I never seen one with more style and point."

"Well, bring him to me," said Miles Calhoun. "Bring him to me, and I'll form my own judgment--though I have some confidence in yours."

"You could go further and fare worse, as the Papists say about purgatory," answered the old man with respectful familiarity.

Captain Ivy and Dyck grinned, but the head of the house seemed none too pleased at the freedom of the old butler.

"Bring him as he is," said Miles Calhoun. "Good G.o.d!" he added, for he just realized that the stamp of the seal was that of the Attorney-General of Ireland.

Then he read the letter and a flush swept over his face, making its red almost purple.

"Eternal d.a.m.nation--eternal d.a.m.nation!" he declared, holding the paper at arm's length a moment, inspecting it. He then handed it to Dyck.

"Read that, lad. Then pack your bag, for we start for Dublin by daylight or before."

Dyck read the brief doc.u.ment and whistled softly to himself.