CHAPTER LIV
BRUSSELS
Once more I would entreat my reader’s indulgence for the prolixity of a narrative which has grown beneath my hands to a length I had never intended. This shall, however, be the last time for either the offence or the apology. My story is now soon concluded.
After wandering about for some time, uncertain which way to take, I at length reached the Charleroi road, now blocked by carriages and wagons conveying the wounded towards Brussels. Here I learned, for the first time, that we had gained the battle, and heard of the total annihilation of the French army, and the downfall of the Emperor. On arriving at the farm-house of Mont St. Jean, I found a number of officers, whose wounds prevented their accompanying the army in its forward movement. One of them, with whom I was slightly acquainted, informed me that General Dashwood had spent the greater part of the night upon the field in search of me and that my servant Mike was in a state of distraction at my absence that bordered on insanity. While he was speaking, a burst of laughter and the tones of a well-remembered voice behind attracted my attention.
“Made a very good thing of it, upon my life. A dressing-case, – not gold, you know, but silver-gilt, – a dozen knives with blood-stone handles, and a little coffee-pot, with the imperial arms, – not to speak of three hundred Naps in a green silk purse – Lord! it reminds me of the Peninsula. Do you know those Prussians are mere barbarians, haven’t a notion of civilized war. Bless your heart, my fellows in the Legion would have ransacked the whole coach, from the boot to the sword-case, in half the time they took to cut down the coachman.”
“The major, as I live!” said I. “How goes it, Major?”
“Eh, Charley! when did you turn up? Delighted see you. They told me you were badly wounded or killed or something of that kind. But I should have paid the little debt to your executors all the same.”
“All the same, no doubt, Major; but where, in Heaven’s name, did you fall upon that mine of pillage you have just been talking of?”
“In the Emperor’s carriage, to be sure, boy. While the duke was watching all day the advance of Ney’s column and keeping an anxious look-out for the Prussians, I sat in a window in this old farm-house, and never took my eye off the garden at Planchenoit. I saw the imperial carriage there in the morning; it was there also at noon; and they never put the horses to it till past seven in the evening. The roads were very heavy, and the crowd was great. I judged the pace couldn’t be a fast one; and with four of the Enniskilleners I charged it like a man. The Prussians, however, had the start of us; and if they hadn’t thought, from my seat on horseback and my general appearance, that I was Lord Uxbridge, I should have got but a younger son’s portion. However, I got in first, filled my pockets with a few little souvenirs of the Emperor, and then laying my hands upon what was readiest, got out in time to escape being shot; for two of Blucher’s hussars, thinking I must be the Emperor, fired at me through the window.”
“What an escape you had!”
“Hadn’t I though? Fortunate, too, my Enniskilleners saw the whole thing; for I intend to make the circumstance the ground of an application for a pension. Hark ye, Charley, don’t say anything about the coffee-pot and the knives. The duke, you know, has strange notions of his own on these matters. But isn’t that your fellow fighting his way yonder?”
“Tear and ages! don’t howld me – that’s himself, – devil a one else!”
This exclamation came from Mickey Free, who, with his dress torn and dishevelled, his eyes bloodshot and strained, was upsetting and elbowing all before him, as he made his way towards me through the crowd.
“Take that fellow to the guard-house! Lay hold of him, Sergeant! Knock him down! Who is the scoundrel?”
Such were the greetings he met with on every side. Regardless of everything and everybody, he burst his way through the dense mass.
“Oh, murther! oh, Mary! oh, Moses! Is he safe here after all?”
The poor fellow could say no more, but burst into a torrent of tears. A roar of laughter around him soon, however, turned the current of his emotions; when, dashing the scalding drops from his eyelids, he glared fiercely like a tiger on every side.
“Ye’re laughing at me, are ye,” cried he, “bekase I love the hand that fed me, and the master that stood to me? But let us see now which of us two has the stoutest heart, – you with your grin on you, or myself with the salt tears on my face.”
As he spoke, he sprang upon them like a madman, striking right and left at everything before him. Down they went beneath his blows, levelled with the united strength of energy and passion, till at length, rushing upon him in numbers, he was overpowered and thrown to the ground. It was with some difficulty I accomplished his rescue; for his enemies felt by no means assured how far his amicable propensities for the future could be relied upon; and, indeed, Mike himself had a most constitutional antipathy to binding himself by any pledge. With some persuasion, however, I reconciled all parties; and having, by the kindness of a brother officer, provided myself with a couple of troop horses, I mounted, and set out for Brussels, followed by Mickey, who had effectually cured his auditory of any tendency to laughter at his cost.
As I rode up to the Belle Vue, I saw Sir George Dashwood in the window. He was speaking to the ambassador, Lord Clancarty, but the moment he caught my eye, he hurried down to meet me.
“Charley, safe, – safe, my boy! Now am I really happy. The glorious day had been one of sorrow to me for the rest of my life had anything happened to you. Come up with me at once; I have more than one friend here who longs to thank you.”
So saying, he hurried me along; and before I could well remember where I was, introduced me to a number of persons in the saloon.
“Ah, very happy to know you, sir,” said Lord Clancarty. “Perhaps we had better walk this way. My friend Dashwood has explained to me the very pressing reasons there are for this step; and I, for my part, see no objection.”
“What, in Heaven’s name, can he mean?” thought I, as he stopped short, expecting me to say something, while, in utter confusion, I smiled, simpered, and muttered some common-places.
“Love and war, sir,” resumed the ambassador, “very admirable associates, and you certainly have contrived to couple them most closely together. A long attachment, I believe?”
“Yes, sir, a very long attachment,” stammered I, not knowing which of us was about to become insane.
“A very charming person, indeed; I have seen the lady,” replied his lordship, as he opened the door of a small room, and beckoned me to follow. The table was covered with paper and materials for writing; but before I had time to ask for any explanation of this unaccountable mystery, he added, “Oh, I was forgetting; this must be witnessed. Wait one moment.”
With these words he left the room, while I, amazed and thunderstruck, vacillating between fear and hope, trembling lest the delusive glimmering of happiness should give way at every moment, and yet totally unable to explain by any possible supposition how fortune could so far have favored me.
While yet I stood hesitating and uncertain, the door opened, and the senhora entered. She looked a little pale though not less beautiful than ever; and her features wore a slight trace of seriousness, which rather heightened than took from the character of her loveliness.
“I heard you had come, Chevalier,” said she, “and so I ran down to shake hands with you. We may not meet again for some time.”
“How so, Senhora? You are not going to leave us, I trust?”
“Then you have not seen Fred. Oh, I forgot; you know nothing of our plans.”
“Here we are at last,” said the ambassador, as he came in followed by Sir George, Power, and two other officers. “Ah, ma belle, how fortunate to find you here! I assure you, it is a matter of no small difficulty to get people together at such a time as this.”
“Charley, my dear friend,” cried Power, “I scarcely hoped to have had a shake hands with you ere I left.”
“Do, Fred, tell me what all this means? I am in a perfect maze of doubt and difficulty, and cannot comprehend a word I hear about me.”
“Faith, my boy, I have little time for explanation. The man who was at Waterloo yesterday, is to be married to-morrow, and to sail for India in a week, has quite enough upon his hands.”
“Colonel Power, you will please to put your signature here,” said Lord Clancarty, addressing himself to me.
“If you will allow me,” said Fred, “I had rather represent myself.”
“Is not this the colonel, then? Why, confound it, I have been wishing him joy the last quarter of an hour!”
A burst of laughter from the whole party, in which it was pretty evident I took no part, followed this announcement.
“And so you are not Colonel Power? Nor going to be married, either?”
I stammered out something, while, overwhelmed with confusion, I stooped down to sign the paper. Scarcely had I done so, when a renewed burst of laughter broke from the party.
“Nothing but blunders, upon my soul,” said the ambassador, as he handed the paper from one to another.
What was my confusion to discover that instead of Charles O’Malley, I had written the name of Lucy Dashwood. I could bear no more. The laughing and raillery of my friends came upon my wounded and irritated feelings like the most poignant sarcasm. I seized my cap and rushed from the room. Desirous of escaping from all that knew me, anxious to bury my agitated and distracted thoughts in solitude and quiet, I opened the first door before me, and seeing it an empty and unoccupied room, throw myself upon a sofa, and buried my head within my hands. Oh, how often had the phantom of happiness passed within my reach, but still glided from my grasp! How often had I beheld the goal I aimed at, as it were before me, and the next moment all the bleak reality of my evil fortune was lowering around me!
“Oh, Lucy, Lucy!” I exclaimed aloud, “but for you and a few words carelessly spoken, I had never trod that path of ambition whose end has been the wreck of all my happiness. But for you, I had never loved so fondly; I had never filled my mind with one image which, excluding every other thought, leaves no pleasure but in it alone. Yes, Lucy, but for you I should have gone tranquilly down the stream of life with naught of grief or care, save such as are inseparable from the passing chances of mortality; loved, perhaps, and cared for by some one who would have deemed it no disgrace to have linked her fortune to my own. But for you, and I had never been – ”
“A soldier, you would say,” whispered a soft voice, as a light hand gently touched my shoulder. “I had come,” continued she, “to thank you for a gift no gratitude can repay, – my father’s life; but truly, I did not think to hear the words you have spoken; nor having heard them, can I feel their justice. No, Mr. O’Malley, deeply grateful as I am to you for the service you once rendered myself, bound as I am by every tie of thankfulness, by the greater one to my father, yet do I feel that in the impulse I had given to your life, if so be that to me you owe it, I have done more to repay my debt to you, than by all the friendship, all the esteem I owe you; if, indeed, by my means, you became a soldier, if my few and random words raised within your breast that fire of ambition which has been your beacon-light to honor and to glory, then am I indeed proud.”
“Alas, alas, Lucy! – Miss Dashwood, I would say, – forgive me, if I know not the very words I utter. How has my career fulfilled the promise that gave it birth? For you, and you only, to gain your affection, to win your heart, I became a soldier; hardship, danger, even death itself were courted by me, supported by the one thought that you had cared for or had pitied me; and now, and now – ”
“And now,” said she, while her eyes beamed upon me with a very flood of tenderness, “is it nothing that in my woman’s heart I have glowed with pride at triumphs I could read of, but dared not share in? Is it nothing that you have lent to my hours of solitude and of musing the fervor of that career, the maddening enthusiasm of that glorious path my sex denied me? I have followed you in my thoughts across the burning plains of the Peninsula, through the long hours of the march in the dreary nights, even to the battle-field. I have thought of you; I have dreamed of you; I have prayed for you.”
“Alas, Lucy, but not loved me!”
The very words, as I spoke them, sank with a despairing cadence upon my heart. Her hand, which had fallen upon mine, trembled violently; I pressed my lips upon it, but she moved it not. I dared to look up; her head was turned away, but her heaving bosom betrayed her emotion.
“No, no, Lucy,” cried I, passionately, “I will not deceive myself; I ask for more than you can give me. Farewell!”
Now, and for the last time, I pressed her hand once more to my lips; my hot tears fell fast upon it. I turned to go, and threw one last look upon her. Our eyes met; I cannot say what it was, but in a moment the whole current of my thoughts was changed; her look was bent upon me beaming with softness and affection, her hand gently pressed my own, and her lips murmured my name.
The door burst open at this moment, and Sir George Dashwood appeared. Lucy turned one fleeting look upon her father, and fell fainting into my arms.
“God bless you, my boy!” said the old general, as he hurriedly wiped a tear from his eye; “I am now, indeed, a happy father.”
CHAPTER LV.
CONCLUSION
The sun had set about half an hour. Already were the dusky shadows blending with the faint twilight, as on a lovely July evening we entered the little village of Portumna, – we, I say; for Lucy was beside me. For the last few miles of the way I had spoken little; thoughts of the many times I had travelled that same road, in how many moods, occupied my mind; and although, as we flew rapidly along, some well-known face would every now and then present itself, I had but time for the recognition ere we were past. Arousing myself from my revery, I was pointing out to Lucy certain well-known spots in the landscape, and directing her attention to places with the names of which she had been for some time familiar, when suddenly a loud shout rent the air, and the next moment the carriage was surrounded by hundreds of country people, some of whom brandished blazing pine torches; others carried rude banners in their hands, – but all testified the most fervent joy as they bade us welcome. The horses were speedily unharnessed, and their places occupied by a crowd of every age and sex, who hurried us along through the straggling street of the village, now a perfect blaze of bonfires.
Mounds of turf, bog-fir, and tar-barrels sent up their ruddy blaze, while hundreds of wild, but happy faces, flitted around and through them, – now dancing merrily in chorus; now plunging madly into the midst of the fire, and scattering the red embers on every side. Pipers were there too, mounted upon cars or turf-kishes; even the very roof-tops rang out their merry notes; the ensigns of the little fishing-craft waved in the breeze, and seemed to feel the general joy around them; while over the door of the village inn stood a brilliantly lighted transparency, representing the head of the O’Malleys holding a very scantily-robed young lady by the tips of the fingers; but whether this damsel was intended to represent the genius of the west, or my wife, I did not venture to inquire.
If the welcome were rude, assuredly it was a hearty one. Kind wishes and blessings poured in on every side, and even our own happiness took a brighter coloring from the beaming looks around us. The scene was wild; the lurid glare of the red torchlight, the frantic gestures, the maddening shouts, the forked flames rising amidst the dark shadows of the little hamlet, had something strange and almost unearthly in their effect; but Lucy showed no touch of fear. It is true she grasped my hand a little closer, but her fair cheek glowed with pleasure, and her eye brightened as she looked; and as the rich light fell upon her beauteous features, how many a blessing, heart-felt and deep, how many a word of fervent praise was spoken.
“Ah, then, the Lord be good to you; it’s yourself has the darling blue eyes! Look at them, Mary; ain’t they like the blossoms on a peacock’s tail? Musha, may sorrow never put a crease in that beautiful cheek! The saints watch over you, for your mouth is like a moss-rose! Be good to her, yer honor, for she’s a raal gem: devil fear you, Mr. Charles, but you’d have a beauty!”
We wended our way slowly, the crowd ever thickening around us, until we reached the market-place. Here the procession came to a stand, and I could perceive, by certain efforts around me, that some endeavor was making to enforce silence.
“Whisht, there! Hould your prate! Be still, Paddy! Tear an’ ages, Molly Blake, don’t be holding me that way; let us hear his reverence. Put him up on the barrel. Haven’t you got a chair for the priest? Run, and bring a table out of Mat Haley’s. Here, Father – here, your reverence; take care, will you, – you’ll have the holy man in the blaze!”
By this time I could perceive that my worthy old friend Father Rush was in the midst of the mob with what appeared to be a written oration, as long as the tail of a kite, between his hands.
“Be aisy, there, ye savages! Who’s tearing the back of my neck? Howld me up straight! Steady, now – hem!”
“Take the laste taste in life to wet your lips, your riverence,” said a kind voice, while at the same moment a smoking tumbler of what seemed to be punch appeared on the heads of the crowd.
“Thank ye, Judy,” said the father, as he drained the cup. “Howld the light up higher; I can’t read my speech. There now, be quiet, will ye! Here goes. Peter, stand to me now and give me the word.”
This admonition was addressed to a figure on a barrel behind the priest, who, as well as the imperfect light would permit me to descry, was the coadjutor of the parish, Peter Nolan. Silence being perfectly established, Father Rush began: —
“When Mars, the god of war, on high,
Of battles first did think,
He girt his sword upon his thigh,
And —
and – what is’t, Peter?”
“And mixed a drop of drink.”
“And mixed a drop of drink,” quoth Father Rush, with great emphasis; when scarcely were the spoken words than a loud shout of laughter showed him his mistake, and he overturned upon the luckless curate the full vial of his wrath.
“What is it you mean, Father Peter? I’m ashamed of ye; faith, it’s may be yourself, not Mars, you are speaking of.”
The roar of merriment around prevented me hearing what passed; but I could see by Peter’s gestures – for it was too dark to see his face – that he was expressing deep sorrow for the mistake. After a little time, order was again established, and Father Rush resumed: —
“But love drove battles from his head,
And sick of wounds and scars,
To Venus bright he knelt, and said —
and said – and said; what the blazes did he say?”
“I’ll make you Mrs. Mars,”
shouted Peter, loud enough to be heard.
“Bad luck to you, Peter Nolan, it’s yourself’s the ruin of me this blessed night! Here have I come four miles with my speech in my pocket, per imbres et ignes.” Here the crowd crossed themselves devoutly. “Ay, just so; and he spoiled it for me entirely.” At the earnest entreaty, however, of the crowd, Father Rush, with renewed caution to his unhappy prompter, again returned to the charge:
“Thus love compelled the god to yield
And seek for purer joys;
He laid aside his helm and shield,
And took —
took – took – ”
“And took to corduroys,”
cried Father Nolan.
This time, however, the good priest’s patience could endure no more, and he levelled a blow at his luckless colleague, which, missing his aim, lost him his own balance, and brought him down from his eminence upon the heads of the mob.
Scarcely had I recovered the perfect convulsion of laughter into which this scene had thrown me, when the broad brim of Father Nolan’s hat appeared at the window of the carriage. Before I had time to address him, he took it reverently from his head, disclosing in the act the ever-memorable features of Master Frank Webber!
“What! Eh! Can it be?” said I.
“It is surely not – ” said Lucy, hesitating at the name.
“Your aunt, Miss Judy Macan, no more than the Rev. Peter Nolan, I assure you; though, I confess, it has cost me much more to personate the latter character than the former, and the reward by no means so tempting.”
Here poor Lucy blushed deeply at the remembrance of the scene alluded to; and anxious to turn the conversation, I asked by what stratagem he had succeeded to the functions of the worthy Peter.
“At the cost of twelve tumblers of the strongest punch ever brewed at the O’Malley Arms. The good father gave in only ten minutes before the oration began, and I had barely time to change my dress and mount the barrel, without a moment’s preparation.”
The procession once more resumed its march; and hurried along through the town, we soon reached the avenue. Here fresh preparations for welcoming us had also been made; but regardless of blazing tar-barrels and burning logs, the reckless crowd pressed madly on, their wild cheers waking the echoes as they went. We soon reached the house; but with a courtesy which even the humblest and poorest native of this country is never devoid of, the preparations of noise and festivity had not extended to the precincts of the dwelling. With a tact which those of higher birth and older blood might be proud of, they limited the excesses of their reckless and careless merriment to their own village; so that as we approached the terrace, all was peaceful, still, and quiet.
I lifted Lucy from the carriage, and passing my arm around her, was assisting her to mount the steps, when a bright gleam of moonlight burst forth and lit up the whole scene. It was, indeed, an impressive one. Among the assembled hundreds there who stood bare-headed, beneath the cold moonlight, not a word was now spoken, not a whisper heard. I turned from the lawn, where the tall beech-trees were throwing their gigantic shadows, to where the river, peering at intervals through the foliage, was flowing on its silvery track, plashing amidst the tall flaggers that lined its banks, – all were familiar, all were dear to me from childhood. How doubly were they so now! I lifted up my eyes towards the door, and what was my surprise at the object before them! Seated in a large chair was an old man, whose white hair, flowing in straggling masses upon his neck and shoulders, stirred with the night air; his hands rested upon his knees, and his eyes, turned slightly upward, seemed to seek for some one he found it difficult to recognize. Changed as he was by time, heavily as years had done their work upon him, the stern features were not to be mistaken; but as I looked, he called out in a voice whose unshaken firmness seemed to defy the touch of time, —
“Charley O’Malley, come here, my boy! Bring her to me, till I bless you both. Come here, Lucy, – I may call you so. Come here, my children. I have tried to live on to see this day, when the head of an old house comes back with honor, with fame, and with fortune, to dwell amidst his own people in the old home of his fathers.”
The old man bent above us, his white hair falling upon the fair locks of her who knelt beside him, and pressed his cold and quivering hand within her own.
“Yes, Lucy,” said I, as I led her within the house, “this is home.”
Here now ends my story. The patient reader who has followed me so far deserves at my hands that I should not trespass upon his kindness one moment beyond the necessity; if, however, any lurking interest may remain for some of those who have accompanied me through this my history, it may be as well that I should say a few words farther, ere they disappear forever.
Power went to India immediately after his marriage, distinguished himself repeatedly in the Burmese war, and finally rose to a high command that he this moment holds, with honor to himself and advantage to his country.
O’Shaughnessy, on half-pay, wanders about the Continent, passing his summers on the Rhine, his winters at Florence or Geneva. Known to and by everybody, his interest in the service keeps him au courant to every change and regulation, rendering him an invaluable companion to all to whom an army list is inaccessible. He is the same good fellow he ever was, and adds to his many excellent qualities the additional one of being the only man who can make a bull in French!
Monsoon, the major, when last I saw him, was standing on the pier at Calais, endeavoring, with a cheap telescope, to make out the Dover cliffs, from a nearer prospect of which certain little family circumstances might possibly debar him. He recognized me in a moment, and held out his hand, while his eye twinkled with its ancient drollery.
“Charley, my son, how goes it? Delighted to see you. What a pity I did not meet you yesterday! Had a little dinner at Crillon’s. Harding, Vivian, and a few others. They all wished for you; ‘pon my life they did.”
“Civil, certainly,” thought I, “as I have not the honor of being known to them.”
“You are at Meurice’s,” resumed he; “a very good house, but give you bad wine, if they don’t know you. They know me,” added he, in a whisper; “never try any tricks upon me. I’ll just drop in upon you at six.”
“It is most unfortunate, Major; I can’t have the pleasure you speak of; we start in half an hour.”
“Never mind, Charley, never mind; another time. By-the-bye, now I think of it, don’t you remember something of a ten-pound note you owe me?”
“As well as I remember, Major, the circumstance was reversed. You are the debtor.”
“Upon my life, you are right; how droll. No matter; let me have the ten, and I’ll give you a check for the whole.”
The major thrust his tongue into his cheek as he spoke, gave another leer, pocketed the note, and sauntered down the pier, muttering something to himself about King David and greenhorns; but how they were connected I could not precisely overhear.
Baby Blake, or Mrs. Sparks, – to call her by her more fitting appellation, – is as handsome as ever, and not less good-humored and light-hearted, her severest trials being her ineffectual efforts to convert Sparks into something like a man for Galway.
Last of all, Mickey Free. Mike remains attached to our fortune firmly, as at first he opened his career; the same gay, rollicksome Irishman, making songs, making love, and occasionally making punch, he spends his days and his nights pretty much as he was wont to do some thirty years ago. He obtains an occasional leave of absence for a week or so, but for what precise purpose, or with what exact object, I have never been completely able to ascertain. I have heard, it as true, that a very fascinating companion and a most agreeable gentleman frequents a certain oyster-house in Dublin called Burton Bindon’s. I have also been told of a distinguished foreigner, whose black mustache and broken English were the admiration of Cheltenham for the last two winters. I greatly fear from the high tone of the conversation in the former, and for the taste in continental characters in the latter resort, that I could fix upon the individual whose convivial and social gifts have won so much of their esteem and admiration; but were I to run on thus, I should recur to every character of my story, with each and all of whom you have, doubtless, grown well wearied. So here for the last time, and with every kind wish, I say, adieu!