Loe raamatut: «Jack Hinton: The Guardsman», lehekülg 22

CHAPTER XXIX. THE DUEL

When morning broke, I started up and opened the window. It was one of those bright and beauteous daybreaks which would seem to be the compensation a northern climate possesses for its want of the azure sky of noon and the silvery moonlight of night, the gifts of happier climes. The pink hue of the sky was gradually replacing the paler tints, like a deep blush mantling the cheek of beauty; the lark was singing high in heaven, and the deep note of the blackbird came mellowed from the leafy grove; the cattle were still at rest, and seemed half unwilling to break the tranquil stillness of the scene, as they lay breathing the balmy odours from the wild flowers that grew around them. Such was the picture that lay on one side of me. On the other was the long street of a little town, on which yet the shadows of night were sleeping; the windows were closed; not a smoke-wreath rose from any chimney, but all was still and peaceful.

In my little parlour I found the good priest and the Major fast asleep in their chairs, pretty much in the same attitudes I had left them in some hours before. The fire had died away; the square decanter of whisky was emptied to its last drop, and the kettle lay pensively on one side, like some shipwrecked craft high and dry upon the shore. I looked at my watch; it was but four o’clock. Our meeting was appointed for half-past five; so I crept noiselessly back to my room, not sorry to have half an hour to myself of undisturbed reflection. When I had finished my dressing, I threw up the sash and sprang out into the garden. It was a wild, uncultivated spot; but still there was something of beauty in those old trees whose rich blossoms scented the air, while the rank weeds of many a gay and gaudy hue shot up luxuriantly about their trunks, the pink marsh-mallow and the taper foxglove mingling their colours with the sprayey meadowsweet and the wild sweet-brier. There was an air of solitude in the neglect around me that seemed to suit the habit of my soul; and I strolled along from one walk to another, lost in my own thoughts.

There were many things at a moment like that I would fain have written, fain have said; but so it is, in the wealth of our emotions we can give nothing, and I could not bring myself to write to my friends even to say farewell Although I felt that in every stage of this proceeding I had nothing to reproach myself with, this duel being thrust on me by one who had singled me out for his hatred, yet I saw as its result nothing but the wreck of all my hopes. Already had she intimated how strong was her father’s attachment to his nephew, and with an expressive fear cautioned me against any collision with him. How vain are all our efforts, how fruitless are all our endeavours, to struggle against the current of our fate. We may stem for a short time the full tide of fortune, we may breast with courage high and spirit fierce the rough billows as they break upon us, but we are certain to succumb in the end. With some men failure is a question of fear; some want the persevering courage to drag on amid trials and difficulties; and some are deficient in the temper which, subduing our actions to a law, governs and presides over every moment of our lives, rendering us, even in our periods of excitement and irritation, amenable to the guidance of our reason. This was my case; and I felt that notwithstanding all my wishes to avoid a quarrel with Burke, yet in my heart a lurking spirit urged me to seek him out and offer him defiance.

While these thoughts were passing through my mind, I suddenly heard a voice which somehow seemed half familiar to my ear. I listened; it came from a room of which the window was partly open. I now remembered that poor Joe lay in that part of the house, and the next moment I knew it to be his. Placing a ladder against the wall, I crept quietly up till I could peep into the room. The poor fellow was alone, sitting up in his bed, with his hunting-cap on, an old whip in his hand, which he flourished from time to time with no small energy; his cheek was flushed, and his eye, prominent and flashing, denoted the access of high fever. It was evident that his faculties, clouded as they were even in their happiest moments, were now under the wilder influence of delirium. He was speaking rapidly to himself in a quick undertone, calling the dogs by name, caressing this one, scolding that; and then, bursting forth into a loud tally-ho, his face glowed with an ecstatic pleasure, and he broke forth into a rude chant, the words of which I have never forgotten, for as he sang them in a voice of wild and touching sweetness, they seemed the very outpourings of his poor simple heart: —

 
‘I never yet owned a horse or hound,
I never was lord of a foot of ground;
Yet few are richer, I will be bound,
Than me of a hunting morning.
 
 
‘I ‘m far better off nor him that pays,
For though I ‘ve no money, I live at my aise,
With hunting and shooting whenever I plase,
And a tally-high-ho in the morning.
 
 
‘As I go on foot, I don’t lose my sate,
As I take the gaps, I don’t break a gate;
And if I’m not first, why I’m seldom late,
With my tally-high-ho in the morning.
 
 
‘And there’s not a man, be he high or low,
In the parts down here, or wherever you go,
That doesn’t like poor Tipperary Joe,
With his tally-high-ho in the morning.’
 

A loud view-holloa followed this wild chant; and then the poor fellow, as if exhausted by his efforts, sank back in the bed muttering to himself in a low broken voice, but with a look so happy, and a smile so tranquil, he seemed more a thing to envy than one to commiserate and pity.

‘I say, Hinton!’ shouted the Major from the window of my bedroom, ‘what the deuce are you doing up that ladder there? Not serenading Mrs. Doolan, I hope. Are you aware it is five o’clock?’

I descended with all haste, and joining my friend, took his arm, and set out towards the rendezvous.

‘I didn’t order the horses,’ said Mahon, ‘for the rumour of such a thing as this always gets abroad through one’s servants.’

‘Ah, yes,’ said I; ‘and then you have the police.’

‘The police!’ repeated he, laughing – ‘not a bit of it, my boy; don’t forget you’re in glorious old Ireland, where no one ever thinks of spoiling a fair fight. It is possible the magistrate might issue his warrant if you would not come up to time, but for anything else – ’

‘Well,’ said I, ‘that certainly does afford me another glimpse of your habits. How far have we to go, Major?’

‘You remember the grass-field below the sunk fence, to the left of the mill?’

‘Where the stream runs?’

‘Exactly; that’s the spot. It was old Pigott chose it, and no man is a better judge of these things. By-the-bye, it is very lucky that Burke should have pitched upon a gentleman for his friend – I mean a real gentleman, for there are plenty of his acquaintances who under that name would rob the mail.’

Thus chatting as we went, Mahon informed me that Pigott was an old half-pay Colonel, whose principal occupation for thirteen years had been what the French would call ‘to assist’ at affairs of honour. Even the Major himself looked up to him as a last appeal in a disputed or a difficult point; and many a reserved case was kept for his opinion, with the same ceremonious observance as a knotty point of law for the consideration of the twelve judges. Crossing the little rivulet near the mill, we held on by a small bypath which brought us over the starting-ground of the steeplechase, by the scene of part of my preceding day’s exploits. While I was examining with some curiosity the ground cut up and trod by the horses’ feet, and looking at the spot where we had taken the fence, the sharp sound of two pistol-shots quickly aroused me, and I eagerly asked what it was.

‘Snapping the pistols,’ said Mahon. ‘Ah, by-the-bye, all this kind of thing is new to you. Never mind; put a careless, half-indifferent kind of face on the matter. Do you take snuff? It doesn’t signify; put your hands in your pockets, and hum “Tatter Jack Walsh!”’

As I supposed there was no specific charm in the melody he alluded to, nor if there had been, had I any time to acquire it, I consoled myself by observing the first part of his direction, and strolled after him into the field with a nonchalance only perhaps a little too perfect.

Mr. Burke and his friends, to the number of about a dozen persons, were already assembled; and were one to judge from their loud talking and hearty laughter as we came forward, it would seem difficult to believe the occasion that brought them there was that of mortal combat. So, at least, I thought. Not so, however, the Major; for with a hop, step, and a jump, performed by about the shortest pair of legs in the barony, he sprang into the midst of the party, with some droll observation on the benefits of early rising which once more called forth their merriment. Seating myself on a large moss-covered stone, I waited patiently for the preliminaries to be settled. As I threw my eye among the group, I perceived that Burke was not there; but on turning my head, I remarked two men walking arm-in-arm on the opposite side of the hedge. As they paced to and fro, I could see, by the violence of his gesticulations and the energy of his manner, that one was Burke. It seemed as though his companion was endeavouring to reason with and dissuade him from some course of proceeding he appeared bent on following; but there was a savage earnestness in his manner that would not admit of persuasion; and at last, as if wearied and vexed by his friend’s importunities, he broke rudely from him, and springing over the fence, called out —

‘Pigott, are you aware it is past six?’ Then pulling out his watch, he added, ‘I must be at Ballinasloe by eleven o’clock.’

‘If you speak another word, sir,’ said the old Colonel, with an air of offended dignity, ‘I leave the ground. Major Mahon, a word, if you please.’

They walked apart from the rest for a few seconds; and then the Colonel, throwing his glove upon the grass, proceeded to step off the ground with a military precision and formality that I am sure at any other time would have highly amused me.

After a slight demur from the Major, to which I could perceive the Colonel readily yielded, a walking-stick was stuck at either end of the measured distance; while the two seconds, placing themselves beside them, looked at each other with very great satisfaction, and mutually agreed it was a sweet spot.

‘Would you like to look at these?’ said Pigott, taking up the pistols from where they lay on the grass.

‘Ah, I know them well,’ replied the Major, laughing; ‘these were poor Tom Casey’s, and a better fellow, and a handier with his iron, never snapped a trigger. These are ours, Colonel’; presenting, as he spoke, two splendid-looking Mortimers, in all the brilliancy of their maiden freshness. A look of contempt from the Colonel, and a most expressive shrug of his shoulders, was his reply.

‘Begad, I think so,’ said Mahon, as if appreciating the gesture; ‘I had rather have that old tool with the cracked stock – not but this is a very sweet instrument, and elegantly balanced in the hand.’

‘We are ready now,’ said Pigott; ‘bring up your man, Major.’

As I started up to obey the summons, a slight bustle near attracted me. Two or three of Burke’s friends were endeavouring as it were to pacify and subdue him; but his passion knew no bounds, and as he broke from them, he said in a voice perfectly audible where I stood —

‘Won’t I, by G – ! then I’ll tell you, if I don’t shoot him – ’

‘Sir,’ said the Colonel, turning on him a look of passionate indignation, ‘if it were not that you were here to answer the appeal of wounded honour, I’d leave you to your fate this moment; as it is, another such expression as that you ‘ve used, and I abandon you on the spot.’

Doggedly and without speaking, Burke drew his hat far down upon his eyes, and took the place marked out for him.

‘Mr. Hinton,’ said the Colonel, as he touched his hat with most courteous politeness, ‘will you have the goodness to stand there?’

Mahon, meanwhile, handed each man his pistol, and whispering in my ear, ‘Aim low,’ retired.

‘The word, gentlemen,’ said the Colonel, ‘will be, “One, two, three.” Mr. Hinton, pray observe, I beg of you, you ‘ll not reserve your fire after I say “three.”’ With his eyes fixed upon us he walked back about ten paces. ‘Are you ready? Are you both ready?’

‘Yes, yes,’ said Burke impatiently.

‘Yes,‘said I.

‘One, two, three.’

I lifted my pistol at the second word, and as the last dropped from the Colonel’s lips one loud report rang through the air, and both pistols went off together. A quick sharp pang shot through my cheek as though it had been seared by a hot instrument. I put up my hand, but the ball had only touched the flesh, and a few drops of blood were all the damage. Not so Burke; my ball had entered above the hip, and already his trousers were stained with blood, and notwithstanding his endeavours he could not stand up straight.

‘Is he hit, Pigott?’ cried he, in a voice harsh from agony. ‘Is he hit, I say?’

‘Only grazed,’ said I tranquilly, as I wiped the stain from my face.

‘Another pistol, quick! Do you hear me, Pigott?’

‘We are not the arbiters in this case,’ replied the Colonel coolly. ‘Major Mahon, is your friend satisfied?’

‘Perfectly satisfied on our own account,’ said the Major; ‘but if the gentleman desires another shot – ’

‘I do, I do!’ screamed Burke, as, writhing with pain, he pressed both hands to his side, from which the blood, now gushing in torrents, formed a pool about his feet. ‘Be quick there, Pigott! I am getting faint.’ He staggered forward as he spoke, his face pale and his lips parted; then suddenly clutching his pistol by the barrel, he fixed his eyes steadily on me, while with a curse he hurled the weapon at my head, and fell senseless to the earth. His aim was true; for straight between the eyes the weapon struck me, and felled me to the ground. Although stunned for the moment, I could hear the cry of horror and indignant shame that broke from the bystanders; but the next instant a dreamy confusion came over me, and I became unconscious of what was passing around.

CHAPTER XXX. A COUNTRY DOCTOR

Should my reader feel any interest concerning that portion of my history which immediately followed the events of my last chapter, I believe I must refer him to Mrs. Doolan, the amiable hostess of the Bonaveen Arms. She could probably satisfy any curious inquiry as to the confusion produced in her establishment by the lively sallies of Tipperary Joe in one quarter, and the more riotous madness of myself in another. The fact is, good reader, my head was an English one; and although its contents were gradually acclimating themselves to the habits of the country, the external shell had not assumed that proper thickness and due power of resistance which Irish heads would appear to be gifted with. In plain words, the injury had brought on delirium.

It was somewhere in the third week after this unlucky morning that I found myself lying in my bed with a wet cloth upon my temples, while over my whole frame was spread that depressing sense of great debility more difficult to bear than acute bodily suffering. Although unable to speak, I could distinctly hear the conversation about me, and recognise the voices of both Father Tom and the Major as they conversed with a third party, whom I afterwards learned was the Galen of Loughrea.

Dr. Mopin, surgeon of the Roscommon militia, had been for forty years the terror of the sick of the surrounding country; for, independent of a naturally harsh and disagreeable manner, he had a certain slangy and sneering way of addressing his patients that was perfectly shocking. Amusing himself the while at their expense, by suggesting the various unhappy and miserable consequences that might follow on their illness, he appeared to take a diabolical pleasure in the terror he was capable of eliciting. There was something almost amusing in the infernal ingenuity he had acquired in this species of torture. There was no stage of your illness, no phase of your constitution, no character or condition of your malady, that was not the immediate forerunner of one or more afflicting calamities. Were you getting weaker, it was the way they always died out; did you gain strength, it was a rally before death; were you despondent, it was the best for you to know your state; were you sanguine, he would rebuke your good spirits and suggest the propriety of a priest. However, with all these qualifications people put up with him; and as he had a certain kind of rude skill, and never stuck at a bold method, he obtained the best practice of the country and a widespread reputation.

‘Well,’ said Father Tom, in a low voice – ‘well, Doctor, what do you think of him this evening?’

‘What do I think of him? Just what I thought before – congestion of the membranes. This is the low stage he is in now; I wouldn’t be surprised if he’d get a little better in a few days, and then go off like the rest of them.’

‘Go off! eh? Now you don’t mean – ’

‘Don’t I? Maybe not. The ould story – coma, convulsions, and death.’

‘Damn the fellow!’ said the Major, in a muttered voice, ‘I feel as if I was in a well. But I say, Doctor, what are we to do?’

‘Anything you plase. They say his family is mighty respectable, and have plenty of money. I hope so; for here am I coming three times a day, and maybe when he dies it will be a mourning ring they’ll be sending me instead of my fee. He was a dissipated chap I am sure: look at the circles under his eyes!’

‘Ay, ay,’ said the priest, ‘but they only came since his illness.’

‘So much the worse,’ added the invincible Doctor; ‘that’s always a symptom that the base of the brain is attacked.’

‘And what happens then?’ said the Major.

‘Oh, he might recover. I knew a man once get over it, and he is alive now, and in Swift’s Hospital.’

‘Mad?’ said the priest.

‘Mad as a March hare,’ grinned the Doctor; ‘he thinks himself the post-office clock, and chimes all the hours and half-hours day and night.’

‘The heavens be about us!’ said Father Tom, crossing himself piously. ‘I had rather be dead than that.’

‘When did you see Burke?’ inquired the Major, wishing to change the conversation.

‘About an hour ago; he is going fast.’

‘Why, I thought he was better,’ said Father Tom; ‘they told me he ate a bit of chicken, and took a little wine and water.’

‘Ay, so he did; I bid them give him whatever he liked, as his time was so short. So, after all, maybe it is as well for this young chap here not to get over it.’

‘How so?’ said the Major. ‘What do you mean by that?’

‘Just that it is as good to die of a brain fever as be hanged; and it won’t shock the family.’

‘I ‘d break his neck,’ muttered Bob Mahon, ‘if there was another doctor within forty miles.’

Of all his patients, Tipperary Joe was the only one of whom the Doctor spoke without disparagement. Whether that the poor fellow’s indifference to his powers of terrorising had awed or conciliated him, I know not; but he expressed himself favourably regarding his case, and his prospects of recovery.

‘Them chaps always recover,’ drawled out the Doctor in a dolorous cadence.

‘Is it true,’ said the Major, with a malicious grin – ‘is it true that he changed all the splints and bandages to the sound leg, and that you didn’t discover the mistake for a week afterwards? Mary Doolan told me.’

‘Mrs. Doolan,’ said the Doctor, ‘ought to be thinking of her own misfortunes; and with an acute inflammation of the pericardium, she might be making her sowl.’

‘She ill? – that fine, fat, comfortable-looking woman!’

‘Ay, just so; they’re always fat, and have a sleepy look about the eyes, just like yourself. Do you ever bleed at the nose?’

‘Never without a blow on it. Come, come, I know you well, Doctor; you shall not terrify me.’

‘You’re right not to fret; for it will take you off suddenly, with a giddiness in your head, and a rolling in your eyes, and a choking feeling about your throat – ’

‘Stop, and be d – d to you!’ said the Major, as he cleared his voice a couple of times, and loosed the tie of his cravat. ‘This room is oppressively hot.’

‘I protest to God,’ said Father Tom, ‘my heart is in my mouth, and there isn’t a bone in my body that’s not aching.’

‘I don’t wonder,’ chimed in the Doctor; ‘you are another of them, and you are a surprising man to go on so long. Sure, it is two years ago I warned your niece that when she saw you fall down she must open a vein in your neck, if it was only with a carving-knife.’

‘The saints in heaven forbid!’ said the priest, cutting the sign of the cross in the air; ‘it’s maybe the jugular she’d cut!’

‘No,’ drawled out the Doctor, ‘she needn’t go so deep; and if her hand doesn’t shake, there won’t be much danger. Good-evening to you both.’

So saying, with his knees bent, and his hands crossed under the skirts of his coat, he sneaked out of the room; while the others, overcome, with fear, shame, and dismay, sat silently, looking misery itself, at each side of the table.

‘That fellow would kill a regiment,’ said the Major at length. ‘Come, Tom, let’s have a little punch; I ‘ve a kind of a trembling over me.’

‘Not a drop of anything stronger than water will cross my lips this blessed night. Do you know, Bob, I think this place doesn’t agree with me? I wish I was back in Murranakilty: the mountain air, and regular habits of life, that’s the thing for me.’

‘We are none of us abstemious enough,’ said the Major; ‘and then we bachelors – to be sure you have your niece.’

‘Whisht!’ said the priest, ‘how do you know who is listening? I vow to God I am quite alarmed at his telling that to Mary; some night or other, if I take a little too much, she’ll maybe try her anatomy upon me!’

This unhappy reflection seemed to weigh upon the good priest’s mind, and set him a-mumbling certain Latin offices between his teeth for a quarter of an hour.

‘I wish,’ said the Major, ‘Hinton was able to read his letters, for here is a whole bundle of them – some from England, some from the Castle, and some marked “On His Majesty’s service.”’

‘I’ll wait another week anyhow for him,’ said the priest. ‘To go back to Dublin in the state he is now would be the ruin of him, after the shake he has got. The dissipation, the dining-out, and all the devilment would destroy him entirely; but a few weeks’ peace and quietness up at Murranakilty will make him as sound as a bell.’

‘You are right, Tom, you are right,’ said the Major; ‘the poor fellow mustn’t be lost for the want of a little care; and now that Dillon has gone, there is no one here to look after him. Let us go down and see if the post is in; I think a walk would do us good.’

Assenting to this proposition, the priest bent over me mournfully for a moment, shook his head, and having muttered a blessing, walked out of the room with the Major, leaving me in silence to think over all I had overheard.

Whether it was that youth suggested the hope, or that I more quickly imbibed an appreciation of the Doctor’s character from being the looker-on at the game, I am not exactly sure; but certainly I felt little depressed by his gloomy forebodings respecting me, and greatly lightened at my heart by the good news of poor Tipperary Joe.

Of all the circumstances which attended my illness, the one that most impressed me was the warm, affectionate solicitude of my two friends, the priest and his cousin. There was something of kindness and good feeling in their care of me that spoke rather of a long friendship than of the weaker ties of chance and passing acquaintance. Again I thought of home; and while I asked myself if the events which beset my path in Ireland could possibly have happened to me there, I could not but acknowledge that if they had so, I could scarcely have hoped to suddenly conjure up such faithful and benevolent friends, with no other claim, nor other recommendation, save that of being a stranger.

The casual observation concerning my letters had, by stimulating my curiosity, awakened my dormant energy; and by a great effort I stretched out my hand to the little bell beside my bed, and rang it. The summons was answered by the barelegged girl who acted as waiter in the inn. When she had sufficiently recovered from her astonishment to comprehend my request, I persuaded her to place a candle beside me; and having given me the packet of letters that lay on the chimney-piece, I desired her on no account to admit any one, but say that I had fallen into a sound sleep, and should not be disturbed.