Kathleen took one of the old lady"s hands and kissed it.
"And which are the better in the sight of G.o.d?" she asked; "the ones that have done the work they were made to do, or those that are merely objects of vanity? But I have worked with mine, too; scrubbed and washed, like you."
"Tis a wicked fate that made you have to do it; more shame to me for calling what is done by Providence wicked. But it"s a strange world, Kathleen, this one; no one seems to be in their proper place. There"s Father Healy, him that should be a Bishop, still a priest."
"Why not a Cardinal, or the Holy Father himself?" laughed Kathleen.
"And why not? It"s a wise Pope the Father would make," answered Mrs.
Quirk. "Not that I am finding any fault with the Holy Father," she added quickly; "he is a great man, the greatest in the whole world, and the wisest."
Kathleen O"Connor exercised a remarkable influence on the old lady. Mrs.
Quirk had needed a companion, and an interest in her new life; these she found in Kathleen. Together they slowly transformed the house, Samuel Quirk grumbling and protesting at each innovation, while he aided them the while with his purse. In a phaeton drawn by a quiet old pony, they travelled about the district, never missing a daily visit to the Catholic Church.
"I go out to visit my friends. Shall I miss calling on the best Friend ever I had?" Mrs. Quirk asked Kathleen. "In Collingwood I never missed the morning Ma.s.s, nor the afternoon visit. Here it is too far to go to Ma.s.s every day, but the Good Lord would miss me if I did not come once in the day to see Him."
"If I am not good, it will not be your fault," laughed Kathleen.
"It will be n.o.body"s fault but your own; but you couldn"t help being good. Didn"t Father Healy tell me----."
"Hush!" cried Kathleen; "you must not give Father Healy"s secrets away."
At the church gates they held a daily conference with Molly Healy. She had interested Mrs. Quirk in her gamins, and was accustomed to draw upon the old lady"s purse when the Presbytery funds were low, or Father Healy obdurate to her appeals.
Molly Healy acted as sacristan in the church, and Father Healy was accustomed to say:
"If you attended to everything as you do to the Altar, you would be a treasure to the husband that came seeking you."
"It"s not many are doing that," replied the girl. "I could not count them on my fingers--because, even I can"t count what does not exist."
"How many would you be expecting at eighteen? You are but a child," he answered. "Well, the Altar is a credit to you. You make the bra.s.s shine as if it were gold."
"Gold it would be, if I had my way, and the gla.s.s precious stones. But I do the best with what there is," replied Molly.
She dearly loved to hear a word of praise in return for her labours.
This Kathleen knew well, and she encouraged Mrs. Quirk to admire the flowers and other decorations. The old lady readily did this, for she was typically Irish in finding it far easier to give a generous measure of encouragement than to blame the actions of another.
"It is you, Molly," she would say--at first, until corrected by the girl, it had been Miss Molly--"that can put the flowers in their proper places! It is a pleasure to come into the church and find the altar so beautiful. Those carnations, now, they remind me of Heaven."
"It is dahlias they are, Mrs. Quirk," Molly would reply; "and out of your own garden."
"Is it dahlias? Well, I am getting a little blind, Molly; but the beauty is there, whatever the flowers may be."
Thus encouraged, Molly would speak of her proteges.
"Joe McCarthy told me the same, and he thinks more praise is due to you than me. You send me the flowers every day."
"And why not? What better use for them? But which is Joe McCarthy?" Mrs.
Quirk might answer.
"Don"t you know Joe? Such a good boy, but unfortunate. He was with Regan, driving the cart, when the horse ran away and broke himself and the cart into small pieces. It was a mercy Joe was not in the cart,"
Molly would continue.
"Poor lad! And that was a misfortune. Is he badly hurt?" Mrs. Quirk would ask.
"Not hurt in his body, but dispirited. Regan discharged him without a character. I went to him myself; it"s a surly man he is. "Why not give the boy a testimonial?" I asked. "It"s the whip I will give him," he answered. That was all I got from Regan."
"And why was the man so heartless?" asked Mrs. Quirk.
"After all, Regan lost his horse and cart. You can scarcely blame him,"
Kathleen would explain.
"And hasn"t he plenty of money to buy another? I have no patience with Regan. And there is Joe, with a mother depending on him, out of work, and with no testimonial to help him to another," Molly would reply.
The result would be a few shillings from the old lady"s purse, which Joe would probably spend on "a good thing," that would just fail to secure a race, as "good things" so often do. But Molly Healy was never discouraged by such trifles as these.
"What did you do with the money, Joe?" she would ask.
"It was Harry Price told me to invest it on Blue Peter."
"I told you to take it home to your mother. Shame on you, Joe, to be wasting her food on horses."
"It was like this. "Would you be making a fortune?" Harry asked me. And who wouldn"t, Miss Molly, not you nor I. "Blue Peter is a cert," said he; "my brother Bill will be riding." Could you resist that?"
"Hem!" Molly would reply; "and did he win?"
"If his neck had been as long as Smoker"s he would have won," Joe would explain.
After a few days he would return to favour, and continue a pensioner until he found work for a short time. But ill-luck ever dogged Joe"s footsteps, and his periods of work were ever briefer and briefer, until he threatened to relapse into chronic idleness. Then, to her own surprise, and that of all who knew her, Molly suddenly compelled Joe to reform.
"I have a place for you, Joe, and the last you will ever be getting,"
she said. "It"s a disgrace to me you are, and everyone saying I have spoiled you. Mr. Quirk will take you on, and he is a slave-driver. He stands over his men with a whip. It was hard work I had to get you the place--milking the cows, and helping in the garden. But I told the man you were a hard worker. If you don"t work hard, Joe, it is the whip I will give you with my own hands."
Whether it was this threat, a fear of Mr. Quirk, or the effects of the mission cannot be clearly said, but Joe McCarthy clung to his work until he eventually became overseer at "Layton." With his change in habits, Joe also acquired a self-respect that led him to dress neatly, and to sign the pledge. Thenceforward Molly Healy quoted him as the proof of her powers as a reformer when taunted because of the rabble over whom she reigned.
"There was Joe McCarthy, that would not work until I persuaded him," she would say. "Leave the boys to me; I am correcting them."
Yet only Mrs. Quirk had absolute confidence in the girl"s vocation as a reformer. The old lady was never told of a good-for-nothing son or husband but she would cry:
"Send him to Molly Healy. If there is any good in him, Molly will bring it out."
Her hearers, knowing of Molly"s long succession of failures, naturally smiled at these commendations.
CHAPTER IV.
PROMOTION.