Sullivan, on discovering this stolen interview--for such it was--felt precisely as a man would feel, who found himself unexpectedly within the dart of a rattlesnake, with but one chance of safety in his favor and a thousand against him. His whole frame literally shook with the deadly depth of his resentment; and in a voice which fully betrayed its vehemence, he replied--
"Blame! ay, shame an" blame--sin an" sorrow there is an" ought to rest upon her for this unnatural and cursed meetin"! Blame! surely, an" as I stand here to witness her shame, I tell her that there would not be a just G.o.d in Heaven, if she"s not yet punished for holdin" this guilty discoorse with the son of the man that has her uncle"s blood--my brother"s blood--on his hand of murdher--"
[Ill.u.s.tration: PAGE 785-- "It"s false," replied the young fellow]
"It"s false," replied the young fellow, with kindling eye; "it"s false, from your teeth to your marrow. I know my father"s heart an"
his thought--an" I say that whoever charges him with the murder of your brother, is a liar--a false and d.a.m.nable li--"
He checked himself ere he closed the sentence.
"Jerry Sullivan," said he, in an altered voice, "I ax your pardon for the words---it"s but natural you should feel as you do; but if it was any other man than yourself that brought the charge of blood against my father, I would thramp upon him where he stands."
"An" maybe murdher him, as my poor brother was murdhered. Dalton, I see the love of blood in your eye," replied Sullivan, bitterly.
"Why," replied the other, "you have no proof that the man was murdered at all. His body was never found; and no one can say what became of him.
For all that any one knows to the contrary, he may be alive still."
"Begone, sirra," said Sullivan, in a burst of impetuous resentment which he could not restrain, "if I ever know you to open your lips to that daughter of mine--if the mane crature can be my daughter--I"ll make it be the blackest deed but one that ever a Dalton did; and as for you--go in at wonst--I"ll make you hear me by and by."
Dalton looked at him once more with a kindling but a smiling eye.
"Speak what you like," said he--"I"ll curb myself. Only, if you wish your daughter to go in, you had better leave the way and let her pa.s.s."
Mave--for such was her name--with trembling limbs, burning blushes and palpitating heart, then pa.s.sed from the shady angle where they stood; but ere she did, one quick and lightning glance was bestowed upon her lover, which, brief though it was, he felt as a sufficient consolation for the enmity of her father.
The prophet had not yet spoken; nor indeed had time been given him to do so, had he been inclined. He looked on, however, with" surprise, which soon a.s.sumed the appearance, as well as the reality, of some malignant satisfaction which he could not conceal.
He eyed Dalton with a grin of peculiar bitterness.
"Well," said he, "it"s the general opinion that if any one knows or can tell what the future may bring about, I can; an", if my knowledge doesn"t desave me, Dalton, I think, while you"re before me, that I"m lookin" at a man that was never born to be drowned at any rate. I prophecy that, die when you may, you"ll live to see your own funeral."
"If you"re wise," replied the young man, "you"ll not provoke me now Jerry Sullivan may say what he wishes--he"s safe, an he knows why; but I warn you, Donnel Dhu, to take no liberty with me; I"ll not bear it.
"Troth, I don"t blame Jerry Sullivan," rejoined the prophet. "Of coorse no man would wish to have a son-in-law hanged. It"s in the prophecy that you"ll go to the surgeons yet."
"Did you foresee in your prophecies this mornin" that you"d get yourself well drubbed before night?" asked Dalton, bristling up.
"No," said the other; "my prophecy seen no one able to do it."
"You and your prophecy are liars, then," retorted the other: "an" in the doom you"re kind enough to give me, don"t be too sure but you meant yourself. There"s more of murdher an" the gallows in your face than there is in mine. That"s all I"ll say, Donnel. Anything else you"ll get from me will be a blow; so take care of yourself."
"Let him alone, Donnel," said Sullivan; "it"s not safe to meddle with one of his name. You don"t know what harm he may do you."
"I"m not afeard of him," said the prophet, with a sneer; "he"ll find himself a little mistaken, if he tries his hand. It won"t be for me you"ll hang, my lad."
The words were scarcely uttered when a terrific blow on the eye, struck with the rapidity of lightning, shot him to the earth, where he lay for about half a minute, apparently insensible. He then got up, and after shaking his head, as if to rid himself of a sense of confusion and stupor, looked at Dalton for some time.
"Well," said he, "it"s all over now--but the truth is, the fault was my own. I provoked him too much, an" without any occasion. I"m sorry you struck me, Condy, for I was only jokin" all the time. I never had ill-will against you; an" in spite of what has happened, I haven"t now."
A feeling of generous regret, almost amounting to remorse, instantly touched Dalton"s heart; he seized the hand of Donnel, and expressed his sorrow for the blow he had given him.
"My G.o.d," he exclaimed, "why did I strike you? But sure no one could for a minute suppose that you weren"t in earnest."
"Well, well," said the other, "let it be a warnin" to both of us; to me, in the first place, never to carry a joke too far; and to you, never to allow your pa.s.sion to get the betther of you, afaird that you might give a blow in anger that you"d have cause to repent of all the days of your life. My eye and cheek is in a frightful state; but no matther, Condy, I forgive you, especially in the hope that you"ll mark my advice."
Dalton once more asked his pardon, and expressed his unqualified sorrow at what had occurred; after which he again shook hands with Dalton and departed.
Sullivan felt surprised at this rencontre, especially at the nature of its singular termination; he seemed, however, to fall into a meditative and gloomy mood, and observed when Dalton had gone--
"If I ever had any doubt, Donnel, that my poor brother owed his death to a Dalton, I haven"t it now."
"I don"t blame you much for sayin" so," replied Donnel. "I"m sorry myself for what has happened, and especially as you were present. I"m afeard, indeed", that a man"s life would be but little in that boy"s hands under a fit of pa.s.sion. I provoked him too much, though."
"I think so," said Sullivan. "Indeed, to tell you the truth, I had as little notion that you wore jokin" as he had."
"That"s my drame out last night, at all events," said Donnel.
"How is that?" asked Sullivan, as they approached the door.
"Why," said he, "I dreamed that I was lookin" for a hammer at your house, an" I thought that you hadn"t one to give me; but your daughter Mave came to me, and said, "here"s a hammer for you, Donnel, an" take care of it, for it belongs to Condy Dalton." I thought I took it, an"
the first thing I found myself doin" was drivin" a nail in what appeared to be my own coffin. The same dhrame would alarm me but that I know that dhrames goes by contrairies, as I"ve reason to think this will."
"No man understands these things better than yourself, Donnel," said Sullivan; "but, for my part, I think there"s a dangerous kick in the boy that jist left us; and I"m much mistaken or the world will hear of it an" know it yet."
"Well, well," said Donnel Dhu, in a very Christian-like spirit, "I fear you"re right, Jerry; but still let us hope for the best."
And as he spoke, they entered the house.
CHAPTER III. -- A Family on the Decline--Omens.
Jerry Sullivan"s house and place had about them all the marks and tokens of gradual decline. The thatch on the roof had begun to get black, and in some places was sinking into rotten ridges; the yard was untidy and dirty; the walls and hedges were broken and dismantled; and the gates were lying about, or swinging upon single hinges. The whole air of the premises was uncomfortable to the spectator, who could not avoid feeling that there existed in the owner either wilful neglect or unsuccessful struggle. The chimneys, from which the thatch had sank down, stood up with the incrustations of lime that had been trowelled round their bases, projecting uselessly out from them; some of the quoins had fallen from the gable; the plaster came off the walls in several places, and the whitewash was sadly discolored.
Inside, the aspect of everything was fully as bad, if not worse.
Tables and chairs, and the general furniture of the house, had all that character of actual cleanliness and apparent want of care which poverty superinduces upon the most strenuous efforts of industry. The floor was beginning to break up into holes; tables and chairs were crazy; the dresser, though clean, had a cold, hungry, unfurnished look; and, what was unquestionably the worst symptom of all, the inside of the chimney brace, where formerly the sides and flitches of deep, fat bacon, grey with salt, were arrayed in goodly rows, now presented nothing but the bare and dust-covered hooks, from which they had depended in happier times. About a dozen of herrings hung at one side of a worn salt-box, and at the other a string of onions that was nearly Stripped, both const.i.tuting the princ.i.p.al kitchen, varied, perhaps, with a little b.u.t.termilk,--which Sullivan"s family were then able to afford themselves with their potatoes.
We cannot close our description here, however; for sorry we are to say, that the severe traces of poverty were as visible upon the inmates themselves as upon the house and its furniture. Sullivan"s family consisted of his eldest daughter, aged nineteen, two growing boys, the eldest about sixteen, and several younger children besides. These last were actually ragged--all of them were scantily and poorly clothed; and if any additional proof were wanting that poverty, in one of its most trying shapes, had come among them, it was to be found in their pale, emaciated features, and in that languid look of care and depression, which any diminution in the natural quant.i.ty of food for any length of time uniformly impresses upon the countenance. In fact, the whole group had a sickly and wo-worn appearance, as was evident from the unnatural dejection of the young, who, instead of exhibiting the cheerfulness and animation of youth, now moped about without gayety, sat brooding in corners, or struggled for a warm place nearest to the dull and cheerless fire.
"The day was, Donnel," said Sullivan, whilst he pointed, with a sigh, to the unfurnished chimney, "when we could give you--as I said awhile agone--a betther welcome--in one sense--I mane betther tratement--than we can give you now; but you know the times that is in it, an" you know the down-come we have got, an" that the whole country has got--so you must only take the will for the deed now--to such as we have you"re heartily welcome. Get us some dinner, Bridget," he added, turning to his wife; "but, first and foremost, bring that girl into the room here till she hears what I have to say to her; and, Donnel, as you wor a witness to the disgraceful sight we seen a while agone, come in an" hear, too, what I"m goin" to say to her. I"ll have no black thraisin in my own family against my own blood, an" against the blood of my loving brother, that was so traicherously shed by that boy"s father."
The persons he addressed immediately pa.s.sed into the cold, damp room as he spoke--Mave, the cause of all this anxiety, evidently in such a state of excitement as was pitiable. Her mother, who, as well as every other member of the family, had been ignorant of this extraordinary attachment, seemed perfectly bewildered by the language of her husband, at whom, as at her daughter, she looked with a face on which might be read equal amazement and alarm.
Mave Sullivan was a young creature, shaped with extraordinary symmetry, and possessed of great natural grace. Her stature was tall, and all her motions breathed; unstudied ease and harmony. In color, her long, abundant hair was beautifully fair--precisely of that delightful shade which generally accompanies a pale but exquisitely clear and almost transparent complexion. Her face was oblong, and her features so replete with an expression of innocence and youth, as left on the beholder a conviction that she breathed of utter guilelessness and angelic purity itself. This was princ.i.p.ally felt in the bewitching charm of her smile, which was irresistible, and might turn the heart of a demon into love.
All her motions were light and elastic, and her whole figure, though not completely developed, was sufficiently rounded by the fulness of health and youth to give promise of a rich and luxurious maturity. On this occasion she became deadly pale, but as she was one of those whose beauty only a.s.sumes a new phase of attraction at every change, her paleness now made her appear, if possible, an object of greater interest.