Further Experiences of an Irish R.M.

by E. Oe. Somerville and Martin Ross

  VI

  THE BOAT'S SHARE

  I was sitting on the steps of Shreelane House, smoking a cigaretteafter breakfast. By the calendar, the month was November, by the mapit was the South-west of Ireland, but by every token that hot sun andsoft breeze could offer it was the Riviera in April.

  Maria, my wife's water spaniel, elderly now, but unimpaired in figure,and in character merely fortified in guile by the castigations of sevenwinters, reclined on the warm limestone flags beside me. Minx, thenursery fox-terrier, sat, as was her practice, upon Maria's ribs,nodding in slumber. All was peace.

  Peace, I say, but even as I expanded in it and the sunshine, therearose to me from the kitchen window in the area the voice of Mrs.Cadogan, uplifted in passionate questioning.

  "Bridgie!" it wailed. "Where's me beautiful head and me lovely feet?"

  The answer to this amazing inquiry travelled shrilly from the region ofthe scullery.

  "Bilin' in the pot, ma'am."

  I realised that it was merely soup in its elemental stage that wasunder discussion, but Peace spread her wings at the cry; it recalledthe fact that Philippa was having a dinner party that same night. In asmall establishment such as mine, a dinner party is an affair of manyaspects, all of them serious. The aspect of the master of the house,however, is not serious, it is merely contemptible. Having got out thechampagne, and reverentially decanted the port, there remains for himno further place in the proceedings, no moment in which his presence isdesired. If, at such a time, I wished to have speech with my wife, shewas not to be found; if I abandoned the search and stationed myself inthe hall, she would pass me, on an average, twice in every threeminutes, generally with flowers in her hands, always with an expressionso rapt as to abash all questionings. I therefore sat upon the stepsand read the paper, superfluous to all save the dogs, to whom I atleast offered a harbourage in the general stress.

  Suddenly, and without a word of warning, Minx and Maria were convertedfrom a slumbrous mound into twin comets--comets that trailed acontinuous shriek of rage as they flew down the avenue. The cause ofthe affront presently revealed itself, in the form of a tall woman,with a shawl over her head, and a basket on her arm. She advancedunfalteringly, Minx walking on her hind legs beside her, as if in acircus, attentively smelling the basket, while Maria bayed her at largein the background. She dropped me a curtsey fit for the LordLieutenant.

  "Does your Honour want any fish this morning?" Her rippling grey hairgleamed like silver in the sunlight, her face was straight-browed andpale, her grey eyes met mine with respectful self-possession. Shemight have been Deborah the prophetess, or the Mother of the Gracchi;as a matter of fact I recognised her as a certain Mrs. Honora Brickley,mother of my present kitchen-maid, a lady whom, not six months before,I had fined in a matter of trespass and assault.

  "They're lovely fish altogether!" she pursued, "they're leppin' fresh!"

  "THEY'RE LOVELY FISH ALTOGETHER! THEY'RE LEPPIN'FRESH!"]

  Here was the chance to make myself useful. I called down the area andasked Mrs. Cadogan if she wanted fish. (It may or may not be necessaryto mention that my cook's name is locally pronounced "Caydogawn.")

  "What fish is it, sir?" replied Mrs. Cadogan, presenting at the kitchenwindow a face like a harvest moon.

  "'Tis pollock, ma'am!" shouted Mrs. Brickley from the foot of the steps.

  "'Sha! thim's no good to us!" responded the harvest moon in bitterscorn. "Thim's not company fish!"

  I was here aware of the presence of my wife in the doorway, with amenu-slate in one hand, and one of my best silk pocket handkerchiefs,that had obviously been used as a duster, in the other.

  "Filleted with white sauce--" she murmured to herself, a world ofthought in her blue eyes, "or perhaps quenelles----"

  Mrs. Brickley instantly extracted a long and shapely pollock from herbasket, and, with eulogies of its beauty, of Philippa's beauty, and ofher own magnanimity in proffering her wares to us instead of to acraving market in Skebawn, laid it on the steps.

  At this point a series of yells from the nursery, of the usualblood-curdling description, lifted Philippa from the scene of action asa wind whirls a feather.

  "Buy them!" came back to me from the stairs.

  I kept to myself my long-formed opinion that eating pollock was likeeating boiled cotton wool with pins in it, and the bargain proceeded.The affair was almost concluded, when Mrs. Brickley, in snatching afish from the bottom of her basket to complete an irresistiblehalf-dozen, let it slip from her fingers. It fell at my feet,revealing a mangled and gory patch on its side.

  "Why, then, that's the best fish I have!" declared Mrs. Brickley inresponse to my protest. "That's the very one her honour Mrs. Yeateswould fancy! She'd always like to see the blood running fresh!"

  This flight of sympathetic insight did not deter me from refusing theinjured pollock, coupled with a regret that Mrs. Brickley's cat shouldhave been interrupted in its meal.

  Mrs. Brickley did not immediately reply. She peeped down the area, sheglanced into the hall.

  "Cat is it!" she said, sinking her voice to a mysterious whisper."Your Honour knows well, God bless you, that it was no cat done that!"

  Obedient to the wholly fallacious axiom that those who ask no questionswill be told no lies, I remained silent.

  "Only for the luck of God being on me they'd have left meself nobetther than they left the fish!" continued Mrs. Brickley. "YourHonour didn't hear what work was in it on Hare Island Strand lastnight? Thim Keohanes had the wooden leg pulled from undher me husbandwith the len'th o' fightin'! Oh! Thim's outlawed altogether, and thefaymales is as manly as the men! Sure the polis theirselves does be indhread of thim women! The day-and-night-screeching porpoises!"

  Seven years of Resident Magistracy had bestowed upon me somesuperficial knowledge of whither all this tended. I rose from thesteps, with the stereotyped statement that if there was to be a case incourt I could not listen to it beforehand. I then closed the halldoor, not, however, before Mrs. Brickley had assured me that I was theonly gentleman, next to the Lord Almighty, in whom she had anyconfidence.

  The next incident in the affair occurred at about a quarter to eightthat evening. I was tying my tie when my wife's voice summoned me toher room in tones that presaged disaster. Philippa was standing erect,in a white and glittering garment. Her eyes shone, her cheeks glowed.It is not given to every one to look their best when they are angry,but it undoubtedly is becoming to Philippa.

  "I ask you to look at my dress," she said in a level voice.

  "It looks very nice----" I said cautiously, knowing there was a trapsomewhere. "I know it, don't I?"

  "Know it!" replied Philippa witheringly, "did you know that it had onlyone sleeve?"

  She extended her arms; from one depended vague and transparent films ofwhiteness, the other was bare to the shoulder. I rather preferred itof the two.

  "Well, I can't say I did," I said helplessly, "is that a new fashion?"

  There was a spectral knock at the door, and Hannah, the housemaid, slidinto the room, purple of face, abject of mien.

  "It's what they're afther tellin' me, ma'am," she panted. "'Twas tookto sthrain the soup!"

  "They took my sleeve to strain the soup!" repeated Philippa, in acrystal clarity of wrath.

  "She said she got it in the press in the passage, ma'am, and shethought you were afther throwin' it," murmured Hannah, with a glancethat implored my support.

  "Who are you speaking of?" demanded Philippa, looking quite six feethigh.

  The situation, already sufficiently acute, was here intensified by themassive entry of Mrs. Cadogan, bearing in her hand a plate, on whichwas a mound of soaked brownish rag. She was blowing hard, the glare ofthe kitchen range at highest power lived in her face.

  "There's your sleeve, ma'am!" she said, "and if I could fall down deadthis minute it'd be no more than a relief to me! And as for BridgieBrickley!" continued Mrs. Cadogan, catching her wind with a gasp, "
Ithravelled many genthry's kitchens, but thanks be to God, I never seenthe like of her! Five weeks to-morrow she's in this house, and thereisn't a day but I gave her a laceratin'! Sure the hair's droppin' outo' me head, and the skin rollin' off the soles o' me feet with theheart scald I get with her! The big, low, dirty buccaneer! And Ideclare to you, ma'am, and to the Major, that I have a pain switchingout through me hips this minute that'd bring down a horse!"

  "Oh God!" said Hannah, clapping her hand over her mouth.

  My eye met Philippa's; some tremor of my inward agony declared itself,and found its fellow on her quivering lips. In the same instant,wheels rumbled in the avenue.

  "Here are the Knoxes!" I exclaimed, escaping headlong from the roomwith my dignity as master of the house still intact.

  Dinner, though somewhat delayed by these agitations, passed offreasonably well. Its occasion was the return from the South Africanwar of my landlord and neighbour, Mr. Florence McCarthy Knox, M.F.H.,J.P., who had been serving his country in the Yeomanry for the pasttwelve months. The soup gave no hint of its cannibalistic origin, andwas of a transparency that did infinite credit to the services ofPhilippa's sleeve; the pollock, chastely robed in white sauce, held nosuggestion of a stormy past, nor, it need scarcely be said, did theyforeshadow their influence on my future. As they made their circuit ofthe table I aimed a communing glance at my wife, who, serene in palepink and conversation with Mr. Knox, remained unresponsive.

  How the volcano that I knew to be raging below in the kitchen couldhave brought forth anything more edible than molten paving stones I wasat a loss to imagine. Had Mrs. Cadogan sent up Bridget Brickley's headas an _entremet_ it would not, indeed, have surprised me. I could notknow that as the gong sounded for dinner Miss Brickley had retired toher bed in strong hysterics, announcing that she was paralysed, whileMrs. Cadogan, rapt by passion to an ecstasy of achievement, copedsingle-handed with the emergency.

  At breakfast time next morning Philippa and I were informed that theinvalid had at an early hour removed herself and her wardrobe from thehouse, requisitioning for the purpose my donkey-cart and the attendanceof my groom, Peter Cadogan; a proceeding on which the comments ofPeter's aunt, Mrs. Cadogan, left nothing to be desired.

  THE INVALID REMOVED HERSELF]

  The affair on the strand at Hare Island ripened, with infinitecomplexity of summonses and cross-summonses, into an imposing PettySessions case. Two separate deputations presented themselves atShreelane, equipped with black eyes and other conventional injuries,one of them armed with a creelful of live lobsters to underline theargument. To decline the bribe was of no avail: the deputationdecanted them upon the floor of the hall and retired, and the lobstersspread themselves at large over the house, and to this hour remain thenightmare of the nursery.

  The next Petty Sessions day was wet; the tall windows of the CourtHouse were grey and streaming, and the reek of wet humanity ascended tothe ceiling. As I took my seat on the bench I perceived with an inwardgroan that the services of the two most eloquent solicitors in Skebawnhad been engaged. This meant that Justice would not have run itscourse till heaven knew what dim hour of the afternoon, and that thatcourse would be devious and difficult.

  All the pews and galleries (any Irish courthouse might, with theaddition of a harmonium, pass presentably as a dissenting chapel) werefull, and a line of flat-capped policemen stood like church-wardensnear the door. Under the galleries, behind what might have answered tochoir-stalls, the witnesses and their friends hid in darkness, whichcould, however, but partially conceal two resplendent young ladies,barmaids, who were to appear in a subsequent Sunday drinking case. Iwas a little late, and when I arrived Flurry Knox, supported by acouple of other magistrates, was in the chair, imperturbable ofcountenance as was his wont, his fair and delusive youthfulness ofaspect unimpaired by his varied experiences during the war, his roving,subtle eye untamed by four years of matrimony.

  A woman was being examined, a square and ugly country-woman, with wispyfair hair, a slow, dignified manner, and a slight and impressivestammer. I recognised her as one of the bodyguard of the lobsters.Mr. Mooney, solicitor for the Brickleys, widely known and respected as"Roaring Jack," was in possession of that much-enduring organ, the earof the Court.

  "Now, Kate Keohane!" he thundered, "tell me what time it was when allthis was going on?"

  "About duskish, sir. Con Brickley was slashing the f-fish at me motherthe same time. He never said a word but to take the shtick and fire medead with it on the sthrand. He gave me plenty of blood to dhrinktoo," said the witness with acid decorum. She paused to permit thisagreeable fact to sink in, and added, "his wife wanted to f-fashten onme the same time, an' she havin' the steer of the boat to sthrike me."

  These were not precisely the facts that Mr. Murphy, as solicitor forthe defence, wished to elicit.

  "Would you kindly explain what you mean by the steer of the boat?" hedemanded, sparring for wind in as intimidating a manner as possible.The witness stared at him.

  "Sure 'tis the shtick, like, that they pulls here and there to go intheir choice place."

  "We may presume that the lady is referring to the tiller," said Mr.Mooney, with a facetious eye at the Bench. "Maybe now, ma'am, you canexplain to us what sort of a boat is she?"

  "She's that owld that if it wasn't for the weeds that's holding hertogether she'd bursht up in the deep."

  "And who owns this valuable property?" pursued Mr. Mooney.

  "She's between Con Brickley and me brother, an' the saine is betweenfour, an' whatever crew does be in it should get their share, and theboat has a man's share."

  I made no attempt to comprehend this, relying with well-foundedconfidence on Flurry Knox's grasp of such enigmas.

  "Was Con Brickley fishing the same day?"

  "He was not, sir. He was at Lisheen Fair; for as clever as he is, hecouldn't kill two birds under one slat!"

  Kate Keohane's voice moved unhurried from sentence to sentence and herslow pale eyes turned for an instant to the lair of the witnesses underthe gallery.

  "And you're asking the Bench to believe that this decent man left hisbusiness in Lisheen in order to slash fish at your mother?" said Mr.Mooney truculently.

  "B'lieve me, sorra much business he laves afther him wherever he'llgo!" returned the witness, "himself and his wife had business enough onthe sthrand when the fish was dividing, and it's then themselves putevery name on me."

  "Ah, what harm are names!" said Mr. Mooney, dallying elegantly with amassive watch-chain. "Come now, ma'am! will you swear you got anyill-usage from Con Brickley or his wife?" He leaned over the front ofhis pew, and waited for the answer with his massive red head on oneside.

  "I was givin' blood like a c-cow that ye'd shtab with a knife!" saidKate Keohane, with unshaken dignity. "If it was yourself that was init ye'd feel the smart as well as me. My hand and word on it, yewould! The marks is on me head still, like the prints of dog-bites!"

  She lifted a lock of hair from her forehead, and exhibited asufficiently repellant injury. Flurry Knox leaned forward.

  "Are you sure you haven't that since the time there was that businessbetween yourself and the postmistress at Munig? I'm told you had thename of the office on your forehead where she struck you with theoffice stamp! Try now, sergeant, can you read Munig on her forehead?"

  The Court, not excepting its line of church-wardens, dissolved intolaughter; Kate Keohane preserved an offended silence.

  "I suppose you want us to believe," resumed Mr. Mooney sarcastically,"that a fine hearty woman like you wasn't defending yourself!" Thenwith a turkey-cock burst of fury, "On your oath now! What did youstrike Honora Brickley with? Answer me that now! What had you in yourhand?"

  "I had nothing only the little rod I had afther the ass," answered MissKeohane, with childlike candour. "I done nothing to them; but as forCon Brickley he put his back to the cliff and he took the flannel wropthat he had on him, and he threwn it on the sthrand, and he said heshou
ld have Blood, Murdher, or F-Fish!"

  She folded her shawl across her breast, a picture of virtue assailed,yet unassailable.

  "You may go down now," said "Roaring Jack" rather hastily, "I want tohave a few words with your brother."

  Miss Keohane retired, without having moulted a feather of her dignity,and her brother Jer came heavily up the steps and on to the platform,his hot, wary, blue eyes gathering in the Bench and the attorneys inone bold comprehensive glance. He was a tall, dark man of about fiveand forty, clean-shaved, save for two clerical inches of blackwhiskers, and in feature of the type of a London clergyman who wouldprobably preach on Browning.

  "Well, sir!" began Mr. Mooney stimulatingly, "and are you the biggestblackguard from here to America?"

  "I am not," said Jer Keohane tranquilly.

  "We had you here before us not so very long ago about kicking a goat,wasn't it? You got a little touch of a pound, I think?"

  This delicate allusion to a fine that the Bench had thought fit toimpose did not distress the witness.

  "I did, sir."

  "And how's our friend the goat?" went on Mr. Mooney, with the furiousfacetiousness reserved for hustling tough witnesses.

  "Well, I suppose she's something west of the Skelligs by now," repliedJer Keohane with great composure.

  An appreciative grin ran round the court. The fact that the goat haddied of the kick and been "given the cliff" being regarded as anexcellent jest.

  Mr. Mooney consulted his notes:

  "Well, now, about this fight," he said pleasantly, "did you see yoursister catch Mrs. Brickley and pull her hair down to the ground anddrag the shawl off of her?"

  "Well," said the witness airily, "they had a little bit of a scratch onaccount o' the fish. Con Brickley had the shteer o' the boat in hishand and says he, 'is there any man here that'll take the shteer fromme?' The man was dhrunk, of course," added Jer charitably.

  "Did you have any talk with his wife about the fish?"

  "I couldn't tell the words that she said to me!" replied the witness,with a reverential glance at the Bench, "and she over-right threecrowds o' men that was on the sthrand."

  Mr. Mooney put his hands in his pockets and surveyed the witness.

  "You're a very refined gentleman upon my word! Were you ever inEngland?"

  "I was part of three years."

  "Oh, that accounts for it, I suppose!" said Mr. Mooney, accepting thislucid statement without a stagger, and passing lightly on. "You're awidower, I understand, with no objection to consoling yourself?"

  No answer.

  "Now, sir! Can you deny that you made proposals of marriage to ConBrickley's daughter last Shraft?"

  The plot thickened. Con Brickley's daughter was my late kitchenmaid.

  Jer Keohane smiled tolerantly.

  "Ah! That was a thing o' nothing!"

  "Nothing!" said Mr. Mooney, with the roar of a tornado, "do you call animpudent proposal of marriage to a respectable man's daughter nothing!That's English manners, I suppose!"

  "I was goin' home one Sunday," said Jer Keohane, conversationally tothe Bench, "and I met the gerr'l and her mother. I spoke to the gerr'lin a friendly way, and asked her why wasn't she gettin' marrid, and shecommenced to peg stones at me and dhrew several blows of an umbrella onme. I had only three bottles o' porther taken. There now was thewhole of it."

  Mrs. Brickley, from under the gallery, groaned heavily and ironically.

  I found it difficult to connect these coquetries with my impressions ofmy late kitchenmaid, a furtive and touzled being, who, in conjunctionwith a pail and scrubbing brush, had been wont to melt round cornersand into doorways at my approach.

  "Are we trying a breach of promise case?" interpolated Flurry, "if so,we ought to have the plaintiff in."

  "My purpose, sir," said Mr. Mooney, in a manner discouraging to levity,"is to show that my clients have received annoyance and contempt fromthis man and his sister such as no parents would submit to."

  A hand came forth from under the gallery and plucked at Mr. Mooney'scoat. A red monkey face appeared out of the darkness, and there was ahoarse whisper whose purport I could not gather. Con Brickley, thedefendant, was giving instructions to his lawyer.

  It was perhaps as a result of these that Jer Keohane's evidence closedhere. There was a brief interval, enlivened by coughs, grinding ofheavy boots on the floor, and some mumbling and groaning under thegallery.

  "There's great duck-shooting out on a lake on this island," commentedFlurry to me, in a whisper. "My grand-uncle went there one time withan old duck-gun he had, that he fired with a fuse. He was three hoursstalking the ducks before he got the gun laid. He lit the fuse then,and it set to work sputtering and hissing like a goods-engine tillthere wasn't a duck within ten miles. The gun went off then."

  This useful side light on the matter in hand was interrupted by thecumbrous ascent of the one-legged Con Brickley to the witness-table.He sat down heavily, with his slouch hat on his sound knee, and hiswooden stump stuck out before him. His large monkey-face was immovablyserious; his eye was small, light grey, and very quick.

  McCaffery, the opposition attorney, a thin, restless youth, with earslike the handles of an urn, took him in hand. To the peltingcross-examination that beset him Con Brickley replied with sombredeliberation, and with a manner of uninterested honesty, emphasisingwhat he said with slight, very effective gestures of his big, supplehands. His voice was deep and pleasant; it betrayed no hint of sotrivial a thing as satisfaction when, in the teeth of Mr. McCaffery'sleading questions, he established the fact that the "little rod" withwhich Miss Kate Keohane had beaten his wife was the handle of apitchfork.

  CON BRICKLEY]

  "I was counting the fish the same time," went on Con Brickley, in hisrolling basso profundissimo, "and she said, 'Let the divil clear me outof the sthrand, for there's no one else will put me out!' says she."

  "LET THE DIVIL CLEAR ME OUT OF THE STHRAND!"]

  "It was then she got the blow, I suppose!" said McCaffery venomously;"you had a stick yourself, I daresay?"

  "Yes. I had a stick. I must have a stick," deep and mellow pathos washinted at in the voice; "I am sorry to say. What could I do to her? Aman with a wooden leg on a sthrand could do nothing!"

  Something like a laugh ran round the back of the court. Mr.McCaffery's ears turned scarlet and became quite decorative. On or offa strand Con Brickley was not a person to be scored off easily.

  His clumsy yet impressive descent from the witness-stand followedalmost immediately, and was not the least telling feature of hisevidence. Mr. Mooney surveyed his exit with the admiration of oneartist for another, and rising, asked the Bench's permission to callMrs. Brickley.

  Mrs. Brickley, as she mounted to the platform, in the dark and nun-likeseverity of her long cloak, the stately blue cloth cloak that is theprivilege of the Munster peasant woman, was an example of the rarelyblended qualities of picturesqueness and respectability. As she tookher seat in the chair, she flung the deep hood back on to hershoulders, and met the gaze of the Court with her grey head erect; shewas a witness to be proud of.

  A WITNESS TO BE PROUD OF]

  "Now Mrs. Brickley," said "Roaring Jack" urbanely, "will you describethis interview between your daughter and Keohane."

  "It was the last Sunday in Shrove, your Worship, Mr. Flurry Knox, andgentlemen," began Mrs. Brickley nimbly, "meself and me little gerr'lwas comin' from mass, and Jer Keohane come up to us and got on in amost unmannerable way. He asked me daughter would she marry him. Medaughter told him she would not, quite friendly like. I'll tell ye nolie, gentlemen, she was teasing him with the umbrella the same time,an' he raised his shtick and dhrew a sthroke on her in the back, an'the little gerr'l took up a small pebble of a stone and fired it athim. She put the umbrella up to his mouth, but she called him nonames. But as for him, the names he put on her was to call her 'anasty long slopeen of a proud thing, and a slopeen of a proud tinker.'"

 
"Very lover-like expressions!" commented Mr. Mooney, doubtlessstimulated by lady-like titters from the barmaids; "and had thisromantic gentleman made any previous proposals for your daughter?"

  "Himself had two friends over from across the water one night to makethe match, a Sathurday it was, and they should land the lee side o' theisland, for the wind was a fright," replied Mrs. Brickley, launchingher tale with the power of easy narration that is bestowed with suchamazing liberality on her class; "the three o' them had dhrink taken,an' I went to shlap out the door agin them. Me husband said then weshould let them in, if it was a Turk itself, with the rain that was init. They were talking in it then till near the dawning, and in thelatther end all that was between them was the boat's share."

  "What do you mean by 'the boat's share'?" said I.

  "'Tis the same as a man's share, me worshipful gintleman," returnedMrs. Brickley splendidly; "it goes with the boat always, afther thecrew and the saine has their share got."

  I possibly looked as enlightened as I felt by this exposition.

  "You mean that Jer wouldn't have her unless he got the boat's sharewith her?" suggested Flurry.

  "He said it over-right all that was in the house, and he reddening hispipe at the fire," replied Mrs. Brickley, in full-sailed response tothe helm. "'D'ye think,' says I to him, 'that me daughter would leavea lovely situation, with a kind and tendher masther, for a mean, hungryblagyard like yerself,' says I, 'that's livin' always in this backwardsplace!' says I."

  This touching expression of preference for myself, as opposed to Mr.Keohane, was received with expressionless respect by the Court.Flurry, with an impassive countenance, kicked me heavily under cover ofthe desk. I said that we had better get on to the assault on thestrand. Nothing could have been more to Mrs. Brickley's taste. Wewere minutely instructed as to how Katie Keohane drew the shawleenforward on Mrs. Brickley's head to stifle her; and how Norrie Keohanewas fast in her hair. Of how Mrs. Brickley had then given a strokeupwards between herself and her face (whatever that might mean) andloosed Norrie from her hair. Of how she then sat down and commenced tocry from the use they had for her.

  "'Twas all I done," she concluded, looking like a sacred picture, "Igave a sthroke of a pollock on them." Then, an after-thought, "an' ifI did, 'twas myself was at the loss of the same pollock!"

  I fixed my eyes immovably on my desk. I knew that the slightestsymptom of intelligence on my part would instantly draw forth theepisode of the fish-buying on the morning of the dinner party, with therape of Philippa's sleeve, and the unjust aspersion on Miss Brickleyfollowing in due sequence, ending with the paralytic seizure anddignified departure of the latter to her parents' residence in HareIsland. The critical moment was averted by a question from Mr. Mooney.

  "As for language," replied Mrs. Brickley, with clear eyes a littleuplifted in the direction of the ceiling, "there was no name fromheaven and hell but she had it on me, and wishin' the divil might burnthe two heels off me, and the like o' me wasn't in sivin parishes! Andthat was the clane part of the discoorse, yer Worships!"

  Mrs. Brickley here drew her cloak more closely about her, as though toenshroud herself in her own refinement, and presented to the Bench asilence as elaborate as a drop scene. It implied, amongst otherthings, a generous confidence in the imaginative powers of her audience.

  Whether or no this was misplaced, Mrs. Brickley was not invited furtherto enlighten the Court. After her departure the case droned on ininexhaustible rancour, and trackless complications as to the shares ofthe fish. Its ethics and its arithmetic would have defied the alliedintellects of Solomon and Bishop Colenso. It was somewhere in thatdead hour of the afternoon, when it is too late for lunch and too earlyfor tea, that the Bench, wan with hunger, wound up the affair byimpartially binding both parties in sheaves "to the Peace."

  As a sub-issue I arranged with Mr. Knox to shoot duck on the one-leggedman's land on Hare Island as soon as should be convenient, and lightlydismissed from my mind my dealings, official and otherwise, with theHouse of Brickley.

  But even as there are people who never give away old clothes, so arethere people, of whom is Flurry Knox, who never dismiss anything fromtheir minds.