The Wild Geese

by Stanley John Weyman

  CHAPTER XIII

  A SLIP

  Flavia McMurrough enjoyed one advantage over her partners inconspiracy. She could rise on the morning after the night of thebonfires with a clear head and an appetite undiminished by punch; andprobably she was the only one at Morristown of whom this could be said.The morning light did not break for her on aching eyelids and a brainat once too retentive of the boasts of the small hours and toosensitive to the perils of the day to come. Colonel John had scarcelypassed away under guard, old Darby had scarcely made his firstround--with many an ominous shake of the head--the slatternlyserving-boys had scarcely risen from their beds in the passages, beforeshe was afoot, gay as a lark, and trilling like one; with spiritsprepared for the best or the worst which the day might bringforth--though she foresaw only the best--and undepressed even by theblanket of mist that shrouded lake and hills and all the world fromview.

  If the past night, with its wassail and its mirth, its toasts and itsloud-voiced bragging, might be called "the great night of Morristown,"this, the girl promised herself, should more truly and more fitly bestyled "the great day of Ireland." On this day would they begin a workthe end of which no man could see, but which, to the close of time,should shed a lustre on the name of McMurrough. No more should theirnative land be swept along, a chained slave, a handmaid, in the trainof a more brutal, a more violent, and a more stupid people! From thisday Ireland's valour, that had never known fit leading, should berecognised for what it was, her wit be turned to good uses, her oldtraditions be revived in the light of new glories. The tears rose tothe girl's eyes, her bosom heaved, her heart seemed too large for her,as she pictured the fruition of the work to be begun this day, and withclasped hands and prayerful eyes sang her morning hymn.

  No more should an Irish gentleman walk swordless and shamed among hisequals. No more should the gallant beast he had bred be seized withcontumely in the market-place. No more should all the nobler servicesof his native land be closed to him, his faith be banned, his priestsproscribed! No more should he be driven to sell his valour to thehighest bidder, and pour forth his blood in foreign causes, under thewalls of old Vienna, and on every stricken field from Almanza to theDon. For on this day Ireland should rouse herself from the longnightmare, the oppression of centuries. She should remember hergreatness of old time and the blessing of Patrick; and those who hadenslaved her, those who had scorned her and flouted her, should learnthe strength of hands nerved by the love of God and the love ofcountry! This day at Morristown the day should break.

  The tears gushed from her eyes as she thought of this, and with anoverflowing heart thanked Heaven for the grace and favour that assignedher a part in the work. And the halo formed of those tears ennobled allshe saw about her. The men, still sprawling up and down the courtyardin the abandonment of drink, her brother calling with a pale face andquerulous oaths for a cooling draught, Sir Donny and old Tim Burke,yawning off, like the old topers they were, the effects of thecarouse--the cause and her hopes ennobled all. It was much--may she beforgiven!--if, in the first enthusiasm of the morning, she gave asingle thought to the misguided kinsman whose opposition had hurriedhim into trouble, and exposed him to dangers at which she vaguelyguessed.

  Fool that he was, she reflected, to pit himself against such men as theBishop and the Spanish Admiral! From her window she saw the two walkingin the garden with bent heads, aloof from the yawning crowd, and nowappearing beyond the line of Florence yews, now vanishing behind them.On which she came near to worshipping them. Had they not brought toIreland, to Kerry, to Morristown, the craft and skill in counsel, thesagacity and courage, which had won for them the favour of foreignkings, and raised them high in exile? Lacking their guidance, themovement might have come to nothing, the most enthusiastic must havewasted their strength. But they were here to inspire, to lead, tocontrol. Against such men the parlour-captains of Tralee, theencroaching Pettys, and their like, must fail indeed. And before moreworthy opponents arrived to encounter the patriots, who could say whatbattles might not be won, what allies gained?

  It was a dream, but a golden dream, and when she descended to theliving-room she still lived in it. The girl's lips quivered as shekissed the Bishop's hand and received with bent knees his episcopalblessing. "And on this house, my daughter," he added, "and on thisday!"

  "Amen!" she murmured in her heart.

  True, breakfast, and the hour after breakfast, gave some pause to herhappiness. The men's nerves were on edge with potheen and excitement,and they had not been at table five minutes before quarrelling brokeout at the lower end of the board. The Spanish officer who was inattendance on Cammock came to words, and almost to blows, with one ofthe O'Beirnes, who resented the notion that the Admiral's safety wasnot sufficiently secured by the Irish about him. The peace was keptwith difficulty, and so much ill-feeling survived the outbreak thatCammock thought it prudent to remit two-thirds of the sailors to theship, and keep the remainder as far as possible in the background.

  This was not a promising beginning, where the numbers were already soscanty that the Bishop wondered in his heart whether his dupes woulddare to pass from words to action. But it was not all. Some one spokeof Asgill, and of another Justice in the neighbourhood, asserting thattheir hearts were with the rising, and that at a later point their aidmight be expected. At once,

  "The Evil One's spawn!" cried Sir Donny, rising in his place, andspeaking under the influence of great excitement. "If you're fordealing with them, I'm riding! No Protestants! No black brood ofCromwell for me! I'd as soon never wear sword again as wear it in theircompany!"

  "You're not meaning it, Sir Donny!" Uncle Ulick said.

  "Faith, but if he's not, I am!" cried old Tim Burke, rising and bangingthe table with his fist. "'Tis what I'm meaning, and devil a bit of amistake! Just that!"

  Another backed him, with so much violence that the most moderate andsensible looked serious, and it needed the Bishop's interference tocalm the storm. "We need not decide one way or the other," he said,"until they come in." Probably he thought that an unlikely contingency."There are arguments on both sides," he continued blandly. "It is truethat half-measures are seldom wise. On the other hand, it was by aProtestant king that France was led back to the true faith. But of thisat another time. I think we must be moving, gentlemen. It grows late."

  While the gentry talked thus at table, the courtyard and the spacebetween the house and the lake began to present, where the mist allowedthem to be seen, the lively and animated appearance which the Irish,ever lovers of a crowd, admire. Food and drink were there served to thebarefoot, shock-headed boys drawn up in bodies under their priests, orunder the great men's agents; and when these matters had been consumedone band after another moved off in the direction of the rendezvous.This was at the Carraghalin, a name long given to the ruins of an abbeysituate in an upland valley above the waterfall, and a long Irish milefrom the house. But as each troop moved off towards the head of thelake its place was filled in a measure by late-comers, as well as bycompanies of women and girls, close-hooded and shawled, who haltedbefore the house to raise shrill cries of welcome, or, as they passed,stirred the air with their wild Erse melodies. The orders for all wereto take their seats in an orderly fashion and in a mighty semicircleabout a well-known rock situate a hundred yards from the abbey.Tradition reported that in old days this rock had been a pulpit, andthat thence the Irish Apostle had preached to the heathen. Morecertainly it had formed a rostrum and the valley a gathering-place introubled and more recent times. The turf about it was dry, sweet, andsheep-bitten; on either side it sloped gently to the rock, while asentry posted on each of the two low hills which flanked the vale was asufficient surety against surprise.

  It was not until the last of the peasants had filed off, and the spacebefore the house had resumed its normal aspect--but for once withoutits beggars--that the gentry began to make their way in the samedirection. The buckeens were the first to go. Uncle Ulick, with theSpanish officer and his men, formed the next pa
rty. The O'Beirnes, withSir Donny and Timothy Burke and a priest or two of a superior order,were not long behind them. The last to leave--and they left the housewith no other guardians than a cook-maid or two--were the Admiral andthe Bishop, honourably escorted, as became their rank, by their hostand hostess.

  Freed from the wrangling and confusion which the presence of the othersbred, Flavia regained her serenity as she walked. There was nothing,indeed, in the face of nature, in the mist and the dark day, and themoisture that hung in beads on thorn and furze, to cheer her. But shedrew her spirits from a higher source, and, sanguine and self-reliant,foreseeing naught but success, stepped proudly along beside the Bishop,who found, perhaps, in her presence and her courage a make-weight forthe gloom of the day.

  "You are sure," he said, smiling, "that we shall not lose our way?"

  "Ah! and I am sure," she answered, "I could take you blindfold."

  "The mist----"

  "It stands, my lord, for the mist overhanging this poor land, which oursun shall disperse."

  "God grant it!" he said--"God grant it, indeed, my daughter!" But, dowhat he would, he spoke without fervour.

  They passed along the lake-edge, catching now and then the shimmer ofwater on their right. Thence they ascended the steep path that led upthe glen of the waterfall to the level of the platform on which the oldtower stood. Leaving this on the right--and only to an informed eye wasit visible--they climbed yet a little higher, and entered a deepdriftway that, at the summit of the gorge, clove its way between themound behind the tower and the hill on their left, and so penetratedpresently to the valley of the Carraghalin. The mist was thinner here,the nature of the ground was more perceptible, and they had notproceeded fifty yards along the sunken way before Cammock, who wasleading, in the company of The McMurrough, halted.

  "A fine place for a stand," he said, looking about him with a soldierlyeye. "And better for an ambush. Especially on such a morning as this,when you cannot see a man five paces away."

  "I trust," the Bishop answered, smiling, "that we shall have no need tomake the one, or to fear the other."

  "You could hold this," Flavia asked eagerly, "with such men as wehave?"

  "Against an army," Cammock answered.

  "Against an army!" she murmured, as, her heart beating high with pride,they resumed their way, Flavia and the Bishop in the van. "Against anarmy!" she repeated fondly.

  The words had not fully left her lips when she recoiled. At the samemoment the Bishop uttered an exclamation, Cammock swore and seized hishilt, The McMurrough turned as if to flee. For on the path close tothem, facing them with a pistol in his hand, stood Colonel Sullivan.

  He levelled the pistol at the head of the nearest man, and thoughFlavia, with instant presence of mind, struck it up, the act helpedlittle. Before Cammock could clear his blade, or his companions back uphis resistance, four or five men, of Colonel John's following, flungthemselves on them from behind. They were seized, strong arms pinionedthem, knives were at their throats. In a twinkling, and while theystill expected death, sacks were dragged over their heads and down totheir waists, and they were helpless.

  It was well, it was neatly done; and completely done, with a singledrawback. The men had not seized Flavia, and, white as paper, but withrage not fear, she screamed shrilly for help--screamed twice.

  She would have screamed a third time, but Colonel Sullivan, who knewthat they were scarcely two furlongs from the meeting-place, and fromsome hundreds of merciless foes, did the only thing possible. He flunghis arms round her, pressed her face roughly against his shoulder,smothered her cries remorselessly. Then raising her, aided by the manwith the musket, he bore her, vainly struggling--and, it must be owned,scratching--after the others out of the driftway.

  The thing done, the Colonel's little band of Frenchmen knew that theyhad cast the die, and must now succeed or perish. The girl's screams,quickly suppressed, might not have given the alarm; but they had setnerves on edge. The prick of a knife was used--and often--to apprisethe blinded prisoners that if they did not move they would be piked.They were dragged, a seaman on either side of each captive, over somehundred paces of rough ground, through the stream, and so into a pathlittle better than a sheep-track which ran round the farther side ofthe hill of the tower, and descended that way to the more remote bankof the lake. It was a rugged path, steep and slippery, droppingprecipitously a couple of feet in places, and more than once followingthe bed of the stream. But it was traceable even in the mist, and theparty from the sloop, once put on it, could follow it.

  If no late-comer to the meeting encountered them, Colonel John, to whomevery foot of the ground was familiar, saw no reason, apart from thechances of pursuit, why they should not get the prisoners, whom theyhad so audaciously surprised, as far as the lower end of the lake.There he and his party must fall again into the Skull road and risk themore serious uncertainties of the open way. All, however, depended ontime. If Flavia's screams had not given the alarm, it would soon begiven by the absence of those whom the people had come to meet. Themissing leaders would be sought, pursuit would be organised. Yet, ifbefore that pursuit reached the foot of the lake, the fugitives hadpassed into the road, the raiders would stand a fair chance. Theywould at least have a start, the sloop in front of them, and theirenemies behind them.

  But, with peril on every side of them, Flavia was still the main, thereal difficulty. Colonel Sullivan could not hope to carry her far, evenwith the help of the man who fettered her feet, and bore part of herweight. Twice she freed her mouth and uttered a stifled cry. TheColonel only pressed her face more ruthlessly to him--his men's livesdepended on her silence. But the sweat stood on his brow; and, aftercarrying her no more than three hundred yards, he staggered under theunwilling burden. He was on the path now and descending, and he heldout a little farther. But presently, when he hoped that she hadswooned, she fell to struggling more desperately. He thought, on this,that he might be smothering her; and he relaxed his hold to allow herto breathe. For reward she struck him madly, furiously in the face, andhe had to stifle her again.

  But his heart was sick. It was a horrible, a brutal business, a thinghe had not foreseen on board the _Cormorant_. He had supposed that shewould faint at the first alarm; and his courage, which would have facedalmost any event with coolness, quailed. He could not murder the girl,and she would not be silent. No, she would not be silent! Short ofsetting her down and binding her hand and foot, which would take time,and was horrible to imagine, he could not see what to do. And the manwith him, who saw the rest of the party outstripping them, and as goodas disappearing in the fog, who fancied, with every step, that he heardthe feet of merciless pursuers overtaking them, was frantic withimpatience.

  Then Colonel John, with the sweat standing on his brow, did a thing towhich he afterwards looked back with great astonishment.

  "Give me your knife," he said, with a groan, "and hold her hands! Wemust silence her, and there is only one way!"

  The man, terrified as he was, and selfish as terrified men are,recoiled from the deed. "My God!" he said. "No!"

  "Yes!" Colonel John retorted fiercely. "The knife!--the knife, man! Anddo you hold her hands!"

  With a jerk he lifted her face from his breast--and this time sheneither struck him nor screamed. The man had half-heartedly drawn hisknife. The Colonel snatched it from him. "Now her hands!" he said."Hold her, fool! I know where to strike!"

  She opened her mouth to shriek, but no sound came. She had heard, sheunderstood; and for a moment she could neither struggle nor cry. Thatterror which rage and an almost indomitable spirit had kept at bayseized her; the sight of the gleaming death poised above her paralysedher throat. Her mouth gaped, her eyes glared at the steel; then, with aqueer sobbing sound, she fainted.

  "Thank God!" the Colonel cried. And there was indeed thankfulness inhis voice. He thrust the knife back into the man's hands, and, raisingthe girl again in his arms, "There is a house a little below," he said."We can leave her there! Hurry, ma
n!--hurry!"

  He had not traversed that road for twenty years, but his memory had nottricked him. Less than fifty paces below they came on a cabin, close tothe foot of the waterfall. The door was not fastened--for what, in sucha place, was there to steal?--and Colonel John thrust it open with hisfoot. The interior was dark, the place was almost windowless; but hemade out the form of an old crone who, nursing her knees, crouched witha pipe in her mouth beside a handful of peat. Seeing him, the womantottered to her feet with a cry of alarm, and shaded her bleared eyesfrom the inrush of daylight. She gabbled shrilly, but she knew onlyErse, and Colonel John attempted no explanation.

  "The lady of the house," he said, in that tongue. And he laid Flavia,not ungently, but very quickly, on the floor. He turned about withoutanother word, shut the door on the two, and hurried along the path atthe full stretch of his legs. In half a minute he had overtaken hiscompanion, and the two pressed on together on the heels of the mainparty.

  The old beldame, left alone with the girl, viewed her with anastonishment which would have been greater if she had not reached thatage at which all sensations become dulled. How the Lady of the House,who was to her both Power and Providence, came to be there, and therein that state, passed her conception. But she had the sense to loosenthe girl's frock at the neck, to throw water on her face, and to beather hands. In a very few minutes Flavia, who had never swoonedbefore--fashionable as the exercise was at this period in femininesociety--sighed once or twice, and came to herself.

  "Where am I?" she muttered. Still for some moments she continued tolook about her in a dazed way; at length she recognised the old woman,and the cottage. Then she remembered, with a moan, what hadhappened--the ambuscade, the flight, the knife.

  She could not turn whiter, but she shuddered and closed her eyes. Atlast, with shrinking, she looked at her dress. "Am I--hurt?" shewhispered.

  The old woman did not understand, but she patted Flavia's hand.Meanwhile the girl saw that there was no blood on her dress, and shefound courage to raise her hand to her throat. She found no wound. Atthat she smiled faintly. Then she began to cry--for she was a woman.

  But, broken as she was by that moment of terror, Flavia's indulgence inthe feminine weakness was short, for it was measured by the time shedevoted to thoughts of her own fortunes. Quickly, very quickly, sheovercame her weakness; she stood up, she understood, and she extendedher arms in rage and grief and unavailing passion. That rage whichtreachery arouses in the generous breast, that passion which an outrageupon hospitality kindles in the meanest, that grief which ruined plansand friends betrayed have bred a thousand times in Irish bosoms--shefelt them all, and intensely. She would that the villains had killedher! She would that they had finished her life! Why should she survive,except for vengeance? For not only were her hopes for Ireland fallen;not only were those who had trusted themselves to The McMurroughperishing even now in the hands of ruthless foes; but her brother, herdear, her only brother, whom her prayers, her influence had broughtinto this path, he too was snared, of his fate also there could be nodoubt!

  She felt all that was most keen, most poignant, of grief, of anger, ofindignation. But the sharpest pang of all--had she analysed herfeelings--was inflicted by the consciousness of failure, and of failureverging on the ignominious. The mature take good and evil fortune asthey come; but to fail at first setting out in life, to be outwitted inthe opening venture, to have to acknowledge that experience is, afterall, a formidable foe--these are mishaps which sour the magnanimous andpoison young blood.

  She had not known before what it was to hate. Now she only lived tohate: to hate the man who had shown himself so much cleverer than herfriends, who, in a twinkling, and by a single blow, had wrecked herplans, duped her allies, betrayed her brother, made her name alaughing-stock, robbed Ireland of a last chance of freedom! who hadheld her in his arms, terrified her, mastered her! Oh, why had sheswooned? Why had she not rather, disregarding her womanish weakness,her womanish fears, snatched the knife from him and plunged it into histreacherous breast? Why? Why?