Kilgorman: A Story of Ireland in 1798

by Talbot Baines Reed

  CHAPTER SIX.

  MISS KIT.

  His honour, saving his presence! was one of the meanest men I ever met,and I have come across many a close-fisted one in my day. There wasnothing large about Maurice Gorman. His little eyes could never openwide enough to see the whole of a matter, or his little mouth open wideenough to speak it. If he owed a guinea, he would only pay a pound ofit, and trust to your forgetting the rest. If his boat wanted painting,he would give it one coat and save the other. If his horse wantedshoeing, he would give him three new shoes, and use an old one for thefourth. If he ever gave money, it was by way of a bargain; and if heever took up a cause, good or bad, it was grudgingly, and in a way whichrobbed his support of all graciousness.

  It took me some months to discover all this about my new master.

  When first I found myself an inmate of Knockowen, I was so sore withdisappointment and anger that I cared about nothing and nobody. Hishonour, whose professions of interest in me were, as I well knew, allhollow, concerned himself very little about my well-being under hisroof. Why he had taken me at all I could not guess. But I was sure,whatever the reason, it was because it suited his interest, not mine. Iwas handed over to the stables, and there they made a sort of groom ofme; and presently, because I was a handy lad, I was fetched indoors whencompany was present, and set to wait at table in a livery coat.

  The Knockowen household was a small one, consisting only of his honourand Mistress Gorman and the young lady. Mistress Gorman was a sadwoman, who had little enough pleasure in this world, and that not of herhusband's making. The man and his wife were almost strangers, meetingonly at meal-times, and not always then, to exchange a few formal words,and then separate, one to her lonely chamber, the other to his grounds.

  The brightness of the house was all centred in my little lady Kit, whowas as remote from her mother's sadness as she was from her father'smeanness. From the first she made my life at Knockowen tolerable, andvery soon she made it necessary.

  I shall not soon forget my first meeting with her. She had been away ona visit when I arrived, and a week later I was ordered to take the boatover to Rathmullan to fetch her home.

  It was a long, toilsome journey, in face of a contrary wind, againstwhich the boat travelled slowly, and frequently not without the help ofan oar. How I groaned as I beat to and fro up the lough, and how Iwished I was away with Tim and father on the _Cigale_.

  At last, late in the afternoon, I reached Rathmullan, and made fast myboat to the pier. I was to call at the inn and find my young mistressthere.

  And there presently I found her, and a bright vision it was for me thatdull afternoon. She was a little maid, although she was a month or twomy elder. Her dark brown hair fell wildly on her shoulders, and herslight figure, as she stood there gazing at me with her big blue eyes,was full of grace and life. Her lips were pursed into a quaint littlesmile as she looked at me, and before I could explain who I was, shesaid,--

  "So you are Barry Gallagher? How frightened you look! You needn't beafraid of me, Barry; I don't bite, though you look as if you thoughtso."

  "'Deed, Miss Kit," said I, "and if you did, I'm thinking there's worsethings could happen."

  She laughed, and then bade me get together her boxes and carry them downto the boat.

  Strange! Half-an-hour before I had been groaning over my lot. Now, asI staggered and sweated down to the wharf under her ladyship's baggage,I felt quite lighthearted.

  In due time I had all aboard, and called on her to come, which she did,protesting that the water would spoil her new Dublin gown, and that if Isailed home no quicker than I had come, she supposed it would be morningbefore she got her supper.

  This put me on my mettle. I even went ashore for a moment to borrow atarpaulin to lay over her knees, knowing I should have to make a voyageall the way back to-morrow to restore it. Then, when I had her tuckedin, and set the ballast trim, I hoisted the sail, and sat beside her,with the tiller in one hand and the sheet in the other.

  She soon robbed me of the former; for with the wind behind us it wasplain sailing, and she could steer, she said, as well as I.

  "Keep a look-out ahead, Barry," she said, "and see if I don't get you toKnockowen in half the time you took to come. I'll give you a lesson insailing this evening."

  Here she had me on a tender point.

  "Begging your pardon, Miss Kit, I think not," said I.

  "Are you a seaman, then?" she asked.

  "I'd give my soul to be one."

  "Your soul! It would be cheap at the price."

  "I don't know what that means," said I; "but if your ladyship will putthe helm a wee taste more to port, we will catch the breeze better--so,so. Keep her at that!"

  We slipped merrily through the water for a while; but it made me uneasyto see the clouds sweeping past us overhead, and feel the sting of adrop or two on my cheek.

  I hitched the sheet a little closer, and came astern again to where shesat.

  "You'll need to let me take her," said I; "there's a squall behind us."

  "What of that?" said she. "Can I not steer through a squall?"

  "No, Miss Kit," said I; "it takes a man to send her through when theweather gets up. Pull the wrap well about you, and make up your mindfor a wetting."

  She sniffed a little at my tone.

  "I see you are captain of this ship," said she.

  "Ay, ay; and I've a valuable freight aboard," said I.

  Whereat she gave it up, and sat with her hair waving in the wind and hersailor's wrap about her shoulders.

  It was a nasty, sudden squall, with a shower of hail and half a cap ofwind in it. Luckily it was straight behind us. Had we been crossingit, it would have caught us badly. As it was, although it gave us agreat toss, and now and then sent a drenching wave over our backs andheads, we were in no real peril. Our only difficulty was that, unlessit eased off before we came within reach of Knockowen, we should have tocross it to get home. But that was far enough away yet.

  Miss Kit, who for all her pretty bragging had had little commerce in themighty deep, sat still for a while, startled by the sudden violence ofthe wind and the onslaught of the waves behind us. But as soon as shediscovered that all the harm they did was to wet her pretty head anddrench her boxes, and when, moreover, she satisfied herself by a chanceglance or two at my face that there was nothing to fear, she began toenjoy the novel experience, and even laughed to see how the boat torethrough the water.

  "Why can't we go on like this, straight out to the open sea?" said she.

  "We could do many a thing less easy," said I. "It's well Knockowen's nonearer the open sea than it is."

  "Why?"

  "If it was as far as Kilgorman," said I, "we'd meet the tide coming in,and then it would be a hard sea to weather."

  "Kilgorman!" said she, catching at the name; "were you ever there,Barry?"

  "Once," said I guiltily, "when I should not have been. And I sufferedfor it."

  "How? what happened?"

  "Indeed, Miss Kit; it's not for the likes of you to hear; and his honourwould be mad if he knew of it."

  "You think I'm a tell-tale," said she. "I'm your mistress, and I orderyou to tell me."

  "Faith, then, I saw a ghost, mistress!"

  She laughed, and pleasant the sound was amid the noise of the storm.

  "You won't make me believe you're such a fool as that," said she. "It'sonly wicked people who see ghosts."

  "Sure, then, I'm thinking it'll be long till you see one, Miss Kit. Butmind now; we must put her a little away from the wind to make Knockowen.Sit fast, and don't mind a wave or two."

  Now began the dangerous part of our voyage. The moment we put her headin for Knockowen, the waves began to break heavily over the stern,sometimes almost knocking the tiller from my hand, sometimes compellingus to run back into the wind to save being swamped.

  She did not talk any more, but sat very quiet, watching each wave as itcame, and looking up now a
nd again at my face, as if to read our chancesthere. You may be sure I looked steady enough, so as not to give her amoment's more uneasiness than she need. But, for all that, I wasconcerned to see how much water we shipped, and how much less easily theboat travelled in consequence.

  Quit the helm I durst not. Yet how could I ask her to perform so meniala task as to bail the boat? But it soon went past the point of standingon ceremony.

  "Begging your pardon, Miss Kit," said I, "there's a can below the seatyou're on. If you could use it a bit to get quit of some of the water,it would help us."

  She was down on her knees on the floor of the boat at once, bailinghard.

  "Are we in danger of sinking?" said she, looking up.

  "No, surely; but we're better without water in the boat."

  Whereat she worked till her arm ached, and yet made little enoughimpression on the water, which, with every roll we took, swung ankledeep from side to side, and grew every minute.

  We wanted a mile of Knockowen still, and I was beginning to think therewould be nothing for it but to put out again before the wind, and runthe risk of meeting the heavy sea in the open, when the wind suddenlyshifted a point, and came up behind us once more. It was a lucky shiftfor us, for my little mistress was worn-out with her labour, and a fewmore broadsides might have swamped us.

  As it was, we could now run straight for home, and a few minutes wouldsee us alongside the little pier of Knockowen.

  I helped her back to her seat beside me, and drew the tarpaulin aroundher.

  Her face, which had been anxious enough for a while, cleared as suddenlyas the wind had shifted.

  "I declare, Barry, I was afraid just now."

  "So you might be; and no shame to you for it," said I.

  "Are you ever afraid?" said she.

  "Ay, I was at Kilgorman that night."

  Again she laughed.

  "I'd as soon be afraid of a real peril as of a silly fancy," said she."I mean to go and see Kilgorman one day."

  "Not with my good-will, mistress," said I.

  "Well, without it then, Mr Barry Gallagher," she replied with a toss ofthe head which fairly abashed me, and made me remember that after all Iwas but a servant-man in my lady's house. The sea, blessings on it!levels all things, and I had almost forgotten this little lady was mymistress. But I recalled it now, and still more when, ten minuteslater, we ran alongside his honour's jetty, and my fair crew was takenout of my hands by her parents, while I was left to carry up thedripping baggage, and seek my supper as best I could.