The Landleaguers Part 29

"He is only a boy, you know."

"Of course he is only a boy. You've no right to expect from him the pluck of a man. When he is as old as his brother he'll have his brother's nerve. I like to see a man plucky under fire when he is not used to it. When you've got into the way of it, it means nothing."

"What am I do about Florian? There are four months before the a.s.sizes. He cannot remain in the house for four months."

"What would he be at the end of it?" said the Captain. "That is what we have to think of."

"Would it alter him?"

"I suppose it would,--if he were here with his sister, talking of nothing but this wretched man, who seems to haunt him. We have to remember, Mr. Jones, how long it was before he came forward with his story."

"I think he will be firm with it now."

"No doubt,--if he had to tell it out in direct evidence. When he is there in the court telling it, he will not think much of Mr. Lax, nor even of Pat Carroll, who will be in the dock glaring at him; nor would he think much of anything but his direct story, while a friendly barrister is drawing it out of him; but when it comes to his cross-examination, it will be different. He will want all his pluck then, and all the simplicity which he can master. You must remember that a skilful man will have been turned loose on him with all the ferocity of a bloodhound; a man who will have all the cruelty of Lax, but will have nothing to fear; a man who will be serving his purpose all round if he can only dumbfound that poor boy by his words and his looks. A man, when he has taken up the cause of these ruffians, learns to sympathise with them. If they hate the Queen, hate the laws, hate all justice, these men learn to hate them too. When they get hold of me, and I look into the eyes of such a one, I see there my bitterest enemy. He holds Captain Yorke Clayton up to the hatred of the whole court, as though he were a brute unworthy of the slightest mercy,--a venomous reptile, against whom the whole country should rise to tear him in pieces. And I look round and see the same feeling written in the eyes of them all. I found it more hard to get used to that than to the snap of a pistol; but I have got used to it.

Poor Florian will have had no such experience. And there will be no mercy shown to him because he is only a boy. Neither s.e.x nor age is supposed to render any such feeling necessary to a lawyer. A lawyer in defending the worst ruffian that ever committed a crime will know that he is called upon to spare nothing that is tender. He is absolved from all the laws common to humanity. And then poor Florian has lied." A gloomy look of sad, dull pain came across the father's brow as he heard these words. "We must look it in the face, Mr.

Jones."

"Yes, look it all in the face."

"He has repeated the lie again and again for six months. He has been in close friends.h.i.+p with these men. It will be made out that he has been present at all their secret meetings. He has been present at some of them. It will be very hard to get a jury to convict on his evidence if it be unsupported."

"Shall we withdraw him?" asked Mr. Jones.

"You cannot do it. His deposition has been sworn and put forward in the proper course. Besides it is his duty and yours,--and mine," he added. "He must tell his story once again, and must endure whatever torment the law-rebels of the court have in store for him. Only it will be well to think what course of treatment may best prepare him for the trial. You should treat him with the greatest kindness."

"He is treated kindly."

"But you, I think, and his sisters and his brother should endeavour to make him feel that you do not think harshly of him because of the falsehoods he has told. Go out with him occasionally." Here Mr.

Jones raised his eyebrows as feeling surprised at the kind of counsel given. "Put some constraint on yourself so as to make him feel by the time he has to go into court with you that he has a friend with him."

"I trust that he always feels that," said Mr. Jones.

They went on discussing the matter till late at night, and Captain Clayton made the father understand what it was that he intended. He meant that the boy should be made to know that his father was to him as are other fathers, in spite of the lie which he had told, and of the terrible trouble which he had caused by telling it. But Mr. Jones felt that the task imposed upon him would be almost impossible. He was heavy at heart, and unable to recall to himself his old spirits.

He had been thoroughly ashamed of his son, and was not possessed of that agility of heart which is able to leap into good-humour at once.

Florian had been restored to his old manner of life; sitting at table with his father and occasionally spoken to by him. He had been so far forgiven; but the father was still aware that there was still a dismal gap between himself and his younger boy, as regarded that affectionate intercourse which Captain Clayton recommended. And yet he knew that it was needed, and resolved that he would do his best, however imperfectly it might be done.

On the next morning the Captain went his way, and did ample homage to the kindly exertions made on his behalf by the two girls. "Now I know you must have been up all night, for you couldn't have done it all without a servant in the house."

"How dare you belittle our establishment!" said Ada. "What do you think of Peter? Is Peter n.o.body? And it was poor Florian who boiled the kettle. I really don't know whether we should not get on better altogether without servants than with them." The breakfast was eaten both by the Captain in the parlour and by Hunter in the kitchen in great good humour. "Now, my fine fellow," said the former, "have you got your pistols ready? I don't think we shall want them this morning, but it's as well not to give these fellows a chance." Hunter was pleased by being thus called into council before the young ladies, and they both started in the highest good humour. Captain Clayton, as he went, told himself that Ada Jones was the prettiest girl of his acquaintance. His last sentimental affinity with the youngest Miss Ormesby waxed feeble and insipid as he thought of Ada.

Perhaps Edith, he said to himself, is the sharpest of the two, but in good looks she can't hold a candle to her sister. So he pa.s.sed on, and with his myrmidon reached Galway, without incurring any impediment from Mr. Lax.

In the course of the morning, Mr. Jones sent for Florian, and proposed to walk out with him about the demesne. "I don't think there will be any danger," he said. "Captain Clayton went this morning, and the people don't know yet whether he has gone. I think it is better that you should get accustomed to it, and not give way to idle fears." The boy apparently agreed to this, and got his hat. But he did not leave the shelter of the house without sundry misgivings. Mr.

Jones had determined to act at once upon the Captain's advice, and had bethought himself that he could best do so by telling the whole truth to the boy. "Now, Florian, I think it would be as well that you and I should understand each other." Florian looked up at him with fearful eyes, but made no reply. "Of course I was angry with you while you were hesitating about those ruffians."

"Yes; you were," said Florian.

"I can quite understand that you have felt a difficulty."

"Yes, I did," said Florian.

"But that is all over now."

"If they don't fire at me it is over, I suppose, till August."

"They shan't fire at you. Don't be afraid. If they fire at you, they must fire at me too." The father was walking with his arm about the boy's neck. "You, at any rate, shall incur no danger which I do not share. You will understand--won't you--that my anger against you is pa.s.sed and gone?"

"I don't know," said the boy.

"It is so,--altogether. I hope to be able to send you to school in England very soon after the trial is over. You shall go to Mr. Monro at first, and to Winchester afterwards, if I can manage it. But we won't think of Winchester just at present. We must do the best we can to get a good place for you on your first going into the school."

"I am not afraid about that," said Florian, thinking that at the time when the school should have come all the evils of the trials would have been pa.s.sed away and gone.

"All the same you might come and read with me every morning for an hour, and then for an hour with each of your sisters. You will want something to do to make up your time. And remember, Florian, that all my anger has pa.s.sed away. We will be the best of friends, as in former days, so that when the time shall have come for you to go into court, you may be quite sure that you have a friend with you there."

To all this Florian made very little reply; but Mr. Jones remembered that he could not expect to do much at a first attempt. Weary as the task would be he would persevere. For the task would be weary even with his own son. He was a man who could do nothing graciously which he could not do _con amore_. And he felt that all immediate warm liking for the poor boy had perished in his heart. The boy had made himself the friend of such a one as Pat Carroll, and in his friends.h.i.+p for him had lied grossly. Mr. Jones had told himself that it was his duty to forgive him, and had struggled to perform his duty. For the performance of any deed necessary for the boy's security, he could count upon himself. But he could not be happy in his company as he was with Edith. The boy had been foully untrue to him--but still he would do his best.

CHAPTER XXIII.

TOM DALY IS BOYCOTTED.

When the time came round, Frank Jones started for Ballinasloe, with his father's cattle and with Peter to help him. They did succeed in getting a boy to go with them, who had been seduced by a heavy bribe to come down for the purpose from Ballinasloe to Morony Castle. As he had been used to cattle, Peter's ignorance and Frank's also were of less account. They drove the cattle to Tuam, and there got them on the railway, the railway with its servants being beyond the power of the boycotters. At Ballinasloe they could not sell the cattle, as the name of Mr. Jones of Morony had become terribly notorious throughout County Galway. But arrangements had been made to send them to a salesman up in Dublin, and from Ballinasloe they had gone under the custody of Peter and the boy. No attempt was made absolutely to harm the beasts, or even to stop them in the streets. But throughout the town it seemed to be perfectly understood that they were the property of Philip Jones of Morony Castle, and that Philip Jones had been boycotted by the League. The poor beasts were sent on to Dublin without a truss of hay among them, and even Frank himself was refused a meal at the first inn at which he had called. He did afterwards procure accommodation; but he heard while in the house, that the innkeeper was threatened for what he had done. Had it not been that Peter had brought with him a large basket of provisions for himself and the boy, they, too, would have been forced to go on dinnerless and supperless to Dublin.

Frank, on his way back home, resolved that he would call on Mr. Daly at Daly's Bridge, near Castle Blakeney. It was Daly's wont to live at Daly's Bridge when the hounds were not hunting, though he would generally go four or five times a week from Daly's Bridge to the kennels. To Castle Blakeney a public car was running, and the public car did not dare, or probably did not wish, to boycott anyone. He walked up to the open door at Daly's Bridge and soon found himself in the presence of Black Tom Daly. "So you are boycotted?" said Tom.

"Horse, foot, and dragoons," said Frank.

"What's to come of it, I wonder?" Tom as he said this was sitting at an open window making up some horse's drug to which was attached some very strong odour. "I am boycotted too, and the poor hounds, which have given hours of amus.e.m.e.nt to many of these wretches, for which they have not been called upon to pay a s.h.i.+lling. I shall have to sell the pack, I'm afraid," said Tom, sadly.

"Not yet, I hope, Mr. Daly."

"What do you mean by that? Who's to keep them without any subscription? And who's to subscribe without any prospect of hunting?

For the matter of that who's to feed the poor dumb brutes? One pack will be boycotted after another till not a pack of hounds will be wanted in all Ireland."

"Has the same thing happened to any other pack?" asked Frank.

"Certainly it has. They turned out against the Muskerry; and there's been a row in Kildare. We are only at the beginning of it yet."

"I don't suppose it will go on for ever," said Frank.

"Why don't you suppose so? What's to be the end of it all? Do you see any way out of it?--for I do not. Does your father see his way to bringing those meadows back into his hands? I'm told that some of those fellows shot at Clayton the other day down at Headford. How are we to expect a man like Clayton to come forward and be shot at in that fas.h.i.+on? As far as I can see there will be no possibility for anyone to live in this country again. Of course it's all over with me. I haven't got any rents to speak of, and the only property I possess is now useless."

"What property?" asked Frank.

"What property?" rejoined Tom in a voice of anger. "What property?

Ain't the hounds property, or were property a few weeks ago? Who'll subscribe for next year? We had a meeting in February, you know, and the fellows put down their names the same as ever. But they can't be expected to pay when there will be no coverts for them to draw. The country can do nothing to put a stop to this blackguardism. When they've pa.s.sed this Coercion Bill they're going to have some sort of Land Bill,--just a law to give away the land to somebody. What's to come of the poor country with such men as Mr. Gladstone and Mr.