Some Experiences of an Irish R.M. Read online

  III

  TRINKET'S COLT

  It was Petty Sessions day in Skebawn, a cold, grey day of February. Acase of trespass had dragged its burden of cross summonses and crossswearing far into the afternoon, and when I left the bench my head wassinging from the bellowings of the attorneys, and the smell of theirclients was heavy upon my palate.

  The streets still testified to the fact that it was market day, and Ievaded with difficulty the sinuous course of carts full of soddenlyscrewed people, and steered an equally devious one for myself among thegroups anchored round the doors of the public-houses. Skebawnpossesses, among its legion of public-houses, one establishment whichtimorously, and almost imperceptibly, proffers tea to the thirsty. Iturned in there, as was my custom on court days, and found the littledingy den, known as the Ladies' Coffee-Room, in the occupancy of myfriend Mr. Florence McCarthy Knox, who was drinking strong tea andeating buns with serious simplicity. It was a first and quiteunexpected glimpse of that domesticity that has now become a markedfeature in his character.

  "You're the very man I wanted to see," I said as I sat down beside himat the oilcloth-covered table; "a man I know in England who is not muchof a judge of character has asked me to buy him a four-year-old downhere, and as I should rather be stuck by a friend than a dealer, I wishyou'd take over the job."

  Flurry poured himself out another cup of tea, and dropped three lumpsof sugar into it in silence.

  Finally he said, "There isn't a four-year-old in this country that I'dbe seen dead with at a pig fair."

  This was discouraging, from the premier authority on horse-flesh in thedistrict.

  "But it isn't six weeks since you told me you had the finest filly inyour stables that was ever foaled in the County Cork," I protested:"what's wrong with her?"

  "Oh, is it that filly?" said Mr. Knox with a lenient smile; "she's gonethese three weeks from me. I swapped her and L6 for a three-year-oldIronmonger colt, and after that I swapped the colt and L19 for thatBandon horse I rode last week at your place, and after that again Isold the Bandon horse for L75 to old Welply, and I had to give him backa couple of sovereigns luck-money. You see I did pretty well with thefilly after all."

  "Yes, yes--oh rather," I assented, as one dizzily accepts thepropositions of a bimetallist; "and you don't know of anythingelse----?"

  The room in which we were seated was closely screened from the shop bya door with a muslin-curtained window in it; several of the panes werebroken, and at this juncture two voices that had for some time carriedon a discussion forced themselves upon our attention.

  "Begging your pardon for contradicting you, ma'am," said the voice ofMrs. McDonald, proprietress of the tea-shop, and a leading light inSkebawn Dissenting circles, shrilly tremulous with indignation, "if theservants I recommend you won't stop with you, it's no fault of mine.If respectable young girls are set picking grass out of your gravel, inplace of their proper work, certainly they will give warning!"

  The voice that replied struck me as being a notable one, well-bred andimperious.

  "When I take a barefooted slut out of a cabin, I don't expect her todictate to me what her duties are!"

  Flurry jerked up his chin in a noiseless laugh. "It's my grandmother!"he whispered. "I bet you Mrs. McDonald don't get much change out ofher!"

  "If I set her to clean the pig-sty I expect her to obey me," continuedthe voice in accents that would have made me clean forty pig-sties hadshe desired me to do so.

  "Very well, ma'am," retorted Mrs. McDonald, "if that's the way youtreat your servants, you needn't come here again looking for them. Iconsider your conduct is neither that of a lady nor a Christian!"

  "Don't you, indeed?" replied Flurry's grandmother. "Well, your opiniondoesn't greatly distress me, for, to tell you the truth, I don't thinkyou're much of a judge."

  "Didn't I tell you she'd score?" murmured Flurry, who was by this timeapplying his eye to a hole in the muslin curtain. "She's off," he wenton, returning to his tea. "She's a great character! She'seighty-three if she's a day, and she's as sound on her legs as athree-year-old! Did you see that old shandrydan of hers in the streeta while ago, and a fellow on the box with a red beard on him likeRobinson Crusoe? That old mare that was on the near side--Trinket hername is--is mighty near clean bred. I can tell you her foals are wortha bit of money."

  I had heard of old Mrs. Knox of Aussolas; indeed, I had seldom dinedout in the neighbourhood without hearing some new story of her and herremarkable menage, but it had not yet been my privilege to meet her.

  "Well, now," went on Flurry in his slow voice, "I'll tell you a thingthat's just come into my head. My grandmother promised me a foal ofTrinket's the day I was one-and-twenty, and that's five years ago, anddeuce a one I've got from her yet. You never were at Aussolas? No,you were not. Well, I tell you the place there is like a circus withhorses. She has a couple of score of them running wild in the woods,like deer."

  "Oh, come," I said, "I'm a bit of a liar myself--"

  "Well, she has a dozen of them anyhow, rattling good colts too, some ofthem, but they might as well be donkeys for all the good they are to meor any one. It's not once in three years she sells one, and there shehas them walking after her for bits of sugar, like a lot of dirtylapdogs," ended Flurry with disgust.

  "Well, what's your plan? Do you want me to make her a bid for one ofthe lapdogs?"

  "I was thinking," replied Flurry, with great deliberation, "that mybirthday's this week, and maybe I could work a four-year-old colt ofTrinket's she has out of her in honour of the occasion."

  "And sell your grandmother's birthday present to me?"

  "Just that, I suppose," answered Flurry with a slow wink.

  A few days afterwards a letter from Mr. Knox informed me that he had"squared the old lady, and it would be all right about the colt." Hefurther told me that Mrs. Knox had been good enough to offer me, withhim, a day's snipe shooting on the celebrated Aussolas bogs, and heproposed to drive me there the following Monday, if convenient. Mostpeople found it convenient to shoot the Aussolas snipe bog when theygot the chance. Eight o'clock on the following Monday morning sawFlurry, myself, and a groom packed into a dogcart, with portmanteaus,gun-cases, and two rampant red setters.

  It was a long drive, twelve miles at least, and a very cold one. Wepassed through long tracts of pasture country, fraught, for Flurry,with memories of runs, which were recorded for me, fence by fence, inevery one of which the biggest dog-fox in the country had gone toground, with not two feet--measured accurately on the handle of thewhip--between him and the leading hound; through bogs thatimperceptibly melted into lakes, and finally down and down into avalley, where the fir-trees of Aussolas clustered darkly round aglittering lake, and all but hid the grey roofs and pointed gables ofAussolas Castle.

  "There's a nice stretch of a demesne for you," remarked Flurry,pointing downwards with the whip, "and one little old woman holding itall in the heel of her fist. Well able to hold it she is, too, andalways was, and she'll live twenty years yet, if it's only to spite thewhole lot of us, and when all's said and done goodness knows how she'llleave it!"

  "It strikes me you were lucky to keep her up to her promise about thecolt," I said.

  Flurry administered a composing kick to the ceaseless strivings of thered setters under the seat.

  "I used to be rather a pet with her," he said, after a pause; "but mindyou, I haven't got him yet, and if she gets any notion I want to sellhim I'll never get him, so say nothing about the business to her."

  The tall gates of Aussolas shrieked on their hinges as they admittedus, and shut with a clang behind us, in the faces of an old mare and acouple of young horses, who, foiled in their break for the excitementsof the outer world, turned and galloped defiantly on either side of us.Flurry's admirable cob hammered on, regardless of all things save hisduty.

  "He's the only one I have that I'd trust myself here with," said hismaster, flicking him approvingly with the whip; "there are plenty ofpeo
ple afraid to come here at all, and when my grandmother goes outdriving she has a boy on the box with a basket full of stones to peg atthem. Talk of the dickens, here she is herself!"

  A short, upright old woman was approaching, preceded by a white woollydog with sore eyes and a bark like a tin trumpet; we both got out ofthe trap and advanced to meet the lady of the manor.

  I may summarise her attire by saying that she looked as if she hadrobbed a scarecrow; her face was small and incongruously refined, theskinny hand that she extended to me had the grubby tan that bespoke theprofessional gardener, and was decorated with a magnificent diamondring. On her head was a massive purple velvet bonnet.

  "I am very glad to meet you, Major Yeates," she said with anold-fashioned precision of utterance; "your grandfather was a dancingpartner of mine in old days at the Castle, when he was a handsome youngaide-de-camp there, and I was----you may judge for yourself what I was."

  She ended with a startling little hoot of laughter, and I was awarethat she quite realised the world's opinion of her, and was indifferentto it.

  Our way to the bogs took us across Mrs. Knox's home farm, and through alarge field in which several young horses were grazing.

  "There now, that's my fellow," said Flurry, pointing to a fine-lookingcolt, "the chestnut with the white diamond on his forehead. He'll runinto three figures before he's done, but we'll not tell that to the oldlady!"

  The famous Aussolas bogs were as full of snipe as usual, and a gooddeal fuller of water than any bogs I had ever shot before. I was on myday, and Flurry was not, and as he is ordinarily an infinitely bettersnipe shot than I, I felt at peace with the world and all men as wewalked back, wet through, at five o'clock.

  The sunset had waned, and a big white moon was making the eastern towerof Aussolas look like a thing in a fairy tale or a play when we arrivedat the hall door. An individual, whom I recognised as the RobinsonCrusoe coachman, admitted us to a hall, the like of which one does notoften see. The walls were panelled with dark oak up to the gallerythat ran round three sides of it, the balusters of the wide staircasewere heavily carved, and blackened portraits of Flurry's ancestors onthe spindle side stared sourly down on their descendant as he trampedupstairs with the bog mould on his hobnailed boots.

  We had just changed into dry clothes when Robinson Crusoe shoved hisred beard round the corner of the door, with the information that themistress said we were to stay for dinner. My heart sank. It was thenbarely half-past five. I said something about having no eveningclothes and having to get home early.

  "Sure the dinner'll be in another half-hour," said Robinson Crusoe,joining hospitably in the conversation; "and as for evening clothes----God bless ye!"

  The door closed behind him.

  "Never mind," said Flurry, "I dare say you'll be glad enough to eatanother dinner by the time you get home." He laughed. "Poor Slipper!"he added inconsequently, and only laughed again when I asked for anexplanation.

  Old Mrs. Knox received us in the library, where she was seated by aroaring turf fire, which lit the room a good deal more effectively thanthe pair of candles that stood beside her in tall silver candlesticks.Ceaseless and implacable growls from under her chair indicated thepresence of the woolly dog. She talked with confounding culture of thebooks that rose all round her to the ceiling; her evening dress wasaccomplished by means of an additional white shawl, rather dirtier thanits congeners; as I took her in to dinner she quoted Virgil to me, andin the same breath screeched an objurgation at a being whose mattedhead rose suddenly into view from behind an ancient Chinese screen, asI have seen the head of a Zulu woman peer over a bush.

  Dinner was as incongruous as everything else. Detestable soup in asplendid old silver tureen that was nearly as dark in hue as RobinsonCrusoe's thumb; a perfect salmon, perfectly cooked, on a chippedkitchen dish; such cut glass as is not easy to find nowadays; sherrythat, as Flurry subsequently remarked, would burn the shell off an egg;and a bottle of port, draped in immemorial cobwebs, wan with age, andprobably priceless. Throughout the vicissitudes of the meal Mrs.Knox's conversation flowed on undismayed, directed sometimes at me--shehad installed me in the position of friend of her youth, and talked tome as if I were my own grandfather--sometimes at Crusoe, with whom shehad several heated arguments, and sometimes she would make a statementof remarkable frankness on the subject of her horse-farming affairs toFlurry, who, very much on his best behaviour, agreed with all she said,and risked no original remark. As I listened to them both, Iremembered with infinite amusement how he had told me once that "a petname she had for him was 'Tony Lumpkin,' and no one but herself knewwhat she meant by it." It seemed strange that she made no allusion toTrinket's colt or to Flurry's birthday, but, mindful of myinstructions, I held my peace.

  As, at about half-past eight, we drove away in the moonlight, Flurrycongratulated me solemnly on my success with his grandmother. He wasgood enough to tell me that she would marry me to-morrow if I askedher, and he wished I would, even if it was only to see what a nicegrandson he'd be for me. A sympathetic giggle behind me told me thatMichael, on the back seat, had heard and relished the jest.

  We had left the gates of Aussolas about half a mile behind when, at thecorner of a by-road, Flurry pulled up. A short squat figure arose fromthe black shadow of a furze bush and came out into the moonlight,swinging its arms like a cabman and cursing audibly.

  "Oh murdher, oh murdher, Misther Flurry! What kept ye at all? 'Twouldperish the crows to be waiting here the way I am these two hours----"

  "Ah, shut your mouth, Slipper!" said Flurry, who, to my surprise, hadturned back the rug and was taking off his driving coat, "I couldn'thelp it. Come on, Yeates, we've got to get out here."

  "What for?" I asked, in not unnatural bewilderment.

  "It's all right. I'll tell you as we go along," replied my companion,who was already turning to follow Slipper up the by-road. "Take thetrap on, Michael, and wait at the River's Cross." He waited for me tocome up with him, and then put his hand on my arm. "You see, Major,this is the way it is. My grandmother's given me that colt rightenough, but if I waited for her to send him over to me I'd never see ahair of his tail. So I just thought that as we were over here we mightas well take him back with us, and maybe you'll give us a help withhim; he'll not be altogether too handy for a first go off."

  I was staggered. An infant in arms could scarcely have failed todiscern the fishiness of the transaction, and I begged Mr. Knox not toput himself to this trouble on my account, as I had no doubt I couldfind a horse for my friend elsewhere. Mr. Knox assured me that it wasno trouble at all, quite the contrary, and that, since his grandmotherhad given him the colt, he saw no reason why he should not take himwhen he wanted him; also, that if I didn't want him he'd be glad enoughto keep him himself; and finally, that I wasn't the chap to go back ona friend, but I was welcome to drive back to Shreelane with Michaelthis minute if I liked.

  Of course I yielded in the end. I told Flurry I should lose my jobover the business, and he said I could then marry his grandmother, andthe discussion was abruptly closed by the necessity of followingSlipper over a locked five-barred gate.

  Our pioneer took us over about half a mile of country, knocking downstone gaps where practicable and scrambling over tall banks in thedeceptive moonlight. We found ourselves at length in a field with ashed in one corner of it; in a dim group of farm buildings a little wayoff a light was shining.

  "Wait here," said Flurry to me in a whisper; "the less noise thebetter. It's an open shed, and we'll just slip in and coax him out."

  Slipper unwound from his waist a halter, and my colleagues glided likespectres into the shadow of the shed, leaving me to meditate on myduties as Resident Magistrate, and on the questions that would be askedin the House by our local member when Slipper had given away theadventure in his cups.

  In less than a minute three shadows emerged from the shed, where twohad gone in. They had got the colt.

  "He came out as quiet as
a calf when he winded the sugar," said Flurry;"it was well for me I filled my pockets from grandmamma's sugar basin."

  He and Slipper had a rope from each side of the colt's head; they tookhim quickly across a field towards a gate. The colt stepped daintilybetween them over the moonlit grass; he snorted occasionally, butappeared on the whole amenable.

  The trouble began later, and was due, as trouble often is, to thebeguilements of a short cut. Against the maturer judgment of Slipper,Flurry insisted on following a route that he assured us he knew as wellas his own pocket, and the consequence was that in about five minutes Ifound myself standing on top of a bank hanging on to a rope, on theother end of which the colt dangled and danced, while Flurry, with theother rope, lay prone in the ditch, and Slipper administered to thebewildered colt's hindquarters such chastisement as could be venturedon.

  I have no space to narrate in detail the atrocious difficulties anddisasters of the short cut. How the colt set to work to buck, and wentaway across a field, dragging the faithful Slipper, literally_ventre-a-terre_, after him, while I picked myself in ignominy out of abriar patch, and Flurry cursed himself black in the face. How we wereattacked by ferocious cur dogs, and I lost my eyeglass; and how, as weneared the River's Cross, Flurry espied the police patrol on the road,and we all hid behind a rick of turf, while I realised in fulness whatan exceptional ass I was, to have been beguiled into an enterprise thatinvolved hiding with Slipper from the Royal Irish Constabulary.

  Let it suffice to say that Trinket's infernal offspring was finallyhanded over on the high-road to Michael and Slipper, and Flurry droveme home in a state of mental and physical overthrow.

  I saw nothing of my friend Mr. Knox for the next couple of days, by theend of which time I had worked up a high polish on my misgivings, andhad determined to tell him that under no circumstances would I haveanything to say to his grandmother's birthday present. It was like myusual luck that, instead of writing a note to this effect, I thought itwould be good for my liver to walk across the hills to Tory Cottage andtell Flurry so in person.

  It was a bright, blustery morning, after a muggy day. The feeling ofspring was in the air, the daffodils were already in bud, and crocusesshowed purple in the grass on either side of the avenue. It was only acouple of miles to Tory Cottage by the way across the hills; I walkedfast, and it was barely twelve o'clock when I saw its pink walls andclumps of evergreens below me. As I looked down at it the chiming ofFlurry's hounds in the kennels came to me on the wind; I stood still tolisten, and could almost have sworn that I was hearing again the clashof Magdalen bells, hard at work on May morning.

  The path that I was following led downwards through a larch plantationto Flurry's back gate. Hot wafts from some hideous caldron at theother side of a wall apprised me of the vicinity of the kennels andtheir cuisine, and the fir-trees round were hung with gruesome andunknown joints. I thanked Heaven that I was not a master of hounds,and passed on as quickly as might be to the hall door.

  I rang two or three times without response; then the door opened acouple of inches and was instantly slammed in my face. I heard thehurried paddling of bare feet on oilcloth, and a voice, "Hurry,Bridgie, hurry! There's quality at the door!"

  Bridgie, holding a dirty cap on with one hand, presently arrived andinformed me that she believed Mr. Knox was out about the place. Sheseemed perturbed, and she cast scared glances down the drive whilespeaking to me.

  I knew enough of Flurry's habits to shape a tolerably direct course forhis whereabouts. He was, as I had expected, in the training paddock, afield behind the stable-yard, in which he had put up practice jumps forhis horses. It was a good-sized field with clumps of furze in it, andFlurry was standing near one of these with his hands in his pockets,singularly unoccupied. I supposed that he was prospecting for a placeto put up another jump. He did not see me coming, and turned with astart as I spoke to him. There was a queer expression of mingled guiltand what I can only describe as divilment in his grey eyes as hegreeted me. In my dealings with Flurry Knox, I have since formed thehabit of sitting tight, in a general way, when I see that expression.

  "Well, who's coming next, I wonder!" he said, as he shook hands withme; "it's not ten minutes since I had two of your d--d peelers heresearching the whole place for my grandmother's colt!"

  "What!" I exclaimed, feeling cold all down my back; "do you mean thepolice have got hold of it?"

  "They haven't got hold of the colt anyway," said Flurry, lookingsideways at me from under the peak of his cap, with the glint of thesun in his eye. "I got word in time before they came."

  "What do you mean?" I demanded; "where is he? For Heaven's sake don'ttell me you've sent the brute over to my place!"

  "It's a good job for you I didn't," replied Flurry, "as the police areon their way to Shreelane this minute to consult you about it. _You_!"He gave utterance to one of his short diabolical fits of laughter."He's where they'll not find him, anyhow. Ho! ho! It's the funniesthand I ever played!"

  "Oh yes, it's devilish funny, I've no doubt," I retorted, beginning tolose my temper, as is the manner of many people when they arefrightened; "but I give you fair warning that if Mrs. Knox asks me anyquestions about it, I shall tell her the whole story."

  "All right," responded Flurry; "and when you do, don't forget to tellher how you flogged the colt out on to the road over her own boundsditch."

  "Very well," I said hotly, "I may as well go home and send in mypapers. They'll break me over this----"

  "Ah, hold on, Major," said Flurry soothingly, "it'll be all right. Noone knows anything. It's only on spec the old lady sent the bobbieshere. It you'll keep quiet it'll all blow over."

  "I don't care," I said, struggling hopelessly in the toils; "if I meetyour grandmother, and she asks me about it, I shall tell her all Iknow."

  "Please God you'll not meet her! After all, it's not once in a bluemoon that she--" began Flurry. Even as he said the words his facechanged. "Holy fly!" he ejaculated, "isn't that her dog coming intothe field? Look at her bonnet over the wall! Hide, hide for yourlife!" He caught me by the shoulder and shoved me down among the furzebushes before I realised what had happened.

  "Get in there! I'll talk to her."

  I may as well confess that at the mere sight of Mrs. Knox's purplebonnet my heart had turned to water. In that moment I knew what itwould be like to tell her how I, having eaten her salmon, and cappedher quotations, and drunk her best port, had gone forth and helped tosteal her horse. I abandoned my dignity, my sense of honour; I tookthe furze prickles to my breast and wallowed in them.

  Mrs. Knox had advanced with vengeful speed; already she was in highaltercation with Flurry at no great distance from where I lay; varyingsounds of battle reached me, and I gathered that Flurry was not--to putit mildly--shrinking from that economy of truth that the situationrequired.

  "Is it that curby, long-backed brute? You promised him to me long ago,but I wouldn't be bothered with him!"

  The old lady uttered a laugh of shrill derision. "Is it likely I'dpromise you my best colt? And still more, is it likely that you'drefuse him if I did?"

  "Very well, ma'am." Flurry's voice was admirably indignant. "Then Isuppose I'm a liar and a thief."

  "I'd be more obliged to you for the information if I hadn't known itbefore," responded his grandmother with lightning speed; "if you sworeto me on a stack of Bibles you knew nothing about my colt I wouldn'tbelieve you! I shall go straight to Major Yeates and ask his advice.I believe _him_ to be a gentleman, in spite of the company he keeps!"

  I writhed deeper into the furze bushes, and thereby discovered a sandyrabbit run, along which I crawled, with my cap well over my eyes, andthe furze needles stabbing me through my stockings. The ground shelveda little, promising profounder concealment, but the bushes were verythick, and I laid hold of the bare stem of one to help my progress. Itlifted out of the ground in my hand, revealing a freshly-cut stump.Something snorted, not a yard away; I glared through t
he opening, andwas confronted by the long, horrified face of Mrs. Knox's colt,mysteriously on a level with my own.

  Even without the white diamond on his forehead I should have divinedthe truth; but how in the name of wonder had Flurry persuaded him tocouch like a woodcock in the heart of a furze brake? For a full minuteI lay as still as death for fear of frightening him, while the voicesof Flurry and his grandmother raged on alarmingly close to me. Thecolt snorted, and blew long breaths through his wide nostrils, but hedid not move. I crawled an inch or two nearer, and after a few secondsof cautious peering I grasped the position. They had buried him.

  A small sandpit among the furze had been utilised as a grave; they hadfilled him in up to his withers with sand, and a few furze bushes,artistically disposed round the pit, had done the rest. As the depthof Flurry's guile was revealed, laughter came upon me like a flood; Igurgled and shook apoplectically, and the colt gazed at me with serioussurprise, until a sudden outburst of barking close to my elbowadministered a fresh shock to my tottering nerves.

  Mrs. Knox's woolly dog had tracked me into the furze, and was nowbaying the colt and me with mingled terror and indignation. Iaddressed him in a whisper, with perfidious endearments, advancing acrafty hand towards him the while, made a snatch for the back of hisneck, missed it badly, and got him by the ragged fleece of hishind-quarters as he tried to flee. If I had flayed him alive he couldhardly have uttered a more deafening series of yells, but, like a fool,instead of letting him go, I dragged him towards me, and tried tostifle the noise by holding his muzzle. The tussle lasted engrossinglyfor a few seconds, and then the climax of the nightmare arrived.

  Mrs. Knox's voice, close behind me, said, "Let go my dog this instant,sir! Who are you----"

  Her voice faded away, and I knew that she also had seen the colt's head.

  I positively felt sorry for her. At her age there was no knowing whateffect the shock might have on her. I scrambled to my feet andconfronted her.

  "Major Yeates!" she said. There was a deathly pause. "Will you kindlytell me," said Mrs. Knox slowly, "am I in Bedlam, or are you? And_what is that_?"

  She pointed to the colt, and that unfortunate animal, recognising thevoice of his mistress, uttered a hoarse and lamentable whinny. Mrs.Knox felt around her for support, found only furze prickles, gazedspeechlessly at me, and then, to her eternal honour, fell into wildcackles of laughter.

  So, I may say, did Flurry and I. I embarked on my explanation andbroke down; Flurry followed suit and broke down too. Overwhelminglaughter held us all three, disintegrating our very souls. Mrs. Knoxpulled herself together first.

  "I acquit you, Major Yeates, I acquit you, though appearances areagainst you. It's clear enough to me you've fallen among thieves."She stopped and glowered at Flurry. Her purple bonnet was over oneeye. "I'll thank you, sir," she said, "to dig out that horse before Ileave this place. And when you've dug him out you may keep him. I'llbe no receiver of stolen goods!"

  She broke off and shook her fist at him. "Upon my conscience, Tony,I'd give a guinea to have thought of it myself!"