Some Experiences of an Irish R.M. Read online

  IV

  THE WATERS OF STRIFE

  I knew Bat Callaghan's face long before I was able to put a name to it.There was seldom a court day in Skebawn that I was not aware of hislevel brows and superfluously intense expression somewhere among theknot of corner-boys who patronised the weekly sittings of the bench ofmagistrates. His social position appeared to fluctuate: I have seenhim driving a car; he sometimes held my horse for me--that is to say,he sat on the counter of a public-house while the Quaker slumbered inthe gutter; and, on one occasion, he retired, at my bidding, to Corkgaol, there to meditate upon the inadvisability of defending a friendfrom the attentions of the police with the tailboard of a cart.

  He next obtained prominence in my regard at a regatta held under theauspices of "The Sons of Liberty," a local football club that justifiedits title by the patriot green of its jerseys and its freeinterpretation of the rules of the game. The announcement of my nameon the posters as a patron--a privilege acquired at the cost of areluctant half-sovereign--made it incumbent on me to put in anappearance, even though the festival coincided with my Petty Sessionsday at Skebawn; and at some five of the clock on a brilliant Septemberafternoon I found myself driving down the stony road that dropped inzigzags to the borders of the lake on which the races were to come off.

  I believe that the selection of Lough Lonen as the scene of the regattawas not unconnected with the fact that the secretary of the club owneda public-house at the cross roads at one end of it; none the less, thepresident of the Royal Academy could scarcely have chosen morepicturesque surroundings. A mountain towered steeply up from thelake's edge, dark with the sad green of beech-trees in September; firwoods followed the curve of the shore, and leaned far over theanswering darkness of the water; and above the trees rose the topplingsteepnesses of the hill, painted with a purple glow of heather. Thelake was about a mile long, and, tumbling from its farther end, afierce and narrow river fled away west to the sea, some four or fivemiles off.

  I had not seen a boat race since I was at Oxford, and the words stillcalled up before my eyes a vision of smart parasols, of gorgeousbarges, of snowy-clad youths, and of low slim outriggers, winged withthe level flight of oars, slitting the water to the sway of the line offlat backs. Certainly undreamed-of possibilities in aquatics wererevealed to me as I reined in the Quaker on the outskirts of the crowd,and saw below me the festival of the Sons of Liberty in full swing.Boats of all shapes and sizes, outrageously overladen, moved about thelake, with oars flourishing to the strains of concertinas. Blackswarms of people seethed along the water's edge, congesting here andthere round the dingy tents and stalls of green apples; and the club'scelebrated brass band, enthroned in a wagonette, and stimulated by thepresence of a barrel of porter on the box-seat, was belching forth "TheBoys of Wexford," under the guidance of a disreputable ex-militiadrummer, in a series of crashing discords.

  Almost as I arrived a pistol-shot set the echoes clattering round thelake, and three boats burst out abreast from the throng into the openwater. Two of the crews were in shirt-sleeves, the third wore thegreen jerseys of the football club; the boats were of the heavysea-going build, and pulled six oars apiece, oars of which the loomswere scarcely narrower than the blades, and were, of the two, but ashade heavier. None the less the rowers started dauntlessly atthirty-five strokes a minute, quickening up, incredible as it may seem,as they rounded the mark boat in the first lap of the two-mile course.The rowing was, in general style, more akin to the action of beating upeggs with a fork than to any other form of athletic exercise; but inits unorthodox way it kicked the heavy boats along at a surprisingpace. The oars squeaked and grunted against the thole-pins, thecoxswains kept up an unceasing flow of oratory, and superfluous littleboys in punts contrived to intervene at all the more criticalturning-points of the race, only evading the flail of the oncoming oarsby performing prodigies of "waggling" with a single oar at the stern.I took out my watch and counted the strokes when they were passing themark boat for the second time; they were pulling a fraction over forty;one of the shirt-sleeved crews was obviously in trouble, the other,with humped backs and jerking oars, was holding its own against thegreen jerseys amid the blended yells of friends and foes. When for thelast time they rounded the green flag there were but two boats in therace, and the foul that had been imminent throughout was at lengthachieved with a rattle of oars and a storm of curses. They were clearagain in a moment, the shirt-sleeved crew getting away with a distinctlead, and it was at about this juncture that I became aware that thecoxswains had abandoned their long-handled tillers, and were standingover their respective "strokes," shoving frantically at their oars, andmaintaining the while a ceaseless bawl of encouragement and defiance.It looked like a foregone conclusion for the leaders, and the war ofcheers rose to frenzy. The word "cheering," indeed, is but aneuphuism, and in no way expresses the serrated yell, composed ofepithets, advice, and imprecations, that was flung like a live thing atthe oncoming boats. The green jerseys answered to this stimulant witha wild spurt that drove the bow of their boat within a measurabledistance of their opponents' stroke oar. In another second athoroughly successful foul would have been effected, but the cox of theleading boat proved himself equal to the emergency by unshipping histiller, and with it dealing "bow" of the green jerseys such a blow overthe head as effectually dismissed him from the sphere of practicalpolitics.

  A great roar of laughter greeted this feat of arms, and a voice at mydogcart's wheel pierced the clamour--

  "More power to ye, Larry, me owld darlin'!"

  I looked down and saw Bat Callaghan, with shining eyes, and a facewhite with excitement, poising himself on one foot on the box of mywheel in order to get a better view of the race. Almost before I hadtime to recognise him, a man in a green jersey caught him round thelegs and jerked him down. Callaghan fell into the throng, recoveredhimself in an instant, and rushed, white and dangerous, at hisassailant. The Son of Liberty was no less ready for the fray, and whatis known in Ireland as "the father and mother of a row" was imminent.Already, however, one of those unequalled judges of the moraltemperature of a crowd, a sergeant of the R.I.C., had quietlyinterposed his bulky person between the combatants, and the comingtrouble was averted.

  Elsewhere battle was raging. The race was over, and the committee boatwas hemmed in by the rival crews, supplemented by craft of all kinds.The "objection" was being lodged, and in its turn objected to, and Ican only liken the process to the screaming warfare of seagulls round apiece of carrion. The tumult was still at its height when out of itsvery heart two four-oared boats broke forth, and a pistol shotproclaimed that another race had begun, the public interest in whichwas specially keen, owing to the fact that the rowers were stalwartcountry girls, who made up in energy what they lacked in skill. It wasa short race, once round the mark boat only, and, like a successfulfarce, it "went with a roar" from start to finish. Foul after foul,each followed by a healing interval of calm, during which the crews,who had all caught crabs, were recovering themselves and their oars,marked its progress; and when the two boats, locked in an inextricableembrace, at length passed the winning flag, and the crews, oblivious ofjudges and public, fell to untrammelled personal abuse and to doing uptheir hair, I decided that I had seen the best of the fun, and preparedto go home.

  It was, as it happened, the last race of the day, and nothing remainedin the way of excitement save the greased pole with the pig slung in abag at the end of it. My final impression of the Lough Lonen Regattawas of Callaghan's lithe figure, sleek and dripping, against the yellowsky, as he poised on the swaying pole with the broken gold of the waterbeneath him.

  Limited as was my experience of the Southwest of Ireland, I was in noway surprised to hear on the following afternoon from Peter Cadoganthat there had been "sthrokes" the night before, when the boys weregoing home from the regatta, and that the police were searching for oneJimmy Foley.

  "What do they want him for?" I asked.

  "Sure it's according as a
man that was bringing a car of bogwood wastellin' me, sir," answered Peter, pursuing his occupation of washingthe dogcart with unabated industry; "they say Jimmy's wife went roaringto the police, saying she could get no account of her husband."

  "I suppose he's beaten some fellow and is hiding," I suggested.

  "Well, that might be, sir," asserted Peter respectfully. He plied hismop vigorously in intricate places about the springs, which would, Iknew, have never been explored save for my presence.

  "It's what John Hennessy was saying, that he was hard set to get hishorse past Cluin Cross, the way the blood was sthrewn about the road,"resumed Peter; "sure they were fighting like wasps in it half thenight."

  "Who were fighting?"

  "I couldn't say, indeed, sir. Some o' thim low rakish lads from thetown, I suppose," replied Peter with virtuous respectability.

  When Peter Cadogan was quietly and intelligently candid, to pursue aninquiry was seldom of much avail.

  Next day in Skebawn I met little Murray, the district inspector, veryalert and smart in his rifle-green uniform, going forth to collectevidence about the fight. He told me that the police were prettycertain that one of the Sons of Liberty, named Foley, had beenmurdered, but, as usual, the difficulty was to get any one to giveinformation; all that was known was that he was gone, and that his wifehad identified his cap, which had been found, drenched with blood, bythe roadside. Murray gave it as his opinion that the whole businesshad arisen out of the row over the disputed race, and that there musthave been a dozen people looking on when the murder was done; but sofar no evidence was forthcoming, and after a day and a night of searchthe police had not been able to find the body.

  "No," said Flurry Knox, who had joined us, "and if it was any of thosemountainy men did away with him you might scrape Ireland with asmall-tooth comb and you'll not get him!"

  That evening I smoked an after-dinner cigarette out of doors in themild starlight, strolling about the rudimentary paths of what would, Ihoped, some day be Philippa's garden. The bats came stooping at thered end of my cigarette, and from the covert behind the house I heardonce or twice the delicate bark of a fox. Civilisation seemed athousand miles off, as far away as the falling star that had just drawna line of pale fire half-way down the northern sky. I had been nearlya year at Shreelane House by myself now, and the time seemed very longto me. It was slow work putting by money, even under the austeritiesof Mrs. Cadogan's _regime_, and though I had warned Philippa I meant tomarry her after Christmas, there were moments, and this was one ofthem, when it seemed an idle threat.

  "Pether!" the strident voice of Mrs. Cadogan intruded upon mymeditations. "Go tell the Major his coffee is waitin' on him!"

  I went gloomily into the house, and, with a resignation born ofadversity, swallowed the mixture of chicory and liquorice which myhousekeeper possessed the secret of distilling from the best and mostexpensive coffee. My theory about it was that it added to the illusionthat I had dined, and moreover, that it kept me awake, and I generallyhad a good deal of writing to do after dinner.

  Having swallowed it I went downstairs and out past the kitchen regionsto my office, a hideous whitewashed room, in which I interviewedpolicemen, and took affidavits, and did most of my official writing.It had a door that opened into the yard, and a window that looked outin the other direction, among lanky laurels and scrubby hollies, wherelay the cats' main thoroughfare from the scullery window to the rabbitholes in the wood. I had a good deal of work to do, and the timepassed quickly. It was Friday night, and from the kitchen at the endof the passage came the gabbling murmur, in two alternate keys, that Ihad learned to recognise as the recital of a litany by my housekeeperand her nephew Peter. This performance was followed by some of thosedreary and heart-rending yawns that are, I think, peculiar to Irishkitchens, then such of the cats as had returned from the chase wereloudly shepherded into the back scullery, the kitchen door shut with aslam, and my retainers retired to repose.

  It was nearly half-an-hour afterwards when I finished the notes I hadbeen making on an adjourned case of "stroke-hauling" salmon in theLonen River. I leaned back in my chair and lighted a cigarettepreparatory to turning in; my thoughts had again wandered on asentimental journey across the Irish Channel, when I heard a slightstir of some kind outside the open window. In the wilds of Ireland noone troubles themselves about burglars; "more cats," I thought, "I mustshut the window before I go to bed."

  Almost immediately there followed a faint tap on the window, and then avoice said in a hoarse and hurried whisper, "Them that wants Jim Foley,let them look in the river!"

  If I had kept my head I should have sat still and encouraged a furtherconfidence, but unfortunately I acted on the impulse of the naturalman, and was at the window in a jump, knocking down my chair, andmaking noise enough to scare a far less shy bird than an Irishinformer. Of course there was no one there. I listened, with everynerve as taut as a violin string. It was quite dark; there was justbreeze enough to make a rustling in the evergreens, so that a man mightbrush through them without being heard; and while I debated on a planof action there came from beyond the shrubbery the jar and twang of aloose strand of wire in the paling by the wood. My informant, whoeverhe might be, had vanished into the darkness from which he had come asirrecoverably as had the falling star that had written its briefmessage across the sky, and gone out again into infinity.

  I got up very early next morning and drove to Skebawn to see Murray,and offer him my mysterious information for what it was worth.Personally I did not think it worth much, and was disposed to regard itas a red herring drawn across the trail. Murray, however, was not in amood to despise anything that had a suggestion to make, having been outtill nine o'clock the night before without being able to find any clueto the hiding-place of James Foley.

  "The river's a good mile from the place where the fight was," he said,straddling his compasses over the Ordnance Survey map, "and there's nosort of a road they could have taken him along, but a tip like this isalways worth trying. I remember in the Land League time how a man cameone Saturday night to my window and told me there were holes drilled inthe chapel door to shoot a boycotted man through while he was at mass.The holes were there right enough, and you may be quite sure that chapfound excellent reasons for having family prayers at home next day!"

  I had sessions to attend on the extreme outskirts of my district, andcould not wait, as Murray suggested, to see the thing out. I did notget home till the following day, and when I arrived I found a letterfrom Murray awaiting me.

  "Your pal was right. We found Foley's body in the river, knockingabout against the posts of the weir. The head was wrapped in his owngreen jersey, and had been smashed in by a stone. We suspect a fellownamed Bat Callaghan, who has bolted, but there were a lot of them init. Possibly it was Callaghan himself who gave you the tip; you nevercan tell how superstition is going to take them next. The inquest willbe held to-morrow."

  The coroner's jury took a cautious view of the cause of thecatastrophe, and brought in a verdict of "death by misadventure," and Ipresently found it to be my duty to call a magisterial inquiry tofurther investigate the matter. A few days before this was to takeplace, I was engaged in the delicate task of displaying to my landlord,Mr. Flurry Knox, the defects of the pantry sink, when Mrs. Cadoganadvanced upon us with the information that the Widow Callaghan fromCluin would be thankful to speak to me, and had brought me a present of"a fine young goose."

  "Is she come over here looking for Bat?" said Flurry, withdrawing hisarm and the longest kitchen-ladle from the pipe that he had beenprobing; "she knows you're handy at hiding your friends, Mary; maybeit's he that's stopping the drain!"

  Mrs. Cadogan turned her large red face upon her late employer.

  "God knows I wish yerself was stuck in it, Master Flurry, the way ye'dhear Pether cursin' the full o' the house when he's striving to washthe things in that unnatural little trough."

  "Are you sure it's Peter does all the cursing?"
retorted Flurry. "Ihear Father Scanlan has it in for you this long time for not going toconfession."

  "And how can I walk two miles to the chapel with God's burden on mefeet?" demanded Mrs. Cadogan in purple indignation; "the Blessed Virginand Docthor Hickey knows well the hardship I gets from them. If itwasn't for a pair of the Major's boots he gave me, I'd be hard set tothravel the house itself!"

  The contest might have been continued indefinitely, had I not struck upthe swords with a request that Mrs. Callaghan might be sent round tothe hall door. There we found a tall, grey-haired countrywoman waitingfor us at the foot of the steps, in the hooded blue cloak that ispeculiar to the south of Ireland; from the fact that she clutched apocket-handkerchief in her right hand I augured a stormy interview, butnothing could have been more self-restrained and even imposing than thereverence with which she greeted Flurry and me.

  "Good-morning to your honours," she began, with a dignified andextremely imminent snuffle. "I ask your pardon for troubling you,Major Yeates, but I haven't a one in the counthry to give me an adwice,and I have no confidence only in your honour's experiments."

  "Experience, she means," prompted Flurry. "Didn't you get adviceenough out of Mr. Murray yesterday?" he went on aloud. "I heard he wasat Cluin to see you."

  "And if he was itself, it's little adwantage any one'd get out of thatlittle whipper-shnapper of a shnap-dhragon!" responded Mrs. Callaghantartly; "he was with me for a half-hour giving me every big rock ofEnglish till I had a reel in me head. I declare to ye, Mr. Flurry,after he had gone out o' the house, ye wouldn't throw three farthingsfor me!"

  The pocket-handkerchief was here utilised, after which, with a heavygroan, Mrs. Callaghan again took up her parable.

  "I towld him first and last I'd lose me life if I had to go into thecoort, and if I did itself sure th' attorneys could rip no more out o'me than what he did himself."

  "Did you tell him where was Bat?" inquired Flurry casually.

  At this Mrs. Callaghan immediately dissolved into tears.

  "Is it Bat?" she howled. "If the twelve Apostles came down from heavenasking me where was Bat, I could give them no satisfaction. The divila know I know what's happened him. He came home with me sober andgood-natured from the rogatta, and the next morning he axed a fresh eggfor his breakfast, and God forgive me, I wouldn't break the score I wastaking to the hotel, and with that he slapped the cup o' tay into thefire and went out the door, and I never got a word of him since, goodnor bad. God knows 'tis I got throuble with that poor boy, and he theonly one I have to look to in the world!"

  I cut the matter short by asking her what she wanted me to do for her,and sifted out from amongst much extraneous detail the fact that sherelied upon my renowned wisdom and clemency to preserve her from beingcalled as a witness at the coming inquiry. The gift of the gooseserved its intended purpose of embarrassing my position, but in spiteof it I broke to the Widow Callaghan my inability to help her. She didnot, of course, believe me, but she was too well-bred to say so. InIreland one becomes accustomed to this attitude.

  As it turned out, however, Bat Callaghan's mother had nothing to fearfrom the inquiry. She was by turns deaf, imbecile, garrulously candid,and furiously abusive of Murray's principal witness, a frightened ladof seventeen, who had sworn to having seen Bat Callaghan and JimmyFoley "shaping at one another to fight," at an hour when, according toMrs. Callaghan, Bat was "lying sthretched on the beddeen with a sickshtomach" in consequence of the malignant character of the portersupplied by the last witness's father. It all ended, as such cases sooften do in Ireland, in complete moral certainty in the minds of allconcerned as to the guilt of the accused, and entire impotence on thepart of the law to prove it. A warrant was issued for the arrest ofBartholomew Callaghan; and the clans of Callaghan and Foley foughtrather more bloodily than usual, as occasion served; and at intervalsduring the next few months Murray used to ask me if my friend themurderer had dropped in lately, to which I was wont to reply withcondolences on the failure of the R.I.C. to find the Widow Callaghan'sonly son for her; and that was about all that came of it.

  Events with which the present story has no concern took me to Englandtowards the end of the following March. It so happened that my oldregiment, the ----th Fusiliers, was quartered at Whincastle, within acouple of hours by rail of Philippa's home, where I was staying, and,since my wedding was now within measurable distance, my formerbrothers-in-arms invited me over to dine and sleep, and to receive avaledictory silver claret jug that they were magnanimous enough tobestow upon a backslider. I enjoyed the dinner as much as any man canenjoy his dinner when he knows he has to make a speech at the end ofit; through much and varied conversation I strove, like a nervousmother who cannot trust her offspring out of her sight, to keep beforemy mind's eye the opening sentences that I had composed in the train; Ifelt that if I could only "get away" satisfactorily I might trust theAyala ('89) to do the rest, and of that fount of inspiration there wasno lack. As it turned out, I got away all right, though the sight ofthe double line of expectant faces and red mess jackets nearlyscattered those precious opening sentences, and I am afraid that so faras the various subsequent points went that I had intended to make, Istayed away; however, neither Demosthenes, nor a Nationalist member ata Cork election, could have been listened to with more gratifyingattention, and I sat down, hot and happy, to be confronted with my ownflushed visage, hideously reflected in the glittering paunch of theclaret jug.

  Once safely over the presentation, the evening mellowed into frivolity,and it was pretty late before I found myself settled down to whist, atsixpenny points, in the ancient familiar way, while most of the othersfell to playing pool in the billiard-room next door. I have playedwhist from my youth up; with the preternatural seriousness of asubaltern, with the self-assurance of a senior captain, with theprivileged irascibility of a major; and my eighteen months ofabstinence at Shreelane had only whetted my appetite for what Iconsider the best of games. After the long lonely evenings there, withrats for company, and, for relaxation, a "deck" of that speciallydemoniacal American variety of patience known as "Fooly Ann," it waswondrous agreeable to sit again among my fellows, and "lay the longs"on a severely scientific rubber of whist, as though Mrs. Cadogan andthe Skebawn Bench of Magistrates had never existed.

  We were in the first game of the second rubber, and I was holding avery nice playing hand; I had early in the game moved forth my trumpsto battle, and I was now in the ineffable position of scoring with thesmall cards of my long suit. The cards fell and fell in silence, andBallantyne, my partner, raked in the tricks like a machine. Theconcentrated quiet of the game was suddenly arrested by a sharp,unmistakable sound from the barrack yard outside, the snap of aLee-Metford rifle.

  "What was that?" exclaimed Moffat, the senior major.

  Before he had finished speaking there was a second shot.

  "By Jove, those were rifle-shots! Perhaps I'd better go and see what'sup," said Ballantyne, who was captain of the week, throwing down hiscards and making a bolt for the door.

  He had hardly got out of the room when the first long high note of the"assembly" sang out, sudden and clear. We all sprang to our feet, andas the bugle-call went shrilly on, the other men came pouring in fromthe billiard-room, and stampeded to their quarters to get their swords.At the same moment the mess sergeant appeared at the outer door with aface as white as his shirt-front.

  "The sentry on the magazine guard has been shot, sir!" he saidexcitedly to Moffat. "They say he's dead!"

  We were all out in the barrack square in an instant; it was clearmoonlight, and the square was already alive with hurrying figurescramming on clothes and caps as they ran to fall in. I was a freeagent these times, and I followed the mess sergeant across the squaretowards the distant corner where the magazine stands. As we doubledround the end of the men's quarters, we nearly ran into a small partyof men who were advancing slowly and heavily in our direction.

  "'Ere he is, sir!" said the mess sergeant, s
topping himself abruptly.

  They were carrying the sentry to the hospital. His busby had fallenoff; the moon shone mildly on his pale, convulsed face, and foam andstrange inhuman sounds came from his lips. His head was rolling fromside to side on the arm of one of the men who was carrying him; as itturned towards me I was struck by something disturbingly familiar inthe face, and I wondered if he had been in my old company.

  "What's his name, sergeant?" I said to the mess sergeant.

  "Private Harris, sir," replied the sergeant; "he's only lately come upfrom the depot, and this was his first time on sentry by himself."

  I went back to the mess, and in process of time the others straggledin, thirsting for whiskies-and-sodas, and full of such information asthere was to give. Private Harris was not wounded; both the shots hadbeen fired by him, as was testified by the state of his rifle and thefact that two of the cartridges were missing from the packet in hispouch.

  "I hear he was a queer, sulky sort of chap always," said Tomkinson, thesubaltern of the day, "but if he was having a try at suicide he made abally bad fist of it."

  "He made as good a fist of it as you did of putting on your sword,Tommy," remarked Ballantyne, indicating a dangling white strap ofwebbing, that hung down like a tail below Mr. Tomkinson's mess jacket."Nerves, obviously, in both cases!"

  The exquisite satisfaction afforded by this discovery to Mr.Tomkinson's brother officers found its natural outlet in a bear fightthat threatened to become more or less general, and in the course ofwhich I slid away unostentatiously to bed in Ballantyne's quarters, andtook the precaution of barricading my door.

  Next morning, when I got down to breakfast, I found Ballantyne and twoor three others in the mess room, and my first inquiry was for PrivateHarris.

  "Oh, the poor chap's dead," said Ballantyne; "it's a very queerbusiness altogether. I think he must have been wrong in the topstorey. The doctor was with him when he came to out of the fit, orwhatever it was, and O'Reilly--that's the doctor y' know, Irish ofcourse, and, by the way, poor Harris was an Irishman too--says that hecould only jibber at first, but then he got better, and he got out ofhim that when he had been on sentry-go for about half-an-hour, hehappened to look up at the angle of the barrack wall near where itjoins the magazine tower, and saw a face looking at him over it. Hechallenged and got no answer, but the face just stuck there staring athim; he challenged again, and then, as O'Reilly said, he 'just oop withhis royfle and blazed at it.'" Ballantyne was not above the commonEnglish delusion that he could imitate an Irish brogue.

  "Well, what happened then?"

  "Well, according to the poor devil's own story, the face just kept onlooking at him and he had another shot at it, and 'My God Almighty,' hesaid to O'Reilly, 'it was there always!' While he was saying that toO'Reilly he began to chuck another fit, and apparently went on chuckingthem till he died a couple of hours ago."

  "One result of it is," said another man, "that they couldn't get a manto go on sentry there alone last night. I expect we shall have todouble the sentries there every night as long as we're here."

  "Silly asses!" remarked Tomkinson, but he said it without conviction.

  After breakfast we went out to look at the wall by the magazine. Itwas about eleven feet high, with a coped top, and they told me therewas a deep and wide dry ditch on the outside. A ladder was brought,and we examined the angle of the wall at which Harris said the face hadappeared. He had made a beautiful shot, one of his bullets havingflicked a piece off the ridge of the coping exactly at the corner.

  "It's not the kind of shot a man would make if he had been drinking,"said Moffat, regretfully abandoning his first simple hypothesis; "hemust have been mad."

  "I wish I could find out who his people are," said Brownlow, theadjutant, who had joined us; "they found in his box a letter to himfrom his mother, but we can't make out the name of the place. By Jove,Yeates, you're an Irishman, perhaps you can help us."

  He handed me a letter in a dirty envelope. There was no address given,the contents were very short, and I may be forgiven if I transcribethem:--

  "My dear Son, I hope you are well as this leaves me at present, thanksbe to God for it. I am very much unaisy about the cow. She swelled upthis morning, she ran in and was frauding and I did not do but to runup for torn sweeney in the minute. We are thinking it is too muchlairels or an eirub she took. I do not know what I will do with her.God help one that's alone with himself I had not a days luck since yewent away. I am thinkin' them that wants ye is tired lookin' for ye.And so I remain,

  "YOUR FOND MOTHER."

  "Well, you don't get much of a lead from the cow, do you? And what thedeuce is an eirub?" said Brownlow.

  "It's another way of spelling herb," I said, turning over the envelopeabstractedly. The postmark was almost obliterated, but it struck me itmight be construed into the word Skebawn.

  "Look here," I said suddenly, "let me see Harris. It's just possible Imay know something about him."

  The sentry's body had been laid in the dead-house near the hospital,and Brownlow fetched the key. It was a grim little whitewashedbuilding, without windows, save a small one of lancet shape, high up inone gable, through which a streak of April sunlight fell sharp andslender on the whitewashed wall. The long figure of the sentry laysheeted on a stone slab, and Brownlow, with his cap in his hand, gentlyuncovered the face.

  I leaned over and looked at it--at the heavy brows, the short nose, thesmall moustache lying black above the pale mouth, the deep-set eyessealed in appalling peacefulness. There rose before me the wild darkface of the young man who had hung on my wheel and yelled encouragementto the winning coxswain at the Lough Lonen Regatta.

  "I know him," I said, "his name is Callaghan."