"Oh, I know all that, my dear," interrupted Judith; "'the infernal mortgagees, and the d.a.m.ned charges, and that blackguard rebel, young Mangan, who cut the ground from under his feet,' and so on. I've heard it all from Papa, exactly five thousand times. But the point is that there was a meeting at Pribawn, with the priest in the chair, and there were furious speeches, and they talked of boycotting Papa, and some steps _ought_ to be taken. It's an intolerable nuisance being boycotted, if it's nothing else, and most expensive. I was with the O'Donnells that time when they were boycotted--up at five every morning to milk the cows and light the kitchen fire, and having to get every earthly thing by post from London!"

"I'll take as many steps as you like," said Christian, "if you'll only tell me where to take them."

Judith took her cigarette out of her mouth, and blew a ring of smoke, regarding her younger sister the while with a shrewd and wary blue eye.

"I've often said to you, my dear child," she began, in a voice that seemed intended to usher in a change of subject, "that if you _won't_ take an interest in men, _they_ won't take an interest; in you."

"Then why repeat the statement?" said Christian, wondering what Judith was working up to, and girding herself for battle; "true and beautiful though it is!"

"Because, my dear--and I may say I speak as one having authority and not as the scribes--in _my_ opinion, and judging by what I perceived with about a quarter of one eye at breakfast, you have only to hold up your little finger, in a friendly and encouraging manner, and our young friend and relative, Mr. Coppinger, will--I admit I don't quite know what people do with little fingers in these cases, something affectionate, no doubt!"

"I thought your authority would have extended to little fingers!"

broke in Christian, sparring for wind, and wishing she were not facing the window; "in any case, I fail to see what mine, in this instance, has to say to our being boycotted?"

"My dear girl," said Judith, leaning forward, and speaking with solemnity, "the priests won't want to fall foul of anyone with as much money as Larry!"

Christian was silent; she had not antic.i.p.ated quite so direct an intervention in her personal affairs as was now being discovered, and she felt that her pearl was melting in the fierce solvent of Judith's interest and curiosity.

"I know it's a bore about his religion, and his politics are _more_ than shaky, but you know, in a way, it's rather lucky, in view of the mess Papa's got everything into, to have someone on that side," went on Judith, who was far too practical to be influenced by that malign Spirit of the Nation who had so persistently endeavoured to establish herself as one of the family at Mount Music. "All I'm afraid of is that Papa may begin to beat the Protestant drum and wave the Union Jack! Such nonsense! The main thing is that Larry himself is quite all right!"

"I'm sure he would be gratified by your approval!" Judith's patronage was somewhat galling; Judith, who was quite pleased with Bill Kirby!--Good, excellent Bill, but still! Christian's colour betrayed her, and she knew it, and knowing also the remorseless cross-examination that the betrayal would immediately provoke, she decided to antic.i.p.ate it.

"As a matter of fact," she went on, "he--we--" she hated the crudity of the statement.

"You're engaged!" swooped Judith, with the speed of a hawk. "Excellent girl!"

Christian found the commendation offensive.

"I a.s.sure you it's quite without either political or religious bias!"

she said defiantly. She had failed to keep her secret, but she went down with her flags flying.

CHAPTER XXIX

Barty Mangan fulfilled his father's behests, and on Sat.u.r.day, he drove his mother to Coppinger's Court.

He drove a motor well; not brilliantly, like Larry, because Barty did nothing brilliantly, but capably and gently, with consideration for donkey-carts, with respect for horses, with kindness towards pedestrians, even without animosity towards cur-dogs. The surprising aspect of the fact was that he should be able, in any degree, to handle a car, the control of energy being an effort foreign to his nature. What in his mother was laziness, was with him trans.m.u.ted to languor; his father's vigour and decision became in Barty a sort of tepid obstinacy, and the Doctor's fierce and fighting allegiance to his Church reappeared in his son as a peevish conscientiousness, that had provoked a friend of the family to say: "Barty's a dam' bad solicitor! He'll take up no case but what pleases him, and he'll touch nothing if he thinks he'll make money out of it!"

"Ah! He was always a fool for himself!" replied, heartily, Barty's great-aunt, Mrs. Cantwell, to whom the comment had been offered.

One aspect of the practical affairs of life, and one only, had power to rouse Barty from the dreamy pa.s.sivity which had excited Great-Aunt Cantwell's contempt. Where Ireland and Irish politics came into question, some deep spring of sentiment and enthusiasm in him was touched, and all the force that he was capable of became manifest. All the strength and tenacity that were in him were concentrated in the cause of Nationalism; Ireland was his religion, and he felt himself to be one of her priesthood.

There are some gentle natures, with deep affections, but without much brain-power in whom an idea, a mental att.i.tude, and especially a personal liking or disliking, is very easily implanted; yet, easily as it is introduced, once it has taken hold it can never be dislodged.

The intellect has not energy enough for reconstruction; it accepts too readily, and, once saturated, the stain is indelible, because there is no power of growth.

Behold, then, Barty, gentle and obstinate, timid and an enthusiast, loving, yet implacable, seated in Larry's studio, regarding with submissive adoration the being compact of the ant.i.thesis of his qualities, and ready, for that being's sake, to make any sacrifice save that of renouncing him.

The being in question, wholly and feverishly absorbed in his own affairs of the heart, while bound by his oath to say nothing about them, brought himself with difficulty to attend to the retrospect of financial operations, hitherto postponed, but now insisted upon, by his man of business.

"Oh, first-rate, old chap--quite all right--good business!--" With these, and similar interjections, did the employer ratify and approve of his agent's transactions. Barty's legal training abetted his conscientiousness, and in his mild and monotonous brogue he laid before Larry a statement of his money matters that was as unsparing in detail as it was accurate.

"So now you see," he concluded, "I didn't act without careful consideration, and I consulted me fawther, besides others of experience in such matters. I believe there are people who are saying we sold too cheap to the tenants. But, on the other hand, the money's good and safe now; you have a certain and secure income, and you're in a very favourable position in the eyes of the people."

Larry pulled himself from reverie to e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.e further general approval; then he rose from the table, upon which Barty's books had been displayed, and drawing forward an easel on which was a framed canvas covered by some vivid oriental drapery, he arranged it carefully with regard to the light. Then he caught away the drapery, stepping back, quickly, from the easel.

"What do you think of that, Barty?"

Barty, who was short-sighted, stood up and adjusted his eye-gla.s.ses, while he endeavoured to readjust his ideas, and to abandon the realms of business for those of art.

"But you know, Larry," he apologised, "I know nothing about paintings.

You wouldn't know what tomfoolery I mightn't--" The apology broke off abruptly.

"Oh, G.o.d!" he muttered, feeling, in the shock of meeting her eyes, as if a sudden wind had swept his mind bare of business, of Larry, of all things save Christian, "it's herself!"

His sallow face had turned a dull red. He moved back a step or two, and then went forward again. The easel was low, and Barty was very tall; he went on his knees, and gazed, speechless.

Thus might a devout Russian have greeted a lost icon, and worshipped, silently, a re-found saint. Larry, equally absorbed, as any painter will understand, in the contemplation of his work, took no heed of its effect upon Barty.

"By Jove!" he murmured, drawing a big breath, "I wonder if I did it! I don't feel as if I had--something outside me--" He stopped; he felt as if Christian herself were there; he felt as if her arms were round him, his head upon her bosom. He was giddy with emotion. Scarcely knowing what he did he walked across the room, and stared out of the window, looking across his own woods to the woods of Mount Music.

That morning he had said good-bye to her for three long days. She had met him at the old stepping stones across the Ownashee, and she had made him renew his promise of silence until her return; he was sorry he couldn't tell old Barty; but no matter, nothing mattered, except the marvel that she was his. He whispered adoration to her, breathing her name again and again, crowning it, as with a wreath, with those old, familiar adjectives that had so lately become intense with new meaning for him; he forgot Barty, forgot even her portrait, as he thought of herself.

Barty came over to him; the two young men, with their common secret, suspected by neither, a secret that for one was a living ecstasy, and for the other an impossible ideal, stood silent, full of their own thoughts. Barty spoke first.

"It's a wonder to me! I didn't think you could paint like that, Larry!

I didn't think anyone could!"

"Well, no more I can, really. This was a sort of a miracle and it painted itself."

The same impulse moved them both, and they returned to the easel on which was the picture, but with a quick movement Larry flung the drapery over the frame again and hid the picture.

"Didn't you say you had a message for me from your father?"

Barty accepted the change of subject with his accustomed resignation to Larry's moods.

"I have. He said he'd be at home to-morrow afternoon--that's Sunday--and he wanted to see you on very special business."

"Do you know what about?" Larry asked, without interest, while he arranged the many-coloured silken drapery in effective folds over the picture.

"I believe old Prendergast's dying."

Barty hesitated; then, remembering that his father had not enjoined secrecy, he rushed into his subject. "Larry, I believe the chance we've been waiting for is come--or as good as come!"

"Do you mean that it's Prendergast the Member who's dying? Do you mean my getting into Parliament?"

Larry swung round on Barty, and fired the questions at him, quick as shots from a revolver.