O'Donnell

“ Hamar whispered.
"I am!" Curtis cried. "Anything is better than the life we are living at present."
"And I, too," Kelson said. "I agree with Ed."
"Very well then," the voice once more lisped. "Each of you take a fruit and eat it, and the compact is irrevocably struck. You cannot back out of it without incurring the consequences already named. Don't be afraid, step up here and help yourselves—one apiece—mind, no more." And again it seemed to Hamar, Curtis and Kelson as if the tree and everything around it was convulsed with silent laughter. ”

“ O'Donnell."
"I never seek to know anything of other people's business," replied O'Donnell, drily. "I have enough to do to attend to my own."
"Which is the supplying Roman Catholic gentry with salt fish for fast days, together with beads, missals, crucifixes, and other little trinkets for private use," answered Barecolt, who had been using his eyes and forming his own conclusions from numerous indications apparently trifling.
O'Donnell, without any change of expression, gazed at him gravely, and the captain continued--"But that is nothing to the purpose, my good friend. ”

“ O'Donnell laughed. "No business at all, friend Brown—no business at all. I happen to be a lover of the Stars and Stripes; consequently, no friend of Captain Farquharson's political intrigues here. Do you understand?"
"More or less. It's the Stars and Stripes for me too, every time!"
"You are a likely-looking man. Since you have left Farquharson I'll offer you place with me. You will find it active, full of excitement, and with pay not small."
"Thank you, Mr. Irishman, but I don't intend to work any more for strangers. It's like buying a pig in a sack. ”

“ The poet then recited a verse of four lines accepting O'Donnell's severities as a just revenge for the destruction, four hundred years before, of Oilech by O'Brien, and yet so artfully worded that, while O'Donnell might take it as approval, the earl of Thomond could not deny that it might be interpreted as a bald statement of fact. ”

“ After several determined but unsuccessful attempts to recover the place, O'Donnell retired across the Finn into winter quarters. His spirits were somewhat revived by the arrival shortly afterwards from Spain of Matthew de Oviedo with a considerable supply of money and arms, which he shared equally with Tyrone. But his policy of aggression was beginning to bear its natural fruit, and old Ulick Burke, earl of Clanricarde, having died in May 1601, his successor, Richard, prepared to attack O'Donnell in his own country. Ever prone to strike the first blow, O'Donnell moved towards Ballymote. ”

“ O'Donnell, seeing that the inspector had turned from the nurse, approached him, and said: "There can no longer be the faintest hope. There can no longer be an excuse for hope. Do you not think so?" "In all cases of the kind," said the inspector, softly and sadly, "it is impossible to be sure until we have positive evidence. The nurse has told me her story, and if it is true, I am afraid we must be prepared for the worst." "Then my boy is dead!" cried O'Donnell, in anguish. "For I am sure old Bridget would not tell a lie to save her life. My boy! My little boy! ”

“ Men don't go ripping one another open for anything else nowadays." "I swear to you, O'Malley, as far as I am concerned, there was no row, and that I did not strike him." "Who else was with you?--although I'm not in the least curious. That was a tremendous blow. I can't make it out. If he had stabbed you first, I don't think you could have struck that blow. I can't make it out. I can't do any more for you now. You mustn't lie on it, you know." "O'Malley," said O'Donnell, "I want you to do me a great favour." ”

“ Ugly cut." "Is it much?" said O'Donnell, very weak now. "Yes, it's a good hit." "Will it do for me?" "I don't think so, if you have luck. He has a much better chance of going than you. What did you hit him with, O'Donnell? It was a terrible blow. Something blunt--a stone, or something of that kind. It's a downright shame that two young fellows like you, of good education, and so on, should fall to hacking and battering one another in this brutal way, and at midnight, too. It's more like assassination than fighting. A woman in the matter, eh?" "For heaven's sake, hush, O'Malley." ”

“ With Hamar it was otherwise—the joy of triumph was strong within him, and the picture of John Martin, leaning forward in his chair, with his mouth half open and a dazed, glassy expression in his eyes, only thrilled him with pleasure; he laughed at the old man, and still more at Gladys.
"That's the way to treat a girl of that sort," he whispered to Kelson; "scoff at her—scoff at her well. Let her see you don't care a snap for her—and in the end she'll run after you and haunt you to death."
"I'm not so sure," Kelson said. ”

“ Lavirotte stumbled and fell backwards. O'Donnell struggled for a moment to regain his upright position, but his strength was spent; he was unconscious, and subsided in the middle of the road. Now was Lavirotte's opportunity. O'Donnell could not have resisted a child. The most cowardly cut-throat that ever lifted steel need have no fear of him. The darkness increased as the night went on. By this time it had grown so great that it was impossible to see an arm's length. The sky, for all the light it gave, might as well have been the solid earth. ”

“ He wondered what the thing might be, and was not long in learning.
"You came hither from Gorumna Castle," went on O'Donnell, fixing him with his black flaming eyes. "Tell me what force of men is in that place, Brian of the hard eyes, and for this service you shall be set free."
"Now I know that you are a fool, O'Donnell Dubh," and Brian's voice rang out merrily. "I have heard many tales of your wizardry and your servants and your watchers, but when an unknown man comes to you, his name is hidden from you; and all your black art cannot so much as tell you the number of your enemies! ”

“ When that meeting took place on the beach, whereat he introduced Ellen to O'Donnell, he had noticed the latter's start of amazed admiration. "What," thought Lavirotte, "is he hit too; he, the invincible! he, the adamantine man, who has hitherto withstood all the charms of her lovely sex? It would be curious to watch this. Will he too make love, and fail--succeed? Ah." When this thought first occurred to Lavirotte he paused in a dim, dazed way. Of all men living he wished best to O'Donnell, now that he might regard himself as dead. ”

“ What have you to say of your craft in deluding O'Donnell into risking his daughter aboard this treasure-ship? Do you call it honorable to persuade a foolish unbalanced fellow to take an innocent young girl out of a convent, carry her half across the world, and then, to cloak a miserable conspiracy, plunge her into the society of such scoundrels as Flint and yourself? ”

“ Here was a high rock on the right, high enough to conceal a man; and here, behind this rock, was hidden a man with gleaming teeth, and in his right hand a gleaming blade. As O'Donnell drew near the rock the man sprang forth, seized the other by the throat with the left hand, and, whirling up his right, whispered: "You shall never marry her." "Lavirotte! Lavirotte! My God, Lavirotte, are you mad?" "Yes, and you are dead." The hand holding the knife descended swiftly.
CHAPTER IV.
Instinctively O'Donnell shot his left hand upward and seized the descending wrist. ”

“ I'm close on the stage when one begins to digest one's own stomach. Curse it! I won't starve any longer! Matt! she's in there all by herself!"
"So I've been thinking," Kelson murmured, glancing uneasily up and down the street. "Still she's a girl, Ed!"
"That's just it!" Curtis whispered; "it is because she is a girl. If she were a man, in our present condition we shouldn't stand a chance. Come! It's this or dying in the gutters. It's our one and only chance. Let's go in—have a feed—take what we can and make a bolt for it. If she tries to stop us we can settle her right enough." ”

“ The table faced its executioner. Yet it was rather I who was at bay, ax in hand, awaiting the charge of a fierce beast of prey: and for once the levity of my insouciant friends was absent from their contemplation of a grotesque spectacle.
The fire in the grate crackled in merry anticipation.
"Get it done and over with, Val," whispered Mark.
The ax flickered upward . . . and then I paused at the crest of the stroke, halted by an insistent pounding at my front door. ”

“ On his return to Tyrconnel, O'Donnell, in order to throw dust in the deputy's eyes, offered to submit; but the following year, 1595, opened with a marauding expedition into Connaught, in which, it is said by his biographer, O'Donnell ‘spared no one over fifteen years of age who could not speak Irish.’ In April he invaded the Annaly, in conjunction with Maguire and Tyrone's brother, Cormac MacBaron O'Neill, and captured the castle of Longford, the constable, Christopher Brown, who was held to ransom at 120l., his wife, and two thousand head of cattle. ”

“ Instead, however, of obeying Mountjoy's summons, Niall caused himself to be inaugurated O'Donnell at Kilmacrenan with the customary ceremonies. By Mountjoy's orders Docwra arrested him, but allowed him to go to Dublin to plead his cause with the viceroy. Shortly afterwards he was allowed to proceed to London ‘to solicit pardon for his offences, and to obtain the reward for his service and aid to the crown of England.’ Rory O'Donnell, to whom Hugh Roe O'Donnell had confided the interests of his clan on quitting Ireland, went at the same time. ”

“ Of this, however, Lughaidh O'Clery had no suspicion, he only tells of the sudden and [Pg 565] unexpected sickness which overtook O'Donnell and killed him after sixteen days, to the utter ruin of the cause of Ireland. Here is his account, which I give as a specimen of his style, of O'Donnell's preparations before the Battle of the Curlews:
"The occupation of O'Donnell's forces during the time that he was in this monastery was exercising themselves and preparing for the fight and for the encounter which they were called to engage in. ”

“ At the same time he began to contribute verse to the ‘Nation,’ the organ of the Young Ireland party, and continued to write prose and poetry for it till his death, twenty years later. After spending two years as reporter on the ‘Munster News,’ O'Donnell was appointed sub-editor on the ‘Tipperary Examiner,’ published in Clonmel; and in 1860 he proceeded to London, where he obtained an appointment on the ‘Universal News,’ a weekly organ of Roman catholic and Irish nationalist opinion. ”

“ I had seen nothing like it since I was in Algiers, but, bah! a soldier can get used to anything. ‘It is a mere nothing,’ I said to myself. ‘I can dive, I can swim; it will take more than cold water to kill me; and if it were twenty times as bad I would face it.’ Ten years is a long time to be away from one’s home, Mr. O’Donnell. I trudged on, and was soon ankle-deep in black mud. At eight o’clock I was confronted by a long line of huge, black trees, that bent their dripping tops as if they had orders to salute me. ”

“ Yet I know all about that woman, just as much as if I had been acquainted with her all my life!"
"It's the first power," Hamar said excitedly, "the power of divination. It takes that form with you, and the form of card tricks with Ed—with me nothing so far."
"But what shall I do?" Kelson cried. "How can I benefit by it?"
"How can't you?" Curtis growled. "Why, blackmail her! If it is true, she will pay you anything to keep your mouth shut. If once you can tell a woman's secret, your future's made. All San Francisco will be at your mercy—God knows who'll escape! ”

“ Whatever was the nature of his communication, it was just over when Captain Barecolt laid his hand upon the Irishman's shoulder; and Mr. O'Donnell only added the words, "Remember, to none but himself, or her."
He then turned to Captain Barecolt, exclaiming, "Quick, quick! upon your horse's back, and away!"
"Oh, there's no such haste, Master O'Donnell!" replied Barecolt, who loved not to receive the word of command from a merchant. "Nothing but cowardice is ever in a hurry; so what is to pay for the horses, my friend?" ”

“ A month had now gone by since that meeting on the shingle, and it was arranged that in another month the wedding was to take place. The course of true love was running as smooth as the planets in their orbits. The happiest man and woman in Ireland were Eugene O'Donnell and Ellen Creagh. As the days went by that cove grew dearer to his heart; and even now, when the moon was making moonlight for lovers somewhere else, he, Eugene O'Donnell, could not keep away from it, nor could he sleep. One night he left her at her mother's gate and walked slowly down the road to the cove. ”

“ They were free and open-hearted themselves, and they liked free and open-hearted souls like O'Donnell. They did not like swarthy skins; and now and then in the newspapers they read that men with swarthy skins drew knives and struck their dearest friends; that foreigners were treacherous, and not to be trusted with the lives, into the homes, or with the honour of law-abiding folk. They knew, it being a seaport, that foreigners spoke a gibberish which they affected to understand, and which was in reality no better than the language of Satan. ”

“ Scarcely had he said these words when all vanished, and the story-teller found himself at the Foxes' Ford, near the castle of Red Hugh O'Donnell. He could see all but none could see him.
O'Donnell was in his hall, and heaviness of flesh and weariness of spirit were upon him.
"Go out," said he to his doorkeeper, "and see who or what may be coming." ”