01 The Building of Jalna (4 page)

The Irish train was dirty, smoky, and its roadbed rough, but it seemed heaven after the Irish Sea. One after the other the sufferers raised their heads and looked about them with renewed interest in life. Gussie took a biscuit in her tiny hand and made a feeble attempt at gnawing it. But more crumbs were strewn down the front of the ayah’s robe than found their way into Gussie’s stomach.

At the railway station they were met by a jaunting car drawn by a fine pair of greys and driven by Patsy O’Flynn who had been nearly all his life in the service of the Courts. He was a great hand with the reins. A light wind was blowing across the hills which were turning into a tender green, and the leaf buds on the trees were opening almost as you watched them. There was a mistiness on the scene as though a fine veil hung between it and the sun. The cackle of geese, the bray of a donkey, the shouts of young children at play, brought tears to Adeline’s eyes. “Oh, ’tis good to be home!” she exclaimed.

“Aye, and it’s good to see your honour, Miss,” said Patsy. “And it’s a queer shame to you that you should be thinkin’ of lavin’ us agin so soon.”

“Oh, I shall make a good visit. There is so much to show my husband. And all the family to see. I expected by father to meet me at the station. Is he not well?”

“He’s well enough and him off to lodge a complaint against Sir John Lafferty for the overflow of wather from his land makin’ a bog out of ours and his cattle runnin’ wild as wolves.”

“And is my mother well?”

“She is, and at her wit’s end to get the house ready for you and your black servant and parrots and all, the poor lady!”

“Are any of my brothers at home?”

“There’s the two young lads your mother sent to the English school to get the new accent on them but they attacked one of the masthers and gave him a beatin’. So they were expelled and ’tis at home they are till himself decides what to do with them. And, of course, there’s Masther Tim. He’s a grand lad entirely.”

Adeline and Patsy chattered on, to Philip’s wonder and amusement. He saw her in a new light against the advancing background of her early life. The road was so muddy after rain and flood that the wheels were sunk almost to their axles but Patsy did not appear to mind. He cracked his whip about the well-groomed flanks of the horses and encouraged them with a stream of picturesque abuse. Several times women appeared in the doorways of low thatched cabins at the roadside and, when they saw Adeline,
held up their babies for her inspection, while fowls scratched and pecked in and out of the cabins. There was an air of careless well-being about the place and the children were chubby, though far from clean. Adeline seemed delighted to see both mothers and babies. She called out to them and promised to visit them later. Apparently Patsy did not approve of this, for he whipped up his horses and hurried them past.

The fields about were bluish-green like the sea and the grass moved slowly in the breeze. Cattle stood knee-deep in the grass. Swallows darted overhead. Adeline was looking beyond the fields. The roof of her home showed above the trees of a park where deer grazed. She cried: —

“There is the house, Philip! Lord, to think it is nearly five years since I’ve seen it! It’s more splendid than anything I’ve set my eyes on since! Look at it! Isn’t it grand, Philip?”

“It’s fallin’ to pieces,” said Patsy, over his shoulder, “and divil a one to spend a five-pound note on it.”

“It was indeed a fine old house, though not so fine as Philip had expected, judging by Adeline’s description of it. Though he was no judge of architecture he could see that several styles had, at different periods, been added to the original. All were now blended into a sufficiently mellow whole. But it was not the noble pile she had described and at a glance he could see signs of dilapidations. Not even its rich cloak of ivy concealed the crumbling stonework.

Adeline craned her neck in delight to see every bit of it.

“Oh, Philip,” she cried, “isn’t it a lovely house?”

“It is indeed.”

“Your sister’s little house is nothing, compared to it.”

“Augusta’s house was built in the time of Queen Anne.”

“Who cares for Queen Anne!” laughed Adeline. “Queen Anne is dead and so is that stuffy cathedral town. Oh, give me the country! Give me Ireland! Give me my old home!” Tears rained down her cheeks.

“I’ll give you a smack,” said Philip, “if you don’t control yourself. No wonder you’re thin.”

“Oh, why did I marry a phlegmatic Englishman!” she exclaimed. “I expected you to go into raptures over the place.”

“Then you expected me to behave like a fool which I am not.”

They had now stopped before the door and a half-dozen tame deer had sauntered up to see them alight from the carriage. Adeline declared that she could recognize each one and that they remembered her.

The footman who opened the door was in handsome livery though rather too tight for him. He greeted Adeline enthusiastically.

“Ah, God bless you, Miss Adeline! It’s grand to see ye back. My, ’tis yourself has got thin in the body! What have they been doing to you out yonder? And is this lovely gentleman your husband? Welcome, sir, y’r honour. Come right in. Patsy, look after the luggage o’ thim and be quick about it.” He turned then and shouted at three dogs which had begun to bark loudly.

Philip felt suddenly self-conscious. He did not quite know how to meet his wife’s family. All she had told him of them made them seem less, rather than more, real. He was prepared not to like them, to find them critical of him, yet the tall gentleman who now came quickly down the stairway held out his hand with a genial smile.

“How d’ye do, Captain Whiteoak,” he said, taking Philip’s finger in a thin muscular grasp. “Welcome to Ireland. I’m very glad to see you, sir. I apologize for not going to the station myself but I had a wearisome business at the Courthouse that must be attended to.… And now, my girl, let’s have a look at you!”

He took Adeline in his arms and kissed her. Philip then had a good look at him.

Adeline had spoken of her father, Renny Court, as a fine figure of a man, but to Philip’s mind his back was too thin and certainly not flat enough at the shoulders, and his legs were not quite straight. It was amusing to see how Adeline’s lovely features had been modeled on this man’s bony aquiline face. And his hair must once have been auburn too, for there was a rusty tinge across the grey of his head. Certainly his eyes were hers.

Philip became conscious that others had come into the hall, a woman somewhat beyond middle age, and three youths.

“Oh, Mother, here I am!” Adeline turned from her father and flung her arms about her mother.

Lady Honoria Court still retained beauty of a Spanish type which had been handed down in her family since the days of the Armada when a Spanish don had remained to marry an ancestress. Honoria was a daughter of the old Marquis of Killiekeggan, who, with the famous Marquis of Waterford, had raised the sport of steeplechasing from a not very respectable one to its present eminence.

One of the dogs, an Irish staghound, raised itself on its hind legs against the ayah, in order to look into Gussie’s face. Both nurse and child shrieked in terror. Renny Court ran across the hall, caught the hound by its heavily studded collar and, dragging it away, cuffed it.

“Did you ever see such a dog!” cried Lady Honoria. “He does so love children! What a sweet baby! We have a man in the town who takes the loveliest daguerreotypes. You must have one made of her while you are here, Adeline.”

Lady Honoria laughed a good deal. Unfortunately she had lost a front tooth and each time she laughed she hastily put a forefinger across her lips to hide the gap. She had beautiful hands which Adeline had inherited, and her laughter rang out with contagious mirth. Philip, before he had been two days in the house, decided that she feared her husband’s temper but that she circumvented and thwarted him many a time. She had an air of triumph when she achieved this and he a wary look, as though waiting his turn to retaliate. Often they did not speak to each other for days at a time but each had a keen sense of humour, each found the other an amusing person and their sulks were often broken in upon by sudden laughter from which they recovered themselves with chagrin. Lady Honoria had had eleven children of whom four had died in early infancy, but she was still quick and graceful in her movements and looked capable of adding to her family.

Adeline was embracing each of her three young brothers in turn. She led them to Philip, her face flushed, her eyes brilliant in her excitement at being home again. Her bonnet had fallen back and her auburn hair rose in curls above her forehead.

“Here they are,” she cried, “the three boys! Conway, Sholto, and Timothy — come and shake hands with your new brother!”

The three offered their hands to Philip, the first two sheepishly, the third with an air almost too bright. Philip decided that there was something queer about him. There was a remarkable resemblance among the three. Their hair was a pale red, their eyes were greenish, their faces long and pointed, their noses remarkably well-shaped with slender, supercilious nostrils. The eldest, Conway, tormented Philip by his resemblance to someone he had met, till he discovered that he was the image of the Knave of Diamonds, in his favourite pack of playing cards.

“Look at them!” exclaimed Renny Court, with a scornful flourish of his hand toward the two elder boys. “’Tis a shameful pair they are, I can tell you. They’ve disgraced me by being sent home from their English school for attacking one of the masters. I knocked their heads together for it but here they are on my hands and God knows what I shall do with them! Put them to work in the stables — or in the fields — ’tis all they’re fit for! I must tell you that I have two other sons, and fine fellows, too. But my wife would have done well to halt before she had these!”

Conway and Sholto grinned with a hangdog air but young Timothy threw his arms about Adeline and hugged her again.

“Oh, it’s grand to have you home again,” he said. “I’ve been saving up things to tell you but now they’ve gone right out of my head and I can only be glad.”

“You have nothing to tell but mischief,” said his father, “and devilment and slyness from morning to night. You have one child, Captain Whiteoak. Stop there and have no more! For it’s children that are bringing my red hairs in sorrow to the grave.”

Lady Honoria interrupted him with solicitude for the travellers. She herself led them to the rooms which had been prepared for
them. They bathed and changed their travel-worn garments and descended to the drawing-room.

A married son who lived at some distance arrived in time for dinner. He was a dark, handsome young man and rode a horse he had purchased that very day and intended entering for the Dublin Races. They all crowded out to see the new horse and were delighted by his appearance. This son was evidently Renny Court’s favourite of the moment. He could not make enough of him and praised his skill as a rider and his perspicacity as a buyer.

There was a certain grandeur in the dining room and dinner was served by two footmen in livery. The food and the wine were good and, as the meal progressed, Philip felt more at ease with his new relatives. They talked and laughed a great deal. Even the two youths forgot their position of disgrace and raised their voices excitedly. But when their father would cast a piercing look on them they would instantly subside and for a few moments be silent. An old gentleman named Mr. O’Regan appeared at table, spoke little but drank a good deal. Adeline told Philip afterward that he was an old friend of the family who had once lent a large sum of money to them and, as it was impossible to collect the debt, had come to live with them. Mr. O’Regan wore a glum, yet rather calculating expression, as though he watched with morbid interest the decrease year by year of Renny Court’s debt to him. Renny Court, on his part, treated his guest with a kind of grim jocularity, pressed him to eat and drink more and inquired solicitously after his health. Mr. O’Regan seemed to resent this and would give no more definite answer than — “Oh, I’m well enough. I think I’ll last —” Though till what, he did not explain.

Renny Court was no absentee landlord, living in England on the rents from a neglected tenantry. He employed no callous bailiff, but himself attended to the business of his estate and knew every man, woman, and child on it.

The Whiteoaks’ visit there passed amiably with the exception of a few fiery encounters between Adeline and her father. In truth they could not be together for long without their wills opposing.
She was the only one of his children who did not fear him. Yet she loved him less than did the others. It was to her mother she clung and from whom she dreaded to part. Lady Honoria could not talk of her departure for Canada without weeping. As for Renny Court, he poured out his full contempt for the project.

“What a life for a gentleman!” he would exclaim. “What will you find out there? Nothing but privation and discomfort! What a place for a fine girl like Adeline!”

“I’m willing to go,” she interrupted. “I think it will be glorious.”

“What do you know about it?”

“More than you do, I’ll be bound,” she retorted. “Philip has had letters from his uncle describing the life in Quebec and he knows a Colonel Vaughan who lives in Ontario and loves it!”

“Lives in Ontario and loves it!” repeated her father, fixing her with his intense gaze. “And has Colonel Vaughan of Ontario told Philip what the roads are like there? Has he told him of the snakes and mosquitoes and the wild animals thirsting for your blood? Why, I know a man who stopped in one of the best hotels there and there was a mud puddle in it, and a frog croaking all the night through by a corner of the bed. And this man’s wife was so frightened that the next child she had had a face like a frog on it! Now what do you think of that, Adeline?” He grinned triumphantly at her.

“I think if it’s Mr. McCready you’re quoting,” she retorted, “his wife has no need to go all the way to Ontario to have a frog-faced child. Sure, Mr. McCready himself —”

“Was as fine a figure of a man as there was in all County Meath!”