Rossmoyne Part 16

"I like a white gown on a woman better than any," he says. "And so they really _can_ make gowns in Ireland? I've been awfully disappointed, do you know?--reg'lar sold. I came over here in the full hope of seeing everybody going about in goatskins and with beads round their necks--and--er--that."

"And why are you disappointed?" asks Monica, mildly, with a provoking want of appreciation of this brilliant sally. "Are you fond of goatskins and beads? Do _you_ wear them when 'your foot is on your native heath'?"

"Eh?--Oh, you don't understand," says this dense young man, fatally bent on explanation. "I meant to imply that the general belief with us over there"--pointing to the horizon, which would have led him to America rather than to England--"is that everybody here is half savage--d'ye see--eh?"

"Oh, yes, it's quite plain," says Miss Beresford, her eyes immovably fixed on the horizon. "'Over _there_' must be a most enlightened spot."

"So of course I thought the goatskins, etc., would be the order of the day," goes on Mr. Ryde, with another chuckle.

"You do think sometimes, then?" says Monica, innocently.

"I have been thinking of _you_ ever since I first saw you this afternoon," returns he, promptly, if unwisely.

There is an almost imperceptible pause, and then--

"Don't trouble yourself to do that again," says Monica _very_ sweetly, but with a telltale flash in her blue eyes; "I am sure it must fatigue you dreadfully. Remember what a warm day it is. Another thing: don't for the future, please, say rude things about Ireland, because I don't like that _either_."

The "_either_" is the cruellest cut of all: it distinctly forbids him even to think of her.

"I am afraid I have been unlucky enough to offend you," says young Mars, stiffly, awaking at last to a sense of the situation, and glancing down uneasily at the demure little figure marching beside him with her pretty head erect. "I didn't mean it, I a.s.sure you. What I said was said in fun."

"Are you always like that when you are funny?" asks she, looking straight before her. "Then I think, if I were you, I wouldn't do it."

Then she is a little ashamed of her severity, and, changing her tone, makes herself so charming to him that he quite recovers his spirits before they come up with all the others on the lawn.

Yet perhaps her smiles have wrought him more harm than her frowns.

Madam O'Connor, going up to Miss Priscilla, engages her in some discussion, so that presently Monica finds Brian beside her again.

"You will let me see you again soon," he says, in a low tone, seeing Ryde is talking to Miss Fitzgerald.

"But how can I?"

"You can if you will. Meet me somewhere, as I may not call; bring your brother, your sister, _any one_, with you; only meet me."

"If I did that, how could I look at Aunt Priscilla afterwards?" says Monica, growing greatly distressed. "It would be shameful; I should feel like a traitor. I feel like it already."

"Then do nothing. Take a pa.s.sive part, if you will, and leave all to me," says Desmond, with a sudden determination in his eyes. "I would not have you vexed or made unhappy in any way. But that I shall see you again--and _soon_--be sure."

"But----"

"I will listen to no 'buts:' it is too late for them. Though all the world, though even you yourself, should forbid me your presence, I should still contrive to meet you."

Here somebody addresses him, and he is obliged to turn and smile, and put off his face the touch of earnest pa.s.sion that has just illumined it; while Monica stands silent, spellbound, trying to understand it all.

"Is it thus that all my countrymen make love?" she asks herself, bewildered. At the very second meeting (she always, even to herself, ignores that ignominious first) to declare in this masterful manner that he _must_ and _will_ see her again!

It is rapid, rather violent wooing; but I do not think the girl altogether dislikes it. She is a little frightened, perhaps, and uncertain, but there is a sense of power about him that fascinates her and tells her vaguely that faith and trust in him will never be misplaced. She feels strangely nervous, yet she lifts her eyes to his, and gazes at him long and bravely, and then the very faintest glimmer of a smile, that is surely full of friendliness and confidence, if nothing more, lights up her eyes and plays around her pensive mouth. A moment, and the smile has vanished, but the remembrance of it lives with him forever.

Yes, the wooing is rapid, and she is not won; but "she likes me," thinks Desmond, with a touch of rapture he has never known before. "Certainly, she _likes_ me; and--there are always time and hope."

"My dear Monica, it grows late," says Miss Priscilla at this moment.

"Say good-by to Madame O'Connor, and let us go."

"Oh, not a bit of it, now," says Madam O'Connor, hospitably in her rich, broad brogue, inherited in all its purity, no doubt, from her kingly ancestor. "You mustn't take her away yet: sure the day is young. Mr.

Ryde, why don't you get Miss Beresford to play a game with you? In my time, a young fellow like you wouldn't wait to be told to make himself agreeable to a pretty girl. There, go now, do! Have you brought your own racket with you?"

"I left it at home," says Mr. Ryde. "Fact is," affectedly, "I didn't think tennis was known over here. Didn't fancy you had a court in the land."

This speech fires the blood of the O'Toole's last descendant.

Madam O'Connor uprears a haughty crest, and fixes the luckless lieutenant with an eagle eye, beneath which he quails.

"There is no doubt we lack much," she says, taking his measure with lofty scorn; "but we have at least our _manners_."

With this she turns her back upon him, and commences a most affable discussion with Miss Penelope, leaving her victim speechless with fright.

"Have a brandy-and-soda, Ryde?" says Mr. Kelly, who is always everywhere, regarding the wretched marine through his eyegla.s.s with a gaze of ineffable sadness. "Nothing like it, after an engagement of this sort."

"I thought Ireland was the land for jokes," says the injured Ryde, indignantly,--"stock in trade sort of thing over here; and yet when I give 'em one of mine they turn upon me as if I was the worst in the world. I don't believe any one understands 'em over here."

"You see, your jokes are too fine for us," says Mr. Kelly, mournfully.

"We miss the point of them."

"You are all the most uncomfortable people I ever met," says the wrathful marine.

"We are, we are," acquiesces Kelly. "We are really a very stupid people.

Anything, delicate or refined is lost upon us, or is met in an unfriendly spirit. I give you my word, I have known a fellow's head smashed for less than half what you said to Madam O'Connor just now.

Prejudice runs high in this land. You have, perhaps," in a friendly tone, "heard of a s.h.i.+llelagh?"

"No, I haven't," sulkily.

"No? _really_? It is quite an inst.i.tution here. It's a sort of a big stick, a very unpleasant stick, and is used freely upon the smallest difference of opinion. You'll meet them round every corner when you get more used to us: you'd like to see them, wouldn't you?"

"No, I shouldn't," still more sulkily.

"Oh, but you ought, you know. If you are going to live for any time in the country, you should study its inst.i.tutions. The best way to see _this_ one is to make cutting remarks about Ireland in a loud voice when two or three of the peasants are near you. They don't like cutting remarks, they are so stupid, and jokes such as yours annoy them fearfully. Still, you mustn't mind that; you must smother your natural kindliness of disposition and annoy them, if you want to see the s.h.i.+llelagh."

"I said nothing to annoy Mrs. O'Connor, at any rate," says Mr. Ryde.

"She needn't have taken a simple word or two like that."

"You see, we are all so terribly thin-skinned," says Mr. Kelly, regretfully, "I quite blush for my country-people. Of course there are n.o.ble exceptions to every rule. I am the n.o.ble exception here. I don't feel in the least annoyed with you. Now do try some brandy, my dear fellow: it will do you all the good in the world."

"I don't know this moment whether _you_ are laughing at me or not," says the marine, eying him doubtfully.

"I _never_ laugh," says Mr. Kelly, reproachfully. "I thought _even you_ could see that. Well, will you have that B. and S.?"

But Mars is huffed, and declines to accept consolation in any shape. He strolls away with an injured air to where his brother officer, Captain Cobbett, is standing near the hall door, and pours his griefs into his ears. Captain Cobbett being a very spare little man, with a half starved appearance and a dismal expression, it is doubtful whether poor Ryde receives from him the amount of sympathy required.