North, South and over the Sea Part 25

"Faith! Nanny's right," cried Mrs. McNally, relaxing. "Go fetch the toast, Elleney, and give Mr. Pat Rooney his marchin' orders at the same time."

"What am I to say?" inquired Elleney, her eyes round with alarm above cheeks that were still crimson.

"Bid him get out of that," returned her aunt, laughing.

Elleney took up her tray, and went away with a lagging step. The kitchen door was wide open, and in the aperture stood Pat, flushed with his exertions, and holding triumphantly aloft an immense dish of beautifully browned toast.

"There now," he cried jubilantly, "I'll throuble them to put their teeth through the whole o' that in a hurry. Isn't that a fine lot? But I know they does be great aiters within there."

"I'm very thankful to ye, Pat," said Elleney, with a downcast face.

"Sure I'm not meanin' to show disrespect," resumed he, quick to note her expression, but mistaking its cause. "It's a powerful big family your a'nt has, first and last, and why wouldn't they ait? I'll tell ye what, Miss Elleney, I'll just stop here in the chimbley corner, an' if they does be wantin' any more toast I'll have it made for them afore you can turn round."

"Oh no, Pat," cried Elleney in alarm. "That wouldn't do at all. Me a'nt bid me tell ye--me a'nt said--"

"Well, what did she say, miss, dear?" inquired Pat, as she faltered.

"She wasn't best pleased," stammered the girl. "She thought I done wrong lettin' you help me; she bid me give ye marchin' orders"--catching at what seemed to her the least offensive manner of conveying her aunt's behest.

"Well, I can soon march," said Pat, in a slightly offended tone, and turning even a deeper red than before. "I'll be off out o' this in a minute."

"Sure ye're not angry with me, Pat?" said Elleney timidly, as she followed him to the door. "I'm very grateful for all ye done for me."

"To be sure you are," said Rooney, without turning his head, and in another moment the house door slammed behind him.

Elleney returned somewhat mournfully to the parlour, there to find the whole family in a state of violent excitement.

Mrs. McNally had just received a letter, which she was clutching fast with both fat hands; while the seven girls were simultaneously endeavouring to read its contents over her broad shoulders.

"If yez 'ull sit down like good children," she exclaimed, as Elleney entered, "I'll read it all out--every word. An' yez 'ull all know as soon as meself. But ye have me distracted entirely, tormentin' me the way ye're doin' now. Musha! did anybody ever see such a scrawl as the man writes?"

"Sure, I can see it plain enough from here," cried Juliana, and with a sudden deft movement she twitched the doc.u.ment out of her mother's hands. "I'll read it, m'mah, in half the time you do be thinkin' about it."

"Very well, me dear, very well," agreed Mrs. McNally resignedly. "Ye have the best right, afther all. It concerns you more nor me."

Juliana smoothed out the paper, and began to read in a high-pitched monotonous voice, and without any regard to punctuation, of which, indeed, in all probability, the letter was devoid.

"'Dear Mrs. McNally,--I write these few lines hoping you are quite well as I am at present thank G.o.d it's a long time since we come across each other but I haven't forgot the old times and I am sure yourself is the same I did be hearin' a while ago about the fine family of daughters you have G.o.d bless them and how well you prospered in business dear Mrs. McNally I have one son a fine young man that I do be anxious to settle in life--'

"Look at that now!" put in Mrs. McNally jocularly. "Didn't I say the letter was more for you than for me, girls?"

"Whisht! can't you whisht?" put in Henrietta eagerly. "Go on, Ju!"

"'Settle in life,' resumed Ju. 'The farm is doin' finely for me thanks be to G.o.d though I'm not able to stock it as well as I'd like these bad times.' He's lookin' out for a bit o' money, ye see, m'mah?"

"To be sure he is," responded her mother comfortably. "Trust Tim Brennan to be lookin' out for that. An' why wouldn't he, the poor ould fellow? Dear knows, it's hard set the most o' the farmers is to live at all. He's a cute ould schemer, Tim is, though."

"'There's not one o' the girls in these parts I'd let him take up with at all,' went on the reader, 'but it come to me mind that if you was willin' we might make up a match between himself an' one o' your fine young daughters--'

"Yous 'ull have all the luck, I suppose?" put in Maggie Nolan enviously.

"Not at all. What's that he says here about nieces, Ju?" returned Mrs.

McNally, leaning over her daughter's shoulder, and pointing with her plump forefinger.

"'Or maybe one of them three nieces I was hearin' ye have livin' with ye I knew your poor sister Bridget R.I.P. as well as I know yourself an' I know all she done for her family.'"

"The sharpness o' that!" interrupted Henrietta. "The ould fellow knows me A'nt Bridget had a nice little fortun', an' I'll engage he made sure the three of yous has a share in the business."

"Young nieces," soliloquised Matilda, looking pensively at Bridget and Mary.

"Young daughters, too, if ye please," returned Bridget with spirit, and her glance fell upon Juliana.

"Well, go on, Ju, finish it," said Mrs. McNally, laughing immoderately. "You can all be pulling caps for him afterwards."

"'Me son,' read Juliana, 'has business in Dublin this next week an' if you've no objections he could run out on an early train some mornin'

an' pay his respects to yourself an' the girls an' he can be tellin'

ye all about our place an' his prospects in life he's the only son I have an' its a good farm an' a comfortable house an' many a girl would think she was doin' well for herself so hopin' you'll think well of the idea I will say no more this time yours ancettery, TIMOTHY BRENNAN. P.S.--My son Brian is six foot high an' has a beautiful head of hair he is very--' What in the name o' fortun' is that word, m'mah?"

"Hearty, is it?" said Mrs. McNally, craning her short neck. "No--happy, maybe--no, that's not it. _Healthy_, that's it! 'He is very healthy.'"

"Laws!" said Henrietta, "that's a quare thing to be sayin'. Who cares whether he's healthy or not?"

"A-ah, me dear," returned her mother sagely, "when ye get to my age ye'll know it makes a great deal o' differ--especially to a farmer.

The poor d'da! Rest his soul!--well, well, we won't be talkin' o' them times, but he was a great sufferer; an' if it was a farmer he was the house wouldn't have held him. It's a terrible thing for a poor farmer to be tryin' to go about his place, an' him not gettin' his health.

I'm glad this young fellow is healthy."

"Six foot!" commented Matilda, who was inclined to be sentimental.

"A beautiful head of hair," exclaimed Anna Maria, with a giggle.

"Troth, if it's me he takes a fancy to I'll be combin' it for him."

"Well," said Juliana indignantly, "I think ye're takin' too much on yourself, Nanny, to go pickin' him up that way. There's others has a better right to be considered first."

"You're the oldest, of course," said Anna Maria meekly.

"There's others older nor her, though," burst out Bridget.

"The oldest daughter has the first claim," cried Juliana, with heightened colour.

"To be sure, to be sure," said Mrs. McNally nervously. She was very much in awe of her firstborn, who was indeed possessed of a considerable amount of determination. "The young man, of course, 'ull make his own choice, but I must say I think it 'ud be only becoming if it was Ju."

Juliana glanced triumphantly round on the row of crestfallen faces, and a sudden silence fell, during which Elleney, who had stood listening with deep interest, suddenly remembered the now sodden toast and handed it dutifully round.

Maggie Nolan's eyes met hers in wrathful protest as she helped herself.

"Did ye ever see sich a girl as Ju?" she whispered.

"A regular grab-all. Of course if me a'nt goes favourin' her, the poor fellow 'ull have to take her. But I pity him, aye do I."