North, South and over the Sea Part 30

good wages, an' the two of them were talkin' o' takin' that little thatched cabin just out of the town--"

"A cabin!" said Juliana, and began to turn up her eyes, and to make a strange clucking noise in her throat.

"For goodness' sake, Ju, don't be goin' off in highsterics," cried Nanny quickly. "Sure what matter if 'tis a cabin itself! I'll engage she'll keep it as clean as a new pin--and she's a great hand at her needle, so she is. Sure she'll be able to do dressmakin' for the quality."

"An' of course," said Mrs. McNally, casting a deprecating glance round at the irate faces, "we mustn't forget she doesn't rightly belong to the family. Tis no disgrace to us at all, an' really an' truly, girls, I'm almost glad to think she's comfortably settled."

"To be sure," said Bridget, "she's no relation at all to any of us. A little girl that me a'nt took in out of charity. Why wouldn't she marry the baker--"

"My blessin' to her!" said Mary sourly.

Juliana left off clucking, and smiled sarcastically. "She isn't breakin' her heart after you, Mr. Brian, at any rate," she remarked.

"She wasn't long in getting over her disappointment."

"I must say I didn't think she'd make so little of herself," he returned, drawing himself up.

"How d'ye like that, Nanny?" said Juliana spitefully. "I declare Mr.

Brian's quite upset."

"Ah, the poor fellow, is he?" said Anna Maria, whose good-humour was imperturbable. "I declare I'll have to get married to him now if it's only to comfort him."

And thereupon she burst into a hearty laugh, in which Brian Brennan joined.

IN ST. PATRICK'S WARD

It was intensely, suffocatingly hot, though the windows on either side of the long room were wide open; the patients lay languidly watching the flies on the ceiling, the suns.h.i.+ne streaming over the ochre-tinted wall, the flickering light of the little lamp which burned night and day beneath the large coloured statue of St. Patrick in the centre of the ward. It was too hot even to talk. Granny M'Gee--who, though not exactly ill, was old and delicate enough to be permitted to remain permanently in the Union Infirmary instead of being relegated to the workhouse proper--dozed in her wicker chair with her empty pipe between her wrinkled fingers. Once, as she loved to relate, she had burnt her lovely fringe with that same pipe--"bad luck to it!" but she invariably hastened to add that her heart 'ud be broke out an' out if it wasn't for the taste o' baccy. Her neighbour opposite was equally fond of snuff, and was usually to be heard lamenting how she had r'ared a fine fam'ly o' boys an' girls, and how notwithstanding she had ne'er a wan to buy her a ha'porth in her ould age. Now, however, for a wonder she was silent, and even the woman nearest the door found it too hot to brandish her distorted wrists, according to her custom when she wished to excite compa.s.sion or to plead for alms. There would be no visitors this morning; not the most compa.s.sionate of "the ladies," who came to read to and otherwise cheer the poor sufferers of St. Patrick's ward, would venture there on such a day.

The buzzing of the flies aforesaid, the occasional moans of the more feeble patients, the hurried breathing of a poor girl in the last stage of consumption were the only sounds to be heard, except for the quiet footsteps and gentle voice of Sister Louise. There was something refres.h.i.+ng in the very sight of this tall slight figure, in its blue-grey habit and dazzling white "cornette," from beneath which the dark eyes looked forth with sweet and almost childish directness.

Sister Louise was not indeed much more than a child in years, and there were still certain inflections in her voice, an elasticity in her movements, a something about her very hands, with their little pink palms and dimpled knuckles, that betrayed the fact. But those babyish hands had done good service since Sister Louise had left the novitiate in the Rue du Bac two years before; that young voice had a marvellous power of its own, and could exhort and reprove as well as soothe and console, and when the blue-robed figure was seen flitting up and down the ward smiles appeared on wan and sorrowful faces, and querulous murmurs were hushed. Even to-day the patients nodded to her languidly as she pa.s.sed, observing with transitory cheerfulness that they were kilt with the hate, or that it was terrible weather entirely. One crone raised herself sufficiently to remark that it was a fine thing for the counthry, glory be to G.o.d! which patriotic sentiment won a smile from Sister Louise, but failed to awaken much enthusiasm in any one else.

The Sister of Charity paused before a bed in which a little, very thin old woman was coiled up with eyes half closed. Mrs. Brady was the latest arrival at St. Patrick's ward, having indeed only "come in" on the preceding day, and Sister Louise thought she would very likely need a little cheering.

"How are you to-day, Mrs. Brady!" she asked, bending over her.

"Why then indeed, ma'am--is it ma'am or Mother I ought to call ye?"

"'Sister'--we are all Sisters here, though some of the people call Sister Superior 'Reverend Mother.'"

"Ah, that indeed?" said Mrs. Brady, raising herself a little in the bed and speaking with great dignity, "Ye see yous are not the sort o'

nuns I'm used to, so you'll excuse me if I don't altogether spake the way I ought. Our nuns down in the Queen's County has black veils ye know, ma'am--Sisther I mane--an' not that kind of a white bonnet that you have on your head."

"Well, do you know our patients here get quite fond of our white wings as they call them?" returned Sister Louise, smiling. "But you haven't told me how you are, yet. Better, I hope, and pretty comfortable."

A tear suddenly rolled down Mrs. Brady's cheek, but she preserved her lofty manner.

"Ah yes, thank ye, Sisther, as comfortable as I could expect in a place like this. Of course I niver thought it's here' I'd be, but it's on'y for a short time, thanks be to G.o.d! My little boy'll be comin'

home from America soon to take me out of it."

"Why, that's good news!" cried the Sister cheerfully. "We must make you quite well and strong--that is as strong as we can"--with a compa.s.sionate glance, "by the time he comes. When do you expect him?"

"Any day now, ma'am--Sisther, I mane--aye, indeed, I may say any day an' every day, an' I'm afeard his heart'll be broke findin' me in this place. But no matther!"

Here she shook her head darkly, as though she could say much on that subject, but refrained out of consideration for Sister Louise.

"Well, we must do all we can for you meanwhile," said the latter gently. "Have you made acquaintance with your neighbours yet? Poor Mrs. M'Evoy here is worse off than you, for she can't lift her head just now. Tell Mrs. Brady how it was you hurt your back, Mrs. M'Evoy."

"Bedad, Sisther, ye know yerself it was into the ca.n.a.l I fell wid a can o' milk," said the old woman addressed, squinting fearfully in her efforts to catch a glimpse of the new patient. "The Bishop says the last time he come round, 'I s'pose,' he says, 'ye were goin' to put wather in the milk.' 'No,' says I, 'there was wather enough in it before.'"

Here Mrs. M'Evoy leered gleefully up at the Sister, and one or two feeble chuckles were heard from the neighbouring beds; but Mrs. Brady a.s.sumed an att.i.tude which can only be described as one implying a mental drawing away of skirts, and preserved an impenetrable gravity.

Evidently she had never a.s.sociated with "the like" of Mrs. M'Evoy in the circles in which she had hitherto moved.

"And there's Kate Mahony on the other side," pursued Sister Louise, without appearing to notice Mrs. Brady's demeanour. "She has been lying here for seventeen years; haven't you, Kate?"

"Aye, Sisther," said Kate, a thin-faced sweet-looking woman of about forty, looking up brightly.

"Poor Kate!" said the Sister in a caressing tone. "You must get Kate to tell you her story some time, Mrs. Brady. She has seen better days like you."

"Oh, that indeed?" said Mrs. Brady, distantly but politely, and with a dawning interest; "I s'pose you are from the country then, like meself."

"Ah no, ma'am," returned Kate. "I may say I was never three miles away from town. I went into service when I was on'y a slip of a little girl, an' lived with the wan lady till the rheumatic fever took me an'

made me what I am now. You're not from this town, I s'pose, ma'am."

"Indeed, I'd be long sorry to come from such a dirty place--beggin'

your pardon for sayin' it. No, indeed, I am from the Queen's County, near Mar'boro'. We had the loveliest little farm there ye could see, me an' me poor husband, the Lord ha' mercy on his soul! Aye, indeed, it's little we ever thought--but no matther! Glory be to goodness! my little boy'll be comin' back from America soon to take me out o'

this."

"Sure it's well for ye," said Kate, "that has a fine son o' your own to work for ye. Look at me without a crature in the wide world belongin' to me! An' how long is your son in America, ma'am?"

"Goin' on two year now," said Mrs. Brady, with a sigh.

"He'll be apt to be writin' to ye often, I s'pose, ma'am."

"Why then, indeed, not so often. The poor fellow, he was niver much of a hand at the pen. He's movin' about, ye see, gettin' work here an'

there."

Sister Louise had moved on, seeing that the pair were likely to make friends; and before ten minutes had elapsed each was in possession of the other's history. Kate's, indeed, was simple enough; her seventeen years in the infirmary being preceded by a quiet life in a very uninteresting neighbourhood; but she "came of decent people," being connected with "the rale ould O'Rorkes," and her father had been "in business"; two circ.u.mstances which impressed Mrs. Brady very much, and caused her to unbend towards "Miss Mahony," as she now respectfully called her new acquaintance. The latter was loud in expressions of admiration and sympathy as Mrs. Brady described the splendours of the past; the servant-man and the servant-maid, who, according to her, once formed portion of her establishment; the four beautiful milch cows which her husband kept, besides sheep, and a horse an' car, and "bastes" innumerable; the three little boys they buried, and then Barney--Barney, the jewel, who was now in Amerika.

"The finest little fella ye'd see between this an' County Cork! Over six fut, he is, an' wid a pair o' shoulders on him that ye'd think 'ud hardly get in through that door beyant."

"Lonneys!" said Kate admiringly.

"Aye, indeed, an' ye ought to see the beautiful black curly head of him, an' eyes like sloes, an' cheeks--why I declare"--half raising herself and speaking with great animation, "he's the very moral o' St.

Patrick over there! G.o.d forgive me for sayin' such a thing, but raly if I was to drop down dead this minute I couldn't but think it! Now I a.s.sure ye, Miss Mahony, he's the very image of that blessed statye, 'pon me word!"

Miss Mahony looked appreciatively at the representation of the patron of Ireland, which was remarkable no less for vigour of outline and colouring than for conveying an impression of exceeding cheerfulness, as both the saint himself and the serpent which was wriggling from beneath his feet were smiling in the most affable manner conceivable.