General John Regan Part 3

Thady Gallagher seemed greatly impressed by this statement. Doyle felt more than ever that his new guest was a man who ought to be treated with all possible consideration.

"It could be," he said, "that them chops would be ready for you now, and if you'll tell the girl what it is you'd like to drink??"

"When I've finished my lunch," said Mr. Billing, "I'd like to take a stroll round this section. There are some things I want to see. Perhaps Mr. Gallagher will come with me, if he can spare the time."

"Thady Gallagher will be pleased," said Doyle. "And as for sparing the time, he has plenty of that. You'll go with the gentleman, won't you, Thady?"

"I will, of course," said Gallagher.

"And there's no man knows the neighbourhood better," said Doyle. "There isn't one in it, man, woman, or child, that he isn't acquainted with, and anything there might be to tell about their fathers or mothers before them, Thady Gallagher is well fit to tell it to you.".

"What I'd like to be shown first," said Mr. Billing, "is the statue to the memory of General John Regan."

Doyle looked at Gallagher doubtfully. Gallagher edged away a little. He seemed inclined to take shelter again behind Doyle.

"The statue?" said Doyle.

"Statue or other memorial," said Mr. Billing.

"With regard to the statue??" said Doyle slowly.

Then he turned round and caught Gallagher by the arm.

"Speak up, Thady Gallagher," he said, "and tell the gentleman about the statue."

"With reference to the statue??" said Gallagher.

"Yes," said Mr. Billing encouragingly, "the statue to General John Regan."

"With reference to the statue of the deceased general," said Gallagher.

"What he's wanting to say," said Doyle, "is that at the present time there's no statue to the General, not in Ballymoy, anyway."

"You surprise me some," said Mr. Billing.

"It's what there ought to be," said Doyle, "and that's a fact."

"Is Ballymoy such a nursery of heroes," said Mr. Billing, "that you can afford to neglect the memory of the great General, the patriot statesman, the deliverer of Bolivia?"

"Speak up, Thady," said Doyle, "and tell the gentleman why there's no statue to the General in Ballymoy."

Gallagher cleared his throat and began to speak. At first his words came to him slowly; but as he warmed to his subject he became fluent and even eloquent.

"It's on account of the way we find ourselves situated in this country at the present time," he said. "It's not the hearts of the people that's at fault. There isn't one, not the poorest man among us, that wouldn't be willing to do honour to the memory of the great men of the past that died on the scaffold in defence of the liberty of the people. It's the cursed system of Castle Government and the tyranny of the landlords, and the way the people is driven off their farms by the rack-renting flunkeys of the rent office. How is the country to prosper, and how is statues to be erected to them that deserve statues, so long as the people isn't able to call their souls their own? But, glory be to G.o.d, it won't be so for long! We have Home Rule as good as got, and when we have it??"

Gallagher might have gone on speaking for a long time. He was a man of tried and practised eloquence. He had arrived without much effort at his favourite subject. Fragments of old speeches, glowing periods, oft-repeated perorations thronged confusedly on his memory. Mr. Billing seemed to be listening with sympathy and admiration. It might be a long time before such a favourable opportunity for making a speech came to Gallagher again. Unfortunately he was interrupted. Mary Ellen had come, unperceived, out of the hotel. She was at Mr. Billing's elbow just when Gallagher reached his prophecy about Home Rule. She spoke without the slightest regard for the orator's feelings.

"The chops is fried," she said.

Doyle had often heard his friend make speeches before. He had no wish to be subjected to unnecessary oratory on a very hot day. He supported Mary Ellen's appeal.

"It would be as well for you," he said, "to go and eat them, the way they won't be getting cold on you."

Mr. Billing saw the wisdom of this advice at once. He turned to go into the hotel. But he evidently wanted to hear more of Thady Gallagher's speech.

"When I've finished my lunch," he said, "I shall look forward to a long talk with Mr. Gallagher. I want to gather together all the local traditions which survive about the boyhood of the great General. I'm writing his biography, gentlemen. I need say no more."

"Mary Ellen," said Doyle, "whatever the gentleman fancies in the way of a drink, will you see that he gets it?"

Mary Ellen, smiling pleasantly, walked in front of Mr. Billing and conducted him to the small ill-lighted room which Doyle called the Commercial Room of his hotel. There, on a very dirty table cloth, were a knife and fork, a plate which held two chops with a quant.i.ty of grease round them, and a dish with five pallid potatoes in it. The meal was not appetising. On a very hot day it was almost repulsive. But Mr. Billing was either really hungry or he was a man of unusual determination. He sat down to his chops with a smile.

"I guess," he said, "that whisky is the drink you're most likely to have in this hotel?"

"There's porter," said Mary Ellen, "and there's minerals, and there's ginger cordial."

"If I'm here for a week," said Mr. Billing, "I'll put you wise in the matter of making c.o.c.ktails. A Saratoga c.o.c.ktail is a drink??"

"Is it whisky I'll bring you now?" said Mary Ellen.

She was a girl of sense and wisdom. She was no more inclined to listen to Mr. Billing's panegyric of the Saratoga c.o.c.ktail than to Thady Gallagher's patriotic denunciation of the flunkeys of the rent office.

Without waiting for an answer she went away and brought Mr. Billing the usual quant.i.ty of Irish whisky in the bottom of a tumbler with a bottle of soda water.

Doyle and Thady Gallagher, left alone in the street, stared at each other in silence. It was Doyle who spoke first:

"What you want, Thady," he said, "is a drop of something to drink, to revive the courage in you."

"What sort of a fellow is that at all?" said Thady hoa.r.s.ely.

"A pint of porter, now," said Doyle, "or a drop of spirits. You want it this minute, and you'll want it more before, you're through with the job that you have on hand."

He led the way into the bar and provided Thady with a satisfying draught. Thady emptied the tumbler without drawing breath. Then he took his pipe from his pocket and lit it.

"Mr. Doyle," he said, "you're a man I've a liking for and always had.

What's more, you're a man I respect, and it isn't everyone that I would say that to."

"The same to you," said Doyle, "and may you live long to enjoy it. Will you have another drop?"

"I don't mind if I do," said Thady.

Doyle filled up the empty tumbler. As he did so Gallagher spoke with serious deliberation.

"Seeing that you're a man I've every confidence in, I'd be glad if you'd tell me this. Who was General John Regan? For I never heard tell of him."

"It'll be better for you, Thady, to know something about him be the same more or less, before the gentleman within has finished his dinner. He'll be asking questions of you the whole of the rest of the day."

"Let him ask."

"And you'll have to be answering him, for he'll not rest contented without you do."