The Black Prophet Part 21

"Well, then, if you don't--may G.o.d direct! me!" he added, "an' guide me to the best--if you don't, Masther Richard--Heaven direct me agin!--will I say it?--could you get that family quietly out of the counthry, Masther Richard? Bekaise if you could, it would be betther, maybe, for all parties."

"You seem to know something about these Daltons, Mr. M'Gowan?" asked d.i.c.k, "and to speak mysteriously of them?"

"Well, then, I do," he replied; "but! what I have to say, I ought to say it to your father, who is a magistrate."

The other stared at him with surprise, but said nothing for a minute or two.

"What is this mystery?" he added at length; "I cannot understand you; but it is clear that you mean something extraordinary."

"G.o.d pardon me, Masther Richard, but you are right enough. No; I can't keep it any longer. Listen to me, sir, for I am goin' to make a strange and a fearful discovery; I know who it was that murdhered Sullivan; I'm in possession of it for near the last two-an'-twenty years; I have travelled every where; gone to England, to Wales, Scotland, an'

America, but it was all of no use; the knowledge of the murdher! and the murdherer was here," he laid his! hand upon his heart as he spoke; "an'

durin' all that time I had peace neither by night nor by day."

His companion turned towards him with amazement, and truly his appearance was startling, if not frightful; he looked as it were into vacancy; his eyes had become hollow and full of terror; his complexion a.s.sumed the hue of ashes; his voice got weak and unsteady, and his limbs trembled excessively, whilst from every pore the perspiration came out, and ran down his ghastly visage in large drops.

"M'Gowan," said his companion, "this is a dreadful business. As yet you have said nothing, and from what I see, I advise you to reflect before you proceed further in it. I think I can guess the nature of your secret; but even if you went to my father, he would tell you, that you are not bound to criminate yourself."

The Prophet, in the mean time, had made an effort to recover himself, which, after a little time, was successful.

"I believe you think," he added, with a gloomy and a bitter smile, "that it was I who committed the murdher; oh no! if it was, I wouldn't be apt to hang myself, I think. No! but I must see your father, as a magistrate; an' I must make the disclosure to him. The man that did murdher Sullivan is livin', and that man is Condy Dalton. I knew of this, an' for two-an'-twenty years let that murdherer escape, an' that is what made me so miserable an' unhappy. I can prove what I say; an' I know the very spot where he buried Sullivan's body, an' where it's lyin'

to this very day."

"In that case, then," replied the other, "you have only one course to pursue, and that is, to bring Dalton to justice."

"I know it," returned the Prophet; "but still I feel that it's a hard case to be the means of hangin' a fellow-crature; but of the two choices, rather than bear any longer what I have suffered an' am still sufferin', I think it betther to prosecute him."

"Then go in and see my father at once about it, and a devilish difficult card you'll have to play with him; for my part, I think he is mad ever since Jemmy Branigan left him. In fact, he knows neither what he is saying or doing without him, especially in some matters; for to tell you the truth," he added, laughing, "Jemmy, who was so well acquainted with the country and every one in it, took much more of the magistrate on him than ever my father did; and now the old fellow, when left to himself, is nearly helpless in every sense. He knows he has not Jemmy, and he can bear n.o.body else near him or about him."

"I will see him, then, before I lave the place; an' now, Masther Richard, you know what steps you ought to take with regard to _Gra Gal_ Sullivan. As she is willin' herself, of course there is but one way of it."

"Of course I am aware of that," said d.i.c.k; "but still I feel that it's devilish queer she should change so soon from Dalton to me."

"That's bekaise you know nothing about women," replied the Prophet.

"Why, Masther Richard, I tell you that a weatherc.o.c.k is constancy itself compared with them. The notion of you an' your wealth, an' grandeur, an'

the great state you're to keep her in--all turned her brain; an' as a proof of it, there you have a lock of her beautiful hair that she gave me with her own hands. If that won't satisfy you it's hard to say what can; but indeed I think you ought to know by this time o' day how far a handsome face goes with them. Give the divil himself but that, and they'll take his horns, hooves, and tail into the bargain--ay, will they."

This observation was accompanied by a grin so sneering and bitter, that his companion, on looking at him, knew not how to account for it, unless by supposing that he must during the course of his life have sustained some serious or irreparable injury at their hands.

"You appear not to like the women, Donnel; how is that?"

"Like them!" he replied, and as he spoke his face, which had been, a little before, ghastly with horror, now became black and venomous; "ha!

ha! how is that, you say? oh, no matther now; they're angels; angels of perdition; their truth is treachery, an' their--but no matther. I'll now go in an' spake to your father on this business; but I forgot to say that I must see _Gra Gal_ soon, to let her know our plans; so do you make your mind aisy, and lave the management of the whole thing in my hands."

CHAPTEE XIV. -- A Middleman Magistrate of the Old School, and his Clerk.

d.i.c.k-o'-the-Grange--whose name was Henderson--at least such is the name we choose to give him--held his office, as many Irish magistrates have done before him, in his own parlor; that is to say, he sat in an arm-chair at one of the windows, which was thrown open for him, while those who came to seek justice, or, as they termed it, law, at his hands, were compelled to stand uncovered on the outside, no matter whether the weather was stormy or otherwise. We are not now about to p.r.o.nounce, any opinion upon the const.i.tutional spirit of d.i.c.k's decisions--inasmuch as nineteen out of every twenty of them were come to by the only "Magistrates' Guide" he ever was acquainted with--to wit, the redoubtable Jemmy Branigan. Jemmy was his clerk, and although he could neither read nor write, yet in cases where his judgments did not give satisfaction, he was both able and willing to set his mark upon the discontented parties m a fas.h.i.+on that did not allow his blessed signature to be easily forgotten. Jemmy, however, as the reader knows, was absent on the morning we are writing about, having actually fulfilled his threat of leaving his master's service--a threat, by the way, which was held out and acted upon at least once every year since he and the magistrate had stood to each other in the capacity of master and servant. Not that we are precisely correct in the statement we had made on this matter, for sometimes his removal was the result of dismissal on the part of his master, and sometimes the following up of the notice which he himself had given him to leave his service. Be this as it may, his temporary absences always involved a trial of strength between the parties, as to which of them should hold out, and put a constraint upon his inclinations the longest; for since the truth must be told of Jemmy, we are bound to say that he could as badly bear to live removed from the society of his master, as the latter could live without him. For many years of his life, he had been threatening to go to America, or to live with a brother that he had in the Isle of White, as he called it, and on several occasions he had taken formal leave of the whole family, (always in the presence of his master, however,) on his departure for either the one place or the other, while his real abode was a snug old garret, where he was attended and kept in food by the family and his fellow-servants, who were highly amused at the outrageous distress of his master, occasioned sometimes by Jemmy's obstinate determination to travel, and sometimes by his extreme brotherly affection.

Donnel, having left his son cracking a long whip which he held in his hand, and looking occasionally at the tress of Mave Sullivan's beautiful hair, approached the hall door, at which he knocked, and on the appearance of a servant, requested to see Mr. Henderson. The man waived his hand towards the s.p.a.ce under the window, meaning that he should take his stand there, and added--

"If it's law you want, I'm afeard you'll get more abuse than justice from him now, since Jemmy's gone."

The knowing grin, and the expression of comic sorrow which accompanied the last words, were not lost upon the prophet, who, in common with every one in the neighborhood for a circ.u.mference of many miles, was perfectly well aware of the life which master and man both led.

"Is that it?" said the prophet; "however, it can't be helped. Clerk, or no clerk, I want to see him on sarious business, tell him; but I'll wait, of coorse, till he's at leisure."

"Tom," said Henderson from within, "Who's there?--is that him? If it is, tell him, confound him! to come in, and I'll forgive him. If he'll promise to keep a civil tongue in his head, I'll forget all, say. Come in, you old scoundrel, I'm not angry with you; I want to speak to you, at all events."

"It's not him, sir; it's only Donnel M'Gowan, the Black Prophet, that wants some law business."

"Send him to the devil for law business What brings him here now? Tell him he shall have neither law nor justice from me. Did you send to his brother-in-law? May be he's there?"

"We did, sir. Sorra one of his seed, breed, or generation but we sent to. However, it's no use--off to America he's gone, or to the Isle o'

White, at any rate."

"May the devil sink America and the Isle of White both in the ocean, an'

you, too; you scoundrel, and all of you! Only for the cursed crew that's about me, I'd have him here still--and he the only man that understood my wants and my wishes, and that could keep me comfortable and easy."

"Troth, then, he hadn't an overly civil tongue in his head, sir,"

replied the man; "for, when you and he, your honor, were together, there was little harmony to spare between you."

"That was my own fault, you cur. No servant but himself would have had a day's patience with me. He never abused me but when I deserved it--did he?"

"No, your honor; I know he didn't, in troth."

"You lie, you villain, you know no such thing. Here am I with my sore leg, and no one to dress it for me. Who's to help me upstairs or downstairs?--who's to be about me?--or, who cares for me, now that he's gone? n.o.body--not a soul."

"Doesn't Masther Richard, sir?"

"No sir; Master Richard gives himself little trouble about me. He has other plots and plans on his hands--other fish to fry--other irons in the fire. Masther Richard, sirra, doesn't care a curse if I was under the sod to-morrow, but would be glad of it; neither does, any one about me--but he did; and you infernal crew, you have driven him away from me."

"We, your honor?"

"Yes, all of you; you put me first out of temper by your neglect and your extravagance; then I vented it on him, because he was the only one among you I took any pleasure in abusin'--speaking to. However, my mind's made up--I'll call an auction--sell everything--and live in Dublin as well as I can. What does that black hound want?"

"Some law business, sir; but I donna what it is."

"Is the scoundrel honest, or a rogue?"

"Throth it's more than I'm able to tell your honor, sir. I don't know much about him. Some spakes well, and some spakes ill of him--just like his neighbors--ahem!"

"Ay, an' that's all you can say of him? but if he was here, I could soon ascertain what stuff he's made of, and what kind of a hearing he ought to get. However, it doesn't matter now--I'll auction everything--in this grange I won't live; and to be sure but I was a precious-old scoundrel to quarrel with the best servant a man ever had."

Just at this moment, who should come round from a back pa.s.sage, carrying a small bundle in his hand, but the object of all his solicitude. He approached quietly on tiptoe, with a look in which might be read a most startling and ludicrous expression of anxiety and repentance.

"How is he?" said he--"how is his poor leg? Oh, thin, blessed saints, but I was the double distilled villain of the airth to leave him as I did to the crew that was about him! The best masther that ever an ould vagabond like me was ongrateful to! How is he, Tom?"