Part 12

On their journey to Kilanure her new granny, as Biddy called her, had spoken much about her son Larry, Biddy’s poor father, who, she said, had been the best son in Ireland, and the finest figure of a young man in the County Donegal. Whereas old granny had often talked of her daughter, little Molly, who used to be the prettiest girl in five parishes, and the best daughter that ever lived in this world--God be good to them all.

“And a grand worker poor Larry was,” Mrs M‘Gowran now had repeated more than once. “Ne’er a lazy bone had he in his body; I’ll say that for him.”

This phrase stuck in Biddy’s mind, and it was chiefly a wish to prove herself a worthy daughter of such an industrious father that made her so eager to set about doing something without delay. But there were other reasons too. She was really shocked at the grimy aspect of the kitchen, as far as she could see it, for perpetual twilight dwelt behind the two tiny windows with their panes of dusty greenish glass and beetle brows of sloping grey thatch. The state of the floor struck her particularly; it felt gritty and rough underfoot, as if incrusted with dried mud. Biddy wondered how it could have got into such a condition. The scrubbing girl, she conjectured, might not have come this week, so that granny had no one to help her except grandfather and Uncle Joe, who of course were not of any use--at all events indoors.

Biddy had often thought, as she watched Meg Hoey working at home, that it must be very delightful to have command of a great bucket filled with foaming suds, and a piece of brown soap for the making of more, besides a cloth and a brush, and liberty to splash and slop all over the shiny tiles or snowy boards. But Meg always refused to let her try, on the grounds that she would be only destroying her clean frock and delaying other people at their work. All this somehow made it now seem quite clear to Biddy that she should set about cleaning up as soon as ever she had the house to herself, and thus be able to surprise her grandparents with the improvement upon their return. She had indeed already rather surprised her grandmother by the alacrity with which she agreed that the walk to market was too far, and her vehemence in declaring that she would not be a bit lonely by herself until her grandfather came in to his dinner at one o’clock. So Mrs M‘Gowran started on her long trudge, reflecting that poor Larry’s little girl seemed to be a good, biddable child; her husband went off with Joe to their field-work, having told Biddy that she was the grandest little housekeeper alive; and Biddy found herself at last blissfully alone. She was strenuously bent upon deserving that character.

Her first requirements were some water and a bucket, and she had the good fortune to find them both at once, in the shape of a battered old zinc pail, nearly full, standing at the back door. She resolved to be content with cold water, for the black, soot-shagged kettle on the hearth was almost as big as herself, and she had sense enough not to try lifting it. Brush and cloth must next be sought; but here Biddy had less luck, as no semblance of the former appeared anywhere, and the nearest approach to the latter that she lit upon was a blue checked linen fabric lying folded on the window-seat. To the unprejudiced eye it was quite evidently an apron; however, since there were two rather large holes in it she gladly decided that it could be good for nothing except a floor-cloth; and when she had torn it across to make it a more convenient size it certainly did look like nothing better than a rag. Then, after a long and anxious quest she found, in a broken tea-pot on the dresser, a piece of soap, disappointingly thin, it is true. Still she thought it would do, and she dropped it into the bucket, intending to stir up a lather with the poker as soon as it had melted sufficiently.

While she waited for this she had leisure to notice that two grey hens and a white one were crawking dismally in a row on the top of the half-door. She had closed it to exclude them, being much scandalised at their free-and-easy entrances. Poultry were never permitted to set scratching foot near the trim flower-beds about the castle gate-lodge, so Biddy had no experience of fowls and their habits; but she felt pretty sure that three hens would not keep on making such a disconsolate noise, like the winding up of the old wheezy eight-day clock at home, unless they wanted something very badly, and she quickly guessed that something to be their breakfast. Granny had most likely forgotten to feed them in the hurry of setting off to market.

What their usual food was Biddy could not tell, but during her late researches she had espied on a shelf under the dresser a large loaf of baker’s bread, which seemed to her suitable fare. Being stale, and not well kneaded, the loaf fell in two as she lifted it out, making it all the easier to break and crumble up. As she flung the white flakes thickly into the middle of the road before the door, fowls gathered speedily about them into a flock so numerous that Biddy thought: “New granny must own a power of hins.” And well she might think so, for she was entertaining unawares any of the neighbours’ “chuckens” that could arrive fast enough, half flying, half running headlong, to share in this public feast.

Watching and supplying their quarrelsome repast, and wishing the big loaf yet bigger, for it was vanishing like snow in a rapid thaw, Biddy did not see that three small children, with ragged lesson-books, and a grey stuff bag, had come along the road and stopped to look on. They were her cousins, Paddy M‘Gowran’s children, on their way to school, but Biddy, the stranger, knew of no such people. After a while: “Is it throwin’ all her good bread to the hins you are?” inquired the taller of the little girls, who was some sizes shorter than Biddy. The sudden question startled her, but as she considered it an impertinence she did not answer. Presently: “Gimme the heel of the loaf,” said the fat little boy. “It’s a nice crusty bit,” and he held out a hand.

“Indeed and I will not,” Biddy said, twisting the tough crust. “I’ve got little enough for the poor hins as it is.” Thereupon he tried to snatch it with a jump, but she flung it into the very centre of the bobbing heads, and withdrew empty-handed behind the half-door.

“Come on out of that wid yourselves, Lizzie and Willie,” said the elder little girl. “We’ll be late, and she’s a cross one.” So they trotted away down the road.

There was now nothing to hinder Biddy from beginning her great task immediately, and she set to work with much zeal on a patch near the door, where she fancied that the floor looked grimiest. At first she thought she was making good progress, because as she scrubbed away the blue cloth quickly grew so very black and dirty that it seemed as if she must soon come upon something underlying smooth and clean, white boards or gay-coloured tiling. But this did not happen. The more she scrubbed and wrung out her wet cloth the worse matters looked, and in one place a perceptible hollow unaccountably appeared. If such an extraordinary thing had been possible she would really have believed that the floor itself was turning into mud. She was feeling much perplexed and distressed, and had already splashed herself all over, when a sudden blot of shadow made her glance up, to see the doorway darkened. It was done by two girls, elder sisters of her last visitors, and they stood staring curiously in at her. Neither of them spoke to her, but they whispered to each other loudly with giggles.

“Herself’s off marketin’, I suppose. Look-a, Nan, there’s the young one she said she was fetchin’ home!”

“Glory be to goodness, what’s she doin’ at all? After spillin’ the bucket of drinkin’ water belike, and wipin’ it up.”

“A quare bad offer she’s makin’ at it then. And I declare now it’s one of granny’s good blue aperns she’s got wisped up there ruinated.”

These remarks so exasperated Biddy that she plucked up courage to say, copying Meg Hoey’s manner as closely as she could: “If _I_ was anybody else, that came gapin’ at a person doin’ a bit of work, I’d stand out of the light and mind me own business, and not be delayin’ other people.”

Her rebuke seemed to amuse the girls vastly, which was disagreeable. However, they went away directly, which was a relief. “Come along, Sally,” Nan said, “we had a right to be there by now. Och but it’s the comical, ould-fashioned thing.”

As the sound of their laughter receded Biddy determined to prevent the recurrence of all such annoying intrusions by shutting the front door, and in her haste to do so she overset the bucket, which sent wedges of water shooting out on every side. Then, while she struggled desperately with the stiff latch, a young man came sauntering by, and stopped to give it the necessary shove and shake, partly from good-nature, partly for occupation. He wore labourer’s clothes, but so far had done nothing that day except whistle on the bank a bit down the road.

“Is Mrs M‘Gowran widin?” said this Matt Caffrey. “Ah no, to be sure, it’s at market she is this mornin’. And so yourself’s keepin’ house, are you--and after spillin’ the sup of water on the floor? Well now, that’s too bad.”

“Washin’ up I was,” Biddy said, still with some pride.

“Bedad were you?” said Matt. “It’s the first ever I heard tell of washin’ up a mud floor. Maybe if you have e’er a drop of water left in it you might take a turn at the road out here. There’s scarce a puddle on it to-day at all, and you’ve got a grand one in there begorrah.” Biddy’s eyes widened with consternation as she began to perceive how much worse than useless her efforts had been. “But sure there’s no great harm done,” Matt added, seeing her dismayed look, “I’ll show you the way it can be set to rights soon enough, if that’s all that ails you.”

He stepped indoors, and picking up a large iron turf-shovel, thrust it into the hottest corner of the fire, whence he presently drew it out, turned a glowing red. This he held steadily, much as a careful laundress tests her heated flat-irons, low over the wet patch on the floor, which at once began to yield up its superfluous moisture in pallid mists of steam. He repeated the process several times, till Biddy, standing by, saw things underfoot grow reassuringly firm and dry.

“There--a fly wouldn’t aisy wet the tips of his ould toes on it now. And you might be layin’ out the table ready for dinner, agin the others come home,” said Matt, who rightly surmised that she was wishing to wield the heavy, scorching shovel, “and then they’ll find everythin’ rael iligant.”

“True for you, I might so,” said Biddy, and darted over to the dresser. But in a minute she emerged from among its deep bottom shelves with a mortified air. “I made sure I seen another loaf sittin’ in there,” she said, “and it’s only an ould white bowl.”

“Was it there you got the one you were throwin’ to the chuckens a while ago?” said Matt, “for you may depind she had it keepin’ for the breakfast to-morra. They do mostly be havin’ a bit of baker’s bread of a Sunday mornin’.”

At this suggestion Biddy looked more alarmed than she knew. “Well, she can be gettin’ another one before that, I should suppose,” she said in an unconcerned tone.

“What sort of trees do loaves of good bread be growin’ wild on in your part of the counthry, might I ax?” said Matt, with polite gravity.

But Biddy suddenly slid down into depths of despair. “Och, what’ll I do at all? Sure how could I tell it was the only one she had? And the hins was starvin’ wid the hunger, and fluttherin’ in at the door like aigles. And it’s tormintin’ me you are, talkin’ about your ould trees.”

“Whisht-a-whisht, there’s a jewel,” Matt said soothingly, “sure I wouldn’t be tormintin’ anybody. You made a fine offer at it, considerin’. And as for the loaf, we must conthrive one way or another.” He was jingling a few pennies in his pocket as he spoke, and balancing the price of whisky against the price of bread. “Just be washin’ the face and hands of you, that are a thrifle black or so,” he said, “and I’ll be back again wid somethin’ in a couple or two of minyits.”

Matt had not far to go, and he trotted briskly, especially past Doyle’s public, so that he very soon did return with nothing less than a portly loaf. But he found the kitchen empty, and through the open back door sounded doleful cries. “Murther alive! What’s took her now?” he said, setting down the loaf and running out.

Biddy had taken Matt’s advice, being indeed extremely muddy, and had gone with a jug to the small stream, which she saw flickering by, not many yards from the back door. There, stooping over the water, she lost her footing on the slippery grass, and went headforemost in. It was quite shallow, and she might easily have scrambled up the bank if she had not got into such a panic that she could only hold on to the edge and scream.

Matt pulled her out dripping. “Well now,” said he, “it’s the unlucky day wid you entirely, as Tim Joyce said when his best cow choked herself swallyin’ one of his new brogues. But the jug’s only cracked, and that’s somethin’ anyway. We’ll make a good job of it yit. And I’ll just bring you in to me sisther over yonder, and see can she get you dried.” So he conducted her along the stream, past two or three cabin-doors, till he came to one where a good-humoured young woman was standing at a tub.

“Here’s a little girl, Bessie, from ould Mrs M‘Gowran’s,” he said to her, “after dhrowndin’ herself fetchin’ water, and the rest of them all away; so I thought you might maybe set her to rights.” And Mrs Bessie said, “Mercy on us all and more too! The little crathur’s dreeped. Why, to be sure, I can borry her a loan of Katty’s Sunday frock till I give them muddy things a rinse in the tub here along wid me wash, and they’ll be none the worser.”

Meanwhile Biddy’s grandmother, and her husband, who was helping her with some parcels, were on their way home through the village. As they passed the schoolhouse, about which the children were playing, little Ellen, Lizzie and Willie M‘Gowran rushed up to them eagerly with news. “Och, granny, do you know what the cross girl at your place is after doin’ on you? She’s broke up your big loaf, and threw it every bit out to the hins.”

“The bould little thing!” Mrs M‘Gowran said in high vexation, “and I keepin’ it these two days a purpose agin to-morra.” She flounced on, so much perturbed that she forgot to produce the sugarsticks she had in her basket for the tale-bearers, who were thus justly punished.

A little further on she met their sisters Nan and Sally, and was greeted with: “There’s fine disthruction up at your place, granny. Poor Uncle Larry’s daughter has the floor all swimmin’ in says of water, and she’s after tearin’ your good blue apern in two halves to wipe it up wid. And the show she is herself wid mud and dirt is a sight to behould. And the childer says your loaf of bread--”

“I’m to be pitied wid the likes of her, the dear knows,” said their grandmother, hurrying on faster still, with Nan and Sally following to see what would happen. But when they arrived, there stood the table in the middle of a dry floor, and on it glimmered a large white loaf, which a black hen was eyeing warily, as if about to aim a judicious peck.

“What romancin’ at all had yous then?” Mrs M‘Gowran said, turning her wrath upon the two girls. “There’s naught amiss wid the floor, and she needn’t ha’ meddled wid the loaf to be lavin’ it out, but it’s right enough. Shoo, get along, you ould baste; it’s one of Mary Gallaher’s pullets. I wonder where the child is herself.”

Here Matt Caffrey put his head in at the back-door. “Matt, avic,” said Mrs M‘Gowran, “might you happen to see little Biddy runnin’ about anywhere?”

“I seen her,” Matt said rather solemnly, “times and again. And the last time I seen her it’s as near as anythin’ she was dhrowndin’ herself dead, the crathur, outside there, strivin’ to fetch you in a jug of clane water you might be wantin’ when you come home. Och no, ma’am, she isn’t hurted, glory be to goodness; I had her hefted out in a brace of shakes. Me sisther’s just givin’ her a dry at her fire, and she’ll bring her round to you directly. ’Twould be a pity of anythin’ happenin’ her, for there isn’t a finer-lookin’ child in the parish. It’s yourself she favours, ma’am.”

Sure enough Matt’s sister immediately arrived, leading Biddy, very trim and tidy in a clean pink cotton frock. But at this moment Nan, who had been poking the loaf, triumphantly announced a discovery: “It isn’t your one at all, granny. Scaldin’ hot it is, just out of the oven like, instead of bein’ stale.”

“Blathers, Nan M‘Gowran, hers it is,” Matt said, and paused, divided between a wish to screen Biddy and to let his own generosity appear.

Biddy, however, settled the question herself. “There wasn’t e’er a bit of anythin’ else to be givin’ the hins,” she said, “and the feathers of all of them standin’ on end wid the hunger. So I gave them the whole of the loaf; but the strange man said he’d bring another--before he saved me out of the river it was.”

“Well, well,” said Mrs M‘Gowran, mollified by relief from several alarms, “she done the best she could, and she isn’t of a size to have over-much sinse yet awhile.”

“And the hins wouldn’t find fau’t wid her housekeepin’ anyway,” said her husband. “Deed now, she was a grand housekeeper--for the hins.”

And thus Biddy M‘Gowran came by her nickname, which she took with her--so fast it stuck--years afterwards, when she went to keep a house of her own at Clochranbeg.

TWO PAIR OF TRUANTS

Ever since little Minnie Lawlor, accompanied by her mother and younger sister, had come to live with her grandmother in a gate-lodge of Shanlough Castle, her great wish had been to visit the castle itself, which was always whetting her curiosity by showing just the rim of one turret, like the edge of a crinkled cloud, over the rounded tree-tops in the distance. But it was not until some months had passed that she found an opportunity. Then, on a showery May morning, her mother set off early to Killavin Fair; her grandmother was pinned to the big chair in the chimney-corner by an access of rheumatics; Lizzie Hackett, the cross girl who scrubbed for them, sent word that she could not come till noon; and, as the last link in this chain of lucky chances, the rope-reins of Willie Downing’s ass-cart snapped right in front of the lodge gate just when Minnie and Baby were setting off for school. “Bad manners to you, Juggy, for a contrary ould baste!” Willie was saying as he halted for repairs. “Would nothin’ else suit you but to set me chuckin’ th’ ould reins till they broke on us in a place where a man hasn’t so much as a bit of string?” Willie, being twelve years old, seemed of formidable age and size to Minnie, who was seven: but the good-natured expression of his face, where large freckles made a well-covered pattern, emboldened her to propose the plan which had occurred to her at the sight of the empty ass-cart. As a preliminary, however, she supplied him with the longest bit of twine she could twitch from the thrifty wisp hung on the hook of a dresser. After which, “Is it anywheres near the castle you’ll be drivin’ to?” she inquired, pointing in that direction.

“I’m apt to be passin’ it pretty middlin’ near,” said Willie, struggling to knot a pair of rather skimpy ends.

“And do you think you could be takin’ me and Baby along wid you that far?” said Minnie.

“What for at all?” he said, looking doubtful.

“To see the grandeur that’s in it,” replied Minnie.

“Up at th’ ould place?” said Willie. “I never heard tell there was any such a thing in it.”

“Well, there’s grand people in it, at all events,” said Minnie. “Me grandmother does be sayin’ the Fitzallens hasn’t their equals next or nigh them. Lords of the land they are, and the top of everythin’. I’d like finely to be seein’ them, and so would Baby. But if we’ve any talk of walkin’ a step up the avenue, me grandmother always says: ‘On no account suffer them, Maria; it mightn’t be liked by the Family.’ So we do be stoppin’ in the little ugly shrubbery.”

“I dunno is there e’er a lord in it,” said Willie, doubtfully. “If there is, I never laid eyes on him.” This was disappointing.

“I suppose you’re very ignorant,” Minnie remarked after a slight pause, as if she had sought and found a satisfactory explanation.

“Pretty middlin’ I am, sure enough,” Willie said more decidedly, and then added, as if he, too, had hit upon a probable conjecture: “Belike yous would be wantin’ to see Mrs O’Rourke, th’ ould housekeeper?” Minnie might have replied truly that she had never heard tell of any such person; but as the idea seemed to remove her new acquaintance’s difficulties she answered: “Ay, sure we could go see her if you took us along. I can step in meself over the wheel, and you can aisy give Baby a heft up.” “But in my belief it’s goin’ to school the two of yous had a right to be,” Willie said, relapsing into doubt again as he glanced at their small bundle of ragged-edged books.

“Och, me mother’d say we might have a holiday this minyit, only she’s went to the fair,” Minnie affirmed confidently, though she might have had some difficulty in reconciling this belief with her gladness that there was not present anybody whose permission need be asked. “I’ll get in first.”

“Themselves inside there might be infuriated wid the whole of us,” said Willie, still unconvinced.