"'Ha, ha, mother--there--that's one--you'll sleep sound now I hope, for you didn't lately--that little thing that comes to your bedside at night, won't trouble you any more, I suppose. No, no, the thing you say in your sleep, that is black in the face, has its tongue out, and the handkerchief drawn tight about its neck. You'd give back the money in your dhrame; but sorry a penny while you're waken, I'll engage.'
"Poll turned away rebuked, but not, if one could judge, either in resentment or revenge. Raymond's words she had not heard, and of course paid no attention to what he said; but the latter, now seeing that the river had fallen considerably, again dashed into the stream, and crossing over, lifted the poor insane widow off the rock, and setting her down in safety on the other side, they both proceeded onwards together.
"'The ford, sir, will not be passable for at least another hour,' said young M'Loughlin, addressing me, 'but if you will have the kindness to step up to my father's, and rest a little after your mountain journey, for I think you have been up the hills, you will find it at least more comfortable than standing here, and less fatiguing than going round by the bridge, which would make it at least five miles added to your journey.'
"I thanked him, said I felt obliged, and would gladly avail myself of his very civil invitation.
"'Perhaps,' he added, 'you might wish to see our flax and linen manufactory; if so, and that you do not think it troublesome, I will feel great pleasure in showing it to you.'
"I expressed my obligations, but pleaded fatigue, which indeed I felt; and we consequently soon found ourselves in his father's parlor, where I met a very venerable old gentleman, the Rev. Mr. Roche, the Roman Catholic pastor of the parish."
We must here exercise the privilege, which, at the commencement of this correspondence, we assured our readers we should reserve to ourselves--we allude to the ability which we possess, from ampler and clearer sources of information--to throw into Mr. Easel's correspondence, in their proper place, such incidents as he could not have possibly known, but which let in considerable light upon the progress of his narrative.
CHAPTER XVIII.--An Execution by Val's Blood-Hounds
Cruel Consequences of Phil's Plot Against Mary M'Loughlin--Dreadful Determination of her Brothers--An Oath of Blood--Father Roche's Knowledge of Nature--Interview Between Mary and her Brothers--Influence and Triumph of Domestic Affection
The hellish and cowardly plot against Mary M'Loughlin's reputation, and which the reader knows has already been planned and perpetrated by Poll Doolin and Phil M'Clutchy, was, as such vile calumnies mostly are, generally successful with the public. On her own immediate relations and family, who knew her firmness, candor, purity of heart, and self-respect, the foul slander had no effect whatsoever, at least in shaking their confidence in her sense of honor and discretion. With the greedy and brutal public, however, it was otherwise; and the discovery of this fact, which reached them in a thousand ways, it was that filled their hearts with such unparalleled distress, terrible agony, and that expanding spirit of revenge which is never satisfied, until it closes on him whose crime has given it birth. In truth,--and it is not to be wondered at--as how almost could it be otherwise?--the diabolical and cowardly crime of Phil M'Clutchy towards their sweet and unoffending sister, had changed her three brothers from men into so many savage and insatiable Frankensteins, resolved never to cease dogging his guilty steps, until their vengeance had slaked its burning thirst in his caitiff blood.
Immediately after the night of its occurrence, a change began to take place in the conduct and deportment of their general acquaintances.
Visitors dropped off, some from actual delicacy, and an unaffected compassion, and others from that shrinking fear of moral contagion, which is always most loudly and severely expressed by the private sinner and hypocrite. Their sister's conduct was, in fact, the topic of general discussion throughout the parish, and we need not say that such discussions usually were terminated--first in great compassion for the poor girl, and then as their virtue warmed, in as earnest denunciations of her guilt. To an indifferent person, however, without any prejudice either for or against her, it was really impossible, considering the satanic success with which the plot was managed, and the number of witnesses actually present at its accomplishment, to consider Miss M'Loughlin as free at least from gross and indefensible levity, and a most unjustifiable relaxation of female prudence, at a period when it was known she was actually engaged to another.
This certainly looked very suspicious, and we need scarcely say that a cessation of all visits, intimacy, and correspondence, immediately took place, on the part of female friends and acquaintances. In fact the innocent victim of this dastardly plot was completely deserted, and the little party of her friends was by no means a match for the large and godly hosts who charitably combined to establish her guilt. Her father, with all his manliness of character, and sterling integrity, was not distressed on his daughter's account only. There was another cause of anxiety to him equally deep--we mean the mysterious change that had come over his sons, in consequence of this blasting calamity. He saw clearly that they had come to the dark and stern determination of avenging their sister's disgrace upon its author, and that at whatever risk. This in truth to him was the greater affliction of the two, and he accordingly addressed himself with all his authority and influence over them, to the difficult task of plucking this frightful resolution out of their hearts. In his attempt to execute this task, he found himself baffled and obstructed by other circumstances of a very distracting nature.
First, there were the rascally paragraphs alluding to his embarrassments on the one hand, and those which, while pretending to vindicate him and his partner from any risk of bankruptcy, levelled the assassin's blow at the reputation of his poor daughter, on the other. Both told; but the first with an effect which no mere moral courage or consciousness of integrity, however high, could enable him to meet. Creditors came in, alarmed very naturally at the reports against his solvency, and demanded settlement of their accounts from the firm. These, in the first instances, were immediately made out and paid; but this would not do--other claimants came, equally pressing--one after another--and each so anxious in the early panic to secure himself, that ere long the instability which, in the beginning, had no existence, was gradually felt, and the firm of Harman and M'Loughlin felt themselves on the eve of actual bankruptcy.
These matters all pressed heavily and bitterly on both father and sons.
But we have yet omitted to mention that which, amidst all the lights in which the daughter contemplated the ruin of her fair fame, fell with most desolating consequences upon her heart--we mean her rejection by Harman, and the deliberate expression of his belief in her guilt. And, indeed, when our readers remember how artfully the web of iniquity was drawn around her, and the circumstances of mystery in which Harman himself had witnessed her connection with Poll Doolin, whose character for conducting intrigues he knew too well, they need not be surprised that he threw her off as a deceitful and treacherous wanton, in whom no man of a generous and honorable nature could or ought to place confidence, and who was unworthy even of an explanation. Mary M'Loughlin could have borne everything but this. Yes; the abandonment of friends--of acquaintances--of a fickle world itself; but here it was where her moral courage foiled her. The very hope to which her heart had clung from its first early and innocent impulses--the man to whom she looked up as the future guide, friend, and partner of her life, and for whose sake and safety she had suffered herself to be brought within the meshes of her enemies and his--this man, her betrothed husband, had openly expressed his conviction of her being unfit to become his wife, upon hearing from his cousin and namesake an account of what that young man had witnessed. Something between a nervous and brain fever had seized her on the very night of this heinous stratagem; but from that she was gradually recovering when at length she heard, by accident, of Harman's having unequivocally and finally withdrawn from the engagement.
Under this she sank. It was now in vain to attempt giving her support, or cheering her spirits. Depression, debility, apathy, restlessness, and all the symptoms of a breaking constitution and a broken heart, soon began to set in and mark her for an early, and what was worse, an ignominious grave. It was then that her brothers deemed it full time to act. Their father, on the night before the day on which poor Raymond was rescued from death, observed them secretly preparing firearms,--for they had already, as the reader knows, satisfied themselves that M'Clutchy, junior, would not fight--took an opportunity of securing their weapons in a place where he knew they could not be found. This, however, was of little avail--they told him it must and should be done, and that neither he nor any other individual in existence should debar them from the execution of their just, calm, and reasonable vengeance--for such were their very words. In this situation matters were, when about eleven o'clock the next morning, Father Roche, who, from the beginning, had been there to aid and console, as was his wont, wherever calamity or sorrow called upon him, made his appearance in the family, much to the relief of M'Loughlin's mind, who dreaded the gloomy deed which his sons had proposed to themselves to execute, and who knew besides, that in this good and pious priest he had a powerful and eloquent ally. After the first salutations had passed, M'Loughlin asked for a private interview with him; and when they had remained about a quarter of an hour together, the three sons were sent for, all of whom entered with silent and sullen resolution strongly impressed on their stern, pale, and immovable features. Father Roche himself was startled even into something like terror, when he witnessed this most extraordinary change in the whole bearing and deportment of the young men, whom he had always known so buoyant and open-hearted.
"My dear young friends," said he, calmly and affectionately, "your father has just disclosed to me a circumstance, to which, did it not proceed from his lips, I could not yield credit. Is it true that you have come to the most unchristian and frightful determination of shedding blood?"
"Call it just and righteous," said John, calmly.
"Yes," followed the other two, "it is both."
"In his cowardly crime he has evaded the responsibility of law,"
continued John, "and we care not if his punishment goes beyond law itself. We will answer for it with our lives--but in the mean time, he must die."
"You see, Father Roche," observed M'Loughlin, "to what a hardened state the strong temptations of the devil has brought them."
"It is not that," said John; "it is affection for our injured sister, whom he has doubly murdered--it is also hatred of himself, and of the oppression we are receiving in so many shapes at his hands. He must die."
"Yes," repeated the two brothers, "he must die, it is now too late."
"Ha!" said the priest, "I understand you; there is an oath here."
The three brothers smiled, but spoke not.
"Are ye my sons?" said the father, in tears, "and will you, who were ever obedient and dutiful, disregard me now?"
"In this one thing we must," said John "we know you not now as our father. Am I right?" said he, addressing his brothers.
"You are right," they replied, "in this thing he is not our father."
"Great God!" said the priest, trembling with absolute dread at a scene so different from any he had ever witnessed, "Merciful Father, hear our prayers, and drive the evil spirits of vengeance and blood out of the hearts of these wicked men!"
"Amen!" said their father, "and rescue them from the strong temptations of the devil which are in them and upon them. Why do you not even pray to God--"
"--For strength to do it--we did, and we do," said John, interrupting him.
Father Roche looked at them, and there they stood, pale, silent, and with a smile upon their lips which filled him with a description of awe and fear that was new to him. Their father was little better; the perspiration stood on his brow, and as he looked at them, he at times began to doubt their very identity, and to believe that the whole interview might be a phantasma, or a hideous dream.
"You have sworn an oath," said the priest. "Rash and sinful men, you dared blasphemously to take, as it were, the Almighty into a league of blood! Do you not know that the creature you are about to slay is the work of your Creator, even as you are yourselves, and what power have you over his life? I see, I see," he added, "you have taken a sacrilegious oath of blood!"
"We have taken an oath of blood," said they, "and we will keep it."
"But is this just to your sister?" said the priest; "do you believe in the justice of an Almighty Providence? Is there no probability that, if this man lives, circumstances may come to light by which her fair and spotless character may be vindicated to the world? On the contrary, should you now take his life, you prevent any such possibility from ever happening; and your own rashness and ungodly crime, will be the means of sending her name down to posterity, foul and spotted with the imputation of woman's worst guilt. Is that love for your sister?"
Father Roche now began to see that he must argue with their passions--or with that strong affection for their sister, upon which these fearful passions were founded--rather than with their reason or their prejudices, which, in point of fact were now immovably set in the dark determination of crime.
"Do you forget," he added, "that there are laws in the country to pursue and overtake the murderer? Do you forget that you will die an ignominious death, and that, instead of acting an honorable part in life, as becomes your ancient and noble name, you will bequeath nothing to your parents but an inheritance of shame and infamy?"
"We have thought of all this before," said John.
"No, not all," said the youngest; "not all, but nearly."
"Well, nearly," said the other.
"Then," said the priest, "you will not hesitate to renounce your most foul and diabolical intention?"
"We have sworn it," said John, "and it must be done." To this the others calmly assented.
"Well, then," said the earnest Christian, "since you fear neither disgrace, nor shame, nor the force of human laws, nor the dread of human punishment, you are not so hardened as to bid defiance to the Almighty, by whom you will be judged. Has he not said, 'thou shalt do no murder?
and that whoso sheddeth blood, by man shall his blood be shed.' I now ask you," said he, "as one of the humblest of his accredited messengers, do you believe in God and fear him?"
"We are sworn," said John; "the blood of him who has dishonored our sister's name we will shed, and it is neither priest nor parent who will or shall prevent us."
"Is not a rash and unlawful oath a crime?" said Father Roche: "yes, and you know it is better broken than kept. I call upon you now, as your spiritual guide, to renounce that blasphemous oath of blood, and in the name of the Almighty and all powerful God, I command you to do it."
"We deny your right to interfere," replied John, "we are not now at confession--keep within your limits; for as sure as there is death and Judgment, so sure as we will fulfil our oath in avenging the disgrace of our sister. That ends all, and we will speak no more."
The good old man began to fear that he should be put to the most painful necessity of lodging informations before a magistrate, and thus become the means of bringing' disgrace and evil upon the family when it occurred to him to ask them a last question.
"My dear young men," said he, "I have forgotten, in the agitation of mind occasioned by the unprecedented disclosure of your evil and wilful intentions, to ask, if you so far renounce God as to refuse to worship him. Kneel down, and let us pray." He himself and their father knelt, but the three brothers stood as sullen and immovable as before. Tho priest uttered a short prayer, but their conduct so completely perplexed and shocked him, that he rose up, and with tears in his eyes, exclaimed--