The Quiet Man and Other Stories Read online

  So, she and I, with Big Paudh Moran at our heels and Paddy Bawn paralleling us along the bank, moved up the stream a quarter of a mile; and I think that her brother was glad to see us go.

  We halted at a fine sweep of pool, where a sally bush leaned over at the breast of the curve on the other side. The slow current made a ripple amongst the trailing branches and curled into a small backwater under a clay bank. I pointed across.

  “An’ wasn’t I the dam’ fool to tell him,” came the anguished voice of Big Paudh.

  “Over there—with flukes like a barn-door,” I told her. “We’ll try him with a heavier fly. What have you got?”

  I went through her fly book, stocked mostly with highland killers too gaudy for our heavier streams, and chose her a double-hooked blae saltoun with scanty hackle and thin wing.

  “A bottom feeder, that fellow,” I explained as I tied the fly on at the tip. “Nymphs out of the egg, and we need weight. Let your fly sink and strike hard at the first touch.”

  “I know.”

  She slipped into the gravelly edge of the pool and began making tentative fly-wetting casts, lengthening her line as she went deeper in.

  “Careful!” I warned. “You’ll be over the top.”

  “Felt a trickle already,” she called laughingly.

  I went and sat on a low green bank back from the pool, and Paddy Bawn came and sat at my side. Big Paudh stood out on the gravel, one hand scratching perplexedly behind his ear. We watched her silently, thinking our own thoughts.

  A supple, finely strung girl in her riding-breeches and brown blouse; and the sun, shining up the valley, brightened a lock of the red hair that had escaped from under her tweed hat. . . . A small and lonely bit of a girl set here amongst us in a tortured land, fishing carefree in a false peace! . . . Her brother was a dashed fool ever to bring her here. His was a peaceful area, indeed, thanks mostly to his own understanding of the breed, but that understanding should have told him that the peace was a false one and might shatter at any hour—as it was shattered now . . . though this girl did not know that yet.

  I was sorry for her then, and with that sorrow came a strange small wave of feeling that was almost tenderness. We must be careful of this girl. Whatever happened, we must set a wall of safety about her—kindness, gentleness, the saving salt of humor—and she must not know anything of the fear and wearing effort in which we lived day and night.

  Paddy Bawn’s thoughts must have been running on the same lines as mine. “A nice bit of a girl, sure enough!” he murmured. “God bless her! Maybe her brother’ll have sense, after all.”

  “The Scots are a pig-headed breed.”

  “Sticky! They’d go to hell for a friend. I mind once over in Pittsburgh—his name was MacRae—”

  The girl laid down a nice fly dangerously close to the trailing branches of the sally, and the current took it deep and sure to the edge of the backwater. I saw the point of the rod jerk.

  “Strike!” I urged under my breath.

  And she struck. But alas! What with light rod, double-barbed hook and heavy water, the strike lacked firmness. The rod leaped and curved half-circle, and a wide fluke came out of the water and threshed under.

  “You’re into him. Point up!”

  But the point came up of itself with a jerk, and the cast looped out of the water and tangled. That was all.

  “Oh, damn!” cried that girl with all her heart.

  And on my feet, stamping the gravel, I forgot the lady in the angler.

  “Thunder! That’s no way to strike a big fish. Come out of it, woman!”

  She looked at me over her shoulder, eyes wide and mouth a little open.

  “Jasus, Owen Jordan!” came Big Paudh’s shocked protest. “That’s no way to talk to a lady. Have you no bloody manners at all?”

  “Sorry!” I said. “I forgot—”

  And there she threw back her head and laughed, a laugh that was rueful enough, but had no pique in it. She waded slowly out of the pool, her line trailing in the water.

  “Remember—in Castletown—you promised to show me a good fish? Are you sorry?”

  “I am sorry I was rude.”

  “Not very rude—for an angler. But my rod was a bit light, wasn’t it?”

  “True for you, miss,” lied Big Paudh.

  “No use trying again?”

  “Divil a bit!” said Paudh hurriedly. “He’ll have a puss on him for days.”

  “Next week, perhaps,” I promised her.

  “But I am going away tomorrow. This was to be our last day on the Ullachowen. Oh, dear!”

  “You used stronger language half a minute ago.”

  She laughed. The little tension or suspicion of the afternoon was suddenly gone. So! She was going away next day. And her brother? Her brother, even now, was having things put before him by Hugh Forbes and Mickeen Oge Flynn—and tomorrow was a long way off.

  “Do you know,” said the girl, “I could do with a sandwich, and Archie—my brother—has my packet in his bag.”

  Big Paudh slung his wicker creel to the front. “Johanna Dillane above filled a paper bag, miss—and two bottles of milk.”

  “You darling man.”

  We sat on the green bank, our feet in the fine river gravel, and ate sandwiches companionably, for the girl insisted that we share with her. Big Paudh watched her diffidently and schooled himself to take ridiculously small bites instead of his usual snap and gulp; Paddy Bawn, after the continent fashion of the fighter, merely nibbled at his sandwich, and stared across the width of the pool as he chewed. She, unconcernedly, arched back her neck to the tip-tilted bottle, and the milk gurgled as she drank. A lovely long neck, and one might have a childish urge to smooth the velvet of it with a fingertip.

  “Don’t get your tongue stuck,” I warned her.

  “Teach your grandmother,” she gave back, and a little pearl of milk trickled on that firm chin—a longish chin, and obstinate, as I know.

  And there I began to rewonder at the quirkiness of life. An hour or two ago we had been strung to kill, and here, now, we were lazying in a valley of peace—though it was a false peace—and making a girl out of another world feel at ease. . . . And tomorrow? Tomorrow I might be at the other side of the new moon.

  And the girl began to wonder, too. Her jaws moved slowly, and she looked all about her, strange speculations behind her eyes; and, somehow, I was able to look behind those dark eyes and follow the wonderings in her mind.

  The sun shone brilliantly up the valley, and the shadows of the scattered trees were long and dark on the green carpet of the grass; over the high brown crowns of the hills the sails of the clouds of evening were scattered widely on the blue; across the river and back again a swallow zigzagged on fleet wings; and above the lonesome aloof wimpling of the water the thrushes were beginning to tune up for evensong, and a solitary green linnet kept piping its one run. A valley set apart for quietude, surely. That was the very thought in her mind. And she sighed.

  And from the valley the girl turned to us, quiet men all, quiet as this valley below the hills, and the wonder deepened in her eyes. One by one, she looked us over: ox-eyed Paudh Moran diffident with shyness; strong-browed Paddy Bawn with the immobile face and steadfast eyes; myself of the black-avised, lean American seriousness. Were we men of the Flying Columns, the terrible men, and was she sitting with us unafraid? She was not afraid. In that secret place of womanly intuition she knew that we were men no woman need fear; she felt that in blood and bone and mind there was a sibness between herself and us. . . . We were men who held our hands from killing because of a woman . . . ? I could follow every turn of her mind. Her eyes opened at me.

  “Was that really an ambush—back there?”

  Because of what was in her mind I prevaricated.

  “Just an observation post.”

  “And you had hundreds of men posted—”

  “You saw all there were of us.”

  “But the Black-and-Tans—the police—are t
errible fighters. They speak of the hundreds—”

  “Faith! an’ they do so,” put in Big Paudh.

  Paddy Bawn chuckled. “I mind myself and Matt Tobin, just for devilment—we had a pint or two taken, it could be—and we couldn’t do much harm in the dark. Anyway, the two of us held up a lorry-load of Tans a whole night at Monreddan Chapel, firing a shot here and there and letting a screech out of us to wake the dead. And next morning we were two columns, or maybe three, and twenty of us toes cocked—according to the Tans.”

  “Ay, faith!” agreed Big Paudh.

  “If we had hundreds—or, rather, equipment for hundreds—” I began.

  She threw a hand out impulsively, persuasively. “But what chance can you have—what hope?”

  “We often wonder.”

  “England—Britain is so resolute, pig-headed if you like. In all her history she has never been the first to cry enough.”

  “Once,” said I, “where I come from.”

  “Oh, yes! You are an American.” A trace of contempt was in her tone. “Why do you fight here?”

  “England is the one nation worth having a whirl at. My father taught me that.”

  “Poor teaching—”

  “The finest in the world. My father spent ten years in an English prison—he was a Fenian. You are not English, are you?”

  She stamped an impatient foot. “But how long is this—this folly to go on?”

  “I couldn’t tell you that,” said I mildly. “But my grandsons will continue the fight—if necessary.”

  “What?” she cried in complete surprise.

  “My wife,” said I, “will rear sons to carry on.”

  “You are married, then?”

  “I am not. But—”

  “That fellow!” Big Paudh was as nearly derisive as he could be. “He wouldn’t look at a girl, an’ she Grecian Helen, as the song says.” He chewed ruminatively. “An’ coortin’ a dam’ pleasant occupation, an’ no harm in it. Paddy Bawn, do you mind purty Grania Grace beyant in Grianaan, with her heart in her eyes an’ she peepin’ at the lad here?”

  “Shut your big mouth!” Paddy Bawn advised him firmly.

  Margaid MacDonald looked at me curiously, some new speculation in her eyes, and that speculation I could not follow. Then she smiled, and a gentle mocking was in the voice that followed every falling cadence of Paudh’s soft brogue.

  “Grania Grace! What a lovely name! An’ she peepin’ at him out of lovely eyes, no doubt. An’ he wouldn’t even look at her!”

  “You people shouldn’t speak with your mouths full,” I admonished them sourly.

  Big Paudh swallowed hastily and nearly strangled; and the girl threw up her chin, after a fashion of her own, and laughed with an odd merriment.

  “Big children of fighting men!” And then, “Is your great Hugh Forbes without a wife, too?”

  A thought struck me. “He talks of going to Scotland for a red-haired one.”

  “To Scotland?”

  “Why not? He says the finest red hair comes out of the Highlands, and,” my eyes on the sun-rich band below her hat, “I am inclined to agree with him.”

  “Splendid—splendid!” She clapped her hands, and a touch of color came exquisitely to her face.

  Big Paudh took a little time to get the drift. “The first dacent thing he ever said in all his life!” he cried then.

  “And no more than the truth,” said Paddy Bawn, who would one day swallow his words.

  “Propaganda!” She laughed. “You are trying to make a Sinn Feiner out of me.”

  “It might be in the blood of you,” I told her, “and in your brother’s, too. Here he comes now, to answer for himself.”

  Captain Archibald MacDonald, Hugh Forbes and Mickeen Oge Flynn came round the curve of the pool, and, judging by his face, the British officer was depressed and a little angry.

  Hugh was serene as the evening. He looked us over as we rose, the sandwich papers scattered at our feet, and nodded his black head.

  “Truckling with the enemy.”

  He came directly to the girl and bent a little over her.

  “Tell me, Margaid MacDonald, are you as pig-headed as your brother?”

  “I couldn’t be, could I, Mr. Forbes?” She smiled at him.

  “It would be hard for you, mo colleen dheas. Listen! We are merely suggesting that he go back to Castletown and forget everything and every one he has seen today. Quite simple, isn’t it, seeing that he is leaving the country tomorrow?”

  Her answer came without hesitation. “But he could not do that. He is a British officer.”

  “You might be your brother’s sister, after all—I don’t know yet. Look now! Take your own case.” His great voice half-coaxed her. “Your memory—not so good sometimes?”

  “It could be very bad—oh, but!—” And for the first time, I think, an inkling of the hard reality of the situation came home to her. She and her brother had seen enough to spoil all our plans, and this was a country at war.

  There was dismay in the look that went round us circle of men; and when her eyes came to me they looked deep into mine for one piercing second. Then she gazed on the ground, and the color that had come slowly to her cheeks ebbed more slowly away. I knew, then, that she was in awe of her own thoughts, and that her thoughts were those of a woman and not at all of the problem set her.

  Still in that dark muse she went to her brother and took hold of the lapels of his coat.

  “Archie, I am afraid.”

  “Nonsense, Margaid!” He slapped her shoulder lightly. “Nothing to be afraid of.”

  “But you do not understand. How could you? I am afraid to stay here. I must—I want to get away—home, Scotland. Something—anything—might happen. Oh, but!—” She could not explain any more. “Could I?” She turned quickly to Hugh Forbes. “You would not harm my brother?”

  He was almost rude. “Hell, girl! Nothing you can do or say, nothing the whole dam’ British forces can do, will bring harm to your brother from us. You may make your choice freely.”

  She did not choose for a time, and then she sighed resignedly, almost forlornly.

  “No. I cannot promise anything. I am British, too.”

  Hugh held up two thumbs before her eyes. “You and your brother—and pig-headed stands. Very well, Britons! You are now prisoners.”

  She nodded, and put him a final question. “Prisoners? Does that mean—prison?”

  “No, my dear.” There could be wonderful depth to his voice. “We’ll keep you with us. We will spread green rushes under your feet, and put our hands under them so that you may step softly.”

  She looked down at her riding-breeches and knee-boots. “But I have nothing to wear.”

  Hugh laughed. “Briton first and woman behind all! Your suitcases should be up at Sean Glynn’s now.”

  “You are unwise, Forbes,” said Captain MacDonald, his voice not hiding his irritation. “You would serve your cause better by letting us go, and, then, clearing your men out of here.”

  “The game has to be played where the board is set. You ought to know that, MacDonald.”

  “And the board will get kicked over on you. This whole valley will be combed out by search parties—soldiers, too. You can never hold us.”

  Hugh threw his hand wide. “Here is the valley of the Ullachowen, and there my own Glounagrianaan running down to the sea, and over there the Glen of Garabhmore, and beyond it Lough Aonach and the valley of the Dunmore—benns, and glens, and water, and islands in the water. We’ll hold you, Briton.”

  “I’ll escape in spite of you, by God!”

  “Let God choose. You are going to have the time of your life.”

  But the girl said nothing at all.

  Chapter IV

  I

  IT was the second night after the ambush at Coolbeigh Bridge in Glounagrianaan, and the second night was always our worst. As this is not a chronicle of the Black-and-Tan war I will say nothing more of that ambush than that we cut
off a lorry-load of Tans, had two men killed, three wounded, and a third bullet-hole through Matt Tobin’s bowler hat. Thereafter we jumped twenty miles to Big Michael Flynn’s place at Lough Aonach, where our prisoners were held for the time.

  Big Michael Flynn was Mickeen Oge’s uncle, and he ran the Anglers’ Hotel above the lough. It was one of the least unsafe of our hide-out places, for it was ten miles from the nearest railway station at Castletown, and the mountain road between had been trenched in four places, so that no military lorries might surprise us while we rested. Of course, there were no anglers in residence, nor had there been any for two years, since not even the most hard-bitten sportsman cared to risk his skin in that unrestful land. Captain Archibald MacDonald, our prisoner, had the pick of the finest fishing in the world.

  We lay about in the lounge, a wide, low, beamed room, with a great open fireplace wherein a peat fire smoldered out of white ash; and that red glow was the only light. There were Hugh Forbes, Mickeen Oge Flynn, Paddy Bawn Enright, Captain MacDonald, his sister Margaid, Kate O’Brien and Joan Hyland. Outside the open french window Big Paudh Moran leaned over the veranda rail and kept in touch with the sentinel posted at the gate of the drive.

  The two Irish girls, Kate O’Brien and Joan Hyland, were companions for our female prisoner. Dark Kate O’Brien, as fervid a republican as Mickeen Oge Flynn, was the niece of a British major-general; and Joan Hyland, tall and fair, was Sean Glynn’s sweetheart. Sean was still at headquarters on his dangerous secret-service work, and his sweetheart was keenly disturbed about him; for she knew that more than one intelligence officer had gone up to the heart of things in Dublin and had never come out alive.

  Most of us were in wicker chairs in a wide circle about the hearth, but Hugh Forbes, in his own characteristic fashion, lay full length on a glass-topped table by the wall, his hat under his poll, pipe aside in his teeth, and silence on him like a pall. We were all silent. And the summer night, fallen softly outside the wide windows, was silent too; and Lough Aonach, a quarter-mile below us, spread out its wan and lonely pallor below the silent hills.

  The second night after an ambush was always our worst night. That inescapable reaction after fight was then at its peak; our nerves gone all slack. Oppressed, depressed, wondering what it was all about, no longer sure of ourselves or even of our cause, we just slumped there in the lounge and waited for something to take us out of the black mood. And we were hopelessly silent.