CHAPTER VI
The conversation between his brother and Mrs. Aron was not overheard by Ulick. As the nervous young mare was cold and impatient, he had hastily mounted, and ridden away through the demesne. After an hour’s exercise he returned home, hurried up to his room, hunted out his money, and, taking what was called “the dairy pony,” galloped off to “The Arms.” He told himself that he could just do it, and be back in time for dinner at eight o’clock, for Mrs. Doran kept fashionable hours. Fashionable hours cost nothing; a chop at six is the same price as a chop two hours later.
When Ulick arrived at “The Arms,” a comfortable family hotel, the resort of tourists in search of fishing and scenery—the fishing a fiction, the scenery a delightful fact—he went to the bar and asked for Mrs. Aron. The landlady replied in person.
“Sure she is upstairs, after packing, and a bit tired, sir. If you will come along with me I will let her know”; and Mrs. Hogan conducted him into the best sitting-room.
In a few minutes Mrs. Aron entered, still wearing her bonnet and cloak.
“So you have brought it, I suppose?” she began abruptly.
“Yes. I’m awfully sorry: it’s only nine pounds after all.”
“Oh, I’ll make it do, and I am ever so much obliged to you; you’ll be no loser by me,” she added with emphasis.
“I am sorry my people were—were—a bit rough, and I hope you won’t tell my aunt more than you can possibly help. I know my mother has been bothered lately with several things, and I daresay my aunt would be vexed if she heard that she had not——well, you know what I mean: ignorance is bliss.”
“Young man, you never said a truer word!” declared Mrs. Aron, with unexpected emphasis. As she spoke she rose and walked over to the glass above the chimney-piece, leaving the money on the table. Ulick sat for a moment buried in thought; then he turned about to look for his cap. It was on the floor. He stooped for it, and when he raised his head Mrs. Aron had disappeared. In her place stood a tall, rather elegant woman with a slight figure and quantities of grey hair.
Ulick Doran started to his feet, and stared at the lady in stupefied silence. The stranger was the first to speak.
“Come here and give me a kiss, Ulick; I am your aunt Nora.”
“But why—and where?” he stammered, and held back.
“Oh, ever so many whys! As to where? Here is Mrs. Aron—my own name backwards;” and she lifted the wadded cloak from the sofa, then held up the bonnet and front. “It was a capital disguise, was it not?”
“Surely quite unnecessary—and why?”
“That is the second time you have asked why? Sit down there, and you shall hear all there is to it. I wished to see your mother, your brother, and yourself—what you called ‘unknownst’—and find out what you were like.”
“And, by Jove, you have been most unfortunately successful!”
“Not altogether unfortunate——”
“But I don’t think it was fair, Aunt Nora,” he protested; “I don’t think it was playing the game!”
“Well, there we differ. I am a rich woman. Tom agreed that our money is to go to the Dorans, my brother’s children, and I naturally wanted to discover what sort of people the Dorans were? As a girl, I was wild, and fond of fun and dancing; but my father, who was a very stern old man, kept me all but locked up. He had forgotten his own youth, poor man, and even his middle age. He married, you know, late in life. I was full of spirits, and daring, and once I got out and dressed up in Katty Foley’s clothes and went to a wake as her cousin, a strange young woman from Dublin. I was glad to see Katty. That’s a nice bright girl of hers; she has some notions, and is real well-looking. Well, to go on with my story, I had a great success. I could take off the brogue to the life, and at the wake I met Tom, and that was the beginning of the end.”
“But did you never go out at all, in your own rank of life—meet people?”
“Never, except to church, and now and then after the hounds. The only pleasure I had at all, was through your father, and you see he went to India. Tom Grogan was handsome and steady, and well enough educated. He had a place offered him in the States. I was just crazy to see the world. I loved Tom, and I ran away with him, and never regretted it, which is more than some can say. He has always been just lovely to me. We have worked hard and done well, and out there we are as good as any—being respectable, self-respecting, and real rich. I often longed to come over and see the old place, but I was ashamed to face people and the talk. However, then Tom had a sudden call to London, and I came with him—almost at a moment’s notice. The idea was his to start with: I got a hustle on, and felt I’d just got to do it, and that was all there was to it, and fixed myself up as you see, a week and more ago; and then I was laid up with a real bad cold. Mrs. Hogan herself nursed me. She knows—she actually knew me when the bonnet was off. But she can keep my secret, and she will. Of course, my dear boy, I’m not going to take your money. I was only trying and testing you, like an old witch in a fairy tale. I’m real glad I met you in the avenue this evening, for to tell you the truth I felt so discouraged I was going right away, never wishing to see a Doran again.”
“I don’t know what my mother will say, and Barky, when I tell them,” said Ulick, after a pause.
“That is immaterial, Ulick. I wish you would come over to Queenstown with me to-morrow, and meet Tom; he would be real glad to know you.”
Ulick shook his head.
“Thank you, Aunt Nora, but I could not get away now. I’ve ever so many young hunters on hand. Duffy is sick.”
“Why, it sounds like old times to hear his name! Do you know that we once had a boy called Ulick; he was killed in a lift accident when he was eleven years of age, and now we have no one belonging to us whatever.”
“I’m awfully sorry for you, Aunt Nora, and for your disappointment here. I am not much good at talking, but——”
“But better at doing.”
“And I had better be going.”
“No, no; here is Mrs. Hogan with the tray. You will just stay and keep your aunt Nora company, and let us get to know one another a bit, my dear boy.”
So Ulick was persuaded, and he and his aunt made friends; he was so like her dear brother, not only in appearance, but ways, that she almost felt that it was she and the Ulick of her young days, once more tête-à-tête, and it was an easy matter to take his boy into her heart. The poor fellow, she knew, had a scanty allowance, and yet he had brought his little all, to his aunt’s old begging friend; she secretly resolved that that kindly meant loan, should be repaid by a great fortune. Mrs. Grogan drew the lad out about his regiment, his comrades, his plans, and tastes. She made him promise to write her long letters, to keep her well posted in his affairs, and ultimately to go over, and visit them. At ten o’clock she rose, and said—
“Now I must turn you out, for I’ve an early start to-morrow.”
“You won’t think too badly of my mother and Barky, will you?” he pleaded.
“My dear, I am not going to think of them, one mite! At first I felt mad: now I’m as cool as a cucumber. You are enough for me. You may tell them it’s no matter, and they have got no need to worry. Now, good-bye, my dear Ulick, and bless you. Keep a corner in your heart for your old American auntie”; and she kissed him affectionately on both cheeks.
Two or three minutes later the patient dairy pony was on his way home. It was considerably after ten o’clock when Ulick entered the dining-room and found his mother and Barky still sitting there. (For one thing it economised candle-light, and for another, Barky could smoke to his heart’s content.)
“Ulick, this is a pretty hour for you to be coming home!” began his mother, in a high, excited key, “and you never told me you were dining out. I suppose these are military manners? Where have you been, pray?”
“At ‘The Arms.’ I’ve had my dinner. I did not intend to stay, and I had no way of letting you know. I am sorry you waited.”
“Oh, oh! I expect you were hob-nobbing with some lady, if the truth were known, you sly fox,” cried Barky.
“Well, yes, you’ve made a good shot. I was dining with a lady. Now for it,” said Ulick to himself.
“I know! The old bag-woman! Ha, ha, ha!”
“Yes. And the old bag-woman turns out to be—who do you think? Our aunt Nora herself!”
“Ah, man alive, you’re drunk,” shouted Barky, pushing back his chair.
“Not I. I met her in the avenue this afternoon. I went down with a small loan I promised her, and after I got there, and saw her, she suddenly slipped off bonnet, wig, and cloak, and turned into a handsome, well-dressed, elderly lady!”
Mrs. Doran, for once in her life, was too horrified to speak; her feelings were beyond the power of expression. Words failed her, and she simply sat glaring at her youngest son, as if he were some horrible monster.
“She said she had long wished to come home and see us all, and what we were like?” he resumed, “but could not face the situation. At last, as her husband was over on business, she accompanied him, and explored about here, as you saw.”
“Good-bye to her money!” roared Barky. “Mother, you’ve done me out of a million dollars, if all you told me that you said to her is true!”
Mrs. Doran’s face had become mottled with red patches.
“Just what comes of associating with low company. A lady would never have played us such a trick,” she said, when she had at last found her voice. “Is she going away early to-morrow?”
“Yes, to Queenstown, to catch the American boat.”
“Then I’ll write a line at once”—rising as she spoke.
“Mother,” protested Barky, “don’t.”
“Yes, I certainly will. I’ll apologise, and explain. After all, she has only herself to thank for her cool reception. Your aunt had no business to come home as a masquerader, and she really got what she deserved; but I will send her a nice letter. Tom shall take the dairy pony and ride down.”
Once again the dairy pony carried an errand to Mrs. Aron at “The Arms,” but on the last occasion he had his journey for nothing—to Mrs. Doran’s note there was no reply.