Ned Brennan, stirring out of his drunken doze, muttered thickly: "Ah, God blast yourselves and your college, can't you let a fellow have a sleep be the fire after his hard day!"
CHAPTER XXII
John went from the kitchen to a restless night. Soon after daybreak he got up and looked out of the window. The crows had been flying across it darkly since the beginning of the light. He gazed down now towards the stretch of trees about the lake. They were dark figures in the somber picture. He had not seen them since autumn, and even then some of the brightness of summer had lingered with them. Now they looked as if they had been weeping. He could see the lake between the clumps of fir-trees. The water was all dark like the scene in which it was framed. It now beat itself into a futile imitation of billows, into a kind of make-believe before the wild things around that it was an angry sea, holding deep in its caverns the relics of great dooms. But the trees seemed to rock in enjoyment and to join forces with the wild things in tormenting the lake.
John looked at the clock. It was early hours, and there would be no need to go out for a long time. He went back to bed and remained there without sleep, gazing up at the ceiling.... He fell to thinking of what he would have to face in the valley now.... His mother had hinted at the wide scope of it last night when she said that she would rather anything in God's world had happened than this thing, this sudden home-coming.... She was thinking only of her own pride. It was an offense against her pride, he felt, and that was all. It stood to lessen the exalted position which the purpose of his existence gave her before the other women of the valley. But he had begun to feel the importance of his own person in the scheme of circumstance by which he was surrounded. It had begun to appear to him that he mattered somehow; that in some undreamt-of way he might leave his mark upon the valley before he died.
He would go to Mass in Garradrimna this morning. He very well knew how this attendance at morning Mass was a comfort to his mother. He was about to do this thing to please her now. Yet, how was the matter going to affect himself? He would be stared at by the very walls and trees as he went the wet road into Garradrimna; and no matter what position he might take up in the chapel there would be very certain to be a few who would come kneeling together into a little group and, in hushed tones within the presence of their God upon the altar, say:
"Now, isn't that John Brennan I see before me, or can I believe my eyes? Aye, it must be him. Expelled, I suppose. Begad that's great. Expelled! Begad!" If he happened to take the slightest side-glance around, he would catch glimpses of eyes sunk low beneath brows which published expressions midway between pity and contempt, between delight and curiosity.... In some wonderful way the first evidence of his long hoped for downfall would spread throughout the small congregation. Those in front would let their heads or prayerbooks fall beside or behind them, so that they might have an excuse for turning around to view the young man who, in his unfortunate presence here, stood for this glad piece of intelligence. The acolytes serving Father O'Keeffe, and having occasional glimpses of the congregation, would see the black-coated figure set there in contradistinction to Charlie Clarke and the accustomed voteens with the bobbing bonnets. In their wise looks up at him they would seem to communicate the news to the priest.
And although only a very few seconds had elapsed, Father O'Keeffe would have thrown off his vestments and be going bounding towards the Presbytery for his breakfast as John emerged from the chapel. It would be an ostentatious meeting. Although he had neither act nor part in it, nor did he favor it in any way, Father O'Keeffe always desired people to think that it was he who was "doing for Mrs. Brennan's boy beyond in England." ... There would be the usual flow of questions, a deep pursing of the lips, and the sudden creation of a wise, concerned, ecclesiastical look at every answer. Then there was certain to come the final brutal question: "And what are you going to do with yourself meanwhile, is it any harm to ask?" As he continued to stare up vacantly at the ceiling, John could not frame a possible answer to that question. And yet he knew it would be the foremost of Father O'Keeffe's questions.