CHAPTER XXIV. GIOVANNI UNMASKED
Can sight and hearing—even touch deceive?
Or, is this real?
Play.
Probably, in all his varied life, Cashel had never passed a day less to his satisfaction than that spent at Drumcoologan. His mind, already tortured by anxieties, was certainly not relieved by the spectacle that presented itself to his eyes. The fearful condition of a neglected Irish property, where want, crime, disease, and destitution were combined, was now seen by him for the first time. There was one predominant expression on and over everything,—“Despair.” The almost roofless cabin, the scarce-clad children, the fevered father stretched upon his bed of clay, the starving mother, with a dying infant at her bosom, passed before him like the dreadful images of a dream. And then he was to hear from his agent, that these were evils for which no remedy existed: “there had always been fever in Ireland;” “dirt they were used to;” want of clothing had become “natural” to them; falsehood was the first article of their creed; their poverty was only fictitious,—this one owned several cows; the other had money in a savings' bank; and so on. In fact, he had to hear that every estate had its plague-spot of bad characters, where crime and infamy found a refuge; and that it might be poor morality, but good policy, to admit of the custom.
Confused by contradictory statements, wearied by explanations, to understand which nothing short of a life long should have passed in studying the people,—imposed upon by some, unjust towards others,—he listened to interminable discussions without one gleam of enlightenment—and, what is far worse, without one ray of hope; the only piece of satisfaction he derived from the visit being, that Hoare had consented to advance a sum of money upon mortgage of the property, which, in his secret soul, Cashel resolved should be a purchase, and not a mere loan. The object he had in view was to buy off Linton's claim upon the cottage; and having settled all his most pressing debts, to retire for some years to the Continent, till a sufficient sum should have accumulated to permit him to recommence his life as a country gentleman, in a manner and with views very different from what he had hitherto done. He hoped, by travel, to improve his mind and extend his knowledge; he trusted that, by observing the condition of the peasant in different countries of Europe, he might bring back with him certain suggestions applicable to his own tenantry; and, at all events, he determined that the resources of his large fortune should no longer be squandered in meaningless debauch, so long as real destitution and grinding misery lay at his very door. He made many a good and noble resolve, and, like most men in such cases, with youth on their side, he was impatient to begin to act upon them.
It was, then, with a feeling like that of a liberated prisoner, he heard from Mr. Kennyfeck that, although Mr. Hoare and himself had yet many preliminaries to arrange, which might detain them several hours longer, he might now return homeward to Tubbermore, where his company were doubtless in anxious expectation of his coming. There were two roads which led to Drumcoologan,—one was a species of carriage-road, by which they had come that morning; the other was a mere bridle-path over the mountain, and though shorter in mileage, required fully as much time, if not more, to travel. Refusing the assistance of a guide, and preferring to be alone, he set out by himself, and on foot, to pursue the way homeward.
It was the afternoon of a sharp, clear winter's day, when the bracing air and the crisp atmosphere elevate the spirits, and make exercise the most pleasurable of stimulants; and as Cashel went along, he began to feel a return of that buoyancy of heart which had been so peculiarly his own in former days. The future, to which his hope already lent its bright colors, was rapidly erasing the past, and in the confidence of his youth he was fashioning a hundred schemes of life to come.
The path along which he travelled lay between two bleak and barren mountains, and followed the course of a little rivulet for several miles. There was not a cabin to be seen; not a trace of vegetation brightened the dreary picture; not a sheep, nor even a goat, wandered over the wild expanse. It was a solitude the most perfect that could be conceived. Roland often halted to look around him, and each time his eye wandered to a lofty peak of rock on the very summit of the mountain, and where something stood which he fancied might be a human figure. Although gifted with strong power of vision, the great height prevented his feeling any degree of certainty; so that he abandoned the effort, and proceeded on his way for miles without again thinking on the subject. At last, as he was nearing the exit of the glen, he looked up once more; the cliff was now perceptible in its entire extent, and the figure was gone! He gave no further thought to the circumstance, but seeing that the day was declining fast, increased his speed, in order to reach the high-road before night closed in. Scarcely had he proceeded thus more than half a mile, when he perceived, full in front of him, about a couple of hundred yards distant, a man seated upon a stone beside the pathway. Cashel had been too long a wanderer in the wild regions of the “Far West,” not to regard each new-comer as at least a possible enemy. His prairie experience had taught him that men do not take their stand in lonely and unfrequented spots without an object; and so, without halting, which might have awakened suspicion in the other, he managed to slacken his pace somewhat, and thus gave himself more time for thought. He well knew that, in certain parts of Ireland, landlord murder had become frequent; and although he could not charge himself with any act which should point him out as a victim, his was not a mind to waste in casuistry the moments that should be devoted more practically. He was perfectly unarmed, and this consideration rendered him doubly cautious. The matter, however, had but few issues. To go back would be absurd; to halt where he was, still more so. There was nothing, then, for it but to advance; and he continued to do so, calmly and warily, till about twenty paces from the rock where the other sat, still and immovable. Then it was that, dropping on one knee, the stranger threw back a cloak that he wore, and took a deliberate aim at him.
The steady precision of the attitude was enough to show Cashel that the man was well versed in the use of firearms. The distance was short, also, and the chance of escape consequently, the very smallest imaginable. Roland halted, and crossing his arms upon his breast, stood to receive the fire exactly as he would have done in a duel. The other never moved; his dark eye glanced along the barrel without blinking, and his iron grasp held the weapon still pointed at Cashel's heart.