We certainly owed a great deal to the Meejer. It was the Meejer, we discovered, who had broken an air-hole in the hermetically-sealed window. “An’ faith, though he give us the money to put in the glass agin, we never got it done afther. It’s a very backwards place here.” The Meejer’s sense of decorum had prescribed the muslin curtains that shielded the interior from the rude gazer’s eye. The Meejer had compelled the purchase of a jug and basin, and “a beautiful clane pair o’ sheets, that not a one ever slep in but himself.” In fact, what of civilisation there was, was due to his beneficent influence, and we rose up and said that the Meejer was blessed. Our dinner was an admirable meal; a blend of the resources of the luncheon-basket and of Mrs. Joyce; its only drawback being that, forgetful, as she herself admitted, of the precepts of the Meejer, she had put the teapot down “on the coals to dhraw,” and the result was a liquid that would have instantly made me sick, and would have kept my second cousin awake in agony till she died next morning. So we avoided the tea.
“SITTING ON LITTLE STOOLS INSIDE THE BIG FIREPLACE.”
“Back in the room” was a small whitewashed place with an earthern floor as clean, though not quite as dry, as the one in the kitchen. A big four-poster bed filled one end of it, and a red painted press, a square table, a huge American chest with the washing apparatus on it, and two or three chairs, were the rest of the furnishing. But though the upholstery was of a simple character, it was evident that the decorative sense was not lacking. The walls were lavishly hung with fervidly coloured religious prints; two or three sheets of an illustrated fishing fly-list had a place of honour near the widow’s patron saint over the fireplace, the gorgeous salmon flies being probably regarded by the younger Joyces as portraits of some new kind of angel; and drapery’s adventitious aid was lent by the suspended wardrobe of the family, both male and female, which relieved the severities of the bedposts, and gave a little air of interesting mystery to the corners of the room. Rather more than half the room had a rough ceiling of boards, and near the door we noticed a ladder leading up to the loft thus made. We had felt anxious about the bestowal of the widow and her family, not knowing what duties the four-poster might not be called upon to perform, and as the witching hour of ten o’clock drew nigh, and the low murmur of Joyce discourse still continued, we had made up our minds to ask what the arrangements might be, when there came a tap at the door.
“I beg yer honour’s pardon, Miss,” said our hostess’ soft, polite voice, “but would there be any harm in meself and the children goin’ above up to the loft?”
We said no, quite the contrary, and after some whispering and giggling outside the door, a procession of Joyces slowly filed up the ladder, headed by the younger sons of the house, and followed by the widow and the daughters. The last pair of stout red legs was hoisted off the ladder, the rustling and pounding overhead gradually subsided, and my second cousin and I found ourselves face to face with the most serious situation—not excepting either the bulldog or the runaway—of the expedition. The fear of interruption had hitherto prevented us from making as thorough investigation as we might have wished, and now we “stared at each other with a wild surmise, silent upon a peak in Darien.” Then she said—
“I’ll look.”