"Begorra, ma'am, here it is, ma'am! I'm alludin' to the funeral, ma'am. Shure I made th' ould woman dresh me up in mee besht clothes thish day, ma'am, so I did. Fur it's Mishter Bairned McCafferty that's to be buried thish day, I sez, ma'am, sez I to th' ould woman, I sez, an' sez I, ever since I haird he wasn't expected, I sez, it's his wake I wants to be goin' to. An' if I wus too ould, I sez, to crossh over an' pay mee respechts when they waked him in the city, sez I, it'll be meeself, I sez, that'll shtand here an' watch 'em parade 'im to Calvary, ma'am, sez I."
Claire had a pity for the old man, at first. But before his speech ended he had roused in her a repulsion. He appeared quietly hilarious; he had produced several distinct chuckles, and his watery, peering eyes, which one of his misshapen hands soon shaded, revealed an actually gay twinkle.
"I don't see why you wanted to come out and watch the person go to his grave," said Claire. "What pleasure can that possibly give you?"
"Pleasure, ma'am, is it, ma'am?" was the startled response. "Why, shure, ma'am, it's the foinest funeral that's been seen in these parts, ma'am, fur manny a day! An' it's mee own son, Larry, that's drivin' the hairse, ye'll understand, ma'am, an' it's a proud day for Larry, so it is. Excuse me, ma'am, but do ye take sight o' the hairse yet?"
"Oh, yes; very well," said Claire. "It has a number of wooden ornaments along its top, that are gilded and look like large black cabbages." She gave a little burst of weary laughter as she finished the last sentence, whose irony was quite lost on her dim-sighted companion. "And its sides are glass," she continued, "and you can see the large coffin within quite plainly, and there are four horses with white and black plumes."
"An'—an'—the carriages, ma'am, if ye plaise, ma'am?" eagerly questioned the old man. "Shure there should be forty if there's wan, ma'am, an' a few loight wagons thrown in behoind as well. How's that, ma'am?"
"I think there must be forty," said Claire, turning a curious look on the questioner, as he bent excitedly forward to hear her answer. "And there are several light wagons, also."
The old man rubbed his weird hands together in gleeful ecstasy, nearly toppling over as he did so, because the act necessitated a transient disregard of the needful prop lent by his staff. "Shure I towld th' ould woman jusht that!" he cried, in great triumph. "Shure I sez to her, sez I, Barney McCafferty's too daicent a man, I sez, to go to his grave, sez I, anny less daicenter nor that, I sez. It'll be forty carriages, I sez, if it's wan. An' there'll be a shport or so, sez I to her, ma'am (bee thish shtick in mee hand, ma'am, I sed it, ma'am!) there'll be a shport or so that'll bring a buggy or so, sez I, for a woind up at the end, I sez, like the laugh that comes, ye mind, at the tail of a joke, I sez. An' it's you I'm thankful to, ma'am, fur the loan o' your two broight eyes, ma'am, that lets me see the soight that God's denied me, ma'am: an' I mean, wid a blessin' to yer, the shtyle o' the hairse an' the gineral natur o' the intertainmint altogether, ma'am, the Lord love yer fur yer frindly assistance!"
"Perhaps you can see the funeral better when it gets in front of the bridge," said Claire, somewhat kindly, but with a shocked sense still remaining. Her varied past, that had shown her so many differing human phases, had not till now presented to her the extraordinary fact of how positively festal are the associations with which the Irish, as our shores find them, are wont to accompany death. At the same time, she felt interested, and rather curious. She could always manage, on brief notice, to feel interested and curious regarding any fellow-creature; and this trait (one that has grown historic among the most noted charmers of her own sex) was now tested to perhaps its last limits.
"Does your son always drive hearses?" she continued, unconsciously looking at the old man as if he were something in a museum, to be marveled at for antiquity and strangeness, but not, on pain of expulsion, to be touched.