“That is,” replied I, my dear father, “no means which may be legitimately employed by one of your profession.”
“I tell you, no means that can be used by man to recover his defrauded rights. Tell me not of legitimate means, when I am to lose a title and property by a spurious and illegitimate substitution! By the God of heaven, I will meet them with fraud for fraud, with false swearing for false swearing, and with blood for blood, if it should be necessary! My brother has dissolved all ties, and I will have my right, even if I demand it with a pistol at his ear.”
“For Heaven’s sake, my dear father, do not be so violent—recollect your profession.”
“I do,” replied he bitterly; “and how I was forced into it, against my will. I recollect my father’s words, the solemn coolness with which he told me, ‘I had my choice of the Church, or—to starve.’—But I have my sermon to prepare for to-morrow, and I can sit here no longer. Tell Ellen to send me in some tea.”
I did not think my father was in a very fit state of mind to write a sermon, but I held my tongue. My sister joined me, and we saw no more of him till breakfast the next day. Before we met, I received a letter from O’Brien.
“My dear Peter,—I ran down to Plymouth, hoisted my pennant, drew my jollies from the dock-yard, and set my first lieutenant to work getting in the ballast and water-tanks. I then set off for Ireland, and was very well received as Captain O’Brien by my family, who were all flourishing. Now that my two sisters are so well married off, my father and mother are very comfortable, but very lonely; for I believe I told you long before that it had pleased Heaven to take all the rest of my brothers and sisters, except the two now married, and one who bore up for a nunnery, dedicating her service to God, after she was scarred with the small-pox, and no man would look at her. Ever since the family have been grown up, my father and mother have been lamenting and sorrowing that none of them would go off; and now that they’re all gone off one way or another, they cry all day because they are left all alone, with no one to keep company with them, except Father McGrath and the pigs. We never are to be contented in this world, that’s sartin; and now that they are comfortable in every respect, they find that they are very uncomfortable, and having obtained all their wishes, they wish everything back again; but as old Maddocks used to say, ‘A good growl is better than a bad dinner’ with some people; and the greatest pleasure that they now have is to grumble; and if that makes them happy, they must be happy all day long—for the devil a bit do they leave off from morning till night.
“The first thing that I did was to send for Father McGrath, who had been more away from home than usual—I presume, not finding things quite so comfortable as they used to be. He told me that he had met with Father O’Toole, and had a bit of a dialogue with him, which had ended in a bit of a row, and that he had cudgelled Father O’Toole well, and tore his gown off his back, and then tore it into shivers,—that Father O’Toole had referred the case to the bishop, and that was how the matter stood just then. ‘But,’ says he, ‘the spalpeen has left this part of the country, and, what is more, has taken Ella and her mother with him; and, what is still worse, no one could find out where they were gone; but it was believed that they had all been sent over the water.’ So you see, Peter, that this is a bad job in one point, which is, that we have no chance of getting the truth out of the old woman; for now that we have war with France, who is to follow them? On the other hand, it is good news; for it prevents me from decoying that poor young girl, and making her believe what will never come to pass; and I am not a little glad on that score, for Father McGrath was told by those who were about her, that she did nothing but weep and moan for two days before she went away, scolded as she was by her mother, and threatened by that blackguard O’Toole. It appears to me, that all our hopes now are in finding out the soldier, and his wife the wet-nurse, who were sent to India—no doubt with the hope that the climate and the fevers may carry them off. That uncle of yours is a great blackguard, every bit of him. I shall leave here in three days, and you must join me at Plymouth. Make my compliments to your father, and my regards to your sister, whom may all the saints preserve! God bless her, for ever and ever. Amen.
“Yours ever,
“Terence O’Brien.”
I put this letter into my father’s bands when he came out of his room. “This is a deep-laid plot,” said he, “and I think we must immediately do as O’Brien states—look after the nurse who was sent to India. Do you know the regiment to which her husband belongs?”
“Yes, sir,” replied I; “it is the 33rd, and she sailed for India about three months back.”
“The name, you say, I think, is O’Sullivan,” said he, pulling out his tablets. “Well, I will write immediately to Captain Fielding, and beg him to make the minutest inquiries. I will also write to your sister Lucy, for women are much keener than men in affairs of this sort. If the regiment is ordered to Ceylon, all the better: if not, he must obtain furlough to prosecute his inquiries. When that is done, I will go myself to Ireland, and try if we cannot trace the other parties.”
My father then left the room, and I retired with Ellen to make preparations for joining my ship at Plymouth. A letter announcing my appointment had come down, and I had written to request my commission to be forwarded to the clerk of the cheque at Plymouth, that I might save a useless journey to London. On the following day I parted with my father and my dear sister, and, without any adventure, arrived at Plymouth Dock, where I met with O’Brien. The same day I reported myself to the admiral, and joined my brig, which was lying alongside the hulk with her topmasts pointed through. Returning from the brig, as I was walking up Fore-street, I observed a fine stout sailor, whose back was turned to me, reading the handbill which had been posted up everywhere, announcing that the Rattlesnake, Captain O’Brien (about to proceed to the West India station, where doubloons were so plentiful, that dollars were only used for ballast), was in want of a few stout hands. It might have been said, of a great many; for we had not entered six men, and were doing all the work with the marines and riggers of the dockyard; but it is not the custom to show your poverty in this world either with regard to men or money. I stopped, and overheard him say, “Ay, as for the doubloons, that cock won’t fight. I’ve served long enough in the West Indies not to be humbugged; but I wonder whether Captain O’Brien was the second lieutenant of the Sanglier. If so, I shouldn’t mind trying a cruise with him.”