“It’ll taste better to you because you’ve been travelling hard, but it’s good wine anyhow. It’s been in the cellar for forty years, and that’s something in a land like this.”
Mallow accepted the glass of port, raised it with a little gesture of respect, and said:
“Long life to the King, and cursed be his enemies!” So saying he flung the wine down his throat—which seemed to gulp it like a well—wiped his lips with a handkerchief, and turned to Miles Calhoun again.
“Yes, it’s good wine,” he said; “as good as you’d get in the cellars of the Viceroy. I’ve seen strange things as I came. I’ve seen lights on the hills, and drunken rioters in the roads and behind hedges, and once a shot was fired at me; but here I am, safe and sound, carrying out my orders. What time will you start?” he added.
He took it for granted that the summons did not admit of rejection, and he was right. The document contained these words:
Trouble is brewing; indeed, it is at hand. Come, please, at once to
Dublin, and give the Lord-Lieutenant and the Government a report
upon your district. We do not hear altogether well of it, but no
one has the knowledge you possess. In the name of His Majesty you
are to present yourself at once at these offices in Dublin, and be
assured that the Lord-Lieutenant will give you warm welcome through
me. Your own loyalty gives much satisfaction here. I am, sir,
Your obedient servant,
JOHN MCNOWELL.
“You have confidence in the people’s loyalty here?” asked Mallow.
“As great as in my own,” answered Dyck cheerily. “Well, you ought to know what that is. At the same time, I’ve heard you’re a friend of one or two dark spirits in the land.”
“I hold no friendships that would do hurt to my country,” answered Dyck sharply.
Mallow smiled satirically. “As we’re starting at daylight, I suppose, I think I’ll go to bed, if it may be you can put me up.”