“Lucky young animals!” said Sir John, openly envious—and the boys flushed a little. As a rule, they were careful not to talk of the Front in the presence of the man whose whole soul longed to be out there with them. “But you’ll all come back, won’t you? and Mr. Linton, when the war is over, or when these ancient campaigners next get leave, you will bring them back to Rathcullen? I want to know that that is a settled thing.”
“That is a matter which I don’t need to put to the committee,” Mr. Linton replied, looking at the cheery faces. “We’ll certainly come, O’Neill, since you are so good. And then, when we pack up finally for Australia and Billabong, what about you? You know it’s high time you visited that little country of ours.”
“He’s coming with us,” said Norah, with decision. “Say you are, Sir John—please!”
“Well, indeed, I begin to think I am,” O’Neill answered. “I was getting terribly old when you invaded Donegal, but now I believe I shall soon be nearly as young as Mr. Linton! At any rate, I might follow you out.” But the boys protested, arguing that there was no point in travelling alone when they might make a family party.
“It would be miles jollier,” said Wally. “Then we could ‘personally conduct’ you to Billabong, and you would have the unforgettable experience of seeing Brownie go mad. I’m quite certain she and Murty will be delirious on the day that Norah comes marching home again!” So they planned happily, in gay defiance of the guns thundering across the Channel. That sullen menace was only a fortnight ahead, and already Norah dreamed of it at night. But in the daytime it was better to pretend that it did not exist.
Con was left with the motor, to administer what “first-aid” was possible: and after lunch the rest of the party set off along the road to Carrignarone, which was reached after an easy walk of an hour and a half. It was a little fishing-village, boasting a better inn than others of its type, since in normal years the sport to be obtained brought a small harvest of visitors. War, however, had meant lean times—wherefore the people of the inn fell thankfully on the windfall afforded them by a stranded party of six, and ran three ways at once in preparing for their comfort. A cart, with a couple of strong horses, was forthcoming, and under the charge of Jim and Wally, set off to the rescue of the motor—which was eventually towed into the village, where it caused what the war-reports term “a certain liveliness.” At the steering-wheel sat Con, a picture of humiliation—deepening to disgust when the carter politely offered him a whip!
“Them machines do be all very well to play with, for genthry an’ for them that have too much money,” said the carter, drawing a distinction that was not lost on his hearers. “But ’tis mighty glad they are of the ould horses when annything goes wrong with the works!” Which was so obviously true at the moment that no one had any spirit to contradict him.
CHAPTER XIII
THE CAVE AMONG THE ROCKS
“The great waves of the Atlantic sweep storming on their way,
Shining green and silver with the hidden herring-shoal;