Few days passed, however, failing to bring him a chance horse to hold for a fine gentleman "wid boots and spurs bedad," or when he had not an errand to run or to lend a helping hand with the luggage of some generous traveller; and with these opportunities came sixpences, sometimes even shillings, for his trouble, but oftener still just because he was Ned Donovan. Many to whom his story was unknown often wondered at the glistening eager eye with which he counted his earnings over, and at the happiness an additional sixpence seemed to give him; all this was so unlike the hourly evidences of his most unselfish nature. Strangers, less charitable in mind than in pocket, led astray by this seeming love of money, not unfrequently thought that much of the boy's idiocy was put on, and they said so; but they did not know him, nor happily he the meaning of their sneer. It was amusing to follow him at the lucky moment when he got a shilling or so in this way, when be invariably made straight for the bar of the inn to deposit it with the utmost gravity of manner in the safe keeping of good Mrs. Blaney. He had learnt from bitter experience how unsafe it was to be his own banker, as he had frequently lost his earnings in the hay loft or the stable, before the happy thought had struck him to find a better keeper for them. You would have heard there, too, how he invariably came at night to withdraw his funds, and how he always had money given him, more or less. For there were unlucky days for Ned, when travellers were few or forgetful; but his memory was far from faithful in this regard, and good Mrs. Blaney was more than kind.
The reason for this seeming selfishness of Ned is easily told. He had a mother whom he loved with all his strange impassioned nature, a widowed mother. To receive her grateful smile in return for the wages of his industry each evening when he reached his home was the crowning happiness of the day.
God was kindly with him—he was not alone, poor boy! He had a mother, and all that mother's love. Had you travelled that way you must have noticed their little cottage at the turning going up the hill to St. Mary's. You may see it even now as you pass, but the roses Mary trained there are dead and gone, the little latticed window broken, the garden weedy and desolate, telling its tale of sorrow like the tombstone.
Mary Donovan had lived there for many years—since her boy was quite a child. She came one morning, so the gossips said, a passenger by the coach, somewhere from the North. Her child was then but four years old, and then, as ever after, an object for the sympathy of the kind of heart. She took humble lodgings and applied to the [{798}] shopkeepers and the neighboring gentry for employment at her needle, with which she was wonderfully skilled, they said. The prejudices which met her at the first, from all save the kind landlady of the "Stag," soon gave way before her patient, unbending uprightness of character and the unfathomable sorrow that weighed her down, for sorrow is a sacred thing; even the voice of scandal hushes in its presence. Her past history was her secret. Whether it was one of shame or of suffering virtue no tongue could tell. Silent as the grave to all impertinent inquiry, meek and humble before her God, and gentle as gentleness itself with every living thing, her mystery became respected, and she and her boy beloved.
From that evening, when wet and weary from her journey, she first awoke the kindly sympathies of the hostess of the "Stag"—the same good-natured Mrs. Blaney—for twelve long years the widow pursued her peaceful way, earning for herself and for her child not merely a livelihood, but many of the comforts of dress and food, which were looked upon as luxuries by those around her; and never did mother receive more fulness of reward in the passionate love of offspring than she in that of her all but mindless boy.
When he was yet a child often have I watched him sitting at her feet, as she sat at the cottage door or window plying her ever busy needle, listening to the strange stories of the fairies and the leprechauns of the olden times she could tell so well. Of Heaven and its glories, too, she would sometimes speak, to be interrupted by some strange remark, suggestive of more than human wisdom. Then the startled mother would fix her eyes upon his face so earnestly, as if in hope that God at last would shed light upon the shadowed mind of her bereaved one, to meet ever and always the glance of childish adoration, but with it, alas! the vacant smile that spoke forgetfulness already of the transitory ray of reason that a moment rested there.
Often have I stopped, as I passed that way, to listen to some quaint old ballad full of the melancholy music of her voice, and make my friendly inquiries for herself and child, sure to find him in his usual resting-place. My welcome was a warm one always, and my grey hairs—for they were grey even then, sir—often mingled with the yellow curls of the boy as he clambered up my knee to kiss me. We were warm friends, sir, Mary and I, for I and I only, of all living beings, knew her secret and the story of her sorrow—and this was the way I learned it:
One day, soon after her arrival in the town, I had just risen from early mass in the chapel and turned in here upon my morning round, when the voice of some one weeping bitterly, and the sad wail of a child accompanying, drew my attention to a corner of the yard and to the kneeling figure of a woman and that of a little boy, seated among the long grass of the grave beside her. Mourners were no unfamiliar sights to me, even at such an early hour, but the woman's dress bespoke the stranger and awoke my curiosity. I neared the grave and recognized it as that of a good old man, once the village school-master, who had died two years before. I knew him well; for many years he had dwelt amongst us, respected for himself as for his calling. He had been happy in the affections of an only child—a daughter, the very picture of her mother, he used to say, whom he had buried amongst strangers. In her was centred his every earthly hope. She was his pride, and her pleasure all the reward he sought in a life laden with all the petty vexatious of the teacher. She forsook him and her happy home, and fled to England with one whom she had known for a few weeks only, who had met her at Rostrevor, where her father's fond indulgence had sent her for the season; forsook all for a husband—scandal said, a lover—who, whilst enamored of her beauty, scorned her father's poverty. The old man never raised his head again in the village. Two years of sorrow, and the grave closed over him. [{799}] I made it. The savings of his industrious life still lay in the hands of the village pastor in safe-keeping for the lost one should she ever return to claim it; but Mary never claimed it.
I drew nearer, for my heart told me who the mourner was. I, too, had loved the girl, as who indeed had not? I, too, had shared the sorrow of her honest father, and many a time had yearned to know the fate of the fair-haired daughter of his affection.
I drew still nearer; my step was noiseless upon the grass. I leaned upon a headstone near me. I spoke the words that pressed for utterance, "Mary, Mary," I said, "You come too late, too late!"