Thady silently shook hands with his friend, and went home; and whether or no he obeyed the priest's injunctions to pray for protection for his sister, that good man himself did not go to sleep till he had long been on his knees, imploring aid for her, and the numerous unfortunates of his flock.
CHAPTER VIII
MISS MACDERMOT AT HOME
At any rate the priest's admonitions had this effect on Thady, that when he came in to breakfast after his morning avocations, he spoke to Feemy, whom he had not seen since their stormy interview of yesterday, with kindness, and, for him, gentleness. But she seemed only half inclined to accept the proffered olive branch. Thady's morning salutations couldn't go far towards putting a young girl in good humour, for even now that he meant to be gracious it was only – "Well, Feemy, how's yourself this morning; and will you be ready for Mary Brady's wedding?" But her answer – "Oh, in course; will you take your breakfast there?" showed him that she had not forgiven his aspersions against her lover, and the breakfast passed over in silence, with the exception of Larry's usual growls. Thady, therefore, when he had swallowed his potatoes and milk, betook himself again to Pat Brady and the fields. Larry was left alone to sleep, if he could, over the fire, and Feemy betook herself to her own parlour, and proceeded to penetrate farther into the mysteries of the "Mysterious Assassin."
There she sat – a striking contradiction of that proverb which we so often quote with reference to young ladies, and which so seldom can be quoted with truth, "Beauty unadorned, adorned the most."
Ussher would not come till the evening, and her hair was therefore in papers – and the very papers themselves looked soiled and often used. Her back hair had been hastily fastened up with a bit of old black ribbon and a comb boasting only two teeth, and the short hairs round the bottom of her well-turned head were jagged and uneven, as though bristling with anger at the want of that attention which they required. She had no collar on, but a tippet of different material and colour from her frock was thrown over her shoulders. Her dress itself was the very picture of untidiness; it looked as though it had never seen a mangle; the sleeves drooped down, hanging despondingly below her elbows; and the tuck of her frock was all ripped and torn – she had trod on it, or some one else had done it for her, and she had not been at the trouble of mending it. It was also too tight, or else Feemy had not fastened it properly, for a dreadful gap appeared in the back, showing some article beneath which was by no means as white as it should be; – "but then, wasn't it only her morning frock?" In front of it, too, was a streaked mark of grease, the long since deposited remains of some of her culinary labours. Her feet were stuffed into slippers – truth compels me to say they would more properly be called shoes down at heel – her stockings were wofully dirty, and, horror of all horrors, out at the heels! There she sat, with her feet on the fender, her face on her hands, and her elbows on her knees, with her thumb-worn novel lying in her lap between them.
There she sat; how little like the girl that had eclipsed Mary Cassidy at the ball at Mohill! Poor though Feemy was, she could make out a dress, and a handsome dress, for such an occasion as that. Then every hair on her fine head had been in its place; the curls of her rich brown hair were enough to win the heart of any man; the collar round her fair neck had been beautifully washed and ironed, for her own hands had been at work on it half the morning; her white long gloves had been new and well fitting, and her only pair of silk stockings had been scrupulously neat; her dress fitted her fine person as though made by Carson, and she had walked as though she knew she need not be ashamed of herself. But now how great was the contrast!
No girls know better how to dress themselves than Irish girls, or can do it with less assistance or less expense; but they are too much given to morning dishevelment. If they would only remember that the change in a man's opinion and mind respecting a girl will often take place as quick as the change in her appearance, and that the contrast will be quite as striking, they would be more particular. And they never can be sure of themselves, take what precautions they will. Lovers will drop in at most unseasonable hours; they have messages to deliver, plans to propose, or leave to take. They can never be kept out with certainty, and all the good done by a series of brilliant evenings – satin dresses, new flowers for the hair, expensive patterns, and tediously finished toilets – may be, and often is, suddenly counteracted by one untidy head, soiled dress, or dirty stocking.
I will, however, return to my story. There sat Feemy, apparently perfectly contented with her appearance and occupation, till a tap at the door disturbed her, and in walked Mary Brady, the bride elect.
"Well, Miss Feemy, and how's your beautiful self this morning?"
"And how are you, Mary, now the time is coming so near?"
Mary Brady was a very tall woman, being about the same height as her brother, thirty or thirty-three years of age, with a plain, though good-humoured looking face, over which her coarse hair was divided on the left temple. She had long ungainly limbs, and was very awkward in the use of them, and though not absolutely disagreeable in her appearance, she was so nearly so, that she would hardly have got married without the assistance of the "two small pigs, and thrifle of change," which had given her charms in the eyes both of Ginty and Denis McGovery.
"Oh! Miss Feemy, and I'm fretting so these two days, that is, ever since Denis said it was to be this blessed day, – the Lord help me! – and I with it all on my shouldhers, and the divil a one to lend a hand the laste taste in life."
"Why, Mary, what can there be so much to do at all?"
"Och! then, hadn't I my white dress to get made, and the pair of sheets to get hemmed, for Denis said his'n warn't large enough for him and I," – and here the Amazon gave a grin of modesty, – "and you know it was part of the bargain, I was to have a pair of new sheets" (Denis had kept this back from Father John in his inventory of his bride's fortune); "and isn't there the supper to get ready, and the things, and the house to ready and all! – and then when I'd done that, it war all for nothing, for the wedding isn't to be at Pat's at all."
"The wedding not to be at Brady's, where is it to be then?"
"Oh, jist at Mrs. Mehan's shop below, at the loch."
"Oh, that's better still, Mary; we won't have so far to go in the mud."
"That's jist what the boys war saying, Miss; and there be so much more room, and there be so many to be in it, they couldn't all be in it, at all at all, at home. So you see we is to be married in the room inside, where the two beds is, and they is to come out of it, and the supper is to be there, Miss, you see, and the most of the dhrinking, and then we'll have the big kitchen comfortable to oursells for the music and the dancing. And what do you think! Pat has got Shamus na Pe'bria, all the ways out of County Mayo, him that makes all the pipes through the counthry, Miss; and did the music about O'Connell all out of his own head, Miss. Oh, it 'll be the most illigant wedding intirely, Miss, anywhere through the counthry, this long time back! When one is to be married, it's as well to do it dacently as not; arn't it, Miss?"
"Oh! that it is Mary, and yours 'll be quite a dash."
"Yours 'll be the next, you know, Miss Feemy, and that will be the wedding! But there's one thing that bothers me intirely."
"Well, out with it at once, Mary; I suppose you want to borrow the plates, and knives, and forks, and things?"
"Oh, that's in course, Miss Feemy; and it's very good in you to be offering them that way before I axed the loan of them at all; but that ain't all. You see I'm so bothered intirely with them big sheets, and they not half finished, and not a taste in life done to the cap of me yet, and the pratees and vegetables to get ready, and the things to dress, and not a sowl to lend me a hand at all, unless jist Mrs. Mehan's bit of a girl, and she's busy readying the rooms; and so, Miss Feemy, if you'd jist let Biddy slip up for the afthernoon, – you know Katty could be doing for you down here, – and then, Miss, I'd be made intirely."
"Well, Mary, I suppose she must go up then; one thing's certain, you can't be getting married every day."
"Why no, Miss, that is sartain; for even if Denis were to die away like, – as in course he must one day, for he ain't quite so young now, – I would have to be waiting a