A thought struck me:
“Did you tell this to Murdock?”
“Certainly; the moment the conviction was in my mind.”
“When was that now — just for curiosity?”
“Last night, before I came away.”
A light began to dawn on me as to Murdock’s readiness to sell the land. I did not want to have to explain anything, so I did not mention the subject of my purchase, but simply asked Dick:
“And what did our upright friend say?”
“He said, in his own sweet manner, that it would last as long as he wanted it, and that after that it might go to hell — and me too, he added, with a thoughtfulness that was all his own.”
When I went to my room that night I thought over the matter. For good or ill I had bought the property, and there was no going back now; indeed, I did not wish to go back, for I thought that it would be a fine opportunity for Dick to investigate the subject. If we could succeed in draining the bog and reclaiming it, it would be a valuable addition to the property.
That night I arranged to go over on the following day to Galway, my private purpose being to consult a solicitor; and I wrote to my bankers in London, directing that an amount something over the sum required to effect my purchase should be lodged forthwith to an account to be opened for me at the Galway Bank.
Next day, I drove to Galway, and there, after a little inquiry, found a solicitor, Mr. Caicy, of whom everyone spoke well. I consulted him regarding the purchase. He arranged to do all that was requisite, and to have the deed of purchase drawn. I told him that I wished the matter kept a profound secret. He agreed to meet my wishes in this respect, even to the extent that when he should come to Carnaclif to make the final completion with Murdock, he would pretend not to know me. We parted on the best of terms, after I had dined with him, and had consumed my share of a couple of bottles of as fine old port as is to be had in all the world.
Next day I returned to Carnaclif in the evening and met Dick.
Everything had gone right during the two days. Dick was in great spirits; he had seen his Norah during the day, and had exchanged salutations with her. Then he had gone to Knocknacar, and had seen a great change in the bog, which was already settling down into a more solid form. I simply told him I had been to Galway to do some banking and other business. It was some consolation to me in the midst of my own unhappiness to know that I was furthering the happiness of my friend.
On the third day from this Mr. Caicy was to be over with the deed, and the following day the sale was to be completed, I having arranged with the bank to transfer on that day the purchase-money for the sale to the account of Mr. Murdock. The two first days I spent mainly on Knocknacar, going over each day ostensibly to look at the progress made in draining the bog, but in reality in the vain hope of seeing my Unknown. Each time I went, my feet turned naturally to the hill-top; but on each visit I felt only a renewal of my sorrow and disappointment. I walked on each occasion to and from the hill, and on the second day, which was Sunday, went in the morning and sat on the top many hours, in the hope that some time during the day, it being a holiday, she might be able to find her way there once again.
When I got to the top the chapel bells were ringing in all the parishes below me to the west, and very sweetly and peacefully the sounds came through the bright crisp September air. And in some degree the sound brought peace to my soul, for there is so large a power in even the aspirations and the efforts of men towards good, that it radiates to immeasurable distance. The wave theory that rules our knowledge of the distribution of light and sound may well be taken to typify, if it does not control, the light of divine love and the beating in unison of human hearts.
I think that during these days I must have looked, as well as felt, miserable; for even Andy did not make any effort to either irritate or draw me. On the Sunday evening, when I was on the strand behind the hotel, he lounged along, in his own mysterious fashion, and after looking at me keenly for a few moments, came up close, and said to me in a grave, pitying half-whisper:
“Don’t be afther breakin’ yer harrt, yer ‘an’r. Divil mend the fairy girrul! Shure, isn’t she vanished intirely? Mark me now, there’s no sahtisfaction at all, at all, in them fairy girruls. Faix, but I wouldn’t like to see a fine young gintleman like yer ‘an’r, become like Yeoha, the Sigher, as they called him in the ould times.”
“And who might that gentleman be, Andy?” I asked, with what appearance of cheerful interest I could muster up.
“Begor, it’s a prince he was that married onto a fairy girrul, what wint an’ was tuk off be a fairy man what lived in the same mountain as she done herself. Shure, thim fairy girruls has mostly a fairy man iv their own somewheres, that they love betther nor they does mortials. Jist you take me advice, Master Art, fur ye might do worser: go an’ take a luk at Miss Norah, an’ ye’ll soon forgit the fairies. There’s a rale girrul av ye like!”
I was too sad to make any angry reply, and before I could think of any other kind, Andy lounged away whistling softly — for he had, like many of his class, a very sweet whistle — the air of “Savourneen Deelish.”
The following day Mr. Caicy turned up at the hotel according to his promise. He openly told Mrs. Keating, of whom he had often before been a customer, that he had business with Mr. Murdock. He was, as usual with him, affable to all, “passing the time of day” with the various inhabitants of all degrees, and, as if a stranger, entering into conversation with me as we sat at lunch in the coffee-room. When we were alone he whispered to me that all was ready; that he had made an examination of the title, for which Murdock had sent him all the necessary papers, and that the deed was complete and ready to be signed. He told me he was going over that day to Knockcalltecrore, and would arrange that he would be there the next day, and that he would take care to have some one to witness the signatures.
On the following morning, when Dick went off with Andy to Knocknacar, and Mr. Caicy drove over to Knockcalltecrore, where I also shortly took my way on another car.
We met at Murdock’s house. The deed was duly completed, and Mr. Caicy handed over to Murdock the letter from the bank where the lodgment had been made.
The land was now mine; and I was to have possession on the 27th of October. Mr. Caicy took the deed with him, and with it took also instructions to draw out a deed making the property over to Richard Sutherland. He went straight away to Galway; while I, in listless despair, wandered out on the hill-side to look at the view.
Chapter 10 — In the Cliff Fields
I went along the mountain-side until I came to the great ridge of rocks which, as Dick had explained to me, protected the lower end of Murdock’s farm from the westerly wind. I climbed to the top to get a view, and then found that the ridge was continuous, running as far as the Snake’s Pass where I had first mounted it. Here, however, I was not, as then, above the sea, for I was opposite what they had called the Cliff Fields, and a very strange and beautiful sight it was.
Some hundred and fifty feet below me was a plateau of seven or eight acres in extent, and some two hundred and fifty feet above the sea. It was sheltered on the north by a high wall of rock like that I stood on, serrated in the same way, as the strata ran in similar layers. In the centre there rose a great rock, with a flat top some quarter of an acre in extent. The whole plateau, save this one bare rock, was a mass of verdure. It was watered by a small stream which fell through a deep, narrow cleft in the rocks, where the bog drains itself from Murdock’s present land. The after-grass was deep, and there were many clumps of trees and shrubs — none of them of considerable height except a few great stone-pines which towered aloft and dared the fury of the western breeze. But not