"How little or how much of this Garret Dawson believed to be true I
leave to his Maker," he said, turning about as the last ash went up the
chimney. "For his son's sake I shall not try to punish him. I believe
some of these letters were forged. I will show you one of these days
letters from the girl I saved from Jasper Tuite. For that is how it was.
She is an honoured wife and mother of children. It is one of the few
things in my life of which I may be proud."
Afterwards he went away and we knew that he was gone to Castle Clody.
There was so much to be done and I had to do it all; Lord and Lady St.
Leger could only be silent together, gazing into each other's eyes,
praising God humbly for their son given back from the dead. I left them
in the sunshine on the terrace creeping up and down, and as I looked
back before I entered the house by the French windows of the
morning-room, I recognized all at once that my grandmother had put off
her black, and was wearing grey, with some of her old lace trimming it.
It was a tabinet which I must have seen in my childhood. The memory of
it was so remote that I felt as if I must have read about it; but I had
an exact memory of the way it was made, which was billowing about the
feet, and with a very straight bodice. While I looked at them she picked
a rose from the wall and fastened it into her husband's coat.
I was busy till lunch-time, putting up packets and addressing them. When
at last I went downstairs I found Uncle Luke and my godmother in the
drawing-room. The years seemed to have slipped away from her. Her dear
brown face was as shy and rapturous as the face of any young girl in
love who knows she is beloved. They were standing by the fire when I
went in.
My godmother had one foot on the fender and her hand supported her
cheek. As I went up to her, I saw in the mirror that she was wearing a
very beautiful ring of sapphires which I had noticed on Uncle Luke's
hand.
She kissed me almost timidly, with her eyes down.
"She has taken me back again, Bawn," said Uncle Luke.
"He would not listen to me when I said I was too old," said my dear
godmother.
In the dining-room Neil Doherty was bustling about with an air of great
importance. Lord and Lady St. Leger had not yet come in.
"Sure, it never rains but it pours," Neil said, lifting a bottle of wine
from the hearth where he had put it to take the chill off. "There's a
great stir in the country. 'Tisn't enough to have Master Luke walking in
to us safe and sound last night, but Garret Dawson's been found dead in
his study. They didn't dare disturb him when he was busy. At last when
Mrs. Dawson herself sent he was dead. A good riddance to bad rubbish,
say I."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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