Miss O’Dwyer’s catalogue of catastrophes was curiously mixed. Perhaps the comedy in it tended to obscure the utter degradation of the ruin she described. But the freakish incongruity of the speech did not strike Hyacinth. He found in it only two notes--pity that such a fate awaited him, and contempt for the man who submitted to it.
‘I cannot help myself. Will you not make an effort to understand? I am trying to do what is right.’
‘No,’ he said, ‘I know it is no use. You could not understand even if I told you all I felt.’
Her eyes filled suddenly with tears. He heard her sob. Then she turned without a word and left them. He stood watching her till she reached the road and started on her walk to the railway-station. Then he took Marion’s two hands in his, and held them fast.
She looked up at him. Her face was all tenderness. Love shone on him--trusting, unquestioning, adoring love, love that would be loyal to the uttermost; but her eyes were full of a dumb wonder.
One morning near the end of September the _Irish Times_ published a list of Irish graduates ordained in England on the previous Sunday. Among other names appeared:
‘Hyacinth Conneally, B.A., T.C.D., deacon, by the Bishop of Ripon, for the curacy of Kirby-Stowell.’
Shortly afterwards the _Croppy_ printed the following verses, signed ‘M.O’D.’:
‘Bight across the low, flat curragh from the sea, Drifting, driving sweeps the rain, Where the bogborn, bent, brown rushes grow for me, Barren grass instead of grain.
‘Out across the sad, soaked curragh towards the sea, Striding, striving go the men, With their spades and forks and barrows toil for me That my corn may grow again
‘Ah! but safe from blast of wind and bitter sea, You who loved me---Tusa féin-- Live and feel and work for others, not for me, Never coming back again.
‘Yes, while all across the curragh from the West Drifts the sea-rain off the sea, You have chosen. Have you chosen what is best For yourself, O son, and me?’
Hyacinth read the verses, cut them out of the _Croppy_, and locked them in the box in which he stored the few papers of interest he possessed. The sorrowful judgment pronounced on his conduct affected him, but only in a dull way, like an additional blow upon a limb already bruised to numbness. He accepted his new duties and performed them without any feeling of enthusiasm, and after a little while without any definite hope of doing any good. He got no further in understanding the people he had to deal with, and he was aware that even those of them who came most frequently into contact with him regarded him as a stranger. A young doctor whose wife took a fancy to Marion tried to make friends with him. The result was unsatisfactory, owing to Hyacinth’s irresponsiveness. He could not, without yawning piteously, spend an evening discussing the performances of the local cricket club; nor did his conduct improve when the two ladies suspended their talk and sacrificed an hour to playing four-handed halma with their husbands. An unmarried solicitor, attracted by Marion’s beauty and friendliness, adopted the habit of calling at Hyacinth’s little house about nine or ten o’clock in the evening. He was a man full of anecdote and simple mirth, and he often stayed, quite happily, till midnight. Every week he brought an illustrated paper as an offering to Marion, and recommended the short stories in it to her notice. He often asked Hyacinth’s advice and help in solving the conundrums set by the prize editor. He took a mild interest in politics, and retailed gossip picked up at the Conservative Club. After a while he gave up coming to the house. Hyacinth blamed himself for being cold and unfriendly to the man.