CHAPTER VII. BY THE SHANON" SHORY.

Te Aroha News, Volume V, Issue 232, 10 December 1887, Page 11

CHAPTER VII. BY THE SHAN ON" SHORY.

sfc > v " SNryi 0 II ordinary 1 VI \jS r "fj trft love - sickness i&U w / there is no more - ~7 / 7 cious cure than mar- / / / riage ; bub for the heart - ache begotten of hopeless lo\e where h th 3 cuie? It \s a disease that Xieople aie for the most pail ashamed of, so they conceal it assiduously : and therefore it ] may be assumed to be more prevalent than appeal-. Walter Lindsay, at all events, could find no cure, though he tried many. For he wa- iuoidiuatcly \OKed with himself that in walking along High sheet, Kensington, he could not see a tall woman in the distance, without his heart leaping up with some wild hope that it might be Sabinu. And why, each time that he went home, wa? there a groat disappointment for him on finding theie no let tor from Janie Wygiam, with some chance mention of Sabina in it ? Jnnie Wygiam could not keep con tinually wiiting to him apropos of nothing The most serious interests j of his life v, ere interfered with by this' 'tgony of vague uniest ; his work was done now, no*, for the "\\orld, that was willing; enough to welcome ib, but that ib might perchance win him a smile ot Sabina's approval. And as foi the hopelessness of his mv-sion— well, he had not studied her oveiy ge-furo and look, he had not li-tened to JanieS minute and intimate desciiption of her way- of life, and her hopes, and opinion-, and interests all for nothing ; and well he knew that maniage formed no paifcof Sdbina'-j plans for the future. She w;h \ery kind to him — for she was kind to eveiybody; and if he were ill, he thought phe might bo sorry : and for the passing hour— a-, had happened the other evening — she would smile on him, and be generous, and gracious, and bland. But as for anything moie? He knew he might as well think of going into the National Gallery and askinpf some fair-browed Madonna to .step dow % i from her frame and take his hand, and go through the yeais of life with ■vi iuh him. And then he would try to argue himself oat of thi? infinity of love. He had .set up an impossible ideal, he maintained to himself. No "woman could be so fine as that. Why should he bother his head about a 'phantom of his own creation? Women ■were women ; he knew what they themselves said and wrote of each other : ho was. no' longet' a boy, imagining everything that woie a petticoat to be an angel. And then lie w ould resolve to-go again to Janie Wygram, and get to know something about the real Sabie, who must, have her faults and weaknesses and' vanities like other folk. Alas ! that was not of much avail. Janie quietly remarked that peoplo might say what they, liked 'about' Wcimen in general: it was none of her business but she knew what Sabina was : nay 1 , more, she did not scruple to declare to him, as oho had already declared to her mother, that, were feho a man, she would consider h&i'self a fool if she wore not in lovo with Sabie. And bo there was no hope for Mm that way either (not that ho was so anxious to dethrone his idol, as ho tiied to persuade Mms,elf that he was) ; and as ( Sabina haunted every moment of his life, and came betweeu his every occupation and project and fancy, he began tp- think that something must be done. He would go away fiiom fchi3 hateful, Kensington and see whether some of this love-sickness could no, tbe left behind. He would seek out one of his favourite solitudes, and bury himself iv that secret place, and devote himself tb assiduous work, or assiduous recreation, he cared not which. To leave London — to TOiss the chance of catching a glimpse of her— to miss the chance eyen of hearing her name mentioned in ( the talking of friends— was not pleasant ; but to remain in'- 1 London, suffering 'this useless torture, was intolerable ; so one morning, and on a sudden impulse, Ke telegraphed over to a friend in the we&t of Ireland, asking whether a place could be found for him on a certain stretch of the Shannon ; the answer bade him come forthwith ; and that afternoon ho packed up his sketching imple ments and fishing-rods, went down by the night mail to Holyhead, and was in Dublin in the morning. He hod come either to woi*k or to play j there wex-eto be ;«> move foolish love-fancies. And so as he sat in that railway carriage, hour after hour, and was tftW away aorose

Ireland, ho kept studying the ever-varying and yot monotonous features of the landscape, and the slowly-changing effects of light. And lucky it was for him that he was a painter ; anybody else would have found that solitary journey a somewhat dismal tiling, and the melancholy April day not a little depressing. The leafless trees looked black and harsh amid the raw reds and greens of ploughed land and fallow ; and the long stretches of bog, with here and there a fow cottages, and stone walls, and miserable enclosures, were not very cheerful under these cold and neutral-tinted skies. That is to say, tho ordinary traveller would have found those skies neutral-tinted and | characterless enough ; but this man was a painter, and he could find quite sufiicient technical interest in regarding the soitlyshaded bulk and retreating perspective of the larger masses of cloud, and in li .icing here and there a tinge of golden-wlrito among tho pale, hopeless, and set pearly and ebhoroal blues and greys. Ami, during all this observation, and studying of foi'ms, J and tones, and "values," "he was do- | termined that his heart should not go away wandering back to Kensington Square and Sabiua Zembra, In the afternoon ho reached his destination, a straggling little town on the banks of the Shannon, theswift-iu&hrng waters of which noble rhcr aie here spanned by a lon^ and many-arched bx'idge. He had telegraphed for rooms to the inn, wheie he was well known ; and having deposited his things there, and picked out a handy little trout rod, ho walked down to the river, to have an hour's careless fishing, and a general look round. This was a picturesque neighbourhood into which he had come, but the afternoon wasnotfavoiuable ; what wind there was was easterly, and that had drunk tho colour out of the hills around, which lookod high and lurid as mountains through the mist. However, there was always the magnificent liver, with its surging rapid masses of white-tipped wa\ es,' and the pleasant sound of the rushing over the weir ; while eventually a sort of coppery- red sunset broke thiough the pall of grey. But he was anxious about neither painting nor fishing on this first evening ; and so he idly walked back to the inn again, and to dinner, in the small sitting-room, where tho faithful Nora had not forgotten to build for him a big- fire of turf instead of coal. This Noia was an old friend of his ; andas she came and went during dinner, they had a little talk together. She was a largelimbed creatuie of a lass, with pretty solt eyes, and black hair that might have been more tidily kept, and hands that might have been more frequently washed. "But she was friendly, and obliging and pleasantmannered ; and her amiable disposition to- j wauls the young English artist was manifested in a hundred little ways. She it was who never neglected to iill his flask before he started in the morning ; and .she was the last to wish him good luck as he left ; and she sent very nice things for lunch ; and she was the iii.-t to congratulate him if the men appealed in the evening bringing it big salmon, or perhaps t\\ o, or perhaps three, with them : ami vthen he came home empty-handed the pretty Nora would say, almost with tear* in her voice, " Well, it's sorry I am, sir; ulnt a shame ye didn't get nothin' all the day long.'" Alauna machrce, he called her, and Marourncen, and Nora ciitoic, and a gieat many other things of the meaning of w liich he knew \ cry little ; but Nora took all those with placid good humour ; and her fi ieudline^s waalways perfectly within bound. " Sure, sir," she said to him this- evening, as he was getting to the end of his dinner, "it'o many's the fcime we've been thinking you'd be bringing Mrs Lindsay over wkl ye, sir." "If you wait for that day, you'll wait all your lite, Nora, my darling,'" he answered. '■Ah, don't say that, &ir !" responded Nora, cheei fully. " Sure there\ plenty of pictty young ladies in London." '■ 1 suppose there are, ' said he. And instantly something' in his manner told the shaip-witted Nora chat f-he had struck a wrong chord ; and she quickly changed tho subject. ••Will ye have any pudding, sir?' 1 she asked : here she could not go wi one:. " What kind of a pudding is it, Nora ? " 'Tisanapple-poy, sir." "Oh. yes, that'll do."' And it may have fancifully occm red to him in his idle musings, as this gen tieman neved hand-maiden came and went, that if Nora Mere only to bru-h her hair, and wash her hands, and get nicely dressed and tened up, she would make a very presentable bride ; and what it ho were to induce her to go away to America — to the west, while he would buy a farm, and they would lead a healthy, happy, matter-of-fact existence — so that he should forgot his sorrows, and think of that hated Kensington no more ? But, no ; that would not do either, Ho might not find the forgetfulness he wa« in search of. Besides, her hair — each time she came into the room he noticed it — it was too dieadfully untidy. And, then again, it was just possible that the Lass of Limerick (this was another of the names he gave her) might not care to go. By-and-bye, when Nora had removed the dinner things, and brought him some coffee, and stirred up the peats, he was left quite alone, and he pulled in his chair to tho biazing fire and lit his pipe. So far ho had done well. He had scarcely sent one backward thought to .yards London the whole day long. But now there was this to be considered. He had promised to paint for Sabina a replica of the water-colour drawing she had chanced to admire ; and he had understood from Janie that Aiiss Zembra was willing to accept the same. But replicas were more or less mechanical things ; besides, he had not the drawing here. Would it not be better, before setting seriously to work, tSiat he should do some sketch for her— of some actual living scene ? A first fresh impression was always preferable. She had shown a little interest in asking him about the various remote corners that he went to ; here was one. Would, she care for a sketch of the wide waters of the Shannon, the long bridge, tho little straggling town, the old squaretowered church, and, over-looking all, the distant slopes and shoulders of the Sieve Bernagh hills ? It would not be recalling him to -her recollection ; it would bo redeeming a prbmide, i And might he not write to Janie— now>~- and make the suggestion ?. ' «•■ * <{ It was » pretty long-letter that he wrote to Janie. And if at first he pretended that all his concern was about that picture avr.angement, in, the end he was quite candid, and even glad to make Janie once more his confidante. ' " . " The truth is 1 ," he vyrote,, " I came here to try to ahake off certain influences— or rather, on 6 particular influence— that you are aware of, I dare say. , Alnd to you, who see so much of Miss Zembra, and know what she is, I am 1 nob ashamed to confess that it may be difficult; i but I hope to succeed in ■ the end ; and' then, when this glamour of fascination his beengot rid of, I hope to meet her on the f more durable basis of friendship, if she will permit of that. Of course a young woman, and especially a beautiful young woman, tuaj naturally distrust any sucjf proposal ; buf if ever the need should arise, she would find that ifc was no fair-\tf eather friendship I had begged her to 1 fcCcppfc./ Ifc would not b« fnerely while .iher physical' beauty lasted —that I should be at her service, ab anj

Next, morning he was all alert ; the boatn\en were waiting outside ; the long Castle Connel rod? had been put together ; Nova had filled his flask— just in case there might be occasion to drink "a tight line to your honour ; "' and prosontly, when he had 1 bundled his sketching implemenU together, they were all on their way down to the boat. This was a veiy excellent recreation for a landscape painter (as well he knew before) ; for when once the coble, or " cob, 1 ' was out in the midst of the wild - whirling waters, the- men not only managed that, but the fishing as well : trolling -" dragging," as they called it—with prawn and ki killoch " and phantom minnow, or lashing the stream with a fortyyard line and a big gold and red and purple Shannon fly, as the occasion demanded ; while he, if he cho3e, could sit idle, studying effects of light and colour and form, or jotting these down in his book, when ho was so inclined. And then again, when the light was bad, or the part of the river they happened to be at uninteresting, ho would get up and take the casting rod and have a turn at the throwing ; and if the forty yards were now reduced to twenty-five, still that was not a bad line for an amateur to throw out clean. On this morning he was less interested in the fishing than usual ; all his concern was to find something fine for the sketch he was to send Sabina. And how would that do, now? Ihe built-up bank all ablaze with golden gorse ; above that a row of leafless trees against a sky of pale lurid blues and faint red greys; and underneath the bank, and all in front of him, the rushing, boiling, surging river, here and there straight, swift rapids, here and thero masses of foam-crested waves, and hero and thero a large, circular eddy of black, oilylooking smooth water, on which were reflected, in wan and spectral fashion, the whitewashed walls of an old, dilapidated mill. He looked at it again, this way and that, but ib would nob do. The east wind had withered the colour out of tho landscape ; thi3 furious river was too difficult for a more sketch j he wanted a blue sky on the water, instoad of those reflections of grey and black. So he gave that up for the present, and took the rod from Johnnie Ryan, and began to belabour the whirling currents with five and-twenby yards of line and a big " silver doctor. " In the afternoon ho was more fortunate. For although that weird haze still hung over the lurid blue hills and the ghostly landscape, and the sun, when the clouds slowly parted, showed himself a sphere of mottled dusky gold, by-and-bye, as tho evening drew on, a beautiful pinky-grey light began to shine in the western heavens, and the stems and branches and twigs of the leafless trees grew to be of a rich warm purple ; and the dark green of the grass on the bank and the deep yellow of the gorse became strangely intense and clear. •* Put me ashore now, Johnnie," he said to the chief boatman. " Sure 'tis the'best bit of the lake we're just coming to," Johnnie remonstrated. " Very well ; you fire away, and pick up a forty pounder. I'm going ashore— look alive now !" And perhaps he was a little anxious as he began, and half-forgetful of his own mastery of his craft. 'He was 80 anxious to justify "Himself in Sabina's eyes. She had not seen muoh offhis work. Nor had any-

something in the nature of a pearl that he wished to give to Sabina. Hecanied out the sketch as far ns was possible in the circumstances, until the rose-hue in the sky began to fade into dusk ; and then he bundled up his things, fairly well content. And Johnnie Ryan and his companion had got the salmon — a twenty-twc pounder, and they were aUo well content. He let the two men go on before him ; and then, after sitting there a while, considering what he could do further with the sketch, and perhaps thinking of one or two things, he rose and walked slowly homo by the river-bank, underneath a twilight made transparent by a single star.