Valentine M'Clutchy, The Irish Agent eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 786 pages of information about Valentine M'Clutchy, The Irish Agent.

Valentine M'Clutchy, The Irish Agent eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 786 pages of information about Valentine M'Clutchy, The Irish Agent.

“Be guided by Mr. Phil,” said she; “he is the only man living that can prevent the damnable work that is designed against your family this night.”

She had scarcely uttered the words when Phil came breathless to the window, and, as if moved by a sense of alarm, and an apprehension of danger still greater than that expressed by Poll herself, he exclaimed—­

“Miss M’Loughlin, it’s no time for ceremony—­my father’s blood-hounds are at your father’s door; and there is but one way of saving your family from violence and outrage.  Excuse me—­but I must pass in by this window.  You don’t know what I risk by it; but for your sake and theirs it must be done.”

Even as he spake, the trampling of horses feet and the jingling of arms were distinctly heard at M’Loughlin.’s door—­a circumstance which so completely paralyzed the distracted girl, that she became perfectly powerless with affright.  Phil availed himself of the moment, put his hand to the window, which he raised up, and deliberately entered, after which he shut it down.  Poll, while he did so, coughed aloud, as if giving a signal; and in an instant, a number of individuals mostly females, approached the window, near enough to see young M’Clutchy enter, and shut the window after him.

“Now,” said Poll to the spectators, “I hope you’re all satisfied; and you, James Harman, will believe your own eyes, if you don’t Poll Doolin.  Is that girl a fit wife for your cousin, do you think?  Well, you’re satisfied, are you?  Go home now, and help forrid the match, if you can.  You’re a good witness of her conduct, at any rate.”

“I did not believe you, Poll,” replied the young man whom she addressed; “but unfortunately I am now satisfied, sure enough.  My own eyes cannot deceive me.  Lost and unhappy girl! what will become of her?  But that’s not all—­for she has proved herself treacherous, and deceitful, and worthless.”

“Ay,” said the crones whom Poll had brought to witness what certainly seemed to them to be the innocent girl’s shame and degradation—­“ay,” they observed, “there’s now an end to her character, at any rate.  The pride of the M’Loughlins has got a fall at last—­and indeed they desarved it; for they held their heads as upsettin’ as if they were dacent Protestants, and them nothing but Papishes affeher all.”

“Go home, now,” said Poll; “go home all of yez.  You’ve seen enough, and too much.  Throth I’m sorry for the girl, and did all I could, to persuade her against the step she tuck; but it was no use—­she was more like one that tuck love powdhers from him, than a raisonable bein’.”

Harman’s cousin had already departed, but in such a state of amazement, indignation, and disgust, that he felt himself incapable of continuing a conversation with any one, or of bestowing his attention upon any other topic whatsoever.  He was thunderstruck—­his very faculties were nearly paralyzed, and his whole mind literally clouded in one dark chaos of confusion and distress.

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Valentine M'Clutchy, The Irish Agent from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.