As he drove, bits and pieces of family history came back to him that his mother had gleaned for him from time to time, because she knew he loved the past.
The turbulent Fanny-Rosa, who ran stocking-less in the dew and broke the hearts of men, and her own as well perhaps, though she told it to no one; and the soft-eyed Jane of the picture, with her hand upon her heart, looking towards Doon Island.
"It was Fanny-Rosa Flower," his mother had said, nodding wisely, "who brought the bad blood into the Brodricks."
Alas, poor Johnnie… His ceremonial swords still hung in the library at Clonmere, crossed, above the mantelpiece.
John-Henry would get them down when he reached home, and clean them, and make them bright again, so that Johnnie in his grave would not feel himself forgotten.
"It will take time, son," said his mother, "getting the place to rights again. And you will have to buy furniture, you know, for the new wing."
"Even if it's the work of a life-time, no matter," said John-Henry.
If the floors were unscrubbed and cobwebs clung from the corners, at least it would be his plot of earth, his kingdom. Sport and entertainment; Aunt Lizette had wondered about these.
There were woodcock and hares on the island, and snipe in the bogs by Kileen; killigs in the creek, and little brown trout in the lake on Hungry Hill. The people of Doonhaven were all the neighbours he wanted; and if the parson and the priest would sink their differences and take cold pig with him on Sunday, why, he would have done all that was necessary for the future of his country.
The dull miles lay behind him, and in front rose the pass, wild and rocky, with the heather and the gorse amidst the granite, tumbling to the road's edge. This, thought John-Henry, was where Copper John rode in his post-chaise the day he signed the lease for the copper mines with Robert Lumley, and Robert Lumley himself would have travelled down in gloomy state to Castle Andriff, from his solitary mansion at Duncroom, which lies naked to the skies now, razed to the earth by the rebels. The bitter feud-for what fine purpose and to what good end? Once again, John-Henry wondered why men must kill one another and spill blood under God's sky, when the gorse is scented, and the heather blows, and the snipe whistle and tumble in the bogs?
He slowed down the car, for the pass was narrow here, and as he turned the bend he saw, right in front of him, a barricade of torn heather and loose wire lying across the road, and beside it a man standing with a rifle in his hand. John-Henry drove slowly to the barricade and switched off his engine. The man did not move, except to cover him with the rifle, and then, putting two fingers in his mouth, he whistled loud and shrill. Some half-dozen figures crept down from the boulders above the pass. All of them were armed.
John-Henry knew none of them. One, he supposed their leader, came to the door of the car and leant upon it.
"What's your name?" he said curtly.
"John-Henry Brodrick."
"Where are you going?"
"To my home, Clonmere, at Doonhaven."
"You served in the Royal Navy in the war, didn't you?"
"I did."
"What are your politics?"
"I have none."
"Were you staying last night in the Hotel Metropole in Slane?"
"I was."
"All right." He jerked his head to a couple of his companions.
"I shall have to ask you to get out of your car."
"What for?"
"That's our business. You'll not be harmed if you go quietly. Try to be funny with us, and we'll put a bullet between your shoulder-blades."
"What are you going to do to my car?"
"You won't see it again. Cars are too precious to us."
The man grinned for the first time. John-Henry shrugged his shoulders.
"I was warned not to take my car on the road.
I've only myself to blame. Go ahead then. What do you want me to do?"
"Stand still while we bandage your eyes. I tell you again, we're not going to hurt you. Now put your wrists behind your back. Take his arm, Tim-you know what to do if he plays tricks."
What a damned fool he had been to fall into this trap! They had told him in Slane it was an act of lunacy to take a car out upon the road. And now he would probably be shot in the back and left to die on the hills. It was the loss of his car that angered him most. The old car, the faithful friend, being driven to hell and damaged by these madmen. No hope of ever getting it back again, of course. He cursed and swore uselessly to himself, as he stumbled over the heather and the stones, a man guiding him on either side.
They must have walked three miles or more, in heaven knew what direction, before they came to a standstill, and there was a sound of a door being unlocked, and someone saying something in a low voice, and then the bandage was removed from his eyes and the bands from his wrists, and he was standing on the mud floor of an abandoned cabin.
There was some loose straw in the corner. The small window was blocked with rags, and the hearth was black with long-burnt sticks and ashes.
"You'll have to stay here awhile," said the man who had unbound him. "I shall be outside on the hill, and my orders are to put lead into you should you run. I'll be bringing you something to eat and to drink."
"How long," said John-Henry, "is this foolery to go on? And what am I supposed to have done?"
"I don't know anything about it," said the man.
"I have my orders, that's good enough for me."
And he went out, bolting the door behind him.
Oh, God damn them all, thought John-Henry; what in hell's name do they want with me, and why must I be mixed up in a revolution which means less than nothing to me, and with which I have no concern? He went and sat down upon the straw, for there was no chair or bench, and presently the man was as good as his word and brought him some bread, and some very sour cheese, and a pitcher of water.
"You haven't any ale, I suppose?" asked John-Henry.
"I have not," said the man, "but I have a flask on me with a drop of whisky in it, and you can have a spot of it if you're that way inclined."
John-Henry swallowed the whisky, and the man smiled.
"Oh, that's all right," he said. "I can get more when I want it, and you'll be here till the morning, or maybe the day after, I don't mind telling you."
"Look here," said John-Henry, "you can take my wallet-there's twenty pounds in it-if you'll let me out of this place."
"I don't want your money," said the man.
"We'd have taken it from you if we'd had the need.
Is it robbers you think we are?"
"You stole my car, didn't you?"
"We borrowed it for the cause. When the country is free you can have it back again."
"That's nonsense, and you know it. Why am I kept here?"
"I tell you I don't know, and that's the plain truth, before God. Do you play two-handed whist?"
"I did once. I haven't played it for a long time."
"I have a pack of cards here in my pocket.
If you're agreeable we could have a game, and it would help to pass the time. I can't do a thing outside your door but kick my heels and look at the heather. We might as well be company one for one another as not."
"All right," said John-Henry, "bring out your cards." They sat down together in the small, close cabin, with a patch of light coming in at the stuffed-up window, and they played two-handed whist, and finished the whisky in the flask.
And this, thought John-Henry, is surely the madness of all time, that my captor and I pledge one another in illicit spirit, and he takes money off me in whist that he is too proud to steal, and we discuss the best method of snaring rabbits. Tomorrow he shoots me in the back, and maybe, as the sentry said in Slane, he will weep with pity and bring flowers to my funeral.