When the 20th of May came, the three started off together for Galway, happy in spite of their boycotting. The girls at least were happy, though Frank was still somewhat sombre as he thought of the edict which Rachel O\'Mahony had pronounced against him. When the boat arrived at the quay at Galway, Captain Clayton, with one of the officers of the West Bromwich, was there to meet it. "He is a wise man," whispered Edith to Ada, "he takes care to provide for number one."
"I don\'t see that at all," said Ada.
"That brave little warrior, who is four feet and a half high, is intended for my escort. Two is company and three is none. I quite agree as to that." Then they left the boat, and Edith so arranged the party that she was to walk between the small warrior and her brother, whereas Ada followed with Captain Clayton. In such straits of circumstances a man always has to do what he is told. Presence of mind and readiness is needful, but the readiness of a man is never equal to that of a woman. So they went off to Mrs. D\'Arcy\'s house, and Ada enjoyed all the little preliminary sweets of the Captain\'s conversation. The words that were spoken all had reference to Edith herself; but they came from the Captain and were assuredly sweet.
"And it\'s really true that you are boycotted?" Mrs. D\'Arcy asked.
"Certainly it\'s true."
"And what do they do to you? Do all the servants leave you?"
"Unless there be any like Peter who make up their minds to face the wrath of Landleaguers. Peter has lived with us a long time, and has to ask himself whether it will be best for him to stay or go."
"And he stays? What a noble fellow," said Mrs. D\'Arcy.
"What would he do with himself if he didn\'t stay?" said Edith. "I don\'t suppose they\'d shoot him, and he gets plenty to eat. The girls who were in the house and the young men about the place had friends of their own living near them, so they thought it better to go. Everybody of course does what is best for himself. And Peter, though he has suited himself, is already making a favour of it. Papa told him only yesterday that he might go himself if he pleased. Only think, we had to send all the horses last week into Galway to be shod;—and then they wouldn\'t do it, except one man who made a tremendous favour of it, and after doing it charged double."
"But won\'t they sell you anything at Tuam?"
"Not a ha\'porth. We couldn\'t get so much as soap for house-washing, unless Mrs. Blake had stood by us and let us have her soap. Ada and I have to do every bit of washing about the place. I do think well of Peter because he insists on washing his own shirts and stockings. Unfortunately we haven\'t got a mangle, and we have to iron the sheets if we want them to look at all nice. Ada\'s sheets and mine, and Florian\'s, are only just rough pressed. Of course we get tea and those things down from Dublin. Only think of the way in which the tradespeople are ruining themselves. Everything has to go to Dublin to be sold: potatoes and cattle, and now butter. Papa says that they won\'t pay for the carriage. When you come to think of it, this boycotting is the most ruinous invention on both sides. When poor Florian declared that he would go to mass after he had first told the story about Pat Carroll, they swore they would boycott the chapel if he entered the door. Not a single person would stay to receive the mass. So he wouldn\'t go. It was not long after that when he became afraid to show his face outside the hall-door."
"And yet you can come here to this ball?" said Mrs. D\'Arcy.
"Exactly so. I will go where I please till they boycott the very roads from under my feet. I expect to hear soon that they have boycotted Ada and me, so that no young man shall come and marry us. Of course, I don\'t understand such things, but it seems to me that the Government should interfere to defend us."
When the evening came, and the witching hour was there, Ada and Edith appeared at the barracks as bright as their second-hand finery could make them. They had awarded to them something of especial glory as being boycotted heroines, and were regarded with a certain amount of envy by the Miss Blakes, Miss Bodkins, Miss Lamberts, Miss Ffrenchs, and Miss Parsons of the neighbourhood. They had, none of them, as yet achieved the full honours of boycotting, though some of them were half-way to it. The Miss Ffrenchs told them how their father\'s sheep had been boycotted, the shepherd having been made to leave his place. The Miss Blakes had been boycotted because their brother had been refused a car. And the Bodkins of Ballytowngal were held to have been boycotted en masse because of the doings at Moytubber gorse. But none of them had been boycotted as had been the Miss Jones\'; and therefore the Miss Jones\' were the heroines of the evening.
"I declare it is very nice," Ada said to her sister that night, when they got home to Mrs. D\'Arcy\'s, "because it got for us the pick of all the partners."
"It got for you one partner, at any rate," said Edith, "either the boycotting or something else." Edith had determined that it should be so; or had determined at any rate that it should seem to be so. In her resolution that the hero of the day should fall in love with her sister, she had almost taught herself to think that the process had already taken place. It was so natural that the bravest man should fall in love with the fairest lady, that Edith took it for granted that it already was so. She too in some sort was in love with her own sister. Ada to her was so fair, so soft, so innocent, so feminine and so lovable, that her very heart was in the project,—and the project that Ada should have the hero of the hour to herself. And yet she too had a heart of her own, and had told herself in so many words, that she herself would have loved the man,—had it been fitting that she should burden him with such a love. She had rejected the idea as unfitting, impossible, and almost unfeminine. There was nothing in her to attract the man. The idea had sprung up but for a moment, and had been cast out as being monstrous. There was Ada, the very queen of beauty. And the gallant hero was languishing in her smiles. It was thus that her imagination carried her on, after the notion had once been entertained. At the ball Edith did in fact dance with Captain Clayton quite as often as did Ada herself, but she danced with him, she said, as the darling sister of his supposed bride. All her talk had been about Ada,—because Edith had so chosen the subject. But with Ada the conversation had all been about Edith, because the Captain had selected the subject.
We all know how a little party is made up on such occasions. Though the party dance also with other people on occasions, they are there especially to dance with each other. An interloper or two now and again is very useful, so as to keep up appearances. The little warrior whom Edith had ill-naturedly declared to be four feet and a half high, but who was in truth five feet and a half, made up the former. Frank did not do much dancing, devoting himself to thinking of Rachel O\'Mahony. The little man, who was a distinguished officer named Captain Butler, of the West Bromwich, had a very good time of it, dancing with Ada when Captain Clayton was not doing so. "The greatest brick I ever saw in my life!"—it was thus Captain Butler afterwards spoke of Edith, "but Ada is the girl for me, you know." Had Edith heard this, which she could not do, because she was then on the boat going back to Morony Castle, she would have informed Captain Butler that Ada was not the girl for him; but Captain Clayton, who heard the announcement made, did not seem to be much disturbed by it.
"It was a very nice party, Mrs. D\'Arcy," sa............