Chapter XIV: Paddy O’Connell apologises for his silence

The Dormy House, Portmarnock,
August 3d, 1905.

Dear Harry,--I should have told you before that you did wisely to leave Paris, and, please God, to see that “iligant faymale” no more. ’Tis many a man that goes to the devil when he might have gone any other road for the asking of a cheap ticket--and you, I am glad to see, are now restored to your senses and safely back in the land of the Sassenach, where I wish you much prosperity. You have wits of your own, man, and a lively presence. Let me implore you to use them in some honorable occupation, if it is only to spite that long-legged beggar of a parson, who would drive the very saints out of heaven should he by any chance arrive in the neighbourhood of that highly praised locality.

Meanwhile, Harry, I am waiting for your news of Mimi. What a droll little witch she was to be sure--and, man, ’tis lucky for ye that I am your friend, or the Lord knows where she would have landed me. Seek her out by all means and restore her to civilisation. Ye’ll never need to be ashamed of her in any company. There are women who are born to be the light of men’s lives; and if ever I saw one of the kind, the little lady whom Greuze should have painted is one of the company. Find her, I say, and play a gentleman’s part towards her. You’ll never regret it, my boy.

I am writing you but a brief letter, for the golfers here have been playing games upon this old bird and ruffling his plumage excessively. Yesterday, young Willie Jackson made me a bet of a sovereign that he’d drive a ball off the face of his watch, and I took him immediately. Well, he goes out to the tee as cool as a martyr at the stake, pops his watch down on the sand, sticks a ball on the top of it, and smashes the whole lot to blazes. You could have heard me laughing two holes off as I paid the money and chaffed him.

“’Tis to the watchmaker ye’ll be taking that same,” says I, “and asking him what’s wrong with the works?”--for there wasn’t a ha’p’orth of the watch left, not enough to put in a teaspoon. To which he answered, as impudent as anything:

“I think not, Paddy; it was a penny watch I bought in Dublin three days ago.”

Ye may think that I didn’t show my nose in the club-house any more that day, Henry. And, as if this wasn’t enough, young Philpots persuaded me to play him with one of those pneumatic balls to-day, and a fine game he had with me. The harder I hit it--and you know that driving is my pride, being able to outdrive any man in Ireland when I hit one--the harder I hit it the shorter, so to speak, it went, until some of my finest brassies weren’t travelling twenty yards, and my cleeks not ten.

“Be hanged to the ball!” says I at last, “I believe it’s bewitched.”

“Oh, come,” says young Philpots, “nothing of the kind Paddy; ’tis your precious bad driving. Now, what did you drink with your dinner last night?”

“Not more than half a pint of whisky, and perhaps not so much.”

“Then your eyesight must be going, Paddy. I’d see a doctor if I were you when I got back to town.”

“There’s no better eyes in Ireland,” says I; and I picked the ball up and put it in my pocket. After that I knocked young Philpots all to blazes, so I knew it was the ball, and would have said so if the Archangel Gabriel himself had come along and denied me. When I got back to the club-house, I took young Martin, the pro., aside, and asked him a few questions.

“Why did ye sell me such a thing of a ball as that, Martin?” I asked him.

He professed great astonishment.

“There’s nay a better baa’ made,” says he.

“Will ye play a round with it yourself, Martin?”

“Ay, when there’s wind in it.”

“Wind!” cried I, beginning to understand.

“True,” says he, “when there’s wind in it; but no’ when a gentleman has pricked her wi’ a needle before the other gentleman ganged oot.”

Henry--I saw it in a moment! That young devil of a Philpots had let all the air out of the ball before I began to play with it. The story’s all over the place--I’ll never show my face here for a month, unless it be to pull the noses of the pair of them for the pleasure of saying good-bye to such jovial companions. My dear Harry, yours as of old,

Paddy O’Connell.