"What's wrong? Is anyone hurt?" asked Tom.
"Some idiot of a fellow came right out of the hedge and ran straight into us," said Henry. "Not Tim's fault at all. It's a mercy we were not all thrown into the ditch. Hand down the carriage lamp, Herbert, and let's see the damage."
Together he and Tom Callaghan dragged the unfortunate man from under the carriage, and laid him out on his back in the road.
"I'm afraid his back is broken," said Tom quietly. "Let me loosen the collar and turn the head to the light. Henry, I think Katherine and your aunt had best get into the other carriage and drive home to Clonmere. This isn't a sight for their eyes. Herbert, will you look after them?"
"What is it? Who is it?" said Katherine, stepping down from the carriage. "Poor fellow.
Let me help, Henry, please."
"No, dear one, I want you to go home. Do what I tell you," said Henry.
Katherine hesitated a moment, and then took Aunt Eliza's arm and turned back to the other carriage.
"Drive on," called Henry, waving his hand to the groom; "we shall follow directly."
Edward had now joined them, and Bill Eyre.
"What a wretched business," said Edward. "Is the man dead?"
"I'm afraid so," said Tom; "the wheel seems to have passed right over his head… We had better lift him into the carriage, and take him straight away to the surgery and rouse the doctor.
The young fellow, not old Armstrong. Not that he will be able to do anything, I don't recognise the fellow, he's no one I know in Doonhaven. About forty-five, I should say, reddish hair going grey. Give us the light again."
Once more they looked down into the face of the dead man. It was badly marked and disfigured, but even so there was something about the hair, the staring blue eyes, that awoke recognition in Henry and a flood of memories.
"Good God," he said slowly, "it's Jack Donovan."
The brothers stared at one another, and old Tim, coming close to them, bent down in his turn and examined the dead man.
"You're right, sir," he said. "It's him sure enough. I'd heard he was home from America, but I hadn't seen him myself. And what does he do but come home and get drunk and walk straight in under my horse's feet. '?
"Is this the man you told me about once?" asked Tom quietly.
"Yes," said Henry. "What a wretched unfortunate business! Why the devil did he have to come back?"
"No use wondering that," said Tom, "
"we have to get him down to the village. Who's his nearest relative? Hasn't he an aunt, Mrs.
Kelly? And I suppose that old rogue Denny Donovan, who used to keep a pub, is an uncle?"
"Yes, sir," said Tim, "Denny is his uncle, but the man's never sober, not much use rousing him. Denny's son, Pat Donovan, has a bit of a farm across the hill here; that's where Jack must have been staying."
"Time enough for all that in the morning," said Tom Callaghan "Let's get the poor fellow to the surgery."
What a damnable end to the evening, thought Henry, as the carriage with its miserable burden rattled down the hill into Doonhaven, And why, of all people, must it have been Jack Donovan, returned from America, who chose to end his life in such a fashion? If only he could have run into somebody else's carriage. Henry had not the slightest pity for the fellow, he was a scoundrel in every sense, and the world was well rid of him, but for anyone to be killed in this way, beneath his horses and his carriage, and especially after the celebration that had taken place that evening, was painful and disturbing, It was not his fault, it was not anyone's fault except Jack Donovan's himself, but that was not the point. The thing had happened. And it brought back the past and so much distress that was best forgotten. '
It was some time after midnight when Henry and his brothers returned to Clonmere. The body of Jack Donovan had been taken to the surgery and the doctor summoned. He must have died instantly, the doctor said, and certainly Tim could be absolved from all blame, for it was obvious that the dead man had been drinking. The doctor promised to go himself in the morning and break the news to Jack Donovan's cousin Pat, and Tom Callaghan also announced his intention of doing the same.
"There's no need for you to concern yourself in the matter, old fellow," he said to Henry. "I'm the Rector of this place, and I'm used to this sort of thing, even if the Donovans don't belong to my church. You have a big house-party on your hands, and it's your duty to look after them."
The castle was hushed and silent in the moonlight.
Only a pinprick of light from their bedroom warned Henry that Katherine was awake and waiting for him. He was afraid she would be very much grieved at what had happened. Damn Jack Donovan, he thought angrily, even if he was dead. His brothers went up to bed, but Henry remained below, wondering whether he should make up some story to Katherine or not. It would be useless, though; he had never lied to her. He stood by the front door gazing out across the creek to Hungry Hill.
It lay in shadow now, and the moon, shining high above Doon Island, seemed pale and cold. Fifty years ago his grandfather must have stood here, with his future before him and the agreement for the mines in his pocket. And fifty years hence, what? His own grandson, a son of Hal's perhaps, with this same moon looking down upon Clonmere, and the creek, and the scarred, blank face of Hungry Hill?
He turned and went indoors, and climbed the stairs softly to Katherine's room. She was sitting up in bed waiting for him, her long dark hair in two plaits like a child. She looked pale and anxious.
"I am sure the man is dead," she said at once. "I felt it, directly you told me to come home."
"Yes," he said, "he is dead."
He told her a little more about it: how they had gone to the surgery, and roused the doctor, and then, when she asked the man's name, he hesitated, having some intuition that the name would make her unhappy, as indeed it made him unhappy too.
"It was Jack Donovan," he said at last.
"It seems he had returned from America."
She said very little, and he went and undressed, and when he came back she had blown out the candles and was lying in darkness.
He held her close to him, and when he kissed her eyes he found they were wet with tears.
"Don't think about it," he said; "it was a wretched unfortunate thing to happen, but the doctor said he died instantly. He was a hopeless fellow, you know that, and would only have made trouble in the district if he had settled down here again. Please, dear one, don't think about it any more."
"It's not that," she said. "I'm not crying for Jack Donovan."
"What is it, then?" he said. "Won't you tell me?"
She said nothing for a moment, and then, putting her arms round him, she said: "I cried just now because I remembered Johnnie, and how lost and unhappy he was. I might have done so much more for him than I did."
"That's absurd," said Henry. "What more could you have possibly done?"
It was Jack Donovan, of course, who had brought back the old tragedy. Johnnie had been dead nearly twelve years, and Katherine had never mentioned him before. And here she was, lying in his arms, with the tears running down her cheeks. He was aware, for the first time in his life, of a queer pang of jealousy. It was disturbing, strange, that Katherine, his beloved wife, so calm always, so patient and reserved, should weep like a little child for his dead brother, after all these years.
"It's that damned accident," he said, "it's been a shock to you. I wish to God it could have been avoided… Katherine darling, you do love me, don't you? More than anyone else, more than the children, more than Hal?"
The great supper up at the mines, the cheering and the clapping, the celebrations of the day, and the sudden horror of the accident on the way home were all forgotten in his sudden longing for reassurance. If he doubted Katherine he doubted everything. There was no faith, no hope, no meaning in life at all.