| ~.. And there was the castle. It stood on a small hill directly abovethe town, with the higher hills that divided the two valleys behindit. The twin towers were ancient keeps, hundreds of years old, butthe main building was much more recent. Both old and new parts had been built in the stone of the coun-tryside. Moss and lichen had stained the walls here and there, butfor the most part it still gleamed white. The towers dominated all,declaring it a fortress. It looked as though it should have had amoat and drawbridge. If the towers dominated the castle, the castle itself dominatedthe surrounding country and the little town in particular. Therewas no point from which it could not be seen, no escape, exceptunder the shadow of a wall or building, from the surveillance ofits windows~ Bella wondered what it must be like to be born andgrow through childhood beneath this stone chaperon~ Presumablyher grandmother had done so. She felt her heart stir insympathyfor the poor peasant girl, as ragged as those she now saw aroundher, who had taken away the child of her disgrace to rear in far-away England. She walked with her father through the town, past the premisesof A. Mahony, Corn-Factor, D. McGuire, Bacon-Factor, TerenceBannion, Attorney-at-Law, Michael Ellis, Land Agent & Surveyor-past the post office and the police barracks, and close on a dozenpublic houses, several with open doors that showed men drinkingeven at this early hour. The streets were very dirty, full of muddy puddles, and theinhabitants of the town looked dreadfully poor and ragged eventhough she did not see anyone actually begging~ Even the donkeys,some harnessed to carts but more wandering loose, were a sorry-looking lot, ribs showing under their rough coats. Bella lifted her gaze to the surrounding hills, gently rounded,emerald-grassed and speckled with white stone. There was nodenying the beauty of the countryside. But it was not easy to con-centrate on that distant loveliness; inevitably her eyes came backto the wretchedness of the town and, as inescapably, to the castlebrooding over it. |
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