CHAPTER XVI

PEACE AND HARMONY

It was many days before Norah did speak or move, and many more before she recovered consciousness sufficiently to take notice of the strange room in which she found herself, and to ask how she came to be there; and during that time some very surprising and unlooked-for things had happened.

Roderick presented himself in his uncle's study later on that same day. Mr. O'Brien sat at his writing-table, a pile of heavy leather-bound ledgers and account-books before him, looking weary and listless after the excitement and the fatigue of the previous day. A quick flush mounted to his forehead as Roderick crossed the room and stood looking down at him.

"I would like to tell you, sir," he said frigidly, "that we will not intrude upon you more than we can possibly avoid. I had hoped that we should have been able to move Norah to Kilshane, but the doctor, who has just been here, has absolutely forbidden our attempting it. Of course, so long as she is here, Anstace must remain to nurse her; and I hope you will not object to Manus and me coming over every day to see her--"

He got no further, for Mr. O'Brien started forward and gripped his hand with a force that was almost painful.

"My boy, what are you talking about?" he cried. "As if I had not wanted you all along!"

Roderick could not conceal his astonishment.

"You did not give me any reason to think so, sir," he said, and stopped short once more, for his glance had fallen on the little water-colour portrait that hung above the writing-table, as Ella's had done months before.

Mr. O'Brien saw the direction of his gaze.

"You don't need to ask who that is, Roderick," he said. "It is your mother as she was in the days when I thought she would have been my wife. It is an old story, over and done with twenty-three years ago, but she was the one woman whom I ever loved, and when she broke faith with me, it went near breaking my heart too. Perhaps you can understand how I dreaded, and yet wished, to see her children. It has been in my mind half a hundred times since I knew you were living in Ansey O'Brien's house to have myself driven over there, and walk in amongst you all. I never could bring myself to do it though. It seemed to me that I had forfeited the right of claiming kinship with you when I let your father die without any effort at reconciliation."

"We would have welcomed you at any time that you had come, Uncle Nicholas," Roderick said earnestly.

"Would you, my boy? I used to doubt it, and so I waited on in the hope that chance would bring us together, till, as you see, it was left for little Norah to act as _dea ex machina_, and end the great family feud."

Roderick could not forbear laughing.

"Norah did it in a manner peculiarly her own," he said. "I only hope it will not be at too great cost to herself, poor child. Dr. Hanlon says she is going on as well as he could hope for at present, but he will not be able to pronounce her out of danger for some days to come."

Outside his uncle's door Roderick encountered Harry Wyndham, evidently lying in wait for him.

"Look here, I'm awfully glad you've come, and I want you to say a good word for me to the governor--Uncle Nicholas, you know," the lad began eagerly and confidentially. "I haven't ventured to show my nose to him to-day, but I want you to persuade him that it's no good trying to make me work on at this mine business. I hate the whole thing, stock, lock, and barrel, and I've cut it, once and for all."

"Is that what you wish me to tell Uncle Nicholas?" enquired Roderick mildly.

"Oh well, just put it to him the best way you can, like a good fellow; he'll take it better from you than from me," said the ingenuous youth. "The fact is, I mean to be a soldier," and unconsciously he drew himself erect, and threw his chest out. "It's what my father was before me, and what I've wanted to be all my life; but then, you see, Uncle Nicholas had done such a lot for Ella and me, and he's getting old, and--oh, hang it all, you understand what I mean--I felt he'd a sort of claim upon me, and that I was bound to do what he wanted--at least, that I ought to give it a try. It's no go, I can't do it. I wouldn't have come back at all, I'd have struck out for myself, only it would have been behaving scurvily to Uncle Nicholas after all I owe him. And if one's going to be a soldier, one oughtn't to begin by shirking things, ought one?"

"Certainly not," said Roderick, much amused, but not wishing to point out to Harry that now that he had come home, he did not appear very desirous of facing his irate uncle himself.

"Well, if you'd just tell Uncle Nicholas that if he'll help me to get into the army it's all I'll ever ask of him, I'll manage for myself after that. Of course, I know I've no right to expect it, and if he won't do it I'll enlist and work my way up, as many a better chap has done. That's why I'm so awfully glad that you've turned up, for of course you're the right man in the right place to look after the mine and keep things straight for Uncle Nicholas, and it makes it all plain sailing for me to go off. I shan't feel that I'm fighting shy of my duty."

It was quite clear that Miss Browne's ambitious schemes had found no entrance into Harry's boyish mind, and that to him a life of soldiering and adventure far outweighed the O'Brien heritage which she coveted so ardently on his behalf.

"I have no reason to imagine that Uncle Nicholas desires my services in any capacity," said Roderick, "but I think he owes you a good deal for defending his house last night. But for you he would have found the mob in possession on his return, and so I dare say he may be induced to let you follow your own bent."

Roderick's anticipations proved correct, and Mr. O'Brien showed himself even more complaisant than had been expected.

"If the boy's determined to wear a red coat he'll do better in it than he would in one of any other colour, and so it's best to let him have his way."

The days of late summer went by, one by one, and still Norah lay in the same heavy stupor, varied only by occasional outbreaks of wandering and delirium. Ella had begged to be allowed to share the duties of sick-nurse, and she proved as unwearied and devoted in her attendance on Norah as even Anstace herself. Mr. O'Brien paid at least one visit every day to the sick-room, and displayed the liveliest anxiety about the little patient. It was he who despatched the mounted messenger to Ballyfin and thence by rail to Ennis, to procure the ice which the doctor had ordered to be placed on Norah's head; and on the day on which Dr. Hanlon looked his gravest, Mr. O'Brien, without a word to either Roderick or Anstace, telegraphed for the doctor who was most highly thought of in the county, to come to the local practitioner's aid. He would have summoned a surgeon from Dublin if Norah had not taken a favourable turn, which enabled the doctor to pronounce her in a fair way of recovery.

The story of the attack made by the miners upon Moyross Abbey, and the manner in which they had been put to flight by Norah, quickly spread through the neighbourhood, and it was quite wonderful what interest it aroused.

Carriages and cars rolled up the avenue constantly with enquiries for the little girl. Foremost of those who came was Lady Louisa Butler, a stately white-haired old lady, who drove all the way from Dromore and insisted on going up into the darkened sick-chamber, where Anstace kept her anxious watch.

"Me dear," she said, with just the sweetest, softest touch of brogue in her voice, as she stooped to kiss her, "don't you be fretting yourself to fiddle-strings, the child will be well again, you'll see, in next to no time. I'd have known she was Piers O'Brien's daughter just by her planning out that trick, it's what he'd have loved to do himself. Dear, dear, but he was the boy for pranks and mischief. No sooner out of one scrape than he was into another, and how fond we were of him in spite of it all!"

But the interest was by no means confined to the gentry and the county magnates; the house was beset by humbler friends of Norah, who, as they said themselves, "slipped up to git a bit of word" how she was progressing. Amongst the rest was the orator of the trolly, Malachy Flanagan himself, who marched up one windy, blustering afternoon, reckless of all consequences to himself, and careless whether it had become known that it was his eloquence which had fired the recalcitrant miners with the thought of attacking Moyross House. He came, too, not modestly to the back-door like the others, but on up the avenue with his long, swinging gait, the ends of his red beard blown back against his chest, and sat himself down on the hall door-steps. Drawing out his scarlet and white handkerchief, he buried his face in it and broke forth into loud and uncontrolled weeping, for it was just that day on which the doctors had looked their gravest, and a rumour had spread abroad that "it's tuk wid a wakeness since mornin', an' goin' fast the little darlin' is."

"An' if we had knew that 'twas widin the house she was, there wasn't wan as would ha' riz a stone agin it," Malachy declared, between the paroxysms of his grief, to Ella, who had come down to speak to him, and who was somewhat alarmed by his wild and uncouth demeanour. "Or if she'd as much as come to the windy an' held up the little finger of her hand, we'd have been as quite that minnit as a flock of ould lambs."

"She wanted to go out and speak to you, she did indeed," said Ella sadly. "She said you would go away if she asked you, but Mr. Harry would not believe it--it seemed so unlikely--and he would not allow her out."

"An' what call had Miss Norah to be mindin' Misther Harry Wyndham, or any orders that he'd give her?" demanded Malachy fiercely, forgetting in his excitement who his interlocutor was. "Didn't she know there wasn't wan of us that wudn't lie down an' let her walk over us? Yis, indade, an' wid good right too, seein' what she done for us that same marnin' as iver was--"

Here, however, Malachy became incoherent, as even in the midst of his grief it was borne in upon him that the service which Norah had rendered him was one which it would hardly be well to proclaim aloud. Happily, as has been already recorded, Norah took a turn for the better that evening, and from thenceforth made steady though slow progress towards recovery.

Manus had gone back to school as soon as she was pronounced out of danger. Mr. O'Brien had announced his intention of sending him to Harrow in the spring, and Harry had previously departed to a tutor to be prepared for the entrance examination into the army. The mine was once more a busy hive of industry, and shipload after shipload of valuable ore was being despatched from the iron pier at the foot of the cliffs. Mr. O'Brien, with Roderick and M'Bain, had met the miners on that very plot of ground behind the mine buildings where Malachy Flanagan on that notable evening had harangued the crowd, and terms of peace had been arranged. M'Bain was to continue at his post for three months till Roderick had gained an insight into the working of the mine, and then relinquish the management to him. The hard-headed and energetic Scotchman, whose opinion of Irish peasants had not been raised by recent events, was not sorry to resign his charge and return to work amongst his own more congenial countrymen.

"A pack o' grown men rinnin' fra a bit lassie in a white sheet--peeh!" and volumes could not have expressed as much contempt as Mr. M'Bain threw into that monosyllable.

Mr. O'Brien promised to overlook the attack made upon Moyross House, and to take no proceedings for the damage done that night, whilst the men, through their spokesman, Malachy Flanagan, whose influence had had a goodly share in bringing about this peaceful settlement, agreed to return to work and to suffer the introduction of the new machinery, the original cause of all the ill-will.

It was at this point that Roderick stepped forward.

"Boys," he said, "I know less than any of you about copper-mining, but I mean to learn. I hope you and I may work together for many a day to come, and if you'll help me, we'll make Moyross the most flourishing mine in the county Clare, and if we can, in the whole of Ireland."

A frantic outburst of cheering answered him; hats and arms were waving wildly, whilst women poured out blessings on him; and when the tumult subsided for an instant, Malachy, his hat held aloft upon his blackthorn, shouted:

"God bless Moyross Abbey, and them that's in it, an' the blue sky over it, an' little Miss Norah, the first o' them all!"

Another roar, louder and more vociferous than the first, rose and rolled out over the Atlantic, and before its echoes had died away Mr. O'Brien and Roderick had mounted the car that was in waiting for them and driven swiftly away.

The car with its two occupants had become a familiar sight on the roads in the neighbourhood of Moyross by this time. Mr. O'Brien took Roderick for long drives through the wide-spreading property, visiting each portion of it in turn; and as they passed, the women at the cabin doors said to each other: "'Tis the ould masther an' the young masther; the blessin' of God be in their company this day."

No one acquiesced in the altered aspect of affairs with more cheerful complacency than did Miss Browne, and the cause of her contentment was twofold. The first was that Roderick, meeting Ella one evening in the Monk's Walk--as it chanced, upon the very spot where the dread white spectre had menaced Manus and Norah--had taken her hand in his own and told her that he loved her, that he had loved her for a long time--ever since that evening, indeed, when he had caught her pony on the road and she had come down afterwards and sat in the little drawing-room at Kilshane amongst them all. He had asked her if she cared enough for him to trust herself to him and give her life into his keeping, and Ella, though fluttered and taken by surprise, had yet given him an answer that satisfied him; and when they came up the path and past the ruins of the old abbey, it was hand in hand, with the light of a great happiness shining in their eyes. Miss Browne was quite content to relinquish her hopes for Harry Wyndham and to see Roderick acknowledged as his uncle's heir, if Ella was to be his wife; and she had another reason for her satisfaction at the turn which matters had taken. Ever since the night of the onslaught on Moyross House, poor Miss Browne had been in constant trepidation and alarm. She could not sleep at night without fancying that she heard the shouts and cries of the mob under her windows, and in every frieze-coated countryman whom she encountered on the road she saw a possible blood-thirsty assailant. Whilst Ella needed her, nothing would have induced Miss Browne to quit her post; but since Ella had found another protector, there was nothing to hinder her from leaving Moyross and Ireland altogether, and establishing herself upon her modest savings in security and in the trimmest of little suburban dwellings.

Roderick and Anstace still remained at Moyross pending Norah's recovery. It had been arranged that Roderick and Ella should take up their abode at Kilshane after their marriage, whilst Anstace and Norah were to live at Moyross with Mr. O'Brien in Ella's place.

It was upon this changed condition of affairs that Norah opened her eyes, in the early days of autumn, when the trees were beginning to assume tints of russet and gold. The very first wish to which she gave utterance, after coming back to full and clear consciousness, was that Lanty Hogan might be brought up to see her.

Lanty, who had been among the most assiduous of the enquirers at Moyross, was greatly gratified, but also somewhat embarrassed, on hearing of Norah's desire, and he came upstairs treading gingerly on the carpets, and wiping his hobnailed shoes with much care on the mat outside Norah's bedroom door.

"How do you do, Lanty? I am very glad to see you," said Norah, stretching out her small white hand to him as he stood just within the door, turning his hat awkwardly round and round in his hands. Her short black hair had been cut shorter still during her illness, and her face seemed to Lanty to have become all eyes, so thin and wasted was it.

"An' faix an' I'm glad to see you, Miss Norah," he stammered, "if 'twas but a bit heartier ye wor lookin'. But niver fear, ye'll be pickin' up noo, an' it's gran' toimes we'll be havin' whin Masther Manus comes home agin; yis, indade, sale-huntin' an' all else."

In his shyness Lanty hardly knew what he was saying. Norah turned to her sister, who was sitting at the other side of her bed.

"Please, Anstace, what I want to say to Lanty is a secret. Will you let me be alone with him for a little while?"

Anstace got up with less demur than might have been expected.

"Very well, Norah; you may talk to Lanty for five minutes, but not longer. I shall come back then."

"Lanty, you haven't been making any more of that stuff--I forget what you called it--the stuff you and the other men made, up in that little house on Drinane Head?" enquired Norah, when the door had closed behind Anstace.

"Is't the potheen, Miss Norah? Sorra sup's been made since ye saw't yerself spillin' out like dirty dish wather. Nor it's not like there will be, nayther, up there anyways, since the polis has their eye on us, and we'd not be knowin' when they'd be happenin' down--bad scran to them! 'Tis another shnug little hidin' place we'll have to be lookin' out for, I'm thinkin', for it's not always we'd have yerself comin' up an' bringin' us warnin'."

"Lanty," said Norah earnestly, "I want you to promise me that you won't make any more potheen, neither on Drinane Head nor anywhere else. I thought about you nearly all the time I was ill," she went on, as Lanty stared at her in undisguised amazement, "you and Malachy and the other men up there, but you especially. I couldn't think quite straight, all my ideas were upside down and mixed together, like when one's not quite asleep and not quite awake, don't you know, but you were in my head somehow or other all through. I didn't quite understand about the potheen. When I went up to tell you about Captain Lester's coming, it didn't seem as if the government had any right to stop you making it if you liked; but I knew there was something wrong about it the moment I saw you, you looked so different from what you used to do when you were boating and fishing with Master Manus: your eyes were so red, and your face was flabby, and you kept looking about all the time as if you were afraid or ashamed of something."

Lanty stood with his eyes on the ground shuffling his feet awkwardly.

"Thrue for ye, Miss Norah," he said slowly at last, "an' meself knows that same roightly. Nor it's not the love of the potheen that takes me mannefacterin' it, but jist the divvlemint an' the divarsion, an' the playin' blind hookey wid the polis. I'd niver contint meself to live workin' hard, wid no variety an' no venturesomeness, not if I was to be makin' pouns an' pouns a day."

"I'm sure all the devilment and the diversion can't make you happy or comfortable, Lanty, when you look as you did on Drinane Head that morning," said Norah sagely. "And then do you remember what Captain Lester said before he went away, and he talked a lot more about it at breakfast at Kilshane afterwards. He said people who took to making potheen always came to ruin sooner or later. I don't want you to be ruined, Lanty; you were so kind to me, and took care of me that day of the seal-hunt, and Master Manus likes you so much; he says you're a broth of a boy, and he'd be so sorry too. That was what kept worrying me all the time I was ill, that if I didn't get well quick you'd have been ruined; and the very first moment Anstace would allow it, I made her bring you upstairs. I want you to promise me that you'll never make potheen again."

"Sure it's too bad intirely that ye should ha' been throublin' yerself for the likes o' me, Miss Norah; an' there's nothin' on this mortial airth I wudn't do for yer axin'--" he hesitated, but the eyes that seemed to have grown so large of late were fixed pleadingly upon him, and with desperate resolve he added: "Divil resave the dhrop o' potheen I'll make nor swally from this oot, not if Malachy an' the rest o' the boys curshed till they broke their hearts. I've promised that, Miss Norah, an' troth I'll kape it."

"I'm so glad," said Norah gratefully. "I won't have to trouble any more about you; and now I must say good-bye, Lanty, for I'm not strong enough yet to talk a great deal, and it makes me tired."

Lanty touched the thin morsel of a hand which she held out to him cautiously and reverently, as if it were an egg-shell, or costly china, which would break with rough handling. He was brushing his hand across his eyes as he came out into the corridor, and he nearly ran against Roderick, who was on his way to his little sister's room.

"Hullo, Lanty!" exclaimed the latter in some astonishment. "Have you taken to the doctoring trade, or what brings you up into Miss Norah's room?"

"Sure yer honour's always for havin' yer joke," said Lanty, grinning confusedly. "Miss Norah tuk a fancy to see me--'twas a little thransacsheeon her an' me was consarned about."

"Had the transaction anything to do with your making potheen on Drinane Head, and her going up there to tell you the police were coming?" asked Anstace quietly, from the window in which she had stood looking out on the pleasure-ground and waiting for the minutes allotted to the interview to be over.

Lanty faced round quickly.

"An' how did yer honour know that?"

Anstace laughed softly.

"I only guessed it before, Lanty; but I know it now. Miss Norah talked about it almost always when she was delirious, but what she said was so incoherent and confused we could not make much of it. Mr. Roderick would not believe that she could really have gone up to warn you, and thought it was only a delusion that had got hold of her, but I remembered two or three little things which happened that morning which made me suspect it was true; and now, Lanty, you have admitted it to me yourself."

"Yer honour's too cute for a poor boy like me," said Lanty in wheedling tones; "but sure it's not yerself, Miss Anstace, that wud inform agin us, an' me jist afther promisin' Miss Norah that I'd quit out of the business wanst an' for all?"

"Well, I'm glad to hear that, at any rate, Lanty; and if you do turn over a new leaf and settle down steadily to some honest trade, you may be quite sure that neither Mr. Roderick nor I will ever breathe a word of what we know."

"I'll thry me livin' best," protested Lanty earnestly; "but whin ye're used to sthravagin' over the counthry wid ne'er a thing to do but plaze yerself, settlin' down to work stiddy is the mischief's own job."

And Lanty heaved a prodigious sigh.

"I'll make you an offer," said Roderick, who had been listening to the colloquy with much amusement. "Old Pat Lannigan, the gamekeeper, is getting past his work, and Mr. O'Brien has been talking of engaging some strapping young fellow as under-keeper to assist him. Now if you're really going to turn over the new leaf Miss Anstace talks of, and will promise to keep from drink and potheen-making and poaching for the future, I'll try to induce my uncle to give the berth to you. That will give you the sort of roving, outdoor life that you like; and if you are steady and give Mr. O'Brien satisfaction, there will be every likelihood that when old Pat finally gives up work you will become gamekeeper in his stead."

Lanty flushed up under his freckles, and his eyes beamed with pleasure.

"Thank ye, Misther Roderick; sure that's what I'd rather be nor nothin' besides."

"One thing I'm sure of," and Roderick looked at him with a twinkle in his eyes, "that there's not a boy in the country that knows the ways of every creature that has feathers or fur, and where to find it, better than yourself. But remember, Lanty," he added more gravely, "if I speak to my uncle on your behalf I shall expect you not to disgrace my recommendation."

"No fear, yer honour, not the taste of a fear," asseverated Lanty joyfully, as he vanished in the direction of the backstairs.

* * * * * * *

"And when you are married, Ella will be my sister--my real, own sister, like Anstace? Oh, I do think it's the most wonderful and the very jolliest thing that ever happened!"

It was a few days later, and Norah had been moved for the first time from her bed to a sofa.

"I quite agree with you, Norah," said Roderick, who, with Anstace and Ella, had gathered in her room for afternoon tea, and who was sitting on the arm of the sofa looking down at his little sister. "What you have to do now is to get well and strong as quickly as possible, for Ella is determined not to be married till you can be her bridesmaid. The very first day you are able to go out of the house I will take you down and show you the Monk's Walk, where this most wonderful and jolly thing came to pass, and Ella promised to bestow herself on my unworthy self."

"But Norah has seen the Monk's Walk before, surely?" exclaimed Ella. Roderick laughed.

"You forget what strangers we all were to each other till Norah broke the ice for us, and her own head into the bargain, by tumbling down from the abbey window. She had never even set foot inside Moyross till she ran over that night with Manus to give you warning that the miners were coming, had you, little woman?"

To Roderick's astonishment, Norah's pale face crimsoned slowly from chin to brow.

"Yes, I was in Moyross before--once," she said, after a few minutes' painful hesitation; "and I came up the Monk's Walk, only it was so dark we couldn't see anything, Manus and I. I've wanted to tell about it ever so often since I've been ill, only I was afraid it would make Uncle Nicholas so dreadfully angry that perhaps he'd have another quarrel with us. But there can't be a family feud now, can there, when Roderick and Ella are going to be married?"

"No, dear, of course not; and now lie quiet and try to go to sleep," said Anstace soothingly. She thought this strange talk on Norah's part must mean that she had been over-excited and that her mind was beginning to wander as it had done during her illness.

But Norah's eyes were far too wide and bright for any possibility of sleep.

"Not even when Uncle Nicholas hears that it was Manus and I who shot holes into his table-cloth?" she asked anxiously.

"Norah, you are not in earnest surely?" said Roderick sternly, whilst Anstace laid her hand quickly on her little sister's forehead. She was quite certain now that Norah was suffering from a sudden return of fever.

Norah, however, shook herself from under the cool, quieting clasp.

"It is true, it is indeed!" she said piteously. "It was that night when we were coming back after killing the seal in Ballintaggart Cave, and Lanty put us ashore out of his coracle in the cove, because he was in a hurry-- Oh, but I forgot," interrupting herself; "that was a secret too!"

Roderick looked even more grave.

"I think we know pretty well about Master Lanty and his doings, Norah," he said; "betraying them is not of much consequence. But I confess I don't like to hear of all this underhand work and keeping of secrets which seems to have gone on behind Anstace's and my back. Let us have the rest of the story now, please; we have not heard about the table-cloth yet."

Very falteringly and tremulously it was told, for Norah, though she was very fond of Roderick, stood also in some awe of him and of his displeasure.

"And why did you not come forward at once when you saw Miss Browne and Ella, and tell them how it had happened, and how sorry you were for the mischief you had done?" demanded Anstace at the end of the recital.

Poor Norah hung her head.

"We were so much ashamed, and we were afraid, too, because Miss Browne seemed so angry about the table-cloth. And Manus said everyone would laugh at us so dreadfully if they heard that we had thought a table-cloth hanging on a tree was a ghost, so we agreed to keep it a secret; but, oh dear! I'm glad it's told, for secrets do weigh on one so much."

Ella stooped quickly to kiss her.

"Never mind, Norah dear, it doesn't matter in the least, not if you had shot all the table-cloths in Moyross into rags. Roderick, you are not to frown like that, I won't have it!"

Roderick, in truth, in his efforts to keep the muscles of his face under control, and to maintain a proper air of severity while Norah was telling her story, had contracted his forehead into a most portentous frown. At Ella's command, however, issued with a pretty air of imperiousness that was quite new to her, he gave up the struggle to retain his gravity and indulged in a hearty and prolonged fit of laughter, in which Anstace and Ella were not slow to join.

"Hey! Hullo! What's all this about?" said a voice behind them.

Mr. O'Brien had come in without anyone hearing him, and was standing leaning on his stick, holding a fine bunch of grapes in his other hand.

"Norah shall tell you what the joke is," said Roderick. "Yes, Norah, every word, just as you have told us now, before you touch one of the grapes Uncle Nicholas has brought you. I ordain that as your penance."

So the whole story had to be told over again, but this time Norah, conscious of having the sympathy of the larger part of her audience with her, was not as nervous as on the first occasion. There was even a roguish twinkle in her eyes as she finished up with:

"But you see, Uncle Nicholas, if it hadn't been for that table-cloth ghost, I'd never have thought of being a ghost up in the abbey window; so it was a good thing it happened after all."

"So it was, my dear, a first-rate thing," said the old man. "And you deserve your grapes for telling it so well. You were a pretty pair of cowards, you and that young rascal Manus; but perhaps we'd none of us have been heroes under the circumstances." And he laughed with as keen enjoyment as anyone else.

"Norah is getting on so well, Uncle Nicholas," said Anstace, "that I think we shall not have to trespass on your kindness much longer. In a few days, if you will lend us the carriage, I think we shall be able to take her home to Kilshane."

"Eh, what's that?" said Mr. O'Brien, wheeling round upon her. "I thought, my dear, you understood that 'home' for you was here from henceforward. I'll lend no carriages to take anyone away from here till one is needed to drive Mr. and Mrs. Roderick O'Brien on their wedding-journey. And that wedding is going to be a big affair, I've made up my mind about that. It shall be remembered in the county when Miss Norah here is brushing a gray head. There's one thing I would like you to understand, nephew Roderick," he said after a pause, fixing his eyes keenly upon him. "Nothing which has occurred during the last few weeks alters your future prospects in any way. You only hold the position which you have held since your father's death. Nothing would have induced me to leave an acre of O'Brien land away from the rightful heir."

"There, didn't I tell you so, Anstace?" exclaimed Norah triumphantly from her sofa, before anyone else could speak.

"Told me what, dear? What are you talking about?" asked her elder sister, somewhat puzzled.

"Don't you remember that first day when you came to Treherne House and told me that Cousin Ansey had left Kilshane to us, and that we were all coming over to live here? You said then you were sure that Uncle Nicholas would not make up the feud, and that he would leave Moyross Abbey to Harry Wyndham; and I told you he hadn't a right to leave half a quarter of a yard of O'Brien land to anyone except an O'Brien."

"Really, Norah, you have become extremely forward since you have been ill," said Roderick, with considerable annoyance. "No one has asked for your opinion, and in future please to remember that little girls should be seen and not heard."

"Just you leave her alone," said Mr. O'Brien gruffly, as the tears sprang into Norah's eyes at her brother's rebuke, and he patted her hand kindly. "If she said anything of the sort, it only showed that she had more sense in her composition than all the rest of her family put together. She's always been the one to cut the Gordian knot and find the way out of difficulties for everyone--miners, smugglers, and quarrelling relatives included." He paused and sighed heavily, then added as by an overmastering impulse, "I wish your father Piers were here to see this day."

"I wish indeed that he were, sir, or even that you and he might have met and made up your quarrel before he died," said Roderick earnestly.

Mr. O'Brien sighed once again.

"You cannot desire it as I do, Roderick. I would gladly give half the little life that is left to me that he and I had shaken hands even once. He wronged me deeply, but he was my only brother, and many a time of late years I should have been glad if any opportunity had arisen to end the estrangement. But I let the time slip by, waiting for the chance that never came, and then one day I heard it was too late."

There was a few minutes' silence, and then Anstace said softly:

"It will be a year next week since he died. How little we thought then that we should all be here, gathered in his old home."