hed, not realising that such a train of thought was in the nature of
things unprofitable.

So Gabrielle grew, and so, in a few years, Jocelyn, with a tremendous
effort pulled himself together, returning, as though refreshed, to his
sporting pursuits, the woods, the lake and the river. He even found a
new hobby: the breeding of Cocker spaniels, and worked up an interest
in the development of his daughter that ran easily with that of
training his puppies. He took a great delight in teasing small
animals, and treated Gabrielle and the cockers on much the same lines,
with the result that the puppies were usually a little cowed and
puzzled when he teased them, but Gabrielle bit his hand. This pleased
him; for he set great store by animal spirits in any form, and he
carried his fingers bandaged in the hunting-field for several weeks in
order that he might tell the story of his daughter's prowess. Jocelyn
was growing rather childish in his old age.

There were really three periods in Gabrielle's early life. The first,
before her father began to take notice of her, was spent altogether in
the company of Biddy, who embraced her in her general devotion to
children. Biddy called herself a Catholic, and for this reason
secretly feared and hated the supervision of young Mr. Considine, a
priest of the Church of Ireland; but at heart she was as pagan as the
top of Slievegullion, and along with her favourite Christian oaths (in
one of which St. Anthony of Padua was disguised as Saint Antonio
Perrier), and her whispered "Aves," she taught Gabrielle enough pagan
mythology and folklore to set her head spinning whenever she found
herself alone in the woods or the fields.

If ever she strayed into the forbidden lanes beyond the lodge-gates at
Roscarna she lived in fear of seeing the dead-coach come round the
corner: a tall coach, painted black and drawn by coal-black horses and
on the box two men, black-coated with black faces, who might jump from
the coach and catch her up and throw her inside it. You could never
know when the dead-coach was coming, for its wheels were bound with old
black rags, so that they made no noise on the stones. Then, in the
fields where corn was growing one might come across the "limrechaun,"
with consequences untold but terrible. And, above all things, she was
never to pick up an old comb in the road, for as like as not the comb
would be the property of the banshee, a little old woman with long
nails