oss the table to lay it on Brian's.

"Success would be of little worth, Yellow Brian," she said softly, and
her eyes steadied him, "if it were won without reverses. Few men have
the luck to win always, and a touch of defeat is not an ill thing,
perhaps. When we had this news of you from Galway, a week since, I sent
off a galley to find Blake at the Cove of Cork and seek aid of him. Also
my kinsmen will return to Gorumna before going home to Erris, and we are
not in hard case here. So now get rested, Brian Buidh, and afterward we
will see what may be done. Those Millhaven men have not yet passed
Erris, or I would have word of it by pigeon, so they have doubtless
delayed to plunder in Sligo or Killala."

Brian looked into her eyes, and from that moment he began to put behind
him all thoughts of capturing that Millhaven castle for himself or of
placing himself out of touch with Nuala O'Malley. He went to his chamber
as she bade, and slept that night and the next day and the night after,
waking on the second morning still empty of sleep and seeming more weary
than when he had laid down.

This was but seeming, however, and when he had bathed and eaten he felt
more like himself than for many a day.

Cathbarr had departed at dawn with a wagon-load of powder to trade for
kine with his O'Flaherty kinsmen in the hills, and before Brian had
broken his fast one of the galleys from Gorumna came over with three
pigeons for Nuala. The cage was brought to her as she sat at meat with
Brian in the hall, and she opened the tiny messages with all the
delighted anticipation of a girl.

"This is from that galley I sent to Cork," she exclaimed, laying down
the first. "It merely reports safe arrival and the delivery of my letter
to Blake, who is leaving there before long. Now for the--ah!"

"Good news or bad?" smiled Brian easily, as animation flashed into her
face. She looked up at him with a rippling laugh.

"Both, Brian! This is from Erris, and says that the O'Donnell seamen
have made a landing at Ballycastle under Downpatrick Head, and will
likely put to sea again in a day or two. They will give Erris a wide
berth, never fear, and that means that they will make no pause until
they come to Galway."

The third message was from Galway itself, and said that the Dark Master
was biding the coming of those Millhaven men, and had been promised both
horsemen and shot if they came, so that Bertragh might be taken and held
for Ireland agains