e
moon on the human mind. He refrained, reflecting that it is an impious
thing to destroy an innocent superstition. One of the great beauties of
Celtic Ireland is that it still clings to faiths forsaken by the rest of
the world.

At two o'clock that afternoon Dr. Lovaway took his seat on Patsy
Doolan's car. It was still raining heavily. Dr. Lovaway wore an overcoat
of his own, a garment which had offered excellent protection against
rainy days in Manchester. In Dunailin, for a drive to Ballygran, the
coat was plainly insufficient. Mr. Flanagan hurried from his shop with a
large oilskin cape taken from a peg in his men's outfitting department.
Constable Malone, under orders from the sergeant, went to the priest's
house and borrowed a waterproof rug. Johnny Conerney, the butcher,
appeared at the last moment with a sou'wester which he put on the
doctor's head and tied under his chin. It would not be the fault of the
people of Dunailin, if Lovaway, with his weak lungs, "died on them."

Patsy Doolan did not contribute anything to the doctor's outfit, but
displayed a care for his safety.

"Take a good grip now, doctor," he said. "Take a hold of the little rail
there beside you. The mare might be a bit wild on account of the rain,
and her only clipped yesterday, and the road to Ballygran is jolty in
parts."

Sergeant Rahilly and Constable Malone sat on one side of the car, Dr.
Lovaway was on the other. Patsy Doolan sat on the driver's seat. Even
with that weight behind her the mare proved herself to be "a bit wild."
She went through the village in a series of bounds, shied at everything
she saw in the road, and did not settle down until the car turned into a
rough track which led up through the mountains to Ballygran. Dr. Lovaway
held on tight with both hands. Patsy Doolan, looking back over his left
shoulder, spoke words of encouragement.

"It'll be a bit strange to you at first, so it will," he said. "But by
the time you're six months in Dunailin we'll have you taught to sit a
car, the same as it might be an armchair you were on."

Dr. Lovaway, clinging on for his life while the car bumped over
boulders, did not believe that a car would ever become to him as an
armchair.

Ballygran is a remote place, very difficult of access. At the bottom of
a steep hill, a stream, which seemed a raging torrent to Dr. Lovaway,
flowed across the road. The mare objected very strongly to wading
through it. Farther on the track along w