say.
I'll leave you now before she joins us. Mind, not a word of what I told
you.'

And, without another word, he sprang over a low fence, and speedily
disappeared in the copse beyond it.

'Wasn't that Dick I saw making his escape?' cried Kate, as she came up.

'Yes, we were taking a walk together, and he left me very abruptly.'

'I wish I had not spoiled a _tete-a-tete_,' said Kate merrily.

'It is no great mischief: we can always renew it.'

'Dear Nina,' said the other caressingly, as she drew her arm around
her--'dear, dear Nina, do not, do not, I beseech you.'

'Don't what, child?--you must not speak in riddles.'

'Don't make that poor boy in love with you. You yourself told me you could
save him from it if you liked.'

'And so I shall, Kate, if you don't dictate or order me. Leave me quite to
myself, and I shall be most merciful.'

CHAPTER XVIII

MATHEW KEARNEY'S 'STUDY'

Had Mathew Kearney but read the second sheet of his correspondent's letter,
it is more than likely that Dick had not taken such a gloomy view of his
condition. Mr. McKeown's epistle continued in this fashion: 'That ought to
do for him, Mathew, or my name ain't Tom McKeown. It is not that he is any
worse or better than other young fellows of his own stamp, but he has the
greatest scamp in Christendom for his daily associate. Atlee is deep in
all the mischief that goes on in the National press. I believe he is a
head-centre of the Fenians, and I know he has a correspondence with the
French socialists, and that Rights-of-labour-knot of vagabonds who meet at
Geneva. Your boy is not too wise to keep himself out of these scrapes,
and he is just, by name and station, of consequence enough to make these
fellows make up to and flatter him. Give him a sound fright, then, and when
he is thoroughly alarmed about his failure, send him abroad for a short
tour, let him go study at Halle or Heidelberg--anything, in short, that
will take him away from Ireland, and break off his intimacy with this Atlee
and his companions. While he is with you at Kilgobbin, don't let him make
acquaintance with those Radical fellows in the county towns. Keep him down,
Mathew, keep him down; and if you find that you cannot do this, make him
believe that you'll be one day lords of Kilgobbin, and the more he has to
lose the more reluctant he'll be to risk it. If he'd take to farming, and
marry some decent girl, even a little beneath him in life, it would save
you