ort-tempered with me.
But ... I hope ... I hope...--" the strange anguish came back to his
voice--"that he would have married her."

"I remember now," Lady O'Gara said. "I remember the girl. Aunt Grace
thought very well of her; she told the old woman she ought not to have
Bridyeen serving in the bar. She was a beautiful little creature, like
a moss rosebud, such dark hair and the beautiful colour and the ardent
look in her eyes. Old Mrs. Dowd answered Aunt Grace with a haughtiness
equal to her own. Aunt Grace was very angry: she said the old woman
was insolent. I did not learn exactly what Mrs. Dowd had said, but I
gathered that she said she knew how to keep her girl as well as Aunt
Grace did."

"I sometimes thought the old woman was ambitious," Sir Shawn went on,
dreamily. "She used to watch Bridyeen while all those fellows were
hanging about her and paying her compliments. I have sometimes thought
she meant Bridyeen to marry a gentleman. Several were infatuated
enough for that. The old woman was always about watching and
listening. I don't think any of them was ever rude to the little girl.
She was so innocent to look at. If any man had forgotten himself so
far he would have had to answer to the others."

"What became of them--afterwards? Killesky seldom came in my path. I
did not know that the picturesque old woman and the little
granddaughter had gone till after we were married, when I drove that
way and saw the garish new shop going up.

"It was like the old woman to carry off poor Bridyeen from all the
scandal and the talk. You remember how ill I was. I thought that as
soon as I was well enough I would go and see them--the old woman and
the poor child. I would have done what I could. They were gone. No
one knew what had become of them. They had gone away quietly and
mysteriously. The little place was shut up one morning. You remember
how pretty it was, the little thatched house behind its long garden.
They had gone to America. Fortunately the people had not begun to
talk."

"That poor little thing!" Lady O'Gara said softly. "She looked as shy
as a fawn. I wonder what became of her."

"Don't you understand, Mary? She has come back. She is ... Mrs. Wade."

"Oh! She married then? Of course you would want to be kind to her. I
suppose she is a widow!"

"I don't think she married. I don't know what brings her back here,
unless it is the desire to return which afflicts the Irish w