ch. You said nothing long ago of running towards the upper
road after Sir Shawn."

"Sure where else would I be runnin' to? It isn't the lower road I'd be
takin'--now is it your Ladyship! It wouldn't be likely."

"I suppose it wouldn't," she said, slightly smiling.

"I remember it like as if it was yesterday, the sound of the horse's
hoofs climbin' and then the clatter that broke out on the lower road
whin Spitfire took the bit between his teeth an' bolted. I'll put the
stopper on that villain's lies. I'd like to think the master wouldn't
be troubled wid them."

"I'm afraid he'll have to hear them, Patsy. Sir Felix was obliged to
issue a summons. It might have been worse if Sir Felix had not been a
friend."

"The divil shweep that man, Fury," said Patsy with ferocity. "If he
hadn't been a busy-body an' stirrer-up of trouble, he'd have drowned
that villain in a bog-hole."

He went off, treading delicately on his toes, which was his way of
showing sympathetic respect, and Lady O'Gara returned to the
drawing-room.

She was very uneasy. She tried reading, but her thoughts came between
her and the page. Writing was no more helpful. She went to the piano.
Music at least, if it did not soothe her, would prevent her straining
her ears in listening for sounds outside.

The butler came and took away the tea-things, made up the fire and
departed in the noiseless way of the trained servant. Her hands on the
keys broke unconsciously into the solemn music of Chopin's Funeral
March. She took her hands off the piano with a shiver as she realized
her choice and began something else, a mad, merry reel to which the
feet could scarcely refrain from dancing. But her heart did not dance.
The music fretted her, keeping her from listening. After a while she
gave up the pretence of it and went back to the fireside, to the sofa
on which she and Shawn had sat side by side while she comforted him.
She could have thought she felt the weight of his head on her shoulder,
that she smelt the peaty smell of his home-spuns. He would be
disturbed, poor Shawn, by what she had to tell him. It would be an
intolerable ordeal if he should be dragged to the Petty Sessions Court
to refute the preposterous charge of being concerned in the death of
the man he had loved more than a brother.. Poor Shawn! She listened.
Was that the sound of a horse coming? He would be so disturbed!

It was only the wind that was getting up. She drew her