ella and her happiness." She looked
at Terry. "So I ran away, meaning to send for my things. I never
meant to come back. I returned to my old cottage at Drumlisk till I
could make up my mind where I was to go to. Lizzie found me there. It
is a long way over the mountains. She walked it in the wind and rain
to tell me Stella was here and pining for me--so I came."

"Go up and tell the child, if she can listen to you, that we are
friends," Mrs. Comerford said. "Tell her you are Terence's wife and my
daughter. Tell her I am not such an ogre as she thinks and you think.
Tell her that you and she are to come to Inch as soon as she can be
moved. Tell her all that, Mrs. Terence Comerford. Perhaps then she
will consent to see me."

She pointed a long finger at Stella's mother, looking more than ever
like a priestess, and Mrs. Wade, as she had called herself, obeyed
meekly.

When the door closed behind her Mrs. Comerford turned to Terry.

"Good-bye," she said. "The future will be yours. You are like your
mother, and she never had any worldly wisdom. I love you for it, but
now you had better go."

So Terry and his mother went away, passing in the dark road Mrs.
Comerford's carriage with its bright lights and champing and impatient
horses.

CHAPTER XXVIII

THE VIGIL

Some time in the night when Lady O'Gara had nodded in the chair beside
her husband's bed, she came awake sharply to the knowledge that he had
called her name.

"Mary! Mary!"

She could not have dozed for long, since the fire which she had made up
was burning brightly.

"Yes, Shawn, I am here," she answered.

"Move your chair so that I may see your face. I want to talk to you."

His voice was quite strong. There was something in the sound of it
that spoke of recovering strength.

"I've been lying awake some little time," he said. "I didn't like to
wake you, you poor sweet woman. I liked to hear your breathing so
softly there close to me--as you have been all these years."

"You are better, Shawn, wonderfully better," she said, leaning down to
see his face, for firelight and the shaded lamp did not much assist her
short-sighted eyes.

"I am free of pain," he answered. "I don't know when it may return.
Give me something to keep me going while I talk."

She gave him a few spoonfuls of a strong meat extract mixed with
brandy, supporting his head on her arm while he took the nourishment.

"How young you look, Mary," he said