s been done. But above all, impress on
her that the story is a wicked lie.'

So Mauryeen went home with her husband to his little cottage on the
cliffs. And in the afternoon, when Father Tiernay came to distribute
the prizes and to merry-make with his people, he raised his hand for
silence and addressed them.

'Children,' he said, 'I hear there has been a grave scandal among you,
and a great sin committed before you this day. The wicked sought to
crush the innocent, as I believe, by bearing false witness, but the
wicked has not triumphed. A few hours ago I made Randal Burke and
Mauryeen Daly man and wife. And I give you solemn warning that the one
who gives ear and belief to the story of the miserable woman who
dishonoured herself to crush her innocent flesh and blood, shares in
that unnatural guilt.'

So after a time Mauryeen crept back to the sunshine, and let herself
be persuaded that her mother was mad. No one on the Island saw Ellen
Daly again; they said she had crossed to the mainland by the
afternoon ferry. She never came back, and there were some in the
Island who believed she had sold her soul to the devil, and that he
had claimed her fulfilment of the compact. But Mauryeen is an honest
man's wife, and whatever people may conjecture in their inmost hearts
as to the truth or falsity of her mother's tale, they say nothing, for
did not Father Tiernay declare such gossip to be a sin? But for all
that Mauryeen's ways are finer and gentler than those of any woman in
the Island.

VII

A WRESTLING

Mike Sheehan tossed awake in the moonlight. The gulls were quiet, and
there was no noise in the night save the sound that had rocked his
cradle--the Atlantic foaming up the narrow ravine before his door, and
withdrawing itself with a loud sucking noise. The cabin was perched on
a bleached hillside. A stony, narrow path went by the door and climbed
the ravine to the world; a bed of slaty rock slanted sheer below it to
the white tossing water. A dangerous place for any one to pass unless
he had his eyes and his wits well about him; but Mike Sheehan was such
a one, for he had the eye of the eagle over Muckross, he could climb
like the mountain goat, and could carry his drink so well that no man
ever saw him less than clear-headed.

Mike, with his six-feet-six of manhood, was well in request at the
country gatherings. But of late, said the folk, the man had turned
queer: in that melancholy, stately country by t