"I think I'll make you into a goose, Barney, with a long neck, thrusting yourself into everybody's business; and Moira into a pool where you can swim."
"Och, och! but the child is temptin' Providence!" cried Moira, coming to a stand at some distance off. "Here in this place of all others; and close by the rath where the gentlefolks is listenin' to every word, and she makin' game of them to their faces!"
"Mebbe she is a fairy, after all!" muttered Barney, under his breath; for he feared a repetition of Moira's prompt chastisement. But this time indeed he was beyond the reach of her arm, and Moira herself was in a less warlike mood. A sudden shadow, too, fell over the moon, so that we were in darkness. It was a cloud of intense blackness, which fell like a pall on the shining disc.
"See what comes of meddlin' with them you know!" cried Barney, while even Winifred was sobered; and the three crept toward the cart, Barney and Moira shivering with fright. Barney whipped up the unconscious horse, who had much relished his stay upon the bog, and was only urged into activity by the prospect of going home.
"Go now, then, Danny avick!" Barney whispered. "It's not bein' turned into a quare beast of some kind you'd wish to be. Get us away from here before the good people comes up out of the rath; for there's no tellin' what they'd do to us."
"Hear how he talks to the horse!" said Winifred, who was now seated again beside me, her curls dancing with the jolting of the cart. "As if Danny knew anything about the good people!"
"Oh, doesn't he, then, Miss Winifred!" cried Barney. "It's meself has seen him all of atremble from me whisperin' in his ear concernin' them."
"You just imagine it, Barney," said Winifred.
"And is it I imagine it?" exclaimed Barney, aggrieved; while Moira sat in terrified silence, peering from side to side into the darkness as if she expected to see the avenging good people waiting for us along the road. We were nearly at the castle gate before Barney resumed anything of his former spirits and ventured on a joke or two. But Winifred was the merriest of the merry, and kept me laughing immoderately all along the moonlit way, as we jolted and jogged. She insisted that the cart wheels sang a song, and made up rhymes to the musical sounds which she pretended she could hear so plainly.
I often look back to that evening with peculiar pleasure. Winifred was at her best: most childlike, most natural, thoroughly enjoying every moment of the beautiful summer night; so that the doubt came over me whether it was better, after all, to remove her from this idyllic life amongst the Irish hills. The sober common-sense, however, of next morning confirmed me in my previous opinion, and I took the first step toward the realization of that design by seeking an interview with the schoolmaster.