“I hope he is not much hurt,” I said again, putting my head out from the doorway; “but he shouldn’t have forced himself into my room.”
“His room, the omadhaun!—the born idiot!” said the landlady.
“Faix, Ma’am, and Father Giles is a dead man,” said the girl, who was kneeling over the prostrate body in the passage below.
I heard her say Father Giles as plain as possible, and then I became aware that the man whom I had thrust out was not the landlord, but the priest of the parish! My heart became sick within me as I thought of the troubles around me. And I was sick also with fear lest the man who had fallen should be seriously hurt. But why—why—why had he forced his way into my room? How was it to be expected that I should have remembered that the stairs of the accursed house came flush up to the door of the chamber?
“He shall be hanged if there’s law in Ireland,” said a voice down below; and as far as I could see it might be that I should be hung. When I heard that last voice I began to think that I had in truth killed a man, and a cold sweat broke out all over me, and I stood for awhile shivering where I was. Then I remembered that it behoved me as a man to go down among my enemies below, and to see what had really happened, to learn whom I had hurt—let the consequences to myself be what they might. So I quickly put on some of my clothes—a pair of trousers, a loose coat, and a pair of slippers, and I descended the stairs. By this time they had taken the priest into the whisky-perfumed chamber below, and although the hour was late, there were already six or seven persons with him. Among them was the real Pat Kirwan himself, who had not been so particular about his costume as I had.
Father Giles—for indeed it was Father Giles, the priest of the parish—had been placed in an old arm-chair, and his head was resting against Mrs. Kirwan’s body. I could tell from the moans which he emitted that there was still, at any rate, hope of life.
Pat Kirwan, who did not quite understand what had happened, and who was still half asleep, and as I afterwards learned, half tipsy, was standing over him wagging his head. The girl was also standing by, with an old woman and two men who had made their way in through the kitchen.
“Have you sent for a doctor?” said I.
“Oh, you born blagghuard!” said the woman. “You thief of the world! That the like of you should ever have darkened my door!”
“You can’t repent it more than I do, Mrs. Kirwan; but hadn’t you better send for the doctor?”