“Oh, mother!” said Meg, rushing into the room where her mother, and Jane, and Anty, were at dinner, “there’s Barry Lynch down in the shop, wanting you.”
“Oh my!” said Jane. “Now sit still, Anty dear, and he can’t come near you. Shure, he’ll niver be afther coming upstairs, will he, Meg?”
Anty, who had begun to feel quite happy in her new quarters, and among her kind friends, turned pale, and dropped her knife and fork. “What’ll I do, Mrs Kelly?” she said, as she saw the old lady complacently get up. “You’re not going to give me up? You’ll not go to him?”
“Faith I will thin, my dear,” replied the widow; “never fear else—I’ll go to him, or any one else that sends to me in a dacent manner. May-be it’s wanting tay in the shop he is. I’ll go to him immediately. But, as for giving you up, I mane you to stay here, till you’ve a proper home of your own; and Barry Lynch has more in him than I think, av’ he makes me alter my mind. Set down quiet, Meg, and get your dinner.” And the widow got up, and proceeded to the shop.
The girls were all in commotion. One went to the door at the top of the stairs, to overhear as much as possible of what was to take place; and the other clasped Anty’s hand, to re-assure her, having first thrown open the door of one of the bed-rooms, that she might have a place of retreat in the event of the enemy succeeding in pushing his way upstairs.
“Your humble sarvant, Mr Lynch,” said the widow, entering the shop and immediately taking up a position of strength in her accustomed place behind the counter. “Were you wanting me, this evening?” and she took up the knife with which she cut penn’orths of tobacco for her customers, and hitting the counter with its wooden handle looked as hard as copper, and as bold as brass.
“Yes, Mrs Kelly,” said Barry, with as much dignity as he could muster, “I do want to speak to you. My sister has foolishly left her home this morning, and my servants tell me she is under your roof. Is this true?”
“Is it Anty? Indeed she is thin: ating her dinner, upstairs, this very moment;” and she rapped the counter again, and looked her foe in the face.
“Then, with your leave, Mrs Kelly, I’ll step up, and speak to her. I suppose she’s alone?”
“Indeed she ain’t thin, for she’s the two girls ating wid her, and myself too, barring that I’m just come down at your bidding. No; we’re not so bad as that, to lave her all alone; and as for your seeing her, Mr Lynch, I don’t think she’s exactly wishing it at present; so, av’ you’ve a message, I’ll take it.”