"Why thin, Feemy, is it yer own self in arnest come back again? And where's yer lover? the man ye married, ye know—what war his name?—why don't ye tell me? Mary, what's the name of the Captain Feemy married?"
"Asy, sir, asy; come in thin," and Mary led him into his own room, and Feemy followed in silence with her eyes already filled with tears.
"Where's yer own husband thin, Feemy dear? Ussher, I main—Captain Ussher—it's he'd be welcome with you now, my pet," and he began stroking his daughter's shoulders and back, for she had still her bonnet on her head. "Thady's not here now to be brow-beating and teasing him; it's we'll be comfortable now the cowld long nights—for the Captain 'll be bringing the whiskey and the groceries with him, won't he, darling? and Thady the blackguard's out along wid Keegan, and they can't get in through the door, for it's always locked;" and then turning to Mary, he said, "why don't you put the locks back, you d——d jade? do you want them to be catching me the first moment I'm seeing my own darling girl here?"
Feemy could not say a word to her father: his absolute idiotcy, and the manner in which he referred to Ussher, quite upset her, and she sat down and wept bitterly.
"What ails you, pet?" continued the old man, "what ails you, alanna? they shan't touch him, dear—there, you see the big lock's closed now; he'll be safe from Thady now, darling."
"Oh, Miss Feemy," said Mary, "he's quite beside himself; asy now, sir, asy, and don't be talking such nonsense; don't ye know the Captain got kilt—months ago—last October?"
"Killed—and who dared to kill my darling's husband? who'd dare to touch him? why wasn't he here? why wasn't he inside the big lock?"
"Why, don't you know," and Mary gave the old man a violent shake to refresh his memory; "don't you know Mr. Thady kilt him in the avenue?"
"May his father's curse blisther him then! May—but I think they wor telling me about that before. Eh, Feemy?" he continued, with a sigh, "it's a bad time I've been having of it with this tipsy woman since you were gone; she don't lave me a moment's pace from morning to night; bad 'cess to her, but I wish she wor well out of the house. I'll have you to mind me now—and you'll not be bawling and shaking me as she does; but she's always dhrunk," he added in a whisper.
Feemy could bear this no longer; she was obliged to make her escape from the room into her own, in which she found that Mary had taken up her temporary residence during so much of the day as she could spare from bawling at, and shaking, poor Larry. At dinner time, she again went into her father's room, but he took no farther notice of her, than if she had been there continually for the last four months. He grumbled at his dinner, which consisted of nothing but potatoes, some milk, and an egg, and he scolded Feemy for having no meat; after dinner she mixed him a tumbler of punch, for there was still a little of Tony's whiskey in the house; and whether it was that she made it stronger for him and better than that which Mary McGovery was in the habit of mixing, or that the action to which he had been for so many years accustomed roused some pleasant memory within him, when he tasted it, he said—