"But I tell you, they won't be there at all to-morrow, unless you come down to them to-night," answered Pat.
"Do they main to say they refuse out and out to pay the rint?"
"Not at all; but they'll be getting stiff if they think you're so thick with him as is their inimy—and isn't that natural too? It's only to come down and say a kind word or so to 'em yourself, and you'll find them all right—and ready to stand by you and yours to the last, Mr. Thady."
"Well, Pat, I'll be down there. Father John would think it odd if I weren't there."
By this time they had got round to the back of the house, where the outhouse stood; and the young man told Brady to go into the kitchen and get him a coal for his pipe, and to tell the girl to say he wouldn't be in to dinner.
"And won't you be wanting your dinner, Mr. Thady?"
"No, Pat; I'll jist sit and have a smoke in the stable, till it's time to go down to you. I couldn't face the owld man and Feemy, afther what jist happened."
So we will for the present leave him smoking in the stable, and return to the inmates of the house.
It will be remembered that when Father John left Feemy after his morning visit, she remained alone till Mr. Keegan came: and that she was dismissed from the dining-room when they began to talk on business. She then betook herself to dress for the evening amusement; that is, to make herself something decent before she met Ussher; to brush her hair, and to dismiss all the traces of that disenchanting dishabille which I have attempted to describe. Whilst at her toilet Feemy turned over in her mind all that her brother and Father John had said, and firmly resolved not to let the evening pass without telling her lover the comfort it would be to have some decided steps taken as to their engagement: and yet she almost shuddered at the thoughts of doing so; there was a frown which occasionally came over Ussher's face, which made her dread him; and she couldn't but feel that if he wished to take any such steps, he would do so without her asking him; in fact, that it would be much better that he should do so unasked. And then, if he got angry,—if he should tell her that as she could not wait and trust him, they must part; how could she bear the idea of losing him? What could she say or do, if he answered her sternly?—if he scolded her, or perhaps worse, absolutely quarrelled with her? Poor Feemy began to wish the evening over to which she had looked forward as the source of so much pleasure; she feared to neglect the warnings she had received, and she felt that things could not go on always as they were; but she trembled at the idea of telling this to Ussher.
Her silent dinner was soon over; she made her father's punch, and sat down to wait for her lover. Larry kept up a continual growl about Thady's absence, suggesting that Keegan had cozened him off to Carrick, to sign the estate away; accusing him of conspiracy with the attorney, to rob him, his father; wondering why he wouldn't come to dinner, &c.: to all which Feemy made no reply; she never noticed his grumblings; she sat absorbed in her own thoughts, meditating what she would say to Ussher, till she heard his horse's feet at the head of the avenue, and then she jumped up to meet him at the hall-door.