“I’m glad to hear you don’t like poachers, Mary. This little chap here”—and he held him up—“kills rats already, and will keep off tramps. He is a gentleman.”
“Sure,” began Katty, with a wheezy laugh, “what would a gentleman be doing with the likes of us?”
“He will like you, and I know you will like him. See, Pap”—and he led him over to Mary—“this is your new mistress; and here is another”; and he pulled him towards Katty, who, however, held back, saying—
“Oh, sir, it’s too great a condescension for us; entirely too much!”
“What do you say to him, Mary?” turning to her.
“If when you’ll be going away ye would spare him sir, it would be a kindness and a consolation, for me mother is very wake in herself, and in dread of a night if she hears a sound, even of a mouse, let alone one of the cows stirring in the byre; she thinks it’s some one coming to murder us, so she does. The little dog will be a grand watch, though of course he is above our station.”
“Is any one within?” The voice came from the half-door, and the open space above was amply filled by a stout, elderly woman, wearing a jetted bonnet, a black front, and a blue waterproof.
“There is to be sure,” replied Mary, who liked visitors, darting to the door. “There’s no fear of the dogs, ma’am. I see it’s spilling rain. Come in if ye plase and take a sate.”
The tall, burly figure stalked forward, and shook out her wet umbrella; she stared very hard—first at Katty, then at Ulick—and sank heavily into the proffered chair.
“I am stopping at an hotel below,” she began, with a strong American accent, “and I’ve lost my way. I am a pretty smart walker. Am I far out?”