"I hope you will be very kind to her, John, when I am gone from here. She's very nice, and this is the drear, lonely place for her to be. I expect to be going away pretty soon."
It seemed extraordinary that this thing should be happening now.... He began to remember how he had longed for Rebecca last summer, and how his poor yearning had been reduced to nothing by the favor with which she looked upon his friend. And later how he had turned away out of the full goodness of his own heart and returned again through power of a fateful accident to his early purpose. And now how the good influence of Father Considine had just come into his life to lead him finally into the way for which he had been intended by his mother from the beginning.
He did not yet fully realize that this quiet and casual meeting which had been effected because Ulick Shannon had accidentally come around this way from Garradrimna represented the little moment which stood for the turning-point of his life. But it had certainly moved into being along definite lines of dramatic significance.
Presently Ulick mounted a stile which gave upon a path leading up through the fields of his uncle Myles and to the lonely house among the trees. Then it was true that he was not seeing Rebecca to-night.... A great gladness seemed to have rushed in upon John Brennan because he had become aware of this thing. And further, Ulick Shannon was going away from the valley and Rebecca remaining here to be lonely. But he, who had once so dearly longed for her company, would be coming and going from the valley daily, and summer was upon them again.... Ulick must have bade him a "Good-night!" that he had not heard, for already he could see him disappearing into the sea of white mist which would seem to have rolled into the valley from the eternity of the silent places.... He was left here now upon this lonely, quiet shore while his mind had turned into a tumbling sea.
When at last he roused himself and went into the kitchen he saw that his mother had already settled herself to the task of reading a religious paper to his father.... The elder man was sitting there so woebegone by the few wet sods that were the fire. He was not very drunk this evening, and the usual wild glint in his eyes was replaced by the look of one who is having thoughts of final dissolution.... John experienced a little shudder with the thought that he did not possess any desire to speak to his father now.
But his mother had broken in with a question:
"Was that Ulick Shannon was with you outside just now?"
"Yes, mother, it was."
"He went home very early, didn't he?"