“Hello, Pat,” said I. “So you are considered a good enough man to walk with Father Hogan?”
His eyes twinkled.
“Sure it’s honoured I am by walkin’ wid him. He’s a hell of a fine man. I was just tellin’ him so. Didn’t he walk a mile out of his way yisterday to tell me he seen me ould cow I lost, roamin’ toward Maltby. First he told them to pen it up, an’ thin he come an’ told me. He’s dam sure of Heaven, that man is! No airs on him at all an’ him a friend of Archbishop Ireland.”
“Well, Pat, how’s the ould scut. Did you enter her for the race?”
“Sure I did not. She got at the oats last night an’ was feelin’ so fine this marnin’ that I knew’t’d be a sure t’hing if I entered her.”
He winked his eye at Ethel and then he said:
“An’ how’s the cherry blossom?”
“Pat, you’re a poet. She’s still on the branch.”
“Egorry, it’s the lucky man that picks her. A fine gerrul. None better in Ireland an’ that’s sayin’ arl there is to be said. I suppose ye’ll be go’n’ down one of those fine days now.”
“Yes, we expect to go to-morrow.”