This terrible taunt at Miss O'Hara's celibacy didn't go unpunished, for, throwing all attempts at conciliation behind her, she rose, with flashing eyes and trembling lips.
“So, it is you that tell me this,” said she—“you that dare to sneer at my being unmarried—you, that were fain to take up with a Dublin attorney—poor Tom Kennyfeck—the hack of the quarter sessions, serving latitats and tithe notices over the country in his old gig—Indeed, girls, I 'm sorry to speak that way of your father, but it 's well known—”
A loud shriek interrupted the speech, and Mrs. Kennyfeck, in strong hysterics, took her place beside Olivia.
“It will do her good, my dear,” said Aunt Fanny to her niece, as she chafed the hands and bathed the temples of her mother. “I was only telling the truth; she'd never have married your father if Major Kennedy had n't jilted her; and good luck it was he did, for he had two other wives living at the time—just as your friend, Mr. Cashel, wanted to do with your sister.”
“Aunt—aunt—I entreat you to have done. Haven't you made mischief enough?”
“Eaten up with vanity and self-conceit,” resumed the old lady, not heeding the interruption. “A French cook and a coach-and-four,—nothing less! Let her scream, child—sure, I know it's good for her—it stretches the lungs.”
“Leave me—leave the room!” cried Miss Kennyfeck, whose efforts at calmness were rendered fruitless by the torrent of her aunt's eloquence.
“Indeed I will, my dear: I'll leave the house, too. Sorry I am that I ever set foot in it. What with the noise and the racket night and day, it's more like a lunatic asylum than a respectable residence.”
“Send her away—send her away!” screamed Mrs. Kennyfeck, with a cry of horror.
“Do, aunt—do leave the room.”