“I said he 'd sup here,” said Nickie, vehemently, for he felt the taunt in all its bitterness.
“I say, old fellow,” said M'Dermot in Tate's ear, “you needn't be sparin' of the liquor. Give us the best you have, and plenty of it. It is all the same to yer master, you know, in a few days. I was saying, sir,” said he to Nickie, who, overhearing him, turned sharply round,-“I was saying, sir, that he might as well give up the ould bin with the cobweb over it. It's the creditors suffers now, and we've many a way of doin' a civil turn.”
“His mistress has shut the door on that,” said Nickie, savagely, “and she may take the consequences.”
“Oh, never mind him,” whispered M'Dermot to Tate; “he 's the best-hearted crayture that ever broke bread, but passionate, d' ye mind, passionate.”
Poor Tate, who had suddenly become alive to the characters and objects of his quests, was now aware that his mistress's refusal to admit the chief might possibly be productive of very disastrous consequences; for, like all low Irishmen, he had a very ample notion of the elastic character of the law, and thought that its pains and penalties were entirely at the option of him who executed it.
“Her Ladyship never liked to see much company,” said he, apologetically.
“Well, maybe so,” rejoined M'Dennot, “but in a quiet homely sort of a way, sure she need n't have refused Mr. Anthony; little she knows, there 's not the like of him for stories about the Court of Conscience and the Sessions.”
“I don't doubt it,” exclaimed Tate, who, in assenting, felt pretty certain that his fascinations would scarcely have met appreciation in the society of his mistress and her daughter.
“And if ye heerd him sing 'Hobson's Choice,' with a new verse of his own at the end!”
Tate threw a full expression of wondering admiration into his features, and went on with his arrangements in silence.