When Carrigeen could no longer be Baby or Doatie she certainly could not be Carrig or Een, and it was the nurse who settled the matter by calling her Miss Gheena, with an "h" introduced.
Major Freyne was taken early to his fathers, and his wife being quite unable to decide anything for herself, drifted into matrimony with a somewhat peppery cousin, who resented Gheena's ultimate inheritance of Castle Freyne at her marriage and the prospect of the dower house, Girtnamurragh, for himself.
Gheena was slight, with very bright brown hair, seldom burdened with a hat; a skin browned to a very soft tan, grey-blue eyes, a crooked smile and a determined will.
"Crabbit very nearly got a gull, Darby; he is snapping at jelly-fish now and coming in. And why you men don't say something!"
Darby Dillon observed patiently that if an American citizen chose to come to Duncahir for his health, they really had no right to criticize.
Gheena returned severely that she did not believe that Basil Stafford had any right either to America or ill-health, and got up.
The sun was setting, and through a rift in the pack of clouds came bars of amber and gold, turning Innisfail island to a dome of misty purple, and Leeshane to a low hump of mauve.
"If Mom did not cry and talk of her heart I'd go out myself," said Gheena, dropping three stitches in her excitement, her needles clicking and flashing feverishly.
"And if I went, no one here would knit. I caught that hateful Maria Casey doing fancy work yesterday, and Annette Freyne making a mitten which might do for a sandbag. There is even no hope of hunting. Hill has gone now. I tell you, Darby, I believe—I really believe that he's—that Stafford man—a——"
"It was hot enough to take a swim this morning," said Basil Stafford easily. "You might have come out, Miss Freyne, when I was doing aquatic feats."