"All Irish people are kind-hearted, and you are not so," retorts he. "Every hour yields me an additional pang. For the last two days you have avoided me,—you do not care to speak to me,—you——"
"How can I, when you spend your entire time upbraiding me and accusing me of things of which I am innocent?"
"I neither accuse nor upbraid; I only say that——"
"Well, I don't think you can say much more,"—maliciously,—"because—I see Philip coming."
He has taken her hand, but now, stung by her words and her evident delight at Shadwell's proximity, flings it furiously from him.
"If so, it is time I went," he says, and turning abruptly from her, walks toward the corner that must conceal him from view.
A passing madness seizes Molly. Fully conscious that Luttrell is still within hearing, fatally conscious that it is within her power to wound him and gain a swift revenge for all the hard words she chooses to believe he has showered down on her, she sings,—slightly altering the ideas of the poet to suit her own taste,—she sings, as though to the approaching Philip:
"He is coming, my love, my sweet!
Was it ever so airy a tread,
My heart would know it and beat,