"And to-morrow ye can go into Banthry an' prosecute that scoundrel Ryan," says Scully, "an' have yer arm properly seen afther."
"So I can," says Geoffrey. Then, not for any special reason, but because, through very love of her, he is always looking at her, he turns his eyes on Mona. She is standing by the table, with her head bent down.
"Yes, to-morrow you can have your arm re-dressed," she says, in a low tone, that savors of sadness; and then he knows she does not want him to prosecute Ryan.
"I think I'll let Ryan alone," he says, instantly, turning to her uncle and addressing him solely, as though to prove himself ignorant of Mona's secret wish. "I have given him enough to last him for some time." Yet the girl reads him him through and through, and is deeply grateful to him for this quick concession to her unspoken desire.
"Well, well, you're a good lad at heart," says Scully, glad perhaps in his inmost soul, as his countrymen always are and will be when a compatriot cheats the law and escapes a just judgment. "Mona, look after him for awhile, until I go an' see that lazy spalpeen of mine an' get him to put a good bed undher Mr. Rodney's horse."
When the old man has gone, Mona goes quietly up to her lover, and, laying her hand upon his arm,—a hand that seems by some miraculous means to have grown whiter of late,—says, gratefully,—
"I know why you said that about Ryan, and I thank you for it. I should not like to think it was your word had transported him."
"Yet, I am letting him go free that he may be the perpetrator of even greater crimes."
"You err, nevertheless, on the side of mercy, if you err at all; and—perhaps there may be no other crimes. He may have had his lesson this evening,—a lasting one. To-morrow I shall go to his cabin, and——"
"Now, once for all, Mona," interrupts he, with determination, "I strictly forbid you ever to go to Ryan's cottage again."