"So up we got," says Kit, gayly, "and away we went in the nice sweet hay, jog trot, jog trot, and so comfortable."
The Misses Blake by this time are filled with dismay. In Rossmoyne, where families are few and far between, and indecent scandal unknown, the smallest trifles are seized upon with avidity and manufactured into mountains. "A good appearance," Miss Penelope was taught at school, "is the first step in life," and here have these children been making their appearance for the first time in a common hay-cart.
What will Madam O'Connor say? Madam O'Connor's father having always laid claim to being a direct descendant of one of the old kings of Munster, Madam's veins of course are filled with blood royal, and as such are to be held in reverence. What won't this terrible old woman say, when she hears of the Beresfords' escapade?
The Misses Blake sit shivering, blinking their eyelids, and afraid to say anything.
"We got on splendidly," Terence is saying, "and might indeed have finished our journey respectably, but for Monica. She laid our reputation in the dust."
Monica turns upon him an appealing glance from her large soft eyes that would have melted any heart but that of a brother's.
"Aunt Priscilla," says the adamantine youth, "what is the name of the house with a big gate, about a half a mile from this?"
"Coole Castle," replies she, stiffly, the very fact of having to mention the residence of the detested Desmond making her heart beat violently. But Terry is a person blind to speaking glances and deaf to worded hints. In effect, Terry and tact are two; so he goes on, unheeding his aunt's evident disrelish for the subject,—
"Well, just as we got to Coole, I saw a fellow standing inside the entrance-gate, smoking a cigar. I fancied he looked amused, but would have thought nothing of that, only I heard him laugh aloud, and saw he was staring over my head—I was driving—to where Monica and Kit were, on the top of the hay. It occurred to me then to see what the girls were doing, so I stood up on the shaft, and looked, and——"
Here he pauses, as though slightly overcome.