Besides the two owners, and not counting an itinerant population of chickens varying in ages and degrees of audacity, the cabin boasted one other inmate. The dog tax being unknown, nearly every Irish cabin has its cur, and on the Aran isles the dogs are only less numerous than the babies. The O’Malleys, however, had no dog, and their house-friend (the r in the last word might appropriately have been omitted) was a small yellow, or, rather, orange-coloured, cat, noted as having the worst temper of any cat upon Inishmaan. Whether in consequence of this temper, or in spite of it, there was no cat who appeared to have also so constant a train of feline adorers. Remote as the O’Malleys’ cabin stood, it was the recognised rendezvous of every appreciative Tom upon the island, so that at night it was sometimes even a little startling to open the door suddenly and catch the steady glitter of a row of watchful eyes, or to see three, four, or five retreating forms creeping feloniously away over the rocks.
‘’Tis the milk she does be tasting already, the little snaking beast,’ Honor said, pointing to it, as it sat furtively licking its lips close to the hearth.
Grania struck the cat a light tap on the nose with the iron spoon she was stirring the pot with, an insult to which it responded with a vicious spitting mew, and a backward leap, which seemed to set all its orange-coloured coat on edge in a moment.
‘Was it along by the sea-way you were to-day, allanah?’ Honor pursued presently.
‘I was, sister.’
‘Did you pass by the old chapel?’
‘I did, Honor.’
‘Then you said, I’ll be bound, a prayer at the little old cross for me, as I bade you do?’
‘Well, then, Honor, I will not tell you a lie—no, I will not—but I never once thought of it,’ Grania replied penitently. ‘You see, Murdough Blake he was with me, and we got colloguing. But sure, sister asthor, don’t fret, and I’ll go to-morrow by the first streak of day and say as many as ever you tell me, so I will, Honor.’
Honor for answer sighed and lay back against the wooden settle as if some habitual source of trouble was weighing upon her mind.