"Ill in bed!" exclaimed Murtagh. "Then, perhaps—Oh, Winnie; we'd better go back."
"Mrs. O'Toole!" he exclaimed, as they once more entered the cottage, "what made you tell us Pat was out when he's ill in bed?"
"Sure, Mr. Murtagh, honey, I never said he was out; Heaven forbid! I only said maybe he'd be in in a minnit."
Murtagh crossed over without ceremony to the door of the little inner room. But Mrs. O'Toole started up and threw herself between him and it, exclaiming:
"Ye can't go in there, Mr. Murtagh! The place is not cleaned up at all. It's not fit for a gentleman like ye!"
"I tell you I must speak to Pat!" persisted Murtagh, with his hand on the latch.
"But ye mustn't, Mr. Murtagh, dear!" cried Mrs. O'Toole, her voice growing strangely eager and imploring. "I tell ye ye mustn't, he's down with the small-pox!"
"As if I cared twopence for the small-pox," replied Murtagh, impetuously bursting open the door as he spoke, and springing towards the press bed where Pat generally slept.
But the room was empty! and the bed had not been slept in that night.
The poor woman, seeing that no concealment was possible, had thrown her apron over her head and was rocking herself backwards and forwards in an agony of tears.