“Sit you here, Peg,” he said, when he had bandaged the cut head, “with the jug of water beside you, and keep the bandage wet. The other bruises are nothing, but a broken head needs to be minded. Now, Neal, don’t you talk.”
Matier fetched a bottle of wine and set it with the light on the table which stood near the window.
“We’ll have to sit here,” he said, “if we don’t disturb your nephew. Every other room in the house is in a state of scatteration. I have set the girls to clean up a bit, and after a while they’ll have beds for us to sleep in. It’s a devil of a business, but as poor Tone used to say when things went wrong with him—
‘Tis but in vain
For soldiers to complain.’”
“What started the riot?” asked Donald. “The Lord knows. Those dragoons only marched into the town this afternoon. I suppose the devil entered into them, if the devil’s ever out of them at all.”
“I guess,” said Donald, “those were the lads that marched through Antrim this morning.”
“The very same.”
“They’re strangers to the town, then?”
“Ay; I don’t suppose one of them ever saw Belfast before.”
“Tell me this, then. How did they know what house to attack? They came straight here.”