“I’ll not have you speaking against the League, doctor. I’ve been a member of it since ever there was a branch started in Clonmore. I’d be a member of it still, if it wasn’t that they went against me the time of the election of the inspector of sheep dipping. I can tell you there’s them in it would think very little of making the country hot for the man that went against the will of the people in the matter of grazing ranches or the like.”
“I don’t want to argue about the League either on one side or another. What I’m trying to get you to understand is simply this. You’ve got to go, and to go to-night, as soon as ever the Field Marshal is tucked up in his little bed and the house quiet. Listen to me now, and I’ll make the position plain to you. As long as I was here by myself I was more or less safe. The disappearance of one man doesn’t make much difference in a neighbourhood like ours; but when it comes to two men vanishing in the inside of one week there’s bound to be a fuss. The police will take the matter up to a certainty. If they come here—and they will come here when they’ve tried everywhere else—you and I will be shot by the Field Marshal.”
He looked at Patsy as he spoke, and noticed with regret that he was producing little or no impression.
“And what’s more, I’ll lose well over a hundred pounds; a hundred pounds that I want badly.”
“Why didn’t you tell me that before?” said Patsy. “Is it likely now that I’d want to stand between you and a lump of money like that? I wouldn’t do it to any man, much less one like yourself, that I have a respect for. Give me the writings now that we were speaking of, and I’ll start at once.”
“You can’t start till night; but I’ll write the notes at once if you like.”
“And the one to the young lady along with the other two.”
“I told you before,” said Dr. O’Grady, “that I won’t give you a note to her.”
“Then I’ll stay where I am. It’s more than I dare to go back without a line of some sort to quiet her. Don’t I tell you she’d have me hanged? And when that’s done she’ll be down here after you with the police, and you’ll be as badly off as you were before.”