'Your reverence, will the child be always a Protestant? Hasn't the holy water of the Church more power in it than the water they have? Don't they only throw it at the child?'
'Now, Mrs. Egan—'
'Ah, your reverence, you're going to say that I shouldn't have given the child to her, and I wouldn't if I hadn't trod on a stone and fallen against the wall, and got afeard the child might be hurt.'
'Well, well,' said Father Oliver, 'you see there's no child—'
'But you'll be waitin' a minute for the sake of the poor child, your reverence? Patsy will be comin' back in a minute.'
On that Mrs. Egan went to the chapel door and stood there, so that she might catch the first glimpse of him as he came across the fields. And it was about ten minutes after, when the priest and his parishioners were talking of other things, that Mrs. Egan began to wave her arm, crying out that somebody should hurry.
'Will you make haste, and his reverence waitin' here this half-hour to baptize the innocent child! He'll be here in less than a minute now, your reverence. Will you have patience, and the poor child will be safe?'
The child was snatched from Patsy, and so violently that the infant began to cry, and Mrs. Egan didn't know if it was a hurt it had received, for the panting Patsy was unable to answer her.
'The child's all right,' he blurted out at last. 'She said I might take it and welcome, now it was a Protestant.'
'Ah, sure, you great thickhead of a boy! weren't you quick enough for her?'