“Before God, if you’re a man, you’ll put your hand on my arm and tell me what trouble quakes your speech.”
“Shon McGann, it is for you to make the sign of the Cross... there, while I put my hand on your shoulder—so!”
“Your hand is heavy, Pierre.”
“This is the sight of the eyes that see. In the Valley there is snow; in the snow of all that was, there is one poppet-head of the mine that was called St. Gabriel... upon the poppet-head there is the figure of a woman.”
“Ah!”
“She does not move—”
“She will never move?”
“She will never move.”
“The breath o’ my body hurts me.... There is death in the Valley, Pierre?”
“There is death.”