The boy looked up gratefully. To be likened to his father was dear to him.
"Yes, Pat," went on Mrs. O'Callaghan. "'Most anybody can take a noice payin' job as suits 'em, but it's the brave wans that takes the work they don't want to do and does it good, too."
And then the mother who had the courage to battle cheerfully for her children, and the son who had the courage to do what seemed best in the face of contempt and ridicule, went to their rest.
CHAPTER VI
The next morning Pat stepped out into the kitchen and donned his apron in a downcast mood. The uplift of his mother's praise had passed, and the fact remained that to-day he was to go out to service like a girl. The little boys were up and stowed here and there waiting for breakfast. Some little boys cannot be kept in bed mornings as long as their elders could wish, and the widow's little boys were of that kind.
"Get up, if you want to," was Mrs. O'Callaghan's counsel to her youngest sons, "but see to it you don't get under Pat's feet. Nayther must you be runnin' out doors, for Moike to be haulin' you in when breakfast's ready."
These orders shut the little fellows into a narrow space, and they were always eager for the morning meal to be over. Andy and Jim were not in such a hurry to rise, having reached the age when boys need a deal of persuasion to get them up.
"They'll be along in a minute," thought the widow. "Here comes Moike."
