At last Trevor recovered himself, and, advancing, laid a hand on her shoulder. 'My good girl,' he said, 'you can't tell how sorry I am that this has occurred. Let us see if we can't help your father. He may not be badly hurt after all.'
'Stan' back,' cried the girl, raising her flushed face and dishevelled hair from the dust and thrusting him violently away. 'Stan' back; don't touch him. Haven't ye done him enough av harrum ahlready?'
'If money's any good,' said Trevor, helplessly making a fresh effort, 'here's all I have with me, and I'll give you—'
'Don't darr to offer me your dirty money,' she interrupted, scattering the coins from his hand with a vehemence of passion that lifted her out of herself. 'It's blood money, so it is, give me back my father's life that ye tuk away. Didn't I hearn ye say ye'd shute him, an' shute him ye did, an' may the curse of the fatherless rist on ye from this day out.'
'Nonsense, girl,' said Fitzgerald hastily, 'it was a pure accident, and Mr. Trevor never threatened to shoot your father, but only the dog, and the gun went off by accident in his hand.'
'An accident was it? An accident?' repeated the girl. 'An' arn't yous a polisman and you stood by and seen it done? Why don't ye arrist him? I'll larn ye if it was an accident or not,' and she stooped down and whispered some words in her brother's ear, her eyes gleaming with all the fierce vindictiveness of the Celtic nature when roused. The boy nodded silently and darted quickly off down the road, looking back from time to time; Fitzgerald gazed uneasily after him for a moment, then turning briskly to the keeper, he said, 'Hurry up to the house and tell Mrs. Trevor to send down some brandy and some linen for bandages. And you, Jackson, run across the fields to Doherty's there behind the hill. The doctor's there now, so bring him back with you. And you,' he continued, laying his hand on the girl's arm, 'must let us carry your father in out of this. He can't be left here any longer or he'll bleed to death.'
The girl stood sullenly on one side while the two men unhinged the door, placed the old man upon it as carefully as possible, carried him in and laid him on the bed. Then Fitzgerald cut the clothes away from the gaping wound, tore up one of the coarse sheets, and bound the injured part up roughly but not unskilfully. The fowls ran in and out of the open door the while and pecked unnoticed at the pot of potatoes upon the floor.
'I think we've done everything that can be done now,' said the D. I. when he had finished, 'and there's no good stopping here. It's time that I was in town, and the doctor'll be round here immediately. I'll send the priest up to you as soon as I get there. I'm afraid I must trouble you, Trevor, to come with me.'
'Why? What's the meaning of this?' stammered the farmer, his face going ashen gray.
'I'm afraid that after what's happened,' answered Fitzgerald formally, looking intently at the ground, and digging a root of grass out of the roadway with his toe, 'that it is my duty not to let you out of my sight.'