Unknown equally to Tim and to Pardo, the house was not deserted, as they supposed. Biddy Flanagan, the old Irish maid-servant, had stuck to it when all the other domestics fled, just as Puss will linger forlorn in an empty house. She shut herself in her room, and only ventured out to forage. She had thus sallied forth to make a cup of tea when she saw Pardo and his companion coming from the direction of the town. She at once slipped out at the back, locking the kitchen door and taking the key with her, and hid herself in the shrubbery. Thus she did not see Tim's arrival, though she heard the hoof-beats, and supposed that Pardo had been joined by another friend. When, after some time, she heard the thud of hoofs again, and guessed that the intruders had gone away, she let herself into the house, put the kettle on, and while she waited for the water to boil, went through the house to see what the spalpeens had been after.
"They've took the gold clock," she muttered, standing with arms folded at the drawing-room door; "and I wouldn't wonder if it did be after striking in the bundle, and maybe get them rogues into trouble. And the mistress's best chainey: faith, 'tis a mercy she took all her jools along with her, or there'd be none of um left at all." She went on to the dining-room. "The like of it! Sorra a silver spoon to be seen, nor the silver jug; I never heard tell of the way them villains have the place stripped, and that Pardo the master's man and all."
She made a mental inventory of the missing articles and proceeded to the office.
"What did they be after doing here?" she grunted, as she noticed, with the quick eye of one accustomed to superintend the cleaning operations, signs of disturbance about the matting. She stooped to straighten it, and discovered the loosened boards. "I wouldn't wonder but they did be hiding the things," she said, raising the planks one after another; "and mighty foolish will they look when they come back, if so be I can get myself down through the hole and back again. There! the kettle's on the boil; I'll just be wetting the tea, and fetch a candle for this same."
The daylight streaming in through the gap had roused Tim from his stupor, and seeing Biddy above he tried to shout, but could not utter a sound through the gag. Biddy soon returned with a candle and a kitchen chair. The latter she lowered into the hole, stepped on to it, carrying the candle, and so reached the ground. She stooped, to search for the stolen articles, and started back in a hurry.
"Holy St. Patrick!" she exclaimed; "but 'tis a man, sure. Is it murder they were after?"
Recovering herself, she held the candle lower.
"Mercy! 'Tis master Tim!" she cried, "and beasties crawling all over on the poor face of um. The like of it! Divil such a state ever I seen as the poor boy do be in."
She bent over him, whipped out a pair of scissors and snapped the cords, and whisked the insects from his spotted and swollen face with her apron.
"The poor lamb!" she said, lifting him. "Sure the life's fair bitten out of um."