The blue eyes of Eileen Ni Cooley shone with contentment; she slipped the shawl from her shoulders and let it drop to the ground.
"We'll do that, Mary," said she, "and let us do it now."
So the women lifted to their feet and they walked towards Brien O'Brien, and suddenly they leaped on him like a pair of panthers, and they leaped so suddenly that he went down against the road with a great bump. But he did not stay down.
He rose after one dumbfounded moment, and he played with the pair of them the way a conjurer would play with two balls, so that the breath went out of their bodies, and they had to sit down or suffocate.
"That's the kind of man he is," panted Eileen.
"Very well!" said Mary fiercely, "we'll try him again in a minute."
The camp was in confusion, and from that confusion Art leaped towards Brien O'Brien, but the Seraph Cuchulain leaped and outleaped Art, and set himself bristling by the elbow of his friend; then Caeltia, with his face shining happily, tip-toed forward and ranged with Art against these two, but Finaun went quicker than they all; he leaped between the couples, and there was not a man of the four dared move against his hand.
In a second that storm blew itself out, and they returned to their seats smiling foolishly.
"Let the women be quiet," said Brien O'Brien harshly.
He also seated himself, with his back touching against the donkey's legs.