She took off her heavy shoes, and crept back into the room. The outline of the form in the bed was not that of a very little child.
"About the age of the captain or the general?" murmured Bet. "I must be careful if the young 'un's weak not to startle the poor lamb."
She stirred the fire very gently, and seeing a little sauce-pan with something simmering in it on the hob, tasted it, and found it was beef-tea. She poured a little into a cracked tea-cup, and when the child moaned again—and this moan was even fainter than the last—went up to the bed, determined to act the part of the absent mother, who was so shamefully neglecting her sick child.
"Here, honey, take a sip," she said, and she put her strong firm arm under the restless little head. The small face was in shadow. Bet raised the head higher. "Drink, dearie," she said again. There was a pause. Bet's own face could be seen—Bet's own face could be recognized.
"Bet—Bet!" said the captain—"oh, Bet—I did ax God to bring you back to me!"
CHAPTER XXXII.
When Bet Granger ran past the open doorway of Mother Bunch's room she had very little idea that in a corner of that room, tied firmly into a chair, sat her bridegroom of to-morrow—Isaac Dent.
The gag had been removed from his mouth, but his hands were still firmly pinioned, and he was so securely strapped into the chair which held him that he could scarcely move a limb. Under these circumstances Dent did not show to advantage. There was none of that conscious innocence which gives to other men a certain nobility in the hour of trial. On the contrary, his face was blanched with the most unmistakable fear, and his restless shifting eyes looked no one member of the motley group who surrounded him full in the face.
To all appearance, however, these people did jot take the smallest notice of Dent. They left him in his corner, and eagerly pursued their own gay revelries, deaf to the sound of the piteous voice which he raised now and then. Patrick O'Flaherty, Mother Bunch's husband, played the fiddle with much spirit, but Mother Bunch herself was the real mistress of the ceremonies, footing it bravely in the jig, and letting her voice peal forth in such enthusiastic Irish songs as "The Shamrock," "Garryowen," "Saint Patrick's Day," and the like.