“Oh, musha, musha, a quare hour o’ the day he comes to his breakfast, goin’ on eleven o’clock, an’ he that wint out before it was makin’ day!”
Mrs. Quin shed tears, and little Mikeen utilized the opportunity by burying his dirty face in her cup, and taking a long drink of the bitter strong tea.
Tom Quin did not waste words on his family when he came in. He sat down on the settle, with his hat on, and his eyes fixed on the floor between his muddy boots. His dog, a black-and-grey cur, remotely allied to the collie breed, snuffed with an habituated nose at the pots and pans under the dresser, found no change in them since he had licked them the night before, passed the lair of the cat with respectful rigidity, and lay down as if tired, submitting like a Christian and a gentleman to the fondlings of Mikeen.
“Have they the bridge finished yet, in Tully Bog?” asked Maria Quin, as she took the teapot up from its nest in the hot ashes.
Quin raised his heavy eyes quickly.
“Ye think ye’re damn wise,” he said, “follyin’ me, an’ axin’ me this an’ that what was I doin’. Haven’t I throuble enough without the likes o’ yee annoyin’ me!”
“Oh, asthoreen,” wailed his mother, “sure it’s only that we’re that much unaisy for the way ye are, that we’d ax where’d ye go. Take the cup o’ tay, asthore, don’t be talkin’ that way.”
Quin relapsed into silence, and Maria was in the act of pouring out his tea, when the long sweet note of a horn struck suddenly on their ears, and Watch sprang out of the open door, barking his shrill vulgar bark, and sniffing the breeze. He was hardly quicker than his master. Before Maria had time to put down the teapot, Quin was outside, listening and staring, and cursing the dog into silence. He saw two red-coated horsemen trotting round the end of the wood, and the note of the horn came again, smooth and melodious. Quin started at a run in the direction of the covert, drawing hard, sobbing breaths as he ran.
On the road at the other side of the covert, Slaney was sitting on Isabella, the elderly brown mare, and wishing that she had stayed at home. To sit on Isabella’s back was an experience almost distinct from riding; it suggested more than anything else a school-room sofa propelled into action by a sour and sluggish sense of the inevitable, a school-room sofa that partook of the nature of the governess. Slaney’s sharply-cut face was pale and sleepless-looking; she was no longer the ethereal creature of the firelight and moonlight, merely an ill-turned-out girl, with interesting eyes and a clear skin, who appeared to be absorbed in discussing bronchitis kettles with the dispensary doctor. Lady Susan was a little farther down the road on her husband’s grey, the horse who was, so far, the only creature possessed of the knowledge that Hugh was afraid of him. He was well aware that Lady Susan was not, but that, after all, was a fact that was patent to all beholders.
Mr. Glasgow, turning away from Lady Susan, and looking back as he turned, thought that she was as good a thing to look at as he had ever seen. He was on his way to Slaney, and as he neared her he attuned his eye to that expression of understanding, even of tenderness, that the occasion required. He delighted in the position; it was intricate, it was a little risky, and in spite of Slaney’s wrinkled habit and old-fashioned hat, he still recognized the attractive quality in her. He felt that it was discriminating and chivalrous of him to be able to do so, and looking down on her from the mental elevation of his assured horsemanship, and his power of being agreeable to women, he anticipated with sufficient pleasure another harmless deviation or so from the ordinary paths of friendship.