"Heard what?" asked Pete.
"She's outer the hawspital."
"Have you seen her?"
The storekeeper nodded.
"She's dreadful hurt, Pete," he said with horrid unction. "I saw her the day she kem out. She's wropped up all one side of her face, like a corp, all in white. They say Ned Quin cut half her face off."
Pete's face was as dreadful as his sister's.
"Where is she?"
"She's gone back to Ned," replied the storekeeper. "She would go back: it warn't no good arguin' with her. Mrs. Alexander offered her a job in her kitchen, bein' a good old soul, but Mary would go back to him, she would."
Pete stood him a drink and then took one himself and then another. He flatly refused to play any more. But he spent ten dollars on the crowd. The more he drank the soberer he seemed to grow. The liquor hid the tension in him, and the excitement of the game. Mary was cut to bits and was back with Ned! He chewed on that as he drank. The storekeeper got hold of him again.
"Some enemy o' Ned's got home on him, Pete, and no fatal error," said he, with his eyes fixed on the young fellow; "some enemy got home on him and no fatal error."