"What indeed!" echoed Kate, throwing herself into nurse's arms; and worn out by the long constraint she had laboured under, she burst into an irrepressible flood of tears, while Mrs. O'Toole hushed and soothed her, as in her childish days.
"There now, hush, darlint; tell me what it vexes ye?"
"I am so afraid you will think me ungrateful and selfish, dear nurse," began Kate, in broken accents, interrupted by sobs. "You see I am particularly anxious to stay in London for a while; and if—if I was richer, and could pay for your lodgings, and all that, do you think I could ever part with you, even for a short season, dearest, kindest friend; but I am not; and I will not let you waste the little you have on my account. No, you will go with Lady Desmond to Ireland, as she wishes, till I join her."
Mrs. O'Toole seemed plunged in thought, and rolled her arms in her apron, a favourite attitude with her, indicative of deep reflection.
"But will ye come back?" she asked, at last, with a keen glance, "an' whin? there's somethin's throublin' ye, jewil, though ye'll not spake out, an' me heart's oneasy; sure, ye wouldn't let me go from ye, if ye wern't manin' to come back to me; sure, ye wouldn't thrate me that a way, me own child?"
"God knows," cried Kate, "it is hard enough to part with you, although I most firmly purpose to be with you ere long; but to say good bye in earnest would be death to me."
"An' why need ye stay wid thim Storeys that arn't yer aiquils at all? Ah! where's the use of sthrivin' to decave me. Have you an' me lady fell out, asthore?"
This question was put with a concentration of anxiety and curiosity which might have raised a smile to the lips of a casual observer, but which only served to fill up the measure of Kate's perplexities—her equally balanced cares—not to betray her cousin, and not to wound nurse, placing her in a double difficulty.
"No, no! quarrel with my dear, kind Georgy! Never, I trust; but, in short, dearest nurse," she continued, with great earnestness, "it would be a source of the greatest comfort to me, to know that you were safe and free from every want, in an establishment such as hers. I am powerless to afford any aid or protection to my oldest, truest friend," pursued Kate, large tears weighing down her eyelashes. "And after years of faithful, constant, self-devoted service, I must owe to another the shelter I cannot give you. Ah! it is a hard fate!"