"What is it then ails ye?" said Cathleen, looking at her with wonder; then to herself, "hunger's turned the wits of her, poor soul! Take it—take it, mother," added she aloud: "eat, good mother; sure there's plenty for us all, and to spare," and she pressed it upon her with all the kindness of her nature. The old woman eagerly seized it.
"God reward ye," said she, grasping Cathleen's hand, convulsively, and retiring to a corner, she devoured the food with almost wolfish voracity.
While they were eating, the two Hogans, father and son, came in. They had been setting snares for rabbits and game on the neighbouring hills; and evidently were both startled and displeased to find the house occupied; which, since Barny Hogan's disgrace with "my lord," had been entirely shunned by the people round about. The old man gave the pedlar a sulky welcome. The son, with a muttered curse, went and took his seat in the chimney, where, turning his back, he set himself to chop a billet of wood. The father was a lean stooping figure, "bony, and gaunt, and grim:" he was either deaf, or affected deafness. The son was a short, brawny, thickset man, with features not naturally ugly, but rendered worse than ugly by an expression of louring ferocity disgustingly blended with a sort of stupid drunken leer, the effect of habitual intoxication.
Halloran stared at them awhile with visible astonishment and indignation, but pity and sorrow for a change so lamentable, smothered the old man's wrath; and as the eatables were by this time demolished, he took from his side pocket a tin flask of whiskey, calling to the old woman to boil some water "screeching hot," that he might make what he termed "a jug of stiff punch—enough to make a cat spake." He offered to share it with his hosts, who did not decline drinking; and the noggin went round to all but Cathleen, who, feverish with travelling, and, besides, disliking spirits, would not taste it. The old pedlar, reconciled to his old acquaintances by this show of good fellowship, began to grow merry under the influence of his whiskey-punch: he boasted of his late success in trade, showed with exultation his almost empty pack, and taking out the only two handkerchiefs left in it, threw one to Cathleen, and the other to the old woman of the house; then slapping his pocket, in which a quantity of loose money was heard to jingle, he swore he would treat Cathleen to a good breakfast next morning; and threw a shilling on the table, desiring the old woman would provide "stirabout for a dozen," and have it ready by the first light.
Cathleen listened to this rhodomontade in some alarm; she fancied she detected certain suspicious glances between the father and son, and began to feel an indescribable dread of her company. She arose from the table, urging the pedlar good-humouredly to retire to rest, as they intended to be up and away so early next morning: then concealing her apprehensions under an affectation of extreme fatigue and drowsiness, she desired to be shown where she was to sleep. The old woman lighted a lanthorn, and led the way up some broken steps into a sort of loft, where she showed her two beds standing close together; one of these she intimated was for the pedlar, and the other for herself. Now Cathleen had been born and bred in an Irish cabin, where the inmates are usually lodged after a very promiscuous fashion; our readers, therefore, will not wonder at the arrangement. Cathleen, however, required that, if possible, some kind of skreen should be placed between the beds. The old hag at first replied to this request with the most disgusting impudence; but Cathleen insisting, the beds were moved asunder, leaving a space of about two feet between them; and after a long search a piece of old frieze was dragged out from among some rubbish, and hung up to the low rafters, so as to form a curtain or partition half-way across the room. Having completed this arrangement, and wished her "a sweet sleep and a sound, and lucky dreams," the old woman put the lanthorn on the floor, for there was neither chair nor table, and left her guest to repose.
Cathleen said her prayers, only partly undressed herself, and lifting up the worn-out coverlet, lay down upon the bed. In a quarter of an hour afterwards the pedlar staggered into the room, and as he passed the foot of her bed, bid God bless her, in a low voice. He then threw himself down on his bed, and in a few minutes, as she judged by his hard and equal breathing, the old man was in a deep sleep.
All was now still in the house, but Cathleen could not sleep. She was feverish and restless; her limbs ached, her head throbbed and burned, undefinable fears beset her fancy; and whenever she tried to compose herself to slumber, the faces of the two men she had left below flitted and glared before her eyes. A sense of heat and suffocation, accompanied by a parching thirst, came over her, caused, perhaps, by the unusual closeness of the room. This feeling of oppression increased till the very walls and rafters seemed to approach nearer and close upon her all around. Unable any longer to endure this intolerable smothering sensation, she was just about to rise and open the door or window, when she heard the whispering of voices. She lay still and listened. The latch was raised cautiously,—the door opened, and the two Hogans entered: they trod so softly that, though she saw them move before her, she heard no foot-fall. They approached the bed of Halloran, and presently she heard a dull heavy blow, and then sounds—appalling sickening sounds—as of subdued struggles and smothered agony, which convinced her that they were murdering the unfortunate pedlar.
Cathleen listened, almost congealed with horror, but she did not swoon: her turn, she thought, must come next, though in the same instant she felt instinctively that her only chance of preservation was to counterfeit profound sleep. The murderers, having done their work on the poor Pedlar, approached her bed, and threw the gleam of their lanthorn full on her face; she lay quite still, breathing calmly and regularly. They brought the light to her eye-lids, but they did not wink or move;—there was a pause, a terrible pause, and then a whispering;—and presently Cathleen thought she could distinguish a third voice, as of expostulation, but all in so very low a tone that though the voices were close to her she could not hear a word that was uttered. After some moments, which appeared an age of agonising suspense, the wretches withdrew, and Cathleen was left alone, and in darkness. Then, indeed, she felt as one ready to die: to use her own affecting language, "the heart within me," said she, "melted away like water, but I was resolute not to swoon, and I did not. I knew that if I would preserve my life, I must keep the sense in me, and I did."
Now and then she fancied she heard the murdered man move, and creep about in his bed, and this horrible conceit almost maddened her with terror: but she set herself to listen fixedly, and convinced her reason that all was still—that all was over.
She then turned her thoughts to the possibility of escape. The window first suggested itself: the faint moon-light was just struggling through its dirty and cobwebbed panes: it was very small, and Cathleen reflected, that besides the difficulty, and, perhaps, impossibility of getting through, it must be some height from the ground: neither could she tell on which side of the house it was situated, nor in what direction to turn, supposing she reached the ground: and, above all, she was aware that the slightest noise must cause her instant destruction. She thus resolved upon remaining quiet.