MURTAGH COSGAR
Your daughter! Ellen! You're—
MARTIN DOURAS
Ay, a good name, and a good girl.
MURTAGH COSGAR
And do you think a son of mine would marry a daughter of yours?
MARTIN DOURAS
What great difference is between us, after all?
MURTAGH COSGAR (fiercely) The daughter of a man who'd be sitting over his fire reading his paper, and the clouds above his potatoes, and the cows trampling his oats. (Martin is beaten down) Do you know me at all, Martin Douras? I came out of a little house by the roadway and built my house on a hill. I had many children. Coming home in the long evenings, or kneeling still when the prayers would be over, I'd have my dreams. A son in Aughnalee, a son in Ballybrian, a son in Dunmore, a son of mine with a shop, a son of mine saying Mass in Killnalee. And I have a living name—a name in flesh and blood.
MARTIN DOURAS
God help you, Murtagh Cosgar.
MURTAGH COSGAR But I've a son still. It's not your daughter he'll be marrying. (He strides to the door and calls Matt)
MARTIN DOURAS (going to him) Murtagh Cosgar—for God's sake—we're both old men, Murtagh Cosgar.
MURTAGH COSGAR
You've read many stories, Martin Douras, and you know many endings.
You'll see an ending now, and it will be a strong ending, and a
sudden ending.
Matt comes in.