“I don’t know,” Dermod answered, lowering his eyes. “D’ye mind the night on the Derry boat?” he asked. “All that night when you were asleep I had your hand in mine.”

“I mind it very well,” she said, and a slight blush stole into her cheeks. They clasped hands, the girl’s fingers stole over Dermod’s and their eyes met. For a moment it seemed as if one or the other was going to speak, but no voice broke the stillness. The fear had now gone from Norah’s heart; it seemed quite natural to her that she should be there clasping the hand of that ragged youth who always attracted and fascinated her. That she should desire to sit beside him, to press his hands so very tightly, did not appear strange to her and above all did not appear wrong. Dermod saw in her eyes a childlike admiration, a look half a child’s and half a woman’s. A vague longing, something which he could not comprehend and which caused him a momentary pang of fear, rose in his heart. What he had to be afraid of he did not know, as he knelt there in spirit before the most holy sanctuary in the world, the sanctuary of chaste and beautiful womanhood.

Many evenings they met together in the same way; they became more intimate, more friendly, and Norah found that her fear of Dermod was gradually passing away. When evenings were wet they sat in the byre or cart-shed, where the fire burned brightly, and talked about Glenmornan and the people at home. One day Micky’s Jim said that he himself had once a notion of Norah Ryan. When Dermod heard this he flushed hotly. Norah’s cheeks got very red and Jim laughed loudly.

“I have no time for them sort of capers now,” said Jim. “Ye can have her all to yerself, Dermod, and people like yerselves will be always doin’ the silly thing, indeed ye will!”

CHAPTER XVII
A GAME OF CARDS

I

MICKY’s Jim was telling the story of a fight in which he had taken part and how he knocked down a man twice as heavy as himself with one on the jaw. Owen Kelly, Gourock Ellen, Dermod, and Norah were the listeners. The squad had just changed quarters from a farm on which they had been engaged to the one on which they were now, and it was here that they were going to end the season. The farm belonged to a surly old man named Morrison, a short-tempered fellow, always at variance with the squad, whom he did not like.

Jim was telling the story in the cart-shed. A blazing fire lit up the place, shadows danced along the roof, outside a slight rain was falling and the wind blew mournfully in from the hayricks that stood up like shrouded ghosts in the gloomy stack yard. Presently a man entered, a red-haired fellow with a limp in one leg and a heavy stick in his hand. He was a stranger to Norah and Dermod, but the rest of the squad knew him well and were pleased to see the man with the limp. Owen Kelly, however, grunted something on seeing the stranger, and a look, certainly not of pleasure, passed across his face.

“How are ye, Ginger Dubbin?” Micky’s Jim shouted to the visitor. “By this and by that ye look well on it.”

“The bad are always well fed,” said Owen Kelly in a low voice.