'Go, Miss Mollie, or you will drive her crazy with your big eyes and frightened face. Whist! don't heed the mistress's wild talk; it is never the truth she is telling you.'
But Mrs. Blake had interrupted the old woman; her eyes were blazing with angry excitement:
'Where do you expect to go, Biddy, if you tell Mollie such lies? You are a wicked old woman! You have helped me to do all this mischief! Would you dare to tell me to my face that I am not the wife of Mat O'Brien?'
'Sorra a bit, Miss Olive; you are the widow of that honest man Blake. Heaven rest his soul!' returned the old woman doggedly. 'We must be having the doctors to you, Miss Olive avick, if you tell us these wild stories.'
'Biddy, you are a false, foolish old creature! and it is you who are driving me out of my sane senses.'
But at this point Mollie fairly fled.
'Did you see your brother?' asked Michael, as she stopped to dry her eyes. Kester had never uttered a word; he left Mollie to tell her own story, and sat leaning his head on his hands. For once Mollie's loquacity was suffered unchecked.
'It was dark, and I could not see him; it was quite late, you know—nearly twelve o'clock. He came out and listened to me; but the passage and the room were quite dark.
'"Go down, Mollie," he said, "and tell my mother that I cannot speak to her to-night. It is quite impossible; she ought not to expect it."
'"But she is ill, Cyril—I am sure she is dreadfully ill; her eyes look so strange, and she is saying such things!"