'He has forgiven me plenty, lad, and you too, and I love Him for it.'
And those were Matthew O'Brien's last words.
Mat O'Brien did not go unwept to his grave, in spite of his unsatisfactory life. His brother mourned for him long and sincerely, and in their way Kester and Mollie grieved, too. At Audrey's wish, Mollie wrote the full particulars of her father's death to the convent. Sister Monica's answer was, in Audrey's opinion, singularly suggestive of the ci-devant Mrs. Blake. It was a strange medley of mysticism and motherly yearnings, but at the end was a touch of real honest feeling.
'Tell Audrey that when I pray for my boy I pray for her, too; and, Mollie, do not think that your mother forgets you, for perhaps she may do you better service now than ever she did when we were together. Think of me sometimes, my child. I am glad that your father spoke of me so kindly. I can pray for him now, as I never could when he was living. Poor man! It was an ill world to him, but he is out of it now.
Your loving and repentant mother,
'Sister Monica Mary.'
Audrey went over to Brail constantly during the autumn and winter months that followed Mat's death. Sometimes Mollie accompanied her, but oftener she was alone. Nothing cheered Thomas O'Brien more than the society of his favourite. He loved to talk to her of the dear ones who had passed within the veil, and to Audrey herself the visits were very soothing.
She liked those solitary walks under the gray November skies, or when the December sun hung redly behind the distant hedgerows. How often she had walked there when Cyril had met her half-way, or she had come upon him lingering in the lanes, with Zack bounding beside him. It was in the Brail lanes that he first told her of his love, when she had sent him sorrowfully away from her; but somehow, as she walked there now, between hedgerows white with hoar frost, she thought less of him than of Michael; but as yet no message had been sent to recall the wanderer home.