While Bessie sipped at her cup the witch-doctor went on talking, but she took quick glances at the girl from time to time and sometimes asked a question.
At length she bolted the door, drew a thick blind over the window, knelt before the hearth, and called on Bessie to do the same, so that they were kneeling side by side, with no light in the darkened room except the red glow from the fire on their faces and the blue streak from the sky behind the smoke from the chimney.
After that the witch-doctor mumbled some rhymes about St. Patrick and the blessed St. Bridget, then put her ear to the ground, saying she was listening to the Sheean ny Feaynid, the invisible beings who were always wandering over the world. And then she began on the fortune, which Bessie, who was trembling, interrupted with involuntary cries.
"There's a fair young man in your life, my chree (Yes) and if you're not his equal you're the apple of his eye. There's a poor ould woman, too, and she praying and praying for her bogh-millish to come home to her (Oh!) and the longing that's taking the woman at times is pitiful to see. 'Where is my wandering girl to-night,' she's singing when she's sitting by her fireside; and when she's going to bed she's saying, 'In Jesu's keeping nought can harm my erring child.'"
At this Bessie broke down utterly, and the witch-doctor had to stop for a moment. Then she began again in a different strain,
"There's an ould man too .... yes .... no .... (Yes, yes!) as imperent as sin and as bould as a white stone, and with a vice at him as loud as a trambone. Aw, yes, woman-bogh, yes, there's trouble coming on you, but take heart, gel, for things will come out right before long and it's a proud woman you're going to be some day. But you must go home to the mother, my chree, and never take rest till you're laying your head under the same roof with her."
"And will the young man be true to me whatever happens?"
"True as true, my chree, and his heart that warm to you at last that it will be like gorse and ling burning on the mountains."
"And will the old man be able to do him any injury?"
"Lough bless me, no! Neither to him nor you, gel. Roaring and tearing and mad as a wasp, maybe, but nothing to do no harm at all."