"It's my own child, Maam my own boy all the child I have and I'll have none by the morning light."
"Is he so ill?" said Alice; "what is the matter with him?"
"Myself doesn't know."
The voice was fainter; the brown cloak was drawn over her face; and Alice and Ellen saw her shoulders heaving with the grief she kept from bursting out. They exchanged glances.
"Sit down," said Alice again presently, laying her hand upon the wet shoulder; "sit down and rest; my father will be here directly. Margery oh, that's right a cup of tea will do her good. What do you want with my father?"
"The Lord bless ye! I'll tell you, my lady."
She drank off the tea, but refused something more substantial that Margery offered her.
"The Lord bless ye! I couldn't. My lady, there wasn't a stronger, nor a prettier, nor a swater child, nor couldn't be, nor he was when we left it it'll be three years come the fifteenth of April next; but I'm thinking the bitter winters of this cowld country has chilled the life o' him and troubles cowlder than all," she added, in a lower tone. "I seed him grow waker and waker, an' his dair face grown thinner and thinner, and the red all left it, only two burning spots was on it some days; an' I worried the life out o' me for him, an' all I could do, I couldn't do nothing at all to help him, for he just growed waker an' waker. I axed the father wouldn't he see the doctor about him, but he's an aisy kind o' man, my lady, an' he said he would, an' he never did to this day; an' John, he always said it was no use sinding for the doctor, an' looked so swate at me, an' said for me not to fret, for sure he'd be better soon, or he'd go to a better place. An' I thought he was already like a heavenly angel itself, an' always was, but then more nor ever. Och! it's soon that he'll be one entirely! let Father Shannon say what he will."
She sobbed for a minute, while Alice and Ellen looked on, silent and pitying.
"An' to-night, my lady, he's very bad," she went on, wiping away the tears that came quickly again "an' I seed he was going fast from me, an' I was breaking my heart wid the loss of him, whin I heard one of the men that was in it say, 'What's this he's saying?' says he. 'An' what is it, thin?' says I. 'About the gintleman that praiches at Carra,' says he 'he's a calling for him,' says he. I knowed there wasn't a praist at all at Carra, an' I thought he was draiming, or out o' his head, or crazy wid his sickness, like; an' I went up close to him, an' says I, 'John,' says I, 'what is it you want,' says I 'an' sure, if it's anything in heaven above or in earth beneath that yer own mother can get for ye,' says I, 'ye shall have it,' says I. An' he put up his two arms around my neck, an' pulled my face down to his lips, that was hot wid the faver, an' kissed me he did 'An',' says he, 'mother dair,' says he 'if ye love me,' says he, 'fetch me the good gintleman that praiches at Carra, till I spake to him.' 'Is it the praist you want, John, my boy?' says I 'sure he's in it,' says I'; for Michael had been for Father Shannon, an' he had come home wid him half an hour before. 'Oh no, mother,' says he, 'it's not him at all that I mane it's the gintleman that spakes in the little white church at Carra he's not a praist at all,' says he. 'An' who is he thin?' says I, getting up from the bed, 'or where will I find him, or how will I get to him?' 'Ye'll not stir a fut for him, thin, the night, Kitty Dolan,' says my husband 'are ye mad,' says he; 'sure it's not his own head the child has at all at all, or it's a little hiritic he is,' says he; 'an' ye won't show the disrespect to the praist in yer own house.' 'I'm maining none,' says I 'nor more, he isn't a hiritic; but if he was, he's a born angel to you, Michael Dolan, anyhow,' says I; 'an' wid the kiss of his lips on my face, wouldn't I do the arrant of my own boy, an' he a dying? by the blessing, an' I will, if twenty men stud between me an' it. So tell me where I'll find him, this praist, if there's the love o' mercy in any sowl o' ye,' says I. But they wouldn't spake a word for me, not one of them; so I axed an' axed at one place an' other, till here I am. An' now, my lady, will the master go for me to my poor boy? for he'd maybe be dead while I stand here."