“Only this,” said I, warming up, “that I would lay down my life any day for Miss Kit; and it is for her sake, and for her alone, that I would be sorry to see harm come to a man to whom I owe nothing but harshness and injury.”
I repented as soon as I had said the words, but he gave me no chance of drawing back. He laughed dryly.
“So that’s at the bottom of it? The son of a boatman and smuggler aspires to be son-in-law to the owner of Knockowen and Kilgorman—a pretty honour indeed!”
Here I flung all prudence to the winds, and glared in his face as I said,—
“Suppose, instead of the son of a boatman and smuggler, the man who loved your daughter were the son of him whose estates and fortune you have stolen, what then, Mr Gorman?”
He looked at me attentively for a moment, and his face turned so white that I thought him about to swoon. It was a moment or two before he could master his tongue, and meanwhile he kept his eyes on me like a man fascinated.
“Fool!” he gasped at last. “You don’t know what you are talking about.” Then with a sudden recovery of composure, and in a voice almost conciliatory, he added, “Miss Kit is about to visit her friends in Dublin, and will not be back here for weeks. Take the advice of a friend, Gallagher, and get away from these parts. To give you the chance, you may, if you wish to serve me, ride to Malin instead of Martin, and escort my daughter as far as Derry.”
“Miss Kit might prefer some other escort,” said I.
“She might. You are not bound to wait upon her. But I can give you a pass if you do.”
“When does she leave Malin?”