Yet, though her brain was sound, it was not to be denied that she had been a woman of sorrow. And the strange words she had spoken when she was near her end added a mystery to her memory which, boy as I was, I took to heart, and resolved, if I could, to master.
That afternoon, when the mourners had gone their several ways, and the short daylight was already beginning to draw in, Tim and I lay at the cliff’s edge, near our mother’s grave, watching the Cigale as, with all her canvas flying and my father’s dexterous hand at the helm, she slipped out of the lough and spread her wings for the open sea. Even in the feeble breeze, which would scarcely have stirred one of our trawlers, she seemed to gather speed; and if we felt any anxiety as to her being chased by one of his Majesty’s cutters, we had only to watch the way in which she slid through the water to assure us that she would need a deal of catching.
I told Tim all I knew about her, and of my errand to Derry.
“What are the guns for?” said he. “What’s there to be fighting about? Man, dear, I’d like a gun myself.”
“There’s plenty up at the house there,” said I, pointing to Kilgorman—“two hundred.”
“Two hundred! and we’re only needing two. Come away, Barry; let’s see where they’re kept.”
“You’re not going up to Kilgorman House, sure?” said I in amazement.
“’Deed I am. I’m going to get myself a gun, and you too.”
“But his honour?”
“Come on!” cried Tim, who seemed greatly excited; “his honour can’t mind. I’ll hold ye, Barry, we’ll use a gun as well as any of the boys.”