"I'm sure I beg your pardon," said my grandfather, "but might I ask you a question?"
"If you want a crooked answer," said Patrick; "turn away, or it'll be the worse for you."
But my grandfather couldn't get it out of his head, hadn't everybody, far and near, said Patrick had fallen overboard. There was enough to think about, and my grandfather did think.
"Andrew Coffey! Andrew Coffey! It's burning me ye are."
Sorry enough my grandfather was, and he vowed he wouldn't do so again.
"You'd better not," said Patrick, and he gave him a cock of his eye, and a grin of his teeth, that just sent a shiver down Andrew Coffey's back. Well, it was odd, that here he should be in a thick wood he had never set eyes upon, turning Patrick Rooney upon a spit. You can't wonder at my grandfather thinking and thinking and not minding the fire.
"Andrew Coffey! Andrew Coffey! It's the death of you I'll be."
And with that what did my grandfather see, but Patrick unslinging himself from the spit, and his eyes glared and his teeth glistened.
It was neither stop nor stay my grandfather made, but out he ran into the night of the wood. It seemed to him there wasn't a stone but was for his stumbling, not a branch but beat his face, not a bramble but tore his skin. And wherever it was clear the rain pelted down and the cold March wind howled along.