"You are not angry. Colonel O'More," she said, with the simplicity of a child; "surely you do not fancy, because I spoke of Netterville, that I am ungrateful for the kindness which has made this island like a second home to me."
"No, indeed," he answered, with a smile so bright that it must have reassured her even if he had not said a word in answer. "No, indeed. I was, or at all events I am, only thinking how I can best persuade you and Lord Netterville to consider this island as your home, even in the absence of its lawful owner."
"Absence," said Nellie; "are you going then, and wherefore?"
"Wherefore?" said O'More quickly. "I marvel that you cannot guess. Because, Mistress Netterville, though I live upon this island, and though its inhabitants acknowledge me as their chieftain, it is yet a sorry fact that I am poor, poorer in proportion than the poorest of the number; an outlaw besides, with every man's hand and sword against me, and nothing but the traditions of past greatness to soothe, or, which much oftener is the case, to add bitterness to the meanness of my present station."
"Why call it meanness?" said Nellie, flashing up. "You have fought and lost for your king and country, as we all have fought and lost; and your enemies may take your lands indeed, but they cannot rob you of the glory of the cause for which you have contended, nor can they make you other than you are, a descendant of brave old Grana Uaille and the inheritor of her kingdom."
"Kingdom!" said Roger, with a little bitter laugh. "Turn your eyes inland, Mistress Netterville, and look from the northern point of Clew Bay southward toward the spot where Croagh Patrick casts its shade upon the bright waters. That was the old kingdom of Grana Uaille, and my inheritance upon the day that I was born. My earliest recollections therefore are connected with this wild land, and every rock and cave in its fair winding coast-line was as familiar to me in my childish days as the toys in their nursery are to more tenderly nurtured children. But they sent me at last to Spain for that education which would have been denied me here, and I only came back (while still a mere raw boy) to fight under the banner of my kinsman, I will not trouble you with a history of that war; you know it, alas, too well already! But when Preston took refuge in Galway, and the other chiefs of the confederation dispersed in different directions, I made the best of my way hither, hoping, amid the wilds and fastnesses of my own country, to be permitted to remain at peace. Rumors reached me on the way of the great scheme of the transplantation, and of the numbers flocking from the eastern counties to usurp, against their will, the possessions of their poorer brethren in the west. Soon after that, came tidings that the enemy had reserved the coast-line for themselves, then that they had swarmed over into some of the Clew Bay islands, and then, at last, that they had taken possession of and fortified Carrig-a-hooly, the old castle of Grana and the spot where I was born. Still I pressed unhesitatingly forward; for I remembered the 'Rath,' and knowing that it was, or used to be, almost a ruin, I hoped it would have escaped them, and that I might find there a refuge and concealment for the moment. Mistress Netterville, you can guess at the result. I went as you went, and found as you found, that it was occupied already. Major Hewitson—"
"What of Major Hewitson?" a voice asked impatiently at his elbow. Roger turned, and found himself face to face with Henrietta, who had glided so quietly up the mountain path that neither he nor Nellie had an idea of her presence until she announced it by this question.
Remembering her kindness of the day before, Nellie's first impulse had been to greet her eagerly; her next was to retreat a step behind O'More, with an uncomfortable though only half acknowledged consciousness that she herself would be considered by Henrietta as one too many in the coming conversation. There was, in truth, a flush on the young lady's brow and a sparkle in her eye, by no means inviting to familiarity, and without seeming conscious even of Nellie's presence, she repeated the question angrily to O'More:
"What of Major Hewitson? What of the owner of yonder castle?"
Roger looked at her steadily, then removing his cap, and speaking in his most courtly tones, he answered quietly: