The sun had by this time nearly penetrated through the heavy fog, which had hung since early dawn like a vail over the valley; and just as Nellie reached the foot of the path leading straight up to the castle, it fairly broke through every obstacle, and cast a gleam of wintry sunshine on her face. That face, once seen, was not one easily to be forgotten. The features were almost, and yet not quite, classic in their beauty, gaining in expression what they lost in regularity; and the frequent mingling, by intermarriages, of Celtic blood with that of her old Norman race, had given Nellie that most especial characteristic of Irish beauty—hair black and glossy as the raven's wing, with eyes blue as the dark, double violet, and looking even bluer and darker than they were by nature through the abundance of the long, silken lashes, the same color as her hair, which fringed them. She carried her small, beautifully-formed head with the grace and spirit of a young antelope, and there was something of firmness even in the elastic lightness of her movements, which gave an idea of energy and decision not naturally to be looked for in one so young and girlish, both as to form and feature. Her tight-fitting robe of dark and strong material, though evidently merely adopted for the convenience of travelling, rather set off than detracted from the beauty of her form; and over it hung that long, loose mantle of blue cloth which seems, time out of mind, to have been a favorite garment with the Irish. It was fastened at the throat by a brooch of gold, curious and valuable even then for its evident antiquity; and with its broad, graceful folds falling to her feet, and its hood drawn forward over her head, and throwing her sweet, sad face somewhat into shadow, gave her at that moment, as the sun shone down upon her, the very look and expression of a Mater Dolorosa.
Ten minutes' rapid walking up a path, which looked more like an irregular staircase cut through rock and turf-mould than a way worn gradually by the pressure of men's feet, brought her to the platform upon which the castle stood.
Moated and circumvallated toward the south and west, which were easy of access from the flat lands beyond, Netterville was comparatively defenceless on the side from whence Nellie now approached it; its builders and inhabitants having evidently considered the deep stream and valley which lay beneath as a sufficient protection against their enemies.
The great gate stood looking eastward, and Nellie could see from the spot where she halted that all the preparations for her approaching journey were already almost completed. A couple of sorry-looking nags, (garrans, the Irish would have called them,) one with a pillion firmly fixed behind the saddle, were being led slowly up and down in readiness for their riders. Little sorrowful groups of the Irish dependents of the family stood here and there upon the terraces, waiting (faithful to the last as they ever were in those days) to give one parting glance and one sorrowful, long farewell to their deposed chieftain and his heiress; and a little further off, like hawks hovering around their prey, might be seen a band of those iron-handed, iron-hearted men in whose favor the transplantation of the present owners of the soil had been decreed, and who had been set there, half to watch and half to enforce departure, should anything like evasion or resistance be attempted. Something very like an angry frown clouded Nellie's brow as she caught sight of these men for whose benefit she was being robbed of her inheritance; but, unwilling to indulge such evil feelings, she suffered her gaze to pass quietly beyond them until it rested once more on the streamlet and valley as they stretched eastward toward the sea. Just then some one tapped her on the shoulder, and, turning sharply round, Nellie found herself confronted by a woman not many years older, probably, than herself, but with a face upon which, beautiful as it was, the early indulgence of wild passions had stamped a look of premature decay.
"What would you with me?" said Nellie, surprised at the familiarity of the salutation, and not in the least recognizing the person who had been guilty of it. "I know you not. What do you want with me?"
"Oh! little or nothing," said the other, in a harsh and taunting voice; "little or nothing, my fair young mistress—heiress, that has been, of the house of Netterville—only I thought that, may be, you could say if the old mistress will be after going with you into exile. They told me she was," she added, with a gesture toward the soldiers; "and yet, as far as I can see, only one of the garrans has a pillion to its back. But, may be, she'll be for going later—"
"I have already said," Nellie coldly answered, for she neither liked the matter nor the manner of the woman's speech—"I have already said that I know you not, and, in all likelihood, neither does my mother. Why, therefore, do you ask the question?"
"Because I hope it!" said the woman, with such a look of hatred on her face that Nellie involuntarily recoiled a step—"because I hope it; and then perhaps, when she is houseless and hungry herself, she will remember that cold December night when she drove me from her door, to sleep, for all that she cared, under the shelter of the whin-bushes in the valley."
"If my mother, good and gentle as she is to all, ever acted as you say she did, undoubtedly she had wise and sufficient reasons for it," Nellie coldly answered.
"Undoubtedly—good and sufficient reasons had she, and so, for that matter, had I too, when I put my heavy curse upon her and all her breed," retorted the girl, with a coarse and taunting laugh. "And see how it has come to work," she added wildly—"see how it has come to work! Ay, ay—she'll mind it when it is too late, I doubt not; and will think twice before she lets loose her Saxon pride to flout a poor body for only asking a night's shelter under her roof. Roof! she'll soon have no roof for herself, I guess; but if ever she has one again, she'll think better of it, I doubt not."