“Can I lose what I niver had or waanted?” Kerrigan asked. “I don’t know.”
“It was not an hour since ye were all but marryin’ her before me eyes,” snapped Reilly. “What of that?”
“I was borrowed only,” exclaimed Kerrigan.
“And what do ye mane?” demanded Reilly.
“’T was what Katie said,” answered Kerrigan. “We were standun’ before the church whin up edged a red-headed little old mon, and says she to me, ‘May I borrow ye for a bit?’ ‘Sure,’ says I. And she borrowed me to get rid of the mon, and now she’s borrowed anither to get rid of you and me. Sure, she’s the bright wan.”
Reilly was staring straight ahead, piecing the broken patches of truth together. Suddenly he looked up.
“And nayther of ye meant nothing at all by all the love-talk?”
“Nothing at all,” answered Kerrigan.
“Thin she’s a desateful hussy,” cried Reilly, angrily. “She’s made me ate me own worrds through fear of ye. I said young Cassidy should niver have her, and now she’s made me fair’ throw him at her, as if he was the last mon on God’s earth! Ye can’t trust a woman at all.”
“Sometimes ye can and sometimes ye cannot,” amended Kerrigan, “but ye niver know which ut is till ut’s too late.”