These were the last words we heard—the gatekeeper’s wife flung an ould shoe after us for luck—and away we went to make our fortune.
When we reached Moylough, the coach was standin’ before the door of the hotel, for the passengers had gone in to breakfast; and by the time we had taken the dust out of our throats with a throw at the counter, the company had come out again. Two or three of them roofed it like myself; and one lady, with blue feathers and a yalla pelisse, stepped inside. She was a clipper! and there was enough of her into the bargain. As Master Diek travelled like a raal gentleman, of coorse, he hopped in too.
Well, when we stopped to change horses, Dick and the lady were thick as inkle-wavers. “Shemus,” says he, “bring out a glass of sherry, and a drop of water in the bottom of a tumbler, with a sketch of sperits through it.” They drank genteely to each other, and away we rowled again. Indeed, at every stop the same order was repated.
* A diminutive sprite who inhabits lakes, and seems a
species of the Scotch Kelpie.
** Anglicè—Money paid upon the nail.
The lady was comin’ from the saa, and that made her dry, I suppose; and from the time he was a boy, Dick Macnamara had an unquenchable thirst upon him.
We reached Athlone in the evening, and stopped at the Red Lion. Dick handed out the lady with the yalla pelisse; and ye would have thought they would have shaken each other’s hands off. Well, a maid-sarvant took her bandbox—Dick give her the arm—away they flourished together—and I stayed at the inn door to see the luggage safe off the coach.
Before long the young master returned.
“Shemus,” says he, shuttin’ the door behind him, “isn’t Miss Callaghan a spanker?”
“‘Pon my soul, she’s a cliver girl, with line action,” says I.
“Bad luck to ye!” said he, “ye talk of her as ye would of a horse. But, Shemus, I thought as we were all alone, I would try if I could put my comether over her by the way of practice. Och! if she was only an heiress! When I kissed her at partin’ in the hall, she tould me she could follow me over the world.”