“Why, a murdher that was committed betther than twenty years ago in this neighborhood.”
“A murdher!” exclaimed the stranger. “Where?—when?—how?”
“I can tell you where, an' I can tell you when,” replied Nelly; “but there I must stop—for unless I was at the committin' of it, you might know very well I couldn't tell you how.”
“Where then?” she asked, and whilst she did so, it was by a considerable effort that she struggled to prevent her agitation from being noticed by the prophet's wife.
“Why, near the Grey Stone at the crossroads of Mallybenagh—that's the where!”
“An' now for the when?” asked the stranger, who almost panted with anxiety as she spoke.
“Let me see,” replied Nelly, “fourteen and six makes twenty, an' two before that or nearly—I mane the year of the rebellion, Why it's not all out two-and-twenty years, I think.”
“Aisey,” said the other, “I'm but very weak an' feeble—will you jist wait till I rest a minute upon this green bank by the road.”
“What ails you?” asked Nelly. “You look as if you got suddenly ill.”
“I did get a little—but it'll soon pass away,” she answered—“thrue enough,” she added in a low voice, and as if in a soliloquy; “God is a just Judge—he is—he is! Well, but—oh, I'll soon get better—well, but listen, what became of the murdhered man?—was the body ever got?”