Darby then hurried her into the room where Mike's mother and sisters were. On entering she threw herself into the arms of the former, laid her face on her bosom, and wept bitterly. This renewed the mother's grief: she clasped the interesting girl in a sorrowful embrace; so did his sisters. They threw themselves into each other's arms, and poured forth those touching, but wild bursts of pathetic language, which are always heard when the heart is struck by some desolating calamity.
“Husht!” said a neighboring man who was present; “husht! it's a shame for yez, an' the boy not dead yit.”
“I'm not ashamed,” said Peggy: “why should I be ashamed of bein' sarry for the likes of Mike Reillaghan? Where was his aquil? Wasn't all hearts upon him? Didn't the very poor on the road bless him whin he passed? Who ever had a bad word agin him, but the villain that murdhered him? Murdhered him! Heaven above! an' why? For my sake! For my sake the pride of the parish is laid low! Ashamed! Is it for cryin' for my betrothed husband, that was sworn to me, an' I to him, before the eye of God above us? This day week I was to be his bride; an' now—now—Oh, Vread Reillaghan, take me to you! Let me go to his mother! My heart's broke, Vread Reillaghan! Let me go to her: nobody's grief for him is like ours. You're his mother, an' I'm his wife in the sight o' God. Proud was I out of him: my eyes brightened when they seen him, an' my heart got light when I heard his voice; an' now, what's afore me?—what's afore me but sorrowful days an' a broken heart!”
Mrs. Reillaghan placed her tenderly and affectionately beside her, on the bed whereon she herself sat. With the corner of her handkerchief she wiped the tears from the weeping girl, although her own flowed fast. Her daughters, also, gathered about her, and in language of the most endearing kind, endeavored to soothe and console her.
“He may live yet, Peggy, avourheen,” said his mother; “my brave and noble son may live yet, an' you may be both,happy! Don't be cryin' so much, asthore galh machree (* The beloved white (girl) of my heart); sure he's in the hands o' God avourneen; an' your young heart won't be broke, I hope. Och, the Lord pity her young feelins!” exclaimed the mother affected even by the consolation she herself offered to the betrothed bride of her son: “is it any whundher she'd sink undher sich a blow! for, sure enough, where was the likes of him? No, asthore; it's no wondher—it's no wondher! lonesome will your heart be widout him; for I know what he'd feel if a hair of your head was injured.”
“Oh, I know it—I know it! There was music in his voice, an' grah and. kindness to every crathur on God's earth; but to me—to me—oh, no one knew his love to me, but myself an' God. Oh, if I was dead, that I couldn't feel this, or if my life could save his! Why didn't the villain,—the black villain, wid God's curse upon him—why didn't he shoot me, thin I could never be Mike's wife, an' his hand o' murdher might be satisfied? If he had, I wouldn't feel as I do. Ay! the warmest, an' the best, an' the dearest blood of my heart, I could shed for him. That heart was his, an' he had a right to it. Our love wasn't of yistherday: afore the links of my hair came to my showldhers I loved him, an' thought of him; an many a time he tould me that I was his first! God knows he was my first, an' he will be my last, let him live or die.”
“Well, but, Peggy achora,” said his sister, “maybe it's sinful to be cryin' this way, an' he not dead.”
“God forgive me, if it's a sin,” replied Peggy; “I'd not wish to do anything sinful or displasin' to God; an' I'll sthrive to keep down my grief: I will, as well as I can.”
She put her hands on her face, and by all effort of firmness, subdued the tone of her grief to a low, continuous murmur of sorrow.
“An' along wid that,” said the sister, “maybe the noise is disturbin' him. Darby put us all out o' the kitchen to have pace an' quietness about him.”