Mass on Christmas morning was then, as now, performed at day-break, and again the Roman Catholic inhabitants of the parish were up betimes to attend it. Frank M'Kenna's family were assembled, notwithstanding their short sleep, at an early breakfast; but their meal, in consequence of the unpleasant sensation produced by the outrage of their son, was less cheerful than it would I otherwise have been. Perhaps, too, the gloom which hung over them, was increased by the snow that had fallen the night before, and by the wintry character of the day, which was such as to mar much of their expected enjoyment. There was no allusion made to their son's violence over-night; neither did he himself appear to be in any degree affected by it. When breakfast was over, they prepared to attend mass, and, what was unusual, young Frank was the first to set out for the chapel.
“Maybe,” said the father, after he was gone—“maybe that fool of a boy is sarry for his behavior. It's many a day since I knew him to go to mass of his own accord. It's a good sign, any way.”
“Musha,” inquired his mother, “what could happen atween him an' that civil boy, Mike Reillaghan?”
“The sorra one o' me knows,” replied his father: “an' now that I think of it, sure enough there was none o' them at the dance last night, although I sent himself down for them. Micaul,” he added, addressing the other son, “will you put an your big coat, slip down to Reillaghan's, an' bring me word what came atween them at all; an' tell Owen himself the thruth that this boy's brakin' our hearts by his coorses.”
Micaul, who, although he knew the cause of the enmity between these rivals, was ignorant of that which occasioned his brother's rash oath, also felt anxious to ascertain the circumstances of the last quarrel. For this purpose, as well as in obedience to his father's wishes, he proceeded to Reillaghan's and arrived just as Darby More and young Mike had set out for mass.
“What,” said the mendicant, “can be bringing Micaul down, I wondher? somethin' about that slip o' grace, his brother.”
“I suppose, so,” said Mike; “an' I wish the same slip was as dacent an' inoffensive as he is. I don't know a boy livin' I'd go farther for nor the same Micaul.—He's a credit to the family as much as the other's a stain upon them.”
“Well, any how, you war Frank's match, an' more, last night. How bitther he was bint on bringin' Peggy aff', when he an' his set waited till they seen the country clear, an' thought the family asleep? Had you man for man, Mike?”
“Ay, about that; an' we sat so snug in Peggy's that you'd hear a pin fallin'. A hard tug, too, there was in the beginnin'; but whin they found that we had a strong back, they made away, an' we gave them purshute from about the house.”
“You may thank me, any how, for havin' her to the good; but I knew by my dhrame, wid the help o' God, that there was somethin' to happen; by the same a token, that your mother's an' her high horse about that dhrame. I'm to tell it to her, wid the sinse of it, in the evenin', when the day's past, an' all of us in comfort.”