It was not so very long after this occurrence that, led on by the beauty of a moonlight night, I wandered somewhat farther than usual from the inn. The soft radiance of the full moon was streaming down over that exquisite landscape. I stood and gazed at a tiny stream which lay sparkling and shimmering with magical brilliancy; and as I did so I saw, coming through the dark masses of foliage on a mountain path, the same figure which I had before seen in company with Winifred. The man's outline seemed larger and more gaunt than before. I presume this was due to the uncertain, flickering light of the moon through the trees.

An impulse urged me to conceal myself. I slipped into the shadow and watched Niall approach, with a curiosity which was full of awe. His head was up in the air, so that he resembled those magicians of old who read the stars and pretended to discover in them the secrets of the future. It was evident that he was making some calculation; for he stopped from time to time, counting rapidly on his fingers.

He finally advanced close to the edge of the stream and knelt down. He peered into the clear depths so keenly that it seemed as if he were counting the pebbles on the bottom. All the time he muttered to himself, but quite unintelligibly, so that I caught not a word. At one point, where the rivulet was shallow, he felt with both hands very carefully for some time, taking up and throwing down again handfuls of clay or pebbles.

Suddenly he threw up his arms with a strange, triumphant exultation; and, rushing in among the trees, he brought out something which seemed like a crock. He placed it beside the stream; and then, as I still watched and waited, his jubilation gave place to caution. He began to look all about him, stooping and shading his eyes with his hand so that he might better penetrate the gloom, while he turned his head in every direction. I wondered what he would do if he should discover me. The idea was, to say the least, uncomfortable at such a time and in such a place. All around darkness save for the light of the moon; everywhere the intense stillness and solitude of a rustic neighborhood, in which all the world sleeps save those "who steal a few hours from the night." I was alone with this singular being, whose wild, grotesque appearance was enough to frighten any one; and once I thought I saw his burning eyes fixed upon me in my hiding-place.

I scarce dared to breathe, fearing that every moment he would pounce upon me and drag me forth. But it was soon evident that he did not see me. His face lost its watchful look, and he advanced once more toward the moon-whitened stream where he had left his crock. He cast a hasty glance upward and I heard gealach—the Gaelic word for the moon—pass his lips, coupled with that of Winifred; and then he began to take up what seemed like mud from the bed of the stream, filling the crock rapidly.

When this was full, he seized the vessel and disappeared at a fearful rate, as it seemed to me, up the steep path by which he had previously descended. I was conscious of a great relief when I saw him vanish in a turn of the road; for there had been something uncanny even in the huge shadow which he cast behind him, and which brought out the weirdness of his figure and of his garments, as well as of his wonderful, sugar-loafed hat. I was afraid to come out from my hiding-place for some time, lest he might be looking down upon me from some dark place above.

I went home, with a firm determination to discover, if possible, who was this singular person, what were his pursuits, and whence he had come. I felt that on Winifred's account, at least, I should like to know more of her ill-chosen companion. I was certain that the landlord, though a natural gossip once his tongue was unloosed, would relapse into taciturnity if I strove to make him throw light upon this mysterious subject. My only hope lay in Granny Meehan. She seemed a reasonable and conscientious woman, certainly devoted to the girl. Therefore I would appeal to her to discover if Niall were worthy of her confidence, if his dreamy and unsettled condition of mind made him a suitable companion for Winifred, and if such companionship would not disgust her with the realities of life, prevent her from acquiring a solid education and the training which befitted the station to which I believed her to belong.

I had become deeply interested in the girl, though I had not as yet formed the project, which later developed itself, of taking her with me to America and putting her in one of the celebrated convent schools there. Her condition even then seemed to me a sad and perilous one: her only guardian apparently a blind woman, who, despite her devoted affection, had neither the power nor, perhaps, the will to thwart Winifred in anything. The girl's nature seemed, on the other hand, so rich in promise, so full of an inherent nobility, purity, and poetry, that I said to myself, sighing:

"No other land under the sun could produce such a daughter—one who in such surroundings gleams as a pearl amongst dark waters."

I paid my second visit to the castle, therefore, on the very day after my moonlight glimpse of the mysterious Niall. It was a bright morning, flower-scented and balmy, with that peculiar balminess, that never-to-be-forgotten fragrance of the Irish atmosphere in the May time of the year. I stood still to listen to a wild thrush above me as I neared the castle, and the thrilling sweetness of its notes filled me with something of its own glee. Winifred was in the old courtyard feeding some chickens, gray and speckled and white, with crumbs of oaten bread and a bowlful of grain. She was laughing gaily at their antics and talking to the fowls by name:

"No, Aileen Mor! You're too greedy: you're swallowing everything. Gray Mary, you haven't got anything. Here's a bit for you. No, no, bantam Mike, you can't have any more; let the hens eat something!"

The large speckled fowl that Winifred had first addressed stalked majestically to and fro, snatching from its weaker brethren every available morsel; while the little ones ran in and out, struggling and fighting in the most unseemly manner over the food Winifred let fall.

The child, on seeing me, nodded gaily.

"See," she said, "how they fight for their food! They're worse even than children!" Then she added in her pretty, inquiring way, with the soft modulation peculiar to the district: "I suppose, now, there are a great many fowls in America?"

"Oh, yes!" I replied—"fowls of every sort. I think you will have to come to America some time and see for yourself."

A flush passed over her face, making it rosy red; then she said, with the curiously imperious manner which I had so often before noticed:

"I am going there some time: I have to go."

She turned once more to the chickens, silently this time; and her manner, as plainly as possible, forbade me to question her. No child had ever impressed me in this way before. It was not that she was unchildlike nor what might be called old-fashioned; but she had that about her which was partly the effect, no doubt, of the peculiar deference with which she was treated by the blind woman and by Niall the wanderer.

"I suppose I may see Granny?" I remarked; and she answered:

"Oh, yes! She will be very glad. She is always in there near the hearth."

I was glad that Winifred showed no disposition at the moment to abandon her occupation of feeding the fowls; for I wanted to have at least a few words with good Mrs. Meehan on the subject of Winifred's association with the grotesque personage whom local tradition seemed to invest with unusual if not unholy powers. I passed through the stone passage, and, entering the square room, found the blind woman, as before, in statuesque attitude near the hearth, where on this occasion no fire was burning, its place being filled by an enormous bunch of clover, placed there by Winifred. The blind woman recognized me the moment I spoke.

"You're heartily welcome, ma'am!" said she, smiling; and we went on to exchange a few commonplaces about the weather and so forth.

It was a still day without, and we heard every once in a while the voice of Winifred calling out her commands to the fowls; and presently she was in conversation with some one whom Mrs. Meehan explained to be Moira, their little maid-of-all-work.

"Sure, then, Miss Winifred, we might go the night with Barney to bring home some of the sods of peat. Barney will be havin' the cart out, an' we may as well have the drive," Moira said.

"Yes, I think I will go," said Winifred, "after the May prayers at the chapel. I'm going, when tea's over, to pick a great posy for the Blessed Virgin's altar. But it will be moonlight and we can go after."

"To be sure, we can, miss," assented Moira; adding the information that "Barney got a power of fine fish the day, an' he sold it all at Powerscourt, barrin' one big trout that's for yourself, Miss Winifred. An' the gentry over there gave him two shillin's, but he's puttin' them by to take him to Ameriky."

"Every one has a craze for America," said Winifred's clear voice. "Even I am going there some day."

"Musha, then, an' I hope you'll take me with you!" cried Moira, coaxingly; "for what would I be doin' at all, at all, without yourself?"

"We'll see when the time comes," declared Winifred. "I might take you—that depends. But you'd better not say anything about it; for perhaps if people got talking we mightn't go at all."

"I'll be as secret as—as the priest himself in the confessional!" promised Moira. "An' that's secret enough. But I can't help wonderin' what it would be like out there?"

"It's a splendid place they say, with mountains and rivers," began Winifred.

"Sure an' we have enough of them ourselves, with no disrespect to them that tould you," said Moira.

"In America they are different," said Winifred, grandly. "And, then, there are great forests—"

Moira scratched her head dubiously.

"With deer and Indians in them."

"I'm afeard of Indians," commented Moira promptly. "I read a terrible story about them once in a book that Father Owen gave me."

"Oh, well, we shan't be very near them if we go!" explained Winifred. "And it would be very fine to see them at a distance."

"I'd rather not see them at all, if it's the same to you, miss," declared the determined Moira.

"The deer, then, and the buffaloes and all the wild animals, and grand cities, with shops full of toys and dresses and beautiful things."

"Oh, it's the cities I'd like to be seein', with shops!" cried Moira. "We'll keep away from the hills and streams, Miss Winifred asthore, havin' them galore in our own country. An' we'll keep away from the forests, for fear it's the wild Indians we'd be comin' across."

Her tone was coaxing, with that wheedling note in it peculiar to her race.

"Oh, it's to the cities I must go!" said Winifred. "But I don't know what a city is like, Moira. I can't make a picture of it to my eye. It is a big place, crowded with people, all hurrying by in a stream; and the shops—"

"I seen a shop once!" exclaimed Moira. "There was things in the window. It was a thread-an'-needle shop, I think."

"There are all kinds in big cities," said Winifred; "and I can't make pictures of them either. But once I remember—I just seem to remember—a strange place. Perhaps it was the street of a city, with shining windows on either side. A gentleman had me by the hand; and presently he put me before him on a horse and we galloped away, and I never saw those things again."

I heard these artless confidences of the young girl in the pauses of my own discourse with the blind woman, who heard them, too, and sometimes interrupted our talk with: "D'ye hear that now, ma'am?" or, "The Lord love her, poor innocent!"

But though I smiled and paused for an instant at such moments, I did not allow myself to be turned away from the main object of my visit, and at last I burst boldly into the subject which was occupying my mind.