The day Mr. French left Drumgool on his visit to Dublin it rained.

Croagh Mahon had been winding himself with scarves of mist all the day before, and he had come up so close to Drumgool that you might have hit him with a biscuit, to use Moriarty's expression.

The weather kept the great mountain for ever in fantastic movement, now retreating, now advancing. He grew and shrank in a wizard way with the changes of the atmosphere. To-day he would be immense, slate-coloured, strewn with dim ravines standing beneath the subdued beauty of the quiet winter daylight, a sure sign that on the morrow he would be blotted out. Fine weather would cast him far away, and he would stand, heather purple in the blue distance, but still calling you to come to him.

When Mr. French departed for the station the weather was clear, and Miss Grimshaw, having watched him drive away, strolled down the garden, then through a little wicket she passed into the kitchen garden, and from there along the uphill path to the cliffs.

There was little wind on the cliffs, and the sea was coming in unruffled, yet hugely stirring in league-long lapses of swell.

Boom!

The whole coast answered with a deep organ note to the leisurely breaking of the billows.

Boom!

You could hear the voice of the Devil's Kitchen, the voices of the Seven Sisters, the voices of the long Black Strand, the voices of the headlands, as billow after billow struck the coast—great waves from the very heart of the ocean; and the snarl of the pebbles to the undertow on the strand beneath could be heard shrill like the voice of each dying wave, "I have come from afar—afar—afar!"

No other sound.

Not a whisper from the land stretching away to the distant hills under the dull grey sky; not a whisper from the heaving sea stretching away to the fleckless grey horizon.

Boom!

"I have come from afar—afar—afar!" Nothing more except the cry of a gull. The girl stood on the cliff edge, looking and listening. The air was sweet with the recent rain, invigorating as wine, clear as crystal, filled with ozone from the seaweed-strewn shore and the perfume of earth from the rain-soaked land.

She could see the Seven Sisters seated in their rings of foam. Miles of coast lay on either hand, cliff, and headland, and bay singing together and being sung to by the waves, tremendous, majestic, desolate, just as they sang and were sung to a million years ago, just as they will sing and be sung to a million years hence.

The recollection of Mr. Giveen, called up in her mind by the sea, brought French and his troubles before her, the league and its pettiness, and old Ryan and his cows' tails. Before the tremendous seascape all these things shrank to their true proportions, and the booming of the billows seemed like a voice commenting on it all, yet indifferent to the doings, the hopes, and aims of man as Death.

A spot of rain touched her cheek, and she turned from the cliff and began the descent towards the house. At the gate leading into the kitchen garden a dirty and draggle-tailed girl without boots or shoes, a girl of about fourteen, with a dirty face, was endeavouring to unravel the mystery of the latch—it was a patent latch with a trick bar in the staple—and failing.

Miss Grimshaw came to her assistance, opened the gate, and held it open for the other to pass through, but the damsel did not enter.

She stood with eyes downcast. Then she looked up, then she looked down, then——

"If you plaze, miss," said she, "are you the young lady ould Mrs. Moriarty tould me to ax for?"

"I'm sure I don't know," laughed Violet, then, remembering the name, "Do you mean old Mrs. Moriarty at Cloyne?"

"Yes, miss."

"Well, why did she send you?"

"If you plaze, miss, I'm Shusey Gallagher."

"Yes?"

"I'm the servant at the blacksmith's, miss, and ould Mrs. Moriarty sez to me to keep me ears open to hear if the bhoys was afther playin' any tricks on Mr. Frinch, an' she'd give me a sixpence, miss; so I lays wid me ears open, pretendin' to be aslape, and I heard him say to his wife: 'It's fixed for Thursday night,' says he. 'What's fixed?' says she. 'Frinch's job,' says he."

"Yes, yes," cut in Miss Grimshaw. "But who were these people speaking?"

"Mr. Blood, the blacksmith, miss, and his wife, and I lyin' wid me ears open and they thinkin' me aslape. 'What are they goin' to do?' says she. 'Hamstring the coult,' says he. 'Garryowen?' says she. 'The same,' says he. 'And how many of them on the job?' says she. 'Only one,' says he. 'That'll larn ould Frinch,' says she. 'And who's goin' to do it?' 'Black Larry,' he says, 'and now shut your head, for it's tired I am and wants to go to slape.'"

"Good heavens!" said Miss Grimshaw.

"Yes, miss," replied the taleteller, evidently pleased with the effect of her information. "And ould Mrs. Moriarty, when I tould her, 'Run, Shusey,' says she, 'hot-fut to Dhrumgool, and ax for the young lady and give her me rispicts, an' tell her what you've tould me, and maybe she won't forget you for your thrubble.'"

"That she won't," said Miss Grimshaw, taking her purse from her pocket and half a crown from her purse. She also took a sixpence, and, giving the child the sixpence, she showed her the half-crown.

"I will give you that," said she, "next Friday if what you have told me is true, and if you say nothing about this to any one else. Tell old Mrs. Moriarty I will call and see her and thank her very much for sending you. Now, mind, if you say a word of this to any one else you won't get the half-crown."

Susie Gallagher, whose mouth had flown open wide at the sight of the half-crown, closed it again.

"Plaze, miss, is the whole half-crown for me?"

"Yes, if you don't say a word."

"Not a word, miss; sure, I'd bite me tongue off before I'd let it be tellin' a word."

"And go on keeping your ears open," said Miss Grimshaw, "and let me know if you hear anything more."

"Yes, miss."

"That'll do," said Miss Grimshaw, and Susie Gallagher departed running, taking a hop, skip, and a jump now and then, presumably as an outlet for her emotions.

When this desirable and faithful servitor had vanished round the corner, Miss Grimshaw passed through the kitchen-garden towards the stables. She wanted to find Moriarty. The news had shocked her, but as yet she could scarcely believe in its truth. Susie Gallagher was not a person to bear conviction, however easily she might bear tales, but Moriarty would be able to decide.

Moriarty was in the stableyard with Doolan. They were overhauling the fishing-tackle of the past season, deep-sea lines and conger hooks, and what not, while Mrs. Driscoll stood at the back entrance to the kitchen premises, her apron over her arms, assisting them. She popped in when Miss Grimshaw made her appearance, and Moriarty touched his cap.

Ever since the bailiff incident he had a great respect for the governess, the respect a sportsman has for a sportsman.

"Moriarty," said Miss Grimshaw, "I want to speak to you."

"Yes, miss," said Moriarty, stepping up to her.

"I have just had some very serious news about the horses. I had better speak to you about it in the library. Come in there."

She led the way into the house.

When they were in the library she shut the door and told him all.

"Divil mend them!" said Moriarty, who seemed much perturbed.

"Do you think there is any truth in it?"

"I do, miss, and what's botherin' me is the master bein' away."

"He's coming back on Thursday."

"Yes, miss. If they'll only hould their hands till Thursday. Not that I mind tacklin' them alone, but if there's any shootin' to be done, I'd sooner the master was on the primises."

"Oh, but—you won't shoot them!"

"Shoot them, miss! Faith, if I catch them at their games, I'll shoot them first and bile them afther. Today's Monday—are you sure it was Thursday she said, miss?"

"Yes."

Moriarty ruminated.

"Black Larry, you said it was, miss, that was comin'?"

"Yes."

"Then he's sure to come single-handed. He always does his jobs alone, and he's never been cotched yet."

"Is he a dangerous man?"

"He's not a man, miss, he's a divil—six fut two and as black as a flue-brush. He was gamekeeper to the masther, and the masther turned him off for bad conduc', and he's swore to be even with him."

"Of course," said Miss Grimshaw, "I might telegraph to Mr. French, and bring him back, but he has gone on important business, and it would be a pity."

"It would, miss."

"I'm not afraid," said the girl, "and if you think you can manage till Thursday by yourself it would be better to do nothing. I will send him a telegram on Wednesday to make sure of him returning on Thursday."

"Yes, miss," said Moriarty. "That'll be the best way—and, if Black Larry comes before the masther is back, Heaven help him!"

Moriarty took his departure, and the girl turned to the window. The rain was falling now, "the long rain of these old, old lands, eternal, fateful, slow!" Verhaeren's verse crossed her mind as she looked out at the lowering sky and at the distant mountains, now half-veiled in clouds. As she looked the naked tree branches all bent one way, as if pressed down by an invisible hand, a sheet of rain obliterated everything beyond the middle distance of the landscape, and every window on the west side of the house shook and rattled to the wind that had suddenly risen.

She went upstairs to the schoolroom, where Effie, kneeling on the window-seat, was engaged in the monotonous occupation of tracing the raindrops on the pane with her finger.