FullReads

“Faix, it was time for her,” insisted Mike, not without sympathy. “Were you afther wanting her to live forever, the poor soul? An’ the shild said she ‘d the best funeral was ever in the parish of Dunkenny since she remimbered it. What could anny one ask more than that, and she r’aching such an age, the cr’atur’! Stop here awhile an’ you ‘ll hear all the tark from Nora; she told over to me all the folks that was there. Where has she gone wit’ herself, I don’t know? Mary Ann!” he turned his head toward the house and called in a loud, complaining tone; “where’s Nora, annyway?”

“Here’s Nora, then,” a sweet girlish voice made unexpected reply, and a light young figure flitted from the sidewalk behind him and stood lower down on the green bank.

“What’s wanting wit’ Nora?” and she stooped quickly like a child to pick some of the dandelions as if she had found gold. She had a sprig of wild-cherry blossom in her dress, which she must have found a good way out in the country.

“Come now, and speak to Patrick Quin, your mother’s own brother, that’s waiting here for you all this time you ‘ve been running over the place,” commanded Mr. Duffy, with some severity.

“An’ is it me own Uncle Patsy, dear?” exclaimed Nora, with the sweetest brogue and most affectionate sincerity. “Oh, that me mother could see him too!” and she dropped on her knees beside the lame little man and kissed him, and knelt there looking at him with delight, holding his willing hand in both her own.

“An’ ain’t you got me mother’s own looks, too? Oh, Uncle Patsy, is it yourself, dear? I often heard about you, and I brought you me mother’s heart’s love, ‘deed I did then! It’s many a lovely present of a pound you ‘ve sent us. An’ I ‘ve got a thorn stick that grew in the hedge, goin’ up the little rise of ground above the Wishin’ Brook, sir; mother said you ‘d mind the place well when I told you.”

“I do then, me shild,” said Patrick Quin, with dignity; “’tis manny the day we all played there together, for all we ‘re so scattered now and some dead, too, God rest them! Sure, you ‘re a nice little gerrl, an’ I give you great welcome and the hope you ‘ll do well. Come along wit’ me now. Your Aunty Biddy’s jealous to put her two eyes on you, an’ we never getting the news you ‘d come till late this morning. ‘I ‘ll go fetch Nora for you,’ says I, to contint her. ‘They ‘ll be tarked out at Duffy’s by this time,’ says I.”

“Oh, I ‘m full o’ tark yet!” protested Nora gayly. “Coom on, then, Uncle Patsy!” and she gave him her strong young hand as he rose.

“An’ how do you be likin’ Ameriky?” asked the pleased old man, as they walked along.

“I like Ameriky fine,” answered the girl gravely. She was taller than he, though she looked so slender and so young. “I was very downhearted, too, l’avin’ home and me mother, but I ‘ll go back to it some day, God willing, sir; I could n’t die wit’out seeing me mother again. I ‘m all over the place here since daybreak. I think I ‘d like work best on the railway,” and she turned toward him with a resolved and serious look.

“Wisha! there ‘s no work at all for a girl like you on the Road,” said Uncle Patsy patiently. “You ‘ve a bit to learn yet, sure; ‘t is the mill you mane.”

“There ‘ll be plinty work to do. I always thought at home, when I heard the folks tarking, that I ‘d get work on the railway when I ‘d come to Ameriky. Yis, indeed, sir!” continued Nora earnestly. “I was looking at the mills just now, and I heard the great n’ise from them. I ‘d never be afther shutting meself up in anny mill out of the good air. I ‘ve no call to go to jail yet in thim mill walls. Perhaps there ‘d be somebody working next me that I ‘d never get to like, sir.”