'Yes, papa,' I answered. 'But I must go back to Mary, if you please, after I have been with you.'
Angry as he was, my father was positively staggered by my audacity.
'You young idiot, your insolence exceeds belief!' he burst out. 'I tell you this: you will never darken these doors again! You have been taught to disobey me here. You have had things put into your head, here, which no boy of your age ought to know—I'll say more, which no decent people would have let you know.'
'I beg your pardon, sir,' Dermody interposed, very respectfully and very firmly at the same time. 'There are many things which a master in a hot temper is privileged to say to the man who serves him. But you have gone beyond your privilege. You have shamed me, sir, in the presence of my mother, in the hearing of my child—'
My father checked him there.
'You may spare the rest of it,' he said. 'We are master and servant no longer. When my son came hanging about your cottage, and playing at sweethearts with your girl there, your duty was to close the door on him. You have failed in your duty. I trust you no longer. Take a month's notice, Dermody. You leave my service.'
The bailiff steadily met my father on his ground. He was no longer the easy, sweet-tempered, modest man who was the man of my remembrance.
'I beg to decline taking your month's notice, sir,' he answered. 'You shall have no opportunity of repeating what you have just said to me. I will send in my accounts to-night. And I will leave your service to-morrow.'
'We agree for once,' retorted my father. 'The sooner you go, the better.'
He stepped across the room and put his hand on my shoulder.
'Listen to me,' he said, making a last effort to control himself. 'I don't want to quarrel with you before a discarded servant. There must be an end to this nonsense. Leave these people to pack up and go, and come back to the house with me.'
His heavy hand, pressing on my shoulder, seemed to press the spirit of resistance out of me. I so far gave way as to try to melt him by entreaties.
'Oh, papa! papa!' I cried. 'Don't part me from Mary! See how pretty and good she is! She has made me a flag for my boat. Let me come here and see her sometimes. I can't live without her.'
I could say no more. My poor little Mary burst out crying. Her tears and my entreaties were alike wasted on my father.
'Take your choice,' he said, 'between coming away of your own accord, or obliging me to take you away by force. I mean to part you and Dermody's girl.'
'Neither you nor any man can part them,' interposed a voice, speaking behind us. 'Rid your mind of that notion, master, before it is too late.'
My father looked round quickly, and discovered Dame Dermody facing him in the full light of the window. She had stepped back, at the outset of the dispute, into the corner behind the fireplace. There she had remained, biding her time to speak, until my father's last threat brought her out of her place of retirement.
They looked at each other for a moment. My father seemed to think it beneath his dignity to answer her. He went on with what he had to say to me.
'I shall count three slowly,' he resumed. 'Before I get to the last number, make up your mind to do what I tell you, or submit to the disgrace of being taken away by force.'
'Take him where you may,' said Dame Dermody, 'he will still be on his way to his marriage with my grandchild.'
'And where shall I be, if you please?' asked my father, stung into speaking to her this time.
The answer followed instantly in these startling words:
'
My father turned his back on the prophetess with a smile of contempt.
'One!' he said, beginning to count.
I set my teeth, and clasped both arms round Mary as he spoke. I had inherited some of his temper, and he was now to know it.
'Two!' proceeded my father, after waiting a little.
Mary put her trembling lips to my ear, and whispered: 'Let me go, George! I can't bear to see it. Oh, look how he frowns! I know he'll hurt you.'
My father lifted his forefinger as a preliminary warning before he counted Three.
'Stop!' cried Dame Dermody.
My father looked round at her again with sardonic astonishment.
'I beg your pardon, ma'am—have you anything particular to say to me?' he asked.
'Man!' returned the Sibyl, 'you speak lightly. Have I spoken lightly to You? I warn you to bow your wicked will before a Will that is mightier than yours. The spirits of these children are kindred spirits. For time and for eternity they are united one to the other. Put land and sea between them—they will still be together; they will communicate in visions, they will be revealed to each other in dreams. Bind them by worldly ties; wed your son, in the time to come, to another woman, and my grand-daughter to another man. In vain! I tell you, in vain! You may doom them to misery, you may drive them to sin—the day of their union on earth is still a day predestined in heaven. It will come! it will come! Submit, while the time for submission is yours. You are a doomed man. I see the shadow of disaster, I see the seal of death, on your face. Go; and leave these consecrated ones to walk the dark ways of the world together, in the strength of their innocence, in the light of their love. Go—and God forgive you!' In spite of himself, my father was struck by the irresistible strength of conviction which inspired those words. The bailiff's mother had impressed him as a tragic actress might have impressed him on the stage. She had checked the mocking answer on his lips, but she had not shaken his iron will. His face was as hard as ever when he turned my
