"Good heavens!" said Dr. O'Grady, "what on earth have you said? Young
Kerrigan hasn't got a wife."

"Sure I know that. But what was I to do? What I said was for the best.
But anyway you'd better come round to the hotel, till you see for
yourself the way we're in."

"Come along, Major," said Dr. O'Grady. "You'll enjoy watching us get out
of this entanglement, whatever it is."

"I'm not going with you," said the Major. "I don't see any fun in
standing still and listening to you telling lies to that American. It's
not my idea of spending a pleasant afternoon."

"Come along," said Dr. O'Grady, taking him by the arm. "I may want you.
I can't tell yet whether I shall or not, for I don't know yet what's
happened. But I may."

The Major hung back.

"I'm not going," he said.

"If you don't," said Dr. O'Grady in a whisper, "I'll tell Doyle about
the filly, all about her, and as you haven't got the money for her
yet--well, you know what Doyle is. He's not the kind of man I'd care to
trust very far when he finds out that--Oh, do come on."

It may have been this threat which overcame Major Kent's reluctance. It
may have been a natural curiosity to find out what trouble Gallagher had
got into with Mr. Billing: It may simply have been Dr. O'Grady's force
of character which vanquished him. He allowed himself to be led away.

CHAPTER V

"Now Thady," said Dr. O'Grady, "tell me exactly what happened and what the trouble is."

"It was on account of my mentioning young Kerrigan's wife," said
Gallagher.

"Young Kerrigan hasn't got a wife," said the Major.

"Better begin at the beginning," said Dr. O'Grady. "If we knew how you
arrived at whatever statement you made about young Kerrigan's wife we'd
be in a better position to judge what has to be done about it, Start
off now at the moment when you went away in the motor-car. You went to
Doyle's farm, I suppose, as I told you, so as to show Mr. Billing the
General's birthplace."

"In the latter end we got there," said Gallagher, "but at the first go
off I took him along the road past the workhouse."

"That wasn't quite the shortest route," said Dr. O'Grady. "In fact you
began by going in exactly the opposite direction."

"After that we went round by Barney's Hill," said Gallagher, "and along
the bohireen by the side of the bog, me telling him the turns he ought
to take."

"What on earth did you go there for," said the Major, "if you wanted to
get to Doyle's farm?"