ched me with unmistakable
amusement--and I knew Marakinoff had told him. But clearly Lugur had
kept his information even from Yolara; and as clearly she had spoken
to none of that episode when O'Keefe's automatic had shattered the
Keth-smitten vase. Again I felt that sense of deep bewilderment--of
helpless search for clue to all the tangle.

For two hours we were questioned and then the priestess called Rador
and let us go.

Larry was sombre as we returned. He walked about the room uneasily.

"Hell's brewing here all right," he said at last, stopping before me.
"I can't make out just the particular brand--that's all that bothers
me. We're going to have a stiff fight, that's sure. What I want to do
quick is to find the Golden Girl, Doc. Haven't seen her on the wall
lately, have you?" he queried, hopefully fantastic.

"Laugh if you want to," he went on. "But she's our best bet. It's
going to be a race between her and the O'Keefe banshee--but I put my
money on her. I had a queer experience while I was in that garden,
after you'd left." His voice grew solemn. "Did you ever see a
leprechaun, Doc?" I shook my head again, as solemnly. "He's a little
man in green," said Larry. "Oh, about as high as your knee. I saw one
once--in Carntogher Woods. And as I sat there, half asleep, in
Yolara's garden, the living spit of him stepped out from one of those
bushes, twirling a little shillalah.

"'It's a tight box ye're gettin' in, Larry avick,' said he, 'but don't
ye be downhearted, lad.'

"'I'm carrying on,' said I, 'but you're a long way from Ireland,' I
said, or thought I did.

"'Ye've a lot o' friends there,' he answered. 'An' where the heart
rests the feet are swift to follow. Not that I'm sayin' I'd like to
live here, Larry,' said he.

"'I know where my heart is now,' I told him. 'It rests on a girl with
golden eyes and the hair and swan-white breast of Eilidh the Fair--but
me feet don't seem to get me to her,' I said."

The brogue thickened.

"An' the little man in green nodded his head an' whirled his
shillalah.

"'It's what I came to tell ye,' says he. 'Don't ye fall for the
Bhean-Nimher, the serpent woman wit' the blue eyes; she's a daughter
of Ivor, lad--an' don't ye do nothin' to make the brown-haired coleen
ashamed o' ye, Larry O'Keefe. I knew yer great, great grandfather an'
his before him, aroon,' says he, 'an' wan o' the O'Keefe failin's is
to think their hearts big enough to hold all the wimmen o'