job
too for iverybody.' And 'Be this and be that,' sez I, 'if I thought
there was e'er a fear of it, 'tis wringin' your ugly neck round I'd be
this instiant.' 'Let go of that bag,' sez she, sweepin' up some of the
shillin's that was spilt. 'The polis,' sez I, 'and a heavy charge, if
there's another word out of your hijjis head.' 'I vow and declare,' sez
Martha, 'I believe 'twould be the chapest thing we could do wid him, to
let him take it and go. Sure he'd be divil a ha'porth more use for an
immigrant than the ould cat there I was ape enough to bring along to
pacify the childer.' So then Tishy gave some more impidence, but the
last ind of it was we come to an agreement that I'd take the note and
the silver, and they'd keep what bits of gould was in it, and they'd go
off wid themselves wheriver they plased at all, and I'd thramp straight
back here to be lookin' after the child and th' ould man. Ay, bedad, we
settled it up civil enough. And afore I went Martha handed me out th'
ould thimble, and bid me bring it to Katty. ''Twas her mother's,' sez
she, 'I was keepin' for her; and thick it is wid houles be the same
token; but don't say I'd be robbin' it off her.' And they tould me to
take Tib along, or else they'd be lavin' her to run wild; so I put her
in the basket. Begorrah, I believe Bobby had a notion to be comin' wid
me and the cat, for he was lettin' sorrowful bawls the last thing I
heard of him.

"So away I come wid the best of me haste; och I knocked the quare
walkin' out of meself entirely. And I stopped at the last big place I
was passin' to get Katty the oranges. And I was thrampin' it all the
night after, till just when there was a sthrake of the mornin' over the
bog, I come into Lisconnel. But och wirra wirra--the roof's off of the
house--och the look of the black houle wid the rafters stickin' thro'
it, and ne'er a breath of smoke, till me heart was sick watchin' to see
might there be an odd one; and the door clap-clappin'. Sure be that I
well knew the child was dead, and me father quit out of it, or maybe
buried himself, and I after lavin' them dyin' and starvin'. So for
'fraid somebody'd be comin' out and tellin' me, off I run away into the
bog, till I was treadin' here in the could wather. And then I tumbled
th' ould cat out of the basket, that was scrawmin' and yowlin' disp'rit,
and I took and slung the basket into the sthrame--there's the handle
among them rushes--and down I sat under the bank. I dunno