speaking about a
thing of that kind to her brother. I'd only be making game of her. (_A
cheer is heard in the distance outside. Hugh goes to look out door._)

Hugh: Here is the car coming up the road with your mother and Agnes.
They're giving her a welcome.

Donagh (_looking out of window_): She'll be very proud of the people,
they to have such a memory of my father.

Hugh: I'll run out and greet her. (_In a sly undertone._) Agnes is
coming up. (_He goes out laughing. Donagh hangs up harness on some pegs.
Agnes Deely, wearing a shawl over her head and carrying a basket on her
arm, comes in._)

Agnes: Donagh, your mother was greatly excited leaving the hut. I think
she doesn't rightly understand what is happening.

Donagh: I was afeard of that. The memory slips on her betimes. She
thinks she's back in the old days again.

Agnes (_going to dresser, taking parcels from the basket._): My father
was saying that we should have everything here as much like what it used
to be as we can. That's why he brought up the bin. When they were
evicted he took it up to his own place because it was too big for the
hut.

Donagh: Do you know, Agnes, when I came up here this morning with your
brother, Hugh, I felt the place strange and lonesome. I think an evicted
house is never the same, even when people go back to it. There seemed to
be some sorrow hanging over it.

Agnes (_putting up her shawl_): Now Donagh, that's no way for you to be
speaking. If you were to see how glad all the people were! And you ought
to have the greatest joy.

Donagh: Well, then I thought of you, Agnes, and that changed everything.
I went whistling about the place. (_Going to her._) After coming down
from your uncle's yesterday evening I heard the first cry of the cuckoo
in the wood at Raheen.

Agnes: That was a good omen, Donagh.

Donagh: I took it that way, too, for it was the first greeting I got
after parting from yourself. Did you hear it, Agnes?

Agnes: I did not. I heard only one sound the length of the evening.

Donagh: What sound was that, Agnes?

Agnes: I heard nothing only the singing of one song, a lovely song, all
about Donagh Ford!

Donagh: About me?

Agnes: Yes, indeed. It was no bird and no voice, but the singing I heard
of my own heart.

Donagh: That was a good song to hear, Agnes. It is like a thought that
would often stir in a man's mind and find no word to suit it. It is
often that I thought that way of you and could spea