but to Ireland?"

"Why not America? It is a great country, and cousins of my own in every
city. It might be I would find a cousin in Goldenvale itself."

"Goldenvale! Father Healy, you are a strange man, a many-sided man, but
I don't think you are the best fitted person I would select to be
discovering other men's secrets."

"Denis Quirk won't help himself. I intend to help him," said the priest.

"And if you prove him guilty?"

"No man need know but that I went to Cork, after all. But something
tells me I shall find him innocent."

"I am prepared to lay 6 to 4 on that myself. Well, Providence go with
you, for you deserve it; and if you require money----," said Dr. Marsh.

"Not one penny. I have a small income of my own, inherited from my
mother, God rest her soul! Molly shall go to the Finns, in Brunswick.
The change will do her good. And no one need know but that I am in
Cork."

"In Cork you shall be, if I have to perjure my soul to prove it!" cried
Dr. Marsh. "No man shall come near me when I come to die but you, for
you are the best man living."

CHAPTER XIV.

"AND ONE OTHER!"

The Grey River was in flood. It came down the valley a torrent of yellow
water, rushing madly between the rocks where the channel was narrow,
spreading out far and wide over the low-lying meads, bearing with it the
trunks of trees and other debris snatched up along its course. It had
overflowed the lower bridge, and rendered it impassable to traffic; the
upper bridge was threatened by the turbulent river.

There had been storms far up among the mountains, where the Grey takes
its origin, and rains all down the valley. From every small stream and
gully a volume of clay-coloured water flowed into the main stream. But
the day was bright and sunny after the rain. The sunshine glittered on
the yellow surface of the stream, and on the green fields sloping
upwards from it. Viewed from the distant hills, the Grey valley was a
shining, sparkling amber, encased in an emerald setting.

Kathleen O'Connor had viewed the flood with concern. On the further bank
of the river was Mrs. Sheridan's small cottage, where a poor widow
struggled to keep a large family by milking on the share system.
Kathleen knew that one of the children was seriously ill, and that the
mother, always living from hand to mouth, but always carrying a brave
face, would be seriously encumbered by Michael's sickness. She feared,
too, that the flood waters might ev