very faint.

"Take--care--of--our--baby--Frank. I'm--I'm--leaving you.
God--help--you--and--keep--you--and bless you--for--your--love--of me."

She paused to take breath--then she whispered her leave-taking. The
words never left O'Connell's memory for all the days of all the years
that followed.

"My--last--words--dear--the--last--I'll--ever--speak--to--you.
I--I--love--you--with--all--my heart--and--my soul--HUSBAND!
Good--good-bye--Frank." She slipped from his arms and lay, lips parted,
eyes open, body still.

The struggle was over. She had gone where there are no petty
treacheries, no mean brutalities--where all stand alike before the
Throne to render an account of their stewardship.

The brave, gentle little heart was stilled forever.

BOOK III

PEG

CHAPTER I

PEG'S CHILDHOOD

And now Peg appears for the first time, and brings her radiant
presence, her roguish smile, her big, frank, soulful, blue eyes, her
dazzling red hair, her direct, honest and outspoken truth: her love of
all that is clean and pure and beautiful--Peg enters our pages and
turns what was a history of romance and drama into a Comedy, of Youth.

Peg--pure as a mountain lily, sweet as a fragrant rose, haunting as an
old melody--Peg o' our Hearts comes into our story, even as she entered
her father's life, as the Saviour of these pages, even as she was the
means of saving O'Connell.

And she did save her father.

It was the presence and the thought of the little motherless baby that
kept O'Connell's hand from destroying himself when his reason almost
left him after his wife's death. The memories of the days immediately
following the passing of Angela are too painful to dwell upon. They are
past. They are sacred in O'Connell's heart. They will be to the
historian. Thanks to some kindly Irishmen who heard of O'Connell's
plight he borrowed enough money to bury his dead wife and place a
tablet to her memory.

He sent a message to Kingsnorth telling him of his sister's death. He
neither expected nor did he receive an answer.

As soon as it was possible he returned to Ireland and threw himself
once again heart and soul into working for the "Cause." He realised his
only hope of keeping his balance was to work. He went back to the
little village he was born in and it was Father Cahill's hands that
poured the baptismal waters on O'Connell's and Angela's baby and it was
Father Cahill's voice that read the baptismal service.