ached him through the police-sergeant. So he ended his speech by
saying:--"What I do lies at my own door, M'riar. You're out of it. So I
shan't say another word of what I will do or won't do. Only I tell you
this, that if I could get a quiet half an hour with the gentleman, I'd
... _What_ would I do?... Well!--I'd save him from the gallows--I
_would_! Ah!--and old as I am, I'd let him keep a hold on his knife....
There--there, old lass! I do wrong to frighten ye, givin' way to bad
temper. Easy does it!"

For a double terror of the woman's position was bred of that mysterious,
inextinguishable love that never turns to hate, however hateful its
object may become; and her dread that if this good, unwieldy giant--that
was what Mo seemed--crossed his path, that jack-knife might add another
to her husband's many crimes. This dread and counter-dread had sent all
Aunt M'riar's blood to her heart, and she might have fallen, but that
Mo's strong hand caught her in time, and landed her in a chair. "I was
wrong--I was wrong!" said he gently. All the fires had died down before
the pallor of her face, and his only thought was how could _she_ be
spared if the destroyer of her life was brought to justice.

They said no more; what more was there to be said? Aunt M'riar came
round, refusing restoratives. Oh no, she would be all right! It was only
a turn she got--that common event! They adjourned, respectively, to
where Dolly and Dave were sleeping balmily, profoundly.

But Uncle Mo was discontented with the handiwork of Creation. Why should
a cruel, two-edged torture be invented for, and inflicted on, an
inoffensive person like M'riar? There didn't seem any sense in it. "If
only," said he to his inner soul, "they'd a-let _me_ be God A'mighty for
five minutes at the first go-off, I'd a-seen to it no such a thing
shouldn't happen." Less than five minutes would have been necessary, if
a full and unreserved concession of omnipotence had been made.

* * * * *

Dave was a man of his word, though a very young one. He seized the
earliest opportunity to indite two letters of congratulation to his
honorary grandmothers, including Dolly in his rejoicing at the discovery
of their relationship. He wrote as though such discoveries were an
everyday occurrence.

His mistakes in spelling were few, the principal one arising from an old
habit of thought connecting the words sister and cistern, which had
survived Aunt M'