and read the thermometer that hung on the wall: it marked 102
degrees. Dejectedly he drove, in fancy, along the glaring, treeless
roads, inches deep in cinnamon-coloured dust. How one learnt to hate
the sun out here. What wouldn't he give for a cool, grey-green Irish
day, with a wet wind blowing in from the sea?--a day such as he had
heedlessly squandered hundreds of, in his youth. Now it made his mouth
water only to think of them.

It still wanted ten minutes to ten o'clock and the buggy had not yet
come round. He would lie down and have five minutes' rest before
starting: he had been up most of the night, and on getting home had
been kept awake by neuralgia.

When an hour later Mary reached home, she was amazed to find groom and
buggy still drawn up in front of the house.

"Why, Molyneux, what's the matter? Where's the doctor?"

"I'm sure I don't know, Mrs. Mahony. I've hollered to Biddy half a
dozen times, but she doesn't take any notice. And the mare's that
restless.... There, there, steady old girl, steady now! It's these damn
flies."

Mary hurried indoors. "Why, Biddy...."

"Sure and it's yourself," said the big Irishwoman who now filled the
kitchen-billet. "Faith and though you scold me, Mrs. Mahony, I couldn't
bring it over me heart to wake him. The pore man's sleeping like a
saint."

"Biddy, you ought to know better!" cried Mary peeling off her gloves.

"It's pale as the dead he is."

"Rubbish. It's only the reflection of the green blind. RICHARD! Do you
know what the time is?"

But the first syllable of his name was enough. "Good Lord, Mary, I must
have dropped off. What the dickens.... Come, help me, wife. Why on
earth didn't those fools wake me?"

Mary held his driving-coat, fetched hat and gloves, while he flung the
necessaries into his bag. "Have you much to do this morning? Oh, that
post-mortem's at twelve, isn't it?"

"Yes; and a consultation with Munce at eleven--I'll just manage it and
no more," muttered Mahony with an eye on his watch. "I can't let the
mare take it easy this morning. Yes, a full day. And Henry Ocock's
fidgeting for a second opinion; thinks his wife's not making enough
progress. Well, ta-ta, sweetheart! Don't expect me back to lunch." And
taking a short cut across the lawn, he jumped into the buggy and off
they flew.

Mary's thoughts were all for him in this moment. "How proud we ought to
feel!" she said to herself. "That makes the second time in a week old
Munce has