Somers.
"M'Carthy is not without sense, and Townsend, queer and intolerant as
he is, has good feeling. If he and Father Columb were left together,
I don't know what might happen. Mr. Prendergast is to be with you the
day after to-morrow, is he not?"

"So I understood my father to say."

"Will you let me give you a bit of advice, Herbert?"

"Certainly."

"Then don't be in the house much on the day after he comes. He'll
arrive, probably, to dinner."

"I suppose he will."

"If so, leave Castle Richmond after breakfast the next morning, and
do not return till near dinner-time. It may be that your father will
not wish you to be near him. Whatever this matter may be, you may be
sure that you will know it before Mr. Prendergast leaves the country.
I am very glad that he is coming."

Herbert promised that he would take this advice, and he thought
himself that among other things he might go over to inspect that
Clady boiler, and of course call at Desmond Court on his way. And
then, when they got near to Castle Richmond they parted company, Mr.
Somers stopping at his own place, and Herbert riding home alone.

CHAPTER XIX.

THE FRIEND OF THE FAMILY.

On the day named by Herbert, and only an hour before dinner, Mr.
Prendergast did arrive at Castle Richmond. The Great Southern and
Western Railway was not then open as far as Mallow, and the journey
from Dublin was long and tedious. "I'll see him of course," said
Sir Thomas to Lady Fitzgerald; "but I'll put off this business till
to-morrow." This he said in a tone of distress and agony, which
showed too plainly how he dreaded the work which he had before him.
"But you'll come in to dinner," Lady Fitzgerald had said. "No," he
answered, "not to-day, love; I have to think about this." And he put
his hand up to his head, as though this thinking about it had already
been too much for him.

Mr. Prendergast was a man over sixty years of age, being, in fact,
considerably senior to Sir Thomas himself. But no one would have
dreamed of calling Mr. Prendergast an old man. He was short of
stature, well made, and in good proportion; he was wiry, strong, and
almost robust. He walked as though in putting his foot to the earth
he always wished to proclaim that he was afraid of no man and no
thing. His hair was grizzled, and his whiskers were grey, and round
about his mouth his face was wrinkled; but with him even these things
hardly seemed to be signs of old age. He was said by