right place for them to be? They had a right to be stoppin' there
altogether, on'y that they are that fond of their own little place I
don't think they 'ud ever contint themselves."

Mike suddenly sat down on the slab, but at a very discreet distance
from Roseen. He cleared his throat and looked towards her, but seemed
to find a difficulty in speaking. Roseen began to swing one of the
little pendant feet and looked away into the blue distance.

"Sure," she resumed in an indifferent tone, after a moment's pause,
"when their own house is not ready for them, the best place for them
to be in is their son's."

The colour rushed over Mike's cheek and brow; his heart began to beat
violently, and his limbs to tremble. There was a long silence, broken
only by the old familiar song of the lark sounding jubilantly from
above their heads; the rustling of the tall fawn-coloured grasses that
grew among the stones, and the distant faint lowing of cattle.

The outline of Roseen's pretty face and head stood out cameo-like
against the background of sunlit stone; Mike's gaze fastened itself
there and could not detach itself. There was a long pause, then with a
great effort he forced himself to speak.

"Roseen, darlint, there's not a ha'porth of good the two of us goin'
on this a-way; we may as well talk out plain. Ye're the best-natured
an' kindest-hearted little girl in the wide world, God bless ye!--"

Roseen drooped her head a little demurely, the colour mantling in her
face now, and dimples coming and going about her mouth.

"But," resumed the young man, steadying his voice, "I wouldn't take
advantage of ye, alanna, an' let ye do what ye'd be apt to be sorry
for afther a while. It wouldn't do at all for ye to be takin' up wid
the likes o' me now. Sure ye'd be the laughingstock of the place, if
ye went an' got married to a poor fellow like meself that hasn't a rag
to his back nor a penny in his pocket, an' just stepped out o' prison
more by token--sure, that alone 'ud make a deal o' differ!"

"Aye, indeed," interrupted Roseen, throwing up her head, "it 'ud make
that much differ, Mike, that if a girl was fond of a boy before, she'd
be apt to be ten times fonder after. Now lookit here, Mike Clancy, I
have had enough of this--'pon me word, isn't it too bad for a poor
girl to have to go beggin' an' prayin' a fellow this way! Ye ought to
be ashamed of yourself! Saints presarve us, this is the third time I
am afther axing ye! I decla