h families. A bold man
might indeed keep the forces of law at bay for a time; but James
McMurrough, notwithstanding the folly into which he had been led, was
no desperado. He had no desire to live with a rope round his neck, to
flee to the bog on the least alarm, and, in the issue, to give his name
to an Irish Glencoe.

A stranger position it had been hard to conceive; or one more
humiliating to a proud and untamed spirit such as Flavia's. What
arguments, what prayers, what threats The McMurrough used to bring her
to it, Colonel Sullivan could not guess. But though she consented, her
shame, her resentment, her hostility, were so patent that the effect
was to pair off Colonel John and herself, to pit them one against the
other, to match them one to one. The McMurrough, supple and insincere,
found little difficulty in subduing his temper to his interests, though
now and again his churlishness broke out. For Uncle Ulick, his habit
was to be easy and to bid others be easy; the dawn and dark of a day
reconciled him to most things. The O'Beirnes, sullen and distrustful,
were still glad to escape present peril. Looking for a better time to
come, they took their orders, helped to shield the common enemy,
supposed it policy, and felt no shame. Flavia alone, in presence of the
man who had announced that he meant to be master, writhed in helpless
revolt, swore that he should never be her master, swore that whoever
bowed the head she never would.

And Colonel Sullivan, seated, apparently at his ease, on the steep lap
of danger, found that this hostility and the hostile person held his
thoughts. A man may be an enthusiast in the cause of duty, he may have
plucked from the hideous slough of war the rare blue flower of
loving-kindness, he may in the strength of his convictions seem
sufficient to himself; he will still feel a craving for sympathy.
Colonel Sullivan was no exception. He found his thoughts dwelling on
the one untamable person, on the one enemy who would not stoop, and
whose submission seemed valuable. The others took up, in a greater or
less degree, the positions he assigned to them, gave him lip-service,
pretended that they were as they had been, and he as he had been. She
did not; she would not.

Presently he discovered with surprise that her attitude rendered him
unhappy. Secure in his sense of right, certain that he was acting for
the best, looking from a height of experience on that lowland in which
she toiled fo