"Faix! I'll not let the rain in! It's a nice day to have the windows open. You're eaten up with your selfishness, Peter Malone!"
"Maybe I am, maybe I am," muttered the old peasant, as he sat down, and hid his face between his hands.
"And who knows where the letter will be from? Maybe its Vyner is going to turn you out of your holding."
"Maybe it's the agents callin' on you to pay up for the time you were in it. Do you think that would be convanient, eh?"
"I wouldn't wonder if it was trouble you were getting in about throwing down the walls of the Lodge. The police, they say, made a report about it."
"Go round to the back. Do you think I'll open the front doore of a day like this?" screamed out O'Rorke to the messenger, who now stood without.
While he went to unbar the door, Old Malone dropped on his knees, and with clasped hands and uplifted eyes muttered a few words of prayer; they were in Irish, but their intense passion and fervour were but increased by the strong-sounding syllables of that strange tongue.
"There it is--from herself," said O'Rorke, throwing down the letter on the table. "Her own handwriting; 'Mr. Peter Malone, to the care of Mr. O'Rorke, Vinegar Hill, Cush-ma-greena, Ireland.'"
"The heavens be your bed, for the good news, Tim O'Rorke! May the Virgin watch over you for the glad heart you've given me this day."
"Wait till we see the inside of it, first. Give it to me till I open it." But the old man could not part with it so easily, but held it pressed hard to his lips.
"Give it here," said the other, snatching it rudely; "maybe you'll not be so fond of it, when you know the contents."
The old man rocked to and fro in his agitation as O'Rorke broke the seal; the very sound of the wax, as it smashed, seemed to send a pang through him, as he saw the rough, unfeeling way the other handled that precious thing.
"It's long enough, anyhow, Peter--one, two, three pages," said he, turning them leisurely over. "Am I to read it all?"
"'My dear old Grandfather,--I sit down to write you a very long letter---'"
"God bless her! God bless the darlin'!" said the old man, interrupting; "show me the words, Tim--show them to me."
"Indeed I will not do any such thing. It's just as much as I'll do is to read it out--'a very long letter, and I hope and trust it will serve for a very long time, and save me, besides, from the annoyance of your friend and secretary, Mr. O'Rorke.' Listen to this, Peter Malone,--'from your secretary, Mr. O'Rorke, who, I suppose, having no treason to occupy him, is good enough to bestow his leisure upon me.' Did you ever hear more impudence than that in all your born days? Did you believe she'd be bowld enough to insult the man that condescended to serve her?"