I wish I could be living near to love you day and night, To let no trouble touch you, or annoy, I wish I could be dyin’ here to rise a spirit light, If them above ’ud let me win you joy. And now I wish no wishes, nor ever fall a tear; Nor take a thought beyond the way I’m led: I mind the day that’s overby, and bless the day that’s near, Then be to come--a day, when we’ll be dead; A longer, lighter day, when we’ll be dead.” Mary read this quickly, with a catch in her breath; then slowly; finally with eyes so dim, that she could scarcely distinguish the words, and her tears pattered down upon the pages. This pathetic and touching lament reopened the gates of the poor girl’s grief. Misery stalked in, and resumed the seat from which, time, youth, and summer, had almost dislodged her. Fifteen months previously, a brother officer on the trooper had given the book to Ulick. Ulick, still smarting from his separation, had found that the lines exactly interpreted his own feelings, and in a spasm of imprudent impulse had posted the book to Mary the very day he landed in Bombay. And now Mary had received it at last. The poem recalled a bygone ecstasy that could never, never return, and in a passion of despair, anguish, and rebellion she cast herself face downwards in the soft June grass. She might have been lifeless, she remained there so long, and lay so still; but the birds in the thorn hedge and the bees among the clover knew better. They heard her low, stifled sobs. It was only a girl who had lost something--or who had been robbed of her all. Well, they had known the experience themselves! The June evening was five years ago, and Mary, like the birds, had outgrown her heartbreak. As she stood leaning on the gate for the last time, dreamily reviewing the past years, there was a loud rumbling, whizzing sound, and a red motor shot by, leaving a cloud of dust and a hideous smell of petroleum. This same motor had not travelled half a mile before it broke down. The by-road was covered with sharp, loose stones, and a tyre was punctured. “It will be nothing much,” announced the chauffeur, “but it will take time.” “What do you call time?” inquired Sir Harry Coxford. “About an hour, sir.” “An hour! How is that hour to be killed?” drawled his companion and host. “I know”--slapping his leg. “I noticed a pretty girl at a gate about a quarter of a mile back--just below a cottage. Let us go and have a look at her, and a talk.” “Let us go anywhere and stretch our legs, as long as it is not far.” “You lazy beggar! I never met your match. You wouldn’t walk half a mile to look at a pretty face, eh?” “Not five yards to look at the prettiest face in Ireland. Come on. Lead the way to the miraculous beauty at the gate. I bet you a sov. she is ugly, or she has gone.” “Done!” rejoined Sir Harry, and they strolled along down the straight road towards the corner.