Money comes between lovers sometimes; but it was not money, nor the want of it, which kept Mary and Denis apart. She was the daughter of a prosperous farmer--a rich man, as riches are reckoned in Ireland. He was a clerk in a lawyer’s office, and poorly paid. But he might have earned more. She would gladly have given up anything. And the objections of parents in such cases are not insuperable. But between these two there was something more. Denis Ryan was a revolutionary patriot. Mary Drennan’s parents were proud of another loyalty. They hated what Denis loved. The two loyalties were strong and irreconcilable, like the loyalties of the South and the North when the South and the North were at war in America. “What does it matter about your father and mother?” he said. “If you love me, Mary, isn’t that enough?” She hid her face on his shoulder again. He could barely hear the murmur of her answer. “I love you altogether, Denis! I love you so much that I would give my soul for you!” A man came down the road walking fast. He passed the gate of Drennan’s farm and came near the corner where the lovers stood. Denis took his arm from Mary’s waist, and they moved a little apart. The man stopped when he came to them. “Good-evening, Denis!” he said. “Good-evening, Miss Drennan!” The greeting was friendly enough, but he looked at the girl with unfriendly eyes. “Don’t forget the meeting to-night, Denis!” he said. “It’s in Flaherty’s barn at nine o’clock. Mind, now! It’s important, and you’ll be expected!” The words were friendly, but there was the hint of a threat in the way they were spoken. Without waiting for an answer, he walked on quickly towards the town. Mary stretched out her hands and clung tight to her lover’s arm. She looked up at him, and fear was in her face. “What is it, Denis?” she asked. “What does Michael Murnihan want with you?” Women in Ireland have reason to be frightened now. Their lovers, their husbands, and their sons may be members of a secret society, or they may incur the enmity of desperate men. No woman knows for certain that the life of the man she loves is safe. “What’s the meeting, Denis?” she whispered. “What does he want you to do?” He neither put his arm round her nor took her hand again. “It’s nothing, Mary,” he said. “It’s nothing at all!” But she was more disquieted at his words, for he turned his face away from her when he spoke. “What is, it?” she whispered again. “Tell me, Denis!” “It’s a gentleman down from Dublin that’s to talk to the boys to-night,” he said, “and the members of the club must be there to listen to him. It will be about learning Irish that he’ll talk, maybe, or not enlisting in the English Army.” “Is that all, Denis? Are you sure now that’s all? Will he not want you to do anything?”