All night long, as he travelled, he pondered over these things, his irritation growing ever deeper. He recalled every word she had said, and in his anger even imitated to himself the careless impertinence of her tone as she said, “And are _you_ going yachting?” just as if such, a thought was too absurd to be entertained. “And why not, I’d like to know? Is there anything in my status or position that would make a pleasure excursion ridiculous in a man like me? I could afford it. I hope she doesn’t imply I’m too old for it. Age is an ugly subject; she’d better not cross-examine her witnesses there. And my red tapery! What a blessing it was that there were creatures to docket, and tie up, and register, and save superior souls the trouble of remembering anything! And then her last impertinence, when, after a sneer at Irish property, she said she wished I had one! I’m much mistaken, Madam,” cried he, half aloud, “if a little of that same secluded savagery that Ireland affords wouldn’t do you a world of good--if a couple of years of country life, with a bog landscape and a rainy sky, wouldn’t prove an admirable alterative to you! No fine acquaintances, none of those pleasant idlers, who like to run down for a week to the country, and bring all the gossip of town along with them, will follow you to Ireland. No fealty, no affection will cross the Channel and traverse that dreary waste of morass, dotted with mud-hovels, they call in irony the Green Isle. If anything could bring you to your senses, Madam, it would be a residence here.” Such were Mr. M’Kinlay’s thoughts as the mail lumbered heavily along through the deeply-rutted roads, and the rain swooped down in torrents. “I should like to see her yonder,” mattered he, as they passed a dreary two-storied house that stood alone on the bleak moor they call the Curragh. “That’s the reformatory I should like to try you with!” With such benevolent intentions as these did he arrive at Carrick’s Royal Hotel, in Westport, just as Vyner and Grenfell had reached the same spot. “You’ve had an uncomfortable journey of it, I fear, Mr. M’Kinlay,” said Vyner, as he shook him cordially by the hand. “Nothing but wind and rain for the last three days. Come in to my room here, I want to speak to you before you meet any one. I don’t think you know Grenfell,” said he, when they were alone, “and I should like to prepare you a little for a man who, with unquestionable abilities, has a number of oddities about him, and has a most intense pleasure in contradiction. This has been especially called out by a project of mine, which, perhaps, you will not fully approve, but, at all events, will accept as a pardonable caprice.”