It was no easy matter now to get hold of Shane. Since his return to Dublin he had plunged deeper and deeper into excess--partly from having been mewed up so long, partly to drown the voice of the inner monitor, partly because of the forbidding chilliness of his own fireside and the presence there of his gloomy brother. The Blasters, who during the reign of terror had been busy with the triangles; the Cherokees, who had been dispersed about the country with their regiments, returned now to the capital, to sit for the last time in the Irish Parliament, by order of the chancellor; and glorious were the nights they passed together whilst awaiting the decisive moment. The hounds of Strogue were brought again into requisition. My lord and his boon companions amused themselves with cub-hunting--careering with wild shrieks across the land--past cabins, the shoulders of whose occupants were disfigured with livid weals--past huts whose inmates cursed the cavalcade as it swept by. They rode all day. They drank and fought all night. My lady had to bide her time in order to lay hands upon her son. Verily, it seemed little probable that his infatuated lordship could be induced, even by her entreaties, to pull up in full career for the sake of wooing the cousin who frightened him! As though in furtherance of the unrelenting measures of Heaven, both sons were received now as guests at the Little House, and equally insulted their parent by making no secret of going there. The scraping of their feet was visible on the wall which divided the two properties. My lady could not but admit that Fate took pleasure in deliberately thwarting her arrangements. Why, when so many Catholics came to ruin in the Hurry, was this horrible woman allowed to escape scot-free? After she had been caught in the act, too, of harbouring traitors! Was it that through her (the only one on earth who had power to do so) the secret she kept so hungrily should be blabbed forth upon the housetops? Sure, a mark of Fate's finger could be detected here. But my lady was all the more determined to be obstinate. She would go on scheming, and wrestle with all her puny strength, shaking her broken spear-haft till finally put out of misery. If Fate was resolved to kill her, she would die hard, fighting to the very last.