That evening two strangers called at his rooms, and after making certain of his identity, explained that a message had been received at the Sinn Fein headquarters in Dublin from Father Michael of Murrisk that Cormac was prepared to join in the Sinn Fein movement, and offering him a high-sounding position. Cormac’s vanity was flattered, and he accepted at once. Knowing that Cormac’s name would carry great weight with many half-hearted supporters and waverers, the Sinn Fein leaders employed him solely on propaganda work, sending him to every part of the country, not excepting the north, to speak at meetings, and always taking good care that his name appeared in large letters on the posters, and kind friends were not wanting to send the mac Nessa cuttings of his son’s speeches from every Irish and English paper in which they appeared. During his travels Cormac at different times met in trains and hotels many friends of his own class, who one and all, to their great credit, refused to speak to him, and this treatment embittered him still more against all Loyalists, more especially against his father and brother. After one trip to a town in the south, where he had tried to enter a club, and had been ejected by the hall porter, he offered himself on his return to Dublin for “active service,” and was at once sent to the Ballybor district to organise outrages, the Sinn Fein leaders knowing that the name of O’Fogarty was one to conjure with in that country even in these days. In the meantime Dominic had been asked by the authorities to join the newly-formed Auxiliary Division of the R.I.C., in order that his knowledge of the Ballybor country might be utilised, and after a short training in Dublin found himself quartered in Ballybor with a platoon of Cadets. By a coincidence the two brothers arrived in Ballybor within a week of each other, Cormac an avowed Sinn Feiner, and Dominic an officer in the Auxiliaries, who were about to take on the rebels at their own breed of warfare. Every kind of news travels fast in country districts in Ireland, and within twelve hours of the brothers’ arrival it is doubtful if you could have found, even in the mountains of Ballyrick, a child who did not know of the O’Fogartys’ return. Moreover, there is nothing an Irishman loves more than a fight, and one between two brothers of the best-known family in three counties, with armed men at their back, was something worth looking forward to, even in these days of murder and outrage. And at local race-meetings in the west bets were freely taken on the issue of the fight between Cormac and Dominic O’Fogarty.