Martin Regan paused to take breath and wipe his mouth with his coat sleeve, and after a moment's abstracted gaze at the vista of tall fir trees before him, burst out again: "And now it's whisky and tea for the old woman, and trimmings at two shillings the yard for the sister's dress, and what for Martin? what for the boy that worked for them the twelve months long? Me that used to go a mile beyond Cloon every morning to break stones, and to deal for two stone o' meal every Saturday to feed the childer when there was nothing in the field. And it's trying to drive me from the house now they are, and me to wet my own tea and to dress my own bed, and me after wringing my shirt twice, with respects to ye, after working all the day in the potato ridges." "Could no one influence your stepmother; has she no friends here?" asked Louise, much moved. Martin Regan laughed bitterly. "Sure she never belonged to the estate at all," he said, "but came in the middle of the night on me and the little sister sitting by the little fire of bushes, and me with a little white coat on me. And we never knew where she came from, and never brought a penny nor a blanket nor a stitch of clothes with her, and our own mother brought seventy pounds and two feather beds. And now she's stiffer than a woman that would have a hundred pounds. And now the old man's like to die, and maybe he won't pass the night, and where'll I be? Sure if he would keep him living a little longer he might get repentance." "Had you not better ask the Doctor to see him?" said Louise. "He might bring him round for a time, and then we must do our best for you." "I was thinking that myself," said Regan; "and I believe I'd best go look for him now; I might chance to find him at home. I heard the old woman had the priest sent for; but, sure, he's wore out anointing him--he threatened to die so often. But he's worse now than ever I saw him." And taking off his hat with many expressions of gratitude, he left Louise to finish her walk alone. An hour or two later she returned, her hands full of sprays and berries as an excuse for her wanderings. The Colonel was smoking contentedly on the bench outside the door. "Ah, Louise," he said, "you have missed your friend the Doctor you were so full of when you wrote to me. He seemed to want to see you--I suppose to have a crack about some of your patients; so I asked him to come and dine this evening." No escape now! Louise bit her lip, and proceeded to arrange her berries. "He seems an intelligent young man," the Colonel went on; "rather good-looking, if he had a drill-sergeant to teach him to hold himself up; and I hear he doesn't drink, which can't often be said of these dispensary doctors."