“Go round to the shop, Katty,” said Martin, “and tell mother to come to the door. There’s a gentleman wanting her.” “It was Miss Lynch I asked for,” said Daly, still looking to the girl for an answer. “Do as I bid you, you born ideot, and don’t stand gaping there,” shouted Martin to the girl, who immediately ran off towards the shop. “I might as well warn you, Mr Kelly, that, if Miss Lynch is denied to me, the fact of her being so denied will be a very sthrong proof against you and your family. In fact, it amounts to an illegal detention of her person, in the eye of the law.” Daly said this in a very low voice, almost a whisper. “Faith, the law must have quare eyes, av’ it makes anything wrong with a young lady being asked the question whether or no she wishes to see an attorney, at eleven in the morning.” “An attorney!” whispered Meg to Jane and Anty at the top of the stairs. “Heaven and ’arth,” said poor Anty, shaking and shivering—“what’s going to be the matter now?” “It’s young Daly,” said Jane, stretching forward and peeping clown the stairs: “I can see the curl of his whiskers.” By this time the news had reached Mrs Kelly, in the shop, “that a sthrange gentleman war axing for Miss Anty, but that she warn’t to be shown to him on no account;” so the widow dropped her tobacco knife, flung off her dirty apron, and, having summoned Jane and Meg to attend to the mercantile affairs of the establishment—turned into the inn, and met Mr Daly and her son still standing at the bottom of the stairs. The widow curtsied ceremoniously, and wished Mr. Daly good morning, and he was equally civil in his salutation. “Mr Daly’s going to have us all before the assizes, mother. We’ll never get off without the treadmill, any way: it’s well av’ the whole kit of us don’t have to go over the wather at the queen’s expense.” “The Lord be good to us;” said the widow, crossing herself. “What’s the matter, Mr Daly?” “Your son’s joking, ma’am. I was only asking to see Miss Lynch, on business.” “Step upstairs, mother, into the big parlour, and don’t let’s be standing talking here where all the world can hear us.” “And wilcome, for me, I’m shure”—said the widow, stroking down the front of her dress with the palms of her hands, as she walked upstairs—“and wilcome too for me I’m very shure. I’ve said or done nothing as I wish to consail, Mr Daly. Will you be plazed to take a chair?” and the widow sat down herself on a chair in the middle of the room, with her hands folded over each other in her lap, as if she was preparing to answer questions from that time to a very late hour in the evening. “And now, Mr Daly—av’ you’ve anything to say to a poor widdy like me, I’m ready.” “My chief object in calling, Mrs Kelly, was to see Miss Lynch. Would you oblige me by letting Miss Lynch know that I’m waiting to see her on business.” “Maybe it’s a message from her brother, Mr Daly?” said Mrs Kelly.