After listening to his grievances as long as he thought necessary,
Ussher followed Feemy into her own room, and here we will leave
them, till we meet them again at Denis McGovery's wedding; merely
remarking, that poor Feemy, though more than once she prepared
to make her dreaded speech to her lover, each time hesitated and
stopped, and at last made up her mind that it would be just as well
to put off the evil hour till her pleasure was over; and finally
determined to have the conversation on the return home, for she well
knew that Ussher would walk back with her to Ballycloran, where his
horse would be left.
CHAPTER XII.
THE WEDDING.
When Ussher first came into the parlour at Ballycloran, he asked
after Thady, and it will be necessary to explain why he did so; the
terms on which the two men stood towards each other not being such
as to render it probable that either should be very anxious for the
presence of the other.
It had come to the knowledge of Denis McGovery that Brady had asked
to the wedding a lot of men from Drumleesh, and some also from
Mohill--characters with whom Denis was not apt to consort himself,
and whom he looked on as paupers and rapparees. He had also made out,
it is presumed with the aid of his affianced, that some other motive
was probably ensuring their attendance than merely that of doing
honour to his, Denis's, nuptials. Pat Brady was not likely to have
made a confidant of his sister or of Denis on the occasion; but
nevertheless, the bridegroom had discovered that the meeting was,
to some extent, to be a political one, and moreover, that Thady
Macdermot was expected to be there.
Now McGovery, although it must be presumed that, in common with all
Irishmen of the lower order, he conceived that he was to a certain
degree injured and oppressed by the operation of the existing laws,
nevertheless had always thought it the wiser course to be with the
laws, bad as they might be, than against them. When, therefore, he
learnt that the brothers of the men whom Ussher had put into prison
were to be of the party, and that many of their more immediate
neighbours would be there, and remembered also that Captain Ussher
himself had promised to come to the "divarsion," mighty fears
suggested themselves to him, and he began to dread that the occasion
would be taken for offering some personal injury to the latter! In
which case, might not all be implicated?--and among the number that
dear person for whom Denis felt the tenderest regard--viz., himself?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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