MURTAGH COSGAR It's that Ellen Douras that's putting him up to all this. Don't you be said by her, Sally. SALLY No, father. MURTAGH COSGAR You're a good girl, and if you haven't wit, you have sense. He'll be home soon, did you say? SALLY He was coming home. He went round the long way, I'm thinking. Ellen Douras was vexed with him, father. She isn't going either, Matt says, but I'm thinking that you might as well try to keep a corncrake in the meadow for a whole winter, as to try to keep Ellen Douras in Aughnalee. MURTAGH COSGAR Make the place tidy for him to come into. He'll have no harsh words from me. _(He goes up to the room)_ SALLY Father's surely getting ould. MARTIN DOURAS _(sitting down)_ He's gone up to rest himself, God help him. Sally, _a stor_, I'm that fluttered, I dread going into my own house. SALLY I'll get ready now, and let you have a good supper before you go to the fair. MARTIN DOURAS Sit down near me, and let me hear everything, Sally. Was it Matt that told you, or were you talking to Ellen herself? SALLY O, indeed, I had a talk with Ellen, but she won't give much of her mind away. It was Matt that was telling me. "Indeed she's not going," said he, "and a smart young fellow like myself thinking of her. Ellen is too full of notions." Here's Matt himself. Father won't have a word to say to him. He's getting mild as he's getting ould, and maybe it's a fortune he'll be leaving to myself. _Matt comes to the door. He enters_. MATT Where is he? He's not gone to the fair so early? SALLY He's in the room. MATT Were you talking to him at all? Were you telling him you saw myself? SALLY I was telling him that you were coming back. MATT How did he take it? SALLY Very quiet. God help us all; I think father's losing his spirit. MATT _(going to Martin)_ Well, you see I've come back, Martin. MARTIN DOURAS Ay, you're a good lad. I always said you were a good lad. MATT How did father take it, Martin? MARTIN DOURAS Quietly, quietly. You saw Ellen? MATT Ay, I saw Ellen _(gloomily)_. She shouldn't talk the way she talks, Martin. What she said keeps coming into my mind, and I'm troubled. God knows I've trouble enough on my head. MARTIN DOURAS _(eagerly)_ What did she say, Matt Cosgar? MATT It wasn't what she said. She has that school in her mind, I know. MARTIN DOURAS And is there anything to keep her here, Matt Cosgar? MATT I don't know that she thinks much of me now. We had a few words, but there's nothing in the world I put above Ellen Douras. MARTIN DOURAS I should be going to her. MATT Wait a bit, and I'll be going with you. Wait a bit. Let us talk it over. She wouldn't go from you, and you old. MARTIN DOURAS God forgive my age, if it would keep her here. Would I have my Ellen drawing turf, or minding a cow, or feeding pigs?