It is customary to bring a friend for support
upon the mission on which he was bent. Con had
his reasons for going alone. His expedition was
a forlorn one. Why should another behold his
defeat?

Con Lavelle had loved Maureen Lacey long.
Last night had shown him that if his chance
were not speedily improved, it would very
quickly become nothing. The Widow Lacey
smiled on him, he knew, for she reckoned on
Con's soft nature and Con's good farm to help
her out of many of her difficulties. This was
little, however, while Maureen was cold. Last
night he had seen her melt and brighten,
and though the change, he knew, had not been
wrought by him, his heart had so ached at her
unwonted beauty, that he could not, like a wise
man, turn his face the other way and think of
her no more. No, he would have his chance
out. He would offer her his love, and if she
would not have that, he would bribe her with
his comfortable house, his goodly land, and help
and protection for her family. If Maureen
could not give him her love, he would grieve;
but, if Maureen could be bought, he would buy
her.

This was the state of Con's mind when he
lifted the Laceys' latch. As ever, the place was
lighted by the fire, and there was an air of hush
and tidiness within that betokened expectation of
something unusual. The children were all in
bed, the house was swept, the bits of tins and
crockeries were all straight on the humble
dresser, the few rude chairs were ranged with
precision along by the walls. Maureen's step-
mother was dozing in her little straw chair in
the warmest corner. It was not in her veins
that the fever burned which had caused this
spell of prostration. Maureen stood on the
hearth, in her work-a-day crimson petticoat
and loose bodice of print, with the blaze
playing over her pretty bare feet, not yet
spoiled by exposure, and deepening the heated
spots on her cheeks, and gilding the wilful
ripples of hair that would creep out and keep
straying about her forehead. Twice Maureen
had slipped " down to the room," and pressed her
face to the one little pane of the window, and
peered forth at the night without, where the
yellow moonlight fell rich and flat on the rugged
causeway, and the silver Atlantic shifted and
glimmered between the grey stone walls of the
neighbouring cabins. And the last time she
had withdrawn her face with a gesture of
impatient dismay. This was not the shape she
wanted to see, this loose swinging figure coming
along with its awkward shadow.

Con lifted the latch and came in. The noise
wakened the widow, who hailed him with glad
surprise. " What can bring him to-night
again?" flashed through the minds of both the
women, followed also by the same surmise, only
the latter was with one a hope, with the other a
fear. Maureen's " Save ye, Con!" was only a
feeble echo of her stepmother's greeting, wrung
from her by the absolute requirements of
hospitality. Curiosity was quickly allayed, and
hope and fear confirmed. Advancing to the
dresser with a sheepish air, the visitor set down
a bottle of whisky, pipes, and tobacco. Thus
his errand was at once declared. Con Lavelle
had come "match-making."

The stepmother rubbed her wasted hands
with delight. " You're welcome, Con, agra,
machree!" she said. "Maureen, set out the
table, an' fetch the glasses, an' fill the pipes."

Maureen did as she was bidden, uncorked the
bottle, and handed the glass and kindled pipe to
her mother, all with a set defiance on her face,
which did not escape the timorous suitor.

"Ye'll be come on business, Con?" began the
widow.

"Ay," said Con, blushing and fidgeting.
"I come, Mrs. Lacey, to ask yer daughter for a
wife. God sees I'll make her as good a husband
as iver laid all he had in a girl's lap an' only
axed for hersel' in return."

"It's thrue for you, Con dear," said the
step-mother. " Oh, an' ye have her with my heart's
best wish. Come down, Maureen, and give yer
han' to yer husband."

Maureen had been standing, pale, over in the
shadows, at the dresser. Now she moved down
to the hearth. "Not my husband," she said,
"an' niver my husband. In my heart I'm
thankful to ye, Con Lavelle, for thinkin' kindly
of a poor girl like me, but I cannot take yer
offer."

"Good Lord, sich talk!" cried the widow,
enraged. "Don't mind her, Con, asthore, it's
only a way girls has, likin' to keep themsel's
high, an' small blame to them! She'll be yours,
niver fear, an' willin' an' plased on her weddin'-
day."

"Mother," said Maureen, " where's the use
of talkin' this ways? Yer not my God, nor my
Maker, that ye have a right to han' over my
soul an' body to this man, or that man again my
will. An' you, Con Lavelle, yer a daceut man,
an' ye wouldn't be for takin' a girl to yer wife
that had her heart set in wan that wasn't you.
I'm a pledged wife, an' as good as a wife this
minit in the eyes o' the Almighty above; an'
thrue an' fast I'll stan' to my word, so help me
Christ, my Saviour!"

Slowly, and with a stern reverence in her
tone, Maureen uttered these last words, her
eyes on the ground and her hands squeezed
together. Con hung his head and hoped no
more, and the stepmother rocked herself to
and fro in her feebleness, and raged with
disappointment.

"You bould hizzy," she cried. " Oh, you
bould shameless hizzy, that's been decavin' me
all this time! Goin' jiggin' to yer dances an'
makin' yer matches, an' throwin' dust in the
eyes o' the poor sickly mother at home. Oh,
you bad unnatural daughther!"

"Aisy, aisy, Mrs. Lacey," put in soft-hearted
Con. " Throth I'll not listen to that from ye.
If Maureen cannot like me, I'll tell the thruth
o' her. She's the good hard-workin' daughther
to you, whatever!"

"Hould yer tongue!" shrieked the passionate