"Ay, indeed!" said Molly, with a groan of sympathy; "oh the whiskey! if
men could keep from it!"

"And if women could!" said Mr. Crofton in a low voice.

The Englishwoman looked up at him, and then looked down, refraining from
assent to his smile.

"My mother-in-law," continued she, "was very koind to me all along, as
far as she could. But one thing she could not do; that was, to pay me
back the money of husband's and mine that I lent her. I thought this odd
of her--and hard. But then I did not know the ways of the country in
regard to never paying debts."

"Sure it's not the ways of all Ireland, my dear," said Molly; "and it's
only them that has not that can't pay--how can they?"

"I don't know--it's not for me to say," said the Englishwoman,
reservedly; "I am a stranger. But I thought if they could not pay me,
they need not have kept a jaunting-car."

"Is it a jaunting-car?" cried Molly. She pushed from her the chair on
which she was leaning--"Jaunting-car bodies! and not to pay you!--I give
them up intirely. Ill-used you were, my poor Mrs. Dermody--and a shame!
and you a stranger! But them were Connaught people. I ask your
pardon--finish your story."

"It is finished, ma'am. They were ruined, and all sold; and I could not
stay with my children to be a burthen. I wrote to husband, and he wrote