Roseen unfastened the half-door and came in, her little bare brown feet making no sound on the mud floor.  She was a pretty child for all her sunburnt face and scanty unkempt attire.  Poor Widow Rorke has long ceased to take pride in the fact that her husband had been the son of the richest farmer in all the countryside, and did not care to keep up appearances, all her energies being devoted to the struggle for daily bread; nevertheless, the short red flannel frock was as becoming to Roseen as any more elegant garment could have been, and when she approached the hearth and sat down on the three-legged stool by Pat’s side, he breathed a blessing on her pretty face that was as admiring as it was fervent.

Crossing one shapely sunburnt leg over the other, and gazing pensively at the smouldering turf sods, she heaved a deep sigh.

“They’re afther goin’ out an’ lavin’ me,” she lamented.

“Did they, asthore?  Sure they had a right to have taken ye along wid them.  Where are they gone to at all, alanna?”

“Me mother’s after goin’ to the town to buy a bit o’ bread, an’ Judy’s streeled off with herself, goodness knows where, wid her ould pipe in her pocket.  Dear knows when she’ll be back; an’ she bid me stop at home an’ mind the fire, but I come away out o’ that as soon as her back was turned.”

The bright eyes glanced defiantly at the old man and then suddenly clouded over; the corners of the little mouth began to droop, and the small bare shoulders to heave.

“They’d no call to go lavin’ me all by meself.”

“Troth they hadn’t, mavourneen,” agreed Pat, clackling his tongue sympathetically.  “It was too hard on ye, altogether, but sure you won’t cry now, there’s a good little girl; crying never done any one a ha’porth o’ good yit.  Look at me here wid all my ould bones broke; I might cry the two eyes out o’ my head an’ never a wan at all ud’ get mended for me.”

Roseen sat up blinking.  “Did it hurt ye much, Misther Clancy, when your bones was broke on ye?”

“Is it hurt, bedad!  Ye’d hear me bawlin’ up at the crass roads.  Sure I thought it was killed I was!  My ancistor couldn’t have shouted louder when he had the Earl Strongbow’s spear stuck in him.  Will I tell ye about that, alanna, to pass the time till herself comes in?”

Roseen shook her head discontentedly.

“I know that story,” she said.  “I wisht ye’d tell me about the Spider an’ the Gout though, Misther Clancy.  Ah do, an’ I’ll sit here listenin’ as quiet as a mouse.”

Pat rubbed his unshaven chin with the lean fingers of his one serviceable hand, the bristles of his week-old beard making a rasping sound the while, and glanced down sideways at the eager little petitioner.

“Is it the Spider an’ the Gout?” he said, knitting his brows with affected reluctance.  “Sure I am sick an’ tired tellin’ ye that.  No, but I’ll tell ye ’The little man and the little woman that lived in the vinegar bottle.’ ...  Wanst upon a time, there was a weeshy-dawshy little man—­’”