Gone without a word of farewell to her!  Roseen betook herself homewards full of bewildered pain; but kept her own counsel.

When the whispers anent the probable cause of his disappearance reached her ears, she felt a momentary thrill of apprehension, but her faith in her old friend survived this temptation.  “Mike never done the like,” she said to herself, with a proud little toss of her head; even when by—­and—­by the lad was openly accused of having been the cause of the disaster, she took his part against all comers, making no secret of her own intention, frustrated by her grandfather, of meeting him in the haggard, and announcing boldly that it was on her account that Mike had come there.

Old Peter, who had behaved like a man distracted while his property was being consumed before his eyes, was the first to connect the disappearance of Mike with this act of destruction, and declared he would leave no stone unturned in his efforts to capture and punish him.

The police were soon on poor Mike’s track, and before long he was discovered in the act of embarking for Liverpool, and ignominiously dragged back to the scene of his supposed exploit.  In vain he denied all knowledge of the deed, putting forward the same motive for his absence as his mother had done; circumstances were adverse to him, and the evidence against him sufficiently strong to justify the magistrate in committing him for trial at the approaching assizes.  In the meantime the unfortunate fellow was despatched to the county gaol.

Peter Rorke remained in a condition of mind bordering upon frenzy; some of his neighbours opined that he was goin’ out of his wits altogether, and there were moments when Roseen herself was in terror of him.  The old man’s excitement took a most unpleasant form, his hatred of Mike and his unfortunate parents being little less than rabid.

Not only were the poor old couple evicted with the least possible delay, but their few “sticks of furniture,” precious to themselves and worth absolutely nothing to anybody else, were seized and carried off to Monavoe—­there being no bidders at the sale which Peter held in “distraint for rent.”

Poor old Pat was helped out of the cabin and insisted on seating himself by the roadside to watch proceedings, though his wife tried anxiously to persuade him to accept at once the hospitality pressed upon them by sympathetic neighbours.

“Lave me alone,” he growled, “I’ll see this out, so I will.  Och, bedad, they are afther liftin’ out the bed now—­mind it doesn’t fall to pieces on yez before yez get it into the cart.  Troth, ould Peter himself ought to sleep in that iligant bed; it’s the pleasant dhrames he’d have!”

“It doesn’t become ye to be talkin’ that way, Pat,” cried “Herself,” flushed and weeping; “that was me mother’s bed, so it was.  Oh dear, oh dear! that I should live to see it taken off of us that way!  And there’s me pot that I biled mornin’ an’ evenin’ these years an’ years!”