Father David eyed Larry cautiously, and began to wonder if something he had been told not long since were true.

In Ireland, it may confidently be said, all things are known to the poor people, and a brief consideration of this position will show, that this being so, there is but little that is unknown to the Church.

“Well, Mr. Coppinger,” Father Hogan resumed, “I’m told—­only told, mind you—­that the Major had Mount Music and the demesne advertised on the English papers—­”

“Good God!” exclaimed Larry, startled out of his sulk; “to sell?”

Father David, like other gentlemen of his age and cloth, had the Baboo’s predilection for a well-worn quotation.  “As to that I cannot say,” he said portentously. “’’Tis whispered in Heaven, ’tis muttered in Hell’ that the encumbrances are very heavy—­mortgages and debts—.  The good Major had a long family, Mr. Coppinger; fine, dashing young min they are too, but we all know that expenses do not tend to diminish as families grow up!  Children may be a heritage that comes from the Lord, but unless other heritages accompany them—!” Father David put his head on one side, and, beaming at Larry, laid his little professional joke, so to speak, at his feet.

“Well, well,” he resumed, “‘What business is it of yours?’ says you!”

“Not at all, Father,” said Larry, still shaken by what he had heard.  “Thank you for speaking to me—­it’s the first I’ve heard of it.”

The procession of the hunt halted, the hounds left the road by the direct method of a high stone “gap,” and Father David and the bay cob melted away to betake themselves to those secret equivalent routes known to those who have come to years of discretion in the hunting-field.

The second draw seemed at first as if it were to be no more fortunate than its predecessor.  The covert was a patch of scrubby woodland at a little distance below the road, at the head of one of the long deep glens that were the terrors of the Broadwater country.  The wind blew from the west, across the wide cleft of Gloun Kieraun, and the hounds were thrown into the wood in which the upper end of the glen was masked, and were encouraged to work downwards.  An unaccustomed wave of misanthropy had assailed Larry, and instead of following with the crowd the course of the hounds, he moved onwards along the road, scarcely considering where he was going.  He was thinking with consternation of what Father Hogan had told him.  Larry was not of those who nurse their wrath to keep it warm, and the thought of Dick’s misfortunes swept away the recollection of his insults.  Joker had, of his own initiative, soon turned aside from the high road into a grassy lane, and he moved along it in the relentless manner in which many horses will decline to stand still while Larry, deep in thought, allowed the reins to lie on the horse’s neck while he lit a cigarette and tried to fix in his memory Father David’s exact words.  He thought he would