“Well, then, Mr. Frank, listen:—­I met about a dozen men—­strangers they wor to me, although their faces weren’t blackened—­not more than twenty minutes ago; and one, o’ them said to me, ‘Cannie, every one knows’ you, and you know every one—­do you know me?’”

“‘No,’ says I; ‘you have the advantage of me.’

“‘Do you know any one here?’ says he again.

“‘Well, I can’t say I do,’ says I; ’you don’t belong to this part of the country.’

“‘If we did, Cannie,’ said the spokesman, ’it isn’t face to face, in the open day, we’d spake to you.’

“‘An’ what is it you have to say to me?’ I axed; for, to tell you the truth, I was beginnin’ to get unaisy someway.

“’Nothing to you; but we’ve been tould that you’re well acquainted wid Procthor Purcel, and that you know a young man, by name M’Carthy, that stops for the present wid Mr. Magistrate O’Driscol.’

“‘I do,’ says myself; ’I’ll not deny but I know them all well—­I mane in the way o’ business—­for I call there often to sell my goods.’

“‘Well,’ said the spokesman, ‘will you give that letther,’ handin’ me this, ‘to Mr. M’Carthy?’” and as the pedlar spoke he placed the note in M’Carthy’s hands. “‘Do so,’ says the fellow, ’as soon as you can—­if possible, widout an hour’s delay.  It consarns himself and it consarns me—­can I depend on you to do this?’ I said I would:  and now there’s the letther—–­my message is delivered.”

M’Carthy read as follows:—­“Francis M’Carthy, as you regard the life of the man that saved yours last night, you won’t breathe a syllable about seein’ a young man’s corpse last night in the shebeen-house, nor about anything that happened to you in it, till you hear further from me.  If you’re grateful, and a gintleman, you won’t; but if you’re a traitor, you will.  Your friend, as you act in this.”

“Now, Mr. Frank,” said the, pedlar, “as you know the danger that’s about you, I say that unless you get out o’ the counthry at wanst, you’ll only have a hand in your own death if anything happens.  You’re, goin’ now, I suppose, to Mr. Purcel’s; if you are—­if it wouldn’t be troublesome—­jist say that the Cannie Soogah will call there in the coorse o’ the mornin’ for breakfast.”

He then turned off by a different road; and M’Carthy proceeded at, a very slow pace towards the proctor’s, which lay in a right line between the house to which the White-boy had brought him and O’Driscol’s.  As he reached the back yard, by which he intended to enter, anxious to get himself washed before any of them should see him—­he was met by Mogue, who after a glance or two recognized him at once by his shooting-dress.

“Why thin, good fortune to me, Misther Frank, is this you?”

“It is, Mogue; but I have no time to speak to you now.  Only get me soap and a towel till I wash my face at the pump here.  These are strange times, Mogue, and that was a very suspicious place of refuge to which you brought me; however, it will go hard or we shall make Mr. Frank Finnerty speak out, and to some purpose too.  Get me soap and towel quick—–­I do not wish to be seen with this diabolical-looking face upon me.”