The skipper smiled and lit his pipe.  The winter twilight had deepened to gloom.  The front of the stove glowed like a long, half-closed red eye, and young Cormick peered fearfully at the black corners of the room.  The skipper left his chair, fetched a candle from the dresser and lit it at the door of the stove.

“We bes a long way off from old Tyoon, Granny,” he said; “an’ maybe there bain’t no fairies now, even in Tyoon.  I never seen no fairy in Chance Along, anyhow; nor witch, mermaid, pixie, bogey, ghost, sprite—­no, nor even a corpus-light.  Herself in yonder bes no fairy-child, Granny, but a fine young lady, more beautiful nor an angel in heaven—­maybe a marchant’s darter an’ maybe a king’s darter, but nary the child o’ any vanishin’ sprite.  Sure, didn’t I hold her in me two arms all the way from the fore-top o’ the wrack to the cliff?—­an’ didn’t she weigh agin’ me arms till they was nigh broke wid it?”

“Denny, ye poor fool,” returned Mother Nolan, “ye bes simple as a squid t’rowed up on the land-wash.  What do ye know o’ fairies an’ the like?  Wasn’t I born on a Easter Sunday, wid the power to see the good people, an’ the little people, an’ all the tricksy tribes?  The body o’ a fairy-child bes human, lad.  ‘Tis but the heart o’ her bes unhuman—­an’ the beauty o’ her—­an’ there bain’t no soul in her.  Did ye hear the voice o’ her, Denny?  Holy saints!  But was there ever a human woman wid a voice the like o’ that?”

“Aye, Granny, but did she eat?  Did she drink?  Did she shed tears?” asked the skipper.

The old woman nodded her head.

“Fairies don’t shed tears,” said Dennis, grinning.  “Sure, ye’ve told me that yerself many a time.”

“But half-fairies, like herself, sheds ’em as well as any human, ye mad fool,” returned Mother Nolan.

At that moment the outer door opened, and Nick Leary entered the kitchen, closing the door behind him, and shooting the bolt into its place.  His face was so generously bandaged that only his eyes and nose were visible.  He glanced fearfully around the room.

“Where bes the mermaid?  Has she flew away?” he whispered.

The skipper sprang to his feet with an oath.

“Mermaid?” he cried.  “Ye dodderin’ fool ye!  She bes no more a mermaid nor any fat wench in Chance Along!  Has she flew, ye say!  How to hell kin a mermaid fly?  Wid her tail?  Ye bes a true man, Nick, or I’d bat ye over the nob for yer trouble.  She bes a poor young woman saved from a wrack, as well ye know.  What d’ye want wid me?”

Leary trembled, big as he was, and pulled off his fur cap with both hands.

“Aye, skipper, aye! but where bes she now?” he whispered.

“She bes sleepin’ like any poor babe in his reverence’s own bed,” replied the skipper.

“Saints presarve us!” exclaimed the other.  “In the blessed father’s bed!  I bain’t sayin’ naught, skipper, sir, but—­but sure ’twill be desperate bad luck for his reverence!”