And there comes Anthony himself with little Bawn on his shoulder.  Her golden hair falls about his white head.  There is not a grey hair in his black moustache, nor in his fine, even, black eyebrows.  They go on after the pony.  Presently they will come shouting for me.  They are my world; but I have room for affections outside.

Brosna is now what it was meant to be, a stately, beautiful, well-kept house.  We are rich:  the treasure made us all rich; and that is a strange thing enough in our country, where there is no money to spare among the gentle-folk.

And talking of wealth reminds me of Richard Dawson.

It was the week before my marriage—­that was Holy Week, and I was married on the Easter Tuesday—­when I received a letter from Mrs. Dawson of Damerstown, asking me to come and see her.  The letter accompanied a gift so beautiful and costly that if I had liked her less I should have been inclined to return it.

As it was, I let Anthony do without me for once.  To be sure, he was tremendously busy getting Brosna in order for me.  I had Zoe brought round, the beautiful mare who was his latest gift to me, and rode over to Damerstown.

Mrs. Dawson received me in the drawing-room, affectionate as of old, but with the air which asked forgiveness for the wrong her husband had done us.  It was an air that grieved me, and as I kissed her I passed my hand over her forehead as though I would brush it away like a palpable thing.

“I thought, dearie,” she said, “being what you are, that you’d be happier in your own happiness if you knew things were well with my poor Rick.  He never did you any harm except to love you too much.”

“No, indeed,” I said hastily, “and I should be so glad to know that he has forgiven and forgotten me.  I’ve heard, of course, that he has quite recovered and is going abroad.  I shall always feel very kindly towards him and very sorry because of any wrong I did him.”

“You never did him any,” the mother said.

It was on the tip of my tongue to ask her where Nora Brady was, for that was a trouble to me, too, despite my happiness.  The poor people round about had, I was told, taken the same view of poor Nora’s devotion to her sick man as Maureen.  She had slipped away from those who, like myself, would have stood her friends.  But before I could ask the question Richard Dawson himself came into the room.

I was startled and a little embarrassed at first sight of him.  I had had no idea that he was at Damerstown.  And his face was sadly marked and pitted with the small-pox.

“Miss Devereux, you must forgive my presenting myself before you with this hideous face, but there are some things I want to tell you.  There, don’t look at me!  Take this.”

He picked up a Japanese fan and handed it to me and the action hurt me.  I compelled myself to look at him without flinching.

“You are not at all hideous,” I said.  “No one who cared for you would think you hideous.”