“Ah, my dear Sir! you couldn’t do it; nor could I advise you to try—­that is, unless there were plenty more who could swear positively that she was out of her mind.  Would the servants swear that?  Could you yourself, now, positively swear that she was out of her mind?”

“Why—­she never had any mind to be out of.”

“Unless you are very sure she is, and, for a considerable time back, has been, a confirmed lunatic, you’d be very wrong—­very ill-advised, I mean, Mr Lynch, to try that game at all.  Things would come out which you wouldn’t like; and your motives would be—­would be—­” seen through at once, the attorney was on the point of saying, but he stopped himself, and finished by the words “called in question”.

“And I’m to sit here, then, and see that young blackguard Kelly, run off with what ought to be my own, and my sister into the bargain?  I’m blessed if I do!  If you can’t put me in the way of stopping it, I’ll find those that can.”

“You’re getting too much in a hurry, Mr Lynch.  Is your sister at the inn now?”

“To be sure she is.”

“And she is engaged to this young man?”

“She is.”

“Why, then, she might be married to him to-morrow, for anything you know.”

“She might, if he was here.  But they tell me he’s away, in Dublin.”

“If they told you so to-day, they told you wrong:  he came into Dunmore, from Tuam, on the same car with myself, this very afternoon.”

“What, Martin Kelly?  Then he’ll be off with her this night, while we’re sitting here!” and Barry jumped up, as if to rush out, and prevent the immediate consummation of his worst fears.

“Stop a moment, Mr Lynch,” said the more prudent and more sober lawyer.  “If they were off, you couldn’t follow them; and, if you did follow and find them, you couldn’t prevent their being married, if such were their wish, and they had a priest ready to do it.  Take my advice; remain quiet where you are, and let’s talk the matter over.  As for taking out a commission ‘de lunatico’, as we call it, you’ll find you couldn’t do it.  Miss Lynch may be a little weak or so in the upper story, but she’s not a lunatic; and you couldn’t make her so, if you had half Dunmore to back you, because she’d be brought before the Commissioners herself, and that, you know, would soon settle the question.  But you might still prevent the marriage, for a time, at any rate—­at least, I think so; and, after that, you must trust to the chapter of accidents.”

“So help me, that’s all I want!  If I got her once up here again, and was sure the thing was off, for a month or so, let me alone, then, for bringing her to reason!”