"The first thing that I did was to send for Father M'Grath, who had
been more away from home than usual--I presume, not finding things
quite so comfortable as they used to be. He told me that he had met
with Father O'Toole, and had a bit of a dialogue with him, which had
ended in a bit of a row, and that he had cudgelled Father O'Toole
well, and tore his gown off his back, and then tore it into shivers,--
that Father O'Toole had referred the case to the bishop, and that was
how the matter stood just then. 'But,' says he, 'the spalpeen has left
this part of the country, and, what is more, has taken Ella and her
mother with him; and what is still worse, no one could find out where
they were gone; but it was believed that they had all been sent over
the water.' So you see, Peter, that this is a bad job in one point,
which is, that we have no chance of getting the truth out of the old
woman; for now that we have war with France, who is to follow them? On
the other hand, it is good news; for it prevents me from decoying that
poor young girl, and making her believe what will never come to pass;
and I am not a little glad on that score, for Father M'Grath was told
by those who were about her, that she did nothing but weep and moan
for two days before she went away, scolded as she was by her mother,
and threatened by that blackguard O'Toole. It appears to me, that all
our hopes now are in finding out the soldier, and his wife the
wet-nurse, who were sent to India--no doubt with the hope that the
climate and the fevers may carry them off.
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