114 GAURYOWEN 



that night, Effie having departed for bed in charge 

 of Norah, Violet, with a ball of red wool and two 

 long knitting-needles, took her seat at a corner of 

 the fireplace in the sitting-room. The idea of a 

 red knitted petticoat for old Mrs Moriarty had 

 occurred to her on the way home, and she was 

 putting it now into practice. 



French had been rather gloomy on the way home 

 and at dinner. It was evident that the incident 

 at the meet had hit him hard. Money worries 

 could not depress the hght-hearted, easy-going 

 gentleman, who had a soul above money and the 

 small affairs of life. It was the feeling of enmity 

 against himseK that cast him out of spirits for the 

 first time in years. For the first time in life he 

 felt the presence, and the infiuence against him, 

 of the thing we call Fate. His whole soul, heart 

 and mind were centred on Garryowen. In Garry- 

 owen he felt he had the instrument which would 

 bring him name and fame and fortune. It was 

 no fanciful belief. He knew horses profoundly; 

 here was the thing he had been waiting for all his 

 Hfe, and everything was conspiring to prevent 

 him using it. 



First, there was Lewis and his debt — that was 

 bad enough. Secondly was the fact that he would 

 have to complete the training of the horse in a 

 hostile country, and that country the Ireland of 

 to-day, a place where law is not and where petty 

 ruffianism has been cultivated as a fine art. With 

 Giveen for a spy on his movements, with a hundred 



