She reached the spot, and finding the girl still sitting there plunged
at once into conversation by saying:
"I think you live in one of our cottages, don't you? What's your name,
please?"
But the answer, "Theresa Curran," was given in such a miserable voice
that Winnie paused and looked at her with some attention.
The girl did not look up, but remained sitting with her elbows on her
knees, and her face supported on her hands, staring in front of her as
though Winnie were not there. Her face was tear-stained, her eyelids
swollen with crying, and there was a look of despairing wretchedness
in her face which made Winnie feel that she could not go on with her
message. So after standing beside her for a moment or two in silence
she said, "Is there anything the matter?"
The girl did not answer; and Winnie repeated, "What's the matter?"
"I dunno what to do at all at all," replied the child, drearily.
"Why?" said Winnie, "what has happened?"
Then, as though she couldn't keep it to herself any longer, the girl's
grief burst forth in a passionate wail, and she sobbed out: "Oh,
whatever will I do, whatever will I do? He'll kill me if I go home
again."
"What is it?" said Winnie, somewhat awe-stricken. "Who is it will kill
you?"
"Oh, it's the rent!" sobbed the child, "and mother so sick and all, and
he so savage at givin' it. He'll kill me; I know he will. He said he
would."
"Have you lost it?" asked Winnie.
But the child's grief seemed too overpowering for her to give any
answer; she only rocked herself backwards and forwards, sobbing as if
her heart would break.
Winnie stood looking at her for a moment, not quite knowing what to do;
then to her great relief Murtagh appeared at her side.
"What's the matter?" he whispered.
"I don't exactly know; somebody's going to kill her," returned Winnie.
She climbed up the bank, and knelt down beside the girl, saying:
"Look here, don't cry like that. Here's my brother and there are some
more of us down there, and we won't let anybody kill you."
"Yes, he will," replied the girl. "He always does what he says."
"But," said Murtagh, "he'll be put in prison, and hanged if he does."
The child sobbed on, giving no heed to Murtagh's words.
"What's he going to kill you for?" asked Murtagh.
"When I lost the goat he said he'd kill me next time," replied the
child. "Look here," she continued, rapidly unfastening her frock,
and displaying her bare neck and shoulder. "That's what he did to me
yesterday."
The little thin shoulder was covered with a great bruise. The skin was
broken in a long zigzag crack; the rapid movement of throwing off her
dress had caused the blood to ooze out, and Winnie and Murtagh stood
transfixed with pity and horror.
"Oh, Win," said Murtagh, "what can we do?"
Winnie went to the bank, and tried to scoop up some water in her hat.
Rosie and Bobbo, seeing that something was the matter, came up.
"Just give me my hat full of water, will you?" said Winnie, "and have
either of you a pocket-handkerchief?"
"What's the matter?" inquired Rosie, filling Winnie's hat.
Winnie didn't trouble herself to answer; and Rosie and Bobbo, climbing
up the bank, stood silent when they saw the wound on Theresa's shoulder.
Winnie dipped the handkerchief in water and gently bathed the bruise.
"How horrible!" said Rosie, presently.
"Great cowardly scoundrel," ejaculated Murtagh.
"That's nothing," said the girl. "He nearly broke me all to pieces the
day I lost the goat, and he said he'd kill me downright next time. Oh!
there's mother!" she added, her tears bursting forth again. "Whatever
will she do? and I daren't go back. I know it's with that great stick
he'll kill me, and I can't bear to be killed; I can't bear it."
"Don't cry," said Murtagh. "You shan't be killed. We'll protect her;
won't we?" he added, turning confidently to the others.
"That we will," said Winnie. "Why, you live on our land, don't you? So
we're bound to protect you even if we didn't want to."
"Yez won't be able," replied the girl. "He'd kill every one of you if
ye came between us."
"What an awful man!" ejaculated Rosie, in a tone of horror.
"I don't care if he does," said Murtagh; "you'll just see if we can't
prevent him touching you."
"Because you don't know," said Winnie, eagerly. "We're bound up in a
tribe, and we always settled we'd protect everybody against people who
wanted to prevent them being free; and then, you live on our land; that
makes you one of the followers of our tribe, and you'll just see if we
let him touch you."
"How can yez help it?" said the girl, in spite of herself half
convinced.
"Oh!" began Winnie, confidently. She consulted the others with her
eyes, but confronted with the practical difficulty, no one was able
immediately to propose a plan.
"Ye don't know what he's like," said Theresa, the momentary flash of
hope dying out of her white face.
"Who is he?" asked Rose. "Is he your father?"
"It's my stepfather, and mother had such work to get the rent from him.
And now we'll be turned out all the same, and he'll be that mad he
won't know what he's doing. And it'll just break mother's heart, an'
finish her off altogether, so it will! O dear, O dear, O dear! whatever
will I do?"
The children looked at her in silence for a little while, then Rosie
asked, "Have you lost the rent?"
"Yes, down there," she answered, raising her head. "I was jumpin' over
the stones goin' across to the little house to pay it, an' I'd got
the two sovereigns in my hand when my foot slipped, and they flew out
before ever I knew they were gone at all. Just in the very middle,
where the water's runnin' fast, and it swept them clean away."
"I'll tell you what!" exclaimed Murtagh, who had been thinking deeply,
"we'll take her up to the island and hide her there; then afterwards
we'll manage."
"Yes! yes!" cried Winnie; "that's the plan. How stupid of me not to
think of that! Let's go up at once for fear he might come and catch
her here. No one'll be able to touch you there," she added, turning
to Theresa; "it's beautifully hidden, you'll see. And we can take you
up provisions every day, and keep you as long as ever we like. Oh,
Murtagh, what a splendid idea!"
"Spiffing!" exclaimed Bobbo. "Come along; let us be moving up. We've
got a jolly lot of fish here," he explained to Theresa, "and we'll all
have dinner together."
The children were so charmed with the notion that Theresa could not
help being cheered. She still demurred, wondering what would become of
her sick mother; but the children overbore her objections, and in a few
minutes they were all going up the river's bank together.
After a time the immediate bank of the river became impassable. Theresa
and Ellie then struck across the woods together. The others returned to
the bed of the river. Bobbo suddenly caught sight of another trout; the
interest in the day's amusement was renewed; and so by the time they
all met together again at Long Island not one of the whole party gave
a thought to anything but the fun of being on a desert island, and of
getting their own dinner.