“Well, then, Mistress Geehan,” said he, “I’ll just step upstairs and see the bit boy for a minute, and I’ll take this gentleman up with me.”

“He’s awake, thin,” said the woman.  ’I’ve just come down from sitting wid him the last hour, tilling him fine shtories of ould County Tyrone.  ’Tis a greedy gossoon, it is, yer riverence, for me shtories.”

“Small the doubt,” said Father Rogan.  “There’s no rocking would put him to slape the quicker, I’m thinking.”

Amid the woman’s shrill protest against the retort, the two men ascended the steep stairway.  The priest pushed open the door of a room near its top.

“Is that you already, sister?” drawled a sweet, childish voice from the darkness.

“It’s only ould Father Denny come to see ye, darlin’; and a foine gentleman I’ve brought to make ye a gr-r-and call.  And ye resaves us fast aslape in bed!  Shame on yez manners!”

“Oh, Father Denny, is that you?  I’m glad.  And will you light the lamp, please?  It’s on the table by the door.  And quit talking like Mother Geehan, Father Denny.”

The priest lit the lamp, and Lorison saw a tiny, towsled-haired boy, with a thin, delicate face, sitting up in a small bed in a corner.  Quickly, also, his rapid glance considered the room and its contents.  It was furnished with more than comfort, and its adornments plainly indicated a woman’s discerning taste.  An open door beyond revealed the blackness of an adjoining room’s interior.

The boy clutched both of Father Rogan’s hands.  “I’m so glad you came,” he said; “but why did you come in the night?  Did sister send you?”

“Off wid ye!  Am I to be sint about, at me age, as was Terence McShane, of Ballymahone?  I come on me own r-r-responsibility.”

Lorison had also advanced to the boy’s bedside.  He was fond of children; and the wee fellow, laying himself down to sleep alone in that dark room, stirred-his heart.

“Aren’t you afraid, little man?” he asked, stooping down beside him.

“Sometimes,” answered the boy, with a shy smile, “when the rats make too much noise.  But nearly every night, when sister goes out, Mother Geehan stays a while with me, and tells me funny stories.  I’m not often afraid, sir.”

“This brave little gentleman,” said Father Rogan, “is a scholar of mine.  Every day from half-past six to half-past eight—­when sister comes for him—­he stops in my study, and we find out what’s in the inside of books.  He knows multiplication, division and fractions; and he’s troubling me to begin wid the chronicles of Ciaran of Clonmacnoise, Corurac McCullenan and Cuan O’Lochain, the gr-r-reat Irish histhorians.”  The boy was evidently accustomed to the priest’s Celtic pleasantries.  A little, appreciative grin was all the attention the insinuation of pedantry received.

Lorison, to have saved his life, could not have put to the child one of those vital questions that were wildly beating about, unanswered, in his own brain.  The little fellow was very like Norah; he had the same shining hair and candid eyes.