Page:Darby O'Gill and the Good People by Herminie Templeton Kavanagh (1903).djvu/261

Rh him to hear, an’ that he was deef only to what he didn’t like to listen to.

Well, anyhow there was the tinker in the road waitin’ for the cart to come up, an’ for a while what to do Darby didn’t well know.

He couldn’t rayf use one who axed food to ate or shelther for a wandherer’s four bones during the night (that would be a sin, besides it would bring bad luck upon the house), an’ still he had a mortial dislike to go agin Bridget in this purtick’ler—she’d surely blame him for bringin’ Bothered Bill home.

But at length an’ at last he daycided, with a sigh, to put the whole case before Bill an’ then let him come or stay.

Whilst he was meditaytin’ on some way of conveyin’ the news that’d be complaymintary to the tinker, an’ that’d elevayte instid of smashing that thraveller’s sinsitiveness, Bill came up to the cart.

“The top iv the day to you, dacint man,” he says. “’Tis gettin’ toward dark an’ I’ll go home with ye for the night, I’m thinkin’,” says he. The tinker, like most people who are hard of hearin’, roared as though the listener was bothered. Rh