Page:Darby O'Gill and the Good People by Herminie Templeton Kavanagh (1903).djvu/274

Rh surrounding spirrits, horrible though they might be, he’d bid it welcome. But though the rain drizzled an’ the tunder rumpled, not a flare lit up the sky.

One swift, dusperate hope at the last minute saved the boy from sheer dispair; an’ that same hope was that maybe some of the Good People might be flyin’ about an’ would hear him. Liftin’ up his face to the sky an’ crying out to the passin’ wind, he says:

“Boys,” he says, agonised, “lads,” says he, “if there be any of yez to listen,” he cried, “I’ll take it as a great favour an’ I’ll thank ye kindly to tell King Brian Connors that his friend an’ comerade, Darby O’Gill, is in deep throuble and wants to see him imaget,” says he.

“Ho! ho! ho!” laughed the turrible thing in the hedge.

In spite of the laugh he was almost sure that off in the distance a cry answered him.

To make sure he called again, but this time, though he sthrained his ears till their drums ached, he caught no rayply.

And now, out of the murkiness in the road ahead of him, something began to grow slowly into a tall, slender, white figure. Motionless it stood, tightly Rh