Page:Darby O'Gill and the Good People by Herminie Templeton Kavanagh (1903).djvu/73

Rh “Bridget! Bridget!” Darby called agin an’ agin. Only a sleepy owl on a distant hill answered.

A shivering thought jumped into the boy’s bewildered sowl—maybe the Leprechaun had stolen Bridget an’ the childher.

The poor man turned, and for the last time darted down into the night-filled walley.

Not a pool in the road he waited to go around, not a ditch in his path he didn’t leap over, but ran as he never ran before till he raiched his own front door.

His heart stood still as he peeped through the window. There were the childher croodled around Bridget, who sat with the youngest asleep in her lap before the fire, rocking back an’ forth, an’ she crooning a happy, continted baby-song.

Tears of gladness crept into Darby’s eyes as he looked in upon her. “God bless her!” he says to himself. “She’s the flower of the O’Hagans and the O’Shaughnessys, and she’s a proud feather in the caps of the O’Gills and the O’Gradys.”

’Twas well he had this happy thought to cheer him as he lifted the door-latch, for the manest of all the little cobbler’s spiteful thricks waited in the house to Rh