Page:Shiana - Peadar Ua Laoghaire.djvu/82

68 Mary of the miracles!" said he, "what shall I do? Or what has happened to the night that it is so long, or what has happened to Shiana, or what is keeping him? If he wants to make a match with Sive, should not the day be long enough to make it, without spending the night out like this? He is a dark man. It is hard to be up to him. He said it would be better for her to be dead than that he should marry her, and there he is doing his best to marry her. I don't know in the world why it should be better for her to be dead than that he should marry her. I should think it would be better for him to be dead than that Sive should marry him. I wouldn't marry her for all Shiana's money and her own and her father's all put together; not I!"

At that moment he noticed a light like the day-break. That gave him great courage. But after a while what rose was the moon. When he saw the moonlight shining in through the window and over upon the mantel-piece where the malvogue was hanging, and no ray of daylight coming, things seemed so black to him that he lost heart completely, and if he had not been too frightened he would have begun to cry. When the light fell fair upon the malvogue it made it look like a human head. Michael thought he had never seen anything so like the head of the hag in the Fenian tale, who had her two furthest back teeth for two crutches. When he had been looking at it for some time the eyes moved, and the lips opened as if it were going to speak. Michael knew it was only the malvogue, but all the same he shuddered and his hair stood on end, and cold shivers ran down his backbone. He had to shut his eyes so as not to look at those eyes