Page:The Snake's Pass (Stoker).djvu/45

 I suppose there must be an instinct in men as well as in the lower orders of animal creation—I felt as though there were a strange presence near me.

I quietly looked round. Close to where I sat, on the sheltered side of the house, was a little window built in the deep recess of the wall, and, further, almost obliterated by the shadow of the priest as he sat close to the fire. Pressed against the empty lattice, where the glass had once been, I saw the face of a man—a dark, forbidding face it seemed in the slight glimpse I caught of it. The profile was towards me, for he was evidently listening intently, and he did not see me. Old Moynahan went on with his story:—

"Me father hid behind a whin bush, an' lay as close as a hare in his forrum. The min seemed suspicious of bein' seen and they looked carefully all round for the sign of anywan. Thin they started up the side of the hill; an' a cloud came over the moon so that for a bit me father could see nothin'. But prisintly he seen the two min up on the side of the hill at the south, near Joyce's mearin'. Thin they disappeared agin, an' prisintly he seen the horses an' the gun carriage an' all up in the same place, an' the moonlight sthruck thim as they wint out iv the shadda; and men an' horses an' gun carriage an' chist an' all wint round to the back iv the hill at the west an' disappeared. Me father waited a minute or two to make sure, an' thin he run round as hard as he could an' hid behind the projectin' rock at the enthrance iv the Shleenanaher,