191
-Chapter. fwentyone
For the next few days there was a numbness among
the people in Rathard. Frank did not tell the full
story of how he had received his injuries, and Hamilton
and Sarah did not press him to tell. Meantime, little
Andrew with wide wondering eyes, crept silently among
his maimed and downcast elders. The swift series of
blows dealt at the inhabitants of his little world
planted in the child a fear of everyone beyond the
shadow of the farmhouse. If, from his eyrie on the
rath wall, he saw a cart crawling on the road below,
the driver, perhaps some jolly country youth, was to
him a malignant creature eager to shoot, kick or beat
any member of the Rathard household unlucky enough to
cross his path. Even the company of old Petie could
not entice him to Knocknadreemally again. His whole
day was spent like a tethered goat, circling close to
the dwelling-house of the farm.
Then came the sleepy afternoon when he was playing
in the rath. Suddenly he heard a high wavering cry of
pain from his mother's window that overlooked him. As
he paused, crouched on his hunkers, he heard Hamilton
calling on him again and again, as he raced round the
corner into the close Hamilton caught him roughly by the
shoulder. "Damn ye, where were yei Stay in the kitchen
'til I come back, and listen if you're called by your
mother!" Hamilton ran to the trap-shed and through the
window the child saw him swing out the springcart and
yoke in the horse.
