Sure there's nothing in the world worse on a man than a
damp bed, and me after airing them sheets at the kitchen fire for the
best part of the morning, so as no one would have it to say that they
wasn't dry. If you didn't want him hunted out of the house, why did
you bid me do that?"
Doyle felt the force of the argument; felt it more acutely than Sabina
could guess. He himself, at the bidding of Meldon, had done much to
make an honoured and profitable guest uncomfortable. Could he fairly
blame Sabina for acting in a similar way with precisely the same
excuse? He felt the necessity for speaking very sternly.
"Will you get out of this?" he said, "for I'm in dread but I might
raise my hand to you if you stand there talking to me any more. You'd
provoke the patience of a saint; but I wouldn't like to have it cast up
to me after that ever I struck you."
"I'm going. You needn't think I'm wanting to stay. There's plenty
will be glad to get me, and pay me more wages than ever you done."
Doyle recognised the truth of this. He had got Sabina cheap--cheap
even by the standard of wages which prevails in Connacht. He felt half
inclined to reconsider his determination.
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