CHAPTER V

THE NURSE


It was a few days later that, coming in one afternoon, I found Miss
Champion with my grandmother and noticed that there was something odd in
the manner of both of them. Nor was I kept long in suspense about it,
for Miss Champion, who was the most candid person alive, could not long
keep a secret.

"Would you like to go to Dublin, Bawn?" she asked.

To Dublin! I could hardly have been more bewildered if she had asked me
would I like to go to the North Pole. Indeed, I had never contemplated
going so far. It would have been a great adventure to have gone even so
far as Quinn, our fair and market town, which lies on the other side of
the Purple Hill, seven miles away.

I stammered out that I should like to go to Dublin, looking from Mary
Champion's face to my grandmother's, for I could hardly believe that
the latter would consent to so tremendous an adventure.

"It is time for her to see and be seen," my godmother went on. "You are
twenty years old, are you not, Bawn? Why, at twenty I had seen a deal of
the world, had travelled far away from Castle Clody and the valley of
the Moy. Next season she ought to be presented, Lady St. Leger. I shall
take her up and do it myself, if you will not. She ought not to be
hidden away."