"Another cup of tay, Father Bernard," said this lady. "It'll be more
to your liking now than the first, you'll find." Father Barney,
perfectly reliant on her word, handed in his cup.

"And the muffin is quite hot," said Fanny, stooping down to a tray
which stood before the peat fire, holding the muffin dish. "But
perhaps you'd like a morsel of buttered toast; say the word, uncle,
and I'll make it in a brace of seconds."

"In course she will," said Mrs. O'Dwyer: "and happy too, av you'll
only say that you have a fancy, Father Bernard."

But Father Bernard would not own to any such fancy. The muffin, he
said, was quite to his liking, and so was the tea; and from the
manner in which he disposed of these delicacies, even Mrs. Townsend
might have admitted that this assertion was true, though she was
wont to express her belief that nothing but lies could, by any
possibility, fall from his mouth.

"And they have been staying with you now for some weeks, haven't
they?" said Father Barney.

"Off and on," said Fanny.

"But there's one of them mostly there, isn't he?" added the priest.

"The two of them is mostly there, just now. Sometimes one goes away
for a day or two, and sometimes the other."