Willy Burke, or, The Irish orphan in America - Digital Repository ...

50 WILLY BURKE; OR,
or should occupy, your whole evening. Has your mother
any particular object in sending for him, Willy ? for if
not, I fear she must excuse him for some days longer.
He is surely not a child, that she should fear to have him
out of her sight for a week or two".
" Why, then", said Willy, puzzled to know what he had
best say, " why, then, ma'am, I think she does want him
particularly. I hard her sayin' that she did".
" And might I ask", said Mrs. Watkins in her very
sweetest tones u and might I ask what this particular
purpose is, that it makes her so very urgent to see him?"
Willy hesitated, reddened, and looked at his brother
with an air as though he expected some help from him
in- his dilemma. But Peter only said, " Why don't you
gpeak, you foolish boy, an' not stand there like a fool ?
Sure its no treason, I hope".
" Well, then, my mother was sayin', Pether, that she
wants to have you go to your duty, an' that's all ; she's
afeard you might neglect it".
Mrs. Watkins affected ignorance. " To go to his duty ;
and what is that, pray ? What duty does the woman
mean?"
" Why, to go to his confession, ma'am !" said Willy
with a look of undisguised amazement. " I 'm goin',
plase God, some day this week, an' my mother thinks he
ought to go at the same time".
Here Mrs. Watkins burst into a loud laugh—douder
than she usually indulged in—while even her grave
husband, letting fall his book, was heard to utter a deep,
low sound that might be taken as a similar demonstration.
" Oh, if tha£ be the object", said the lady, when she.
had in some degree recovered her composure, " lessons