Michael (moodily, sitting down and beginning to work at a tin can). Great love, surely.

Sarah (eagerly). Make a great blaze now, Michael Byrne.

The Priest comes in on right; she comes forward in front of him.

Sarah (in a very plausible voice). Good evening, your reverence. It’s a grand fine night, by the grace of God.

Priest. The Lord have mercy on us! What kind of a living woman is it that you are at all?

Sarah. It’s Sarah Casey I am, your reverence, the Beauty of Ballinacree, and it’s Michael Byrne is below in the ditch.

Priest. A holy pair, surely! Let you get out of my way. (He tries to pass by.)

Sarah (keeping in front of him). We are wanting a little word with your reverence.

Priest. I haven’t a halfpenny at all. Leave the road, I’m saying.

Sarah. It isn’t a halfpenny we’re asking, holy father; but we were thinking maybe we’d have a right to be getting married; and we were thinking it’s yourself would marry us for not a halfpenny at all; for you’re a kind man, your reverence, a kind man with the poor.

Priest (with astonishment). Is it marry you for nothing at all?

Sarah. It is, your reverence; and we were thinking maybe you’d give us a little small bit of silver to pay for the ring.

Priest (loudly). Let you hold your tongue; let you be quiet, Sarah Casey. I’ve no silver at all for the like of you; and if you want to be married, let you pay your pound. I’d do it for a pound only, and that’s making it a sight cheaper than I’d make it for one of my own pairs is living here in the place.

Sarah. Where would the like of us get a pound, your reverence?

Priest. Wouldn’t you easy get it with your selling asses, and making cans, and your stealing east and west in Wicklow and Wexford and the county Meath? (He tries to pass her.) Let you leave the road, and not be plaguing me more.

Sarah (Pleadingly, taking money from her pocket). Wouldn’t you have a little mercy on us, your reverence? (Holding out money.) Wouldn’t you marry us for a half a sovereign, and it a nice shiny one with a view on it of the living king’s mamma?

Priest. If it’s ten shillings you have, let you get ten more the same way, and I’ll marry you then.

Sarah (whining). It’s two years we are getting that bit, your reverence, with our pence and our halfpence and an odd three-penny bit; and if you don’t marry us now, himself and the old woman, who has a great drouth, will be drinking it to-morrow in the fair (she puts her apron to her eyes, half sobbing), and then I won’t be married any time, and I’ll be saying till I’m an old woman: “It’s a cruel and a wicked thing to be bred poor.”

Priest (turning up towards the fire). Let you not be crying, Sarah Casey. It’s a queer woman you are to be crying at the like of that, and you your whole life walking the roads.