He could hear the ring of her laugh as she told him Irish stories, and the soft drone of her voice as she sang him old Irish songs.

It was she who told him about the fairies and witches that lived up behind the peat-flames.

He remembered holding her hand and putting his cheek against it when the goblins came too near.

Then the picture would go out, like a picture in a magic-lantern show, and sometimes Sandy could make it come back, and sometimes he could not.
After that came a succession of memories, but none of them held the silent father and the merry mother and the little white house on the heath.

They were of new faces and new places, of temporary homes with relatives in Ireland and Scotland, of various schools and unceasing work.