The Wind Bloweth Part 31

"A strange woman is in it, your Honor; a strange and dark woman."

"An old lady?"

"If she was one of us, she would be an old woman, your Honor, what with the bitter work and the hard ways. But being what she is, she is a young woman, your Honor. I heard tell she said she was thirty-four."

"Is she good-looking?"

"Well, now, your Honor, that would surely be a hard thing to say. A great dark face she has on her, and her head high, the like of a grand horse. Barring her eyes, you might call her a fine woman."

"What's wrong with her eyes?"

"Hard eyes she has, your Honor, hating eyes. She's always looking at you to see if it is an enemy is in it. A queer woman, your Honor; the like of her was never known."

"But how?"

"The talk that's at her, your Honor. The great hatred she bes having of England, and the talk of old Irish times."

"And she a lady?"

"You'd think it was a queen was in it, with the high head of her, and the proud step of a racing horse. You would, your Honor, you would so."

He asked the admiral about her.

"Do you know this Miss O'Malley, sir, of Tusa hErin?"

"I had the honor to meet her twice, Campbell. A very great woman. A great loss, Campbell, a great loss."

"Who is she, sir?"

"Good G.o.d! Do you mean to tell me you don't know who Grace O'Malley is?"

"No, sir, I don't."

"One of the greatest Shaksperian actresses, possibly, the English stage ever knew--and you never heard of her. Good G.o.d! How abominably ignorant you merchant marine men are!"

"Abominably so, sir ... But please tell me, sir, why does she hate England so much?"

"Oh, these geniuses, Campbell! They must hate something, or love something to excess ... Depths of feeling, I suppose ... Campbell, do you know anything about Ogham writing?"

"Only that it's straight lines on the corners of stones, sir!"

"Well, now, I think I've discovered something important, most terribly important ... You may have heard of the Babylonian cuneiform script ..."

and the old gentleman was off full gallop on his hobby ...

From Simon Fowler he extracted a little more information.

"Fowler, do you know Miss O'Malley of Tusa hErin?"

"I do, poor lady."

"Why poor lady?"

"Wouldn't you call any one poor lady who had just been widowed, then lost her two children? Poor lady, I wish I could say something to comfort her."

"You! Fowler! You couldn't say anything?"

"The wisdom of G.o.d, Shane, is sometimes very hard to see. Our physical eyes can only see a little horizon, and yet the whole world is behind it. Miss O'Malley is not a case for any of the ministers of G.o.d ... but for Himself ..."

"You exaggerate, Fowler. Surely you are wrong ... They say she is young and proud and beautiful."

"I don't know. I never noticed ... She may be young and proud and beautiful ... I only thought of the dark hara.s.sed thing--inside all the youth and pride and beauty ..."

-- 5

He met her for the first time at a neighboring fair ...

Eleven on a hot June morning, and the little town was crowded, like some old-time immigrant s.h.i.+p. Women in plaid shawls and frilled caps, men in somber black as befitted a monthly occasion. Squawking of ducks and hens, trudging of donkeys, creaking of carts, unbelievably stubborn bullocks and heifers being whacked by ash-plants, colts frisking. Girls with baskets of eggs and b.u.t.ter; great carts of hay and straw.

Apple-women with bonnets of cabbage-leaves against the sun. Herring-men bawling like auctioneers. Squealing of young pigs. An old clothes dealer hoa.r.s.e with effort. A ballad singer split the air with an English translation of _Bean an Fhir Ruaidh_, "The Red-haired Man's Wife."

Ye Muses Nine, Combine, and lend me your aid, Until I raise the praise of a beautiful maid--

The crash of a drover driving home a bargain:

"Hold out your hand now, by G.o.d! till I be after making you an offer.

Seven pound ten, now. h.e.l.l to my soul if I give you another ha' penny.

Wait now. I 'll make it seven pound fifteen."

"Is it insulting the fine decent beast you are?"

"Eight pounds five and ten s.h.i.+llings back for a luck-penny?"

"Is it crazy you've gone all of a sudden, dealing man. If the gentle creature was in Dublin town, sure they'd be hanging blue ribbons around her neck until she wilted with the weight of them."

"It's hanging their hats on the bones of her they'd be, and them sticking out the like of branches from a bush."

"Yerra Jasus! Do you hear the man, and her round as a bottle from the fine filling feeding. You could walk your s.h.i.+n-bones off to the knee, and you'd not find a cow as has had the treatment of this cow. Let you be on our way now."

"Look, honest man. Put out your hand, and wait till I spit on my fist--"

Through the doors of Michael Doyle's public house a young farmer walked uncertainly. He gently swung a woman's woolen stocking in his right hand, and in the foot of the stocking was a large round stone:

"I am young Packy McGee of Ballymoyle," he announced, "the son of old Packy McGee of Ballymoyle, a great man in his day, but never the equal of young Packy McGee. I have gone through Scotland and Ireland, Wales, the harvest fields of England, and I have never yet found the equal for murder and riot of young Packy McGee. I am young Packy McGee. I am young Packy McGee of Ballymore, and I don't care who knows it. Is there any decent man in this fair that considers himself the equal of young Packy McGee?" And he walked through the fair, chanting his litany and gently swinging the woman's woolen stocking with the large round stone in the foot of it ...

The penny poet changed from the high grace notes of "The Red-Haired Man's Wife" to the surge of a come-all-ye. There was the undercurrent of a pipe drone to his voice:

Fare-you-well, Enniskillen, fare-you-well for a while, All round the borders of Erin's green isle And when the war 's over return I shall soon, And your arms will be o-o-open for your Enniskillen Dragoon.

In the intervals between verses a black-bearded man with blue spectacles announced solemnly that he was Professor Handley direct from English and German universities, empowered by the Rosicrucian order to distribute a remarkable panacea at the nominal sum of sixpence a bottle ...