"Make haste, make haste!" says one, in a doleful voice; "their supper's gettin' cowld."
Hearing these words, Bridget imagetly bounced out, an' was half way up the steps before Darby could ketch her an' hould her till the childher came up.
"I never in all my life saw her so owdacious," he says, half cryin', an' linkin' her arm to keep her back, an' thin, with the childher follying two by two, according to size, the whole family payraded up the steps, till Darby, with a gasp of deloight, stopped on the thrashol of a splendid hall. From a high ceiling hung great flags from every nation an' domination, which swung and swayed in the dazzlin' light.
Two lines of men and maid servants dhressed in silks an' satins an' brocades, stood facing aich other, bowing an' smiling an' wavin' their hands in welcome. The two lines stretched down to the goold stairway at the far ind of the hall.
For half of one minute Darby, every eye in his head as big as a tay-cup, stood hesitaytin'. Thin he said, "Why should it flutther me? Arrah, ain't it all mine? Aren't all these people in me pay? I'll engage it's a pritty penny all this grandeur is costing me to keep up this minute." He trew out his chist. "Come on, Bridget!" he says; "let's go into the home of my ansisthers."
Howandever, scarcely had he stepped into the beautiful place whin two pipers with their pipes, two fiddlers with their fiddles, two flute-players with their flutes, an' they dhressed in scarlet an' goold, stepped out in front of him, and thus to maylodius music the family proudly marched down the hall, climbed up the goolden stairway at its ind, an' thin turned to enter the biggest room Darby had ever seen.
Something in his sowl whuspered that this was the picture-gallery.
"Be the powers of Pewther!" says the knowledgeable man to himself, "I wouldn't be in Bridget's place this minute for a hatful of money! Wait, oh just wait, till she has to compare her own relations with my own foine people! I know how she'll feel, but I wondher what she'll say," he says.
The thought that all the unjust things, all the unraysonable things Bridget had said about his kith an' kin were just going to be disproved and turned against herself, made him proud an' almost happy.
But wirrasthrue! He should have raymembered his own adwise not to make nor moil nor meddle with the fairies, for here he was to get the first hard welt from the little Leprechaun.
It was the picture-gallery sure enough, but how terribly different everything was from what the poor lad expected. There on the left wall, grand an' noble, shone the pictures of Bridget's people. Of all the well-dressed, handsome, proud-appearing persons in the whole worruld, the O'Hagans an' the O'Shaughnessys would compare with the best. This was a hard enough crack, though a crushinger knock was to come. Ferninst them on the right wall glowered the O'Gills and the O'Gradys, and of all the ragged, sheep-stealing, hangdog-looking villains one ever saw in jail or out of jail, it was Darby's kindred.
The place of honour on the right wall was given to Darby's fourth cousin, Phelem McFadden, an' he was painted with a pair of handcuffs on him. Wullum O'Gill had a squint in his right eye, and his thin legs bowed like hoops on a barrel.
If you have ever at night been groping your way through a dark room, and got a sudden, hard bump on the forehead from the edge of the door, you can undherstand the feelings of the knowledgeable man.
"Take that picture out!" he said, hoarsely, as soon as he could speak. "An' will someone kindly inthrojuice me to the man who med it? Bekase," he says, "I intend to take his life! There was never a crass-eyed O'Gill since the world began," says he.
Think of his horror an' surprise whin he saw the left eye of Wullum O'Gill twist itself slowly over toward his nose and squint worse than the right eye.
Purtending not to see this, an' hoping no one else did, Darby fiercely led the way over to the other wall.
Fronting him stood the handsome picture of Honoria O'Shaughnessy, an' she dhressed in a shuit of tin clothes like the knights of ould used to wear—armour I think they calls it.
She hildt a spear in her hand with a little flag on the blade, an' her smile was proud and high.
"Take that likeness out, too," says Darby, very spiteful; "that's not a dacint shuit of clothes for any woman to wear!"
The next minute you might have knocked him down with a feather, for the picture of Honoria O'Shaughnessy opened its mouth an' stuck out its tongue at him.
"The supper's getting cowld, the supper's getting cowld!" someone cried at the other ind of the picture-gallery. Two big doors were swung open, an' glad enough was our poor hayro to folly the musicianers down to the room where the ating an' drinking were to be thransacted.
This was a little room with lots of looking-glasses, and it was bright with a thousand candles, and white with the shiningist marble. On the table was biled beef an' reddishes an' carrots an' roast mutton an' all kinds of important ating an' drinking. Beside there stood fruits an' sweets an'—but, sure, what is the use in talkin'?
A high-backed chair stood ready for aich of the family, an' 'twas a lovely sight to see them all whin they were sitting there—Darby at the head, Bridget at the foot, the childher—the poor little paythriarchs—sitting bolt upright on aich side, with a bewigged and befrilled serving-man standing haughty behind every chair.
The atin' and dhrinkin' would have begun at once—in throth there was already a bit of biled beef on Darby's plate—only that he spied a little silver bell beside him. Sure, 'twas one like those the quality keep to ring whin they want more hot wather for their punch, but it puzzled the knowledgeable man, and 'twas the beginning of his misfortune.
"I wondher," he thought, "if 'tis here for the same raison as the bell is at the Curragh races—do they ring this one so that all at the table will start ating and dhrinking fair, an' no one will have the advantage, or is it," he says to himself agin, "to ring whin the head of the house thinks everyone has had enough. Haven't the quality quare ways! I'll be a long time learning them," he says.
He sat silent and puzzling an' staring at the biled beef on his plate, afeard to start in without ringing the bell, an' dhreadin' to risk ringing it. The grand sarvants towered cowldly on every side, their chins tilted, but they kep' throwing over their chowlders glances so scornful and haughty that Darby shivered at the thought of showing any uncultivaytion.
While our hayro sat thus in unaisy contimplation an' smouldherin' mortification an' flurried hesitaytion a powdhered head was poked over his chowlder, and a soft, beguiling voice said, "Is there anything else you'd wish for?"
The foolish lad twisted in his chair, opened his mouth to spake, and gave a look at the bell; shame rushed to his cheeks, he picked up a bit of the biled beef on his fork, an' to consale his turpitaytion gave the misfortunit answer:
"I'd wish for a pinch of salt, if you plaze," says he.
'Twas no sooner said than came the crash. Oh, tunderation an' murdheration, what a roaring crash it was! The lights winked out together at a breath an' left a pitchy, throbbing darkness. Overhead and to the sides was a roaring, smashing, crunching noise, like the ocean's madness when the winthry storm breaks agin the Kerry shore, an' in that roar was mingled the tearing and the splitting of the walls and the falling of the chimneys. But through all this con-fusion could be heard the shrill, laughing woice of the Leprechaun. "The clever man med his fourth grand wish," it howled.
Darby—a thousand wild woices screaming an' mocking above him—was on his back kicking and squirming and striving to get up, but some load hilt him down, an' something bound his eyes shut.
"Are you kilt, Bridget asthore?" he cried; "where are the childher?" he says.
Instead of answer there suddenly flashed a fierce an' angry silence, an' its quickness frightened the lad more than all the wild confusion before.
'Twas a full minute before he dared to open his eyes to face the horrors which he felt were standing about him; but when courage enough to look came, all he saw was the night-covered mountain, a purple sky, and a thin, new moon, with one
trembling goold star a hand's space above its bosom.
Darby struggled to his feet. Not a stone of the castle was left, not a sod of turf but what was in its ould place; every sign of the little cobbler's work had melted like April snow. The very threes Darby had seen pulled up by the roots that same afternoon now stood a waving blur below the new moon, an' a nightingale was singing in their branches. A cricket chirped lonesomely on the same fallen log which had hidden the Leprechaun.
"Bridget! Bridget!" Darby called agin an' agin. Only a sleepy owl on a distant hill answered.
A shivering thought jumped into the boy's bewildered sowl—maybe the Leprechaun had stolen Bridget an' the childher.
The poor man turned, and for the last time darted down into the night-filled walley.
Not a pool in the road he waited to go around, not a ditch in his path he didn't leap over, but ran as he never ran before till he raiched his own front door.
His heart stood still as he peeped through the window. There were the childher croodled around Bridget, who sat with the youngest asleep in her lap before the fire, rocking back an' forth, an' she crooning a happy, continted baby-song.
Tears of gladness crept into Darby's eyes as he looked in upon her. "God bless her!" he says to himself. "She's the flower of the O'Hagans and the O'Shaughnessys, and she's a proud feather in the caps of the O'Gills and the O'Gradys."
'Twas well he had this happy thought to cheer him as he lifted the door-latch, for the manest of all the little cobbler's spiteful thricks waited in the house to meet Darby—nayther Bridget nor the childher raymembered a single thing of all that had happened to them during the day. They were willing to make their happydavitts that they had been no farther than their own petatie-patch since morning.
-
The Convarsion of Father Cassidy
I TOULD you how on cowld winther nights whin Bridget and the childher were in bed, ould Brian Connors, King of the Fairies, used to sit visitin' at Darby O'Gill's own fireside. But I never tould you of the wild night whin the King faced Father Cassidy there.
* * * * * * *
Darby O'Gill sat at his own kitchen fire the night afther Mrs. Morrisey's burying, studyin' over a gr-r-reat daybate that was heldt at her wake.
Half-witted Red Durgan begun it be asking loud an' sudden of the whole company, "Who was the greatest man that ever lived in the whole worruld? I want to know purtic'lar, an' I'd like to know at once," he says.
At that the day liberations started.
Big Joey Hooligan, the smith, hildt out for Julius Sayser, bekase Sayser had throunced the widdy woman Clayopathra.
Maurteen Cavanaugh, the little schoolmaster, stood up for Bonyparte, an' wanted, to fight Dinnis Moriarity for disputin' agin the Frenchman.
Howsumever, the starter of the rale excitement was ould Mrs. Clancy. She was not what you'd call a great histhorian, but the parish thought her a foine, sinsible woman. She said that the greatest man was Nebbycodnazer, the King of the Jews, who ate grass like a cow and grew fat on it.
"Could Julius Sayser or Napoleon Bonyparte do as much?" she axed.
Well, purty soon everyone was talking at once, hurling at aich other, as they would pavin'-stones, the names of poets an' warriors an' scholars.
But afther all was said an' done, the mourners wint away in the morning with nothing settled.
So the night afther, while Darby was warming his shins before his own turf fire in deep meditaytion and wise cogitaytion and ca'm contemplaytion over these high conversaytions, the Master of the Good People flew ragin' into the kitchen.
"Darby O'Gill, what do you think of your wife Bridget?" says he, fiercely.
"Faix, I don't know what particular thing she's done," says Darby, rubbing his shins and lookin' troubled, "but I can guess it's something mighty disagrayable. She wore her blue petticoat and her brown shawl whin she went away this morning, and I always expect ructions whin she puts on that shuit of clothes. Thin agin, she looked so sour and so satisfied whin she came back that I'm worried bad in my mind; you don't know how uncomfortable she can make things sometimes, quiet as she looks," says he.
"And well you may be worried, dacint man!" says the ruler of Sleive-na-mon; "you'll rage and you'll roar whin ye hear me. She wint this day to Father Cassidy and slandhered me outrageous," he says. "She tould him that you and Maureen were colloguing with a little ould, wicked, thieving fairy-man, and that if something wasn't done at once agin him the sowls of both of ye would be desthroyed entirely."
Whin Darby found 'twas not himself that was being bothered, but only the King, he grew aisier in his feelings. "Sure you wouldn't mind women's talk," says he, waving his hand in a lofty way. "Many a good man has been given a bad name by them before this, and will be agin—you're not the first by any manes," says he. "If Bridget makes you a bad repitation, think how many years you have to live it down in. Be sinsible, King!" he says.
"But I do mind, and I must mind!" bawled the little fairy-man, every hair and whusker bristling, "for this minute Father Cassidy is putting the bridle and saddle on his black hunter, Terror; he has a prayer-book in his pocket, and he's coming to read prayers over me and to banish me into the say. Hark! listen to that," he says.
As he spoke, a shrill little voice broke into singing outside the window.
-
"Oh, what'll you do if the kittle biles over,
Sure, what'll you do but fill it agin;
Ah, what'll you do if you marry a sojer,
But pack up your clothes and go marchin' with him."
-
"That's the signal!" says the King, all excited; "he's coming and I'll face him here at this hearth, but sorrow foot he'll put over that threshol' till I give him lave. Then we'll have it out face to face like men ferninst this fire!"
Whin Darby heard those words great fright struck him.
"If a hair of his Riverence's head be harmed," he says, " 'tis not you but me and my generation'll be blamed for it. Plaze go back to Sleive-na-mon this night, for pace and quietness sake!" he begged.
While Darby spoke, the fairy-man was fixing one stool on top of another undher the window.
"I'll sit at this window," says the Master of the Good People, wagging his head threateningly, "and from there I'll give me ordhers. The throuble he's thrying to bring on others is the throuble I'll throuble him with. If he comes dacint, he'll go dacint; if he comes bothering, he'll go bothered," says he.
Faith, thin, your Honour, the King spoke no less than the truth, for at that very minute Terror, as foine a horse as ever followed hounds, was galloping down the starlit road to Darby's house, and over Terror's mane bent as foine a horseman as ever took a six-bar gate—Father Cassidy.
On and on through the moonlight they clattered, till they came in sight of Darby's gate, where, unseen and onwisible, a score of the Good People, with thorns in their fists, lay sniggering and laughing, waiting for the horse. Of course the fairies couldn't harm the good man himself, but Terror was complately at their marcy.
"We'll not stop to open the gate, Terror," says his Riverence, patting the baste's neck. "I'll give you a bit of a lift with the bridle-rein, and a touch like that on the flank, and do you clear it, my swallow-bird."
Well, sir, the priest riz in his stirrups, lifted the rein, and Terror crouched for the spring, whin, with a sudden snort of pain, the baste whirled round and started like the wind back up the road.
His Riverence pulled the horse to its haunches and swung him round once more facing the cottage. Up on his hind feet went Terror and stood crazy for a second, pawing the air, then with a cry of rage and pain in his throat, the baste turned, made a rush for the hedge at the roadside, and cleared it like an arrow.
Now, just beyant the hedge was a bog so thin that the geese wouldn't walk on it, and so thick that the ducks couldn't swim in it. Into the middle of that cowld pond Terror fell with a splash and a crash.
That minute the King climbed dow
n from the window splitting with laughter. "Darby," he says, slapping his knees, "Father Cassidy is floundhering about in the bog outside. He's not hurt, but he's mighty cowld and uncomfortable. Do you go and make him promise not to read any prayers this night, then bring him in. Tell him that if he don't promise, by the piper that played before Moses, he may stay reading his prayers in the bog till morning, for he can't get out unless some of my people go in and help him!" says the King.
Darby's heart began hammerin' agin his ribs as though it were making heavy horseshoes.
"If that's so, I'm a ruined man!" he says. "I'd give tunty pounds rather than face him now!" says he.
Darby O'Gill and the Good People Page 4
