The Tuatha De Danaan

Auckland Star, Volume LXX, Issue 207, 2 September 1939, Page 6 (Supplement)

The Tuatha De Danaan

Long Short Story

IF once you come under Their

notice. They will never leave you go till the light is quenched trorn out of your eyes and songs and questions hushed in your throat.

If so be They take a fancy to you, it is snug and choice your days will be, dear gentlemen, but it is often They are not kind at all. Their behaviour is peevish and spiteful, and it i's not much use a man s life will be to him after Their attentions.

V\ Ito iire Thev, and whore do Thev live' I hoy 11 re the lords of tlie world that amis 1 hey are the Tuatha de Danaan, On pa, whose day was loud and golden day before ever the Children of the Gael came to disturb Ihein. nnd Their home is still in the hills find windy spaces of Ireland.

Very knowledpealile Thev are. and mischievous in Their ways. Red are the dreams I hey do dream, sitting in the twilight in thp slia|K! of an earthly man, or a hunch of wild cherries, or maybe an nss under the wall, for thov have the power t.» use any shape that pleases I hi'in.

l hev know all the tricks, and every card in I heir pile!; is a trump card. A mortal man with his poor cramp brains would never see the better of Them, and his eflorts would only set Them ing.

I here wns once a man who fell under Their hand fr.>m t ie minute he camo bawling info the earthly world. Michael Trulliber was his name. His parents' house was built on Their territory—a hoime "in the way," as we Ray of such unlucky dwelling places, and while the midwife was wiping the face of the little gossoon the half-door shot open and a tall fella came bowling into the house, a walking terror—red eyes in a lime-white face, and black hair flowing like a capo round his shoulders.

'I he poor mother let a scream when she saw the stranger standing over her childoen, giving it revengeful looks, and before the baby's da could raise voice or fist, the visitor had clapped his hand on the mite's head, saying the while: "It is ourselves will remember you. No mutter where you roam or who you league with, you will be in our memory. We are not fools to lie mocked at or meddled with, yon thick omadawns."

With that he quit off, and you could havo heard tlio hearts of the folk he left, behind creaking in their chests.

"What'll we do nflw?" groaned Mrs. Trulliber, and the midwife was like to burst gabbling chants and religious sayings to ward away the stranger's harm.

The baby's da kept a still tongue in his head, and went to the cupboard to beat up a hen egg in a glass of port wine to keep the grief from the heart of his moithercd wife, but he was a changed, melancholy man from that out, and woudn't he be, with his wife half-de-mented nfter, and the only child of his manhood getting "tlio touch" as we say of people under magic.

Michael Trulliber grew up lean, longnosed, and full of good intentions; but tho marvellous bad luck of his life made a sad creature of him.

A« a bojy he was always in the most perilous situations that ever robbed lad's face of its mirth and blew the whito into his hair. He'd be found up to his neck perishing in the bog, he'd be discovered fast drowning in a lake,

♦ "Doctor's Orders"

he'd be beard demented in the ditch, lynifr there with a broken leg, and when questioned concerning his plight, he d Kav that "something"' had put the comchether on him, and his misfortunes were Ho fault of his own.

In the class room five minutes he d been given a clean exercise book it; would be smothered with ink; if he was asked a simple r-uin the question put a g<i<l on his reason so that he stood there blubbering. and if be went out to plav a ball "nine it was a sure thing he'd be flat on his back before the first pass was made.

When lie was fourteen he went to work in a potato garden, but it wasn t long before a blight came on the crops and he farmer turned him nwnv.

Calamity came in his train wherever he was employed and at the last he stayed in his o\\ n home, afraid to touch pot, pen, or pick.

He was thirty years old when his parents died, and between them they left him a tidy legacy. With it he determined to leave Ireland and travel, hoping that in foreign parts be might escape his murderous fate. He got as far as Dublin, and liked the place so much he decided to stop there a while and watcn how his destiny went with him. 11l Dublin they gave him a rest and lie didn't see anything worse than himself.

A Strange Tale From Ireland

ByElizabeth Myers

Unmolested and unaffrighted he wandered through the streets of Dublin, standing a-gawp before the great churches that rise in nobility among farden-size houses and ramshackle clubrooms. He went out to Ratlimines and Kathgar where the handsome houses filled him with wonder —who'd never seen anything better than broken-down places in the country and parish churches the size of apple dumplings.

But 'twas the quays of Dublin took his fancy the most—all the bustle, the. comings-and-goings, the flying-gulls and whiffs of far foreign places that would delight him in a dram-shop or while he was standing at some windy corner on a night of rain.

In the end he gathered all his capital together and bought ail eating house with living rooms above, from which he could see and hear the shipping on the Liffey.

At the first, the custom broke his heart. It was hardly a sausage he sold or a pint of tea.

"They're at it again." he thought dismally. "My sorrow, will they ever leave me be, and give me a chance in the world?"

At a time when he was thinking of bankruptcy and cutting his throat, business mended.

Night after night his place was filled out with people eating and drinking; all gay and mirthful it was, and he had a busy time trying to get supplies in fast enough.

He had to get a license for intoxicants, the way they'd be bawling for booze, and it was all sorts of fancy and expensive drinks they were after, too.

He made good his losses, and it wasn't long till there was three hundred pounds in his small safe, and he congratulating himself that at long last the spells had wore away off him, and he could hold up his head like any Christian.

One afternoon when he'd closed his cafe for an hour or two so that he could visit an agency for the engaging of two lads to help him in the shop, he met an acquaintance who gave him a greeting and the wish that his business might increase.

"Trade's roaring, man," said Michael "I can't feed 'em fast enough."

"Feed who?" says the man

"Why me customers. The place is crammed out with 'em every night."

'"Tis a brave man you are, Michael Trulliber," said his friend, "niakin' light of your misfortune so. 'Twas only last night I passed your shop, and there wasn't a soul in it but yourself, dancing about behind the counter in a vain, wild way, tryin' to keep yourself warm, no doubt."

"Arra, you must have been drunk," replied Michael. "There were more people in last night than ever before. I'm goin' this minnnt to engage more staff, for I've more work to do than one man can manage. I'm thrivin'. In a few weeks I'll lie able to give it all up — for I've had my enough—an' travel the world."

His friend gave him a hard look. He repeated: "I was passin' your place last night, stone-cold sober, an' apart from yourself there wasn't a livin' soul in your cafe. The same happened last week, and the week before—for I've to pass down your way from the Wednesday night whist drives I go to, an' divil a man but yourself have I ever seen in your cafe." "It is mad words you are saving," cried Michael. "You're drinkin' too much, or else it is you want spectacles," and he walked away, more amused, than indignant. First thing Michael did when he got home was to look in his safe. Three hundred pounds of money was lying there—a fine comforting sight—and he gave a laugh of relief. "That's proof enough for anybody," he addressed a cat he had got in to keep mice away. "The Dear knows, there's people in this world would deny the light of day for the pleasure of liearin' themselves gab. (Jet out of me way now, pussy, I've a lot to do come evenin', an' the lads I've engaged can't start work till to-morrow."

That night a larger crowd than ever before came trooping between the two bay trees at the door into the cafe— big ladies with yellow hair, and medium men with 110 hair at all, all laughing and making good talk, giving tall orders and keeping my man skipping about among the terrines and tomato sauce.

At last he was able to snatch a quiet minute to himself arid sat down l>eliind the counter with a cup of tea and a sandwich.

He had lianlly begun life snack when the door of the place open, and a man walked across to the counter.

"Well," says he, "I've certainly helped you to make a goin' concern of this place."

Michael looked at liim—red eyes in a lime-white face, and long black hair flowing like a cape round his shoulders.

"I don't know what you're talkin' about," said Michael, feeling a cold gust round hit; heart. "I built up this business meself, with no help from you or anybody else."

"Is it to insult me you want?" cried the creature.

"I don't mind if I've done that," answered Michael. "Who are you, yourself, comin' into my place, so, roarin' and screechin', and' pretending you've gathered me customers together for me, you presumptious old strap, you!"

".Lovely, thanks!" said the man. "Lovely thanks for all I've done for YOU."

"You?" cried Michael, "you've done nothing at all, but make yourself a raping nuisance in my place. Go on! Get out of it, or I'll call in the peelers to vou."

"You're an ungrateful rip," shouted the man, "but I'll pay you back. I'll go, but I'll take my company with me, and never again will they make song and dance in your dwelling-place." So saying, he made for the door, and as he parsed through it, the company at the tables melted away, but they didn't go through the door.

Michael gazed round the empty room, the most confounded man drawing breath that night. All of a sudden he was struck by an unwholesome thought. Ho rushed to his safe and opened it— it was full of dry leaves. Then he knew that they had played another of their tricks upon him. " 'Tis small wonder me pal O'Shay couldn't see anybody in my shop," he mourned, "and it full of the supernatural an' the mean, the mocking and the damned!"

He broke into a wild cursing, and as as did so the lighta in the cafe faltered and failed.

"Even me electricity's gone," said Michael, untying the white apron off his hi pa.

He stood there in the dark, knowing himself to be ruined, listening to the shipping on the Liffey giving out the mournfulest crying, and a bough that tapped like a beak on the window-pane. Green gaslight from a street lamp flared into the room and long shadows reared and dipped on the walls.

It was then he felt that the company had come back and, invisible and silent. They were waiting in the dark—wait-

The furniture of his mind fell into great disorder then and his fear was enough to numb his very skeleton cowering under its suit of living flesh. He gave out a hard cry, took a mad run for the door, and —well, good grief —as he did so, the floor collapsed beneath him and ho fell into a kind of pit over which the place had been built.

In the morning the two lads he had engaged, coming to take up their new employment, found him lying there, broken-necked, dead.