“THE BAN DHU”

Manawatu Times, Volume 61, Issue 231, 30 September 1936, Page 7

“THE BAN DHU”

''yere doin’ in the room beyond, than Td find in the town. Well, I don’t care. 1 don’t want to live hero and have people calling me the Fairy Child, as if I wasn’t flesh and blood, the same as tho rest of them." ; The old woman looked at the rebel j In amazement. Kathleen waited for] a torrent of fury, but it did not come. "What's come over (he child at all? 1 I never thought to hear such wordsi from her mouth." ( t “No, gran, nor I didn't neither. ] Not until yesterday or to-day, maybe. ( ’Tis asleep I was, a child, sure enough. * But ’tis a woman I was, nearly, and ‘ not knowing it nor thinking about it.” j The old woman’s eyes narrowed. * Slie was not called ‘wise* for nothing. , “I sec,’ she said slowly. “I see. , There’s a man has come Into yere life ; that wasn't there before.” “There's not I henbut Kathleen’s i colour heightened, why, she did not; know. £ "It’s not Scan Burke, is it?" ques- : tioned her grandmother, not heeding' the denial. r "You know about him. What did c I say on the wolfe’s skull?" 1 "An’ it’s not that wan with his fair ! talk to-day,, is it?" ( “'Him? Faith ’tis not.” ( "W ho else did you meet then that , made you change all of a sudden?” I met none other but the strange . gentleman that’s up at the big house, ; an I only saw him for a few minutes, c I tell you," she burst out, "’Tis no i man I’m thinking about, It is the big world; (hat’s what it is that’s calling t me!” 1 Aye, so you say," said her grand t mother, shaking her head, "but I ' know more than you do, child, for all { you think yerself so clever. The : world may be callin’ you as you say, ' but there's a man that’s the halt on ' the hook. Don’t I know the.heart of * a 1 was J’oung mcself once.” ' There's no man I tell you, gran." * “ ni say no more, but I’ll think as I j will. You’ve got your home where ‘

you were born and bred, an’ I’ve kept , you since your father and mother died, God rest them, and I’ve watched ye ; grow. i tell ye, my girl, go soft an' go slow. There’s hot blood in your veins, come from them that went be- 1 fore ye; hot an’ wild, and I see it now, wakin’ it is from where it has been e sleepin’ in your heart!” Kathleen was stirred and shaken by ! the old woman’s eloquence, but the 5 newly awakened emotions, so long 1 dormant and unknown, ever to her- ' self, could not lightly be suppressed. ' I know, gran, ail that you say may ' be true, most likely it is, but there’s something acalling me, and I must " answer it.” c

Mrs MacMorrough had made her appeal, and she had failed. Never before had the Fairy Child stood up against her will—never Questioned it. Rage gripped her, rage that her influence had waned so greatly and so fast. Still, she suppressed herself and made one more effort. “And ye would leave me? Me that has cared for you ail these years?” “It wouldn’t be leaving you, gran ” Kathleen parried, “to go away for’a little; perhaps not even to go away, for to try this new way for myseif Isn’t leaving you. If I went, I’d come back again, surely." “Come back again, would ye?” sneered the old woman, “a broken rope never mends the same. Ye’d come back, perhaps, soiled an’ stained an ragged, like the poor outcast you’d be—ldlin’ me that I was right after all—as if I didn’t know that all along. Sure ’tis obliged to you I’d be,’’ with a mock curtsy, “tollin’ me I was the wise one after it was too late.” “What must be, must be, gran. What would be the good of it for any of us it I was to stay here all my life, eating my heart out for what I couldn’t get? Sorry help, or comfort I’d be to you if my heart wasn’t here." “Curse them that came and woke ye,” railed (he crone. “Haven’t I had sorrow and tears enough in my own life that I'd want to' see them coming into yours? You’re over young yet, girl—an’ I was as young as you—an’ handsomer too when—well, never mind. I’ve lived, for two things] an’ you arc one of them—a great lady

I’d have made of ye yet. I never said that to ye before, but it was in my mind to do it; an’ now you would turn fronr lie an’ go yore own way, not knowin' where it would take ve. 3s that the last word I have from ye, , o” ■ “You know what I said, gran, the heart of me is torn into it will he more tom if jouie not said by me.* . “I’ll be all the comfort I can to you, S ran, In,l I'm mate. You said It yourself just now.” The old woman stood up. She looked as Kathleen had seen her when she came from the secret room: taller than anyone would have guessed her to he, with something of the majesty of an old queen. She spoke calmly, hiding the tire tint raged within her. “I’ see. There's no more to ] )e ~ ~ . ~ , sa |d hem Tes, there is, though You th.nk to have me beat, don t yc? believe nothin of what ton \ e heard of me. You think that 1 11 sit down and cry over the turf fire in the corner as if I was one of them poor folks that do the like when their young ones, go away to Ameriky. They’re right to do that; what else are they fit for only to take what money comes to them in letters?'You think I’m like them don’t ye, knowin' nothin’?” “No, gran, "indeed I don’t. You know i don’t.” “You’re actin’ as if yc did. Go out, girl, an’ leave me. I have things T, t 0 i>r i -in . it „ -vi-.iii , . . Go, l tell Ye. VVc 11 see who s .the strongest. . She pointed to the door. “What are you going to do, gran?” The girl was frightened and trembling at the sudden change of front. . “Time will tell. Be hack in time for lea. Make it yourself If I’m not here.” Kathleen went, impelled by the command in spile of herself. ■Mrs MacMorrough waited until she saw iicr go slowly towards the hill.

(By Desmoed Lough)

Instalment 13.

Then she went to her secret room. CHAPTER XII-I. Mrs MacMorrough. her face set grimly, opened Die door in the wall and entered the little room beyond and bolted it behind her. It was a strange place. If the villagers had seen it It would have added much to their awe of the old woman. Confusion was everywhere, but perhaps it was ordered confusion. At all events the owner knew where to lay her hand on anything she wanted. On a shelf lay her pipes. A little fireplace was in one corner. Over it a tin chimney, funnelled at the bottom to carry off smoke, thrust its top through the roof. On oilier shelves were a few old books and many bottles, jars and bowls of glass and earthenware. In a cupboard, close to the fire, were two or three pots of different sizes. One of them, on a shelf by Itself, as if in the place of honour, was an ancient bronze cauldron which would have been welcome in any museum. Here was the pharmacy of cures and potions that brought relief to many a sore limb and aching body, be It human or animal. Thero were oilier things too, supposed to bring case to aching hearts. As has been already said, all that Knockarra . knew of the wise woman was good. She healed, she did no evil that any of the villagers knew of, yet they all feared her power for ill if she chose to use It, a power that their r ears had created for her. She went to the shelf on which tho bottles and jars were arranged, and fingered one after another. Even though none could see her, she left what siie wanted most to investigate to the last. It was a small hut strongly made cupboard of oak, block with age. It was secreted behind ill bottles. These she set aside .md, taking a key from a cord which she

wore round her neck, she opened it. In it were three or four small flasks of strange shapes. On them were pasted labels on which various marks were scribbled; only their owner could tell what it meant. She took out a flask and held it up to the light. Only a little liquid, like water, was in it. “That will be enough," she muttered. Then she took up another. It was empty. “!• thought so. Too long It has been there and ’tis dried up it is. I must get some more. To-night I must -get it, when the moon is in the first quarter—at the Witch’s Rock. Well it is the moon is new or I'd have to wait a month. Then it would be too late maybe 1 'Tis come to me that she’ll want it soon, the little fool! Set on her own way she Is."

The old woman talked to herself in an undertone. “I could kill them with this,” she went on, taking up another flask, ‘‘but I'll have no blood on my hands. Only one blood I'd welcome there—but that is not to be yet—maybe never.” Her search ended, she took her pipes from the shelf and sat down by the ashes of the fire. The chair, like most of the other things In the room, was of black oak. It was heavily built and carved with quaint designs, relics of apagan days—another thing that would have been a treasure for a museum. The music of the pipes began very softly, for she would not that any passer-by should hear them, not that many passed by that quiet cottage. She swayed to and fro in time to the sad music, which sounded like a fairy lullaby. After a time, the sounds grew disjointed and then ceased —the old woman was asleep. The thin, clawlike hands lay in her lap; she made a rather fearsome sight, reclining there, her withered breast rising and falling, but one could see that she told the truth when she said that she had once been beautiful. As for Kathleen, she made for one of her favourite nooks. She was a thing of moods—one day the wild mountain side called her, where heather and furze bushes trembled in the breezes that carried with them the salt of the Atlantic; on another day, some bracken-scented nest would be more to her liking. There was ever a refuge to welcome her and her thoughts. She never asked herself why she liked this place or that; she could not have answered the question had she done so.

To-day, shaken and trembling after her encounter with her grandmother, slie SOL 'obt a quiet haven, m soing up to the pool, Jonny, to try my hl r o | { al , t'* o , aft , ernoon rlse > announced Lionel at lunch. - “ J ° nny ’ upon my W01 ' dl ” smiled T ho new name pleased her. It s ] lo wed dm opening of a more familiar chapter in their lives. Heretofore she pori Always been ‘Johanna 1 ••somclwtly "ailed me Xl,'" ha ratoricd laughing. “Tit-for-tat, miss.” “Doesn’t the name suit you, bearest?” asked Johanna demurely, "Certainly not! I’m the living personi lira lion of truth, but, such is my fl ' vc i°r the young lady that uttered lb*? libel, that I never even squealed, ** lll delighted to hear about the liadn L noticed it. “What a pair ol kids you are said Pl . eslwi ' h> “ Nc vcr mind, you can only bc yomjg onec . rm gla d, Lionel, |j ia j. showing you my rods has bitten you the desire to he a llsherman. You’ll be stopping here pretty often—■ a p em —afterwards, I suppose. There are quite good trout, up in the pool, up to a pound, or even more occasionally. Eighteen ounces is my record." “What about that big one that got away, Dad?” asked Johanna slyly, “I’m .not going to rise to that fly, Miss Impudence. Of course I’ve lost 0110 °!’ Dvo sood ones, but none bigger Man Mat, 1 think. ’ “ vvhcn yol J cie J ™ s ° ln ° put ‘Here lies a beautiful fisherman 011 your tombstone.” “Sounds contradictory, my dear." ..j intended lt tO ,” laughed Johanna, “that’s what’s called the noble art of hedging." “Are y oll coming up with me, mademoiselle?” asked Lionel, “so that you can see what I catch and what I lose, and so take care of my morals, lest my enthusiasm should outrun my truthfulness." “No, not to-day, I' think. If I feel frisky I might, mind 1 only say I might, go up later, hut I don’t think Thanks to that not very estimabl*