RED HANRAHAN

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    Hanrahan, the hedge saster, a tall, strong, red?haired young man, came into the barn where some of the men of the village were sitting on Samhai had been a dwelling?house, and when the man that ow had built a better one, he had put the two rooms together, a it for a place to store ohing or ahere was a fire on the old hearth, and there were dip dles stu bottles, and there was a black quart bottle upon some boards that had been put across two barrels to make a table. Most of the men were sitting beside the fire, and one of them was singing a long wandering song, about a Munster man and a aught man that were quarrelling about their two provinces.

    Hanrahao the man of the house and said, I got your message; but when he had said that, he stopped, for an old mountainy man that had a shirt and trousers of unbleached flannel, and that was sitting by himself  he door, was looking at him, and moving an old pack of cards about in his hands and muttering. Dont mind him, said the man of the house; he is only some stranger came in awhile ago, and we bade him wele, it being Samhain night, but I think he is not in his right wits. Listen to him now and you will hear what he is saying.

    They listehen, and they could hear the old man muttering to himself as he turhe cards, Spades and Diamonds, Ce and Power; Clubs as, Knowledge and Pleasure.

    That is the kind of talk he has been going on with for the last hour, said the man of the house, and Hanrahan turned his eyes from the old man as if he did not like to be looking at him.

    I got your message, Hanrahan said t..hen; "he is in the barn with his three first cousins from Kilchriest," the messenger said, "and there are some of the neighbours with them."

    It is my cousihere is wanting to see you, said the man of the house, and he called over a young frieze?coated man, who was listening to the song, and said, This is Red Hanrahan you have the message for.

    It is a kind message, indeed, said the young man, for it es from your sweetheart, Mary Lavelle.

    How would you get a message from her, and what do you know of her?

    I dont know her, indeed, but I was in Loughrea yesterday, and a neighbour of hers that had some dealings with me was saying that she bade him send you word, if he met any one from this side in the market, that her mother has died from her, and if you have a mio join with herself, she is willing to keep her word to you.

    I will go to her indeed, said Hanrahan.

    And she bade you make no delay, for if she has not a man in the house before the month is out, it is likely the little bit of land will be givbbr>藏书网</abbr>en to another.

    When Hanrahan heard that, he rose up from the bench he had sat down on. I will make no delay indeed, he said, there is a full moon, and if I get as far as Gilchreist to?night, I will reach to her before the setting of the sun to?morrow.

    Whehers heard that, they began to laugh at him for being in such haste to go to his sweetheart, and one asked him if he would leave his school in the old lime?kiln, where he was giving the children such good learning. But he said the children would be glad enough in the m to find the place empty, and no oo keep them at their task; and as for his school he could set it up again in any place, having as he had his little inkpot hanging from his neck by a , and his big Virgil and his primer in the skirt of his coat.

    Some of them asked him to drink a glass before he went, and a young man caught hold of his coat, and said he must not leave them without singing the song he had made in praise of Venus and of Mary Lavelle. He drank a glass of whiskey, but he said he would not stop but would set out on his journey.

    Theres time enough, Red Hanrahan, said the man of the house. It will be time enough for you to give up sport when you are after your marriage, and it might be a long time before we will see you again.

    I will not stop, said Hanrahan; my mind would be on the roads all the time, bringio the woman that sent for me, and she lonesome and watg till I e.

    Some of the others came about him, pressing him that had been such a pleasant rade, so full of songs and  every kind of trid fun, not to leave them till the night would be over, but he refused them all, and shook them off, ao the door. But as he put his foot over the threshold, the strange old man stood up and put his hand that was thin and withered like a birds claw on Hanrahans hand, and said: It is not Hanrahan, the learned man and the great songmaker, that should go out from a gathering like this, on a Samhain night. And stop here, now, he said, and play a hand with me; and here is an old pack of cards has dos work many a night before this, and old as it is, there has been much of the riches of the world lost and wo.

    One of the young men said, It isnt much of the riches of the world has stopped with yourself, old man, and he looked at the old mans bare feet, and they all laughed. But Hanrahan did not laugh, but he sat down very quietly, without a word. Then one of them said, So you will stop with us after all, Hanrahan; and the old man said: He will stop indeed, did you not hear me asking him?

    They all looked at the old man then as if w where he came from. It is far I am e, he said, through France I have e, and through Spain, and by Lough Greine of the hidden mouth, and none has refused me anything. And then he was silent and nobody liked to question him, and they began to play. There were six men at the boards playing, and the others were looking on behind. They played two or three games for nothing, and then the old man took a fourpenny bit, worhin and smooth, out from his pocket, and he called to the rest to put something on the game. Then they all put down something on the boards, and little as it was it looked much, from the way it was shoved from oo another, first one man winning it and then his neighbour. And some?times the luck?９９lｉｂ. would go against a man and he would have nothi, and then one or another would lend him something, and he would pay it again out of his winnings, for her good nor bad luck stopped long with anyone.

    And once Hanrahan said as a man would say in a dream, It is time for me to be going the road; but just then a good card came to him, and he played it out, and all the money began to e to him. And once he thought of Mary Lavelle, and he sighed; and that time his luck went from him, and he fot her again.

    But at last the luck went to the old man and it stayed with him, and all they had flowed into him, and he began to laugh little laughs to himself, and to sing over and over to himself, Spades and Diamonds, Ce and Power, and so on, as if it was a verse of a song.

    And after a while anyone looking at the men, and seeing the way their bodies were rog to and fro, and the way they kept their eyes on the old mans hands, would think they had drink taken, or that the whole store they had in the world ut on the cards; but that was not so, for the quart bottle had not been disturbed sihe game began, and was nearly full yet, and all that was on the game was a few sixpenny bits and shillings, and maybe a handful of coppers.

    Yood men to win and good men to lose, said the old man, you have play in your hearts. He begao shuffle the cards and to mix them, very quid fast, till at last they could not see them to be cards at all, but you would think him to be making rings of fire in the air, as little lads would make them with whirling a lighted stick; and after that it seemed to them that all the room was dark, and they could see nothing but his hands and the cards.

    And all in a minute a hare made a leap out from between his hands, and whether it was one of the cards that took that shape, or whether it was made out of nothing in the palms of his hands, nobody knew, but there it was running on the floor of the barn, as quick as any hare that ever lived.

    Some looked at the hare, but more kept their eyes on the old man, and while they were looking at him a hound made a leap out between his hands, the same way as the hare did, and after that another hound and aill there was a whole pack of them following the hare round and round the barn.

    The players were all standing up now, with their backs to the boards, shrinking from the hounds, and nearly  deafened with the noise of their yelping, but as quick as the hounds were they could not overtake the hare, but it went round, till at the last it seemed as if a blast of wind burst open the barn door, and the hare doubled and made a leap over the boards where the men had been playing, a out of the door and away through the night, and the hounds over the boards and through the door after it.

    Then the old man called out, Follow the hounds, follow the hounds, and it is a great hunt you will see to?night, and he went out after them. But used as the meo go hunting after hares, and ready as they were for any sport, they were io go out into the night, and it was only Hanrahan that rose up and that said, I will follow, I will follow on.

    You had best stop here, Hanrahan, the young man that was  him said, for you might be going into some great danger. But Hanrahan said, I will see fair play, I will see fair play, and he went stumbling out of the door like a man in a dream, and the door shut after him as he went.

    He thought he saw the old man in front of him, but it was only his own shadow that the full moon cast on the road before him, but he could hear the hounds g after the hare over the wide green fields h, and he followed them very fast for there was nothing to stop him; and after a while he came to smaller fields that had little walls of loose stones around them, ahrew the stones down as he crossed them, and did not wait to put them up again; and he passed by the place where the river goes under ground at Ballylee, and he could hear the hounds going before him up towards the head of the river. Soon he found it harder to run, for it hill he was going, and clouds came over the moon, and it was hard for him to see? his way, and once he left the path to take a short cut, but his foot slipped into a boghole and he had to e back to it. And how long he was going he did not know, or what way he went, but at last he  on the bare mountain, with nothing but the rough heather about him, and he could her hear the hounds nor any other thing. But their cry began to e to him again, at first far off and then very near, and when it came quite close to him, it went up all of a sudden into the air, and there was the sound of hunting over his head; then it went away northward till he could hear nothing more at all. Thats not fair, he said, thats not fair. And he could walk no longer, but sat down on the heather where he was, in the heart of Slieve Echtge, for all the strength had gone from him, with the dint of the long journey he had made.

    And after a while he took notice that there was a door close to him, and a light ing from it, and he wohat being so close to him he had not seen it before. And he rose up, and tired as he was he went in at the door, of and although it was night time outside, it was daylight he found within. And presently he met with an old man that had been gathering summer thyme and yellow flag?flowers, and it seemed as if all the sweet smells of the summer were with them. And the old man said: It is a long time you have been ing to us, Hanrahan the learned man and the great songmaker.

    And with that he brought him into a very big shining house, and every grand thing Hanrahan had ever heard of, and every colour he had ever seen, were in it. There was a high place at the end of the house, and on it there was sitting in a high chair a woman, the most beautiful the world ever saw, having a long pale fad flowers about it, but she had the tired look of ohat had been long waiting. And there was sitting oep below her chair frey old women, and the one of them was holding a great cauldron in her lap; and anreat stone on her knees, and heavy as it was it seemed light to her; and another of them had a very long spear that was made of pointed wood; and the last of them had a sword that was without a scabbard. Red Hanrahan stood looking at them for a long Hanrahan?time, but none of them spoke any word to him or looked at him at all. And he had it in his mind to ask who that woman in the chair was, that was like a queen, and what she was waiting for; but ready as he was with his tongue and afraid of no person, he was in dread now to speak to so beautiful a woman, and in so grand a place. And thehought to ask what were the four things the frey old women were holding like great treasures, but he could not think of the right words t out.

    Then the first of the old women rose up, holding the cauldroweewo hands, and she said Pleasure,

    and Hanrahan said no word. Then the sed old woman rose up with the stone in her hands, and she said Power; and the third old woman rose up with the spear in her hand, and she said Ce; and the last of the old women rose up having the sword in her hands, and she said Knowledge. And everyone, after she had spoken, waited as if for Hanrahan to question her, but he said nothing at all. And then the four old wome out of the door, bringing their tour treasures with them, and as they went out one of them said, He has no wish for us; and another said, He is weak, he is weak; and another said, He is afraid; and the last said, His wits are gone from him. And then they all said Echtge, daughter of the Silver Hand, must stay in her sleep. It is a pity, it is a great pity.

    And then the woman that was like a queen gave a very sad sigh, and it seemed to Hanrahan as if the sigh had the sound in it of hidden streams; and if the place he was in had beeimes grander and more shining than it was, he could not have hindered sleep from ing on him; aaggered like a drunken man and lay down there and then.

    When Hanrahan awoke, the sun was shining on his face, but there was white frost on the grass around him, and there was i the edge of the stream he was lying by, and that goes running on through Daire? caol and Druim?da?rod. He knew by the shape of the hills and by the shining of Lough Greine in the distahat he on one of the hills of Slieve Echtge, but he was not sure how he came there; for all that had happened in the barn had gone from him, and all of his journey but the soreness of his feet and the stiffness in his bones.

    It was a year after that, there were men of the village of Cappaghtagle sitting by the fire in a house on the roadside, and Red Hanrahan that was now very thin and worn and his hair very long and wild, came to the half?door and asked leave to e in a himself; and they bid him wele because it was Samhain night. He sat down with them, and they gave him a glass of whiskey out of a quart bottle; and they saw the little inkpot hanging about his neck, and knew he was a scholar, and asked for stories about the Greeks.

    He took the Virgil out of the big pocket of his coat, but the cover was very blad swollen with the wet, and the page when he ope was very yellow, but that was no great matter, for he looked at it like a man that had never learo read. Some young man that was there began to laugh at him then, and to ask why did he carry so heavy a book with him when he was not able to read it.

    It vexed Hanrahan to hear that, a the Virgil ba his pocket and asked if they had a pack of cards among them, for cards were better than books. When they brought out the cards he took them and began to shuffle them, and while he was shuffling them something seemed to e into his mind, a his hand to his face like ohat is trying to remember, and he said: Was I ever here before, or where was I on a night like this? and then of a suddeood up ahe cards fall to the floor, and he said, Who was it brought me a message from Mary Lavelle?

    We never saw you before now, and we never heard of Mary Lavelle, said the man of the house. And who is she, he said, and what is it you are talking about?

    It was this night a year ago, I was in a barn, and there were men playing cards, and there was money oable, they were pushing it from oo another here and there??and I got a message, and I was going out of the door to look for my sweetheart that wanted me, Mary Lavelle. And then Hanrahan called out very loud: Where have I been sihen? Where was I for the whole year?

    It is hard to say where you might ha<q>?</q>ve been in that time, said the oldest of the men, or art of the world you may have travelled; and it is like enough you have the dust of many roads on your feet; for there are many go wandering and fetting like that, he said, when ohey have been giveouch.

    That is true, said another of the men. I knew a woma wandering like that through the length of seven years; she came back after, and she told her friends she had often been glad enough to eat the food that ut in the pigs trough. And it is best for you to go to the priest now, he said, a him take off you whatever may have been put upon you.

    It is to my sweetheart I will go, to Mary Lavelle, said Hanrahan; it is too long I have delayed, how do I know what might have happened her in the length of a year?

    He was going out of the door then, but they all told him it was best for him to stop the night, and to get strength for the journey; and indeed he wahat, for he was very weak, and when they gave him food he eat it like a man that had never seen food before, and one of them said, He is eating as if he had trodden on the hungry grass. It was in the white light of the m he set out, and the time seemed long to him till he could get to Mary Lavelles house. But when he came to it, he found the door broken, and the thatch dropping from the roof, and no living person to be seen. And when he asked the neighbours what had happened her, all they could say was that she had been put out of the house, and had married some lab man, and they had gone looking for work to London or Liverpool or some big place. And whether she found a worse place or a better he never knew, but anyway he never met with her or with news of her again.

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