第65章

But there will be some one there, and that is the aforesaid Jamesy Flanigan! Sometimes I think he is fibbing, but a glance at his soft, dark, far-seeing eyes under their fringe of thick lashes convinces me to the contrary. His field of vision is different from mine, that is all, and he fears that if I accompany him to the shores of the Fairy Lough the Horseman will not ride for him; so I am even taunted with undue common-sense by a little Irish gossoon.

I tried to coax Benella to go with me to the hyacinth wood by moonlight. Fairies detest a crowd, and I ought to have gone alone; but, to tell the truth, I hardly dared, for they have a way of kidnapping attractive ladies and keeping them for years in the dim kingdom. I would not trust Himself at Glen Ailna for worlds, for gentlemen are not exempt from danger. Connla of the Golden Hair was lured away by a fairy maiden, and taken, in a 'gleaming, straight- gliding, strong, crystal canoe,' to her domain in the hills; and Oisin, you remember, was transported to the Land of the Ever Youthful by the beautiful Niam. If one could only be sure of coming back! but Oisin, for instance, was detained three hundred years, so one might not be allowed to return, and still worse, one might not wish to; three hundred years of youth would tempt--a woman! My opinion, after reading the Elf Errant, is that one of us has been there--Moira O'Neill. I should suspect her of being able to wear a fairy cap herself, were it not for the human heart-throb in her verses; but I am sure she has the glamour whenever she desires it, and hears the fairy pipes at will.

Benella is of different stuff; she not only distrusts fairies, but, like the Scotch Presbyterians, she fears that they are wicked.

"Still, you say they haven't got immortal souls to save, and I don't suppose they're responsible for their actions," she allows; "but as for traipsing up to those heathenish, haunted woods when all Christian folks are in bed, I don't believe in it, and neither would Mr. Beresford; but if you're set on it, I shall go with you!"

"You wouldn't be of the slightest use," I answered severely;

"indeed, you'd be worse than nobody. The fairies cannot endure doubters; it makes them fold their wings over their heads and shrink away into their flowercups. I should be mortified beyond words if a fairy should meet me in your company."

Benella seemed hurt and a trifle resentful as she replied: "That about doubters is just what Mrs. Kimberly used to say." (Mrs.

Kimberly is the Salem priestess, the originator of the 'science.')

"She couldn't talk a mite if there was doubters in the hall; and it's so with spiritualists and clairvoyants, too--they're all of 'em scare-cats. I guess likely that those that's so afraid of being doubted has some good reason for it!"

Well, I never went to the hyacinth wood by moonlight, since so many objections were raised, but I did go once at noonday, the very most unlikely hour of all the twenty-four, and yet--As I sat there beneath a gnarled thorn, weary and warm with my climb, I looked into the heart of a bluebell forest growing under a circle of gleaming silver birches, and suddenly I heard fairy music--at least it was not mortal--and many sounds were mingled in it: the sighing of birches, the carol of a lark, the leap and laugh of a silvery runnel tumbling down the hillside, the soft whir of butterflies' wings, and a sweet little over or under tone, from the over or under world, that I took to be the opening of a million hyacinth buds in the sunshine. Then I heard the delicious sound of a fairy laugh, and, looking under a swaying branch of meadowsweet, I saw--yes, I really saw--You must know that first a wee green door swung open in the stem of the meadowsweet, and out of that land where you can buy joy for a penny came a fairy in the usual red and green. I had the Elf Errant in my lap, and I think that in itself made him feel more at home with me, as well as the fact, perhaps, that for the moment I wasn't a bit sensible and had no money about me. I was all ready with an Irish salutation, for the purposes of further disarming his aversion. I intended to say, as prettily as possible, though, alas!

I cannot manage the brogue, "And what way do I see you now?" or "Good-mornin' to yer honour's honour!" But I was struck dumb by my good fortune at seeing him at all. He looked at me once, and then, flinging up his arms, he gave a weeny, weeny yawn! This was disconcerting, for people almost never yawn in my company; and to make it worse, he kept on yawning, until, for very sympathy, and not at all in the way of revenge, I yawned too. Then the green door swung open again, and a gay rabble of wide-awake fairies came trooping out: and some of them kissed the hyacinth bells to open them, and some of them flew to the thorn-tree, until every little brancheen was white with flowers, where but a moment ago had been tightly-closed buds. The yawning fairy slept meanwhile under the swaying meadowsweet, and the butterflies fanned him with their soft wings; but, alas! it could not have been the hour for dancing on the fairy ring, nor the proper time for the fairy pipers, and long, long as I looked I saw and heard nothing more than what I have told you.

Indeed, I presently lost even that, for a bee buzzed, a white petal dropped from the thorn-tree on my face, there was a scraping of tiny claws and the sound of two squirrels barking love to each other in the high branches, and in that moment the glamour that was upon me vanished in a twinkling.

"But I really did see the fairies!" I exclaimed triumphantly to Benella the doubter, when I returned Carrig-a-fooka Inn, much too late for luncheon.

"I want to know!" she exclaimed, in her New England vernacular. "I guess by the looks o' your eyes they didn't turn out to be very lively comp'ny!"