Mongan loved Duv Laca of the White Hand better than he loved his life, better than he loved his honour. The kingdoms of the world did not weigh with him beside the string of her shoe. He would not look at a sunset if he could see her. He would not listen to a harp if he could hear her speak, for she was the delight of ages, the gem of time, and the wonder of the world till Doom.
She went to Leinster with the king of that country, and when she had gone Mongan fell grievously sick, so that it did not seem he could ever recover again; and he began to waste and wither, and he began to look like a skeleton, and a bony structure, and a misery.
Now this also must be known.
Duv Laca had a young attendant, who was her foster-sister as well as her servant, and on the day that she got married to Mongan, her attendant was married to mac an Da’v, who was servant and foster-brother to Mongan. When Duv Laca went away with the King of Leinster, her servant, mac an Da’v’s wife, went with her, so there were two wifeless men in Ulster at that time, namely, Mongan the king and mac an Da’v his servant.
One day as Mongan sat in the sun, brooding lamentably on his fate, mac an Da’v came to him.
“How are things with you, master?” asked Mac an Da’v.
“Bad,” said Mongan.
“It was a poor day brought you off with Mananna’n to the Land of Promise,” said his servant.
“Why should you think that?” inquired Mongan.
“Because,” said mac an Da’v, “you learned nothing in the Land of Promise except how to eat a lot of food and how to do nothing in a deal of time.”
“What business is it of yours?” said Mongan angrily.
“It is my business surely,” said mac an Da’v, “for my wife has gone off to Leinster with your wife, and she wouldn’t have gone if you hadn’t made a bet and a bargain with that accursed king.”
Mac an Da’v began to weep then.
“I didn’t make a bargain with any king,” said he, “and yet my wife has gone away with one, and it’s all because of you.”
“There is no one sorrier for you than I am,” said Mongan.
“There is indeed,” said mac an Da’v, “for I am sorrier myself.”
Mongan roused himself then.
“You have a claim on me truly,” said he, “and I will not have any one with a claim on me that is not satisfied. Go,” he said to mac an Da’v, “to that fairy place we both know of. You remember the baskets I left there with the sod from Ireland in one and the sod from Scotland in the other; bring me the baskets and sods.”
“Tell me the why of this?” said his servant.
“The King of Leinster will ask his wizards what I am doing, and this is what I will be doing. I will get on your back with a foot in each of the baskets, and when Branduv asks the wizards where I am they will tell him that I have one leg in Ireland and one leg in Scotland, and as long as they tell him that he will think he need not bother himself about me, and we will go into Leinster that way.”
“No bad way either,” said mac an Da’v.
They set out then.
CHAPTER XIV
It was a long, uneasy journey, for although mac an Da’v was of stout heart and goodwill, yet no man can carry another on his back from Ulster to Leinster and go quick. Still, if you keep on driving a pig or a story they will get at last to where you wish them to go, and the man who continues putting one foot in front of the other will leave his home behind, and will come at last to the edge of the sea and the end of the world.
When they reached Leinster the feast of Moy Life’ was being held, and they pushed on by forced marches and long stages so as to be in time, and thus they came to the Moy of Cell Camain, and they mixed with the crowd that were going to the feast.
A great and joyous concourse of people streamed about them. There were young men and young girls, and when these were not holding each other’s hands it was because their arms were round each other’s necks. There were old, lusty women going by, and when these were not talking together it was because their mouths were mutually filled with apples and meat-pies. There were young warriors with mantles of green and purple and red flying behind them on the breeze, and when these were not looking disdainfully on older soldiers it was because the older soldiers happened at the moment to be looking at them. There were old warriors with yard-long beards flying behind their shoulders llke wisps of hay, and when these were not nursing a broken arm or a cracked skull, it was because they were nursing wounds in their stomachs or their legs. There were troops of young women who giggled as long as their breaths lasted and beamed when it gave out. Bands of boys who whispered mysteriously together and pointed with their fingers in every direction at once, and would suddenly begin to run like a herd of stampeded horses. There were men with carts full of roasted meats. Women with little vats full of mead, and others carrying milk and beer. Folk of both sorts with towers swaying on their heads, and they dripping with honey. Children having baskets piled with red apples, and old women who peddled shell-fish and boiled lobsters. There were people who sold twenty kinds of bread, with butter thrown in. Sellers of onions and cheese, and others who supplied spare bits of armour, odd scabbards, spear handles, breastplate-laces. People who cut your hair or told your fortune or gave you a hot bath in a pot. Others who put a shoe on your horse or a piece of embroidery on your mantle; and others, again, who took stains off your sword or dyed your finger-nails or sold you a hound.
It was a great and joyous gathering that was going to the feast.
Mongan and his servant sat against a grassy hedge by the roadside and watched the multitude streaming past.
Just then Mongan glanced to the right whence the people were coming. Then he pulled the hood of his cloak over his ears and over his brow.
“Alas!” said he in a deep and anguished voice.
Mac an Da’v turned to him.
“Is it a pain in your stomach, master?”
“It is not,” said Mongan. “Well, what made you make that brutal and belching noise?”
“It was a sigh I gave,” said Mongan.
“Whatever it was,” said mac an Da’v, “what was it?”
“Look down the road on this side and tell me who is coming,” said his master.
“It is a lord with his troop.”
“It is the King of Leinster,” said Mongan. “The man,” said mac an Da’v in a tone of great pity, “the man that took away your wife! And,” he roared in a voice of extraordinary savagery, “the man that took away my wife into the bargain, and she not in the bargain.”
“Hush,” said Mongan, for a man who heard his shout stopped to tie a sandie, or to listen.
“Master,” said mac an Da’v as the troop drew abreast and moved past.
“What is it, my good friend?”
“Let me throw a little, small piece of a rock at the King of Leinster.”
“I will not.”
“A little bit only, a small bit about twice the size of my head”
“I will not let you,” said Mongan.
When the king had gone by mac an Da’v groaned a deep and dejected groan.
“Oco’n!” said he. “Oco’n-i’o-go-deo’!” said he.
The man who had tied his sandal said then: “Are you in pain, honest man?”
“I am not in pain,” said mac an Da’v.
“Well, what was it that knocked a howl out of you like the yelp of a sick dog, honest man?”
“Go away,” said mac an Da’v, “go away, you flat-faced, nosey person.” “There is no politeness left in this country,” said the stranger, and he went away to a certain distance, and from thence he threw a stone at mac an Da’v’s nose, and hit it.
CHAPTER XV
The road was now not so crowded as it had been. Minutes would pass and only a few travellers would come, and minutes more would go when nobody was in sight at all.
Then two men came down the road: they were clerics.
“I never saw that kind of uniform before,” said mac an Da’v.
“Even if you didn’t,” said Mongan, “there are plenty of them about. They are men that don’t believe in our gods,” said he.
“Do they not, indeed?” said mac an Da’v. “The rascals!” said he. “What, what would Mananna’n say to that?”
“The one in front carrying the big book is Tibraide’. He is the priest of Cell Camain, and he is the chief of those two.”
“Indeed, and indeed!” said mac an Da’v. “The one behind must be his servant, for he has a load on his back.”
The priests were reading their offices, and mac an Da’v marvelled at that.
“What is it they are doing?” said he.
“They are reading.”
“Indeed, and indeed they are,” said mac an Da’v. “I can’t make out a word of the language except that the man behind says amen, amen, every time the man in front puts a grunt out of him. And they don’t like our gods at all!” said mac an Da’v.
“They do not,” said Mongan.
“Play a trick on them, master,” said mac an Da’v. Mongan agreed to play a trick on the priests.
He looked at them hard for a minute, and then he waved his hand at them.
The two priests stopped, and they stared straight in front of them, and then they looked at each other, and then they looked at the sky. The clerk began to bless himself, and then Tibraide’ began to bless himself, and after that they didn’t know what to do. For where there had been a road with hedges on each side and fields stretching beyond them, there was now no road, no hedge, no field; but there was a great broad river sweeping across their path; a mighty tumble of yellowy-brown waters, very swift, very savage; churning and billowing and jockeying among rough boulders and islands of stone. It was a water of villainous depth and of detestable wetness; of ugly hurrying and of desolate cavernous sound. At a little to their right there was a thin uncomely bridge that waggled across the torrent.
Tibraide’ rubbed his eyes, and then he looked again. “Do you see what I see?” said he to the clerk.
“I don’t know what you see,” said the clerk, “but what I see I never did see before, and I wish I did not see it now.”
“I was born in this place,” said Tibraide’, “my father was born here before me, and my grandfather was born here before him, but until this day and this minute I never saw a river here before, and I never heard of one.”
“What will we do at all?” said the clerk. “What will we do at all?”
“We will be sensible,” said Tibraide’ sternly, “and we will go about our business,” said he. “If rivers fall out of the sky what has that to do with you, and if there is a river here, which there is, why, thank God, there is a bridge over it too.”
“Would you put a toe on that bridge?” said the clerk. “What is the bridge for?” said Tibraide’ Mongan and mac an Da’v followed them.
When they got to the middle of the bridge it broke under them, and they were precipitated into that boiling yellow flood.
Mongan snatched at the book as it fell from Tibraide”s hand.
“Won’t you let them drown, master?” asked mac an Da’v.
“No,” said Mongan, “I’ll send them a mile down the stream, and then they can come to land.”
Mongan then took on himself the form of Tibraide’ and he turned mac an Da’v into the shape of the clerk.
“My head has gone bald,” said the servant in a whisper.
“That is part of it,” replied Mongan. “So long as we know?’ said mac an Da’v.
They went on then to meet the King of Leinster.
CHAPTER XVI
They met him near the place where the games were played.
“Good my soul, Tibraide’!” cried the King of Leinster, and he gave Mongan a kiss. Mongan kissed him back again.
“Amen, amen,” said mac an Da’v.
“What for?” said the King of Leinster.
And then mac an Da’v began to sneeze, for he didn’t know what for.
“It is a long time since I saw you, Tibraide’,” said the king, “but at this minute I am in great haste and hurry. Go you on before me to the fortress, and you can talk to the queen that you’ll find there, she that used to be the King of Ulster’s wife. Kevin Cochlach, my charioteer, will go with you, and I will follow you myself in a while.”
The King of Leinster went off then, and Mongan and his servant went with the charioteer and the people.
Mongan read away out of the book, for he found it interesting, and he did not want to talk to the charioteer, and mac an Da’v cried amen, amen, every time that Mongan took his breath. The people who were going with them said to one another that mac an Da’v was a queer kind of clerk, and that they had never seen any one who had such a mouthful of amens.
But in a while they came to the fortress, and they got into it without any trouble, for Kevin Cochlach, the king’s charioteer, brought them in. Then they were led to the room where Duv Laca was, and as he went into that room Mongan shut his eyes, for he did not want to look at Duv Laca while other people might be looking at him.
“Let everybody leave this room, while I am talking to the queen,” said he; and all the attendants left the room, except one, and she wouldn’t go, for she wouldn’t leave her mistress.
Then Mongan opened his eyes and he saw Duv Laca, and he made a great bound to her and took her in his arms, and mac an Da’v made a savage and vicious and terrible jump at the attendant, and took her in his arms, and bit her ear and kissed her neck and wept down into her back.
“Go away,” said the girl, “unhand me, villain,” said she.
“I will not,” said mac an Da’v, “for I’m your own husband, I’m your own mac, your little mac, your macky-wac-wac.” Then the attendant gave a little squeal, and she bit him on each ear and kissed his neck and wept down into his back, and said that it wasn’t true and that it was.
CHAPTER XVII
But they were not alone, although they thought they were. The hag that guarded the jewels was in the room. She sat hunched up against the wail, and as she looked like a bundle of rags they did not notice her. She began to speak then.
“Terrible are the things I see,” said she. “Terrible are the things I see.”
Mongan and his servant gave a jump of surprise, and their two wives jumped and squealed. Then Mongan puffed out his cheeks till his face looked like a bladder, and he blew a magic breath at the hag, so that she seemed to be surrounded by a fog, and when she looked through that breath everything seemed to be different to what she had thought. Then she began to beg everybody’s pardon.
“I had an evil vision,” said she, “I saw crossways. How sad it is that I should begin to see the sort of things I thought I saw.”
“Sit in this chair, mother,” said Mongan, “and tell me what you thought you saw,” and he slipped a spike under her, and mac an Da’v pushed her into the seat, and she died on the spike.
Just then there came a knocking at the door. Mac an Da’v opened it, and there was Tibraid~ standing outside, and twenty-nine of his men were with him, and they were all laughing.
“A mile was not half enough,” said mac an Da’v reproachfully.
The Chamberlain of the fortress pushed into the room and he stared from one Tibraide’ to the other.
“This is a fine growing year,” said he. “There never was a year when Tibraide”s were as plentiful as they are this year. There is a Tibraide’ outside and a Tibraide’ inside, and who knows but there are some more of them under the bed. The place is crawling with them,” said he.
Mongan pointed at Tibraide’.
“Don’t you know who that is?” he cried.
“I know who he says he is,” said the Chamberlain.
“Well, he is Mongan,” said Mongan, “and these twenty-nine men are twenty-nine of his nobles from Ulster.”
At that news the men of the household picked up clubs and cudgels and every kind of thing that was near, and made a violent and woeful attack on Tibraide”s men The King of Leinster came in then, and when he was told Tibraide’ was Mongan he attacked them as well, and it was with difficulty that Tibraide’ got away to Cell Camain with nine of his men and they all wounded.
The King of Leinster came back then. He went to Duv Laca’s room.
“Where is Tibraide’?” said he.
“It wasn’t Tibraide’ was here,” said the hag who was still sitting on the spike, and was not half dead, “it was Mongan.”
“Why did you let him near you?” said the king to Duv Laca.
“There is no one has a better right to be near me than Mongan has,” said Duv Laca, “he is my own husband,” said she.
And then the king cried out in dismay: “I have beaten Tibraide”s people.” He rushed from the room.
“Send for Tibraide’ till I apologise,” he cried. “Tell him it was all a mistake. Tell him it was Mongan.”
CHAPTER XVIII
Mongan and his servant went home, and (for what pleasure is greater than that of memory exercised in conversation?) for a time the feeling of an adventure well accomplished kept him in some contentment. But at the end of a time that pleasure was worn out, and Mongan grew at first dispirited and then sullen, and after that as ill as he had been on the previous occasion. For he could not forget Duv Laca of the White Hand, and he could not remember her without longing and despair.
It was in the illness which comes from longing and despair that he sat one day looking on a world that was black although the sun shone, and that was lean and unwholesome although autumn fruits were heavy on the earth and the joys of harvest were about him.
“Winter is in my heart,” quoth he, “and I am cold already.”
He thought too that some day he would die, and the thought was not unpleasant, for one half of his life was away in the territories of the King of Leinster, and the half that he kept in himself had no spice in it.
He was thinking in this way when mac an Da’v came towards him over the lawn, and he noticed that mac an Da’v was walking like an old man.
He took little slow steps, and he did not loosen his knees when he walked, so he went stiffly. One of his feet turned pitifully outwards, and the other turned lamentably in. His chest was pulled inwards, and his head was stuck outwards and hung down in the place where his chest should have been, and his arms were crooked in front of him with the hands turned wrongly, so that one palm was shown to the east of the world and the other one was turned to the west.
“How goes it, mac an Da’v?” said the king.
“Bad,” said mac an Da’v.
“Is that the sun I see shining, my friend?” the king asked.
“It may be the sun,” replied mac an Da’v, peering curiously at the golden radiance that dozed about them, “but maybe it’s a yellow fog.”
“What is life at all?” said the king.
“It is a weariness and a tiredness,” said mac an Da’v. “It is a long yawn without sleepiness. It is a bee, lost at midnight and buzzing on a pane. It is the noise made by a tied-up dog. It is nothing worth dreaming about. It is nothing at all.”
“How well you explain my feelings about Duv Laca,” said the king.
“I was thinking about my own lamb,” said mac an Da’v. “I was thinking about my own treasure, my cup of cheeriness, and the pulse of my heart.” And with that he burst into tears.
“Alas!” said the king.
“But,” sobbed mac an Da’v, “what right have I to complain? I am only the servant, and although I didn’t make any bargain with the King of Leinster or with any king of them all, yet my wife is gone away as if she was the consort of a potentate the same as Duv Laca is.”
Mongan was sorry then for his servant, and he roused himself.
“I am going to send you to Duv Laca.”
“Where the one is the other will be,” cried mac an Da’v joyously.
“Go,” said Mongan, “to Rath Descirt of Bregia; you know that place?”
“As well as my tongue knows my teeth.”
“Duv Laca is there; see her, and ask her what she wants me to do.”
Mac an Da’v went there and returned.
“Duv Laca says that you are to come at once, for the King of Leinster is journeying around his territory, and Kevin Cochlach, the charioteer, is making bitter love to her and wants her to run away with him.”
Mongan set out, and in no great time, for they travelled day and night, they came to Bregla, and gained admittance to the fortress, but just as he got in he had to go out again, for the King of Leinster had been warned of Mongan’s journey, and came back to his fortress in the nick of time.
When the men of Ulster saw the condition into which Mongan fell they were in great distress, and they all got sick through compassion for their king. The nobles suggested to him that they should march against Leinster and kill that king and bring back Duv Laca, but Mongan would not consent to this plan.
“For,” said he, “the thing I lost through my own folly I shall get back through my own craft.”
And when he said that his spirits revived, and he called for mac an Da’v.
“You know, my friend,” said Mongan, “that I can’t get Duv Laca back unless the King of Leinster asks me to take her back, for a bargain is a bargain.”
“That will happen when pigs fly,” said mac an Da’v, “and,” said he, “I did not make any bargain with any king that is in the world.”
“I heard you say that before,” said Mongan.
“I will say it till Doom,” cried his servant, “for my wife has gone away with that pestilent king, and he has got the double of your bad bargain.”
Mongan and his servant then set out for Leinster.
When they neared that country they found a great crowd going on the road with them, and they learned that the king was giving a feast in honour of his marriage to Duv Laca, for the year of waiting was nearly out, and the king had sworn he would delay no longer.
They went on, therefore, but in low spirits, and at last they saw the walls of the king’s castle towering before them. and a noble company going to and fro on the lawn.
CHAPTER XIX
THEY sat in a place where they could watch the castle and compose themselves after their journey.
“How are we going to get into the castle?” asked mac an Da’v.
For there were hatchetmen on guard in the big gateway, and there were spearmen at short intervals around the walls, and men to throw hot porridge off the roof were standing in the right places.
“If we cannot get in by hook, we will get in by crook,” said Mongan.
“They are both good ways,” said Mac an Da’v, “and whichever of them you decide on I’ll stick by.”
Just then they saw the Hag of the Mill coming out of the mill which was down the road a little.
Now the Hag of the Mill was a bony, thin pole of a hag with odd feet. That is, she had one foot that was too big for her, so that when she lifted it up it pulled her over; and she had one foot that was too small for her, so that when she lifted it up she didn’t know what to do with it. She was so long that you thought you would never see the end of her, and she was so thin that you thought you didn’t see her at all. One of her eyes was set where her nose should be and there was an ear in its place, and her nose itself was hanging out of her chin, and she had whiskers round it. She was dressed in a red rag that was really a hole with a fringe on it, and she was singing “Oh, hush thee, my one love” to a cat that was yelping on her shoulder.
She had a tall skinny dog behind her called Brotar. It hadn’t a tooth in its head except one, and it had the toothache in that tooth. Every few steps it used to sit down on its hunkers and point its nose straight upwards, and make a long, sad complaint about its tooth; and after that it used to reach its hind leg round and try to scratch out its tooth; and then it used to be pulled on again by the straw rope that was round its neck, and which was tied at the other end to the hag’s heaviest foot.
There was an old, knock-kneed, raw-boned, one-eyed, little-winded, heavy-headed mare with her also. Every time it put a front leg forward it shivered all over the rest of its legs backwards, and when it put a hind leg forward it shivered all over the rest of its legs frontwards, and it used to give a great whistle through its nose when it was out of breath, and a big, thin hen was sitting on its croup. Mongan looked on the Hag of the Mill with delight and affection.
“This time,” said he to mac an Da’v, “I’ll get back my wife.”
“You will indeed,” said mac an Da’v heartily, “and you’ll get mine back too.”
“Go over yonder,” said Mongan, “and tell the Hag of the Mill that I want to talk to her.”
Mac an Da’v brought her over to him.
“Is it true what the servant man said?” she asked.
“What did he say?” said Mongan.
“He said you wanted to talk to me.”
“It is true,” said Mongan.
“This is a wonderful hour and a glorious minute,” said the hag, “for this is the first time in sixty years that any one wanted to talk to me. Talk on now,” said she, “and I’ll listen to you if I can remember how to do it. Talk gently,” said she, “the way you won’t disturb the animals, for they are all sick.”
“They are sick indeed,” said mac an Da’v pityingly.
“The cat has a sore tail,” said she, “by reason of sitting too close to a part of the hob that was hot. The dog has a toothache, the horse has a pain in her stomach, and the hen has the pip.”
“Ah, it’s a sad world,” said mac an Da’v.
“There you are!” said the hag.
“Tell me,” Mongan commenced, “if you got a wish, what it is you would wish for?”
The hag took the cat off her shoulder and gave it to mac an Da’v.
“Hold that for me while I think,” said she.
“Would you like to be a lovely young girl?” asked Mongan.
“I’d sooner be that than a skinned eel,” said she.
“And would you like to marry me or the King of Leinster?” “I’d like to marry either of you, or both of you, or whichever of you came first.”
“Very well,” said Mongan, “you shall have your wish.”
He touched her with his finger, and the instant he touched her all dilapidation and wryness and age went from her, and she became so beautiful that one dared scarcely look on her, and so young that she seemed but sixteen years of age.
“You are not the Hag of the Mill any longer,” said Mongan, “you are Ivell of the Shining Cheeks, daughter of the King of Munster.”
He touched the dog too, and it became a little silky lapdog that could nestle in your palm. Then he changed the old mare into a brisk, piebald palfrey. Then he changed himself so that he became the living image of Ae, the son of the King of Connaught, who had just been married to Ivell of the Shining Cheeks, and then he changed mac an Da’v into the likeness of Ae’s attendant, and then they all set off towards the fortress, singing the song that begins: My wife is nicer than any one’s wife, Any one’s wife, any one’s wife, My wife is nicer than any one’s wife, Which nobody can deny.
CHAPTER XX
The doorkeeper brought word to the King of Leinster that the son of the King of Connaught, Ae the Beautiful, and his wife, Ivell of the Shining Cheeks, were at the door, that they had been banished from Connaught by Ae’s father, and they were seeking the protection of the King of Leinster.
Branduv came to the door himself to welcome them, and the minute he looked on Ivell of the Shining Cheeks it was plain that he liked looking at her.
It was now drawing towards evening, and a feast was prepared for the guests with a banquet to follow it. At the feast Duv Laca sat beside the King of Leinster, but Mongan sat opposite him with Ivell, and Mongan put more and more magic into the hag, so that her cheeks shone and her eyes gleamed, and she was utterly bewitching to the eye; and when Branduv looked at her she seemed to grow more and more lovely and more and more desirable, and at last there was not a bone in his body as big as an inch that was not filled with love and longing for the girl.
Every few minutes he gave a great sigh as if he had eaten too much, and when Duv Laca asked him if he had eaten too much he said he had hut that he had not drunk enough, and by that he meant that he had not drunk enough from the eyes of the girl before him.
At the banquet which was then held he looked at her again, and every time he took a drink he toasted Ivell across the brim of his goblet, and in a little while she began to toast him back across the rim of her cup, for he was drinking ale, but she was drinking mead. Then he sent a messenger to her to say that it was a far better thing to be the wife of the King of Leinster than to be the wife of the son of the King of Connaught, for a king is better than a prince, and Ivell thought that this was as wise a thing as anybody had ever said. And then he sent a message to say that he loved her so much that he would certainly burst of love if it did not stop.
Mongan heard the whispering, and he told the hag that if she did what he advised she would certainly get either himself or the King of Leinster for a husband.
“Either of you will be welcome,” said the hag.
“When the king says he loves you, ask him to prove it by gifts; ask for his drinking-horn first.”
She asked for that, and he sent it to her filled with good liquor; then she asked for his girdle, and he sent her that.
His people argued with him and said it was not right that he should give away the treasures of Leinster to the wife of the King of Connaught’s son; but he said that it did not matter, for when he got the girl he would get his treasures with her. But every time he sent anything to the hag, mac an Da’v snatched it out of her lap and put it in his pocket.
“Now,” said Mongan to the hag, “tell the servant to say that you would not leave your own husband for all the wealth of the world.”
She told the servant that, and the servant told it to the king. When Branduv heard it he nearly went mad with love and longing and jealousy, and with rage also, because of the treasure he had given her and might not get back. He called Mongan over to him, and spoke to him very threateningly and ragingly.
“I am not one who takes a thing without giving a thing,” said he.
“Nobody could say you were,” agreed Mongan.
“Do you see this woman sitting beside me?” he continued, pointing to Duv Laca.
“I do indeed,” said Mongan.
“Well,” said Branduv, “this woman is Duv Laca of the White Hand that I took away from Mongan; she is just going to marry me, but if you will make an exchange, you can marry this Duv Laca here, and I will marry that Ivell of the Shining Cheeks yonder.”
Mongan pretended to be very angry then.
“If I had come here with horses and treasure you would be in your right to take these from me, but you have no right to ask for what you are now asking.”
“I do ask for it,” said Branduv menacingly, “and you must not refuse a lord.”
“Very well,” said Mongan reluctantly, and as if in great fear; “if you will make the exchange I will make it, although it breaks my heart.”
He brought Ivell over to the king then and gave her three kisses.
“The king would suspect something if I did not kiss you,” said he, and then he gave the hag over to the king. After that they all got drunk and merry, and soon there was a great snoring and snorting, and very soon all the servants fell asleep also, so that Mongan could not get anything to drink. Mac an Da’v said it was a great shame, and he kicked some of the servants, but they did not budge, and then he slipped out to the stables and saddled two mares. He got on one with his wife behind him and Mongan got on the other with Duv Laca behind him, and they rode away towards Ulster like the wind, singing this song: The King of Leinster was married to-day, Married to-day, married to-day, The King of Leinster was married to-day, And every one wishes him joy.
In the morning the servants came to waken the King of Leinster, and when they saw the face of the hag lying on the pillow beside the king, and her nose all covered with whiskers, and her big foot and little foot sticking away out at the end of the bed, they began to laugh, and poke one another in the stomachs and thump one another on the shoulders, so that the noise awakened the king, and he asked what was the matter with them at all. It was then he saw the hag lying beside him, and he gave a great screech and jumped out of the bed.
“Aren’t you the Hag of the Mill?” said he.
“I am indeed,” she replied, “and I love you dearly.”
“I wish I didn’t see you,” said Branduv.
That was the end of the story, and when he had told it Mongan began to laugh uproariously and called for more wine. He drank this deeply, as though he was full of thirst and despair and a wild jollity, but when the Flame Lady began to weep he took her in his arms and caressed her, and said that she was the love of his heart and the one treasure of the world.
After that they feasted in great contentment, and at the end of the feasting they went away from Faery and returned to the world of men.
They came to Mongan’s palace at Moy Linney, and it was not until they reached the palace that they found they had been away one whole year, for they had thought they were only away one night. They lived then peacefully and lovingly together, and that ends the story, but Bro’tiarna did not know that Mongan was Fionn.
The abbot leaned forward.
“Was Mongan Fionn?” he asked in a whisper.
“He was,” replied Cairide’.
“Indeed, indeed!” said the abbot.
After a while he continued: “There is only one part of your story that I do not like.”
“What part is that?” asked Cairide’.
“It is the part where the holy man Tibraide’ was ill treated by that rap–by that–by Mongan.”
Cairide’ agreed that it was ill done, but to himself he said gleefully that whenever he was asked to tell the story of how he told the story of Mongan he would remember what the abbot said.