Shiana

“ At last she spoke.
"He is coming to you, Shiana!" said she. "The enemy is almost close to you," said she. And if it was a great gladness and delight to look at her beautiful, noble countenance, even greater was the gladness and delight of listening to the sound of her speech. ”

“ When it was finished, everybody was running about and shouting, but Shiana did not run, nor did he shout.
No sooner was the race over than a fight arose between two tinkers about a donkey's halter. A tinker who was stronger than either of them sprang in between them, and put them apart and took the halter himself.
Just then Shiana heard the people round him whispering.
"Look! Look! Look!" they said. He looked in the same direction as they did. Whom should he see coming down the middle of the fair-green, while all the fair made way for them, but the pair—Sive and the strange gentleman! ”

“ The next person that sits in it, except myself, may he stick in it!"
"Oh, fie, fie, Shiana!" said the angel; "there is a beautiful wish gone to waste. You have two more; don't forget Mercy."
"I have," said Shiana, "a little malvogue of meal at home, and every dalteen that comes in must needs push his fist into it. The next person that puts his hand into that malvogue, except myself, may he stick in it!"
"Oh, Shiana, Shiana, you have not an atom of sense!" said the angel. "Now you have only one wish more. Ask the Mercy of God for your soul." ”

“ Sheila.—But listen, Peg; I wonder what power there was in that jewel that the barefooted woman gave to Shiana, so that the great grief left him so suddenly. What a pity that everybody who is in trouble has not one like it. ”

“ Go away up from me and sit in that chair above, and let me do my work."
"You are the most extraordinary man I have ever met yet!" said the Black Man. "You have no fear or dread of me any more than you would have of a puppy dog!"
"Well, that is a comical thing," said Shiana, with a burst of laughter. " You think that because you have horns and claws we should run into an auger-hole to hide from you. If it is your bargain you want, fulfil your own side of it, man! ”

“ Or what is it you want?"
"It is no wonder you should ask that question, Father," said Shiana. "It is hard to say what sort of man I am, or what it is that I want. Whatever sort of man I am, I have this to say about this match: it would be better for Short Mary to die the worst death that ever a human being died, than that I should marry her. That is the sort of man I am. ”

“ When Shiana saw the change, and when he heard the sound and the power of that roar, swelling and rising, the house whirled about him, a cloud came before his eyes, and he fell like a dead lump on the floor, unconscious and speechless.
Sheila.—Oh, Peg! I see him, I see him! oh! oh! oh!
Peg.—Hush, hush, Sheila dear! What do you see?
Sheila.—Oh, the man with the horns! The man with the horns! What shall I do? What shall I do? Oh!
Kate.—The neighbours will hear her. Hush, Sheila, my darling. ”

“ Who should be behind him but the thimble-rigger.
"He would kill you, would he?" said the thimble-rigger. "Why, confound you, you little yellow shoemaker with the malvogue, of the race of the brown leather patches and thick awls and smelly shoes, if you haven't presumption, to be coming here to buy a horse, and without a penny in your pocket!"
When Shiana heard that, he turned away. He slipped his hand down into his pocket. On my word it was empty! He searched another pocket—empty also! He put his hand into his bosom, to look for the purse. ”

“ If Sive had known that, she would have understood what the grip was that Shiana had of him.
Peg.—He had that grip of him firmly, and signs by, he had but to beckon to him in order to send him to work, be the work hard or easy, be the time late or early, and no matter how cold or wet the weather. "Do you think is there any chance of his being caught?" said Shiana.
"The pursuit is hot at all events," said Cormac.
"There are men on his trail from whom it is hard to escape, I promise you. They say themselves that no thief has ever escaped them. If this fellow escapes them he will take the palm." ”

“ All Shiana did was to turn round and go out at the door.
Michael's mother was a widow. He went straight to the widow's house. He arrived before the bailiff, and only just before him. The widow welcomed him.
"What does he want?" said Shiana.
"The rent," said she.
"How much is it?" said he.
"Twenty pounds," said she.
"Here," said he. "Michael gets a pound a week. There are twenty pounds of his wages for you before-hand."
"Oh," said she, "why would you give me so much money in advance?" ”

“ There would not be a batch of men working in a field, nor a few people walking on the road, nor a little gathering going to a neighbour's house in the evening, nor a company going to have a drink, but that the first question that would start up among them would be, "Man, did you hear what Grey Dermot did? Oh, upon my word and credit, he walked straight up to Shiana' s house, and he wanted, right or wrong, to bring Shiana down with him by the poll of his head and marry him there and then, to Sive, in spite of his back teeth! ”

“ Think of it, Hannah," said she, "of all men in the great wide world, who would think of Shiana being under such a bond? I never was so much surprised in my born days. I tell you," said she, "that he opened my eyes for me. That man, of whom people say that he has no religion, to have such an obligation upon him in the sight of God ”

“ An enemy, you call her!" said Shiana. "She is not an enemy, and well you know she is not. It is not you that put her in my way. It is God that put her in my way, praise be to Him! If you were going to put someone like her in my way, no fear but it would be a very different sort of person from her. If you were choosing an enemy for me you would choose an enemy who would be a real enemy. Drop your prevarication. Tell the truth. You do not like the truth, of course, but you have to tell the truth in that chair, much as you hate it. Tell me the truth. Why have you called her an enemy? ”

“ What am I to do at all, at all? It is a hard thing to happen to me at the end of my life! Oh! I am ruined! Utterly ruined! What shall I do! What shall I do?"
"Shut your mouth and not be bothering us—that's what you'll do!" said Sive. "It is not you that are at a loss by it, but I. If I get him into my hands I'll tear the eyes out of his head. And now I think of it, what string was tying your tongue," said she to Shiana, "that you didn't speak when we passed you as we went down the fair-green? ”

“ Abbie.—There was nothing putting them apart except that Shiana wouldn't do what was wrong.
Kate.—What put it into his heart not to do what was wrong? He need not have told any one living whether he had a secret or not. There was nothing to hinder him from marrying her; nothing to prevent him saying to himself: "Who knows if I shall live even the thirteen years? Who knows if that Black Man will ever come, after the fright he got the time he gave that extraordinary roar?" ”

“ There were big horses there, and little horses, old horses and young horses, black horses and white horses, grey horses and speckled horses, horses neighing and horses leaping, horses that had fine skins and were well-built and powerful, and ugly little shaggy colts. Among them all he utterly failed to fix his mind upon the one that he would like.
At last he laid his eye upon a fine jet-black horse, well-knit and full of braced-up energy, that was cantering about the field with a light lissom rider on his back. Shiana moved up and beckoned to the rider. ”

“ Peg.—As I said a while ago, when Grey Dermot's Sive understood that Short Mary's match was broken off, she told everyone that it was she herself who had broken it, and that the reason why she broke it was that Shiana had made a promise of marriage to herself.
Nobody contradicted her. Some people believed it and some did not; but whether they believed it or not, there was no fear that anybody would try to dispute the matter with her. She was always boasting that she was the girl to put down forward, chattering hussies like the Maid of the Liss and Nora of the Causeway. ”

“ He gave a side-look at the thimble-man. The man was minding his own business and taking no more notice of Shiana than if he had never seen him.
"Well," said Shiana to himself, "there's the end of the showing off! It's easier since the curse has been taken off the malvogue and the chair and the tree. I suppose it can't have been put on again. At all events, I have nothing to do now but to go and see if I can buy some leather, and go and stick to the business I know best. If they are strong-smelling shoes, the people who wear them don't find any fault with them. ”

“ That day was only a week off, but Shiana had never yet come to have any talk with him.
"I suppose," said Dermot to himself, "that he would come, if it were not that he does not mean to ask for any fortune with Sive. Very good. She is a fine handsome woman. A quiet sensible girl—if nothing happens to make her angry. 'A wife is better than a fortune.' Whoever was the first to say that had great wisdom! All the world can't beat a proverb."
Two days more passed and there was neither tale nor tidings of Shiana. Dermot was very much surprised. His daughter Sive was twice as much surprised. ”

“ We were all making game of Dermot that day that he went up. Perhaps he knew what he was about. 'There is not a ghost nor a pooka that does not know his own business himself.' And see now, Shiana did not say, 'I won't marry her,' but 'I have no notion of marrying.' Perhaps it may not come so easily to me to break off the match as I thought it would.——And see too, here am I weighing and balancing, while, perhaps, the match is being finished by my mother. May she not be rewarded for her trouble! How very neighbourly she is! ”

“ You are a good girl to-night, and I am very fond of you, my darling, my heart's darling!
Sheila.—Oh, yes indeed! Wait till you are vexed, and maybe then you won't say "my darling!"
Abbie.—Now, now, stop, girls. I and my gollaun are the cause of all this trouble. Put away that stocking, Peg, and let us have the story. Did Shiana get the purse? Many a person has been near getting a purse and then didn't get it. Peg.—As soon as Shiana said the words: "by the virtue of the Holy Things!" a change came over the appearance of the Black Man. ”

“ She was very glad when she heard that he had given the money for the Saviour's sake.
"And," said she, "I hope, now, that Michael will earn that money as honestly as if he had not got it beforehand."
"Why then indeed," said the widow, "that is just the wonder of the whole business. When he was paying the men last night he handed a pound to Michael as usual. 'Oh,' said Michael, 'I am paid already.' 'Take that from me,' said Shiana, and he had to take it."
"Well!" said Short Mary, "they used to say that Shiana had no religion. Let them take that as a sign of it!"
"Religion?" said the widow. ”

“ When the priest heard of the dreadful doings of those thieves at the fair he came here himself, and when he found Dermot sick and no one here to give him a drink, he sent for me, and I came."
"Might we go in to see him? " said Shiana.
"Oh, certainly, certainly," said she. Cormac was already within, without leave.
Sheila.—I would not doubt him! Peg.—"How goes it, Dermot?" said Cormac.
"Ask something else!" said Dermot. "Where did you leave her?" said he. "Did he take her from you? You are a good-for-nothing man to let her go with him." ”

“ But it is gone, great thanks to God for it! Don't talk any more now; you are too weak to talk much. You will soon be strong enough for it, with the help of God. I have a drink here for you. Take it and drink it. It will do you good. There!"
"How long have I been here, Mary?" said he.
"It is three weeks since I came," said she, "and I think you were three days ill before I was sent for."
Shiana lay back and closed his eyes, but it was not to sleep.
"Three weeks! What has happened to me at all?" said he to himself. "Mary!" said he to the woman. ”

“ Shiana himself knew right well, though, what was the matter with him. The last year of the thirteen years was going at a hand-gallop. According as he was moving on towards the end of the time the poor fellow used to be thinking more closely and more constantly upon what was before him, until the thought hardly ever left his mind. There used to be such a strain and such an oppression upon his heart and upon his mind from constantly dwelling upon that one thought, that he used to think an hour longer than a day while the hour was passing ”

“ Peg.—You are quite right, Nora. She was talking to Michael's mother a couple of days afterwards, and this is how she spoke to her:—
"Hannah," said she, "isn't it a great wonder that Shiana didn't tell you the other day that he was a Céile Dé, [1] and not let us be under a false impression, as he did?"
Sheila.—What is a Céile Dé, Peg? Surely nobody could be a spouse to God,—praise and thanks be to Him! ”

“ May you not as well leave alone the good that was done by that shilling?"
"You talk too much; too much altogether. I told you to shut your mouth. Here! There is the whole purse for you," said the Black Man.
"I suppose there is no fear, sir," said Shiana, "that there wouldn't be enough in it to last the time? There is many a day in thirteen years. A man would have made many a shoe during that length of time, and there's many a way in which he would need a shilling." ”