The Crock of Gold (16 page)

"Get up," said Shawn, "get up till give you another one."

"That will do," said the sergeant, "we'll go home. We're the laughing stock of the world. I'll pay you out for this some time, every damn man of ye. Bring that Leprecaun along with you, and
quick march."

"Oh!" said Shawn in a strangled tone.

"What is it now?" said the sergeant testily.

"Nothing," replied Shawn.

"What did you say 'Oh!' for then, you blockhead?"

"It's the Leprecaun, sergeant," said Shawn in a whisper—"he's got away—when I was hitting the man there I forgot all about the Leprecaun: he must have run into the hedge. Oh,
sergeant, dear, don't say anything to me now—!"

"Quick march," said the sergeant, and the four men moved on through the darkness in a silence, which was only skin deep.

CHAPTER XV

By reason of the many years which he had spent in the gloomy pine wood, the Philosopher could see a little in the darkness, and when he found there was no longer any hold on his coat he
continued his journey quietly, marching along with his head sunken on his breast in a deep abstraction. He was meditating on the word "Me," and endeavouring to pursue it through all its changes and
adventures. The fact of "meness" was one which startled him. He was amazed at his own being. He knew that the hand which he held up and pinched with another hand was not him and the endeavour to
find out what was him was one which had frequently exercised his leisure. He had not gone far when there came a tug at his sleeve and looking down he found one of the Leprecauns of the Gort
trotting by his side.

"Noble Sir," said the Leprecaun, "you are terrible hard to get into conversation with. I have been talking to you for the last long time and you won't listen."

"I am listening now," replied the Philosopher.

"You are, indeed," said the Leprecaun heartily. "My brothers are on the other side of the road over there beyond the hedge, and they want to talk to you: will you come with me, Noble Sir?"

"Why wouldn't I go with you?" said the Philosopher, and he turned aside with the Leprecaun.

They pushed softly through a gap in the hedge and into a field beyond.

"Come this way, sir," said his guide, and the Philosopher followed him across the field. In a few minutes they came to a thick bush among the leaves of which the other Leprecauns were hiding.
They thronged out to meet the Philosopher's approach and welcomed him with every appearance of joy. With them was the Thin Woman of Inis Magrath who embraced her husband tenderly and gave thanks
for his escape.

"The night is young yet," remarked one of the Leprecauns. "Let us sit down here and talk about what should be done."

"I am tired enough," said the Philosopher, "for I have been travelling all yesterday, and all this day and the whole of this night I have been going also, so I would be glad to sit down
anywhere."

They sat down under the bush and the Philosopher lit his pipe. In the open space where they were there was just light enough to see the smoke coming from his pipe, but scarcely more. One
recognised a figure as a deeper shadow than the surrounding darkness; but as the ground was dry and the air just touched with a pleasant chill, there was no discomfort. After the Philosopher had
drawn a few mouthfuls of smoke he passed his pipe on to the next person, and in this way his pipe made the circuit of the party.

"When I put the children to bed," said the Thin Woman, "I came down the road in your wake with a basin of stirabout, for you had no time to take your food, God help you! and I was thinking you
must have been hungry."

"That is so," said the Philosopher in a very anxious voice: "but I don't blame you, my dear, for letting the basin fall on the road—"

"While I was going along," she continued, "I met these good people and when I told them what happened they came with me to see if anything could be done. The time they ran out of the hedge to
fight the policemen I wanted to go with them, but I was afraid the stirabout would be spilt."

The Philosopher licked his lips.

"I am listening to you, my love," said he.

"So I had to stay where I was with the stirabout under my shawl—"

"Did you slip then, dear wife?"

"I did not, indeed," she replied: "I have the stirabout with me this minute. It's rather cold, I'm thinking, but it is better than nothing at all," and she placed the bowl in his hands.

"I put sugar in it," said she shyly, "and currants, and I have a spoon in my pocket."

"It tastes well," said the Philosopher, and he cleaned the basin so speedily that his wife wept because of his hunger.

By this time the pipe had come round to him again and it was welcomed.

"Now we can talk," said he, and he blew a great cloud of smoke into the darkness and sighed happily.

"We were thinking," said the Thin Woman, "that you won't be able to come back to our house for a while yet: the policemen will be peeping about Coilla Doraca for a long time, to be sure; for
isn't it true that if there is a good thing coming to a person, nobody takes much trouble to find him, but if there is a bad thing or a punishment in store for a man, then the whole world will be
searched until he be found?"

"It is a true statement," said the Philosopher.

"So what we arranged was this—that you should go to live with these little men in their house under the yew tree of the Gort. There is not a policeman in the world would find you there; or
if you went by night to the Brugh of the Boyne, Angus Óg himself would give you a refuge."

One of the Leprecauns here interposed.

"Noble Sir," said he, "there isn't much room in our house, but there's no stint of welcome in it. You would have a good time with us travelling on moonlit nights and seeing strange things, for
we often go to visit the Shee of the Hills and they come to see us; there is always something to talk about, and we have dances in the caves and on the tops of the hills. Don't be imagining now
that we have a poor life, for there is fun and plenty with us and the Brugh of Angus Mac an Óg is hard to be got at."

"I would like to dance, indeed," returned the Philosopher, "for I do believe that dancing is the first and last duty of man. If we cannot be gay what can we be? Life is not any use at all unless
we find a laugh here and there—but this time, decent men of the Gort, I cannot go with you, for it is laid on me to give myself up to the police."

"You would not do that," exclaimed the Thin Woman pitifully: "you wouldn't think of doing that now!"

"An innocent man," said he, "cannot be oppressed, for he is fortified by his mind and his heart cheers him. It is only on a guilty person that the rigour of punishment can fall, for he punishes
himself. This is what I think, that a man should always obey the law with his body and always disobey it with his mind. I have been arrested, the men of the law had me in their hands, and I will
have to go back to them so that they may do whatever they have to do."

The Philosopher resumed his pipe, and although the others reasoned with him for a long time they could not by any means remove him from his purpose. So, when the pale glimmer of dawn had stolen
over the sky, they arose and went downwards to the cross roads and so to the Police Station.

Outside the village the Leprecauns bade him farewell and the Thin Woman also took her leave of him, saying she would visit Angus Óg and implore his assistance on behalf of her husband,
and then the Leprecauns and the Thin Woman returned again the way they came, and the Philosopher walked on to the barracks.

CHAPTER XVI

When he knocked at the barrack door it was opened by a man with tousled, red hair, who looked as though he had just awakened from sleep.

"What do you want at this hour of the night?" said he.

"I want to give myself up," said the Philosopher.

The Policeman looked at him—

"A man as old as you are," said he, "oughtn't to be a fool. Go home now, I advise you, and don't say a word to any one whether you did it or not. Tell me this now, was it found out, or are you
only making a clean breast of it?"

"Sure I must give myself up," said the Philosopher.

"If you must, you must, and that's an end of it. Wipe your feet on the rail there and come in—I'll take your deposition."

"I have no deposition for you," said the Philosopher, "for I didn't do a thing at all."

The policeman stared at him again.

"If that's so," said he, "you needn't come in at all, and you needn't have wakened me out of my sleep either. Maybe, though, you are the man that fought the badger on the Naas
Road—Eh?"

"I am not," replied the Philosopher: "but I was arrested for killing my brother and his wife, although I never touched them."

"Is that who you are?" said the policeman; and then, briskly, "you're as welcome as the cuckoo, you are so. Come in and make yourself comfortable till the men awaken, and they are the lads
that'll be glad to see you. I couldn't make head or tail of what they said when they came in last night, and no one else could either, for they did nothing but fight each other and curse the
banshees and cluricauns of Leinster. Sit down there on the settle by the fire and, maybe, you'll be able to get a sleep; you look as if you were tired, and the mud of every county in Ireland is on
your boots."

The Philosopher thanked him and stretched out on the settle. In a short time, for he was very weary, he fell asleep.

Many hours later he was awakened by the sound of voices, and found on rising, that the men who had captured him on the previous evening were standing by the bed. The sergeant's face beamed with
joy. He was dressed only in his trousers and shirt. His hair was sticking up in some places and sticking out in others which gave a certain wild look to him, and his feet were bare. He took the
Philosopher's two hands in his own and swore if ever there was anything he could do to comfort him he would do that and more. Shawn, in a similar state of unclothedness, greeted the Philosopher and
proclaimed himself his friend and follower forever. Shawn further announced that he did not believe the Philosopher had killed the two people, that if he had killed them they must have richly
deserved it, and that if he was hung he would plant flowers on his grave; for a decenter, quieter, and wiser man he had never met and never would meet in the world.

These professions of esteem comforted the Philosopher, and he replied to them in terms which made the red-haired policeman gape in astonishment and approval.

He was given a breakfast of bread and cocoa which he ate with his guardians, and then, as they had to take up their outdoor duties, he was conducted to the back-yard and informed he could walk
about there and that he might smoke until he was black in the face. The policemen severally presented him with a pipe, a tin of tobacco, two boxes of matches and a dictionary, and then they
withdrew leaving him to his own devices.

The garden was about twelve feet square, having high, smooth walls on every side, and into it there came neither sun nor wind. In one corner a clump of rusty-looking sweet-pea was climbing up
the wall—every leaf of this plant was riddled with holes, and there were no flowers on it. Another corner was occupied by dwarf nasturtiums, and on this plant, in despite of every
discouragement, two flowers were blooming, but its leaves also were tattered and dejected. A mass of ivy clung to the third corner, its leaves were big and glossy at the top, but near the ground
there were only grey, naked stalks laced together by cobwebs. The fourth wall was clothed in a loose Virginia creeper every leaf of which looked like an insect that could crawl if it wanted to. The
centre of this small plot had used every possible artifice to cover itself with grass, and in some places it had wonderfully succeeded, but the pieces of broken bottles, shattered jampots, and
sections of crockery were so numerous that no attempt at growth could be other than tentative and unpassioned.

Here, for a long time, the Philosopher marched up and down. At one moment he examined the sweet-pea and mourned with it on a wretched existence. Again he congratulated the nasturtium on its two
bright children; but he thought of the gardens wherein they might have bloomed and the remembrance of that spacious, sunny freedom saddened him.

"Indeed, poor creatures!" said he, "ye also are in gaol."

The blank, soundless yard troubled him so much that at last he called to the red-haired policeman and begged to be put into a cell in preference; and to the common cell he was, accordingly,
conducted.

This place was a small cellar built beneath the level of the ground. An iron grating at the top of the wall admitted one blanched wink of light, but the place was bathed in obscurity. A wooden
ladder led down to the cell from a hole in the ceiling, and this hole also gave a spark of brightness and some little air to the room. The walls were of stone covered with plaster, but the plaster
had fallen away in many places leaving the rough stones visible at every turn of the eye.

There were two men in the cell, and these the Philosopher saluted; but they did not reply, nor did they speak to each other. There was a low, wooden form fixed to the wall, running quite round
the room, and on this, far apart from each other, the two men were seated, with their elbows resting on their knees, their heads propped upon their hands, and each of them with an unwavering gaze
fixed on the floor between his feet.

The Philosopher walked for a time up and down the little cell, but soon he also sat down on the low form, propped his head on his hands and lapsed to a melancholy dream.

So the day passed. Twice a policeman came down the ladder bearing three portions of food, bread and cocoa; and by imperceptible gradations the light faded away from the grating and the darkness
came. After a great interval the policeman again approached carrying three mattresses and three rough blankets, and these he bundled through the hole. Each of the men took a mattress and a blanket
and spread them on the floor, and the Philosopher took his share also.