The Last Storyteller (33 page)

Because the gods had parted the clouds, the day grew glorious. You could hear the stones splitting with the heat on Ben Bulben. Flanked by the chieftain and his warriors, the lovers sat on their horses to face the oncoming riders. In war, in peace, and in hunting, Finn always led his warriors from the front. And he did so now, astride a great black horse, his faithful dogs loping along beside him
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Up the foothills of the mountain they came, thundering with urgency, and yet the lovers felt not a qualm of fear. Diarmuid, after all, had been the greatest of Finn’s warriors, capable of defeating any number of men in battle, and Grainne had magic powers, the strength of which she did not fully comprehend
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Finn reined in his horse, and his warriors drew up in ranks on either side of him. They outnumbered the lovers, the chieftain, and his warriors by ten to one. Nobody spoke. Finn looked at Grainne, the woman who had left him, and Diarmuid, the warrior who had betrayed him, whom he had once loved as his own son. Across his face traveled first disappointment, then rage, and then cunning. When Diarmuid saw the last emotion, he felt fear for the first time—because nobody could outsmart Finn, nobody could outguess or out-think him
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Finn spoke: “My beloved son, we have come to this.”

Neither of the lovers replied; nor did anyone on their side
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Finn spoke again: “And since we have come to this, let it be decided not by bloodshed but by a trial of strength and skill. I am an old man, you are young; therefore, the odds are on your side. As you know, you have come to the side of a mountain wherein dwells a magic boar. Together, Diarmuid, we will hunt this boar, and whoever slays the animal shall be the rightful lover of the Princess Grainne.”

Grainne had long heard the stories of Finn MacCool’s cunning, and she felt no reason to trust him. She spoke up
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“I fear this plan,” she said. “I fear that during the hunt you will find a means of wounding my beloved man, and then come back and tell us that he was gored by the wild boar. How may we have a means of trusting that this will not happen?”

Finn rode forward. “You have your magic powers, and they should be
proof enough against any disaster. But as a token of my trust, I will give you this ring, and as long as you keep it, all whom you love will be safe from injury or death.”

Grainne accepted the ring, which would have fitted around three of her fingers. It sat on the palm of her hand as she watched Diarmuid and Finn ride off together up the mountain to hunt the boar. What she did not know was that Finn, being a god, was untrustworthy, as are all gods, and that his ring had its own magic, which canceled all the magic powers of anybody who held it
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From the moment Grainne closed her hand around the ring, her magic began to wane. So powerful was the ring that she was unable to speak and protest, and she sat there on the horse with tears rolling down her cheeks, fearing the worst
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The two riders reached the top of the mountain, and the dogs began to bark. Soon they had flushed the wild boar from its cave, and Diarmuid, the best horseman in Ireland, took off in wild pursuit. Within minutes he caught up with the boar, dismounted, and cornered the snarling beast in a hollow in the rocks
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Finn arrived and surveyed the scene. He called out words of congratulation to Diarmuid. But his call distracted Diarmuid, and the boar charged. A tusk caught Diarmuid in the side, just above the hip, and almost went right through him. Diarmuid jumped back, dislodging the tusk, and the boar escaped. Diarmuid fell to the ground, blood pouring from his wound
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As everybody knows, the top of Ben Bulben mountain is inhabited by magic people. Across the valley stands the grave of Queen Maeve, the ruler of all invisible people everywhere, and the countryside is protected by her people. The very heathers and grasses contain cures and healing powers, and the waters in the springs and streams can fix all ailments. One hundred paces away, the most potent of these waters bubbled from the ground. Finn knew this, and so did Diarmuid, and he sent Finn to fetch a drink for him
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At first, Finn protested. He said, “I have no vessel in which to carry the water.”

Diarmuid prevailed upon Finn to dip his hands into the cold spring and bring back the water. Finn went to the spring and dipped his hands, but as he reached Diarmuid one hundred paces later, the water slipped through his fingers
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Finn went back to the spring and dipped his hands again, and this time he brought a full handful, but he spilled the water so close to Diarmuid that he only splashed him
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Diarmuid was slipping away, and Finn went back to the spring a third time. He dipped his cupped hands deep into the freezing waters and scooped up a big handful. But as he stood above Diarmuid, he let the water trickle through his fingers, and Diarmuid, the most handsome and most brave warrior in the land, died on the side of the mountain
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Finn gathered Diarmuid’s body in his arms, and when he appeared at the top of the mountain, holding the body of his beloved warrior, Grainne, waiting below, let out a scream and expired
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To this day, that same scream is heard near households and on farms and by lakeshores when a beloved person dies. It is the voice of the banshee, the woman fairy, and it haunts all those who have ever heard it
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And that is my story tonight, and I am glad to have told it to you, because it will now make room in my heart for the next story that wants to be told
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Children, by working diligently, by concentrating on my rewarding life collecting folklore all over the Irish countryside, I managed long ago to give myself tremendous purpose, and I absorbed the most useful material you could imagine.

Every day I collected some kind of story, song, or tradition that gave extra meaning to me, that helped to guide me, to steer me. When I’d first begun to look at this material with the help of my beloved friend and mentor James Clare, I’d seen a pathway stretching out ahead of me. This road, should I take it, would surely lead me to a higher place, a plateau upon which, when I’d reached it, put me above the places through which I had toiled. Now, I’d said to myself, the snarling tendrils of the past can no longer entwine around my legs and pull me down.

I loved those stories; I still do. Their vigor, their relentless optimism, their trust in nature and humanity—they told me to look at my own life
in a different way. I wasn’t able to achieve that immediately, but in time I came around to it, and I was able to see that moping on a day-to-day basis, which is what I had been doing, was absolutely no good for me.

Yes, I know, I know—it took me years to overcome the deep and morbid depression after my great loss. For more than a decade I endured constant self-blame for not having protected your mother. But once I got hold of the fact that I could learn from these legends, I slowly began to absorb the possibility. And one by one I saw the steps being cut into the rock of the mountain ahead of me, the steps I would climb to reach that high and sunny plateau.

When Jimmy Bermingham came into the pub that afternoon in County Kilkenny, I was at last a sunny person. My parents—your grandparents—might have told you how morose I used to be, how I used to mope each dawn, day, and nightfall, with not a word to throw to a dog. At last, though, by constant and consistent self-exhortation, by constant and consistent self-improvement, by constant and consistent self-awareness, I had taken myself up onto a place where the sun shone until it was time for the night to arrive.

When the night did arrive, it wasn’t always cold, chilly night anymore, like all those darknesses I’d lived through; it was a night bathed by the moon and the stars. Benign winds blew.

I had put so much behind me, so many bad character traits, so many ill-informed tendencies—I had even allowed myself to be dragged through that pit of hell we call World War II, because I hadn’t yet come into my full emotional domain. Well, by that afternoon at John Jacob’s with Venetia I had surely arrived in the place I considered mine, the place of my very best self.

In myself, nothing much disturbed me. I had perspective; I had calm; I had good judgment. Not for me anymore those days of irrational behavior, of wild mood swings, of punches thrown in bars; of savage depressions, and money spent like water; of morbid sulking and dramatic self-pity. I had determined my way forward. And now that Venetia had returned, whatever her difficulties, I was about to be complete. Or so I told myself.

We slept soundly that night, in the lovely loft room of John Jacob’s house. Before falling asleep, Venetia turned to me and put her head on my chest, her first overt movement of affection since our reuniting.

“Thank you for all this magic,” she said. “My soul is on fire.” Then, as she always did, she fell asleep in an instant.

The next morning, we both sprang awake at the same time—because we heard a noise. With our heads still full of John Jacob’s wonderful story, we thought it an enchanting sound. I opened the door a little to hear it better.

John Jacob was singing. He was practicing scales. When he had run up and down the scale many times he launched into an exercise practiced by professional singers—no more than two words, “Bella Signora,” but with the “Signora” drawn out into many, many notes. It had been designed, I assume, for coloratura sopranos, but he made a good job of it. At breakfast I said to him, “I didn’t know there was such a thing as a coloratura baritone.”

Venetia delighted him. He served her almost as a butler, quelling efforts by her to help, even to pour milk into her own tea. They began a long conversation about performance, about the need to identify what he called “the sagging pockets” in an audience. I listened, happy to see her so nearly returned to the woman of twenty-five years ago.

We stayed until eleven o’clock or so, and left with slow footsteps and many last moments of “Oh, I forgot to tell you …” and “Next time you come, remind me to tell you …” and so on.

She took my arm as we walked up that lane, a place I so often visit in my memory. Her deepest interests had been reignited. The Venetia I had first known wanted more than anything else to share the joys she had discovered with an audience.

I looked ahead to where I had parked the car by the roadside at the
mouth of the lane. And I knew, in the part of my soul that’s as deep as a mine to this day, the part whence all good and bad comes, the cavern where all prophecy, good and bad, is born, that fear had returned. And I recalled—again—the dangers of hearing a legend from John Jacob O’Neill. And the values.

PART FIVE
A Carelessness with Death

Let me draw you, children, into the story at this point. I want to remind you of the parts you played, how kind you were and how compassionate—to all parties. For a moment it will feel like leaping ahead, but please bear with me.

On the evening of the day we left John Jacob O’Neill’s house, I telephoned Marian Killeen from Limerick. I’d had time to think. I knew that we faced serious problems, and I’d made sure that we lost ourselves in the city, the first place where we tried to hide (of which more in a moment).

Marian told me that you’d visited her a second time. And she told me of her own visit to Miss Fay. In the hospital. Jack Stirling had broken one of Miss Fay’s fine cheekbones with a punch.

In the theater he’d heard the gossip from the housekeeper May’s friend, or her cousin, or some connection or other (Dublin is a village) and had ascertained the address where we’d been visiting. Miss Fay, telling the truth, said she didn’t know where we were or where we’d gone. Drunk as a skunk, he hit her anyway. Repeatedly. Left her lying in her own blood on the floor of her tiled kitchen.

When you visited Marian’s that second time, you knew what had happened—that I had taken Venetia away. Insofar as you could, you took over. Marian had found out about Miss Fay, had organized doctors, hospital care, and so on. And the two of you, abject with apology, visited Miss Fay. A long time afterward, she told me that this had brought her great comfort, especially when you reassured her that Jack wouldn’t return.
She even made jokes with you, I gather, regarding “Gentleman” Jack.

By now his stint at the Olympia had ended, and he told you two things: That he’d cancel his upcoming shows at different venues. And that he’d devote all his time to pursuing your mother. You feared murderous intent. How did you keep calm? Or did you?

And you knew nothing of the other characters in this lethal farce. It had all become much worse than you could imagine. The word “ludicrous” would have leapt to mind if it hadn’t all been so frightening. D’you remember that I mentioned earlier how violence hung in the very atmosphere of the country?

At the top of the lane, the mist of the night had clouded the windows of the car. By the hedge, a red-haired boy waited. He handed me a letter and fled on his bicycle.