surely there had never been one like this before? He was certain it would have dislocated his wings and pitched him back into the floods to drown.
Drown? No, he couldn’t drown, could he?
The mare shifted beneath him, trying to turn her back to the storm. Had Aengus not been a god he might have pitied poor Maureen Ryan and felt regret at having turnedher into a horse and driven her into such a predicament. But he was a god, and so he didn’t.
‘Here,’ he said. ‘Keep your rotten apples.’ And he flung them, basket and all, into the water beneath the horse’s nose, then slithered down from her back. In an instant he was gone, nothing more than a glimmer of shining scales vanishing into the murky depths of the flood.
Aisling, being ploddy bred as well as ploddy born, did not have the ability to fly. So Jenny left her to make her own way across the plain and went on sparrowhawk wings back to the rath. There, to her relief, she found that the Dagda had calmed down a bit. He had discovered a box of tin whistles in an old suitcase and he was working his way through them, playing a tune on each one.
‘These are rubbish, too,’ he said. ‘Look!’ He blew a note on one and then another note with the same fingering on another. The second one was several tones higher. ‘They’re not even in tune with each other,’ he said.
‘They’re not supposed to be, Granddad,’ said Jenny. ‘They’re in different keys. They were made like that.’
‘Just what I said. Didn’t you hear me? Different keys, I said. They’re made like that.’
He appraised the whistles splayed out around his feet like shiny bristles. Then he picked up the biggest of them, the low D whistle, and in no time he was lost in its mellow tones.
Jenny was mesmerized by the brilliance of the Dagda’splaying. She had seen him dance and knew that there was no one in either world to compare with him, but she had never heard him play before. She hadn’t even known he could, until now.
She stretched out on the bank in the sunshine to listen. First there was a set of hornpipes, then a barn dance, then a pair of jigs. Jenny knew there was something she ought to be doing, but surely it couldn’t be all that important? Not more important than lying here in the sunshine, listening to this beautiful music, surely? Nothing could be, could it?
29
The salmon that swam beneath the dark waters of the vast turlough was not the salmon of wisdom that was told of in the old tale of Fionn Mac Cumhail. He was a lost and bewildered fish who felt very small and had no more idea where he was going underneath the water than he had when he was a man on horseback up above it. So the fish that was Aengus Óg decided his best bet was to swim in a straight line and keep going in the same direction. That way, sooner or later, he was certain to reach land.
But it wasn’t as simple as it sounded. There were lumps and bumps of hillocks and rocks there on the lake bed, and they had to be swum round. Some of the larger ones that broke the surface had to be investigated in case they turned out to be a shoreline. And when they turned out not to be a shoreline but a bit of a rocky island instead, then the fish was left with the difficulty of trying to remember which way he had been heading when he found it.
Once, discovering he had been deceived three times by the same protruding outcrop of limestone, the fishreared up into the shape of a man, who climbed out on to the rock and bellowed his rage at the world. But the world roared back even louder, and the storm thumped him so hard that he pitched forward from the rock and slid, silverscaled again, back into the safe, watery darkness.
30
Since there was no sign of Devaney returning with the goat, JJ decided to go along with his wife for the stroll. Out of habit, he put the Stradivarius fiddle away in its case and shouldered it. He knew it was safe in Tír na n’Óg, but he still felt uneasy being separated from it by any
Drown? No, he couldn’t drown, could he?
The mare shifted beneath him, trying to turn her back to the storm. Had Aengus not been a god he might have pitied poor Maureen Ryan and felt regret at having turnedher into a horse and driven her into such a predicament. But he was a god, and so he didn’t.
‘Here,’ he said. ‘Keep your rotten apples.’ And he flung them, basket and all, into the water beneath the horse’s nose, then slithered down from her back. In an instant he was gone, nothing more than a glimmer of shining scales vanishing into the murky depths of the flood.
Aisling, being ploddy bred as well as ploddy born, did not have the ability to fly. So Jenny left her to make her own way across the plain and went on sparrowhawk wings back to the rath. There, to her relief, she found that the Dagda had calmed down a bit. He had discovered a box of tin whistles in an old suitcase and he was working his way through them, playing a tune on each one.
‘These are rubbish, too,’ he said. ‘Look!’ He blew a note on one and then another note with the same fingering on another. The second one was several tones higher. ‘They’re not even in tune with each other,’ he said.
‘They’re not supposed to be, Granddad,’ said Jenny. ‘They’re in different keys. They were made like that.’
‘Just what I said. Didn’t you hear me? Different keys, I said. They’re made like that.’
He appraised the whistles splayed out around his feet like shiny bristles. Then he picked up the biggest of them, the low D whistle, and in no time he was lost in its mellow tones.
Jenny was mesmerized by the brilliance of the Dagda’splaying. She had seen him dance and knew that there was no one in either world to compare with him, but she had never heard him play before. She hadn’t even known he could, until now.
She stretched out on the bank in the sunshine to listen. First there was a set of hornpipes, then a barn dance, then a pair of jigs. Jenny knew there was something she ought to be doing, but surely it couldn’t be all that important? Not more important than lying here in the sunshine, listening to this beautiful music, surely? Nothing could be, could it?
29
The salmon that swam beneath the dark waters of the vast turlough was not the salmon of wisdom that was told of in the old tale of Fionn Mac Cumhail. He was a lost and bewildered fish who felt very small and had no more idea where he was going underneath the water than he had when he was a man on horseback up above it. So the fish that was Aengus Óg decided his best bet was to swim in a straight line and keep going in the same direction. That way, sooner or later, he was certain to reach land.
But it wasn’t as simple as it sounded. There were lumps and bumps of hillocks and rocks there on the lake bed, and they had to be swum round. Some of the larger ones that broke the surface had to be investigated in case they turned out to be a shoreline. And when they turned out not to be a shoreline but a bit of a rocky island instead, then the fish was left with the difficulty of trying to remember which way he had been heading when he found it.
Once, discovering he had been deceived three times by the same protruding outcrop of limestone, the fishreared up into the shape of a man, who climbed out on to the rock and bellowed his rage at the world. But the world roared back even louder, and the storm thumped him so hard that he pitched forward from the rock and slid, silverscaled again, back into the safe, watery darkness.
30
Since there was no sign of Devaney returning with the goat, JJ decided to go along with his wife for the stroll. Out of habit, he put the Stradivarius fiddle away in its case and shouldered it. He knew it was safe in Tír na n’Óg, but he still felt uneasy being separated from it by any
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