Thistle and Thyme by Sorche Nic Leodhas Page A

that the lad had built. There was a fire on the hearth and a shining kettle singing on the hob. And on the shelf above the fire was a clock that the lad had brought from the town, ticking busily beside the sea king’s pearl ring.
    One day the lad came in and caught the lass with the ring upon her finger. She was holding up her hand and looking at the ring.
    â€œWhat are you doing there!” he asked sharply.
    She jumped and looked frighted. “Och!” said she. “I was just having a look at it!”
    â€œWell, put it away and do not do so again!” he ordered, going on out to the shed to put his gear away.
    â€œTill you give me leave,” she said softly to his back. But he didn’t hear her. She slipped the ring from her finger and laid it back in its place on the shelf by the clock.
    When he came back she said to him, “I’ll soon be leaving here.”
    â€œYou will!” said he. “Why will you then?”
    â€œThe year and the day will soon be up and you’ll be going to fetch your own true love,” she told him.
    â€œYou’d best stay here,” said the lad.
    â€œOch, I’d not be liking to do that,” she said.
    â€œWhere can you go then?” he asked her.
    â€œBack to my father’s house,” said she.
    â€œAre you not afraid to go back there?” he asked.
    â€œNay! I’m a lot older now,” said she. “I can look after myself.”
    â€œA lot older!” he scoffed. “’Tis but a year that’s gone by and hardly that!”
    â€œHappen I’m a lot wiser then,” said the lass. “I’ll go there anyway.”
    So he said no more about it nor did she.
    But a few days later she rose at day’s dawning and made herself a packet of all she had of her own in the world. There was little enough to take. Just her comb and an apron or two she’d made for herself, a knot of ribbon and a kerchief he’d brought her from the town, and her nightshift. When she’d packed them all, she took the bundle under her arm and laid her shawl over her shoulders. Then she went out to the lad. She took the chart from the shelf behind the clock and laid it before him where he sat at the table. And she marked the last days off.
    â€œAll of the days of your waiting are over today,” said she. “You’ll be going to claim your own true love tomorrow. So I’ll wish you well and bid you farewell!”
    Then she walked past him and out of the house.
    He sat there for a long while staring at the door through which she had gone, like a man who has heard something but not believed his ears. When he jumped up at last and went to the door to look after her, she was out of sight.
    The lad went back and sat down again in the place where he’d been sitting when she went away. All that day he did not go out in his boat nor move from his chair. He thought over all the days that had gone by since the day he caught the mermaid in his net. It took him all the hours of the day to do it. When he was through, he went to bed.
    The next morning he got up at break of dawn and dressed himself in the best he had. He took the sea king’s ring from the shelf and tucked it into his pocket, and started off to claim his own true love.
    But it wasn’t down to his boat he went, to sail back home. Instead, he turned away from the sea, and walked inland the same way the lass had gone the day before.
    She was walking in her father’s garden when she saw him coming up the road. When he got up to her and spoke to her, she turned red and white by turns. But she spoke right up to him.
    â€œI thought you had gone to claim your own true love,” said she.
    â€œI have so!” said he. “That’s what I’m doing here!” And he took the sea king’s ring from his pocket and held it out to her.
    â€œWill you have it?” he asked her. “And me with it, of course!”
    â€œIf you