The Atlantic Book of Modern Plays Part 55

CATHLEEN. Give me the ladder, and I'll put them up in the turf-loft, the way she won't know of them at all, and maybe when the tide turns she'll be going down to see would he be floating from the east.

(_They put the ladder against the gable of the chimney_; CATHLEEN _goes up a few steps and hides the bundle in the turf-loft. MAURYA comes from the inner room._)

MAURYA (_looking up at CATHLEEN and speaking querulously_). Isn't it turf enough you have for this day and evening?

CATHLEEN. There's a cake baking at the fire for a short s.p.a.ce (_throwing down the turf_) and Bartley will want it when the tide turns if he goes to Connemara.

(NORA _picks up the turf and puts it round the pot-oven._)

MAURYA (_sitting down on a stool at the fire_). He won't go this day with the wind rising from the south and west. He won't go this day, for the young priest will stop him surely.

NORA. He'll not stop him, mother, and I heard Eamon Simon and Stephen Pheety and Colum Shawn saying he would go.

MAURYA. Where is he itself?

NORA. He went down to see would there be another boat sailing in the week, and I'm thinking it won't be long till he's here now, for the tide's turning at the green head, and the hooker's tacking from the east.

CATHLEEN. I hear someone pa.s.sing the big stones.

NORA (_looking out_). He's coming now, and he in a hurry.

BARTLEY (_comes in and looks round the room; speaking sadly and quietly_). Where is the bit of new rope, Cathleen, was bought in Connemara?

CATHLEEN (_coming down_). Give it to him, Nora; it's on a nail by the white boards. I hung it up this morning, for the pig with the black feet was eating it.

NORA (_giving him a rope_). Is that it, Bartley?

MAURYA. You'd do right to leave that rope, Bartley, hanging by the boards. (BARTLEY _takes the rope._) It will be wanting in this place, I'm telling you, if Michael is washed up to-morrow morning, or the next morning, or any morning in the week, for it's a deep grave we'll make him by the grace of G.o.d.

BARTLEY (_beginning to work with the rope_). I've no halter the way I can ride down on the mare, and I must go now quickly. This is the one boat going for two weeks or beyond it, and the fair will be a good fair for horses, I heard them saying below.

MAURYA. It's a hard thing they'll be saying below if the body is washed up and there's no man in it to make the coffin, and I after giving a big price for the finest white boards you'd find in Connemara.

(_She looks round at the boards._)

BARTLEY. How would it be washed up, and we after looking each day for nine days, and a strong wind blowing a while back from the west and south?

MAURYA. If it wasn't found itself, that wind is raising the sea, and there was a star up against the moon, and it rising in the night. If it was a hundred horses, or a thousand horses you had itself, what is the price of a thousand horses against a son where there is one son only?

BARTLEY (_working at the halter, to_ CATHLEEN). Let you go down each day, and see the sheep aren't jumping in on the rye, and if the jobber comes you can sell the pig with the black feet if there is a good price going.

MAURYA. How would the like of her get a good price for a pig?

BARTLEY (_to_ CATHLEEN). If the west wind holds with the last bit of the moon let you and Nora get up weed enough for another c.o.c.k for the kelp. It's hard set we'll be from this day with no one in it but one man to work.

MAURYA. It's hard set we'll be surely the day you're drownd'd with the rest. What way will I live and the girls with me, and I an old woman looking for the grave?

(BARTLEY _lays down the halter, takes off his old coat, and puts on a newer one of the same flannel._)

BARTLEY (_to_ NORA). Is she coming to the pier?

NORA (_looking out_). She's pa.s.sing the green head and letting fall her sails.

BARTLEY (_getting his purse and tobacco_). I'll have half an hour to go down, and you'll see me coming again in two days, or in three days, or maybe in four days if the wind is bad.

MAURYA (_turning round to the fire, and putting her shawl over her head_). Isn't it a hard and cruel man won't hear a word from an old woman, and she holding him from the sea?

CATHLEEN. It's the life of a young man to be going on the sea, and who would listen to an old woman with one thing and she saying it over?

BARTLEY (_taking the halter_). I must go now quickly. I'll ride down on the red mare, and the gray pony'll run behind me. The blessing of G.o.d on you.

(_He goes out._)

MAURYA (_crying out as he is in the door_). He's gone now, G.o.d spare us, and we'll not see him again. He's gone now, and when the black night is falling I'll have no son left me in the world.

CATHLEEN. Why wouldn't you give him your blessing and he looking round in the door? Isn't it sorrow enough is on everyone in this house without your sending him out with an unlucky word behind him, and a hard word in his ear?

(MAURYA _takes up the tongs and begins raking the fire aimlessly without looking round._)

NORA (_turning towards her_). You're taking away the turf from the cake.

CATHLEEN (_crying out_). The Son of G.o.d forgive us, Nora, we're after forgetting his bit of bread.

(_She comes over to the fire._)

NORA. And it's destroyed he'll be going till dark night, and he after eating nothing since the sun went up.

CATHLEEN (_turning the cake out of the oven_). It's destroyed he'll be, surely. There's no sense left on any person in a house where an old woman will be talking for ever.

(MAURYA _sways herself on her stool._)

CATHLEEN (_cutting off some of the bread and rolling it in a cloth, to_ MAURYA). Let you go down now to the spring well and give him this and he pa.s.sing. You'll see him then and the dark word will be broken, and you can say, "G.o.d speed you," the way he'll be easy in his mind.

MAURYA (_taking the bread_). Will I be in it as soon as himself?

CATHLEEN. If you go now quickly.

MAURYA (_standing up unsteadily_). It's hard set I am to walk.

CATHLEEN (_looking at her anxiously_). Give her the stick, Nora, or maybe she'll slip on the big stones.

NORA. What stick?

CATHLEEN. The stick Michael brought from Connemara.

MAURYA (_taking a stick NORA gives her_). In the big world the old people do be leaving things after them for their sons and children, but in this place it is the young men do be leaving things behind for them that do be old.

(_She goes out slowly. NORA goes over to the ladder._)