For three days Colum had fasted, save for a mouthful of meal at dawn,
a piece of rye-bread at noon, and a mouthful of dulse and spring-water
at sundown. On the night of the third day, Oran and Keir came to him
in his cell. Colum was on his knees, lost in prayer. There was no
sound there, save the faint whispered muttering of his lips, and on
the plastered wall the weary buzzing of a fly.
"Master!" said Oran in a low voice, soft with pity and awe, "Master!"
But Colum took no notice. His lips still moved, and the tangled hairs
below his nether lip shivered with his failing breath.
"Father!" said Keir, tender as a woman, "Father!"
Colum did not turn his eyes from the wall. The fly droned his drowsy
hum upon the rough plaster. It crawled wearily for a space, then
stopped. The slow hot drone filled the cell.
"Master," said Oran, "it is the will of the brethren that you break
your fast. You are old, and God has your glory. Give us peace."
"Father," urged Keir, seeing that Colum kneeled unnoticingly, his lips
still moving above his black beard, with the white hair of him falling
about his head like a snowdrift slipping from a boulder. "Father, be
pitiful! We hunger and thirst for your presence. We can fast no
longer, yet have we no heart to break our fast if you are not with us.
Come, holy one, and be of our company, and eat of the good broiled
fish that awaiteth us. We perish for the benediction of thine eyes."
Then it was that Colum rose, and walked slowly towards the wall.
"Little black beast," he said to the fly that droned its drowsy hum
and moved not at all; "little black beast, sure it is well I am
knowing what you are. You are thinking you are going to get my
blessing, you that have come out of hell for the soul of me!"
At that the fly flew heavily from the wall, and slowly circled round
and round the head of Colum the White.
"What think you of that, brother Oran, brother Keir?" he asked in a
low voice, hoarse because of his long fast and the weariness that was
upon him.
"It is a fiend," said Oran.
"It is an angel," said Keir.
Thereupon the fly settled upon the wall again, and again droned his
drowsy hot hum.
"Little black beast," said Colum, with the frown coming down into his
eyes, "is it for peace you are here, or for sin? Answer, I conjure you
in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost!"
"_An ainm an Athar, 's an Mhic, 's an Spioraid Naoimh_," repeated Oran
below his breath.
"_An ainm an Athar, 's an Mhic, 's an Spioraid Naoimh_," repeated Keir
below his breath.
Then the fly that was upon the wall flew up to the roof and circled
to and fro. And it sang a beautiful song, and its song was this:
I
Praise be to God, and a blessing too at that, and a blessing!
For Colum the White, Colum the Dove, hath worshipped;
Yea, he hath worshipped and made of a desert a garden,
And out of the dung of men's souls hath made a sweet savour of
burning.