When old Sheen nic Lèoid came back to the croft, after she had been to
the burn at the edge of the green airidh, where she had washed the
_claar_ that was for the potatoes at the peeling, she sat down before
the peats.
She was white with years. The mountain wind was chill, too, for all that
the sun had shone throughout the midsummer day. It was well to sit
before the peat-fire.
The croft was on the slope of a mountain and had the south upon it.
North, south, east, and west, other great slopes reached upward like
hollow green waves frozen into silence by the very wind that curved them
so, and freaked their crests into peaks and jagged pinnacles. Stillness
was in that place for ever and ever. What though the Gorromalt Water
foamed down Ben Nair, where the croft was, and made a hoarse voice for
aye surrendering sound to silence? What though at times the stones fell
from the ridges of Ben Chaisteal and Maolmòr, and clattered down the
barren declivities till they were slung in the tangled meshes of whin
and juniper? What though on stormy dawns the eagle screamed as he fought
against the wind that graved a thin line upon the aged front of Ben
Mulad, where his eyrie was: or that the kestrel cried above the
rabbit-burrows in the strath: or that the hill-fox barked, or that the
curlew wailed, or that the scattered sheep made an endless mournful
crying? What were these but the ministers of silence?
There was no blue smoke in the strath except from the one turf cot. In
the hidden valley beyond Ben Nair there was a hamlet, and nigh upon
three-score folk lived there; but that was over three miles away. Sheen
Macleod was alone in that solitary place, save for her son Alasdair Mòr
Og. “Young Alasdair” he was still, though the grey feet of fifty years
had marked his hair. Alasdair Og he was while Alasdair Ruadh mac Chalum
mhic Lèoid, that was his father, lived. But when Alasdair Ruadh changed,
and Sheen was left a mourning woman, he that was their son was Alasdair
Og still.
She had sore weariness that day. For all that, it was not the weight of
the burden that made her go in and out of the afternoon sun, and sit by
the red glow of the peats, brooding deep.
When, nigh upon an hour later, Alasdair came up the slope, and led the
kye to the byre, she did not hear him: nor had she sight of him, when
his shadow flickered in before him and lay along the floor.
“Poor old woman,” he said to himself, bending his head because of the
big height that was his, and he there so heavy and strong, and tender,
too, for all the tangled black beard and the wild hill-eyes that looked
out under bristling grey-black eyebrows.
“Poor old woman, and she with the tired heart that she has. Ay, ay, for
sure the weeks lap up her shadow, as the sayin’ is. She will be thinking
of him that is gone. Ay, or maybe the old thoughts of her are goin’ back
on their own steps, down this glen an’ over that hill an’ away beyont
that strath, an’ this corrie an’ that moor. Well, well, it is a good
love, that of the mother. Sure a bitter pain it will be to me when
there’s no old grey hair there to stroke. It’s quiet here, terrible
quiet, God knows, to Himself be the blessin’ for this an’ for that; but
when she has the white sleep at last, then it’ll be a sore day for me,
an’ one that I will not be able to bear to hear the sheep callin’,
callin’, callin’ through the rain on the hills here, and Gorromalt Water
an’ no other voice to be with me on that day of the days.”
She heard a faint sigh, and stirred a moment, but did not look round.
“Muim’-à-ghraidh, is it tired you are, an’ this so fine a time, too?”
With a quick gesture, the old woman glanced at him.
“Ah, child, is that you indeed? Well, I am glad of that, for I have the
trouble again.”
“What trouble, Muim’ ghaolaiche?”
But the old woman did not answer. Wearily she turned her face to the
peat-glow again.
Alasdair seated himself on the big wooden chair to her right. For a time
he stayed silent thus, staring into the red heart of the peats. What was
the gloom upon the old heart that he loved? What trouble was it?
At last he rose and put meal and water into the iron pot, and stirred
the porridge while it seethed and sputtered. Then he poured boiling
water upon the tea in the brown jenny, and put the new bread and the
sweet-milk scones on the rude deal board that was the table.
“Come, dear tired old heart,” he said, “and let us give thanks to the
Being.”
“Blessings and thanks,” she said, and turned round.
Alasdair poured out the porridge, and watched the steam rise. Then he
sat down, with a knife in one hand and the brown-white loaf in the
other.
“O God,” he said, in the low voice he had in the kirk when the Bread and
Wine were given—“O God, be giving us now thy blessing, and have the
thanks. And give us peace.”
Peace there was in the sorrowful old eyes of the mother. The two ate in
silence. The big clock that was by the bed _tick-tacked, tick-tacked_. A
faint sputtering came out of a peat that had bog-gas in it. Shadows
moved in the silence, and met and whispered and moved into deep, warm
darkness. There was peace.
There was still a red flush above the hills in the west when the mother
and son sat in the ingle again.
“What is it, mother-my-heart?” Alasdair asked at last, putting his great
red hand upon the woman’s knee.
She looked at him for a moment. When she spoke she turned away her gaze
again.
“Foxes have holes, and the fowls of the air have their places of rest,
but the Son of Man hath not where to lay his head.”
“And what then, dear? Sure, it is the deep meaning you have in that grey
old head that I’m loving so.”
“Ay, lennav-aghray, there is meaning to my words. It is old I am, and
the hour of my hours is near. I heard a voice outside the window last
night. It is a voice I will not be hearing, no, not for seventy years.
It was cradle-sweet, it was.”
She paused, and there was silence for a time.
“Well, dear,” she began again, wearily, and in a low, weak voice, “it is
more tired and more tired I am every day now this last month. Two
Sabbaths ago I woke, and there were bells in the air: and you are for
knowing well, Alasdair, that no kirk-bells ever rang in Strath-Nair. At
edge o’ dark on Friday, and by the same token the thirteenth day it was,
I fell asleep, and dreamed the mools were on my breast, and that the
roots of the white daisies were in the hollows where the eyes were that
loved you, Alasdair, my son.”
The man looked at her with troubled gaze. No words would come. Of what
avail to speak when there is nothing to be said? God sends the gloom
upon the cloud, and there is rain: God sends the gloom upon the hill,
and there is mist: God sends the gloom upon the sun, and there is
winter. It is God, too, sends the gloom upon the soul, and there is
change. The swallow knows when to lift up her wing overagainst the
shadow that creeps out of the north: the wild swan knows when the smell
of snow is behind the sun: the salmon, lone in the brown pool among the
hills, hears the deep sea, and his tongue pants for salt, and his fins
quiver, and he knows that his time is come, and that the sea calls. The
doe knows when the fawn hath not yet quaked in her belly: is not the
violet more deep in the shadowy dewy eyes? The woman knows when the babe
hath not yet stirred a little hand: is not the wild-rose on her cheek
more often seen, and are not the shy tears moist on quiet hands in the
dusk? How, then, shall the soul not know when the change is nigh at
last? Is it a less thing than a reed, which sees the yellow birch-gold
adrift on the lake, and the gown of the heather grow russet when the
purple has passed into the sky, and the white bog-down wave grey and
tattered where the loneroid grows dark and pungent—which sees, and knows
that the breath of the Death-Weaver at the Pole is fast faring along the
frozen norland peaks. It is more than a reed, it is more than a wild doe
on the hills, it is more than a swallow lifting her wing against the
coming of the shadow, it is more than a swan drunken with the savour of
the blue wine of the waves when the green Arctic lawns are white and
still. It is more than these, which has the Son of God for brother, and
is clothed with light. God doth not extinguish at the dark tomb what he
hath litten in the dark womb.
Who shall say that the soul knows not when the bird is aweary of the
nest, and the nest is aweary of the wind? Who shall say that all
portents are vain imaginings? A whirling straw upon the road is but a
whirling straw: yet the wind is upon the cheek almost ere it is gone.
It was not for Alasdair Òg, then, to put a word upon the saying of the
woman that was his mother, and was age-white, and could see with the
seeing of old wise eyes.
So all that was upon his lips was a sigh, and the poor prayer that is
only a breath out of the heart.
“You will be telling me, grey sweetheart,” he said lovingly, at
last—“you will be telling me what was behind the word that you said:
that about the foxes that have holes for the hiding, poor beasts, and
the birdeens wi’ their nests, though the Son o’ Man hath not where to
lay his head?”
“Ay, Alasdair, my son that I bore long syne an’ that I’m leaving soon, I
will be for telling you that thing, an’ now too, for I am knowing what
is in the dark this night o’ the nights.”
Old Sheen put her head back wearily on the chair, and let her hands lie,
long and white, palm-downward upon her knees. The peat-glow warmed the
dull grey that lurked under her closed eyes and about her mouth, and in
the furrowed cheeks. Alasdair moved nearer and took her right hand in
his, where it lay like a tired sheep between two scarped rocks. Gently
he smoothed her hand, and wondered why so frail and slight a creature as
this small old wizened woman could have mothered a great swarthy man
like himself—he a man now, with his two score and ten years, and yet but
a boy there at the dear side of her.
“It was this way, Alasdair-mochree,” she went on in her low thin
voice—like a wind-worn leaf, the man that was her son thought. “It was
this way. I went down to the burn to wash the _claar_, and when I was
there I saw a wounded fawn in the bracken. The big sad eyes of it were
like those of Maisie, poor lass, when she had the birthing that was her
going-call. I went through the bracken, and down by the Gorromalt, and
into the Shadowy Glen.
“And when I was there, and standing by the running water, I saw a man by
the stream-side. He was tall, but spare and weary: and the clothes upon
him were poor and worn. He had sorrow. When he lifted his head at me, I
saw the tears. Dark, wonderful, sweet eyes they were. His face was pale.
It was not the face of a man of the hills. There was no red in it, and
the eyes looked in upon themselves. He was a fair man, with the white
hands that a woman has, a woman like the Bantighearna of Glenchaisteal
over yonder. His voice, too, was a voice like that: in the softness, and
the sweet, quiet sorrow, I am meaning.
“The word that I gave him was in the English: for I thought he was like
a man out of _Sasunn_, or of the southlands somewhere. But he answered
me in the Gaelic: sweet, good Gaelic like that of the Bioball over
there, to Himself be the praise.
“‘And is it the way down the Strath you are seeking,’ I asked: ‘and will
you not be coming up to the house yonder, poor cot though it is, and
have a sup of milk, and a rest if it’s weary you are?’
“‘You are having my thanks for that,’ he said, ‘and it is as though I
had both the good rest and the cool sweet drink. But I am following the
flowing water here.’
“‘Is it for the fishing?’ I asked.
“‘I am a Fisher,’ he said, and the voice of him was low and sad.
“He had no hat on his head, and the light that streamed through a
rowan-tree was in his long hair. He had the pity of the poor in his
sorrowful grey eyes.
“‘And will you not sleep with us?’ I asked again: ‘that is, if you have
no place to go to, and are a stranger in this country, as I am thinking
you are; for I have never had sight of you in the home-straths before.’
“‘I am a stranger,’ he said, ‘and I have no home, and my father’s house
is a great way off.’
“‘Do not tell me, poor man,’ I said gently, for fear of the pain, ‘do
not tell me if you would fain not; but it is glad I will be if you will
give me the name you have.’
“‘My name is Mac-an-t’-Saoir,’ he answered with the quiet deep gaze that
was his. And with that he bowed his head, and went on his way, brooding
deep.
“Well, it was with a heavy heart I turned, and went back through the
bracken. A heavy heart, for sure, and yet, oh peace too, cool dews of
peace. And the fawn was there: healed, Alasdair, healed, and
whinny-bleating for its doe, that stood on a rock wi’ lifted hoof an’
stared down the glen to where the Fisher was.
“When I was at the burnside, a woman came down the brae. She was fair to
see, but the tears were upon her.
“‘Oh,’ she cried, ‘have you seen a man going this way?’
“‘Ay, for sure,’ I answered, ‘but what man would he be?’
“‘He is called Mac-an-t’-Saoir.’
“‘Well, there are many men that are called Son of the Carpenter. What
will his own name be?’
“‘Iosa,’ she said.
“And when I looked at her, she was weaving the wavy branches of a thorn
near by, and sobbing low, and it was like a wreath or crown that she
made.
“‘And who will you be, poor woman?’ I asked.
“‘O my Son, my Son,’ she said, and put her apron over her head and went
down into the Shadowy Glen, she weeping sore, too, at that, poor woman.
“So now, Alasdair, my son, tell me what thought you have about this
thing that I have told you. For I know well whom I met on the brae
there, and who the Fisher was. And when I was at the peats here once
more I sat down, and my mind sank into myself. And it is knowing the
knowledge I am.”
“Well, well, dear, it is sore tired you are. Have rest now. But sure
there are many men called Macintyre.”
“Ay, an’ what Gael that you know will be for giving you his surname like
that.”
Alasdair had no word for that. He rose to put some more peats on the
fire. When he had done this, he gave a cry.
The whiteness that was on the mother’s hair was now in the face. There
was no blood there, or in the drawn lips. The light in the old, dim eyes
was like water after frost.
He took her hand in his. Clay-cold it was. He let it go, and it fell
straight by the chair, stiff as the cromak he carried when he was with
the sheep.
“Oh my God and my God,” he whispered, white with the awe, and the bitter
cruel pain.
Then it was that he heard a knocking at the door.
“Who is there?” he cried hoarsely.
“Open, and let me in.” It was a low, sweet voice, but was that grey hour
the time for a welcome?
“Go, but go in peace, whoever you are. There is death here.”
“Open, and let me in.”
At that, Alasdair, shaking like a reed in the wind, unclasped the latch.
A tall fair man, ill-clad and weary, pale, too, and with dreaming eyes,
came in.
“_Beannachd Dhe an Tigh_,” he said, “God’s blessing on this house, and
on all here.”
“The same upon yourself,” Alasdair said, with the weary pain in his
voice. “And who will you be? and forgive the asking.”
“I am called Mac-an-t’-Saoir, and Iosa is the name I bear—Jesus, the Son
of the Carpenter.”
“It is a good name. And is it good you are seeking this night?”
“I am a Fisher.”
“Well, that’s here an’ that’s there. But will you go to the Strath over
the hill, and tell the good man that is there, the minister, Lachlan
MacLachlan, that old Sheen nic Lèoid, wife of Alasdair Ruadh, is dead.”
“I know that, Alasdair Òg.”
“And how will you be knowing that, and my name too, you that are called
Macintyre?”
“I met the white soul of Sheen as it went down by the Shadowy Glen a
brief while ago. She was singing a glad song, she was. She had green
youth in her eyes. And a man was holding her by the hand. It was
Alasdair Ruadh.”
At that Alasdair fell on his knees. When he looked up there was no one
there. Through the darkness outside the door, he saw a star shining
white, and leaping like a pulse.
It was three days after that day of shadow that Sheen Macleod was put
under the green turf.
On each night, Alasdair Òg walked in the Shadowy Glen, and there he saw
a man fishing, though ever afar off. Stooping he was, always, and like a
shadow at times. But he was the man that was called Iosa
Mac-an-t’-Saoir—Jesus, the Son of the Carpenter.
And on the night of the earthing he saw the Fisher close by.
“Lord God,” he said, with the hush on his voice, and deep awe in his
wondering eyes: “Lord God!”
And the Man looked at him.
“Night and day, Alasdair MacAlasdair,” he said, “night and day I fish in
the waters of the world. And these waters are the waters of grief, and
the waters of sorrow, and the waters of despair. And it is the souls of
the living I fish for. And lo, I say this thing unto you, for you shall
not see me again: _Go in peace_. Go in peace, good soul of a poor man,
for thou hast seen the Fisher of Men.”
_THE LAST SUPPER_
“... and there shall be
Beautiful things made new....”
(_Hyperion._)