“What is it you will be listening to now, my little lad?” he whispered,
as he saw me lean, intent, to catch I know not what.
“Sure,” I said, “I am not for knowing: but I thought I heard a music
away down there in the wood.”
I heard it, for sure. It was a wondrous sweet air, as of one playing the
feadan in a dream. Callum Dall, the piper, could give no rarer music
than that was; and Callum was a seventh son, and was born in the
moonshine.
“Will you come with me this night of the nights, little Art?” the man
asked me, with his lips touching my brow and giving me rest.
“That I will indeed and indeed,” I said. And then I fell asleep.
When I awoke we were in the huntsman’s booth, that is at the far end of
the Shadowy Glen.
There was a long rough-hewn table in it, and I stared when I saw bowls
and a great jug of milk and a plate heaped with oatcakes, and beside it
a brown loaf of rye-bread.
“Little Art,” said he who carried me, “are you for knowing now who I
am?”
“You are a prince, I’m thinking,” was the shy word that came to my
mouth.
“Sure, lennav-aghrày, that is so. It is called the Prince of Peace I
am.”
“And who is to be eating all this?” I asked.
“This is the last supper,” the prince said, so low that I could scarce
hear; and it seemed to me that he whispered, “For I die daily, and ever
ere I die the Twelve break bread with me.”
It was then I saw that there were six bowls of porridge on the one side
and six on the other.
“What is your name, O prince?”
“Iosa.”
“And will you have no other name than that?”
“I am called Iosa mac Dhe.”
“And is it living in this house you are?”
“Ay. But Art, my little lad, I will kiss your eyes, and you shall see
who sup with me.”
And with that the prince that was called Iosa kissed me on the eyes, and
I saw.
“You will never be quite blind again,” he whispered, and that is why all
the long years of my years I have been glad in my soul.
What I saw was a thing strange and wonderful. Twelve men sat at that
table, and all had eyes of love upon Iosa. But they were not like any
men I had ever seen. Tall and fair and terrible they were, like morning
in a desert place; all save one, who was dark, and had a shadow upon him
and in his wild eyes.
It seemed to me that each was clad in radiant mist. The eyes of them
were as stars through that mist.
And each, before he broke bread, or put spoon to the porridge that was
in the bowl before him, laid down upon the table three shuttles.
Long I looked upon that company, but Iosa held me in his arms, and I had
no fear.
“Who are these men?” he asked me.
“The Sons of God,” I said, I not knowing what I said, for it was but a
child I was.
He smiled at that. “Behold,” he spoke to the twelve men who sat at the
table, “behold the little one is wiser than the wisest of ye.” At that
all smiled with the gladness and the joy, save one; him that was in the
shadow. He looked at me, and I remembered two black lonely tarns upon
the hillside, black with the terror because of the kelpie and the
drowner.
“Who are these men?” I whispered, with the tremor on me that was come of
the awe I had.
“They are the Twelve Weavers, Art, my little child.”
“And what is their weaving?”
“They weave for my Father, whose web I am.”
At that I looked upon the prince, but I could see no web.
“Are you not Iosa the Prince?”
“I am the Web of Life, Art lennavan-mo.”
“And what are the three shuttles that are beside each Weaver?”
I know now that when I turned my child’s-eyes upon these shuttles I saw
that they were alive and wonderful, and never the same to the seeing.
“They are called _Beauty_ and _Wonder_ and _Mystery_.”
And with that Iosa mac Dhe sat down and talked with the Twelve. All were
passing fair, save him who looked sidelong out of dark eyes. I thought
each, as I looked at him, more beautiful than any of his fellows; but
most I loved to look at the twain who sat on either side of Iosa.
“He will be a Dreamer among men,” said the prince; “so tell him who ye
are.”
Then he who was on the right turned his eyes upon me. I leaned to him,
laughing low with the glad pleasure I had because of his eyes and
shining hair, and the flame as of the blue sky that was his robe.
“I am the Weaver of Joy,” he said. And with that he took his three
shuttles that were called Beauty and Wonder and Mystery, and he wove an
immortal shape, and it went forth of the room and out into the green
world, singing a rapturous sweet song.
Then he that was upon the left of Iosa the Life looked at me, and my
heart leaped. He, too, had shining hair, but I could not tell the colour
of his eyes for the glory that was in them. “I am the Weaver of Love,”
he said, “and I sit next the heart of Iosa.” And with that he took his
three shuttles that were called Beauty and Wonder and Mystery and he
wove an immortal shape, and it went forth of the room and into the green
world singing a rapturous sweet song.
Even then, child as I was, I wished to look on no other. None could be
so passing fair, I thought, as the Weaver of Joy and the Weaver of Love.
But a wondrous sweet voice sang in my ears, and a cool, soft hand laid
itself upon my head, and the beautiful lordly one who had spoken said,
“I am the Weaver of Death,” and the lovely whispering one who had lulled
me with rest said, “I am the Weaver of Sleep.” And each wove with the
shuttles of Beauty and Wonder and Mystery, and I knew not which was the
more fair, and Death seemed to me as Love, and in the eyes of Dream I
saw Joy.
My gaze was still upon the fair wonderful shapes that went forth from
these twain—from the Weaver of Sleep, an immortal shape of star-eyed
Silence, and from the Weaver of Death a lovely Dusk with a heart of
hidden flame—when I heard the voice of two others of the Twelve. They
were like the laughter of the wind in the corn, and like the golden fire
upon that corn. And the one said, “I am the Weaver of Passion,” and when
he spoke I thought that he was both Love and Joy, and Death and Life,
and I put out my hands. “It is Strength I give,” he said, and he took
and kissed me. Then, while Iosa took me again upon his knee, I saw the
Weaver of Passion turn to the white glory beside him, him that Iosa
whispered to me was the secret of the world, and that was called “The
Weaver of Youth.” I know not whence nor how it came, but there was a
singing of skiey birds when these twain took the shuttles of Beauty and
Wonder and Mystery, and wove each an immortal shape, and bade it go
forth out of the room into the green world, to sing there for ever and
ever in the ears of man a rapturous sweet song.
“O Iosa,” I cried, “are these all thy brethren? for each is fair as
thee, and all have lit their eyes at the white fire I see now in thy
heart.”
But, before he spake, the room was filled with music. I trembled with
the joy, and in my ears it has lingered ever, nor shall ever go. Then I
saw that it was the breathing of the seventh and eighth, of the ninth
and the tenth of those star-eyed ministers of Iosa whom he called the
Twelve: and the names of them were the Weaver of Laughter, the Weaver of
Tears, the Weaver of Prayer, and the Weaver of Peace. Each rose and
kissed me there. “We shall be with you to the end, little Art,” they
said: and I took hold of the hand of one, and cried, “O beautiful one,
be likewise with the woman my mother,” and there came back to me the
whisper of the Weaver of Tears: “I will, unto the end.”
Then, wonderingly, I watched him likewise take the shuttles that were
ever the same and yet never the same, and weave an immortal shape. And
when this Soul of Tears went forth of the room, I thought it was my
mother’s voice singing that rapturous sweet song, and I cried out to it.
The fair immortal turned and waved to me. “I shall never be far from
thee, little Art,” it sighed, like summer rain falling on leaves: “but I
go now to my home in the heart of women.”
There were now but two out of the Twelve. Oh the gladness and the joy
when I looked at him who had his eyes fixed on the face of Iosa that was
the Life! He lifted the three shuttles of Beauty and Wonder and Mystery,
and he wove a Mist of Rainbows in that room; and in the glory I saw that
even the dark twelfth one lifted up his eyes and smiled.
“O what will the name of you be?” I cried, straining my arms to the
beautiful lordly one. But he did not hear, for he wrought Rainbow after
Rainbow out of the mist of glory that he made, and sent each out into
the green world, to be for ever before the eyes of men.
“He is the Weaver of Hope,” whispered Iosa mac Dhe; “and he is the soul
of each that is here.”
Then I turned to the twelfth, and said “Who art thou, O lordly one with
the shadow in the eyes.”
But he answered not, and there was silence in the room. And all there,
from the Weaver of Joy to the Weaver of Peace, looked down, and said
nought. Only the Weaver of Hope wrought a rainbow, and it drifted into
the heart of the lonely Weaver that was twelfth.
“And who will this man be, O Iosa mac Dhe?” I whispered.
“Answer the little child,” said Iosa, and his voice was sad.
Then the Weaver answered:
“I am the Weaver of Glory——,” he began, but Iosa looked at him, and he
said no more.
“Art, little lad,” said the Prince of Peace, “he is the one who
betrayeth me for ever. He is Judas, the Weaver of Fear.”
And at that the sorrowful shadow-eyed man that was the twelfth took up
the three shuttles that were before him.
“And what are these, O Judas?” I cried eagerly, for I saw that they were
black.
When he answered not, one of the Twelve leaned forward and looked at
him. It was the Weaver of Death who did this thing.
“The three shuttles of Judas the Fear-Weaver, O little Art,” said the
Weaver of Death, “are called Mystery, and Despair, and the Grave.”
And with that Judas rose and left the room. But the shape that he had
woven went forth with him as his shadow: and each fared out into the dim
world, and the Shadow entered into the minds and into the hearts of men,
and betrayed Iosa that was the Prince of Peace.
Thereupon, Iosa rose and took me by the hand, and led me out of that
room. When, once, I looked back I saw none of the Twelve save only the
Weaver of Hope, and he sat singing a wild sweet song that he had learned
of the Weaver of Joy, sat singing amid a mist of rainbows and weaving a
radiant glory that was dazzling as the sun.
And at that I woke, and was against my mother’s heart, and she with the
tears upon me, and her lips moving in a prayer.
_THE AWAKENING OF ANGUS OGUE_