In ten seconds the floor rugs had sailed from their anchorages and were
lying some neatly inside out and all in woeful askewness. The chairs
left their military formation; some stood seat to seat like couples
preparing for a dance, others in the woeful, slack isolation of those
who stare after uncivil partners that have fled. And in this wreckage
of a woman’s room Conachúr strode.
“Lavarcham,” he cried, “there shall be great deeds done in Ireland from
this day.”
“Yes, my dear lord.”
“I am twenty years younger than I was an hour ago. I could leap like a
young buck, Lavarcham.”
“Yes, my dear lord,” she stammered.
“Poets shall sing more wisely in Eirè because of this day; harpers
shall play more sweetly; the magicians shall win increase of power, for
through me this land shall be possessed by power and beauty.”
“Yes, my sweet lord,” cried the transformed woman.
“You shall be with me always, Lavarcham.”
“Oh, my master!”
“I shall marry thee to an hero, and thy descendants for ever shall sit,
even in the presence of a king.”
“Nay, I shall kneel, and all my seed shall kneel in the house of my
dear lord.”
“Sit down, my soul, and let us talk. Lavarcham,” he said, “that girl
shall be my wife.”
“I have dreamed of this day,” she murmured.
“You knew I would marry her?”
“I knew that my lord loves the best, and that she is the best. I
trained her for my lord.”
“She is the best,” he conceded. “She is better than the best.”
“The king will never blush for his bride, nor I for my training,” she
continued, “for in everything that becomes a lady she is well taught.”
“So!” said Conachúr.
“There is no ceremony of court or camp that she does not understand.
There is no domestic care that she is not mistress of. She can touch
the harp like a master, she can make a poem like a bard.”
“You give me pleasure, Lavarcham, but all these she need do or not do
as she pleases. Tell me rather of herself, what is her mode? What is
her way of thinking?”
“She is loving and obedient as a pet fawn, and she is wild-spirited as
a wild fawn. She is thoughtful for others; she loves knowledge, and she
fears nothing.”
“Even lacking all this, there is yet the makings of a queen in her.”
Lavarcham nodded a satisfied head.
“But she does not lack, and she is a queen. In a week, when she has
become used to the crowd and the court, all the others will fall back
to their own places and she will remain in her place.”
“I think it will be so. But,” and he aroused again, “you have said
nothing about the curve of her cheek, Lavarcham.”
“What would a poor woman say of that!” she cried gleefully.
“I saw her neck when she bent over my hand, and I saw the two great
tresses falling away on either side. Lavarcham, that was a wonder to
see!”
“We see with our own sight, master.”
“When she stood up I saw the lips that had touched my hand: and I
looked in her eyes as she went away. There is no end to those depths
of light, and I can imagine that they would change as the deep sea
changes. If she were angry they would be--thus; and if she smiled they
would be thus again; the same and different. If she smiled her lips
would move in the smile. How do her lips go when they smile, Lavarcham?”
“These are things which women are blind to, master; they are seen only
by men. You must ask your poets to tell of them, for this is man’s
talk, and no woman is versed in it.”
“Lavarcham!”
“Yes, master!”
“I shall take her away with me this day.”
“Master!”
“Bring her to the Red Branch at nightfall.”
“Master!”
“At nightfall, you hear me.”
“I will not do it.”
“What will you not do, slave, that I order?”
“I will not debauch your queen.”
“Lavarcham----!”
“No one shall make a leman of my babe.”
“She shall return in a few hours. Be with her at the Red Branch
to-night. Do not fail on your life.”
“If I bring her my knife will be in her bosom.”
Conachúr leaned back in his chair and the terrible staring frown went
from his face.
“We shall certainly marry Lavarcham to an hero. I am impatient, my
heart, but strength and victory lies always with the one who can abide,
and I can, even in torment. Have your way, woman.”
“It is the best way, master. You shall thank me yet for this way.”
He smiled wryly.
“Dear, my lord,” she continued earnestly, “there must be the ceremonies
that befit a king’s wedding, and guests must be invited from the four
great Provinces of Ireland. It cannot all be done before two little
months.”
“You shall have one week, my friend.”
“A week! O my master!”
“A woman’s mind runs to gauds and tricks and rites, but in a week we
two shall be married, and you may have ceremonies for a year afterwards
if you wish for them.”
Lavarcham wrung her hands.
“O my sweet lord----”
“It shall be so,” said the king.
Lavarcham sat dumb.
* * * * *
“In this house,” he continued impatiently, “refreshments are long in
appearing, and after those excitements and battlings we need them.”
“They only wait permission to enter,” she stammered, and clapped her
hands.
Deirdre appeared with three servants carrying silver trays. She took
one and knelt to present it to the king.
“Nay, you shall partake with me, and Lavarcham shall serve us. Let
those others go.”
At a sign from Lavarcham the servants placed their trays on tables and
retired with terrified courtesies.
“Taste from the cup, my brightness,” said Conachúr, “and afterwards I
shall taste.”
“A Rí Uasal!” Deirdre stammered.
“All precedence is yours from this hour. Are you not called the
Troubler?”
“I am, lord.”
“You have troubled the king, O sky-woman. Do not be shy with me or
frightened, for although a king is terrible to all he is not fearful to
a queen. Drink from my cup, O queen.”
Deirdre glanced hastily towards Lavarcham, for this conversation had
taken a turn which her training had not provided for, but her guardian
was sitting bemused, in a trance of benevolence and admiration.
She sipped from the cup, and, with a tiny smile of apology and fear,
tendered it again to the staring king. He took the vessel, and her hand
with it.
“I imagined it so,” he said; “I imagined how the thin red lip would
arch and curve and cling to the cup; and I foresaw how it would cling
and uncurve and re-arch and withdraw. The poets tell of such wonders
when they can, but I know these things by my own virtue better than
they do. One day, O shy cluster of delight, you will sing to me: my
harper shall listen to that when I can bear a companion, for I may
grudge a sight or a sound of you even to the men of art. I shall see
your hair done otherwise, and this way again. I shall see you stir
about me, this side and that and backwards; a thousand harmonies of
movement that I divine and a thousand that I know nothing of. Do not be
fearful, O little twisted loop of the ringlets, for you are my beloved.
You shall have no weariness or lack for ever, for I shall fold you in
my affection as a hawk folds air within her wings. You shall leave
these bleak halls and yon mangy field to sit at the banquets in the Red
Branch: to be the Queen of Ulster, the pearl of the world, and my own
heart’s comrade.”
Deirdre was the more alarmed, not only because a strange and mighty
gentleman was holding a strange and monstrous discourse to her, but
he was holding her hand, and she did not know how to retrieve it. She
thought it would not be polite to laugh, although she vastly wanted
to, and she knew it would be foolish to cry, although she was so
bewildered and terrified that an ocean of frightened tears was surging
behind her eyes.
“Lavarcham, my sweet mother,” she murmured in distress.
And that low plaint went to Conachúr’s heart like a sword of delight,
so that his soul was shaken and he could have wept for pity and love.
“Return to your embroidery, my child,” said Lavarcham. “I shall come to
you later and prepare your mind for all that is in store for you.”
Deirdre stood up then and fled, only remembering her courtesy at the
doorway.