words, dropping on my knee I took the hand of Grace O’Malley, and swore by the Five Wounds of God to be her servant so long as it might be her will.
Then her people, old and young, pressed about her, calling her their darling and their pride, and thus she became their leader and chief.
But with the death of Owen O’Malley there was an end of the times of peace and quietness in Connaught, whereat, like the hothead I was, I rejoiced, not seeing the perilous adventures that lay before us.
CHAPTER III.
THE TITLE-DEED OF THE SWORD
“Ruari!”
It was the soft note of Eva O’Malley, calling to me as I came within the gate of Carrickahooley Castle, whither Grace O’Malley, our mistress, had come to fulfil her period of mourning for her father. I had just crossed over from Clare Island on a small sailing vessel, which now lay in the little harbour under the west wall.
“Ruari!”
It was ever a sound of gladness to me, that sweet voice; and looking up to the chambers of the women, half-way up the front of the great square tower, I beheld the fair face, framed in its pale-gold curls, against the darkness of the embrasure of her window. My heart gave a quick bound of pleasure, and then I grew hot and cold by turns.
For I loved her, and the fear that is born of love made my strength turn to weakness when I gazed upon her. Yet was I resolved to win her, though in what way I knew not. Neither did I hope overmuch up to that time that I understood her, for her manner was a riddle to me.
And here let me set down what were then my relations with these two women, or, rather, what was their attitude to me.
Grace O’Malley clearly regarded me as a younger brother, and never lost a certain air of protection in her dealings with me. To her I remained always in some sort “a little boy, a child,” whose life she had saved – although I was one of the biggest men in Ireland.
Eva O’Malley, who was two years younger than I, had tyrannised over me when I was a lad, and now that I was a man she mocked at and flouted me, dubbing me “Giant Greathead” – I say “Greathead,” but in our language Greathead and Thickhead are the same – and otherwise amusing herself at my expense. But in her griefs and troubles it was to me she came, and not to Grace, as might have seemed more natural.
“Ruari!” she called, and I waved my hand to her in greeting. As I went into the hall she met me.
“I was waiting for you,” she said, “for I wished to speak to you before you saw Grace.”
“Yes?” I asked, and as I noticed the freshness of the roseleaf face I marvelled at it for the hundredth time.
“Grace has made an end of her mourning,” she went on, “and her purpose now is to go to Galway to see the Lord Deputy, if he be there, as it is said he is, or, if he be not, then Sir Nicholas Malby, the Colonel of Connaught.”
I could have shouted for joy, for I was weary of forced inaction while the fine weather was passing us by, and all the harvest of the sea was waiting to be gathered in by ready hands like ours.
“Glad am I, in truth, to hear it,” said I heartily. I was not fond of Galway, but I was anxious to be again on the waters, and who could tell what might not happen then? There had been no fighting for a long time, and the men were lusting for it, hungering and thirsting for it – only biding, like dogs in the leash, for the word. And I was of the same mind.
“But listen, Ruari,” said Eva. “Is it well that she should go to Galway? To my thinking there is a very good reason against it.”
“Indeed,” said I, surprised. “What is it?” As I have declared already, I had no special liking for Galway – and the sea is wide.
“By going to Galway,” said she, “does she not run the chance of putting herself in the power of the English? Is it not to thrust one’s head into the very jaws of the lion? The English never loved her father, Owen O’Malley, and the merchants of Galway were never done accusing him of supplying himself from their ships at his good pleasure without asking permission from them.”
I smiled, for what she said about the dead chief was true.
“’Tis not well to smile,” said Eva, frowning.
“There is wisdom in your words,” I replied, becoming instantly grave at her rebuke. “But why not say to Grace herself what you have said to me?”
“Oh, you mountain of a man,” she said, “to be so big and to be so – ” and she stopped, but I could fill up the gap for myself.
“What have I said?” demanded I, still more abashed.
“Think you not that I have already spoken to her?” she asked. “But she will not hearken.”
“Why should she,” said I, “care for my opinion?”
“You know she does care,” she said testily. “But there is more to tell you.”
“More?” I asked.
Her manner now showed the utmost dejection. Her eyes were downcast, and as I regarded her I asked myself why it was that one so fair should have dark, almost black eyelashes – eyelashes which gave a strange shadow to her eyes. Her next words brought me quickly out of this musing.
“The ’Wise Man’” said she, “is set against her going. His words are of darkness and blood, and he declares that he sees danger for us all in the near future. I’m afraid – you know he sees with other eyes than ours.”
And she said this with such evident terror that inwardly, but not without some dread, I cursed the “Wise Man,” – a certain Teige O’Toole, called “Teige of the Open Vision” by the people, who counted him to be a seer and a prophet. He was certainly skilled in many things, and his knowledge was not as the knowledge of other men.
As she stood beside me, wistfully, entreatingly, and fearfully, I pondered for a brief space and then I said —
“I will go and speak with Teige O’Toole, and will return anon,” and forthwith went in search of him.
I found him sitting on a rock, looking out to sea, murmuring disconsolately to himself. Straightway I asked him what it was that he had to say against Grace O’Malley’s intended visit to Galway, but he would vouchsafe no reply other than the awesome words which he kept on repeating and repeating —
“Darkness and blood; then a little light; blood and darkness, then again light – but darkness were better.”
Whereat I shuddered, feeling an inward chill; yet I begged of him not once, nor twice, to make plain his meaning to me. He would not answer, so that I lost patience with him, and had he not been an aged man and an uncanny I would have shaken the explanation of his mysterious words out of his lips, and, as it was, was near doing so.
Rising quickly from the stone whereon he had been sitting, he moved away with incredible swiftness as if he had read my thoughts, leaving me staring blankly after him.
What was it he had said?
“Darkness and blood; and then a little light!”
Well, darkness and blood were no strangers to me.
“Blood
