Imaget, from undher the willows and from the ditch near the hedge an’ in the air above his head, from countless dead lips aychoed that triumphing, onairthly laugh, Ho! ho! ho!
’Twas then Darby just nearly guve up for lost. He felt his eyes growing dim an’ his limbs numb. There was no air comin’ into his lungs, for whin he thried to breathe he only gaped, so that he knew the black spell was on him, an’ that all that was left for him to do was to sink down in the road an’ thin to die.
But at that minute there floated from a great way off the faint cry of a woice the dispairing man knew well.
“Keep up your heart, Darby O’Gill,” cried Brian Connors; “we’re coming to resky you,” an’ from over the fields a wild cheer follyed thim worruds.
“Faugh-a-balla—clear the way!” sprang the shrill war-cry of a thousand of the Good People.
At the first sound of the King’s worruds there rose about Darby the mighty flurrying an’ rushing of wings in the darkness, as if thraymendous birds were rising sudden an’ flying away, an’ the air emptied itself of a smothering heaviness.
So fast came the King’s fairy army that the great cheer was still aychoing among the threes when the goold crown of Brian Connors sparkled up from beside the knowledgeable man’s knees. At that the parsecuted man, sobbin’ with joy, knelt down in the muddy road to shake hands with his friend, the masther of the Good People.
Brian Connors was not alone, for there crowded about Darby, sympathisin’ with him, little Phelim Beg, an’ Nial the fiddler, an’ Shaun Rhue the smith, an’ Phadrig Oge. Also every instant, flitthering out of the sky into the road, came be the score green-cloaked and red-hooded men, follying the King an’ ready for throuble.
“If ever a man needed a dhrop of good whusky, you’re the hayro, an’ this is the time an’ place for it,” says the King, handin’ up a silver-topped noggin. “Dhrink it all,” he says, “an’ then we’ll escorch ye home. Come on,” says he.
The masther of the nighttime turned an’ shouted to his subjects. “Boys,” he cried, “we’ll go wisible, the betther for company sake. An’ do you make the ’luminaytion so Darby can see yez with him!”
At that the lovely rosy light which, as you may raymember, our hayro first saw in the fairy’s home at Sleive-na-mon, lighted up the roadway, an’ undher the leafy arches, bobbin’ along like a ridgement of sojers, all in their green cloaks an’ red caps, marched at laste a thousand of the Little People, with Phadrig Oge at their head actin’ as gineral.
As they passed the mill foive dayfiant pipers med the batthered ould windys rattle with “Garry Owen.”
IV
The Costa Bower
I
So the green-dhressed little army, all in the sweet, rosy light they made, wint marchin’, to the merry music of the pipes, over the tree-bowered roadway, past the ha’nted brakes up the shivering hills, an’ down into the waiting dales, making the grim night maylodious.
For a long space not a worrud, good, bad, or indifferent, said Darby.
But a sparrow woke her dhrowsy childher to look at the beautiful purcession, an’ a robin called excited to her sleepy neighbours, the linnets an’ the rabbits an’ the hares, an’ hundhreds like them crowded daylighted through the bushes, an’ stood peerin’ through the glistening leaves as their well-known champyions wint by. A dozen wentursome young owls flew from bough to bough, follying along, crackin’ good-natured but friendly jokes at their friends, the fairies. Thin other birds came flying from miles around, twitthering jubilaytion.
But the stern-jawed, frowny-eyed Little People for once answered back never a worrud, but marched stiff an’ silent, as sojers should. You’d swear ’twas the Enniskillins or ’twas the Eighteenth Hussars that ’twas in it.
“Isn’t that Gineral Julius Sayser at the head?” says one brown owl, flapping an owdacious wing at Phadrig Oge.
“No!” cries his brother, another young villian. “ ’Tis only the Jook of Wellington. But look at the bothered face on Darby O’Gill! Musha, are the Good People goin’ to hang Darby?”
And faix, thin, sure enough, there was mighty little elaytion on the faytures of our hayro. For, as he came marchin’ along, silent an’ moody, beside the King, what to do with the banshee’s comb was botherin’ the heart out of him. If he had only trun it to the ghosts whin he was there at the mill! But that turrible laugh had crunched all sense an’ rayson out of him, so that he forgot to do that very wise thing. Ochone, now the ghosts knew he had it; so, to trow it away’d do no good, onless they’d find it afther. One thing was sartin—he must some way get it back to the banshee, or else be ha’nted all the rest of his days.
He was sore-hearted, too, at the King, an’ a bit crass-timpered bekase the little man had stayed away so long frum wisitin’ with him.
But at last the knowledgeable man found his tongue. “Be me faix, King,” he complained, “ ’tis a cure for sore eyes to see ye. I might have been dead an’ buried an’ you none the wiser,” says he, sulky.
“Sure, I’ve been out of the counthry a fortnit,” says the King. “And I’ve only rayturned within the hour,” he says. “I wint on a suddin call to purvent a turrible war betwixt the Frinch fairies and the German fairies. I’ve been for two weeks on an island in the River Ryan, betwixt France an’ Germany. The river is called afther an Irishman be the name of Ryan.”
“At laste ye might have sint me wurrud,” says Darby.
“I didn’t think I’d be so long gone,” says the fairy; “but the disputaytion was thraymendous,” he says.
The little man dhrew himself up dignayfied an’ scowled solemn up at Darby. “They left it for me to daycide,” he says, “an’ this was the contintion:
“Fufty
