King o’ Connaught. Do ye believe that, now?”
“No,” Tim said.
“What would ye believe then?”
“That this is—some way, somehow—what people call a saucer. That you and your crew are from a planet of another sun.”
Daniel laughed. “ ’Tis a close encounter you’re havin’, is it? Would ye like to see me as a tiny green man wi’ horns like a snail’s? I can do that too.”
“Don’t bother.”
“All right, I won’t, though ’tis a good shape. A man can take it and be whatever he wants, one o’ the People o’ Peace or a bit o’ a man from Mars. I’ve used it for both, and there’s nothin’ better.”
“You took Lissy,” Tim said.
“And how would ye be knowin’ that?”
“I thought she’d drowned.”
“Did ye now?”
“And that this ship—or whatever it is—was just a sign, an omen. I talked to a policeman and he as good as told me, but I didn’t really think about what he said until last night, when I was trying to sleep.”
“Is it a dream yer havin’? Did ye ever think on that?”
“If it’s a dream, it’s still real,” Tim said doggedly. “And anyway, I saw your ship when I was awake, yesterday and the day before.”
“Or yer dreamin’ now ye did. But go on wi’ it.”
“He said Lissy couldn’t have been abducted because I was in the same bed, and that she’d gone out for a swim in the morning and drowned. But she could have been abducted, if she had gone out for the swim first. If someone had come for her with a boat. And she wouldn’t have drowned, because she didn’t swim good enough to drown. She was afraid of the water. We went in yesterday, and even with me there, she would hardly go in over her knees. So it was you.”
“Yer right, ye know,” Daniel said. He formed a little steeple of his fingers. “ ’Twas us.”
Tim was recalling stories that had been read to him when he was a child. “Fairies steal babies, don’t they? And brides. Is that why you do it? So we’ll think that’s who you are?”
“Bless ye, ’tis true,” Daniel told him. “ ’Tis the Fair Folk we are. The jinn o’ the desert too, and the saucer riders ye say ye credit, and forty score more. Would ye be likin’ to see me wi’ me goatskin breeches and me panpipe?” He chuckled. “Have ye never wondered why we’re so much alike the world over? Or thought that we don’t always know just which shape’s the best for a place, so the naiads and the dryads might as well be the ladies o’ the Deeny Shee? Do ye know what the folk o’ the Barb’ry Coast call the hell that’s under their sea?”
Tim shook his head.
“Why, ’tis Domdaniel. I wonder why that is, now. Tim, ye say ye want this girl.”
“That’s right.”
“An’ ye say there’ll be trouble and plenty for us if ye don’t have her. But let me tell ye now that if ye don’t get her, wi’ our blessin’ to boot, ye’ll drown—hold your tongue, can’t ye, for ’tis worse than that. If ye don’t get her wi’ our blessin’, ’twill be seen that ye were drownin’ now. Do ye take me meaning?”
“I think so. Close enough.”
“Ah, that’s good, that is. Now here’s me offer. Do ye remember how things stood before we took her?”
“Of course.”
“They’ll stand so again, if ye but do what I tell ye. ’Tis yerself that will remember, Tim Neal, but she’ll remember nothin’. An’ the truth of it is, there’ll be nothin’ to remember, for it’ll all be gone, every stick of it. This policeman ye spoke wi’, for instance. Ye’ve me word that ye will not have done it.”
“What do I have to do?” Tim asked.
“Service. Serve us. Do whatever we ask of ye. We’d sooner have a broth of a girl like yer Lissy than a great hulk of a lad like yerself, but then too, we’d sooner be havin’ one that’s willin’, for the unwillin’ girls are everywhere—I don’t doubt but ye’ve seen it yerself. A hundred years, that’s all we ask of ye. ’Tis short enough, like Doyle’s wife. Will ye do it?”
“And everything will be the same, at the end, as it was before you took Lissy?”
“Not everythin’, I didn’t say that. Ye’ll remember, don’t ye remember me sayin’ so? But for her and all the country round, why ’twill be the same.”
“All right,” Tim said. “I’ll do it.”
“ ’Tis a brave lad ye are. Now I’ll tell ye what I’ll do. I said a hundred years, to which ye agreed—”
Tim nodded.
“—but I’ll have no unwillin’ hands about me boat, nor no ungrateful ones neither. I’ll make it twenty. How’s that? Sure and I couldn’t say fairer, could I?”
Daniel’s figure was beginning to waver and fade; the image of the dark mass Tim had seen first hung about it like a cloud.
“Lay yerself on yer belly, for I must put me foot upon yer head. Then the deal’s done.”
T
