The Demi-Gods

“Will you leave that donkey alone,” said Patsy Mac Cann to his daughter. “I never heard the like of it,” he continued testily. “I tell you the way you do be going on with the ass is enough to make a Christian man swear, so it is.”

“You let me be,” she replied. “If I was doing hurt or harm to you I wouldn’t mind, and if I am fond of the ass itself what does it matter to anybody?”

“It’s this way, that I don’t like to see a woman kissing an ass on the snout, it’s not natural nor proper.”

“A lot you know about natural and proper. Let you leave me alone now; and, besides that, doesn’t the ass like it?”

“That’s not a reason; sure it doesn’t matter in the world what an ass likes or dislikes, and, anyhow, an ass doesn’t like anything except carrots and turnips.”

“This one does,” said she stoutly.

“And a body might be kissing an ass until the black day of doom and he wouldn’t mind it.”

“This one minds.”

“Kissing an old ass!”

“One has to be kissing something.”

“Let you kiss me then and get done with it,” said he.

She regarded him in amazement.

“What would I kiss you for? Sure you’re my father, and aren’t you as old as the hills?”

“Well, well, you’re full of fun, and that’s what I say. Take the winkers off that donkey’s face, and let him get a bit to eat; there’s grass enough, God knows, and it’s good grass.”

Around the little bucket of fire where Mac Cann and his daughter were sitting there was an intense darkness. At the distance of six feet they could still see, but delicately, indistinctly, and beyond that the night hung like a velvet curtain. They did not mind the night, they did not fear it, they did not look at it: it was around them, full of strangeness, full of mystery and terror, but they looked only at the glowing brazier, and in the red cheer of that they were content.

They had eaten the bread and the turnip, and were waiting for the potatoes to be cooked, and as they waited an odd phrase, an exclamation, a sigh would pass from one to the other; and then, suddenly, the dark curtain of night moved noiselessly, and the three angels stepped nobly in the firelight.

For an instant neither Mac Cann nor his daughter made a movement; they did not make a sound. Here was terror, and astonishment the sister of terror: they gaped: their whole being was in their eyes as they stared. From Mac Cann’s throat came a noise; it had no grammatical significance, but it was weighted with all the sense that is in a dog’s growl or a wolf’s cry. Then the youngest of the strangers came forward:

“May we sit by your fire for a little time?” said he. “The night is cold, and in this darkness one does not know where to go.”

At the sound of words Patsy seized hold of his sliding civilization.

Now at this moment Mary was devoured with curiosity. She wanted to know how her father had become possessed of the basketful of provisions. She knew that three shillings would not have purchased a tithe of these goods, and, as she had now no fear of the strangers, she questioned her parent.

“Father,” said she, “where did you get all the good food?”

The angels had eaten of his bounty, so Mac Cann considered that he had nothing to fear from their side. He regarded them while he pulled thoughtfully at his pipe.

“Do you know,” said he, “that the hardest thing in the world is to get the food, and a body is never done looking for it. We are after eating all that we got this morning, so now we’ll have to search for what we’ll eat tonight, and in the morning we’ll have to look again for more of it, and the day after that, and every day until we are dead we’ll have to go on searching for the food.”

“I would have thought,” said the eldest angel, “that of all problems food would be the simplest in an organised society.”

This halted Mac Cann for a moment.

“Maybe you’re right, sir,” said he kindly, and he dismissed the interruption.

“I heard a man once⁠—he was a stranger to these parts, and he had a great deal of the talk⁠—he said that the folk at the top do grab all the food in the world, and that

“She’s a bad woman,” replied Patsy.

“What sort of a bad woman is she?”

“She’s the sort that commits adultery with every kind of man,” said he harshly.

Caeltia turned over that accusation for a moment.

“Did she ever commit adultery with yourself?” said he.

“She did not,” said Patsy, “and that’s why I don’t like her.”

Caeltia considered that statement also, and found it reasonable:

“I think,” said he, “that the reason you don’t like that woman is because you like her too much.”

“It’s so,” said Patsy, “but there is no reason for her taking on with every kind of man and not taking on with me at all.”

He was silent for a moment.

“I tell you,” said he furiously, “that I made love to that woman from the dawn to the dark, and then she walked off with a man that came down a little road.”

“That was her right,” said Caeltia mildly.

“Maybe it was, but for the weight of a straw I would have killed the pair of them that night in the dark place.”

“Why didn’t you?”

“She had me weakened. My knees gave under me when she walked away and there wasn’t even a curse in my mouth.”

Again he was silent, and again he broke into angry speech!

“I don’t want to see her at all, for she torments me, so let the pair of them walk their road until they come to a ditch that is full of thorns and is fit for them to die in.”

“I think,” said Caeltia, “that the reason you don’t want to see her is because you want to see her too much.”