Read Online Thistle and Thyme by Sorche Nic Leodhas - Free Book Online Page B

hearing.
    After a day or two, she began to grow restless, for she wanted to go home to their own wee croft. So off they set, and she chattered to him every mile of the way. The sound of her voice was the sweetest sound he’d ever heard.
    So they came home. It was still winter, and the sheep were still penned in the fold and the soldier in the house, but there wasn’t a bit of silence in the cottage. There was this that she had to tell him, and something else she must say. The soldier could hardly slip a word in edgewise, but he still thought it was wonderful to hear her.
    After a month or two had gone by and the winter was wearing off toward spring, he began to notice something he had not noticed before. And that was that his bonny wee wife talked away from morn to night, and he wasn’t too sure that she did not talk in her sleep. He found he had in his house what he’d told the innkeeper he never could abide—a lass with a clackiting tongue.
    He would not have had her silent again; ne’er the less, a little quiet now and then would not have come amiss. But he still loved her dearly, and she was his own dear lass.
    So one fine morn after the lambing was over and the sheep were out on the hillside with their dams, he went off to see the old woman who had the second sight to find out if she could do aught about it.
    â€œDeary me!” said she. “I misdoubted the kelpie would find a way to turn things against you.”
    â€œThat he did!” said the soldier, “or I’d not be here.”
    â€œDid she drink of the water again?” the old body asked.
    â€œShe did not,” said the soldier. “Not even a drop.”
    â€œâ€™Twas not that way he got at her then,” said the old woman. “Well, tell me what she did do then?”
    â€œShe took the comb from the water and she stuck it in her hair,” the soldier told her, “and that’s all she did do.”
    â€œDid she wipe it off first?” the old body asked anxiously.
    â€œNay. She did not,” said the soldier.
    â€œI see it plain,” the old body said. “The water that was on the comb was bewitched again. Och, there’s not a fairy in the land so full of malice as the water kelpie.”
    So the old woman sat and thought and thought, and the soldier waited and waited. At last the old woman said, “A little is good, but too much is more than enough. We’ll give the kelpie a taste of his own medicine. Take your lass back to the well. Set her beside it and bid her to talk down the well to the kelpie the livelong day. The kelpie must answer whoever speaks to him, so the one of them that tires first will be the loser.”
    â€œâ€™Twill not be my lass,” said the soldier. “I’ll back her to win the day.”
    So he took his wife back to the well and sat her down beside it, and bade her call the kelpie and talk to him until he came back for her.
    So she leaned over the well as he told her to and called to the kelpie. “Kelpie! Kelpie! I’m here!” cried she.
    â€œI’m here!” answered the kelpie from the bottom of the well.
    â€œWe’ll talk the whole of the day,” the lass said happily into the well.
    â€œThe whole of the day,” the kelpie agreed.
    â€œI’ve such a lot to tell you,” the lass went on.
    â€œA lot to tell you,” the kelpie said in return.
    The soldier went away, leaving the lass by the well talking so fast that her words tripped over themselves, with the kelpie answering her back all the time.
    He came back when the sun had set and the gloaming lay over the wood, to find the lass still sitting there, bending over the well. She was still talking, but very slow, and he could hardly hear the kelpie answer at all.
    Well, now that the day was safely over, the soldier laid his hand on her shoulder. “Come away, lass,” said he. She looked at him so weary-like that his heart turned over with