The Countess Cathleen | Page 9

no one who is famished or
afraid,
Despair of help or of a welcome with it.
But you have news,
you say.
FIRST MERCHANT. We saw a man,
Heavy with sickness in the bog
of Allen,
Whom you had bid buy cattle. Near Fair Head
We saw
your grain ships lying all becalmed
In the dark night; and not less still
than they,
Burned all their mirrored lanthorns in the sea.
CATHLEEN.. My thanks to God, to Mary and the angels,
That I have
money in my treasury,
And can buy grain from those who have stored
it up
To prosper on the hunger of the poor.
But you've been far and
know the signs of things,
When will this yellow vapour no more hang

And creep about the fields, and this great heat
Vanish away, and
grass show its green shoots?
FIRST MERCHANT. There is no sign of change--day copies day,
Green things are dead--the cattle too are dead
Or dying--and on all
the vapour hangs,
And fattens with disease and glows with heat.
In
you is all the hope of all the land.
CATHLEEN. And heard you of the demons who buy souls?
FIRST MERCHANT.
There are some men who hold they have
wolves' heads,
And say their limbs--dried by the infinite flame--

Have all the speed of storms; others, again,
Say they are gross and
little; while a few
Will have it they seem much as mortals are,
But
tall and brown and travelled--like us--lady,
Yet all agree a power is in
their looks
That makes men bow, and flings a casting-net
About
their souls, and that all men would go
And barter those poor vapours,
were it not
You bribe them with the safety of your gold.
CATHLEEN. Praise be to God, to Mary, and the angels
That I am
wealthy! Wherefore do they sell?

FIRST MERCHANT. As we came in at the great door we saw
Your
porter sleeping in his niche--a soul
Too little to be worth a hundred
pence,
And yet they buy it for a hundred crowns.
But for a soul like
yours, I heard them say,
They would give five hundred thousand
crowns and more.
CATHLEEN. How can a heap of crowns pay for a soul?
Is the green
grave so terrible a thing?
FIRST MERCHANT. Some sell because the money gleams, and some
Because they are in terror of the grave,
And some because their
neighbours sold before,
And some because there is a kind of joy
In
casting hope away, in losing joy,
In ceasing all resistance, in at last

Opening one's arms to the eternal flames,
In casting all sails out upon the wind;
To this--full of the gaiety of the
lost--
Would all folk hurry if your gold were gone.
CATHLEEN. There is something, Merchant, in your voice
That
makes me fear. When you were telling how
A man may lose his soul
and lose his God
Your eyes were lighted up, and when you told

How my poor money serves the people, both--
Merchants forgive
me--seemed to smile.
FIRST MERCHANT. Man's sins
Move us to laughter only; we have
seen
So many lands and seen so many men.
How strange that all
these people should be swung
As on a lady's shoe-string,--under them

The glowing leagues of never-ending flame.
CATHLEEN. There is a something in you that I fear;
A something
not of us; but were you not born
In some most distant corner of the
world?
(The SECOND MERCHANT, who has been listening at the door,
comes forward, and as he comes a sound of voices and feet is heard.)

SECOND MERCHANT. Away now--they are in the passage--hurry,

For they will know us, and freeze up our hearts
With Ave Marys, and
burn all our skin
With holy water.
FIRST MERCHANT. Farewell; for we must ride
Many a mile before
the morning come;
Our horses beat the ground impatiently.
(They go out. A number of PEASANTs enter by other door.)
FIRST PEASANT. Forgive us, lady, but we heard a noise.
SECOND PEASANT. We sat by the fireside telling vanities.
FIRST PEASANT.
We heard a noise, but though we have searched
the house
We have found nobody.
CATHLEEN. You are too timid.
For now you are safe from all the
evil times.
There is no evil that can find you here.
OONA (entering hurriedly)
Ochone! Ochone! The treasure room is
broken in,
The door stands open, and the gold is gone.
(PEASANTS raise a lamentable cry.)
CATHLEEN. Be silent.
(The cry ceases.)
Have you seen nobody?
OONA Ochone!
That my good mistress should lose all this money.
CATHLEEN. Let those among you--not too old to ride--
Get horses
and search all the country round,
I'll give a farm to him who finds the
thieves.
(A man with keys at his girdle has come in while she speaks. There is a

general murmur of The Porter! the porter!")
PORTER. Demons were here. I sat beside the door
In my stone niche,
and two owls passed me by,
Whispering with human voices.
OLD PEASANT. God forsakes us.
CATHLEEN. Old man, old man, He never closed a door
Unless one
opened. I am desolate,
For a most sad resolve wakes in my heart

But I