The Well of the Saints | Page 7

glory be to God.
MARTIN DOUL -- [pointing to Bride.] -- And what is it herself has,

making sounds in her hand?
BRIDE -- [crossing to Martin Doul.] -- It's the Saint's bell; you'll hear
him ringing out the time he'll be going up some place, to be saying his
prayers.
[Martin Doul holds out his hand; she gives it to him.]
MARTIN DOUL -- [ringing it.] -- It's a sweet, beautiful sound.
MARY DOUL. You'd know, I'm thinking, by the little silvery voice of
it, a fasting holy man was after carrying it a great way at his side.
[Bride crosses a little right behind Martin Doul.]
MOLLY BYRNE -- [unfolding Saint's cloak.] -- Let you stand up now,
Martin Doul, till I put his big cloak on you. (Martin Doul rises, comes
forward, centre a little.) The way we'd see how you'd look, and you a
saint of the Almighty God.
MARTIN DOUL -- [standing up, a little diffidently.] -- I've heard the
priests a power of times making great talk and praises of the beauty of
the saints. [Molly Byrne slips cloak round him.]
TIMMY -- [uneasily.] -- You'd have a right to be leaving him alone,
Molly. What would the Saint say if he seen you making game with his
cloak?
MOLLY BYRNE -- [recklessly.] -- How would he see us, and he
saying prayers in the wood? (She turns Martin Doul round.) Isn't that a
fine holy-looking saint, Timmy the smith? (Laughing foolishly.)
There's a grand, handsome fellow, Mary Doul; and if you seen him now
you'd be as proud, I'm thinking, as the archangels below, fell out with
the Almighty God.
MARY DOUL -- [with quiet confidence going to Martin Doul and
feeling his cloak.] -- It's proud we'll be this day, surely. [Martin Doul is
still ringing.]
MOLLY BYRNE -- [to Martin Doul.] -- Would you think well to be all
your life walking round the like of that, Martin Doul, and you
bell-ringing with the saints of God?
MARY DOUL -- [turning on her, fiercely.] -- How would he be
bell-ringing with the saints of God and he wedded with myself?
MARTIN DOUL. It's the truth she's saying, and if bell-ringing is a fine
life, yet I'm thinking, maybe, it's better I am wedded with the beautiful
dark woman of Ballinatone.
MOLLY BYRNE -- [scornfully.] -- You're thinking that, God help you;

but it's little you know of her at all.
MARTIN DOUL. It's little surely, and I'm destroyed this day waiting to
look upon her face.
TIMMY -- [awkwardly.] -- It's well you know the way she is; for the
like of you do have great knowledge in the feeling of your hands.
MARTIN DOUL -- [still feeling the cloak.] -- We do, maybe. Yet it's
little I know of faces, or of fine beautiful cloaks, for it's few cloaks I've
had my hand to, and few faces (plaintively); for the young girls is
mighty shy, Timmy the smith and it isn't much they heed me, though
they do be saying I'm a handsome man.
MARY DOUL -- [mockingly, with good humour.] -- Isn't it a queer
thing the voice he puts on him, when you hear him talking of the
skinny-looking girls, and he married with a woman he's heard called
the wonder of the western world?
TIMMY -- [pityingly.] -- The two of you will see a great wonder this
day, and it's no lie.
MARTIN DOUL. I've heard tell her yellow hair, and her white skin,
and her big eyes are a wonder, surely.
BRIDE -- [who has looked out left.] -- Here's the saint coming from the
selvage of the wood. . . . Strip the cloak from him, Molly, or he'll be
seeing it now.
MOLLY BYRNE -- [hastily to Bride.] -- Take the bell and put yourself
by the stones. (To Martin Doul.) Will you hold your head up till I
loosen the cloak? (She pulls off the cloak and throws it over her arm.
Then she pushes Martin Doul over and stands him beside Mary Doul.)
Stand there now, quiet, and let you not be saying a word.
[She and Bride stand a little on their left, demurely, with bell, etc., in
their hands.]
MARTIN DOUL -- [nervously arranging his clothes.] -- Will he mind
the way we are, and not tidied or washed cleanly at all?
MOLLY BYRNE. He'll not see what way you are. . . . He'd walk by the
finest woman in Ireland, I'm thinking, and not trouble to raise his two
eyes to look upon her face. . . . Whisht!
[The Saint comes left, with crowd.]
SAINT. Are these the two poor people?
TIMMY -- [officiously.] -- They are, holy father; they do be always
sitting here at the crossing