by Tom O'Neill
Then one day the thing happened that had transformed the Banbhs from being no more than a minor nuisance to being a major menace. A change that would ultimately lead Matha to their hideout.
As usual, on that day the bigger ones went in to rob a little cabin, having been informed by the little ones that there was nobody home. The home owner’s sow was outside rooting under an apple tree as the bigger Runners entered. She was very disturbed indeed by what she saw. She knew things weren’t right and she started doing a lot of snorting and giving out. As it happened, the man of the house wasn’t far away. He had called over to a neighbour for a mug of mead and was not very entertained by the conversation. So when he heard the carry on of the pig, who was a particular lady he had great respect for, it gave him an excuse to take his leave and wander home to see what troubled his only female companion. He made the short journey quicker than the smalls could whistle their warnings.
On hearing the frantic whistles, the bigger Banbhs of course wanted to do their usual trick. But standing between them and freedom, right in the middle of the doorway, they saw the short burly man with neatly trimmed hair and an enormous moustache that was nearly as big as himself. In his hand he had a nice slender blackthorn stick with a fine knob on the end of it. They didn’t like the look of it.
‘Who the blazes is in my house?’ the man started shouting without any restraint. ‘I’ll clobber ye.’
The middle one told the big ones to shove the roaring obstacle out of the way so they could all get out.
The big ones made a lunge at the man in the doorway.
‘And where do you think you’re going, lads?’ said the man, as life sprung into his stick. It made a terrible smack as it hit one of the big Banbhs direct on the eye and, on the return stroke, ploughed into the soft shoulder muscle of the other, deadening his arm for him. The Banbhs fell back in terrible fright.
It turned out the man had been a stick-fighting champion in his youth. He went by the name of Ceallaigh.
Ceallaigh was in a rage and now started coming forward into the lads, trapping them against the back walls and landing cruel blows all over them. His fighting days had taught him to be hard, accurate and mean with his stick. It was able to find the softest parts of the Banbh bodies and he gave them all kinds of beneficial advice as it did so. It was not clear to the boys that the little madman had any plans of easing off, not while there was any breath or blood left in their bodies. ‘Injured to death you’ll soon be, aye,’ he kept saying. ‘That’ll teach you discipline, me bucks.’ They were squealing and squeaking. Anyone passing might have thought a fox was in with the hens.
In the end, the two small Banbhs got a bit of courage up and crawled from the bushes outside. They went on their hands and knees behind Ceallaigh. The middling and big Banbhs understood that this was going to be their only chance to get out of the house before this madman had knocked their few wits out of them. They rushed at him at once. That surprised him and he stepped back, falling over the little toadstools behind him.
He wasn’t able to break the fall and on his way to the ground he gave his head a good loud knock on the round stone next to the door. With the stick quietened, the Banbhs ran as fast as their limping groaning bodies would carry them, leaving all of Ceallaigh’s possessions behind and their own bags along with them.
They reached their hideaway cave. They lay on the hay. They were very sorry for themselves. They spent three days sipping water, nursing their bruises, and wondering would they ever be able to walk properly again, before they even started talking about what had happened.
‘That was terrible. I never want it to happen again. I’m very ruffled,’ said one of the big Banbhs.
‘I’m done with this trade now,’ said the other big Banbh.
The little ones were not happy with this line of talk and suggested they get advice from Tobín whom they knew would not like it either.
‘What ails you?’ Tobín asked as they limped towards him, a tincture of curiosity in his bog-flattened voice. He was tickled to see the neat Banbh boys with torn clothes, blackened eyes and limping. Their tears flowed freely as they explained the situation to him. When he was done laughing, they asked him for advice on how to avoid conflicts of this kind in the future.
‘Let me understand you fully now,’ he said, ‘You are out there robbing people’s most valued things. But you want them not to be angry with you?’
‘Just to avoid any violence and harm to us.’
‘Maybe you should change over to being priests. They’re the only other ones I know who get well-fed without working or being entertaining.’
Tobín the outcast was not a fan of the religious. His local druid had been to him many times imploring him to give up his dealings with hooligans, to come back to his family, and most of all to come back to the respect of Daghda, Mórrígan, Brigid and all those Gods that most people want kept in good humour. Tobín would chase the druid away saying, ‘An eternity of misery in the other world is a low enough price to pay for not having to spend another day in the miserable company of my wife’s crab-eating family. I plan for tomorrow and let the next day take care of itself.’
‘Maybe we could do that,’ said one of the bigs. ‘Become priests.’
‘The only problem there,’ said Tobín, ‘is that a druid must be able to feign wisdom and concern for others.’
‘But it would be dishonest to pretend to be concerned about people besides ourselves,’ said the other big. ‘How about if we learn instruments then and become travelling musicians. They go to endless festivities, have drink poured into them, and have no responsibilities other than to stir up a good bit of craic.’
‘Indeed,’ said Tobín, ‘that might work. Except that musicians usually don’t sound like injured crows.’
‘You see,’ said the middle, ‘even when we want to be right, everyone just throws obstacles in our way.’
‘You could go to work the fields,’ said Tobín.
‘Don’t be stupid,’ said one of the smalls.
‘So all that is left for you is to remain half-baked thieves,’ laughed Tobín, ‘and hope that Mac Cumhaill or his boys don’t catch up with you. He doesn’t share your distaste for violence from what I’ve heard. Now what have you got for me today?’
‘We have brought nothing because we haven’t robbed a single place since that fellow pulled so hard on us with that tree stump two weeks ago.’
Tobín’s face darkened. He had assumed the talk of quitting was just the usual idle noise. It angered him to think of having wasted conversation on visitors who had come to him with empty hands. After some minutes spent arguing with himself, he said, ‘Alright then. Listen here you useless curs, I can give you something that will make your victims happier.’
He produced a clay jar from a cavity hidden behind a stone slab in the mud wall of his hut. ‘This is full of ash. I myself took it from a druid up north. One pinch of it blown in the air and whoever whiffs it will be as happy as pigs in muck. I’ll give it to you on condition that you bring me twice as much stuff every day for the next five years.’
‘But do you not want to keep a bit of it for yourself?’ said one of the big ones. ‘To maybe cheer yourself up a bit?”
‘What would I be wanting with it? I see life plainly as it is. I don’t need my judgement clouded by good feelings. Now take it and go because I’m already thinking it’s a terrible mistake to give it to such fools as you.’
The Runner Banbhs took the jar. They were excited and had hardly gone twenty steps from Tobín’s bog hut when the two little ones lined up the other three. As Tobín watched from his doorway with a scowl of disbelief, they took a pinch of stuff from the jar and blew it up towards the faces of the stupider three to see what effects it would have. Right enough, a sweet happiness swept over them immediately. They were happy to the point of even greater stupidity, falling around the place, rolling in the freezing black bog water and tickling each other with rushes. It took a couple of hours for t
he effects to wear off. Their once dainty garments were now even more torn from frolicking through the bushes and they were covered from head to toe in mud stains.
They went back to Tobín with the jar. One of the smalls said, ‘This is no good. We wouldn’t be able to rob anyone in that state.’
Tobín came at them with his wooden boots flying. ‘It’s not meant for you, you donkey shite, it’s for the thrifty hoarders whose good things you are to bring me.’
The boys didn’t have long to wait for a chance to try it out. The owners of a group of huts on the river Súir had gone to a meeting called by their chief. When the meeting ended, all five Runners were inside one cabin choosing stuff to rob. No more hurry. No more bother about keeping lookout.
When the woman of the place shuffled in and saw them, the middle Runner was ready with a pinch of the ash of delight and blew it at the woman through a straw so that it couldn’t spread around and get into them all.
It worked instantly. The woman stood there smiling as they lifted everything of value. She just laughed as if they were her best friends. She even helped them carry out an oak settle bed that her father had engraved with designs of curly plants and fierce wild animals.
Robbing had suddenly become too easy.
And with easy takings the Runner Banbhs turned out to be greedy. They started robbing night and day. They ignored their mother’s instructions. Instead of taking a few things that people would survive without, they now left nothing behind. Even Tobín soon became nervous. They were taking far more than even he had expected. ‘It’s not wise, there will be trouble,’ he told them. ‘If you want to keep getting eggs you mustn’t eat the hen.’ Yet he took what they brought him.
Sure enough, the chiefs to the north of Sliabh na mBan were soon meeting. They had a lot of very angry people who had lost their winter stores of grain and salted meats as well as their valuables.
When the Runners got wind of the anger, they simply decided to go to the south of the mountain. It was a bit further to run but at least nobody there would be expecting anything.
As it happened, their first raid on the south side was on the homestead of the well-known woodcutter family, the Sheas. They took the finest haul they had ever landed. So much that they had to steal a horse and mule to help with the load. They got the three befuddled Shea boys to help them calm the animals down while they filled baskets with the loveliest woollen clothing, patchwork quilts, and embroideries made by three industrious generations of Shea women over countless winter evenings. They landed tools and brass utensils and other contraptions made by three generations of Shea men. They took blackened pots and golden gifts. They took the carefully-minded dress of a little daughter who had died at the age of three. They took a lot of clay plates and flasks. They even took a little plain brown bowl that they couldn’t see a use for but assumed was valuable because of its perch on a high shelf.
Had they the smallest idea of how much trouble that little bowl could bring they might have left it behind.
Had they known that the sound of a breaking branch as they entered their hideout a few days later was made by a boy who wanted nothing more than that bowl, they would have happily parted with it.
Had Matha known how much trouble it could bring, maybe he too would have left it behind. Instead, he walked away from the Banbh hideout with groundless confidence. He was somehow fixed on the idea of what he must do next.
He went along the path till he found a track that looked like it was going north east. He had heard of Tara being in that direction. The people of the farm places he called into for rest and food either did not know or would not say whether he was on the right road. They didn’t talk to strangers about such things. He proceeded in this uncertain way on his journey to seek out the help of a man he had only ever heard tales about and who in truth he was not even sure existed.
So fixed was Matha that he didn’t know or care anything about the Banbhs. So fixed was he that he did not even care much about who else they might have robbed. The bowl had taken root in his mind now as though it was the most important thing in the world. He was going to get it from those men by whatever means. As he walked, he became so determined that he even decided he would lie if he had to. Or exaggerate at least. He would build up the thieves into marauding murderers, ruthless bandits, people who were ridiculing the King; whatever he had to say to ensure that he returned with help.
It was a cold winter’s day with a dewy dusk settling in quickly when Matha caught sight of large enclosures on the hills up ahead. It had to be Tara. He stopped along the track to ask a man how he might get into the great place on the hill so as to meet the High King Cormac Mac Airt or the famous Fionn Mac Cumhaill.
The man was bending over what looked like a piece of dried calf skin spread over a stone on the road. There were brown squiggles on the stretched pelt. He was smiling like a roasting pig. Matha suspected the unfortunate man was not entirely correct in his head. The man examined Matha with a dark eye and rolled up the tattered skin like it was a thing of great value and tucked it with some ceremony into his tunic. Then he took a bite from a turnip that he had left by the side of the path. ‘Did you know that with this scrap of pelt I have no need of memory? That all the laws and history of the world can be stored on this cow’s backside?’ he asked. ‘Mac Airt, talking. Who is looking?’
Matha was not inclined to believe that this man was the High King of all Ireland. He had been brought up with grand notions of High Kings, great castles, fine robes, and much fuss. But he was not going to easily call any man a liar. Though this clearly was not King Cormac Mac Airt, it was certainly a man who genuinely believed himself to be. And therefore Matha responded respectfully. ‘Great King, could you possibly tell me where I might meet Fionn?’
‘What business do you have with that lad?’ said the man in a friendly tone, offering the turnip to Matha. ‘Here, taste this, these are surely the finest, sweetest little roots I’ve ever bred.’
‘I have information on a band of robbers that is ...’
‘Well? What?’ said the man impatiently.
Matha inwardly swore at himself. All the exaggerations he had prepared, stories about old people beaten to death and terrified children – the words would not come out of his mouth. He was not able to lie. Not even to this skitty old fellow who was not listening. ‘They are causing great trouble down south,’ he said feebly.
‘Oh. Well, talk to Mac Cumhaill, talk to Mac Cumhaill.’
‘Where is he?’
‘Over beyond in the other field there trying to find one of his own turnips that he thinks will better mine.’
Matha looked over. Whatever doubts he had that the odd person next to him was king of his country, he could have none about who the person was that stood in the distance. Mac Cumhaill was as large and fine a figure as Matha had heard of in the wildest stories. Indeed, back then Fionn Mac Cumhaill stood like a great oak tree.
Matha thanked the King and made his way over to the warrior. Up close, Matha’s disappointment set in. The famous doer of extraordinary deeds was grumpily stamping through a patch of turnips. His sword hung loosely off his belt in a dust-covered scabbard no more impressive than a crooked stick in the hand of a shepherd or a mallet in the sack of a carpenter.
‘A good farmer, that’s one thing I’ll never be,’ was Mac Cumhaill’s greeting to Matha. ‘You look like a lad who spent some time scratching in the ground. What advice do you bring me?’
‘I am greatly honoured to be in your presence and bring you every good wish,’ said Matha, not insulted. ‘The reason your plants are small is that the ground was not broken finely enough when the seeds were planted.’
‘Is that your opinion?’
‘It is,’ said Matha.
‘Did nobody ever teach you,’ said Mac Cumhaill crankily, ‘that you shouldn’t always give your opinion when you are asked for it?’
‘No,’ said Matha.
Mac Cumhaill looked at him with some surprise. H
e apparently was not used to being talked to bluntly by young people. Matha didn’t mean to sound disrespectful, he just didn’t know any other way to speak.
Mac Cumhaill came closer and lifted Matha from the ground as he inspected him. Suddenly Matha was very afraid. Mac Cumhaill stared at him. Then he put him down and said, ‘I can see that you are not somebody who came here to show how little you know about turnips. Tell me what request you come with, sonny, and let it be something that amuses me.’
‘Thank you,’ said Matha. ‘There are some people in and around Sliabh na mBan having trouble with robberies.’
‘Aye, I heard something of that.’
‘People think it’s a dark force.’
‘People always think that. You don’t believe it is so on this occasion?’
‘No. And I know the hideout of the lads that are doing it.’
Mac Cumhaill looked more interested. ‘Do you now?’
Matha continued, ‘But I didn’t follow them further because I suspect that they’re using some kind of powder on the people they’re robbing because I overheard them talking about “the ash” sorting someone out.’
Mac Cumhaill brightened up and Matha became hopeful but, at the same time, even more disappointed. The heroes he had grown up learning about would not be interested in some small-time robberies. Surely they had more glorious pursuits: wars to fight, foreign princes to slay.
‘I am tired of people coming here for us to solve local disputes,’ said Mac Cumhaill with a yawn, ‘when they have no place for us to start.’
‘Well I do have a place for you to start,’ Matha nodded.
‘Come over here and listen to this,’ he shouted over towards the ditch. Another large man emerged from where he had apparently been lying looking at the sky. His huge black mane was covered in burdocks. Matha had heard stories about this man too, but not such glorious stories: Conán Mac Liath was the friend of Mac Cumhaill who was given to bursts of anger and practical jokes. Matha was very relieved to get a smile of greeting from him.