“And we are the only ones who know of this coming?”
“We alone.”
“What shall I do?”
Build man of snow
Let the winds blow.
Finn struck camp immediately and did not bed down for the night, but worked until dawn, raising a giant man of snow. In its eyeholes he stuffed tufts of rabbit fur soaked in oil of the heron’s liver, and put fire to them. The snow giant, looming on its headland, glared with enormous burning eyes over the frozen sea. In its lifted hand he balanced a young pine, and it seemed to be poised to cast a huge spear. He had placed the snow giant so that it faced north by west, and the north wind howled at an angle into its earhole and out its westering mouth, making a terrible sobbing bellowing cry.
You can still see that giant if you find the headland. It stands there where Finn built it in one night, but the snow has turned to white stone, and its legs and trunk are one column of stone. Its eyeholes are dead. But you may know it by its raised arm and by the sobbing bellowing sound it still makes when the wind blows strongly off the North Sea.
But it served its purpose for Finn that night so long ago. The fur-hatted invaders did not strike the coast of Eire, and the bards say it was because they feared the giant standing sentinel on the headland, and its burning eyes and the shadow of its mighty spear, and they imagined Eire a land of giants. Be that as it may, we do know that the next day was even colder, so cold that the sunset froze in the sky. Its weight overbalanced the horizon, and it slid down the tilted line of the sky to the North Pole, where it stuck, flashing there in a pageantry of frozen colors we call the Northern Lights.
“Quickly!” said the harp. “Visit the sunset before it slides away and search its roots for the seeds of fire.”
“Why?”
“You will need them. Go!”
Finn bound long straight branches to his feet like the runners of a sled. He slung his sword belt to the falcon, who seized one end of it in her beak and drew Finn swiftly over the icy plain of the sea to the great frozen lake of flame. He felt small as a speck of dust, did Finn, when he came to the base of that pulsing radiant wall of color. Cold light poured down, staining him with its rich dyes, and his blood sang at the loveliness. The falcon flew slowly, pulling him on his skis past arches and columns and ramparts of living color to the red roots of the sunset. He dug there with his knife and pried out the seeds of fire, white-hot little pearls of the primal flame, which sprout with unbelievable speed when planted, and will nourish life or spread death according to the manner of their sowing, and must be handled only by heroes. He put the white-hot little pearls in his wallet and skied swiftly away as the sunset’s weight began to tilt the horizon.
Now Finn turned from the coast and made his way southwest toward Ballinoe, for that was where his first task lay—to kill the boar that was ravaging the countryside. But the going was not easy. The weather had shifted suddenly. The iron frost was broken. A thaw set in, melting the snow, cracking the ice, turning the whole countryside into water. Freshets of water came tumbling off the hills. The rivers were enormously swollen, and overflowed their banks, washing away huts, barns, trees. Finn, passing, saw people afloat on their roofs. He saw cows swimming, and sheep and goats, all herded by dogs who paddled after, barking furiously. Roads were washed out, trees were uprooted. As far as the eye could see, the fields were covered with water. Finn hauled in a drifting coracle, and packed himself in it with cat and harp and falcon, and simply let his little boat go with the tide. The cat rode his shoulder, trying to fluff his wet fur, eyes burning disapproval at the idea of wetness. The falcon rode the bow, hunching malevolently between her wings. She, too, disliked the weather.
By and by as the sun came up warmly each morning, the waters shrank back off the fields. The land steamed. Dogs herded cattle back to the barns. Horses ran in the field, trumpeting. The road appeared again. Finn left his little boat and resumed his journey by foot.
The falcon flew high, searching for game. The cat stalked the underbrush. Finn strode on, hair loose in the wind, breathing deeply of the wild moist air, now and again touching his harp. He came finally to Ballinoe, where he met an old woman on the road.
“Good day, Grandmother,” he said. “And a good afternoon to follow, and a good night after that. My name is Finn McCool.”
“Is it now?”
“Do you dislike strangers here?”
“We do, but not so much as we dislike our neighbors.”
“Is the place full of sadness and suspicion then, stewing in spite and black looks and sour words? Is that the way of it?”
“It is. We are no different from anyplace else.”
“But are you plagued by a wild boar?”
“Good day to you,” said the woman. “I can’t stand here talking of this and that.” She humped off rapidly down the road, muttering to herself.
A while later Finn came to an inn. He entered and ordered a meal.
“You look like a lad with a sharp appetite,” said the landlord. “What do you care to commence with, fish or fowl?”
“Why …”
“Don’t give too much thought to it because we have neither. Perhaps you would care to choose between plovers’ eggs and carp roe.”
“Will I be served what I choose?”
“Well, that takes care of the first course,” said the landlord. “Now for the big decision. Will you have joint of beef, leg of lamb, side of veal, or mutton chop?”
“You jest with me,” said Finn. “There is no savor of food here. Your kitchen fires are cold. Why do you mock a hungry man, innkeeper?”
“What else should I do to one who comes ordering a meal where there is no food?”
“Why is there no food?”
“Because it has been eaten. We had a visitor before you, and he took it all. Carp, salmon, trout. Twenty dozen of plover eggs. A pail of roe. And six sheep, three cows, two goats, five kids—oh, and the lambs, of course, all ten. Flesh, fat, bone, muscle, sinew, skin and horn.”
“Quite a feeder,” said Finn. “But why such a long face, my host? And so sour a greeting for your next guest? If he emptied your larder, he filled your purse.”
“Not he,” growled the innkeeper. “He skinned me clean, you young fool. It was Boru the Bad who visited this inn and destroyed both peace and profit. He does not pay, man, he takes. Takes without giving. I’m lucky he did not eat my wife and children as well. Or perhaps not. For I don’t know how I shall keep them now without cattle or grain or fish in the pond. No. It were better we were all dead than visited by Boru.”
“What manner of man is he to look at?”
“Man? God save us. He is no man, but an ogre. Foul, friend, foul. Huge and foul. So ugly you sicken with it. So savagely strong you melt with fear. And of vile odor.”
“What does he look like so that I will know him if I meet him?”
“If you meet him, my lad, you’ll know him all right, but you won’t be knowing anything for long. Avoid him is my advice.”
“What does he look like?”
“So tall he has to bend almost double to squeeze through that door there, and about as wide as he is tall. With a fat face and little poisonous red eyes. A big snout on him, lad, a beard made of black bristles—and, look you, most horrible, two teeth, if you can call them teeth, but they come curving out of his mouth as long and sharp as the horns of an Angus bull.”
“And does he terrorize the countryside?”
“He does not tranquilize it, that’s for certain.”
“Then he must be the wild boar they speak of in Tara.”
“Well, his name is Boru, sure enough. And he does resemble a giant pig, now that you mention it. But if you heard of him, why are you here?”
“To cut short his career, my good host.”
“You?”
“Myself and no other. Finn McCool.”
“Finn the Fool, more likely.”
“Careful now. You are an unfortunate man. Disaster has jus
t struck you. I do not wish to strike you too. But do not play with my name.”
The innkeeper looked at him a long time. He was a big enough fellow himself with a beefy face and great slabs of forearms, and a bullhide apron. Finn looked back at him. Finally, the man said:
“If you have come to fight Boru, I must wish you well.”
“Thank you, master landlord. And good day to you.”
Now, as Finn walked along the road he stopped each passerby and asked him what he knew about Boru. But he could learn nothing. Their faces closed when he spoke to them. They faced him sullenly, lips clenched, eyes clouded. “Why, they are frightened,” he said to himself. “Too much afraid of this fellow even to mention his name—so far gone, so sunk in terror, they dare not serve their own interests.” And he felt their fear begin to infect him, and was immediately shaken by the dancing rage that took him whenever he began to know fear. On impulse he stopped a small boy who passed, grinning.
“Why do you smile at me, young sir?”
“You’re a funny sight you are, master stranger, with that cat on one shoulder and that ugly bird on the other.”
“Would you earn a penny?”
“Rather be given one, but I’ll earn it if there is no other way.”
“Tell me then, have you heard of him called Boru?”
“Boru the Bad? Why, everyone has heard of him. He is the worst of living things, they say—and he lives right here in Ballinoe.”
“Where?”
“And I shall be like him when I grow up and everyone shall fear me. I’m practicing wickedness right now. For you can’t start early enough if you wish to make something of yourself, I am told.”
“Where does Boru live?”
The boy grinned at him.
“Don’t you want the penny?”
“Price has gone up. Twopence now.”
Finn reached out and lifted him off the ground and held him upside down, kicking and yelping.
“Easy now, little merchant, or I shall drop you square on your scheming red head, and it will break like an egg. A penny I said, and a penny it shall be. Penny is the fee.”
“Down this road, round the bend, up the hill and down again. Over a valley, across a stream—and there you will see a tall hill. That is his castle.”
“He lives in the hill, does he?”
“Aye, he has hollowed it out. It is his stronghold, and there he lives, with his troops. And I hope you do find him, that’s all I hope. But pay me my penny first. For you won’t be around to collect any debts from, not after you meet Boru; no, that you won’t.”
Finn set the boy on his feet and gave him a penny.
“Now be off with you, little rascal, before I warm your tail.”
The boy scampered off, cursing. Finn laughed, and went his way.
He went the way the boy had told him, and after a bit came to the stream. More river than stream, it was swollen to twice its size, and the current ran swiftly. Beyond the stream he could see the hollow hill that was Bora’s castle.
“Looks like an ordinary hill to me,” said Finn to himself. “Nevertheless, I believe that red-headed little liar for some reason, so there it is I shall go to seek Boru. I see no gate nor portal nor any means of entrance, but if he dwells there with his troops there must be a way in. First, however, I must cross this overgrown stream.”
Now at this time there were few bridges that crossed the waterways of Eire, and those only along the most traveled routes. Ferries too were very scarce. It was the custom to cross water on stilts. On the bank of river or stream opposite a dwelling, there was always a stack of stilts for travelers to use. Just as Finn was selecting a pair, the harp spoke to him, saying:
Walk on two spears
And have no fears.
Now, as it happened, Finn carried no spear because he had wished to travel light. He was armed only with sword and dagger. But he had learned that the harp’s advice was not to be ignored. So he cut two long thick branches. To one of them he bound his sword, to the other his dagger. Then to each he nailed a chock of wood to keep his feet on. Stepping very carefully, he edged into the stream.
All this time Finn was being watched by Boru from his barrow-castle. It was Boru’s custom to attack travelers while they were crossing the stream. He would wait until they were midway, where the current was strongest, then rush into the stream, where he could move about much more quickly, for his legs were so long he needed no stilts. Then he would carry his catch off to the slave pens. Or, if the victim was fat and tasty-looking, he would find himself turning on a spit. Boru ate human flesh too.
But Finn knew nothing of all this as he stilt-walked across the tumbling stream. He had a difficult time of it, balancing himself against the current, nor was the task made any easier by his stilts being knife-tipped according to the harp’s instruction. But he managed all the same until he reached midstream. Then, suddenly, he heard a wild bellowing and snorting, and saw something huge and terrible splashing toward him from the other shore. A sight to make a strong man’s courage melt away it was. According to O’Hare’s Book of Harms:
In stature, Boru of Ballinoe did overtop two good-size yeomen, one standing on the shoulders of the other, and was as broad withal as the horn-span of a twain of oxen yoked side by side. These dimensions are closely observed and such as I can vouch for, having been related to me by a close witness of these dread matters, he being Shawn Calan, a turf-cutter of Ballinoe, who was so fortunate as to escape from the roasting-spit itself. Calan, having despaired of his life and a-swoon from the first heat of the cooking fire, when the rig was overturned by a blow of Bora’s foot kicking in anger. The ogre had broken one of his smaller teeth biting down on a man who had been roasted in armor, this being done by Boru’s cook on his master’s command, who fancied it might be like unto boiling a lobster in its shell. However, roaring with pain from his broken tooth, Boru delivered that kick at the spit which was Calan’s salvation, for it (the spit) flew out of the roasting pit and was shattered on the flagstones, allowing the half-charred man to crawl away in much agony of body but thankful in his soul, and so he made his escape.
And this was the brute Finn saw charging upon him as he balanced himself on his stilts in the middle of the stream. Topping that enormous body was a face more horrible than any the lad had ever dreamed in his deepest nightmare. A man’s face, but resembling that of a giant boar, with long heavy needle-pointed tusks curving from its mouth, and eyes like two drops of blood. Finn, swaying there on his poles in the rushing stream, was completely helpless. He could neither run nor fight.
Boru reached him, seized him by the neck, and lifted him in the air as easily as if he were a kitten. But Finn held onto his stilts, and, dangling there in the monster’s hands, he kicked twice, once with his left foot, and once with his right. The left-footed kick sliced off the elbow of Boru’s raised arm, forcing him to release his grip. And Finn’s right-footed kick drove a hole through the gross bladder that was Boru’s stomach. The spear quivered there in the torn belly. Finn released the haft of both spears, fell into the water, and dived deep to escape the gouts of blood spouting from Boru’s wound. But he had no sooner surfaced than an enormous weight fell on him—Boru’s body it was—driving him to the bottom of the stream before he had time to take breath.
He would have drowned there, perhaps, but the falcon shot into the air, folded her wings and dropped—not like a gull, but like the diving fishhawk who goes deep to find its prey underwater. The falcon grasped Finn’s belt and dragged him to the surface, and the lad was able to stumble to shore, choking and gasping.
Boru’s body now lay in the stream, which ran red. The giant was big enough to walk on, and his Finn did, walking out and kneeling upon Boru’s shoulders, wrenching the huge head around and slicing it off. He held it high, dripping, tusks glittering in the watery light, as he walked back over his foe’s body to the shore.
“Truly,” he said to the falcon, “you are the very Queen of hawks, and I c
hoose you for an important errand. Take this ugly head by the hair and fly it back to Tara. Upon the tusk I impale this note which says that I, Finn McCool, have accomplished my first task, dispatching the Boar of Ballinoe.”
The falcon flew away carrying the head, still dripping blood. And in the tales of those days they speak of a rain of blood that fell strangely upon the southern counties after the Great Frost and the Great Thaw.
Houlihan’s Barn
UPON THE SCROLL AT Tara whereon were listed Finn’s tasks was written “Houlihan’s Barn.” What these words meant he had no idea, nor did he attempt to learn, knowing that it was the nature of such labors to disclose themselves in their own way. But the fact of it is—and a fact or two, but not too many, will fit pleasantly into a true story—the fact of it is that Houlihan’s wife, when he had one in the long ago, was altogether too tidy. How Houlihan had come to choose her is a mystery. He was a big brawling red-pelted man; the only time he bathed was when he was caught in the rain. No member of his family had worn shoes since the dawn of time, nor did he ever use knife at table, but tore the meat with his hands, then wiped them on his beard. Yet when it came time to marry, why, he chose this brisk little person who fairly shone with cleanliness, and who shook with fury at the mere shadow of dust. Why did he woo her? Why did she allow herself to be won? There is a puzzle between man and woman beyond ordinary meaning, and time can turn a girl into a hag and a man into a stick and the mystery into a gall, but it is born again at wakes and weddings—which is perhaps why they are so popular.
Anyway, this little wife of Houlihan’s took the stinking pigpen that was his farm and made it sweet as a garden of herbs. By god, when she was finished the pigs smelled like violets; there was not a nettle or briar to be seen on the place; her pots hung over the hob like dark suns, and fence and barn were whitewashed so white it hurt the eye to look at them. She cleaned up her husband, too. Wouldn’t let him near her on their wedding night, rumor said, until he had soaked himself in the river for a full hour, scrubbing himself raw while she stood on the bank telling him what to do. And after she had him awhile, why, hair and beard were clipped, and he was combed and curried and scrubbed and rubbed until he was sleek as an otter. And he seemed happy that way, and anyone who dared jest about new ways or new wife felt the weight of his fist, which was the heaviest in that part of Leinster.
The Green Hero Page 7