Tale V
You remember me telling you the other evening about young Maighdlin and how the Leprechawn, Bearach Candlestick O'Floinn, rode her one night across the land? I thought as you would and about how she had lost her running clothes on the moor, yes I thought you'd remember that all right! Well, I told you, more as likely, he rode her to a nice warm barn—and so he did—but the merry old time he anticipated did not result—least not that night—but I am getting ahead of meself.
You can visualise the scene, a cosy old barn full of soft hay; Bearach sitting and taking a nip of Bushmills from his flask; Maighdlin now shorn, hee hee, of her sheepskin coat standing there, breathing hard with all her recent exertion, both from running and her first tupping, those breasts rising and falling and the sheen of sweat shining in the yellow light of an old Tilly lamp. Outside it's dark, real dark with another storm brewing, yes the air full of electricity. You can imagine old Bearach eyeing Maighdlin's damp secret hair and thinking it was just about time for a tumble in the hay, and I don't suppose she would have been all that averse given as how these Leprechawn do get the wans' feelings going; when all of a moment the barn door swings open with a mighty crash, that right startles them I can tell you, but then there is a flash and there silhouetted for a moment by the lightning is a terrible figure - leastways that is how Bearach Candlestick O'Floinn described the apparition to me—a fearsome, black, sharp silhouette of a person, all hard angles, no rounding to it at all; it just stands there and Bearach and Maighdlin are rooted to the spot; they durst not move. Then the thunder crashes and the rain begins to pour and over the sound of the falling rain, in a terrible voice resonant with opprobrium, come three words spoken slow with a rich meaning from long usage, "Bearach Candlestick O'Floinn..."
So that's Bearach's tricks ended for the night. How his sister knew where to find him he doesn't know to this day and I've heard him speak often on the subject and none too kindly either. Anyways she takes Maighdlin by the hand, "You poor craytur," she says and leads her away to the farm.
Well, Bearach was not seen in those parts for quite a time. I hear he went on holiday but that sounds unlikely indeed for a Leprechawn - I mean, have you ever heard of such a thing? There was no doubt a distinct cooling of relations in the Candlestick family for a time, not as it had been at all easy at the best of times. I mean, you know, families... and siblings to boot!
Farmer Shea had quite a shock by the affair and was careful to keep Maighdlin under lock and key but, by and by, things stayed quiet, for Bearach was not around and then Farmer Shea had to go away on business (or so he said to his wife anyway but I think drinking came into it) and so Maighdlin managed to get out of the house and go running again. Now old Faolán, who works at the farm, says he saw her once or twice poke her nose into that barn; yes the one Bearach took her to, which makes you think that perhaps she was wanting to carry on where it had all left off. Seems unlikely but, perhaps, the tupping had, after all, tickled her fancy, so to speak.
It's got to the third day since she has started running again and Maighdlin is really enjoying it. The weather is fine, the going's good and she feels as if she could run like the wind. Her legs, smooth and lithe carry her across the land, her elbows moving in time and, I say it because you'd be interested, her fine chest rising and falling with her breathing but restrained, as it should be, by a new sports bra. You remember as how the old one got pulled to ribbons in the storm. Funny that.
She's toiling up the path by the Wall, it's hot and thirsty work and she's glad she's got her little plastic water bottle with her - though it's nigh on empty. She pauses for a moment to take a last drink and look at the magnificent scenery, so empty and so fine. Maighdlin has not seen anyone for some time and thinks there cannot be anyone for miles. She upends the now empty bottle and looks at it wistfully.
"It's a fine old day, isn't it just?" says a voice and there behind her sitting on the wall is the Leprechawn, Bearach Candlestick O'Floinn, and he raises his cocked hat to her. "How's the form?"
"Thirsty, a bit tired and right cross with myself for not running faster," replies Maighdlin after the briefest of moments.
She's torn between a desire to run away and a fascination with the peculiarity of meeting one of the little folk and still more this one whom she had such a strange adventure with and promise of rather more. Maighdlin is more than a little unnerved by the fact that, apart from the aforementioned hat, he is wearing nothing at all not even his breeches. Perhaps he was sun bathing.
"You are in need of a drink? It is hot and your running will have made you powerful thirsty. It so happens there's an awful drout on me too but not a drop to be had for miles." There is a sigh. "More's the pity but there it is. The best I can offer is a pull on my pizzle, a suck—for they say, though I haven't tried it meself, that a drop o' the spunk o' a Leprechawn is as thirst quenching as it comes (which it does)."
Maighdlin is a bit taken aback at this speech and glances at the little empty plastic bottle in her hand, but Bearach goes on,
"I'm not surprised at you being tired with all of that running up and down; I've been watching you for an hour or more and fair worn out am I just by looking. Now right restorative, or so it is said, is the spunk o' a Leprechawn."
Maighdlin looks puzzled. She's never heard of such a thing and nor, I'm sure, have you! Even so the Leprechawn squints up at the sky and says,
"It is said, and I would bet a crock o'gold that it's true, that the spunk o' a Leprechawn gives the legs fierce speed. Should you really want to race then that is what you need and..." at this point Bearach tapped the side of his long nose meaningfully, "I might just have what you are needing."