The Collected Works in Verse and Prose of William Butler Yeats. Volume 4 of 8. The Hour-glass. Cathleen ni Houlihan. The Golden Helmet. The Irish Dramatic Movement

Yes, that’s impossible. He will never come home from Scotland. He has all he wants there. Luck in all he does. Victory and wealth and happiness flowing in on him, while here at home all goes to rack, and a man’s good name drifts away between night and morning.

LEAGERIE

I wish he would come home for all that, and put quiet and respect for those that are more than she is into that young wife of his. Only this very night your wife and my wife had to forbid her to go into the dining-hall before them. She is young, and she is Cuchulain’s wife, and so she must spread her tail like a peacock.

CONAL [at door]

I can see the horn-blower now, a young man wrapped in a cloak.

LEAGERIE

Do not let him come in. Tell him to go elsewhere for shelter. This is no place to seek shelter in.

CONAL

That is right. I will tell him to go away, for nobody must know the disgrace that is to fall upon Ireland this night.

LEAGERIE

Nobody of living men but us two must ever know that.

CONAL [outside door]

Go away, go away!

    [A YOUNG MAN covered by a long cloak is standing upon the rocks outside door.

YOUNG MAN

I am a traveller, and I am looking for sleep and food.

CONAL

A law has been made that nobody is to come into this house to-night.

YOUNG MAN

Who made that law?

CONAL

We two made it, and who has so good a right? for we have to guard this house and to keep it from robbery, and from burning and from enchantment.

YOUNG MAN

Then I will unmake the law. Out of my way!

    [He struggles with CONAL and shoves past into the house.

CONAL

I thought no living man but Leagerie could have stood against me; and Leagerie himself could not have shoved past me. What is more, no living man could if I were not taken by surprise. How could I expect to find so great a strength?

LEAGERIE

Go out of this: there is another house a little further along the shore; our wives are there with their servants, and they will give you food and drink.

YOUNG MAN

It is in this house I will have food and drink.

LEAGERIE [drawing his sword]

Go out of this, or I will make you.

[The YOUNG MAN seizes LEAGERIE’S arm, and thrusting it up, passes him, and puts his shield over the chair where there is an empty place.

YOUNG MAN [at table]

It is here I will spend the night, but I won’t tell you why till I have drunk. I am thirsty. What, the flagon full and the cups empty and Leagerie and Conal there! Why, what’s in the wind that Leagerie and Conal cannot drink?

LEAGERIE

It is Cuchulain.

CONAL

Better go away to Scotland again, or if you stay here ask no one what has happened or what is going to happen.

CUCHULAIN

What more is there that can happen so strange as that I should come home after years and that you should bid me begone?

CONAL

I tell you that this is no fit house to welcome you, for it is a disgraced house.

CUCHULAIN

What is it you are hinting at? You were sitting there with ale beside you and the door open, and quarrelsome thoughts. You are waiting for something or someone. It is for some messenger who is to bring you to some spoil, or to some adventure that you will keep for yourselves.

LEAGERIE

Better tell him, for he has such luck that it may be his luck will amend ours.

CONAL

Yes, I had better tell him, for even now at this very door we saw what luck he had. He had the slope of the ground to help him. Is the sea quiet?