The Legend of the Corrib King Read Free

Big Jim explained, ‘somebody got the bright idea of linking the Mask and the Corrib. They thought it would be handy if people around the Mask could bring their produce down to Galway by boat. It took an army of men five years to cut their way through the rock. They built bridges and locks and when every-thing was ready the canal was opened. However, the engineers seemed to have overlooked the fact that the rock around here is limestone. The water just poured through the bottom and disappeared.’
    â€˜How could it do that?’ asked Cowlick.
    â€˜Because limestone is a porous rock,’ Big Jim told him. ‘You can see where the rain has worn holes in it, and there are cracks and caves all over the place.’
    â€˜What a terrible waste,’ said Dan. ‘I mean, to spend all that time cutting their way through it.’
    Big Jim nodded. ‘I suppose it was in one way, but it was a lifesaver for the people who worked on it. You see, it was the time of the famine. They only got four pence a day, but it probably made the difference between life and death for most of them.’
    â€˜Four pence,’ said Dan. ‘I wonder how much that is in today’s money?’
    â€˜I saw in the paper,’ said Big Jim, ‘that somebody in the bank worked it out. And taking inflation into account, they reckoned it would be less than two euro.’
    What inflation meant, the young people didn’t know, but they thought it wasn’t much for a day’s work.
    â€˜Anyway,’ added Big Jim, looking at Mary, ‘there’s no water in it worth talking about, so there’s no need to worry.’
    * * *
    Jamesie was like his father in many ways. He had black hair and was bronzed from the wind and sun of a summer spent on the lake. His Uncle Dan’s description of him as being like a string of pump water was very apt, for he had that awkward, lanky look of a young man who had suddenly shot up into his teens. While his mother packed a picnic lunch, he collected the fishing rods and a net from the closet. Jamesie hadn’t said much since they arrived, and his young visitors were looking forward to getting to know him again. They helped him carry the gear down the stone steps and watched as he placed it carefully in a blue boat with an outboard engine. They could see that this sort of thing was part of his everyday routine and they marvelled at how different it was from their own way of life back in Antrim.
    â€˜Are we ready to go now?’ asked Tapser.
    Jamesie smiled. ‘Not quite. This is where the riddle starts.’ He went back into the house and brought out two jam jars with screw-on lids. Puzzled they followed him around to the field at the back. There he gave one jar to Cowlick to hold, took the lid off the other and asked, ‘Listen now, what do you hear?’
    â€˜Grasshoppers,’ said Rachel.
    â€˜Right,’ said Jamesie. Spotting one of them on a blade of grass, he reached down and scooped it into the jar with the lid. ‘They chirp like that when the sun comes out, and Pakie says they do it by rubbing their legs against their wings.’
    â€˜Wings that whistle,’ said Cowlick. ‘So that’s what he meant.’
    Jamesie smiled and nodded, and Tapser asked him, ‘What do you think has happened to him?’
    â€˜It’s hard to say. He’s never been away as long as this before.’ He clamped the lid on another grasshopper before Prince could disturb it. ‘And then there was his house …’
    â€˜What about it?’ asked Róisín.
    â€˜It had been broken into and everything thrown about.’
    â€˜So that’s why you’re so worried about him,’ said Rachel.
    Jamesie nodded and, reaching into a clump of ferns, clamped the lid on the second jar. ‘There you are,’ he said, ‘ legs that fly .’
    â€˜Daddy-long-legs,’ the others exclaimed. ‘Of