Lavarcham was not only glad that Maeve was gone, she was jubilant; and, moreover, it gave her an opportunity that she could scarcely have hoped for to advance her babe in life without parting from her, and to strengthen all her own grips on fortune.
Hitherto, when she had spoken of Conachúr to Deirdre she spoke of the king’s majesty, but now, insensibly, she began to talk of a great man bowed under misfortune and a proper subject for female pity. But she could not wipe out the king’s majesty with that sponge nor alter one lineament of the portrait she had taken ten years to limn.
The king persisted for Deirdre, stern and aloof and almost incredibly ancient, looming out from and overshadowing her infancy like a fairy tale; and was he not contemporary with Lavarcham, herself old enough to be remembered but not thought of? Deirdre was interested in the king as she was interested in the people of the Shí, [6] without expectation, and with a little fear.
But to her reasonings and objections Lavarcham had one answer:
“My soul and dear treasure, you cannot speak about men, for you have not seen any.”
And at last one day Deirdre replied:
“Indeed, mother, I have seen them, these men you tell me of.”
Lavarcham stared at her.
“And,” the gleeful child continued, “I have spoken to them.”
Her foster-mother became smoother than silk, and soft as the lap of kindness.