The old man raised his hand. He stopped only a few feet away, and the others with him. There was something infinitely threatening in the squat monolithic bulk of that little crowd, a survival from an older world. The girl flung up her head and laughed, but Trehearne did not feel like laughing.
The old man cursed them.
Trehearne had not one word of Gaelic, but he did not need a knowledge of the tongue. Nor did he need to have explained to him the gesture of angry dismissal. The Bretons had already picked up their stones from the fire. In another minute, they would use them, on himself and the girl.
He caught her rather roughly by the arm, but she pulled away and shouted something at the old man, still laughing, still mocking, and he thought again that she was changeling and no ordinary girl. The words she spoke might have been Gaelic, but they had a different sound. Whatever they were, they held no kindness. Trehearne thrust his way through the sightseers, who parted readily to let him through, and in a minute the girl came after him. The voice of the old man followed them down the slope of the hill, and the curious tourists stared after them until they were out of sight.
The girl said, "Are you still angry?"
"What's the matter with them?" demanded Trehearne.
"The peasant folks have long memories. They don't understand what it is they remember, only that evil things once happened to them, because of us."
"What sort of evil things?"
"Have there been any new ones since the beginning?" Her voice held a dry humor. Trehearne had to admit there hadn't been. From the stealing away of maidens to witchcraft, family legends tended to a wearying sameness.
"However," he added, "the Kerrels and the Cahusacs both must have been outstanding in their field, judging from the reception they gave us back there."