“Ah, my poor man,” says Shamus, says he, “don’t be asking me, for there’s no use in telling you, you could do nothing to help me.”
“You don’t know that,” says the Wee Red Man, says he. “It’s no harm to tell me anyhow.”
So Shamus, to relieve his mind, ups and tells the Wee Red Man what Prince Connal had threatened to do to him if he had not a grand castle finished on that spot in three weeks.
Says the little man, says he: “Go to the Fairies’ Glen at moonrise the night, and under the rockin’ stone at the head of the glen you’ll find a white rod. Take that rod with you, and mark out the plan of the castle on this ground with it; then go back and leave the rod where you got it, and by the time you get back again your castle will be finished.”
At moonrise that night Shamus, as you may be well assured, was at the rockin’ stone at the head of the Glen of the Fairies, and from under it he got a little white rod. He went to the hill where the Prince’s castle was to be built, and with the point of the rod he marked out the plan of the castle, and then he went back and left the rod where he got it.
The next morning, when Prince Connal got up out of bed and went out of his little sod hut to take the air, his eyes were opened, I tell you, to see the magnificent castle that was standing finished and with the coping-stones on it on the hill above. He lost no time till he went over to thank Shamus for building him such a beautiful castle; and when Nancy heard that the castle was finished, it was she that was the angry woman.
She went out and looked at the castle, and she wondered and wondered, too, but she said nothing. She had a long chat with Rory that day again, and from Rory she went off to Prince Connal, and says she: “Now, didn’t I tell you right well what Shamus could do?”
“I see you did,” says Prince Connal, “and it is very thankful to you I am. I’m contented now for life,” says he, “and I’ll never forget yourself and Shamus.”
“Contented!” says she; “why, that place isn’t half finished yet.”
“How’s that?” says Prince Connal.