They ate no cowree at Ballamona that night and they drank no jough.
"We've been going to the goat's house for wool," grunted one of them as they trudged home.
"Aw, well, man, and what can you get of the cat but his skin?" growled another.
Next day they put on the first timbers of the roof, and the following night a great storm swept over the island, and the roof-timbers were torn away, not a spar or purlin being left in its place. Thorkell fumed at the storm and swore at the men, and when the wind subsided he had the work done afresh. The old homestead of Ballamona was thatched, but the new one must be slated, and slates were quarried at and carted to Slieu Dhoo, and run on to the new roof. A dead calm had prevailed during these operations, but it was the calm that lies in the heart of the storm, and the night after they were completed the other edge of the cyclone passed over the island, tearing up the trees by their roots, and shaking the old Ballamona to its foundations. Thorkell Mylrea slept not a wink, but tramped up and down his bedroom the long night through; and next morning, at daybreak, he drew the blind of his window, and peered through the haze of the dawn to where his new house stood on the breast of Slieu Dhoo. He could just descry its blue walls—it was roofless.
The people began to mutter beneath their breath.
"Aw, man, it's a judgment," said one.
"He has been middlin' hard on the widda and fatherless, and it's like enough that there's Them aloft as knows it."
"What's that they're saying?" said one old crone, "what comes with the wind goes with the water."
"Och, I knew his father—him and me were same as brothers—and a good ould man for all."
"Well, and many a good cow has a bad calf," said the old woman.