The Fairies and the Grey Woman on Loughin More

by Ian Sherry of Rostrevor, Northern Ireland

I have custody of The Wee Holms, a strip of land along the river that a century ago was held in respectful awe as a fairy domain. A place where they would baffle and confuse the unwary, and where when crossing it was imperative to turn your coat inside out. My great-grandmother knew the fairies, she lived in Pothill, the clachan above here, and she oft told my mother that their pasture was The Wee Holms, their bailiwick The Clornies and their totem The Grey Woman (a standing stone) on Loughin More. I also have a ‘diamond dog’ called Bo-Patch. He’s big and athletic, full of fun and tricks and like David Bowie he has a blue and a brown eye.

Back there in September (a lovely night), Bo-Patch and I crossed the river into The Wee Holms, where to my amazement four ponies grazed. Four spirited thoroughbreds that startled when they saw us, wheeled and trotted away in fused single file. Bo-Patch followed directly behind them, while I more circumspect stayed back. Whistling to call him up, I was surprised to find he couldn’t get back. Restrained behind an invisible barrier, a dimension through which neither he nor I could pass.

In the moonlight I could see the line of daisies and buttercups trampled by the ponies and I told Bo-Patch to ‘stay’ while I rushed over to a hazel bush and broke off eight short sticks, markers to push into the ground and show the path in, and more importantly out, of what I could only think must be the fairy world. And my return was nothing if not timely, because on his side of the barrier Bo-Patch was adroitly avoiding the attentions of three men. Short buckos, two dressed in heavy tweed ganzies, the other a formal jacket and a feathered hat. Quick as I could I got my coat off, turned it inside-out and fumbled it back on. Then following the trampled daisies I marked the ground. It turned out to be a funnel in the force field and as soon as I came out the other side I was uneasy because the three gurriers were compact and robust enough to manhandle me, were it not for the inside-out coat. It did indeed repel them, but to my horror (here in their world) it also repelled Bo-Patch. He was slinking away from me, confused at knowing my voice but not knowing my form. Leaving me in the predicament that if I took my coat off these people would surely bamboozle me, while if I kept it on, I would surely lose my dog.

Heavens knows how long I just stood there vacantly pondering; but the three fairy men had gone over to sit on the stone ditch, and the horses were grazing on the brae behind that. What if I were to send Bo-Patch for them? I thought. Get him to drive them back through the funnel and in doing so follow them out. ‘Away to me’ I heard myself saying and Bo-Patch, delighted to (eventually) have something to do, swept out and began quietly to ease the ponies back. Passed the fairy men sitting on the ditch, they passing no remarks on us – and that rattled me – surely they knew what I was at.

Right tight against the last stick in the alignment Bo-Patch and I manoeuvred the four horses, time and time again we settling them, but still they wouldn’t amble out. With each attempt the boyos on the ditch became more animated, squealing at my failures, there was something unnervingly childish about their delight. And it was then that I began to suspect that my inside out coat was no longer quite so repellent – I was finding myself in my endeavours ever closer to Bo-Patch. Could that be the reason for their jubilance? Somehow they had closed the exit and my inside-out coat was losing its power.

Disheartened, I began to wonder could it have been one of these fairy man that turned up at my great-granny’s for a can of oaten meal, and could they have been horsemen in the Clornies – the realm of raths and rocks just across the way. Over her half door my great-granny would watch them indulge in their frenzy of galloping horsemanship, stopping to rear their mounts, raise themselves in the stirrups and give a great cheer to salute the Grey Woman (behind Pothill) on the face of Loughin More. And then an awful thought came to me; could these boys have been part of the squad of fairy men who stopped Peter Owen Gartlin on the road at the Clornies? Peter Owen was going to the October devotions and they charged him to ask Cannon Maginn ‘Would the fairies get into heaven?’ So after the litany of the Irish saints and with no other option open to him Peter Owen went round to the vestry; knocked on the door and duly delivered his message; ‘Would the fairies get into heaven?’ ‘You keep away from those boys!’ was all Cannon Maginn said. Going back up the road Peter Owen was trembling but seeing the road clear at The Clornies he ran. He ran for his life. Unscathed but for a cub of a stone that one of them fired and hit him on the back of the neck. Seems Peter Owen had a carbuncle there for the rest of his life.

And pondering it all in the clear grey of moonlight I looked at the mountain and I looked at the stars and I thought of the funnel and how I bent down as I exited it and how I was in line with the Grey Woman and Mizar – the Plough’s brightest star. And suddenly a great excitement sprang in me, and I knew that I had it, and I knew why the fairy men were delighted with my frittering time. The power of my inside-out coat was fading, and the stars were slowly revolving in the sky. Mizar was now in a completely different position, altering the alignment of the funnel. And trusting Bo-Patch to hold the horses, I plucked the end two sticks from their old position and placed them on the run of the Grey Woman and the now relocated brightest star of The Plough. But the fairy men were on to me, gnarled pismires, runnin’ and shoutin’ and flappin’ their coats. And in the mayhem of dancing and prancing the stallion’s position coincided exactly with the new exit and I rushed towards him with outstretched arms. A horse so excited with the furore that he stood right up on his hind legs, ready to plunge over me, and all I could do was shout ‘Bo-Patch!’ And over my shoulder the great black and white dog sprang. Such was his leap that he landed high on the fairy stallion’s chest, knocking the horse right back on his haunches and driving him sprackelin down the funnel into the outside world.

Bo-Patch and I sat on the brae and looked at the activity below. The fairy men were running after the stallion, a horse galloping, rearing and lashing out. He was whinnying constantly. Then just when I thought they would never catch him, and wondered at the consequences thereof, they changed tack. Dashing back down the funnel they haltered the three mares and led them out; entrapping the stallion; and I watched the four horses and three men in single file fade gently back into the fairy world.