KELLY’S GOLDRUSH
MRS.P:
Mabel, what do you think of this business with Sean Kelly and the gold, eh?
MABEL:
What are you talking about? Sean Kelly came into a fortune, did he?
MRS.P:
By all accounts, Mabel. It all started at Whisky MacQuaid’s house. Whisky saw Goat’s Hair in the sky about a week ago.
MABEL:
Was he dreaming, or what? Goat’s hair, Mrs.P.? What was that doing in the sky?
MRS.P:
Ach, Mabel, you’re not thinking with both pistons. It’s a cloud formation… you know the wee wispy clouds you see all over the place in contrary directions, like the underbelly hair of a goat? Well, when you see it, it’s usually three days before a storm. Whisky pointed it out to the fellas in the pub and they had a bet on whether the storm would hit Saturday night or Sunday night.
MABEL:
Dear bless us he was right. We had the storm of all storms on Sunday night, but what has that got to do with Sean Kelly and his fortune?
MRS.P:
Precisely, Mabel. I’m getting to that. During the week, Sean Kelly was seen digging in that old fallow field of his, the one that is full of rocks. Barren it is. No-one has ever grown anything in that field. He told everyone who asked what his business was, that he was digging for gold.
MABEL:
Gold? Well, he might be right. They used to have gold in Ireland.
MRS.P:
He told them he had found a crock. I wandered up there myself, Mabel, and all I could see was his head. It was very eerie, only the head to be seen and the flying shovels of dirt. He might as well have been digging a grave, so he might!
MABEL:
So what was the origin of this gold, Mrs.P.?
MRS.P:
I’m not a rocket scientist, Mabel. Gold was here before we were here. Comes from space, I believe, wee particles of dust millions of years ago.
MABEL:
Where did Kelly say it came from?
MRS.P:
By all accounts, the rainbow.
MABEL:
You mean, leprechauns and the crock of gold at the end of the rainbow and suchlike? Sure, there’s no such thing, Mrs.P.! That’s all baloney!
MRS.P:
I’m the type, Mabel, that has an open mind, you know, and I fell down a coalhole once and swore I saw a wee chap with a cocked hat, sitting there, looking at me as bold as brass!
MABEL:
That could have been concussion, Mrs.P. Did he say anything?
MRS.P:
Not at all! Sure his language might have been different from mine, and mine was very colourful at the time, I must say! I must have startled him with my expletives for he disappeared in a flash of stars, so he did! I’m thinking that if I can see these wee fellas that clearly, maybe Kelly can too. We’re the ‘fey’ sort, Mabel, blessed with the second sight, you see!
MABEL:
Ach sure, Mrs.P. I need glasses for the first sight never mind the second sight!
MRS.P:
That happens to intellectuals like us, Mabel. I’d say you would pay through the nose for glasses for the second sight too.
Anyway, as I was saying, Kelly dug for the crock all week and a crowd gathered to watch him, so they did.
Then Saturday morning, didn’t I see Himself with a big chest on a cart, and himself heading out the Belfast road to the bank, three brothers sitting on the back with bore-guns! By Sunday, it was the talk of the County. I’m surprised you didn’t hear anything, Mabel?
MABEL:
Sure, I had a wee cold and didn’t see you, Mrs.P. to hear the news. I didn’t want to smit you with it!
MRS.P:
Ach, we were all busy, Sunday, some of the men mighty anxious about their bets on the storm too. The Priest was keeping an eye on everybody too. He preached about Sunday being God’s day and there should be no manual labour done until after sun-down!
MABEL:
Ach, Mrs.P. What sparked that then?
MRS.P:
On Sunday night, Mabel, I heard a commotion by Kelly’s field and ran over there with a shovel in hand… to deal with intruders and suchlike. Lucky I did too. Every Tom, Dick and Harry, Mary, Ann and Maggie were in Kelly’s fallow field, bicycles parked by the stone wall, and tilly lamps lighting up the whole field like a Christmas tree. And we dug and dug over every inch of Kelly’s field, like Billy-O. Even Father Riley was there with a pick-axe! It was a Gold Rush, Mabel! Kelly’s Goldrush! Emotions at fever pitch!
MABEL:
Heaven help us! You were digging too, Mrs.P.?
MRS.P:
Aye, I have great respect for the shovel, you know? There were holes all over Kelly’s barren bit of land. Then the storm struck! But sure, no-one cared! Lightning and big claps of thunder, and the sound of spades, shovels and picks digging and digging! Drenched we were! Dymphna Brennan up to her eyes in muck, digging like a demon out of hell! At least I was more refined with my digging, Mabel. I wore rubber gloves.
MABEL:
So you came well prepared for those intruders, Mrs.P.? Well, did anyone find any gold?
MRS.P:
Not at all! Not only did Kelly get the crock, but the rain got into places in that field that never saw rain before, and now Kelly has himself a fertile bit of land, the by-product of the greed for gold, Mabel!
MABEL:
Goodness gracious, Mrs.P! So there are Leprechauns after all, then. I’m going to watch for rainbows in the future, see where they end, and start digging!
MRS.P:
Aw, Mabel, don’t bother to exert yourself. The Crock of Gold turned out to be Kelly’s grandfather’s fortune that he hid in a fallow field that no-one would ever dig up. So we think! But I am still of the mind that Kelly is very wily as well as being ‘fey’, and that his second sight had steered it all. We worked like slaves for him and he must have laughed all the way to the bank and back! Oh, and Whisky too was in the field, to add insult to injury, gathering all his bets on the storm!
MABEL:
Well, all I can say, Mrs.P. is that you should all have had more sense!
MRS.P:
Ach, away or that, Mabel! It was real Gold Fever! And now I know what that is like. I was smitten like the rest of them. Kelly’s Goldrush will go down in The Fingerpost history. It was better than the Wild West! See you later, Mabel, I’m on my way to the shop to buy a new shovel. You never know when you might need it again.
MABEL:
Bye, Mrs.P. Watch out for rainbows and wee fellows with cocky hats, mind!
Dwina x
Ah, not all that glisters, eh?!