The Midnight Circus, стр. 5
Oneday it came to Merdock as if in a dream that he should leave offfishing that day and go down to the sea-ledge and hunt the seal. Hehad never done such a thing before, thinking it close to murder, forthe seal had human eyes and cried with a baby’s voice.
Yetthough he had never done such a thing, there was such a longing withinhim that Merdock could not say no toit. And that longing was like a high, sweet singing, a calling. Hecould not rid his mind of it. So he went.
Downby a gray rock he sat, a long sharpened stick by his side. He kept hiseyes fixed out on the sea, where the white birds sat on the waves likefoam.
Hewaited through sunrise and sunset and through the long, cold night, thesinging in his head. Then, when the wind went down a bit, he saw awhite seal far out in the sea, coming toward him, the moon riding onits shoulder. Merdock could scarcely breathe as he watched the seal, soshining and white was its head. It swam swiftly to the sea-ledge, andthen with one quick push it was on land.
Merdockrose then in silence, the stick in his hand. He would have thrown it,too. But the white seal gave a sudden shudder and its skin sloughedoff. It was a maiden cast in moonlight, with the tide about her feet.
Shestepped high out of her skin, and her hair fell sleek and white abouther shoulders and hid her breasts.
Merdockfell to his knees behind the rock and would have hidden his eyes, buther cold white beauty was too much for him. He could only stare. And ifhe made a noise then, she took no notice but turned her face to the seaand opened her arms up to the moon. Then she began to sway and call.
Atfirst Merdock could not hear the words. Then he realized it was thevery song he had heard in his head all that day:
Cometo the edge,
Come down to the ledge
Wherethe water laps the shore.
Cometo the strand,
Seals to the sand,
Thewatery time is o’er.
Whenthe song was done, she began it again. It was as if the whole beach,the whole cove, the whole world were nothing but that one song.
Andas she sang, the water began to fill up with seals. Black seals andgray seals and seals of every kind. They swam to the shore at her calland sloughed off their skins. They were as young as the white sealmaid, but none so beautiful in Merdock’s eyes: They swayed and turnedat her singing, and joined their voices to hers. Faster and faster theseal maidens danced, in circles of twos and threes and fours. Only thewhite sea maid danced alone, in the center, surrounded by the castoffskins of her twirling sisters.
Themoon remained high almost all the night, but at last it went down. Atits setting, the sea maids stopped their singing, put on their skinsagain, one by one, went back into the sea again, one by one, and swamaway. But the white seal maid did not go. She waited on the shore untilthe last of them was out of sight.
Thenshe turned to the watching man, as if she had always known he wasthere, hidden behind the gray rock. There was something strange, a kindof pleading, in her eyes.
Merdockread that pleading and thought he understood it.He ran over to where she stood, grabbed up her sealskin, and held ithigh overhead.
“Nowyou be mine,” he said.
Andshe had to go with him, that was the way of it. For she was a selchie,one of the seal folk. And the old tales said it: the selchie maidwithout her skin was no more than a lass.
Theywere wed within the week, Merdock and the white seal maid, because hewanted it. So she nodded her head at the priest’s bidding, though shesaid not a word.
AndMerdock had no complaint of her, his “Sel” as he called her. Nocomplaint except this: she would not go down to the sea. She would notgo down by the shore where he had found her or down to the sand to seehim in his boat, though often enough she would stare from the cottagedoor out past the cove’s end where the inlet poured out into the greatwide sea.
“Willyou not walk down by the water’s edge with me, Sel?” Merdock would askeach morning. “Or will you not come down to greet me when I return?”
Shenever answered him, either “Yea” or “Nay.” Indeed, if he had not heardher singing that night on the ledge, he would have thought her mute.But she was a good wife, for all that, and did what he required. If shedid not smile, she did not weep. She seemed, to Merdock, strangelycontent.
So Merdock hung the white sealskin up over the door where Selcould see it. He kept it there in case she should want to leave him, todon the skin and go. He could have hidden it or burned it, but he didnot. He hoped the sight of it, so near and easy, would keep her withhim, would tellher, as he could not, how much he loved her. For he found he did loveher, his seal wife. It was that simple. He loved her and did not wanther to go, but he would not keep her past her willing it, so he hungthe skin up over the door.
Andthen their sons were born. One a year, born at the ebbing of the tide.And Sel sang to them, one by one, long, longing wordless songs thatcarried the sound of the sea. But to Merdock she said nothing.
Sevensons they were, strong and silent, one born each year. They were bornto the sea, born to swim, born to let the tide lap them head andshoulder. And though they had the dark eyes of the seal, and thoughthey had the seal’s longing for the