“The thing which intrigued the cockatrice most was something called a looking-glass which was bought by the chief of the Bedouin as a gift for his favourite wife. We heard the merchant extolling its properties; whoever should look upon this thing, he said, would be able to see in it exactly how he looked in every detail. The cockatrice immediately coveted that looking-glass, for he felt that he could never be content until he had seen himself in his true beauty. I told him it was a foolish dream which could never come true; but he wanted it so badly that I determined to try to get it for him.
“Early next morning, I sslid cautiously into the tent where, from my careful observations, I knew that the women slept. How a serpent could carry such a thing as a looking-glass I did not know, but to make my beloved cockatrice happy I was willing to try.
“Once inside the tent, I began my search. It was dark there but I slid over the ground, over the sleeping forms of the tent dwellers and in and out of the baggage without making a sound. At last I found the looking-glass. The woman had placed it beside her pillow so that it would be the first thing she saw when she awoke.
“It was shaped like an oval, made of polished steel and set into a jewelled frame with a narrow handle. I curled the tip of my tail twice around the handle and with great care, dragged it slowly across the tent and out through the doorway.
“My husband was waiting eagerly for me outside the tent and when he saw that I had secured the prize, he began to crow with joy. Quickly I hushed him and told him to beware or be would rouse the camp and we should be caught before we could slither away. But the cockatrice was beyond caring about such things; at last he was to see for himself how beautiful he was.
“As he slithered towards the looking-glass, I suddenly remembered the advice my mother had given him when we were young—never look upon anything you love with your full gaze, she had said, and, knowing that the cockatrice loved himself above all things, I tried to shout a warning.
“It was too late. The cockatrice had positioned himself above the mirror and looked down into it, his eyes wide open. He had one moment in which to enjoy his beauty—and then he turned to stone.
“Sssso,” the serpent would finish her tale, “I lost my beloved cockatrice. Often and often I have thought that had I not loved him so much that for him I accomplished the almost impossible task of stealing the looking-glass, he might still be here. It is a woeful tale, is it not, stranger?”
Usually the listener would agree. Sometimes one would say sympathetically that she should not blame herself, for had the cockatrice not been so vain he would not have come to harm. Sometimes a traveller would ask her what became of the stone cockatrice and she would tell sadly that while she mourned from the branches of the tree where she had taken refuge when morning brought the people from their tents, she had seen one of the merchants pick up the statue of her beloved and tuck it into his camel bag, and that was the last time she ever set eyes on him.
TWELVE GREAT BLACK CATS AND THE RED ONE
By Sorche Nic Leodhas
Folk will tell you that the days of signs and omens, witches, wizards, and warlocks and the like are past, and only to be found in old wives’ tales told to frighten silly bairns. But there’s a man in Auchinogie who’ll stand up against all the doubting folk who call such things superstitious, and with good reason. For did he not once have an uncommonly queer experience himself?
Murdo MacTaggart his name was, and you’d look far before you’d find a more God-fearing, sober, and honest man. He had never been one to give up his mind to foolish fancies, so it surprised him a lot when things turned out the way they did. There he was, come day, go day, going about his affairs, taking his boat out at night with his nets and his fishing gear all in order, and coming in with his load of fish in the misty dawn. Each time was like the time before it, and nothing ever out of the way, until he met up with the great black cats.
It was upon an All Hallowmass Eve that it happened. The rest of the men told him he’d do better to stay at home and go to church, and not go out in his boat to fish that night, but Murdo only laughed and said, “The better the day, the better the deed!”
Down to the shore he went, but before he even got to his boat, all of a sudden a terrible storm blew up, with lightning flashing and thunder rolling, and the wind tearing by in a gale. There was a hut above the shore where the fisherman kept their nets and oars and fishing gear of one sort and another, and Murdo took shelter there while waiting for the storm to pass by.
While he waited he heard a queer sort of sound outside, and he looked out to see what made it. It was a very queer sight he saw, for there were twelve great black cats, and another, even bigger than the rest, with fur the colour of a red fox, who seemed to be their leader, and they were all coming towards the hut. Murdo looked them over and did not care at all for what he saw. He drew back into the hut and sat down upon a stool in the corner there.
The red one led the twelve great black cats up to the door of the hut. They all crowded into the small space within and the black ones sat themselves down in a circle about the red one.
Said the red one to the great black cats, “Why should we be sitting here in silence? Come now! Raise your voices in a coronach to Murdo MacTaggart.”
And every cat opened its mouth and yowled out the coronach, and a good long and loud one it was, too, fit to nearly split the walls of the hut. What with the din of the storm without and the caterwauling of the creatures within, Murdo was not sure that he’d be able to come through it alive.
When the great black cats came to the end of the coronach, they sat still in their places, but the eyes of every one of them were fixed expectantly on Murdo.
The red one, giving a pleasant purr, said to Murdo, “Come along now, Murdo! You must pay for the grand coronach the cats have sung to you.”
“Pay for it!” said Murdo. “What way would I be needing a coronach anyway, and me not being dead? What would I be paying them with, forbye?”
“That I cannot tell you,” said the red one. “But singing whets the appetite. You had better pay them soon, man, for I can see the light of their hunger in their eyes.”
Murdo looked at the glowing green eyes of the great black cats and shuddered. He looked to the left of him and he looked to the right of him, and saw nothing he could use to pay for the coronach, which he hadn’t wanted anyway. Then he looked in front of him, over the heads of the great black cats and their leader, the red one, and in the field above the shore he saw an old wether and a bony old cow, standing with their backs against the storm.
The beasts were not Murdo’s. They belonged to the laird, but Murdo was beyond caring who owned what. He pointed to the old sheep and cried out, “Take the old wether over there on the lea for your pay.”
Up the black cats sprang and all streaked through the door, and up the shore on to the lea. They fell upon the wether and it did not last them long, for in no time there was naught left of the laird’s wether but a neat heap of well-picked white bones.
Back they came in a trice before Murdo had time to think out a way to escape from them. Down they sat again in a ring with the red one in the middle as before.
“Why be silent?” said the red one to the great black cats. “Sing a coronach to Murdo MacTaggart.”