Red-haired Mary.....

The Tinker Wife….

"Now, and what’s that you would be saying? Who’s the fine lady waiting for me while I finish me pint? Sure now, ‘tis none other than Red-haired Mary herself".   Sean was happy to make the fact plain to all and sundry for he had been married to Mary for exactly a year.

Now when I say ‘married’, I should of course say ‘married in fact, but never churched’. 

"Sure now, isn’t it many a church marriage that falls by the wayside and as for them registary weddings they talk about, sure wouldn’t you be lucky if them lasted more than twelve months" Sean pontificated.

Sean Cash sat in Murphy’s Pub sipping at his pint of Guinness with a big grin on his face that was like something out of Alice in Wonderland – the big Cheshire Cat I mean. He kept looking out the open door at the truly beautiful young woman who was holding the halter of his donkey. With her flaming red hair and peach-like skin she was indeed the most beautiful woman in the whole of Ireland. He worshipped the ground she walked upon and she thought that the sun shon out from under his old flat cap..............................

Twelve months previously – to the exact day – a beautiful July day indeed, Sean was making his way to the summer market in the town of Dingle, County Kerry. He had left his home four hours earlier and had completed the twelve miles to the outskirts of the town. As Sean would say "Sure now isn’t the auld donkey getting on in years. There was a time when she could do the self same journey in three and a half hours".

As he turned a bend in the road he saw her for the first time. She was skipping down the middle of the road before him carrying two wicker baskets of small bunches of heather. He knew that she would be one of the tinkers – he knew they preferred to be called gypsies – who sell the heather as ‘lucky charms’. 

"God help those who don’t buy one" Sean had thought at the time "for they put a fearsome curse on you and yours if you don’t".  He firmly believed that a curse from a tinker woman could make your cow go dry, your chickens to stop laying and your potatoes to rot in the ground. 

He truly believed in these things but worse was to come to those who swore at the tinker woman. A man would lose the ability to father any children and he himself swore he knew of at least two such men who completely lost their manhood. "The whole lot just shrivelled up and fell off" he once told me and I know that he fully believed it.

In any case, there he was on his donkey with Mary skipping along the little road on the outskirts of Dingle. He did no more than approach her and raising his cap in greeting, he wished her a ‘Good morning’. 

She gave him a beautiful smile back and asked "Now will you be buying a bunch of lucky heather, kind sir?" Bearing in mind what I have just said, our Sean could not get his hand into his pocket quickly enough. He handed her a shilling piece. As she handed him the small bunch of heather he nervously said to her "Now will you hop up on the donkey at the back of me and I’ll carry you into Dingle?"  "Are you sure that your auld donkey will carry two" she asked. "To be sure" replied Sean, "at least going down the hills and sure I’ll walk up the other sides".

With that and a flurry of her flowing red dress, she threw her leg over the donkey and having introduced themselves, away they rode. If you had seen them you would have thought that Sean had just won a ton of money on the Irish Sweepstakes he looked so proud.

As they entered the town of Dingle, the crowds stepped aside at the sight. Some clapped and cheered whilst others stood in amazement. When they stopped and Mary got off the donkey, Sean took her hand to say goodbye. 

Out of the corner of his right eye he saw it coming but could do nothing about it. A large fist struck him in the left eye knocking him sideways. With his good eye he looked to see who or what had hit him. It was a giant of a man with a big red beard, obvious to anyone who knew these parts of the world, an out and out tinker man. 

In among the bells ringing in Sean’s ears, he heard the tinker shout "You keep your hands off Red-haired Mary, her and I will soon be wed". Sean stuttered and almost cried "Sure and how the blinking hell was I to know that?". The tinker man began to speak but  before he uttered more than a few words, Sean struck out with his hobnailed right boot and caught the other on the left shin. 

I doubt if it was entirely down to the kick as it was probably the amount of beer that the tinker man had been drinking all day that caused him to spin around and crash through the closed door of Murphy’s Pub. Mary stood with her hand over her mouth but said nothing. However, Sean could see the twinkle in her eyes – a twinkle of admiration for his audacity.........................

Before anyone could say anything, a policeman in his fine uniform and who was even bigger than the tinker man, came around the corner and walked straight up to Sean. "You young man have broke the law, I am afraid you will have to……….". 

Before he could finish the sentence, the old donkey – and I mean this in truth that she realised that Sean was in some sort of trouble – lashed out with her hind-legs and caught the officer full square on the upper thighs. They do say that ‘the bigger they are, the harder they fall’ and this policeman proved the point perfectly. He fell to the ground like a ton of bricks holding his family jewels. 

Well let me put it this way, one second his hands were down below, the next they were up to his face which he had struck against the pavement. Through the bloody froth coming from his mouth he muttered something about his jaw being broken. He was last seen returning in the direction from which he had arrived.

Literally three minutes later, he returned with three others who were not wearing uniforms. He pointed out Sean and with that he was taken down the side alley to Murphy’s Pub where he was ‘taught a lesson’. He emerged about ten minutes later with two black eyes, several bruises and minus several teeth. 

However, much to his surprise, beautiful Mary stood her ground where he had left her. She was holding the donkey’s halter and had a beautiful radiant smile on her face – a smile of true admiration. 

"Oh Sean", she sighed "’Tis with you I’ll go. Forget what he said about us getting married, it’s you I want. We can forget about the Priest and if you want, we can have an open wedding and sleep tonight in Murphy’s shed’.

Well now, to finish up this little story, Mary and Sean rode the donkey up and down the streets of Dingle all day long. Sean forgot what he had come to the market to buy and Mary had forgotten all about her lucky heather. They returned later that day to Sean’s house and they have lived there as man and wife ever since. She still thinks the world of him................

Oh yes and by the way, when I said at the very start of the story that she stood outside Murphy’s Pub holding the halter of the donkey, I forget to mention the red haired twins in the two wicker baskets beside her……………….

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