Chasing Rainbows, Part 2

It was the first idea Seamus O’Reilly had ever had. So naturally, he thought it was brilliant. It had come to him in a flash, as he looked out the window and saw the rainbow.

"The leprechaun's pot of gold at the end of the rainbow! Of course!" cried Seamus. "It's simple! You go to the end of the rainbow, catch the leprechaun, and he has to give you his pot of gold! I've seen the pictures in books, it's a cauldron the size of a bathtub filled with gold coins, worth a million dollars each!"

Seamus had been looking out the window of his run-down little shack, watching the rain fall, watching the roof leak, watching the two-foot weeds waving in the wind, watching the cat claw the furniture. But when he saw the rainbow, he knew he’d found the way to get enough money to pay someone to fix everything.

Seamus knew that he couldn't run fast enough to catch the rainbow (and anyway, running was too much work), so he borrowed his friend Sean's car, promising that when he got the gold, he'd buy Sean a new convertible. That is, he promised himself - Sean was out for a walk, and there wasn't time to find Sean and ask to use the car. But Seamus knew all would be forgiven once he bought Sean a convertible. Seamus floored the accelerator and drove East for all he was worth.

Now, most people know that you can't reach the end of the rainbow. It's an optical illusion, a trick played on the eyes by the light. You may as well try to walk into a movie screen and help the hero save the day. However, magic doesn't obey the rules of science. Science merely explains how things happen. Magic is when things that can't possibly happen, happen. Seamus didn't know anything about science, because he’d never bothered to learn. But he knew the rules of magic, and the rules said that you could get to the end of the rainbow, catch a leprechaun, and demand his gold. So because he didn't know he couldn't, Seamus actually arrived at the end of the rainbow.

The lucky dog.

It was beautiful, too. Imagine that light is a liquid instead of just light. Imagine that you could pour yourself a glass of red light, and drink it like water. Imagine that it tastes different than orange, yellow, green, blue, or purple light. Now imagine a waterfall made of liquid light, in searing bright colors. And now imagine standing under it.

It was beautiful, but Seamus never noticed, because he was looking for the leprechaun. He tried the green stripe first, because all the leprechauns he'd ever seen in pictures wore green, and so, thought Seamus, it must be their favorite color. If he'd thought a little harder, he would have realized that leprechauns wear green to blend into the grass so people like Seamus can't find them. Fortunately for Seamus, green WAS the favorite color of this particular leprechaun, and he did love to lie in it and rainbow-bathe (like sun-bathing, only green light doesn't burn you so badly, especially when you're a leprechaun). Seamus saw a man lying on the grass, no more than two feet tall. The little man lay snoring gently, eyes closed, pipe clamped between his teeth. His mouth seemed to be curled permanently into the smirk of a man who knows he’s the only one who got the joke, and is so pleased with himself that he doesn’t even mind that the joke was on him. The light glinted off the shiny buckles on his shoes. In a moment Seamus had grabbed the leprechaun by the back of the collar, lifted him off the ground, and was yelling "Gold! Give me your gold!"

"What? Who? Which?" piped a sleepy, startled little tenor voice. "Oh, it's another of the Big People, is it? Right, then, put me down, close your eyes and hold out your hand, and I'll run home and get the gold for you. Can't have you watch while I run home, otherwise you'll know where I live and be poppin’ in at all hours, and I can't have that."

"I don't think so, little man" sneered Seamus. "I've read the stories, and I know the rules. If I take my eyes off you for even a second, you can disappear, and you won't have to give me anything. No, I have you, and you're going to tell me where the gold is, and I'm not going to let you go until I've got the pot of gold in my hand."

"Oh, you've heard that one, have you? I'll have to have words with me cousin for lettin’ the word get out. Well, since you're so smart, what else do you know about the Little People?"

Seamus didn't know very many things, so when he did know something, he couldn't resist showing off. In the tone of a professor giving a lecture, he began:

"Leprechaun: from the Old Irish words luchorpan, or 'little body', and leathbrogan, or 'maker of shoes'."

"Aye, the English never could keep their Gaelic words straight. That's why they told everyone to stop speakin’ it."

"Don't interrupt, I'm trying to tell you about yourself."

"Fair enough."

"Leprechauns are the guardians of vast hoards of gold left behind by Danish invaders in the year... well, quite some time ago. They are greedy, and add to their hoard by stealing gold wherever they find it."

"Not at all like humans, o' course."

"Will you be quiet? They are also the shoemakers of the fairy kingdom..."

"I'm particularly proud of me buckles, have you noticed them?"

"...AND", continued Seamus, ignoring both comment and buckles, "when caught, must reveal the whereabouts of their gold in order to buy their freedom. Now, where is it?"

"This is robbery, you know. If someone three times your size grabbed you and demanded that you give him all your money, you'd call it a muggin’, and have him arrested. And how do you propose to explain your sudden wealth to the tax collectors? They'll know you didn't earn it, and so they'll know you stole it, and you'll end up in prison for life."

"Don't bother stalling, little man. The rules say you've got to give me the gold; and if the rules say so, it's rightfully mine. Besides, who's going to arrest me for stealing from a leprechaun?"

"Any honest judge would throw the book at you. Oh, very well, it's this way" the leprechaun pointed. "After all, it's only all the money I have, I've only been saving it for a thousand years, why should I complain about losing it?" he added, as Seamus carried him in the direction he had indicated. "It's not like it's mine or anything, is it?"

“No, it’s mine now”, gloated Seamus. The leprechaun muttered something in Gaelic, which I won’t translate because this is a children’s story. He tried several more ways of bribing or tricking Seamus, but the thing about a person whose brain is too small to hold more than one idea is that he can’t be distracted from that idea by anything – there’s no room for another idea to get in and sidetrack him. In other words, Seamus was too stupid for the leprechaun to trick him.

Finally, they arrived at the leprechaun’s house, and though the little man tried to convince Seamus to release him “So I can go in and get me pot of gold, see. You’re too big to get through the door…” , Seamus wouldn’t be fooled, and the leprechaun sighed and waved a hand irritably, and suddenly the door was big enough for Seamus to walk in. The leprechaun directed Seamus into the kitchen, pointed to the stove, and said, “Well, there it is, you horrible man. Take it and choke.”

“What, it’s in the oven?”

“No, you fool, it’s sitting right there on the back burner. My pot of gold. Right in front of you.”

Seamus looked again, and there, indeed, was a pot – a saucepan, six inches wide, with a non-stick coating, and a single tiny golden coin sitting in the middle of it. Seamus shifted his grip on the leprechaun to choke him, and bellowed,

“What?!?!?! THAT’S the legendary pot of gold?!?!?! It’s supposed to be a bathtub-sized cauldron full of gold coins worth millions, billions, trillions, whatever’s bigger than trillions!!! WHERE IS THE REAL ONE, YOU LITTLE …” and at this point Seamus used some more words that I won’t write down because this is a children’s story.

“Ick eek oak-eek hock ike ock” choked the leprechaun, who was turning blue, and didn’t like it because it clashed with his green clothes.

Seamus loosened his hold slightly, and the leprechaun gasped for air.

“What was that?”

‘I said, it’s the only pot I’ve got” panted the leprechaun. “How would I cook in a pot the size of your bathtub? I’d never budge it! YOU’D never budge it! Do you know how heavy gold is? You’d need a crane and a coupla trucks to cart off a cauldron of gold! And you’d spend half of it on the hauling fees! Anyway, I like that pot” he added sulkily. “Perfect for makin’ soup, that pot is.”

“But the hoarded gold from the Danish invaders! There was tons o’ the stuff!”

“Aye, sure there was, a thousand years ago when I got it. But I’ve spent it, haven’t I? Had to buy groceries, didn’t I? Even a ton o’ gold don’t last forever, you know.”

“Make another pot with your magic, then! Big! Pot! Of! Gold! NOW!!!!”

“It don’t work like that, you madman! The only gold you can make with magic is fairy gold that disappears as soon as it leaves the fairy world! If I gave you that, you’d just come back and assault me again! But this is a real pot, used by a real leprechaun, and has real gold in it! That’s all the rules call for, and that’s all I’ve got! The rules don’t say it has to be a big pot, or that it has to be full o’ gold – just a pot with gold in it. Do you want it or not? ‘Cause if not, I’d be much obliged your puttin’ me down and leavin’ me house.”

And no matter how much Seamus bullied the leprechaun, even threatening to drink all the whiskey in the house (that reduced the little man to tears), the story didn’t change, and Seamus had to accept that it wasn’t a trick this time. Still grumbling things I won’t repeat, Seamus took the pot off the range, and dropped the leprechaun with a snarl. Seamus took the coin out of the pot, looked at it, and demanded, “What kind of coin is this, anyway? I’ve never seen one like it.”

“It’s a Finn Mac Coul farthing. Not very big, but genuine, and lots of historical value. Oldest thing in the world, ‘cept us little people.”

“Aye, and the most worthless thing ‘cept you, too.”

“Isn’t it bad enough your attackin’ an’ robbin’ me, without your insultin’ me, too? Take the gold, go buy somethin’ with it, it’s small but it’s still a lot more money than you’ve ever had before, you lazy slob of a man!”

Seamus stormed out the door, stopping only to throw the empty pot at the leprechaun, who ducked.

“Well, at least I’ve got me cookin’ pot back” , muttered the leprechaun, as the door slammed.

(To be continued...)

© John M. Munzer