The Merman’s Rose: A Folk Tale
The wind came up off the water, picking up strength as it advanced. The old woman was trying to dry the child’s hair with her apron, but he laughed, shaking his golden hair: “Let me go swim again, grandma!”
He laughed louder, and the droplets of sea water on her face and lips tasted salty, and her old, merry eyes became wistful as they strayed toward the swelling sea.
Her hand ran through the child’s hair, and her arm went round his warm brown shoulders. She held him like treasure. The villagers wondered that from old Annie and her silent daughter, who did not live to see her child grow, had sprung this marvel of a boy, so full of life, recklessness and beauty. Never afraid, never cold, running barefoot on the beach in wind and gale, and he always knew the tide and the storms before the fishermen did.
The waves crashed louder, but the boy squirmed in her arms, wanting to run free.
She gazed further out, where the reefs hid under the waves, and so many ships lay broken on the seabed. There, sky and water seemed to merge into a realm of iridescent spray and mists. She held the boy tighter but again he said, suddenly grave: “Let me go to the waves, grandma.”
“Stay with me, my boy, the sea is getting rough,” she pleaded.
He laughed again: ” I am not afraid of the sea, grandma.”
She looked into her wrinkled palm. “I was not either, once.” Then, looking up into his green eyes: “But that is wrong, my boy. Everyone should be afraid of a rough sea.”
“I am not,” he repeated.
“Ah”, she sighed, “many got lost that way – stay with me”
“So tell me, tell me of those who got lost, grandma.”
Sighing, she rose to her feet: “Come, let us go back and see if the Merman’s rose is still in bloom, and by and by I shall tell you.”
They walked up the beach to where the tide did not reach, and only then, on the dry sand, did she let go of the boy’s hand, and he ran and danced around, collecting shells and round stones, running back to drop them in her apron pocket. Now and then he turned to gaze at the sea, then darted off again.
At last, they came to the cottages – small white houses with scant grass patches and needy gardens, here a few sheep, there a donkey, and nearest the sea was the old woman’s house.
By the spotless doorstep, there climbed from the sandy soil a hardy rose bush, with leaves so green, and golden creamy flowers so rich, that people slowed their step to look. They called it “the Merman’s rose”.
Near the heart of its most perfect flower, one petal was fluttering in the wind. On the threshold, the boy stood still and said “Look, grandma, I am now as tall as the Merman’s rose! “Then once more, he looked out at the waves with longing.
She, following his gaze, swiftly recalled him: “Come, go inside and get me my knitting, then let us sit out here on the bench, and I shall tell you a tale.” And so they did, the boy spreading out his shells and stones in a mysterious pattern, as the old woman, with another look at her old brown hand, began:
“Once on this very beach there lived a maid, and she loved to gather strange shells and beautiful stones like you – and like you, she loved the sea, the voice of the waves, and the salt on her lips, and the feel of the water on her skin.
And sometimes secretly she would go to the far end of the beach, behind that rock over there, and take off her clothes to go swimming, although her father, a fisherman, had forbidden it. “
The boy stood up and gazed at the dark rock, where the waves crashed louder and louder.
“One very fine day in June, she went out swimming and it was so good that she swam out too far. She was getting tired, but she felt the sea carry her softly, as if it was bearing her in its arms, and so she was rocked gently, further and further away … When she opened her eyes, she saw, close to hers, a young man’s face, with sea-green eyes and wet golden hair, and pearls of water running along his skin which shone faintly silver, and his gentle silvery hand was around her waist. She felt no fear, only a great wonder, because the merman was beautiful to look upon, and she knew in her heart that he loved and understood all of her. She gave herself to him as the beach gives itself to the tide, feeling a joy and peace she had never known.
For a long time, they danced together in the waves, turning this way and that, and the dance lasted and lasted and seemed never to end and she wished it never to end… But as the sun began to set, he took her hand and pressed the palm of it to his mouth … and there a mark appeared, a small mark in the shape of a shell and the colour of a pearl, as a token of love.
The sea had now closed over the sun. He swam her back to the shore, nearly flying in the water, and at the shoreline, she left him and ran to her father’s house.
All summer, every day, her chores done, she ran to the beach, and there the merman awaited her, and their dance with the waves began again.
That summer she knew such happiness, that people told her mother “Your lass is indeed blossoming” – and truly her skin glowed pearly and soft, and her eyes had a sea-light in them.
But then the summer waned, as it is doing now, and there came days like this, days when the wind first rises and then roars, and the waves rear ragged heads over the reefs, and they seemed to be calling, louder and louder… And she knew, without needing to be told, that the time had come when the merman must leave her.”
The grandmother paused and closed her eyes. The boy took a step toward the beach where the waves crashed ever louder. But she caught his hand and went on with her tale:
“On the very last day the maid and the Merman swayed together in the water for a long, long time, and as long as he was with her, she did not feel the cold. When the light of day at last began to fail, he picked a handful of seaweed, held it to his heart for a while, and handed it to her, pressing a kiss to her hand, where the sea-mark glowed. Then, a wave pulled them softly apart, and carried her ashore, shivering and sad … But as she looked at the seaweed in her hand, she saw it turn a greener green, with tiny leaves cradling a small golden rosebud. Turning to the waves with tears in her eyes, she pressed the flower to her lips and bore it home with her, and that night under the hunter’s moon, she went out and planted it near the doorstep of her house. And that rose, the Merman’s rose, was the wonder of the village, for it thrived in the sandy soil and the salt wind. And in time people came to believe that it would never die.
But for a long time, the maid was veiled in sadness, until, the next winter, she gave birth to a little girl, sea-eyed and pearl-skinned, and she learned to smile again.”
Thus the grandmother ended her tale, and smiling through her tears into the boy’s green eyes, she laid her hand on his golden hair. The boy wordlessly took his grandmother’s little weathered hand and opening it, he pressed his lips to the pearly shell.
Then he raised his eyes to the horizon, where sky and water merged, and she knew his longing had now waxed full.
Just then a stronger gust rushed up straight to the house from the water, and with a sound like a sigh, it tore the petal from the rose. The boy went to pick it up where it had fallen on the sand and he put it in his shirt, close to his heart.
Nothing more was said that evening between the old woman and her grandson. But in the night, under the hunter’s moon, the boy with the golden hair and the sea-green eyes noiselessly rose and went down toward the sea.
And it is said he carried the petal of the Merman’s rose to his grandfather’s people, the sea-folk.