My New Curate

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"Indeed, 'n' I do,--what else? Oh! wirra, wirra! to hear that me poor
gintleman was gone to the cowld gaol, where he is lying on the stone
flure, and nothing but the black bread and the sour wather."

Whilst Nell was uttering this lonely threnody, she was dragging out of
the recesses of her bosom what appeared to be a red rag. This she placed
on the table, whilst I watched her with interest. She then commenced to
unroll this mummy, taking off layer after layer of rags, until she came
to a crumpled piece of brown paper, all the time muttering her Jeremiad
over her poor priest. Well, all things come to an end; and so did the
evolutions of that singular purse. This last wrapper was unfolded, and
there lay before me a pile of crumpled banknotes, a pile of sovereigns,
and a handful of silver.

"'T isn't much, your reverence, but it is all I have. Take it and give
it to that good gintleman, or thim who are houlding him, and sind him
back to us agin."

"'T is a big sum of money, Nell, which a poor woman like you could hardly
afford to give--"

"If it were tin millions times as much, your reverence, I'd give it to
him, my darlin' gintleman. Sure, an' 't was he came to me up on that
lonesome hill in all the rain and cowld of last winter; and 't was he
said to me, 'Me poor woman, how do you live at all! And where's the
kittle?' sez he; but sure, I had no kittle; but he took up a black burnt
tin, and filled it with wather, and put the grain of tay in it, and
brought it over to me; and thin he put his strong arm under my pillow,
and lifted me up, and 'Come, me poor woman,' sez he, 'you must be wake
from fastin'; take this; and thin he wint around like a 'uman and set
things to rights; and I watchin' him and blessin' him all the time in
_my_ heart of hearts; and now to think of him without bite or
sup;--wisha, tell me, your reverence," she said, abruptly changing her
subject, "how much was it? Sure, I thought there was always a dacent
living for our priests at Kilronan. But the times are bad, and the
people are quare."

It needed all my eloquence and repeated asseverations to persuade her
that Father Letheby was not gone to gaol as yet, and most probably would
not go. And it was not disappointment, but a sense of personal injury
and insult, that overshadowed her fine old face as I gathered up her
money and returned it to her. She went back to her lonely cabin in
misery.

When Father Letheby came in and sat down to a late dinner, I told him
all. He was deeply affected.

"There is some tremendous mine of the gold of human excellence in these
good people," he said; "but the avenues to it are so tortuous and
difficult, it seems hardly worth while seeking for. They are capable of
the most stupendous sacrifices provided they are out of the common; but
it is the regular system and uniformity of the natural and human law
that they despise. But have you any letter for me?"

"None. But here is a tremendous indictment against myself from Duff."

"No letter from the bishop?" he said despondently, as he opened and read
the letter, which ran thus:--

Atheloy, 13/10/7--.

Rev. dear Father Dan:--How has all this miserable business
occurred? Well, to our minds, you alone are culpable and
responsible. We must seem to Letheby to be utter caitiffs and
cowards, to allow matters to come to such a horrible crisis,
especially in the case of a sensitive fellow like him. But up to
the date of that horrible exposure in Stubbs', we had no idea there
were complications with those factory people--nothing, in fact,
beyond the responsibilities of that unhappy boat. Now, why didn't
you let us know? You may not be aware that the evening of the
disaster I made a solemn engagement to stand by him to the end; and
now all this must seem the merest braggadocio. And yet, the thing
was a trifle. Would you tell Letheby now, that it will be all right
in a few days, and to cheer up; no harm done, beyond a temporary
humiliation! But we'll never dine with you again, and we shall,
one and all, brave the Episcopal anger by refusing to be your
curates when Letheby is promoted.

Yours, etc.,
Charles L. Duff, C. C.

"He's very kind, very kind, indeed," said Father Letheby, meditatively;
"but I cannot see how he is going to make it all right in a few days."

"It wouldn't surprise me much," I replied, "if that good young fellow
had already put a sop in those calves' mouths over there at Kilkeel."

"Impossible!" he cried.

"Well, time will tell."

I called down to see Alice and talk over things. It is wonderful what a
_clairvoyante_ she has become. She sees everything as in a magic mirror.

"I think the Holy Souls will come to his relief," she said, in a cool,
calm way. "He has, I think, a great devotion to the Holy Souls. He told
me once, when we were talking about holy things, that he makes a
_memento_ in every Mass of the most neglected and abandoned priest in
purgatory; but, sure, priests don't go to purgatory, Father Dan, do
they?"

"Well, my dear, I cannot answer you in general terms; but there's one
that will be certainly there before many years; and unless you and
Father Letheby and Bittra pull him out by your prayers, I'm
afraid--But continue what you were saying."

"He makes a _memento_, he said, for the most abandoned priest, and for
the soul that is next to be released. And whenever he has not a special
intention, he always gives his Mass to our Blessed Lady for that soul.
Now, I think, that's very nice. Just imagine that poor soul waiting
inside the big barred gates, and the angel probably her warder for many
years, outside. They don't exchange a word. They are only waiting,
waiting. Far within are the myriads of Holy Souls, praying, suffering,
loving, hoping. There is a noise as of a million birds, fluttering their
wings above the sea. But here at the gate is silence, silence. She dares
not ask: When?--because the angel does not know. Now and again he
looks at her and smiles, and she is praying softly to herself. Suddenly
there is a great light in the darkness overhead, and then there is a
dawn on the night of purgatory; for a great spirit is coming down
swiftly, swiftly, on wings of light, until he reaches the prison-house.
Then he hands the warder-angel a letter from the Queen of Heaven; and in
a moment, back swing the gates, and in plunges the guardian angel, and
wraps up that expectant soul in his strong wings, and up, up, up,
through starry night and sunny day they go, until they come into the
singing heavens; and up along the great avenues of smiling angels, until
at last the angel lays down that soul gently at the feet of Mary. And
all this was done by a quiet priest in a remote, whitewashed chapel,
here by the Atlantic, and there was no one with him but the little boy
who rang the bell."

I had been listening to this rhapsody with the greatest admiration, when
just then Bittra came in. She has got over the most acute period of her
grief, "except when," she says, "she looks at the sea and thinks of what
is there."

"Alice is prophesying," I said; "she is going to take Father Letheby out
of his purgatory on Monday."

"Ah, no, Daddy Dan, that's not fair. But I think he will be relieved
from his cross."

"And what about your own troubles, Alice?" said Bittra. "Is the healing
process going on?"

"Yes, indeed, thank God," she replied, "except here and there."

Bittra was watching me curiously. Now it is quite a certain fact, but I
never dreamed of attaching any importance to it, that this child had
recovered her perfect health, so far as that dreadful scrofulous
affection extended, except in the palms of her hands and the soles of
her feet, where there remained, to the doctor's intense disappointment,
round, angry sores, about the size of a half-crown, and each surrounded
with a nimbus of raw, red flesh, which bled periodically.

"And here, also," she said innocently this evening, "here on my side is
a raw sore which sometimes is very painful and bleeds copiously. I have
not shown the doctor that; but he gets quite cross about my hands and
feet."

"It is very curious," I said, in my own purblind fashion, "but I suppose
the extremities heal last."

"I shall walk home with you, Father Dan, if you have no objection," said
Bittra.

"Come along, child," I replied. "Now, Alice, we shall be watching
Monday, All Souls' Day."

"Very well, Daddy Dan," she said, smiling. "Everything will come right,
as we shall see."

As we walked through the village, Bittra said to me wonderingly:--

"Isn't it curious about those sores, Father? They won't heal."

"It is," I said musingly.

"I have been thinking a lot about it," she said.

"And the result of your most wise meditations?"

"You'll laugh at me."

"Never. I never laugh. I never allow myself to pass beyond the genteel
limits of a smile."

"Then I think--but--"

"Say it out, child. What are you thinking of?"

"I think it is the _stigmata_," she said, blushing furiously.

I was struck silent. It was too grand. Could it be? Had we a real,
positive saint amongst us?

"What do you think, Father Dan? Are you angry?"

"God forbid, child. But tell me, have you spoken to Alice on the
matter?"

"Oh, dear no! I wouldn't dream of such a thing. It would give her an
awful shock."

"Well, we'll keep it a profound secret, and await further revelations.
'Abscondisti haec a prudentibus, et revelasti ea parvulis.'"

But next evening, I think I threw additional fervor into the _Laudate's_
and _Benedicite's_ at Lauds.

But as I looked at Father Letheby across the table in the lamplight, and
saw his drawn, sallow cheeks and sunken eyes, and the white patch of
hair over his ears, I could not help saying to myself: "You, too, have
got your _stigmata_, my poor fellow!"

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 8: Shroud.]

CHAPTER XXX

ALL'S WELL

The soul of Jem Deady was grievously perturbed. That calm and placid
philosopher had lost his equanimity. It showed itself in many ways,--in
violent abstraction at meal-times, and the ghoulish way in which he
swallowed cups of tea, and bolted potatoes wholesale; in strange
muttered soliloquies in which he called himself violent and opprobrious
names; in sacrilegious gestures towards Father Letheby's house. And
once, when Bess, alarmed about his sanity, and hearing dreadful sounds
of conflict from his bedroom, and such expressions as these: "How do you
like that?" "Come on, you ruffian!" "You'll want a beefsteak for your
eye and not for your stomach, you glutton!" when Bess, in fear and
trembling, entered the bedroom, she found her amiable spouse belaboring
an innocent bolster which, propped against the wall, did service
vicariously for some imaginary monster of flesh and blood. To all Bess's
anxious inquiries there was but one answer: "Let me alone, 'uman; I'm
half out o' my mind!" There should be a climax, of course, to all this,
and it came. It was not the odor of the steaks and onions that, wafted
across intervening gardens from Father Letheby's kitchen, precipitated
the crisis; nor the tears of Lizzie, who appeared from time to time, a
weeping Niobe, and whose distress would have touched the heart of a less
susceptible Irishman than Jem Deady; nor yet the taunts of the women of
the village, who stung him with such sarcasms as these: "Yes; Faynians
begor, with their drilling, an' their antics, an' their corporals, an'
their sergeants,--they couldn't hunt a flock of geese. Dere goes de
captain!--look at him an' his airs; and thim Dublin jackeens above in
the priest's house, atin' him out o' house and home, and not a man in
Kilronan able to lay a wet finger on 'em." But, as in all great crises,
it is the simple thing that proves the last straw, so in this. What
steaks and onions, tears and taunts, could not do, was done by an
innocent Havana, whose odors, sprung from a dainty weed, held between
the lips of one of these great representatives of Her Majesty's law, and
wafted to the senses of Jem Deady, as he bent over his cabbages in his
little garden, made him throw down his spade with something that seemed
like, and most unlike, a prayer, and rush into the house and shout:
"Tare an' houns! Flesh and blood can't stand this! Don't shpake a word,
'uman! Don't shpake a word! but get me soap, and hot wather, and a
towel, while you'd be saying thrapsticks!"

[Illustration: "Come down to Mrs. Haley's--there isn't a better dhrop
betune this and Dublin." (p. 452.)]

[Illustration: "Come on, you ruffian!"]

Bess did as she was directed; and then paused anxiously in the kitchen
to conjecture what new form her husband's insanity was taking.
Occasionally a muttered growl came from the recesses of the bedroom; and
in about a quarter of an hour out came Jem, so transformed that Bess
began to doubt her own sanity, and could only say, through her tears:--

"For the love of God, Jem, is 't yourself or your ghost?"

It certainly was not a ghost, but a fine, handsome man, over six feet
high, his hair curled, and his whiskers shining with Trotter Oil, and
his long pilot coat with the velvet collar, which he had got from Father
Laverty, and on which the merciful night, now falling, concealed the
abrasions of time. Bess looked at him with all a wife's admiration; and
then, half crying, half laughing, said:--

"And what new divilmint are ye up to now?"

Jem answered not a word. He was on the war-path. He only said
sarcastically:--

"Ye needn't expect me home to tay, Mrs. Deady. I'm taking tay with
shupparior company to-night."

An hour later there were three gentlemen in Father Letheby's parlor, who
appeared to have known each other in antenatal times, so affectionate
and confidential were they. The gentleman in the middle was sympathizing
with his brethren in the legal profession--for he had introduced himself
as the local bailiff--on their being sent down from the metropolis and
its gayeties, from their wives and children, into this remote and
forsaken village called Kilronan.

"It ain't too bad," said one, with a strong Northern accent. "A' have
bun in wuss diggins thon thus!"

[Illustration: "For the love of God, Jem, is 't yourself or your
ghost?"]

Then the conversation drifted to possible dangers. And it appeared there
was not, in Her Majesty's dominions, a more lawless and fiendish set of
ruffians than those who lurked in Kilronan. Why, what did they do in the
days of the Lague? Didn't they take his predecessor, as honest a man as
ever lived, and strip him, and nail him by the ears to his door, where
his neighbors found him in the morning? But "the poluss? the poluss?"
"Oh! they're always looking the other way. But let us get the taste of
these murderin' ruffians out o' our mout'! Come down to Mrs. Haley's.
There isn't a better dhrop betune this and Dublin."

"But the proputty? the proputty?" said the bailiffs, looking around
anxiously.

"As safe as if ye had it in yere waistcoat pockets," they were assured.

The three well-dressed gentlemen moved with easy dignity down the one
dark street of the village, piloted carefully by the central figure, who
linked his arms affectionately in his comrades', and smoked his weed
with as much dignity as if he had been born in Cuba.

"Powerful dark hole!" said one; "one mut git a blow o' a stun and nuvver
be the wiser."

"Or the prod of a pike," suggested the middle gentleman.

"Huv tha' no gaws here?" cried his neighbor.

"No. But we're thinkin' of getting up the electric light; at laste the
parish priest do be talkin' about it, and sure that's the same as havin'
it. But here we are. Now, one word! There's one ruffian here whose name
mustn't pass yere mout', or we don't know the consekinces. He's a most
consaited and outrageous ruffian, doesn't care for law or judge, or
priest or pope; he's the only one ye have to be afeard of. Listen, that
ye may remimber. His name is Jem Deady. Keep yere mouths locked on that
while ye 're here."

It was a pleasant little party in Mrs. Haley's "cosey" or "snuggery."
There was warmth, and light, and music, and the odor of rum-punch and
lemon, and the pungency of cigars, and the pleasant stimulus of
agreeable conversation. Occasionally one of the "byes" looked in, but
was promptly relegated to the taproom, at a civil distance from the
"gintlemin." By and by, however, as more charity and less exclusiveness
prevailed under the generous influences of good liquor, the "gintlemin"
requested to be allowed to show the light of their glowing faces in the
plebeian taproom; and the denizens of the latter, prompt at recognizing
this infinite condescension, cheered the gentlemen to the echo.

"'T is the likes of ye we wants down here," they cried; "not a set of
naygurs who can't buy their tay without credit."

But the local bailiff didn't seem to like it, and kept aloof from the
dissipation. Also, he drank only "liminade." It was admitted in after
years that this was the greatest act of self-denial that was recorded in
history. His comrades chaffed him unmercifully.

"Come, mon, and git out o' the blues. Whoy, these are the jolliest
fullows we uver mot."

"And there isn't better liquor in the Cawstle cellars. Here's to yer
health, missus."

So the night wore on.

But two poor women had an anxious time. These were Lizzie, who, in some
mysterious manner, persuaded herself that she was responsible for the
custody and safe keeping of the bailiffs in the eyes of the law; and if
anything happened to them she might be summoned up to Dublin, and put on
her trial on the capital charge. The other was Mrs. Deady. When eleven
o'clock struck, she expected to hear every moment the well-known
footsteps of her spouse; but no! Half-past eleven--twelve struck--and
Jem had not returned. At half-past twelve there was a peculiar
scratching sound at the back-door, and Bess opened it and dragged Jem
into her arms, whilst she poured into his face a fire of
cross-questions.

"Ax me no questions an' I'll tell ye no lies," said Jem. "Have ye
anythin' to ate?"

Bess had, in the shape of cold fat bacon. Jem set to hungrily.

"Would ye mind covering up the light in the front windy, Bess?" said
Jem.

Bess did so promptly, all the while looking at her spouse in a
distressed and puzzled manner.

"Jem," said she at length, "may the Lord forgive me if I'm wrong, but I
think ye're quite sober."

Jem nodded. A knock came to the door. It was Lizzie.

"Have ye no news of the bailiffs, Jem?"

"I have, acushla. I left them at your dure half an hour ago, and they're
now fast asleep in their warm and comfortable beds."

"They're not in our house," said Lizzie, alarmed. "Oh, Jem, Jem, what
have ye done, at all, at all?"

"I'll tell ye, girl," said Jem, emphatically. "I left the gintlemin at
your dure, shook hands wid them, bid them good-night, and came down
here. Is that thrue, Bess?"

"Every word of it," said Bess.

"Go back to your bed, alanna," said Jem, "and have pleasant dhreams of
your future. Thim gintlemin can mind theirselves."

"'T is thrue, Lizzie," said Bess. "Go home, like a good girl, and make
your mind aisy."

Lizzie departed, crying softly to herself.

"What mischief have ye done, Jem?" said Bess, when she had carefully
locked and bolted the door. "Some day ye'll be dancin' upon nothin',
I'm thinkin'."

"Nabocklish!" said Jem, as he knelt down and piously said his prayers
for the night.

The following day was Sunday and All Saints' Day besides; and Jem, being
a conscientious man, heard an early Mass; and being a constitutional
man, he strolled down to take the fresh air--down the grassy slopes that
lead to the sea. Jem was smoking placidly and at peace with himself and
the world. One trifle troubled him. It was a burn on the lip, where the
candle had caught him the night before at Mrs. Haley's, when he was
induced to relax a little, and with his hands tied behind his back,
grabbed at a rosy apple, and caught the lighted candle in his mouth. But
that was a trifle. As Jem calmly strolled along, he became suddenly
aware of a marine phenomenon; and Jem, as a profound student of natural
history, was so interested in the phenomenon that he actually took the
pipe from his mouth and studied the marvel long and carefully. About
twenty yards from where he was standing, a huge pile of rock started
suddenly from the deep--a square, embattled mass, covered by the short,
springy turf that alone can resist the action of the sea. Beside it, a
tall needle of rock, serrated and sharp, shot up. These two solitary
islands, the abode of goats and gulls, were known in local geography as
the Cow and Calf. Now the Cow and Calf were familiar to Jem Deady from
his childhood. So were the deep, hollow caves beneath. So was the angry
swirl of the tide that, parted outside the rocks, swept around in fierce
torrents, and met with a shock of strength and a sweat of foam at the
angle near the cliffs. Therefore, these things did not surprise the
calm, equable mind of Jem. But perched on the sward on the top were two
strange beings, the like of whom Jem had never seen before, and whom his
fancy now at once recognized as the mermen of fable and romance. Their
faces were dark as that of his sable majesty; their hair was tossed
wildly. But they looked the picture of despair, whereas mermen were
generally reputed to be jolly. It might be no harm to accost them, and
Jem was not shy about strangers.

"Hallo, there!" he cried across the chasm; "who the--are ye? Did ye
shwim across from ole Virginny, or did ye escape from a throupe of
Christy Minstrels?"

"You, fellow," said a mournful voice, "go at once for the poluss."

"Aisier said than done," said Jem. "What am I to say suppose the
gintlemin are not out of their warm beds?"

"Tell them that two of Her gracious Majesty's servants are here--brought
here by the worst set of ruffians that are not yet hanged in Ireland."

"And what do ye expect the police to do?" said Jem, calmly.

"To do? Why, to get a boat and tuk us out o' thus, I suppose!"

"Look at yere feet," said Jem, "and tell me what kind of a boat would
live there?"

True enough. The angry waters were hissing, and embracing, and swirling
back, and trying to leap the cliffs, and feeling with all their awful
strength and agility for some channel through which they might reach and
devour the prisoners.

By some secret telegraphy a crowd had soon gathered. One by one, the
"byes" dropped down from the village, and to each in turn Jem had to
tell all he knew about the mermen. Then commenced a running fire of
chaff from every quarter.

"Where are yere banjoes, gintlemin? Ye might as well spind the Sunday
pleasantly, for the sorra a wan o' ye will get off before night."

"Start 'Way down the Suwanee River,' Jem, and we'll give 'em a chorus."

"You're Jem Deady, I suppose," said one of the bailiffs. "Well, Deady,
remember you're a marked mon. I gut yer cherickter last night from a
gentleman as the greatest ruffian amongst all the ruffians of
Kilronan--"

"Yerra, man, ye're takin' lave of yer sinses. Is 't Jem Deady? Jem
Deady, the biggest _omadhaun_ in the village."

"Jem Deady, the greatest _gommal_[9] that ever lived."

"Jem Deady, that doesn't know his right hand from his left."

"Jem Deady, who doesn't know enough to come in out of the wet."

"Jem Deady, the innocent, that isn't waned from his mother ayet."

[Illustration: "Hallo, there!... who the ---- are ye?" (p. 457.)]

During all these compliments Jem smoked placidly. I had forgotten one of
the most serious duties of a novelist--the description of Jem's
toilette. I had forgotten to say that a black pilot coat with velvet
collar, red silk handkerchief, etc., was a veritable Nessus shirt to
Jem. So passionately fond of work was he, and so high an idea had he
conceived on the sacredness and nobleness of work, that integuments
savoring of Sabbath indolence were particularly intolerable to him. He
moved about stiffly in them, was glad to shake them off, and resume his
white, lime-stained, patched, and torn, but oh! such luxuriously easy
garments of every-day life. Then I regret to have to record an act of
supreme vanity, that might be pardonable or venial in a young lady going
to a ball or coming out in her first concert, but was simply shocking in
a middle-aged man going out to Mass on a Sunday morning. Jem Deady
actually _powdered his face_! I do not say that it was violet powder or
that he used a puff. His methods were more primitive and more
successful. He went to a pot where lime was seething, or rather had been
seething. He took up the thick lumps and crushed them into dust. He made
his face as white as if he were going to play the king in Macbeth, and
Banquo's ghost was arising; and he turned his glossy locks into a
cadaverous and premature grayness, and Bess didn't like it. She wanted
to see him only one Sunday in "his best shuit"; but Jem, unkind fellow,
would not grant her that gratification.

Where was I? Oh, yes!

Jem, nothing loth, "ruz" the "Suwanee River," and accompanying himself
on an imaginary banjo, drew tears from all eyes by singing, with mingled
pathos and regret:--

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