Chapter IV: Part 4

“I looked at her, thinking she was mad, but she held me by the arm and blinked up at me, and seemed in her senses. I told her to tell me what she meant, but she would not. At last I promised to say the masses at once. The next morning I began the masses, and said four of them, and at each the old woman was there close to me, for I said them at the altar of S. Espedito that was in the nave, as she had asked me, and I had a great devotion to him as well, and she was always at her chair just outside the altar-rails. I scarcely saw her, of course, for I was a young priest and had been taught not to lift my eyes when I turned round, but on the fourth day I looked at her at the _Orate fratres_ and she was staring not at me or the altar, but at the corner on the left. I looked there when I turned, but there was nothing but the glass case with the silver hearts in it to S. Espedito.

“That was on a Friday, and in the evening I went to the church again to hear confessions, and when I was done, the old woman was there again.

“‘They are nearly done, my Father?’ she said, ‘and you will finish them to-morrow?’

“I told her Yes; but she made me promise that whatever happened I would do so.

“Then she went on, ‘Then I will tell you, my Father, what I would not before. I do not know the man’s name, but I see him each day during mass at that altar. He is in the corner. I have seen him there ever since the church was built.’

“Well, I knew she was mad then, but I was curious about it, and asked her to describe him to me; and she did so. I expected a man in a sheet or in flames or something of the kind, but it was not so. She described to me a man in a dress she did not know--a tunic to the knees, bareheaded, with a short sword in his hand. Well, then I saw what she meant, she was thinking of S. Espedito himself. He was a Roman soldier, you remember, gentlemen?

“‘And a cuirass?’ I said. ‘A steel breastplate and helmet?’

“Then she surprised me.

“‘Why, no, Father; he has nothing on his head or breast, and there is a bull beside him.’

“Well, gentlemen, I was taken aback by that. I did not know what to say.”

Monsignor leant swiftly forward.

“Mithras,” he said abruptly.

The Italian smiled.

“Monsignor knows everything,” he said.

Then I broke in, because I was more interested than I knew.

“Tell me, Monsignor, what was Mithras?”

The priest explained shortly. It was an Eastern worship, extraordinarily pure, introduced into Italy a little after the beginning of the Christian era. Mithras was a god, filling a position not unlike that of the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity. He offered a perpetual sacrifice, and through that sacrifice souls were enabled to rise from earthly things to heavenly, if they relied upon it and accompanied that faith by works of discipline and prayer.

“I beg your pardon, Father Bianchi,” he ended.

The Italian smiled again.

“Yes, Monsignor,” he said, “I know that now, but I did not know it for many years afterwards, and I know something else now that I did not know then. Well, to return.

“I told my old woman that she was dreaming, that it could not be so, that there was no room for a bull in the corner, that it was a picture of S. Espedito that she was thinking of.

“‘And why did you not get the masses said before?’ I asked.

“She smiled rather slyly at me then.

“‘I did get five said once before,’ she said, ‘in Naples, but they did him no good. And when once again I told the _parrocho_ here, he told me to be off; he would not say them.’

“And she had waited for a young priest, it seemed, and had determined not to tell him the story till the masses were said, and had saved up her money meanwhile.

“Well, I went home, and got to talking with the old priest, and led him on, so that he thought that he had introduced the subject, and presently he told me that when the foundation of the church had been laid forty years before, they had found an old cave in the hill, with heathen things in it. He knew no more than that about it, but he told me to fetch a bit of pottery from a cupboard, and showed it me, and there was just the tail of a bull upon it, and an eagle.”

Monsignor leaned forward again.

“Just so,” he said, “and the bull was lying down?”

The Italian nodded, and was silent.

We all looked at him. It seemed a tame ending, I thought. Then Father Brent put our thoughts into words.

“That is not all?” he said.

Father Bianchi looked at him sharply, and at all of us, but said nothing.

“Ah! that is not all,” said the other again persistently.

“Bah!” cried the Italian suddenly. “It was not all, if you will have it so. But the rest is madness, as mad as Giovannina herself. What I saw, I saw because she made me expect it. It was nothing but the shadow, or the light in the glass case.”

A perceptible thrill ran through us all. The abrupt change from contempt to seriousness was very startling.

“Tell us, Father,” said the English priest; “we shall think no worse of you for it. If it was only the shadow, what harm is there in telling it?”

“Indeed you must finish,” went on Monsignor; “it is in the contract.”

The Italian looked round again, frowned, smiled and laughed uneasily.

“I have told it to no one till to-day,” he said, “but you shall hear it. But it was only the shadow--you understand that?”

A chorus, obviously insincere, broke out from the room.

“It was only the shadow, Padre Bianchi.”

Again the priest laughed shortly; then the smile faded, and he went on.

“I went down early the next morning, before dawn, and I made my meditation before the Blessed Sacrament; but I could not help looking across once or twice at the corner by S. Espedito’s altar; it was too dark to see anything clearly; but I could make out the silver hearts in the glass case. When I had finished Giovannina came in.

“I could not help stopping by her chair as I went to rest.

“‘Is there anything there?’ I asked.

“She shook her head at me.

“‘He is never there till mass begins,’ she said.

* * * * *

“The sacristy door that opens out of doors was set wide as I came past it in my vestments; and the dawn was coming up across the hills, all purple.”

Monsignor murmured something, and the priest stopped.

“I beg your pardon,” said Monsignor; “but that was the time the sacrifice of Mithras was offered.”

“When I came out into the church,” went on the priest, “it was all gray in the light of the dawn, but the chapels were still dark. I went up the steps, not daring to look in the corner, and set the vessels down. As I was spreading the corporal the server came up and lighted the candles. And still I dared not look. I turned by the right and came down, and stood waiting till he knelt beside me.

“Then I found I could not begin. I knew what folly it was, but I was terribly frightened. I heard the server whisper, _In nomine Patris_....

“Then I shut my eyes tight, and began.

“Well, by the time I had finished the preparation, I felt certain that something was watching me from the corner. I told myself, as I tell myself now,” snapped the Italian fiercely--“I told myself it was but what the woman had told me. And then at last I opened my eyes to go up the steps, but I kept them down, and only saw the dark corner out of the side of my eyes.

“Then I kissed the altar and began.

“Well, it was not until the Epistle that I understood that I should have to face the corner at the reading of the Gospel; but by then I do not think I could have faced it directly, even if I had wished.

“So when I was saying the _Munda cor_ in the centre, I thought of a plan, and as I went to read the Gospel I put my left hand over my eyes, as if I were in pain, and read the Gospel like that. And so all through the mass I went on; I always dropped my eyes when I had to turn that way at all, and I finished everything and gave the blessing.

“As I gave it, I looked at the old woman, and she was kneeling there, staring across at the corner; so I knew that she was still dreaming she saw something.

“Then I went to read the last Gospel.”

The priest was plainly speaking with great difficulty; he passed his hands over his lips once or twice. We were all quiet.

“Well, gentlemen, courage came to me then; and as I signed the altar I looked straight into the corner.”

He stopped again, and began resolutely once more; but his voice rang with hysteria.

“Well, gentlemen, you understand that my head was full of it now, and that the corner was dark, and that the shadows were very odd.”

“Yes, yes, Padre Bianchi,” said Monsignor easily, “and what did the shadows look like?”

The Italian gripped the arms of the chair, and screamed his answer.

“I will not tell you, I will not tell you. It was but the shadow. My God, why have I told you the tale at all?”

VII

_Father Jenks’ Tale_

I have not yet had occasion to describe Father Jenks, the Ontario priest; partly, I think, because he had not previously distinguished himself by anything but silence, and partly because he was so true to his type that I had scarcely noticed even that.

It was not until the following evening, when he was seated in the central chair of the group, that I really observed him sufficiently to take in his characteristics with any definiteness and to see how wholly he was American. He was clean-shaven, with a heavy mouth, square jaw, and an air of something that I must call dulness, relieved only by a spark of alertness in each of his eyes, as he leaned back and began his story. He spoke deliberately, in an even voice, and as he spoke looked steadily a little above the fire; his hands lay together on his right knee, which was crossed over his left, and I noticed a large, elastic-sided boot cocked toward the warmth. I knew that he had passed a great part of his early life in England, and I was not surprised to observe that he spoke with hardly a trace of American accent or phraseology.

“I, too, am a man of one story,” he said, “and I dare say you may think it not worth the telling. But it impressed me.”

He looked round with heavy, amused eyes as if to apologize.

“It was when I was in England, in the eighties. I was in the Cotswolds. You know them, perhaps?”

Again he looked round. Monsignor Maxwell jerked the ash off his cigarette impatiently. This American’s air of leisure was a little tiresome.

“I lived in a cottage,” went on the other, “at the edge of Minchester, not two hundred yards from the old church. My own schism shop, as the parson called it once or twice in the local paper, was a tin building behind my house; it was not beautiful. It was a kind of outlandish stranger beside the church, and the parson made the most of that. I never was able to understand.”

He broke off again and pressed his lips in a reminiscent smile.

“Now, all that part of the Cotswolds is like a table; it is flat at the top, with steep sides sloping down into the valleys. The great houses stand mostly half way down these slopes. It is too windy on the top for their trees and gardens. The Dominicans have a house a few miles from Minchester up one of the opposite hills; and I would go over there to my confession on Saturdays and stay an hour or two over tea, talking to one of them. It was there that I heard the tale of the house I am going to speak about.

“This was a house that stood not two miles from my own village--a great place, built half way down one of the slopes. It had been a Benedictine house once, though there was little enough of that part left; most of it was red brick with twisted chimneys; but on the lawn that sloped down toward the wood and the stream at the bottom of the valley there was the west arch of the nave still standing, with the doorway beneath and a couple of chapels on either side. Mrs.--er--Arbuthnot we will call her, if you please--had laid it out with a rockery beneath; and once I saw her from the hill behind drinking tea with her friends in one of the chapels.

“Then the dining-room, I heard from the Dominicans, had been the abbot’s chapel. This, too, was what they told me. The house had been shut up for forty years and had a bad name. It had once been a farm, but things had happened there--the sons had died, a famous horse bred there had broken its neck somehow on the lawn. Then another family had taken it from the owner, and the only son of the lot, too, had died; and then folks began to talk about a curse; and the oldest inhabitant was trotted out as usual to make mischief and gossip; and the end was, the house was shut up.

“Then the owner had built on to it. He pulled down a bit more of the ruins, meaning to live in it himself, and then his son went up.”

The Canadian smiled with one corner of his mouth.

“This is what I heard from the Dominicans, you know.”

Father Brent looked up swiftly.

“They are right, though,” he said. “I know the house and others like it.”

“Yes, Father,” said the other priest; “your island has its points.”

He recrossed his legs and drew out his pipe and pouch.

“Well, as this priest says, there are other houses like it. Otherwise I could scarcely tell this tale. It’s too ancient and feudal to happen in my country.”

He paused so long to fill his pipe that Father Maxwell sighed aloud.

“Yes, Monsignor,” said the priest without looking up, “I am going on immediately.”

He put his pipe into the corner of his mouth, took out his matches and went on.

“Well, Mrs. Arbuthnot had taken the house a year before I came to Minchester. She was what the Dominicans called a frivolous woman; but I called her real solid before the end. What they meant was that she had parties down there, and tea in the chapel, and a dresser with blue plates where the altar used to stand in the abbot’s place, and a vestment for her fire-screen, and all that; and a couple of chestnuts that she used to drive about the country with, and a groom in boots, and a couple of fellows with powdered hair to help her in and out.

“Well, I saw all that at a garden-party she gave, and I must say we got on very well. I had seen her before once or twice out of my window on Sunday morning going along with a morocco prayer-book with a cross on it, and a bonnet on the back of her head. Then I showed her round the old church one day with some visitors of hers, and she left a card on me next day.

“On the day of the garden-party I saw the house, and the blue china and the rest, and she asked me what I thought of it all, and I said it was very nice; and she asked me whether I thought it wrong, with a sort of cackle; and I told her she had better follow her own religious principles and let me follow mine, and not have any exchanges. She told me then I was a sensible man, and called up her son to introduce us. He was a fellow of twenty or so, a bright lad, up at Oxford. He was just engaged to be married, too--that was why they had the party--and when I saw his girl, too, I thought things looked pretty unwholesome for the old curse, and I think I said so to the lady. She thought me more sensible than ever after that, and I heard her telling another old body what I had said.”

The Canadian paused again to strike a match, and I saw the corners of his mouth twitching either with the effort to draw or with amusement; I scarcely knew which. When the pipe was well alight he went on.

“It was on the last Sunday of September that year that I heard the young man was ill, and that the marriage was put off. I remember it well, partly because they were having a high time at the church, decorating it all for Michaelmas, which was next day, with the parson pretending it was for Harvest Festival, as they always do. I had seen the pumpkins go in the day before, and wondered where they put them all. I went up to the churchyard after mass to have a look, and was nearly knocked down by the parson. I began to say something or other, but he ran past me, through from the vicarage, with his coat-tails flying and his man after him. But I stopped the man, and got out of him that Archie was ill, and that the parson was sent for.

“Well, then I went back home and sat down.”

The priest drew upon his pipe in silence a moment or two.

I felt rather impressed. His airy manner of talking was shot now with a kind of seriousness, and I wondered what was coming next.

He went on almost immediately.

“I heard a bit more as the day wore on. One of my people stayed after Catechism to tell me that the young man was worse, that a doctor had come from Stroud, and another wired for from London.

“Well, I waited. I thought I knew what would happen. I thought I had seen a bit more in the old lady than the Dominicans had seen, but what I was going to say to her I knew no more than the dead.

“Then that night as I was going to bed--I had just said Matins and Lauds for Michaelmas day--the message came.

“I was half way upstairs when I heard a knocking at the door, and I went down again and opened it. There stood one of the fellows I had seen on the box of the carriage, and he was out of breath with running. He had a lantern in his hand, because there was a thick mist that night up from the valley.

“He gave me the lady’s compliments, and would I step down? Master Archie was ill. That was all.”

“Well, in a minute we were off into the thick of the mist. I took nothing with me but my stole, for it was not a proper sick call. We said little or nothing to each other. He just told me that Master Archie had been taken ill about ten o’clock, quite suddenly. He didn’t know what it was.”

The priest paused again for a moment.

Then he went on almost apologetically.

“You know how it is, gentlemen, when something runs in your head. It may be a tune or a sentence. And I don’t know if you’ve noticed how strong it is sometimes when you have something on your mind.

“Well, what ran in my head was a bit of the office I had just said. It was this. I have never forgotten it since:

“_Stetit Angelus juxta oram templi habens thuribulum aureum in manu sua._”

He said it again, and then added:

“It comes frequently in the office, you remember. It was very natural to remember it.

* * * * *

“Well, in half an hour we were at the top of the hill above the house. I think there must have been a moon, because we could see the mist round us like smoke, but nothing of the house, not even the lights in the top floors below us. It was all white and misty.

“Then we started down through the iron gate and the plantation. I could have lost my way again and again but for the fellow with me, and still we saw nothing of the house till we were close to it on one side; and then I looked up and saw a window like a great yellow door overhead.

“We came round to the front of the house, and there was a carriage there drawn up, with the lamps smoking in the mist, and as we came up I saw that the horses were steaming and blowing. The driver had just brought the London doctor from Stroud and was waiting for orders, I suppose.”

The Canadian paused again.

I was more interested than ever. His descriptions had become queerly particular, and I wondered why. I did not understand yet. The rest, too, were very quiet.

“We went in through the hall past the stuffed bear that held the calling cards and all that, you know, and then turned in to the left to the big dining-room that had been the Abbot’s chapel. Some fool had left the window open. I suppose they were too flurried to think of it. At any rate, the mist had got in, and made the gas-jets overhead look high up like great stars.

“There was a door open upstairs somewhere, and I could hear whispering.

“Well, we went up the staircase that opened on one side below the gallery, that they had put up above the eastern end. The footpace was still there, you know, below the gallery, and the sideboard stood there.

“We came out on to the gallery presently, and my man stopped.

“Then some one came out with Mrs. Arbuthnot and the door closed. She saw me standing there, and I thought she was going to scream; but the fellow with her in the fur coat--he was the London doctor I heard afterward--took her by the arm.

“Well, she was quiet enough then, but as white as death. She had her bonnet on still, just as she must have put it on to go to church with in the morning, when the young man was taken ill. She beckoned me along, and I went.

“As I was going past the doctor he first shook his head at me, and then whispered as I went on to keep her quiet. I knew there was no hope then for Archie, and I was sorry, very sorry, gentlemen.”

The priest shook his own head meditatively once or twice, leaned forward and spat accurately into the heart of the fire.

“Well, it was a big room that I went into, and to tell the truth, I left the door open this time, because I was startled by the screen at the bed and all that.

“The screen stood in the corner by the window to keep off the draught; and the bed to one side of it. I could just catch a glimpse of the lad’s face on the pillow and the local doctor close by him. There was a woman or two there as well.

“But the worst was that the lad was talking and moaning out loud, but I didn’t attend to him then, and besides, Mrs. Arbuthnot had gone through by another door, and I went after her.

“It was a kind of dressing-room--Archie’s perhaps. There was a tall glass and silver things on the table by the window, and a candle or two burning. She turned round there and faced me, and she looked so deadly that I forgot all about the lad for the present. I just looked out to catch her when she fell. I had seen a woman like that once or twice before.

“Well, she said all that I expected--all about the curse and that, and the sins of the fathers; and it was all her fault for taking the beastly place, and how she would swear to clear out--I couldn’t get a word in--and at last she said she’d become a Catholic if the boy lived.

“I did get a word in then, and told her not to talk nonsense. The Church didn’t want people like that. They must believe first and so on, and all the while I was looking out to catch her.

“Well, she didn’t hear a word I said, but she sat down all on a sudden, and I sat down, too, opposite her, and all the while the boy’s voice grew louder and louder from the next room.

“Then she started again, but she hadn’t been under way a minute before I had given over attending to her. I was listening to the lad.”

The priest stopped again abruptly. His pipe had gone out, but he sucked at it hard and seemed not to notice it. His eyes were oddly alert.

“As I listened I looked toward the door into the next room. Both that and the one with the gallery over the hall were open, and I saw the mist coming in like smoke.

“I couldn’t catch every word the lad said. He was talking in a high, droning voice, but I caught enough. It was about a face looking at him through smoke.

“‘His eyes are like flames,’ he said, ‘smoky flames--yellow hair--are you a priest?... What is that red dress?’... Things like that. Well, it seemed pretty tolerable nonsense, and then I----”

Monsignor Maxwell sat up suddenly.

“Good Lord!” he said.

“Yes,” drawled the Canadian, “_Stetit Angelus habens thuribulum aureum_.”

He spoke so placidly that I was almost shocked. It seemed astonishing that a man--Then he went on again.

“Well, I stood up when I heard that, and I faced the old lady.

“‘What’s the dedication of the chapel?’ I said; ‘what’s the saint? Tell me, woman, tell me!’ There! I said it like that.

“Well, she didn’t know what I meant, of course, but I got it out of her at last. Of course, it was St. Michael’s.

“I sat down then and let her chatter on. I suppose I must have looked a fool, because she took me by the shoulder directly.

“‘You aren’t listening, Father Jenks,’ she said.

“I attended to her then. It seemed as if she wanted me to do something to save him, but I don’t think she knew what it was herself, and I’m sure I didn’t, not at first, at least.

“Then she began again, and all the while the boy was crying out. She wanted to know if her becoming a Catholic would do any good, and to tell the truth I wasn’t so sure then myself as I had been before. Then she said she’d give up the house to Catholics, and then at last she said this:

“‘Will you take it off, Father? I know you can. Priests can do anything.’

“Well, I stiffened myself up at that. I was sensible enough not to make a fool of myself, and I said something like this.”

He stopped again; sucked vigorously at his cold pipe.

“I said something like this: ‘Mind you keep your promise,’ I said, ‘but as far as I am concerned, I’d let him off.’”

A curious rustle passed round the room, and the priest caught the sound.

“Yes, gentlemen, I said that. I did, indeed, and I guess most of you gentlemen would have done the same in my circumstances.

“And this is what happened.

“First the lad’s voice stopped, then there was a whispering, then a footstep in the other room, and the next moment Mrs. Arbuthnot was on her feet, with her mouth opened to scream. I had her down again though in time, and when I turned a woman was at the door, and I could see she had closed the outer door through which the mist came.

“Well, her face told us. The lad had taken the right turn. It was something on the brain, I think, that had dispersed or broken or something--I forget now--but it seemed to come in pat enough, didn’t it, gentlemen?”

The Canadian stopped and leaned back. Was that the end then?

Father Brent put my question into words:

“And what happened?”

“Well,” added the other, drawling more than ever, “Mrs. Arbuthnot did not keep her promise. She’s there still, for all I know, and attends the Harvest Festivals as regularly as ever. That spoils the story, doesn’t it?”

“And the son?” put in the English priest swiftly.

“Well, the son was a bit better. That marriage did not take place. The girl broke it off.”

“Well?”

“And Archie’s at the English College at this moment studying for the priesthood. I had tea with him at Aragno’s yesterday.”

VIII

_Father Martin’s Tale_

The Father Rector announced to us one day at dinner that a friend of his from England had called upon him a day or two before, and that he had asked him to supper that evening.

“There is a story I heard him tell,” he said, “some years ago that I think he would contribute if you cared to ask him, Monsignor. It is remarkable; I remember thinking so.”

“To-night?” said Monsignor.

“Yes; he is coming to-night.”

“That will do very well,” said the other; “we have no story for to-night.”

* * * * *

Father Martin appeared at supper, a gray-haired old man with a face like a mouse and large brown eyes that were generally cast down. He had a way at table of holding his hands together with his elbows at his side, that bore out the impression of his face.

He looked up deprecatingly and gave a little nervous laugh as Monsignor put his request.

“It is a long time since I have told it, Monsignor,” he said.

“That is the more reason for telling it again,” said the other priest with his sharp geniality, “or it may be lost to humanity.”

“It has met with incredulity,” said the old man.

“It will not meet with it here, then,” remarked Monsignor. “We have been practising ourselves in the art of believing. Another act of faith will do us no harm.”

He explained the circumstances.

Father Martin looked round, and I could see that he was pleased.

“Very well, Monsignor,” he said; “I will do my best to make it easy.”

* * * * *

When we had reached the room upstairs the old priest was put into the arm-chair in the centre, drawn back a little so that all might see him; he refused tobacco, propped his chin on his two hands, looking more than ever like a venerable mouse, and began his story. I sat at the end of the semicircle, near the fire, and watched him as he talked.

“I regret I have not heard the other tales,” he said; “it would encourage me in my own. But perhaps it is better so. I have told this so often that I can only tell it in one way, and you must forgive me, gentlemen, if my way is not yours.

* * * * *

“About twenty years ago I had charge of a mission in Lancashire, some fourteen miles from Blackburn, among the hills. The name of the place is Monkswell; it was a little village then, but I think it is a town now. In those days there was only one street, of perhaps a dozen houses on each side. My little church stood at the head of the street, with the presbytery beside it. The house had a garden at the back, with a path running through it to the gate; and beyond the gate was a path leading on to the moor.

“Nearly all the village was Catholic, and had always been so, and I had perhaps a hundred more of my folk scattered about the moor. Their occupation was weaving; that was before the coal was found at Monkswell. Now they have a great church there, with a parish of over a thousand.

“Of course I knew all my people well enough; they are wonderful folk, those Lancashire folk! I could tell you a score of tales of their devotion and faith. There was one woman that I could make nothing of. She lived with her two brothers in a little cottage a couple of miles away from Monkswell; and the three kept themselves by weaving. The two men were fine lads, regular at their religious duties, and at mass every Sunday. But the woman would not come near the church. I went to her again and again, and before every Easter, but it was of no use. She would not even tell me why she would not come; but I knew the reason. The poor creature had been ruined in Blackburn, and could not hold up her head again. Her brothers took her back, and she had lived with them for ten years, and never once during that time, so far as I knew, had set foot outside her little place. She could not bear to be seen, you see.”

* * * * *

The little pointed face looked very tender and compassionate now, and the brown, beady eyes ran round the circle deprecatingly.

* * * * *

“Well, it was one Sunday in January that Alfred told me that his sister was unwell. It seemed to be nothing serious, he said, and of course he promised to let me know if she should become worse. But I made up my mind that I would go in any case during that week and see if sickness had softened her at all. Alfred told me, too, that another brother of his, Patrick, on whom, let it be remembered”--and he held up an admonitory hand--“I had never set eyes, was coming up to them on the next day from London for a week’s holiday. He promised he would bring him to see me later on in the week.

“There was a fall of snow that afternoon, not very deep, and another next day, and I thought I would put off my walk across the hills until it melted, unless I heard that Sarah was worse.

“It was on the Wednesday evening about six o’clock that I was sent for.

“I was sitting in my study on the ground floor with the curtains drawn when I heard the garden gate open and close, and I ran out into the hall just as the knock came at the back door. I knew that it was unlikely that any one should come at that hour and in such weather except for a sick call, and I opened the door almost before the knocking had ended.

“The candle was blown out by the draught, but I knew Alfred’s voice at once.

“‘She is worse, Father,’ he said; ‘for God’s sake come at once. I think she wishes for the sacraments. I am going on for the doctor.’

“I knew by his voice that it was serious, though I could not see his face; I could only see his figure against the snow outside, and before I could say more than that I would come at once he was gone again, and I heard the garden door open and shut. He was gone down to the doctor’s house, I knew, a mile further down the valley.

“I shut the hall door without bolting it and went to the kitchen and told my housekeeper to grease my boots well and set them in my room with my cloak and hat and muffler and my lantern. I told her I had had a sick call and did not know when I should be back; she had better put the pot on the fire, and I would help myself when I came home.

“Then I ran into the church through the sacristy to fetch the holy oils and the Blessed Sacrament.

“When I came back I noticed that one of the strings of the purse that held the pyx was frayed, and I set it down on the table to knot it properly. Then again I heard the garden gate open and shut.”

The priest lifted his eyes and looked round again; there was something odd in his look.

“Gentlemen, we are getting near the point of the story. I will ask you to listen very carefully and to give me your conclusions afterward. I am relating to you only events as they happened historically. I give you my word as to their truth.”

There was a murmur of assent.

“Well, then,” he went on, “at first I supposed it was Alfred come back again for some reason. I put down the string and went to the door without a light. As I reached the threshold there came a knocking.

“I turned the handle and a gust of wind burst in as it had done five minutes before. There was a figure standing there, muffled up as the other had been.

“‘What is it?’ I said. ‘I am just coming. Is it you, Alfred?’

“‘No, Father,’ said a voice--the man was on the steps a yard from me--‘I came to say that Sarah is better and does not wish for the sacraments.’

“Of course I was startled at that.

“‘Why, who are you?’ I said. ‘Are you Patrick?’

“‘Yes, Father,’ said the man; ‘I am Patrick.’

“I cannot describe his voice, but it was not extraordinary in any way; it was a little muffled; I supposed he had a comforter over his mouth. I could not see his face at all. I could not even see if he was stout or thin, the wind blew about his cloak so much.

“As I hesitated the door from the kitchen behind me was flung open, and I heard a very much frightened voice calling:

“‘Who’s that, Father?’ said Hannah.

“I turned round.

“‘It is Patrick Oldroyd,’ I said; ‘he is come from his sister.’

“I could see the woman standing in the light from the kitchen door; she had her hands out before her as if she were frightened at something.

“‘Go out of the draught,’ I said.

“She went back at that, but she did not close the door, and I knew she was listening to every word.

“‘Come in, Patrick,’ I said, turning round again.

“I could see he had moved down a step, and was standing on the gravel now.

“He came up again then, and I stood aside to let him go past me into my study. But he stopped at the door. Still I could not see his face; it was dark in the hall, you remember.

“‘No, Father,’ he said; ‘I cannot wait. I must go after Alfred.’

“I put out my hand toward him, but he slipped past me quickly and was out again on the gravel before I could speak.

“‘Nonsense!’ I said. ‘She will be none the worse for a doctor, and if you will wait a minute I will come with you.’

“‘You are not wanted,’ he said rather offensively, I thought. ‘I tell you she is better, Father; she will not see you.’

“I was a little angry at that. I was not accustomed to be spoken to in that way.

“‘That is very well,’ I said; ‘but I shall come for all that, and if you do not wish to walk with me I shall walk alone.’

“He was turning to go, but he faced me again then.

“‘Do not come, Father,’ he said; ‘come to-morrow. I tell you she will not see you. You know what Sarah is.’

“‘I know very well,’ I said; ‘she is out of grace, and I know what will be the end of her if I do not come. I tell you I am coming, Patrick Oldroyd. So you can do as you please.’

“I shut the door and went back into my room, and as I went the garden gate opened and shut once more.

“My hands trembled a little as I began to knot the string of the pyx; I supposed then that I had been more angered than I had known”--the old priest looked round again swiftly and dropped his eyes--“but I do not now think that it was only anger. However, you shall hear.”

He had moved himself by now to the very edge of his chair, where he sat crouched up with his hands together. The listeners were all very quiet.

“I had hardly begun to knot the string before Hannah came in. She bobbed at the door when she saw what I was holding, and then came forward. I could see that she was very much upset by something.

“‘Father,’ she said, ‘for the love of God do not go with that man.’

“‘I am ashamed of you, Hannah,’ I told her. ‘What do you mean?’

“‘Father,’ she said, ‘I am afraid. I do not like that man. There is something the matter.’

“I rose, laid the pyx down, and went to my boots without saying anything.

“‘Father,’ she said again, ‘for the love of God do not go. I tell you I was frightened when I heard his knock.’

“Still I said nothing, but put on my boots and went to the table where the pyx lay and the case of oils.

“She came right up to me, and I could see that she was as white as death as she stared at me.

“I finished putting on my cloak, wrapped the comforter round my neck, put on my hat and took up the lantern.

“‘Father,’ she said again.

“I looked her full in the face then as she knelt down.

“‘Hannah,’ I said, ‘I am going. Patrick has gone after his brother.’

“‘It is not Patrick,’ she cried after me; ‘I tell you, Father----’

“Then I shut the door and left her kneeling there.

* * * * *

“It was very dark when I got down the steps, and I hadn’t gone a yard along the path before I stepped over my knee into a drift of snow. It had banked up against a gooseberry bush. Well, I saw that I must go carefully, so I stepped back on to the middle of the path, and held my lantern low.

“I could see the marks of the two men plain enough; it was a path that I had made broad on purpose so that I could walk up and down to say my office without thinking much of where I stepped.

“There was one track on this side and one on that.

“Have you ever noticed, gentlemen, that a man in snow will nearly always go back over his own traces in preference to any one else’s? Well, that is so, and it was so in this case.

“When I got to the garden gate I saw that Alfred had turned off to the right on his way to the doctor; his marks were quite plain in the light of the lantern, going down the hill. But I was astonished to see that the other man had not gone after him as he said he would, for there was only one pair of footmarks going down the hill, and the other track was plain enough, coming and going. The man must have gone straight home, I thought.

“Now----”

“One moment, Father Martin,” said Monsignor, leaning forward; “draw the two lines of tracks here.”

He put a pencil and paper into the priest’s hands.

Father Martin scribbled for a moment or two and then held up the paper so that we could all see it.

As he explained I understood. He had drawn a square for the house, a line for the garden wall, and through the gap ran four lines, marked with arrows. Two ran to the house and two back as far as the gate; at this point one curved sharply round to the right and one straight across the paper beside that which marked the coming.

“I noticed all this,” said the old priest emphatically, “because I determined to follow along the double track so far as Sarah Oldroyd’s house, and I kept the light turned on to it. I did not wish to slip into a snowdrift.

“Now, I was very much puzzled. I had been thinking it over, of course, ever since the man had gone, and I could not understand it. I must confess that my housekeeper’s words had not made it clearer. I knew she did not know Patrick; he had never been home since she had come to me. I was surprised, too, at his behavior, for I knew from his brother that he was a good Catholic; and--well, you understand, gentlemen, it was very puzzling. But Hannah was Irish, and I knew they had strange fancies sometimes.

“Then there was something else, which I had better mention before I go any further. Although I had not been frightened when the man came, yet when Hannah had said that she was frightened I knew what she meant. It had seemed to me natural that she should be frightened. I can say no more than that.”

He threw out his hands deprecatingly, and then folded them again sedately on his hunched knees.

“Well, I set out across the moor, following carefully in the double track of--of the man who called himself Patrick. I could see Alfred’s single track a yard to my right; sometimes the tracks crossed.

“I had no time to look about me much, but I saw now and again the slopes to the north, and once when I turned I saw the lights of the village behind me, perhaps a quarter of a mile away. Then I went on again, and I wondered as I went.

“I will tell you one thing that crossed my mind, gentlemen. I did wonder whether Hannah had not been right, and if this was Patrick after all. I thought it possible--though I must say I thought it very unlikely--that it might be some enemy of Sarah’s, some one she had offended, an infidel, perhaps, but who wished her to die without the sacraments that she wanted. I thought that, but I never dreamed of--of what I thought afterward and think now.”

He looked round again, clasped his hands more tightly and went on.

“It was very rough going, and as I climbed up at last on to the little shoulder of hill that was the horizon from my house, I stopped to get my breath, and turned round again to look behind me.

“I could see my house lights at the end of the village, and the church beside it, and I wondered that I could see the lights so plainly. Then I understood that Hannah must be in my study, and that she had drawn the blind up to watch my lantern going across the snow.

“I am ashamed to tell you, gentlemen, that that cheered me a little; I do not quite know why, but I must confess that I was uncomfortable. I know that I should not have been, carrying what I did, and on such an errand, but I was uneasy. It seemed very lonely out there, and the white sheets of snow made it worse. I do not think that I should have minded the dark so much. There was not much wind and everything was very quiet. I could just hear the stream running down in the valley behind me. The clouds had gone, and there was a clear night of stars overhead.”

The old priest stopped; his lips worked a little as I had seen them before two or three times during his story. Then he sighed, looked at us and went on.

“Now, gentlemen, I entreat you to believe me. This is what happened next. You remember that this point at which I stopped to take breath was the horizon from my house. Notice that.

“Well, I turned round and lowered my lantern again to look at the tracks, and a yard in front of me they ceased. They ceased!”

He paused again, and there was not a sound from the circle.

“They ceased, gentlemen; I swear it to you, and I cannot describe what I felt. At first I thought it was a mistake; that he had leaped a yard or two; that the snow was frozen. It was not so.

“There a yard to the right were Alfred’s tracks, perfectly distinct, with the toes pointing the way from which I had come. There was no confusion, no hard or broken ground; there was just the soft surface of the snow, the trampled path of--of the man’s footsteps and mine and Alfred’s a yard or two away.”

The old man did not look like a mouse now; his eyes were large and bright, his mouth severe, and his hands hung in the air in a petrified gesture.

“If he had leaped,” he said, “he did not alight again.”

* * * * *

He passed his hand over his mouth once or twice.

“Well, gentlemen, I confess that I hesitated. I looked back at the lights and then on again at the slopes in front, and then I was ashamed of myself. I did not hesitate long, for any place was better than that. I went on; I dared not run, for I think I should have gone mad if I had lost self-control; but I walked, and not too fast, either; I put my hand on the pyx as it lay on my breast, but I dared not turn my head to right or left. I just stared at Alfred’s tracks in front of me and trod in them.

“Well, gentlemen, I did run the last hundred yards; the door of the Oldroyds’ cottage was open, and they were looking out for me, and I gave Sarah the last sacraments, and heard her confession. She died before morning.

“And I have one confession to make myself--I did not go home that night. They were very courteous to me when I told them the story, and made out that they did not wish me to leave their sister; so the doctor and Alfred walked back over the moor together to tell Hannah I should not be back, and that all was well with me.

“There, gentlemen.”

“And Patrick?” said a voice.

“Patrick, of course, had not been out that night.”

IX

_Mr. Bosanquet’s Tale_

I think that it was on the second Sunday evening that Father Brent brought in his guest. There was a function of some kind at S. Silvestro--I forget the occasion; a Cardinal had given Benediction, and a reception was to follow. At any rate, there were only three of us at home, the German, Father Brent, and myself.

Of course, we talked of our symposium, and the guest, a middle-aged layman, seemed to listen with interest, but he did not say very much. He was a brown-bearded man; he ate slowly and deliberately, and I must confess that I was not particularly impressed with him. Neither did Father Brent try to draw him out. I noticed that he looked at him questioningly once or twice, but he did not actually express his thought till after a little speech from Father Stein.

“But it is a little tiresome to me,” said the German, “this talk of footsteps and voices and visions. If that world in which we believe is spiritual, as we know it is, how is it that it presents itself to us under material images? These things are but appearances, but what is the reality?”

Father Brent turned to his friend.

“Well,” he said, “what now?”

Mr. Bosanquet smiled and became grave again over his pastry.

“You will repeat it then?” persisted the priest.

The Englishman looked up for an instant, and I met his grave eyes.

“If these gentlemen really wish it,” he said briefly.

Father Brent sighed with satisfaction.

“That is excellent,” he said.

Then he explained.