II

The account old Simeon and Grandsire Welsh gave of Tim's seizure was

that he had been sitting outside the kitchen window, where they all were

listening with interest to the conversation within, when suddenly he had

thrown up his arms, crying out that he could not do it, and had fallen

in a fit. No one at the poor-farm could know that Tim had reached the

crisis of a severe mental struggle which had been going on for days. He

had for days listened to the bitter words of Mrs. Trafton, and had

sympathized with her grief over her child; and all the time he listened

he had been secretly conscious that the little hoard he had gathered for

his burying would save Nellie from the Betts woman, a shrew notorious

all over the county for her cruelty. He remembered that Bill Trafton had

saved him from drowning; that Mrs. Betts had the credit of having caused

the death of her last bound child; and against this he set the terror of

rising at the Resurrection from the unblessed precincts of the Dartbank

Potter's Field. The mental conflict had been too much for him, and the

appeal of Mrs. Trafton to the Overseer had broken old Tim down.

Tim was got to bed, and in time recovered his senses, although he was

very weak. Mrs. Trafton volunteered to watch with him that night, and so

it came about that at midnight she sat in the bare chamber where old Tim

lay. As the hours wore on Tim seemed much brighter, and asked her to

talk to him to while away the time. The only subject in her mind was her

child.

"If Nellie was with my folks," she said, "I'd try to stand being away

from her; but it's just killing me to have that Betts woman starve her

and beat her the way she's done with the others. She'd kill Nellie."

Tim moved uneasily in bed.

"But ye'd be after seein' the child here," he muttered feebly.

"I'd see her no more'n if she was with my folks," returned Louizy

bitterly; "but I'd know how she was suffering."

The sick man did not answer. He turned his face to the wall and lay

silent. After a time his regular breathing showed that he slept, while

the watcher brooded in hopeless grief. At length Tim grew restless and

began to mutter in his sleep.

"The poor creature's having a bad dream," Louizy said to herself, as his

words grew more vehement and wild. "I wonder if I'd better wake him."

She was still debating the matter in her mind when Tim gave a sudden cry

and sat up in bed, trembling in every limb. His face was ghastly.

"Oh, I will, I will!" he cried out. "I will, so help me Holy Mary!"

"Tim, Tim, what's the matter?" asked the nurse.

The old man clutched her hands desperately for a moment, and then seemed

to recover a little his reason. He sank down again and closed his eyes.

For a time he lay there silent. Then he said with strange solemnity:--

"'T is a vision meself has had this night, Louizy."

She thought his mind still wandering, but in a moment he went on with

more calmness: "I'll tell it to ye all, Louizy. Give me a sup till I get

strength. I'm no more strong than a blind kitten that's just born."

She gave him nourishment and stimulant, and Tim feebly and with many

pauses told his dream. The force of a natural dramatic narrator still

shaped his speech, and as he became excited, he spoke with more and more

strength, until he was sitting up in bed, and speaking with a voice more

clear than he had used for many a day.

"But it was a fearsome dream's had holt on me the night. 'T is meself's

been palarvering with the blessed St. Peter face to face and tongue to

tongue; and if I'd ought to be some used to it through having been dead

once already by drowning, this time I was broke up by being dead in good

earnest, by the same token that when St. Peter set his two piercing

black eyes on me, I could tell by the look of 'em that it was straight

through me whole body he was seeing.

"And the first thing I knew in my dream I was going all sole alone on

a frightsome road all sprinkled over with ashes and bones, and I that

crawly in my back I could feel the backbone of me wiggling up and down

like a caterpillar, so my heart was choking in my throat with the fear

of it. And I went on and I went on; and all the time it was in the head

of me there was that coming behind was more fearsome than all the bones

and skelingtons forninst. And I went on and I went on, seeming to

be pushed along like, and not able to help meself; and all the time

something was creeping, and creeping, and creeping behind, till all the

blood in my body was that chilled the teeth of me chattered. And I went

on and I went on till I could n't stand it one mortal minute more; but I

had to turn if the life went out of me for it. And there behind was a

mite of a girl, a wee bit thing, thin and starved looking, and seeming

that weak it was pitiful to see. 'Poor thing,' sez I to my own ghost,

'it's pitying her the day is Tim Calligan, if I be him,' sez I, 'and not

some other body, for having no body perhaps I ain't anybody at all, but

just a spook in this place that ain't nowhere.' And all the time I was

that scared of the wee bit child, being as it were where it could n't

be, and me dead before it and it dead behind me, and always following

and following; so without thinking deeply what was to be done, I starts

up and runs as hard as my legs that was turned into ghost shanks would

let me. And I run through them ashes, stumbling on bones and seeing

shadows that would get in the way and I had to run through 'em, and the

weight of the horror of it words would n't tell.

"And when I run, the wee bit child run; and it scared me worse than

ever when the further I run away from it the closer it was to me, till

at last it had a grab on the tail of my coat; and it clung on, and I

that mad with fear I had no more sense than a hen with its head cut

off and goes throwing itself round about for anger at the thought of

being killed, and not knowing it is dead already. And oh, Louizy, the

scaresomeness of the places I run through a-trying to get rid of that

wee bit thing! It's downright awful to think of the things that can

happen to a dead man while he's alive all the time and forgetful of it

through dreaming!

"So when I'd been going on till mortal man could n't stand it no longer,

let alone a ghost, there I was just forninst the gate of Heaven, not in

the least knowing how I come there or would I get in; and blessed St.

Peter himself on a white stone outside the gate sitting and smiling and

looking friendly so the terror went out of me like a shadow in the sun.

And I scraped my foot, and I went up close to him, standing that way

would I hide the child ahind of me; for sez I to meself: 'What'll I say

to his Reverence and he axes me about the girl?' And St. Peter he sez to

me, mighty polite and condescending: 'Good-morning,' sez he. 'The top of

the morning to your Reverence, and thank ye kindly,' sez I. 'And what'll

be your name?' sez he. 'Tim Calligan, your honor,' sez I, answering as

pert as ever I could; for there was that in his manner of speaking

that made me feel shivery, as if me heart'd been out all night in a

snowstorm. 'It's a decent, respectable body I am, your Reverence,' sez

I, 'though I say it as should n't, having nobody else at hand that would

put in a word for me.' 'And was ye buried in holy ground?' sez he. 'I

was that,' sez I; 'and many's the weary year I've been scraping to do

that,' sez I. 'And what'll that be behind ye?' sez he. And I looked

this way and that way, trying to make as if I did n't know; and at last

I pretended to spy the child, and to be that surprised he could n't

suspect I ever clapped eyes on the wee bit thing before. 'That, your

Reverence,' sez I, 'has the look of a scrap of a girl. Is it one your

Reverence is bringing up?' sez I, being that desperate I was as bold

as a brass kettle. 'And what'll she be doing here?' sez his Reverence,

paying no heed to the impertinence of the question. 'Sure, how'll I know

that?' sez I. 'Will she be coming with you?' sez he. 'Don't she belong

hereabouts?' sez I, trying hard to brazen it out, and feeling my heart

go plump down out of my mouth into my boots, more by token that I was

barefoot the time. 'Will she be coming with you?' sez he again. 'Sorra

a bit,' sez I; 'I just could n't get away from her,' sez I. 'And what

for'll you be trying to get away from her, and her no bigger than a

bee's knee?' sez he, looking at me so hard that I could n't hold up my

face forninst him. 'Well, your Reverence,' sez I, looking down at the

stones, and seeing the weeds trying to grow between them in the very

face of Heaven itself, 'it's inconvenient traveling with a child

anywhere, let alone the ondecent places I've been through this night;

and the girl was n't mine, and I might get blamed for keeping her out

late, with her folks getting scared about her, not knowing where she

was, and not understanding she was where your Holiness would be after

caring for her.' And with that St. Peter put out his hand, looking that

sharp his eyes went through me like needles; and he pulled the wee bit

child from behind me, and he sez to her: 'What is the name of yer?'

'Nellie,' sez she, her voice so thin you could n't hear it, only knowing

what she said from the moving of her lips like shadows on the wall.

'And how came you here?' sez he. 'I was beat and starved to death,'

sez she, shivering till 't was a mercy she did n't go to pieces like

a puff of smoke. And with that St. Peter looked at me once more, and

the cold sweat run down my backbone like rain down a conductor in a

thunder-storm. 'Your Reverence,' sez I, trembling, 'I did n't beat and

starve the girl.' 'That may be,' sez he, 'but there'll be some reason

why she's hanging on to your coat-tail like a burr on a dog,' sez he.

'What for are you following Tim Calligan,' sez he to the girl, 'and he

dead and resting in holy ground?' And with that she put you her little

front finger, that was as thin as a sparrow's claw that's starved to

death in winter, and she pointed to me, and sez she: 'He would n't give

the money to send me to my folks,' sez she; 'and my own father saved the

life of him when he was dead and drownded before I was born,' sez she.

'What for would n't you give the money, Tim?' sez St. Peter, sitting

there on that white stone like a judge trying the life of a man. 'Your

Reverence,' sez I, falling down on the stones at the feet of him,

'twenty years was I struggling, and saving, and scraping to get the bit

money for a grave in holy ground! If I'd give it to the child, I'd be

down this blessed minute I'm having the honor of conversing with your

Holiness--and it's proud I am of your condescending so far!--lying in

unconsecrated ground all cheek by jowl with heretics, and like as not

getting my bones mixed with theirs at the blessed resurrection. Sorra a

bit did I know the suffering of this poor wee bit thing.' 'And did her

father save your life?' sez he. 'He did that,' sez I, 'and a good,

decent, God-fearing man he were,' sez I, 'barring he were a heretic,

your Reverence, owing to his not being asked, it's likely, would he be

born a good Catholic,--and I hope your Reverence ain't been too hard on

Bill Trafton if he's come this way,' sez I. 'Tim,' sez St. Peter,

looking at me with a look like one of the long isuckles on the north

side of the barn in January,--'Tim, 't is no use trying the palarver on

me,' sez he. 'Ye know ye let this child get bound to that Betts woman,

and now she'll be bate to death, and who's to bear the blame if not ye

that might have stopped it? Do ye think, Tim Calligan,' sez he, raising

his voice so the blessed angels come a-looking over the holy walls of

Heaven to see what would be the matter,--by the same token that the

little gold hoops floating round their heads kept clashing together and

sounding like sleigh-bells, their heads was that close together on top

of the wall, and all their eyes looking at me that sorrowful like it

nigh broke my heart,--'do ye think,' sez he, 'you're sleeping in holy

ground when the price of the grave your worthless old carcass is in was

the life of this wee bit child?' And all the angels shook their heads,

and looked at me that reproachful the heart in me got so big it would

have killed me with its swelling only saving that I was dead already,

not to say being dead twice; and I fell to sobbing and praying to St.

Peter for mercy,--and the first thing I knew I woke up in bed, praise be

to the handiworks of God! made alive again, this being the third time,

counting the time I was first born."

Tim's tale was long, and it was interrupted by frequent intervals of

rest made necessary by his weakness. When he ended, the pale forecast

of dawn shone into the squalid room. Louizy was crying softly, in the

suppressed fashion of folk unaccustomed to give full vent even to grief.

Tim lay quiet for a long time. At last he aroused himself to feel

beneath the mattress, and to bring to light a dirty bag of denim. This

he pressed into the hand of his nurse.

"It'll take you both," he murmured feebly. "Blessings go with ye, and

the saints be good to the soul of Tim Calligan, coming up at the Day of

Judgment like a scared woodchuck out of unblessed ground!"