The eve of the day of the memorable funeral two belated visitors to the
Passion Play arrived in the village, unknowing that it had ended, and of
the tragedy which had set a whole valley mourning; unconscious that they
shared in the bitter fortunes of the tailor-man, of whom men and women
spoke with tears. Affected by the gloom of the place, the two visitors
at once prepared for their return journey, but the manner of the
tailorman’s death arrested their sympathies, touched the humanity in
them. The woman was much impressed.
They asked to see the body of the man. They were taken to the door of
the tailor-shop, while their horses were being brought round. Within
the house itself they were met by an old Irishwoman, who, in response to
their wish “to see the brave man’s body,” showed them into a room where
a man lay dead with a bullet through his heart. It was the body of
Jo Portugais, whose master and friend lay in another room across the
hallway. The lady turned back in disappointment--the dead man was little
like a hero.
The Irishwoman had meant to deceive her, for at this moment a girl who
loved the tailor was kneeling beside his body, and, if possible, Mrs.
Flynn would have no curious eyes look upon that scene.
When the visitors came into the hall again, the man said: “There was
another; Kathleen--a woodsman.” But standing by the nearly closed door,
behind which lay the dead tailor of Chaudiere--they could see the
holy candles flickering within--Kathleen whispered “We’ve seen the
tailor--that’s enough. It’s only the woodsman there. I prefer not, Tom.”
With his fingers at the latch, the man hesitated, even as Mrs. Flynn
stepped apprehensively forward; then, shrugging a shoulder, he responded
to Kathleen’s hand on his arm. They went down the stairs together, and
out to their carriage.
As they drove away, Kathleen said: “It’s strange that men who do such
fine things should look so commonplace.”
“The other one might have been more uncommon,” he replied.
“I wonder!” she said, with a sigh of relief, as they passed the bounds
of the village. Then she caught herself flushing, for she suddenly
realised that the exclamation was one so often on the lips of a dead,
disgraced man whose name she once had borne.
If the door of the little room upstairs had opened to the fingers of the
man beside her, the tailor of Chaudiere, though dead, would have been
dearly avenged.