The Untilled Field Part 14

"And you saw the crown, Biddy?"

"I had it on my head, your reverence."

"And you heard the saints singing?"

"Yes, and I will tell you what they were singing," and she began crooning. "Something like that, your reverence. You don't believe me, but we have only our ears and our eyes to guide us."

"I don't say I don't believe you, Biddy, but you may be deceived."

"Sorra deceiving, your reverence, or I've been deceived all my life.

And now, your reverence, if you have no more business with me I will go, for they are waiting in the chapel yard to hear me tell them about the crown that was put upon my head."

"Well, Biddy, I want you to understand that I cannot have you interrupting the Ma.s.s. I cannot permit it. The visions may be true, or not true, but you must not interrupt the Ma.s.s. Do you hear me?"

The acolyte had opened the door of the sacristy, she slipped through it, and the priest took off his ca.s.sock. As he did so, he noticed that the acolytes were anxious to get out; they were at the window watching, and when the priest looked out of the window he saw the people gathered about Biddy, and could see she had obtained an extraordinary hold on the popular imagination; no one noticed him when he came out of the sacristy; they were listening to Biddy, and he stood unnoticed amid the crowd for a few minutes.

"She's out of her mind," he said. "She's as good as mad. What did she tell me--that Our Lord put a crown on her head."

It was difficult to know what to do. News of her piety had reached Dublin. People had been down to Kilmore to see her and had given subscriptions, and he understood that Biddy had enabled him to furnish his church with varnished pews and holy pictures. A pious Catholic lady had sent him two fine statues of Our Lady and St. Joseph. St. Joseph was in a purple cloak and Our Lady wore a blue cloak, and there were gold stars upon it. He had placed these two statues on the two side altars. But there were many things he wanted for his church, and he could only get them through Biddy. It was, therefore, his interest to let her remain in Kilmore, only she could not be allowed to interrupt the Ma.s.s, and he felt that he must be allowed to pa.s.s in and out of his church without having to put up with extravagant salutations.

He was going home to his breakfast and a young man extremely interested in ecclesiastical art was coming to breakfast with him. The young man had a great deal to say about Walter Pater and Chartres Cathedral, and Father Maguire feared he was cutting but a very poor figure in the eyes of this young man, for he could not keep his thoughts on what the young man was saying, he was thinking of Biddy; he hardly thought of anything else but her now; she was absorbing the mind of his entire parish, she interrupted the Ma.s.s, he could not go into his church without being accosted by this absurd old woman, and this young man, a highly cultivated young man, who had just come from Italy, and who took the highest interest in architecture, would not be able to see his church in peace. As soon as they entered it they would be accosted by this old woman; she would follow them about asking them to look at her window, telling them her visions, which might or might not be true. She had a knack of hiding herself--he often came upon her suddenly behind the pillars, and sometimes he found her in the confessional. As soon as he crossed the threshold he began to look for her, and not finding her in any likely place, his fears subsided, and he called the young man's attention to the altar that had been specially designed for his church.

And the young man had begun to tell the priest of the altars he had seen that Spring in Italy, when suddenly he uttered a cry, he had suddenly felt a hand upon his shoulder.

"Your honour will be well rewarded if you will come to my window. Now why should I tell you a lie, your reverence?"

She threw herself at the priest's feet and besought him to believe that the saints had been with her, and that every word she was speaking was the truth.

"Biddy, if you don't go away at once I will not allow you inside the church to-morrow."

The young man looked at the priest, surprised at his sternness, and the priest said:--

"She has become a great trial to us at Kilmore. Come aside and I will tell you about her."

And when the priest had told the young man about the window the young man asked if Biddy would have to be sent away.

"I hope not, for if she were separated from her window she would certainly die. It came out of her savings, out of the money she made out of chickens."

"And what has become of the chickens?"

"She has forgotten all about them; they wandered away or died. She has been evicted, and she lives now in an out-house. She lives on the bits of bread and the potatoes the neighbours give her. The things of this world are no longer realities to her. Her realities are what she sees and hears in that window. She told me last night the saints were singing about her. I don't like to encourage her to talk, but if you would like to hear her--Biddy, come here!"

The old woman came back as a dog comes to its master, joyful, and with brightening eyes.

"Tell us what you saw last night."

"Well, your reverence, I was asleep, and there suddenly came a knocking at the door, and I got up, and then I head a voice say, 'Open the door.' There was a beautiful young man outside, his hair was yellow and curly, and he was dressed in white. He came into the room first, and he was followed by other saints, and they had harps in their hands, and they sang for a long while; they sang beautiful music. Come to the window and you will hear it for yourselves. Someone is always singing it in the window, not always as clearly as they did last night."

"We'll go to see your window presently."

The old woman crept back to her place, and the priest and the young man began to talk about the possibilities of miracles in modern times, and they talked on until the sudden sight of Biddy gave them pause.

"Look at her," said the young man, "can you doubt that she sees Heaven, quite plainly, and that the saints visited her just as she told us?"

"No doubt, no doubt. But she's a great trial to us at Ma.s.s .... The Ma.s.s must not be interrupted."

"I suppose even miracles are inconvenient at times, Father Maguire. Be patient with her, let her enjoy her happiness."

And the two men stood looking at her, trying vainly to imagine what her happiness might be.

CHAPTER III

THE EXILE

I

Pat Phelan's bullocks were ready for the fair, and so were his pigs; but the two fairs happened to come on the same day, and he thought he would like to sell the pigs himself. His eldest son, James, was staying at home to help Catherine Ford with her churning; Peter, his second son, was not much of a hand at a bargain; it was Pat and James who managed the farm, and when Peter had gone to bed they began to wonder if Peter would be able to sell the bullocks. Pat said Peter had been told the lowest price he could take, James said there was a good demand for cattle, and at last they decided that Peter could not fail to sell the beasts.

Pat was to meet Peter at the cross-roads about twelve o'clock in the day. But he had sold his pigs early, and was half an hour in front of him, and sitting on the stile waiting for his son, he thought if Peter got thirteen pounds apiece for the bullocks he would say he had done very well. A good jobber, he thought, would be able to get ten shillings apiece more for them; and he went on thinking of what price Peter would get, until, suddenly looking up the road, whom should he see but Peter coming down the road with the bullocks in front of him.

He could hardly believe his eyes, and it was a long story that Peter told him about two men who wanted to buy the bullocks early in the morning. They had offered him eleven pounds ten, and when he would not sell them at that price they had stood laughing at the bullocks and doing all they could to keep off other buyers. Peter was quite certain it was not his fault, and he began to argue. But Pat Phelan was too disappointed to argue with him, and he let him go on talking. At last Peter ceased talking, and this seemed to Pat Phelan a good thing.

The bullocks trotted in front of them. They were seven miles from home, and fifteen miles are hard on fat animals, and he could truly say he was at a loss of three pounds that day if he took into account the animals' keep.

Father and son walked on, and not a word pa.s.sed between them till they came to Michael Quinn's public-house. "Did you get three pounds apiece for the pigs, father?"

"I did, and three pounds five."

"We might have a drink out of that."

It seemed to Peter that the men inside were laughing at him or at the lemonade he was drinking, and, seeing among them one who had been interfering with him all day, he told him he would put him out of the house, and he would have done it if Mrs. Quinn had not told him that no one put a man out of her house without her leave.

"Do you hear that, Peter Phelan?"

"If you can't best them at the fair," said his father, "it will be little good for you to put them out of the public-house afterwards."

And on that Peter swore he would never go to a fair again, and they walked on until they came to the priest's house.

"It was bad for me when I listened to you and James. If I hadn't I might have been in Maynooth now."

"Now, didn't you come home talking of the polis?"

"Wasn't that after?"

They could not agree as to when his idea of life had changed from the priesthood to the police, nor when it had changed back from the police to the priesthood, and Peter talked on, telling of the authors he had read with Father Tom--Caesar, Virgil, even Quintillian. The priest had said that Quintillian was too difficult for him, and Pat Phelan was in doubt whether the difficulty of Quintillian was a sufficient reason for preferring the police to the priesthood.

"Any way it isn't a girl that's troubling him," he said to himself, and he looked at Peter, and wondered how it was that Peter did not want to be married. Peter was a great big fellow, over six feet high, that many a girl would take a fancy to, and Pat Phelan had long had his eye on a girl who would marry him. And his failure to sell the bullocks brought all the advantages of this marriage to Pat Phelan's mind, and he began to talk to his son. Peter listened, and seemed to take an interest in all that was said, expressing now and then a doubt if the girl would marry him; the possibility that she might seemed to turn his thoughts again towards the priesthood.