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How Thomas Connolly met the Banshee
J. Todhunter
Aw, the banshee, sir? well, sir, as I was striving to tell ye,
I was going home from work one day, from Mr.Cassidy's that I tould
ye of, in the dusk o' the evening. I had more nor a mile - aye,
it was nearer two mile - to thrack to, where I was lodgin' with
a dacent widdy woman I know, Biddy Maguire be name, so as to be
near me work.
It was the first week in November, an' a lonesome road I had to
travel, an' dark enough, wid threes above it; an' about half-ways
there was a bit of a brudge I had to cross, over one o' them little
sthrames that runs into the Doddher. I walked on in the middle iv
the road, for there was no toe-path at that time, Mister Harry,
nor for many a long day after that; but, as I was saying', I walked
along till I an' there, right enough, I seen the hog's back o' the
ould-fashioned bridge that used to be there till it was pulled down,
an' a white mist steaming' up out o' the wather all around it.
Well, now, Mister Harry, often as I'd passed by the place before
that night it seemed sthrange to me, an' like a place ye might see
in a dhrame; an' as I come up to it I begin to feel a cowld wind
blowing' through the hollow o' me heart. "Musha Thomas,"
sez I to meself, "is it yerself that's in it? sez I; "
or, if it is, what's the matter wid ye at all, at all? sez I; so
I put a bould face on it, an' I made a sthruggle to set one leg
afore the other, ontil I came to the rise o' the brudge. And there,
God be good to us! in a cantle o' the wall I seen an ould woman,
as I thought, sittin' on her hunkers, all crouched together, an'
her head bowed down, seemin'ly in the greatest affliction.
Well , sir, I pitied the ould craythur, an' thought I wasn't worth
a thraneen, for the mortial fright I was in, I up an' sez to her,
"That's a cowld lodgin' for ye, ma'am." Well, the sorra
ha'porth she sez to that, nor tuk no more notice o' me than if I
hadn't let a word out o' me, but kep' rocking' herself to an' fro,
as if her heart was breakin'; so I sez to her again, "Eh, ma'am,
is there anythin' the matter wid ye?" An' I made for to touch
her on the shouldher, on'y somethin' stopt me, for as I looked closer
at her I saw she was no more an ould woman nor she was an out cat.
The first thing I tuk notice to, Mister Harry, was here hair, that
was sthreeling' down over his showldhers, an' a good yard on the
ground on aich side of her. O, be the hoky farmer, but that was
the hair! The likes of it I never seen on mortial woman, young,
or ould, before nor sense. It grew as sthrong out of her as out
of e'er a young slip of a girl ye could see; but the colour of it
was a misthery to describe. The first squint I go of it I thought
it was silvery grey, like an ould crone's; but when I got up beside
her I saw, be the glance o' the sky, it was a soart iv an Iscariot
colour, an' a shine out of it like floss silk. It ran over her showldhers
and the two shapely arms she was lanin' her head on, for all the
world like Mary Magdalen's in a pitcher; and then I persaved that
the grey clock and the green gownd undhernaith it was made of no
earthly matarial I ever laid eyes on. Now, I needn't tell ye, sir,
that I seen all this in the twinkle of a bed-post - long as I take
to make the narrtion of it. So I made a step back from her, an'
"The Lord be betune us an' harm! sez I, out loud, an' wid that
I blessed meself. Well. Mister Harry, the word wasn't out of me
mouth afore she turned her face on me. Aw, Mister Harry, but 'twas
that was the awfullest apparation ever I seen, the face of her as
she looked up at me! God forgive me for saying it, but 'twas more
like the face of the "Axy Homo" bezand in Marlboro' Sthreet
Chapel nor like any face I could mintion - a pale as a corpse, an'
a most o' freckles on it, like the freckles on a turkey's egg; and'
the two eyes sewn in wid red thread, from the terrible power o'
crying the' had to do; an' such pair iv eyes as the' wor, Mister
Harry, as blue as two forget-me-nots, an' as cowld as the moon in
a bog-hole of a frosty night, an' a dead-an'-live look in them that
sent a cowld shiver through the marra o' me bones. Be the mortial!
ye could ha' rung a tay cupful o' cowld paspiration out o' the hair
o' me head that minute, so ye could. Well, I thought the life 'ud
lave me intirely when she riz up from her hunkers, till, bedad!
she looked mostly as tall as Nelson's Pillar; an' wid the two eyes
gazin' back at me, an' her two arms stretched out before hor, an'
a keine out of her that riz the hair o' me scalp till it was as
stiff as the hog's bristles in a new hearth broom, away she glides
- glides round the angle o' the brudge, an' down with her into the
sthrame that ran undhernaith it. 'Twas then I began to suspect what
she was. "Wisha, Thomas! says I to meself, sez I; an' I made
a great struggle to get me two legs into a throt, in spite o' the
spavin o' fright the pair o' them wor in; an' how I brought meself
home that same night the Lord in Heaven only knows, for I never
could tell; but I must ha' tumbled agin the door, and shot in head
foremost into the middle o' the flure, where I lay in a dead swoon
for mostly an hour; and the first I know was Mrs. Magurie stannin'
over me with a jorum o' punch she was pourin' down me throath (throat),
to bring back the life into me, an' me head in a pool of cowld wather
she dashed over me in her first fright. "Arrah Mister Connolly,"
shashee, "What ails ye?" shashee, "to put the scare
on a lone woman like that? shashee. "Am I in this world or
the next?" sez I. "Musha! where else would ye be on'y
here in my kitchen? shashee. "O, glory be to God! sez I, "but
I thought I was in Purgathory at the laste, not to mintion an uglier
place," sez I. "Faix, an' maybe ye wor more nor half-ways
there, on'y for me," shashee; "but what's come to you
at all, at all? Is it your fetch ye seen, Mister Conolly? "Aw,
naboclish!* sez I. "Never mind what I seen," sez I. So
be degrees I began to come to a little; an' that's the way I met
the banshee, Misther Harry! "But how did you know it really
was the banshee after all, Thomas?" "Begor, sir, I knew
the apparation of her well enough; but 'twas confirmed by a sarcumstance
that occurred the same time. There was a Misther O'Nales was come
on a visit, ye must know, to a place in the neighbourhood - one
of' the ould O'Nales iv the county Tyrone, a rale ould Irish family
- an' the banshee was heard keening round the house that same night,
be more than one that was in it; an' sure enough, Misther Harry,
he was found dead in his bed the next mornin'. So it it wasn't the
banshee I seen that time, I'd like to know what else it could a'
been.
* Ba bac leis - i.e. don't mind it.
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