Wilfredo Machado: Mago

El niño con el pote de pega cruzaba la calle, somnoliento, cuando un autobús lo embistió con violencia, dejándolo muerto sobre la acera. Todos quedaron conmovidos frente al cadáver del infante. Nadie supo de dónde salió el mago, quien cubrió el cuerpecito con una sábana blanca. El mago comenzó a realizar una serie de pases mágicos sobre la sábana que brillaba bajo el sol. Un grupo enfurecido de los que allí estaba se acercó al mago e, insultándolo, lo golpeó con violencia. “Qué te has creído” ¡Cabrón! “¿No respetas el dolor de la gente?” El mago desapareció del lugar antes de ser linchado. Cuando al fin llegaron los paramédicos en una ambulancia, levantaron la sábana con cuidado. Algunos curiosos que llegaron tarde sólo vieron la bandada de palomas que elevaba su vuelo desde la sábana manchada de sangre hacia los edificios grises. Todos aplaudían con lágrimas en los ojos. 

Michael Marshall Smith: The Dark Land

For want of anything better to do, and in the spirit that keeps my room austerely tidy when there are other things I should be doing, I decided to move my bed. After returning from college I’d redecorated my room, as it had been the same since I’d been about ten, and I’d moved just about everything round except for the bed. I knew it was largely an excuse for not doing anything more constructive but pulled it away from the wall and tried it in another couple of positions.

    It was hard work, as one of the legs is rather fragile and the thing had to be virtually lifted off the floor, and after half an hour I was hot and irritated and becoming more and more convinced that its original position had been the optimal, and indeed the only, place to put it. And it was as I struggled to shove it back up against the wall that I began to feel a bit strange. When it was finally back in place I sat down on it, feeling light-headed and a bit ill and I suppose basically I just drifted off to sleep.

    I don’t know if the bed is part of it in some way. I only mention it because it seems important, and I guess that it was while I was asleep on it that it all began. After a while I woke up, half-remembering a dream in which I had been doing nothing more than lying on my bed remembering that my parents had said that they were going to extend the wood panelling on the downstairs hall walls. For a few moments I was disorientated, confused by being in the same place in reality as I had been in the dream, and then I drifted off again.

    Some time later I awoke again, feeling very sluggish and slightly nauseous. I found it very difficult to haul my mind up from sleep, but eventually stood up and lurched across the room to the sink to get a glass of water, rubbing my eyes and feeling very rough. Maybe I was going down with something. I decided that a cup of tea would be a good idea, and headed out of the bedroom to go downstairs to the kitchen to make one.

    As I reached the top of the stairs I remembered the dream about the panelling and wondered vaguely where a strange idea like that could have come from. I’d worked hard for my psychology paper at college, and was fairly confident that Freud hadn’t felt that wood panelling was even worth a mention. I trudged downstairs, still feeling a bit strange, my thoughts dislocated and confused.

    Then I stopped, open-mouthed, and stared around me. They really had extended the panelling. It used to only go about eight feet up the wall, but it now soared right up to the front hall ceiling, which is two floors high. And they’d done it in exactly the same wood as the original panelling: there wasn’t a join to be seen. How the hell had they managed that? Come to that, when had they managed that? It hadn’t been there that morning, both my parents were at work and would be for hours and … well, it was just impossible, wasn’t it? I reached out and touched the wood, marvelling at how even the grain was the same, and that the new wood looked just as aged as the original, which had been there fifty years.

Angelina Muñiz-Huberman: La ofrenda más grata

¿Soy yo guarda de mi hermano?
Génesis 4:9

En algún libro estaba escrito, en algún libro grande y denso que tuviera toda la historia del hombre, un libro que marcara cada destino, que enseñara todos los caminos a elegir, un libro que a fuerza de gritar la palabra de Dios cantara al hombre pleno y débil, poderoso e impotente, amante y asesino. En algún libro, en ese tal vez, estaba también escrito mi acto. Así como la mayoría se preocupa por dejar su huidiza sombra en el curso deleznable de la historia, yo, en cambio, sabía que mi vida ya había sido vivida y que sólo repetía un relato antiguo e injusto. Pero saberlo no me evitaba el sufrimiento. Por eso, desde niña, desde el día en que naciste empezó mi odio por ti.

¿Por qué tenía que ser alabado tu nacimiento? ¿Por qué los regalos y las predicciones, las palabras, los deseos y la felicidad? Yo no sentía nada y tu presencia me desagradaba: ahí estabas, pequeño, indefenso, amoratado. Imposible amarte. Mi lugar me lo habías quitado sin ningún esfuerzo, sin siquiera dejarme luchar, mi lugar que había ido ganando con dolor y lentamente, pero que me pertenecía y que todos respetaban hasta que tú llegaste.

¿De dónde venías y por qué me alejabas tan fácil y cruelmente? Nuestras sangres no eran las mismas: la mía hervía en odio y en pasión; la tuya, dulce y apacible, creaba el amor.

Caí en la soledad y en el olvido. Nadie preguntaba por mí, nadie recordaba que yo era la primogénita. Y lo peor, oír las palabras que antes eran para mí sola, repetidas para ti solo. ¿Qué tenías tú, acabado de nacer, indefenso, amoratado, que hacías recaer la maldición sobre mí?

Porque yo había sido maldecida. Por alguna razón, para mí oculta, había caído del favor de los demás. Lo mío no valía: mi llanto, mis gritos y mis juegos eran desagradables. Para mí era la orden del silencio y el hastío constante.

No, nunca pude quererte, y aún se atrevían a preguntármelo. ¿Cómo quererte si me lo prohibieron? ¿Cómo jugar contigo si me lo negaban?

Rudyard Kipling: The Bisara of Pooree

Little Blind Fish, thou art marvellous wise,
Little Blind Fish, who put out thy eyes?
Open thy ears while I whisper my wish—
Bring me a lover, thou little Blind Fish.
The Charm of the Bisara

SOME natives say that it came from the other side of Kulu, where the eleven-inch Temple Sapphire is. Others that it was made at the Devil-Shrine of Ao-Chung in Thibet, was stolen by a Kafir, from him by a Gurkha, from him again by a Lahouli, from him by a khitmatgar, and by this latter sold to an Englishman, so all its virtue was lost; because, to work properly, the Bisara of Pooree must be stolen—with bloodshed if possible, but, at any rate, stolen.

These stories of the coming into India are all false. It was made at Pooree ages since—the manner of its making would fill a small book—was stolen by one of the Temple dancing-girls there, for her own purposes, and then passed on from hand to hand, steadily northward, till it reached Hanlé: always bearing the same name—the Bisara of Pooree. In shape it is a tiny square box of silver, studded outside with eight small balas-rubies. Inside the box, which opens with a spring, is a little eyeless fish, carved from some sort of dark, shiny nut and wrapped in a shred of faded gold cloth. That is the Bisara of Pooree, and it were better for a man to take a king-cobra in his hand than to touch the Bisara of Pooree.

All kinds of magic are out of date and done away with, except in India, where nothing changes in spite of the shiny, top-scum stuff that people call ‘civilisation.’ Any man who knows about the Bisara of Pooree will tell you what its powers are—always supposing that it has been honestly stolen. It is the only regularly working, trustworthy love-charm in the country, with one exception. [The other charm is in the hands of a trooper of the Nizam’s Horse, at a place called Tuprani, due north of Hyderabad.] This can be depended upon for a fact. Some one else may explain it.

If the Bisara be not stolen, but given or bought or found, it turns against its owner in three years, and leads to ruin or death. This is another fact which you may explain when you have time. Meanwhile, you can laugh at it. At present the Bisara is safe on a hack-pony’s neck, inside the blue bead-necklace that keeps off the Evil Eye. If the pony-driver ever finds it, and wears it, or gives it to his wife, I am sorry for him.

Valerio Evangelisti: RACHID

Io, Rachid, nato in Palestina e vissuto in Siria, giuro che mai e poi mai rinnegherò il santo nome di Allah. Sono venuto in Afghanistan come ero stato in Cecenia, per difendere l’Islam dai nuovi crociati che cercano di distruggerlo. Mi sono battuto con onore e mi sono arreso solo quando il nostro comandante mi ha detto di farlo. Gli americani potranno cercare di umiliarmi, ma io conserverò fino all’ultimo la mia dignità.

E’ inutile che adesso, col sacchetto ridicolo che mi hanno messo in testa e con le strisce di plastica che mi feriscono i polsi, tentino di piegare la mia volontà. Un soldato di Allah non si lascia spaventare dal buio, né dall’obbligo di tenere corpo e testa piegati in avanti, né dalle percosse. Resisterò, perché così comanda il Misericordioso. Resisterò anche sull’aereo che mi sta per portare nella terra di Satana.

Sono ormai due ore che siamo decollati. Fatico molto a respirare. Ma cosa conta la mia sofferenza? Brucia ancora nella mia mente il ricordo dei fratelli sepolti vivi, a… Laggiù, dietro il carcere.

Quanti erano? Cento? Duecento? Alcuni imploravano pietà, ma la maggior parte di loro erano dignitosi. Molti perdevano sangue dalle ferite, e sapevano che comunque non sarebbero sopravvissuti a lungo. I vecchi sembravano rassegnati, però erano pochi. L’età dei più era all’incirca la mia: vent’anni. Gridavano ancora le loro maledizioni, mentre i camion coprivano con la sabbia la fossa in cui erano distesi. A tanti erano state serrate le labbra con un cerotto, ma non a tutti. Chi non poteva pregare o gridare lo faceva con gli occhi. Non credo che i soldati americani capissero parole o sguardi. Osservavano indifferenti, e lasciavano fare ai loro servi afgani.

E’ in nome di quei martiri che io, Rachid, terrò duro.

In fondo, la ridicola tuta arancione che mi hanno fatto indossare prima di salire in aereo mi torna comoda. Mi ripara dal freddo. Mi dispiace solo di non vedere i miei fratelli in Allah, a causa del cappuccio. Ce n’è uno che urla, forse per una ferita. Alcuni piangono, tuttavia sono pochi. Io li comprendo, è per via dell’età. Sono poco più che bambini.

Humberto Rivas: Un pacto roto

Tocó la puerta por tercera ocasión. Yo dudaba entre ocultarme en el baño o enfrentarlo abiertamente; no me interesaba más el pacto. Tenía un boleto de tren para partir en la madrugada hacia Tierra Caliente.

A la cuarta llamada abrí con violencia y vi al quebrantahuesos : sus ojos, lejos de parecer amenazantes, imploraban. Me ofrecía el cuerpo laxo de una jovencita rubia, no mayor de quince años. ¡Ese cuerpo ya está maduro!, le grité cerrando la puerta de golpe. Corrí hasta la recámara, abrí la ventana, cogí la valija y me deslicé con dificultad por la tubería amarilla. Mientras intentaba alejarme por la solitaria calle, alcancé a escuchar al quebrantahuesos que chillaba golpeándose contra la puerta del pasillo.

Edgar Allan Poe: The Colloquy of Monos and Una

Edgar Allan Poe Portrait by Samuel S. Osgood

UNA. "Born again?"

MONOS. Yes, fairest and best beloved Una, "born again." These were the words upon whose mystical meaning I had so long pondered, rejecting the explanations of the priesthood, until Death itself resolved for me the secret.

UNA. Death!

MONOS. How strangely, sweet Una, you echo my words! I observe, too, a vacillation in your step, a joyous inquietude in your eyes. You are confused and oppressed by the majestic novelty of the Life Eternal. Yes, it was of Death I spoke. And here how singularly sounds that word which of old was wont to bring terror to all hearts, throwing a mildew upon all pleasures!

UNA. Ah, Death, the spectre which sate at all feasts! How often, Monos, did we lose ourselves in speculations upon its nature! How mysteriously did it act as a check to human bliss, saying unto it "thus far and no further!" That earnest mutual love, my own Monos, which burned within our bosoms–how vainly did we flatter ourselves, feeling happy in its first upspringing, that our happiness would strengthen with its strength! Alas! as it grew, so grew in our hearts the dread of that evil hour which was hurrying to separate us forever! Thus, in time, it became painful to love. Hate would have been mercy then.

MONOS. Speak not here of these griefs, dear Una–mine, mine, forever now!

UNA. But the memory of past sorrow–is it not present joy? I have much to say yet of the things which have been. Above all, I burn to know the incidents of your own passage through the dark Valley and Shadow.

MONOS. And when did the radiant Una ask any thing of her Monos in vain? I will be minute in relating all–but at what point shall the weird narrative begin?

UNA. At what point?

Charles Baudelaire: La corde

A Edouard Manet.

"Les illusions, - me disait mon ami, - sont aussi innombrables peut-être que les rapports des hommes entre eux, ou des hommes avec les choses. Et quand l'illusion disparaît, c'est-à-dire quand nous voyons l'être ou le fait tel qu'il existe en dehors de nous, nous éprouvons un bizarre sentiment, compliqué moitié de regret pour le fantôme disparu, moitié de surprise agréable devant la nouveauté, devant le fait réel. S'il existe un phénomène évident, trivial, toujours semblable, et d'une nature à laquelle il soit impossible de se tromper, c'est l'amour maternel. Il est aussi difficile de supposer une mère sans amour maternel qu'une lumière sans chaleur; n'est-il donc pas parfaitement légitime d'attribuer à l'amour maternel toutes les actions et les paroles d'une mère, relatives à son enfant? Et cependant écoutez cette petite histoire, où j'ai été singulièrement mystifié par l'illusion la plus naturelle.

"Ma profession de peintre me pousse à regarder attentivement les visages, les physionomies, qui s'offrent dans ma route, et vous savez quelle jouissance nous tirons de cette faculté qui rend à nos yeux la vie plus vivante et plus significative que pour les autres hommes. Dans le quartier reculé que j'habite, et où de vastes espaces gazonnés séparent encore les bâtiments, j'observai souvent un enfant dont la physionomie ardente et espiègle, plus que toutes les autres, me séduisit tout d'abord. Il a posé plus d'une fois pour moi, et je l'ai transformé tantôt en petit bohémien tantôt en ange, tantôt en Amour mythologique. Je lui ai fait porter le violon du vagabond, la Couronne d'Epines et les Clous de la Passion, et la Torche d'Eros. Je pris enfin à toute la drôlerie de ce gamin un plaisir si vif, que je priai un jour ses parents, de pauvres gens, de vouloir bien me le céder, promettant de bien l'habiller, de lui donner quelque argent et de ne pas lui imposer d'autre peine que de nettoyer mes pinceaux et de faire mes commissions. Cet enfant, débarbouillé, devint charmant, et la vie qu'il menait chez moi lui semblait un paradis, comparativement à celle qu'il aurait subie dans le taudis paternel. Seulement je dois dire que ce petit bonhomme m'étonna quelquefois par des crises singulières de tristesse précoce, et qu'il manifesta bientôt un goût immodéré pour le sucre et les liqueurs; si bien qu'un jour où je constatai que, malgré mes nombreux avertissements, il avait encore commis un nouveau larcin de ce genre, je le menaçai de le renvoyer à ses parents. Puis je sortis, et mes affaires me retinrent assez longtemps hors de chez moi.

Ramón Gómez de la Serna: Voz de contralto

Era extraña aquella voz de contralto en la niña prodigio, pero se tendían a su alrededor tapices de concierto para verla tan niña, pálida y vestida de negro cantando con la voz de una alma mayor que la que le pertenecía.

La voz de contralto de la niña ponía en todas aquellas damas vestidas de blanco, que sufrían el escalofrío de oír penar a la acólita los pecados mayores que les pertenecían a ellas.

Huérfana, era llevada de un escenario a otro y de salón en salón por una tía suya que parecía cuidarla con un esmero de madre.

La vida parecía rodear de lejos a la niña con conmovedora voz de contralto, pero pronto se acercó a ella y comenzó a colgar de sus hombros el chal de pieles el novio futuro.

Ella le acogió con anhelo de hacerle la confidencia suprema de su espíritu, y un día le dijo:

No canto yo... Alguien canta por mí... Mi voz es la voz de mi madre.

Mary E. Wilkins Freeman: The Shadows On The Wall

"Henry had words with Edward in the study the night before Edward died," said Caroline Glynn.

She was elderly, tall, and harshly thin, with a hard colourlessness of face. She spoke not with acrimony, but with grave severity. Rebecca Ann Glynn, younger, stouter and rosy of face between her crinkling puffs of gray hair, gasped, by way of assent. She sat in a wide flounce of black silk in the corner of the sofa, and rolled terrified eyes from her sister Caroline to her sister Mrs. Stephen Brigham, who had been Emma Glynn, the beauty of the family. She was beautiful with a large, splendid, full-blown beauty; she filled a great rocking-chair with superb bulk of femininity, and swayed back and forth, her black silks whispering and her black frills fluttering. Even the shock of death (for her brother Edward lay dead in the house,) could not disturb her outward serenity of demeanour. She was grieved over the loss of her brother: he had been the youngest, and she had been fond of him, but never had Emma Brigham lost sight of her own importance amidst the waters of tribulation. She was always awake to the consciousness of her own stability in the midst of vicissitudes and the splendour of her permanent bearing.

But even her expression of masterly placidity changed before her sister Caroline's announcement and her sister Rebecca Ann's gasp of terror and distress in response.

"I think Henry might have controlled his temper, when poor Edward was so near his end," said she with an asperity which disturbed slightly the roseate curves of her beautiful mouth.

"Of course he did not know," murmured Rebecca Ann in a faint tone strangely out of keeping with her appearance.

One involuntarily looked again to be sure that such a feeble pipe came from that swelling chest.

"Of course he did not know it," said Caroline quickly. She turned on her sister with a strange sharp look of suspicion. "How could he have known it?" said she. Then she shrank as if from the other's possible answer. "Of course you and I both know he could not," said she conclusively, but her pale face was paler than it had been before.

Rosana Ordóñez: A las tres de la tarde

Hicieron el amor. Eran felices. La corrida sería a las tres. Ella no lo acompañó, prefirió ir a comprar ropitas para el futuro bebé. Regresó cansada. Se tendió en la cama del hotel y encendió el televisor. Lo vio. Con el cuerno calado en la ingle y las luces del traje girando en el aire. Él se diluye en la ambulancia. Ella en la cama. El niño es sangre y arena. 

Arthur Young: Pepopukin in Corsica

Arthur Young by John Russell

AH torment, trouble, wonder, and amazement

Inhabits here. Some heavenly power guide us

Out of this fearful country 1

Tempest.

SIR Giles de Montfort was not only superstitious but constitutionally timid. He was one of those men who, during the bloody scenes of the revolution of France, rose himself on the ruins of his betters, and, having acquired immense wealth, considered himself entitled to commit every excess which can be practised by human nature. In the midst of the many extravagant ideas which he had planned for execution, he suddenly took the resolution of visiting the native island of that man who swayed the sceptre not only of France but of the greater part of Europe. He took leave of the capital, after having made the necessary preparation, set out with all the pomp of an eastern monarch, and excited the attention of every town and village through which he travelled.

The principal object which induced him to make this no less sudden than extraordinary visit, was a young. lady, beautiful as Aurora, who had attended her father to Paris to pay his respects to the sovereign of the world, as Buonaparte was styled in Corsica.

Cupid smiled in her looks—her eyes were black—they captivated the knight, who, not doubting that he would be accepted, set forward like a second Don Quixote, and determined never to return without his bride.

The lady was the youngest sister of three: they were all handsome, but Jane was strikingly so. She alone was as yet unmarried.

In the numerous train of Sir Giles was a young man, who in grace and elegance as far surpassed his master as the Apollo Belvidere surpasses the casts made from it. He was the right hand of the knight, and managed all his affairs with that diligence and honesty which gained him the esteem of all those who knew him.

Several were the ridiculous adventures which befel the knight on his journey, who in bulk equalled Sir John Falstaff; but as we have not time to travel with him from Paris to Marseilles, let it suffice that he arrived in safety at the latter place, whence he embarked for Ajaccio, which he reached in one of those exquisite summer evenings which must ever engage the attention of the most callous. But love—though not that love which filled the bosom of Petrarch, or influenced the heart of the tender Abelard—love alone engrossed his thoughts. The setting sun cast its departing rays on the rugged rocks that crowned the distant horizon, and yet faintly tinged the receding bay, on the northern side of which is situated the city that gave birth to a man whose talents raised him to the highest pinnacle of glory attainable by human beings; and whose ambition caused that fall which most evidently proved the instability of mortal fabrics. Sir Giles expected to meet Mademoiselle Jane de Launay on the beach on his landing—why we do not know: in this hope every idea was concentrated. As the tide was ebbing, he was forced to proceed to the town in a boat, and nearly risked falling into the water through his impatience, which was considerably damped by his not finding the lovely Jane, as he had ridiculously expected.

Hugo Hiriart: Ana la sigilosa

“Era yo muy joven en aquellos días y estaba lejos de mis tierras. Combatía a la pandilla tumultuosa de los Intransigentes que con sus escudos hacían escarabajos y atacaban en furioso montón a los aislados. Murió mi padre. Cuando el último de los Intransigentes abjuró de sus falsas certidumbres y destiñó de su rostro el amaranto insolente, regresé a reinar sobre mi heredad. 

“El pueblo empavorecido me recibió en triunfo, como a un salvador. Hablé a la turba amedrentada y sollozante; declaré que me enfrentaría a cualquier intrusión.

“Nadie logró advertir cuándo principió la estampida silenciosa: habían huido del reino todas las mariposas. Fueron unos recolectores de miel quienes divulgaron el misterio: regresaban de los panales cuando fueron embestidos por una suave y abigarrada bandada de mariposas que precipitadamente, chocando unos colores contra otros, se desplazaban hacia el poniente.

“La inquietud, pronto elevada a pánico, penetró en las gentes: sin duda detectaban algún horror las mariposas que no lograban prevenir. Mi padre agonizaba; el pueblo descarriado se enfrascó en interminables discusiones. Los campos se veían muy solitarios sin esos animalitos a quienes nadie presta cuidado ni interés.

“Comparecí y ordené serenidad; fui capitán de un ejército de artesanos, comerciantes y campesinos que esperaban la agresión desconocida. Algunos veteranos de la guerra contra los Intransigentes acariciaban nerviosos el puño de sus espadas meditando si habría ocasión de blandirlas.

Decreté el cuidadoso censo de flora y fauna en busca de otras especies fugitivas o aniquiladas, sólo se supo de una disminución en la población de sapos y ranas. Esperábamos.

“Entonces llegó Ana la Sigilosa.

“Nadie sintió su presencia. Fuimos vistos por ella; no la reconocimos. Lentamente los temores se calmaron; las mariposas olvidadas. La buena gente volvió a sus faenas. Y se celebraron fiestas.

En el torneo de los Siete Colores gané con mi lanza los laureles de piedra. Fui coronado sobre la arena de las justas; entonces encontré a Ana. Sonriente, blanda, hermosa; quieta como un potro

de mármol.

“La busqué; conversamos y cantamos donde se bebe cerveza entre los alegres músicos. Sus ojos

enamorados se fijaron en mí con dulce seriedad. La amé.

“Las lluvias volvieron al reino; una tarde la llevé conmigo al pabellón donde gritan los halcones cazadores, y conocimos el placer.

“Esa tarde la perdí para siempre; nunca volví a encontrarla. Vivimos catorce años en el castillo; la torre azul fue para ella; nació nuestro hijo pero nunca volví a encontrarla.

“Cuando salimos del pabellón donde gritan los halcones, cuando mi capa roja la cubrió, cuando cabalgamos bajo la lluvia, Ana se perdió.

Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu: Madam Crowl's ghost

I'm an old woman now; and I was but thirteen my last birthday, the night I came to Applewale House. My aunt was the housekeeper there, and a sort o' one-horse carriage was down at Lexhoe to take me and my box up to Applewale.

I was a bit frightened by the time I got to Lexhoe, and when I saw the carriage and horse, I wished myself back again with my mother at Hazelden. I was crying when I got into the "shay"—that's what we used to call it—and old John Mulbery that drove it, and was a good-natured fellow, bought me a handful of apples at the Golden Lion, to cheer me up a bit; and he told me that there was a currant-cake, and tea, and pork-chops, waiting for me, all hot, in my aunt's room at the great house. It was a fine moonlight night and I eat the apples, lookin' out o' the shay winda.

It is a shame for gentlemen to frighten a poor foolish child like I was. I sometimes think it might be tricks. There was two on 'em on the tap o' the coach beside me. And they began to question me after nightfall, when the moon rose, where I was going to. Well, I told them it was to wait on Dame Arabella Crowl, of Applewale House, near by Lexhoe.

"Ho, then," says one of them, "you'll not be long there!"

And I looked at him as much as to say, "Why not?" for I had spoke out when I told them where I was goin', as if 'twas something clever I had to say.

"Because," says he—"and don't you for your life tell no one, only watch her and see—she's possessed by the devil, and more an half a ghost. Have you got a Bible?"

"Yes, sir," says I. For my mother put my little Bible in my box, and I knew it was there: and by the same token, though the print's too small for my ald eyes, I have it in my press to this hour.

As I looked up at him, saying "Yes, sir," I thought I saw him winkin' at his friend; but I could not be sure.

"Well," says he, "be sure you put it under your bolster every night, it will keep the ald girl's claws aff ye."

And I got such a fright when he said that, you wouldn't fancy! And I'd a liked to ask him a lot about the ald lady, but I was too shy, and he and his friend began talkin' together about their own consarns, and dowly enough I got down, as I told ye, at Lexhoe. My heart sank as I drove into the dark avenue. The trees stands very thick and big, as ald as the ald house almost, and four people, with their arms out and finger-tips touchin', barely girds round some of them.