“THE BAN DHU”

Manawatu Times, Volume 61, Issue 239, 9 October 1936, Page 5

“THE BAN DHU”

(By Desmond Lough)

Instalment 17.

something -of the evil gossip that was surging in the background, Donal had come storming into the village from his lonely cottage. ' Thero had been a terrible scene. Fiercely he and handsome Cauth Breslin had fluns taunts and accusations at one another, poisoned ami barbed with hate that might once have been love. Men and women had to come between them, l'or in his goaded frenzy bo might have strangled the girl. At length his fury had died down, and ho had rushed from them into the night, while she lay palo and panting with passion, sobbing her heart out on the clay floor. That night -Donal got brain fever. Tiie next day some young men friends of his went to his cottage to see how he fared after the events of the night before. They found bhn raving and near to death. They bore him tenderly, for they loved him, down from bis lonely home, and took him over many a mile of rough road to a hospital where, under the care of the sisters and the doctor, he had slowly recovered. But something had snapped in liis brain He went home again, but lie was not the same. They said that in liis illness lie had come so near to death that he had crossed the borderline that holds ordinary mortals from seeing what jt is not good to see, and speaking with those whom it is not good to speak. Even these tilings were whispered, nothing was named. ’Good People’ and goblins may be vengeful if treated lightly. That is the story of Donal Burke as far as it was known. Ho never renewed the scene that had ended so tragically for him. To all whom he met be appeared as sane as ever, but lie seldom mixed with his fellows. He read and studied as of old, whiling away his solitary evenings thus, and although liis soul was sick, his body seemed endowed with the more strength which the years could not conquer. His old friends died or retired to the fireside, until the whole story dimmed and almost faded from Knockarra. Cauth Breslin, too, lived on. She had married a few years later. She was now Cauth MacCUorrough, the Wise Woman of Ivnockarra. Johanna knew the way of the hills and valleys for miles around her home. She sometimes struggled through tiie heather, even as far as Donal’s cottage. This was a big expedition indeed, and not one that she often made, for Donal was seldom at home. Mhey met more often near tiie trout pool or some such likely rendezvous. Donal never encouraged her to go near the Witch’s Rock. “ 'Tis not a right nor a good place for you to go to, my little girl,” he said, patting her head one day when she asked him for a reason. "It is different for an old man like me, who was brought up nigh to the place, breathing it’s life, as it were. Not that there’s anything there that would hurt ye—nor anything to see neither,” he added hastily, seeing the dawning curiosity in her eyes. ” But Tls as good to let it- be.” The years drifted on. Johanna had gone to some big school, coming to Knockarra for the holidays, and then, school days over, she had it as her home again when she was not on some trip or visit to tiie big world that always seemed so far away. Her old friendships with the villagers, and more especially with Donal, never waned. .She often chatted witli him, telling him thoughts that she would tell no other. After supper, on her return with Lionel from Ills rather unfortunate expedition to the trout pool, she went to her own room. The window looked out on Iho billowing trees, now bronzed by the sunset. Tiie Witch’s Rock was a golden spire. ■Her thoughts ran to Donal. She had not seen him for some days. She wanted to toll him of her. adventure with the Ban Diiu, or whatever it was I hat had attacked her —she was sure of sympathy for him—and perhaps, perhaps— she might test his wisdom as to the solving of a love problem that had gone a lit Lie awry. Johanna had never heard the story of his young days. None of the old people, who might recollect it, would speak about it to her. Strangely enough she remembered that the Ban Diiu had never been mentioned by him. We must now relurn -to Cauth MacMorrough, looking Into the unfathomable blackness of tiie newly-discovered cave. Tiie narrow track that lay before her fell away steeply as the grey walls widened and darkened into invisibility. Her l'cct, as -she moved cautiously forward, crunched on the coarse sand of fallen limestone and stalactite. Holding her candle in her right hand, she felt her way with the left against the wall. The floor was very cold, even to her hardened feel; the tunnel widened gradually. After about twenty yards of steep descent the wall to tiie right disappeared entirely. Tiie feeble candle light struck on nothing that would enable her to gauge the limit of this unknown land. Caution, bred of fear of her new discovery, kept her very quiet. She paused and listened. A faint sound, like rustling silk, seemed to come from the darkness. Water was flowing there. The ground became smooth, and hard. Lowering her candle, sho saw that she now walked on a firm floor. Although sho did not know it, this was stalagmite, formed by “the age-long drip of water carrying the dissolved limestone from the rock above. The incline lessened until the floor became almost level. Then she saw the gleam of water close to her on the right. She was on a narrow path skirting a lake. Touching the water with her foot, she found it icy cold. Only an adventurer of strong nerve would" dare to penetrate further, but pride and courage were hers. The many years of lording It In a puny way over the other villagers made her ashamed to call herself “coward.” She would go on. Cracks aud rents began to -score the walls to which her searching' fingers clung: Al Is*'; candle's flicker was me!

mg gleam from the right. Tfie was ending. The murmur of <• water increased and she could no see a swift current brushing the pain. Another passage opened before hei. Besido the path that ran. through H tumbled a stream from the still late, A prudent explorer would ha\c returned, but Mrs MacMorrough knew nothing of the dangers that lurked ahead. Her candle was still good lor a considerable time. The second tunnel was a short one. Then came another cave, like the first, but smaller. The swish of falling water increased. The stream hurried across the little lake to some outlet at the farther end, and there, at the farther end, the old woman could scarcely believe her eyes, was a dim light! Hwas not sunlight, for the day was done; it was not moonlight, for it flickered. As a snake draws it 3 victim so did it draw the trembling woman towards it. Out in the open it would have been nothing, just a small lire of'pine branches; she could smell them; here it was terrifying, who was the lighter? But there was none. The fire was before a flat slab, like a natural altar, and on the slab some objects shone white in the fitful flicker. Mrs MacMorrough crept closer. Bones 1 Bones of a caii, perhaps an immense dog, or—the thought flashed into her mind —a wolf! Spine, ribs and legs were there, but no head! In spite of herself she .uttered a little scream. Could It be that the old legend was true? She had always thought that she believed it; now that there seemed to he a proof of it before her she was utterly bewildered. The candle dropped from her hand and she was left in darkness, save for the dim light from the pine branches. She sank on the floor, groping frantically for her lost candleThen something blotted out Hie ray that scarcely helped ber at all. Looking up, she saw a fresh cause for terror. Between her and the flame a figure had crept silently, a hunebed-up, shapeless tiling, swathed in some kind of drapery, li rose, tall and menacing, craning ils head with a hideous hack and forward movement as if it were scenting its prey. With eyes fixed on the apparition, her fingers groping mechanically for her candle, the old woman found what she sought at last. The thing was coming towards her, skirting the margin of Hie pool In which the torchlike fire was again mirrored. The creature that was tracking her—there was no other word for it, so horribly deliberate were its movements, so sure of its prey it seemed—* came padding after her as she fled in silent terror. And those seemingly slow-striding feet were gaining on her. The wise woman was a very pitiful object now! She could never reach the entrance before she was overtaken. Suddenly she stumbled sideways as her arm shot into one of the fissures in the wall. It was her only chance of safety. She crept Into the unexpected haven, her feet feeling their way, heerless of the cuts'against the Jagged sides of the passage. Fear sharpened the senses of the almost fainting woman, but luck was with her; for Ibe moment, at all events. The passage elbowed sharply so that she was hidden lo a passerby who had riot been able to mark her down. She waited breathlessly, not knowing whether or not she had been seen. Then the soft steps hurried past —their speed was increasing, she noticed- Was she safe, or was it only a respite? CHAPTER XVII. There were two that found sleep eluding that night: Lionel, disturbed by the result of the entirely unpremeditated encounter at the trout pool with that queer lit tie elf Kathleen; and Johanna, more deeply stirred than she ever thought she could be over such a trivial happening. Her wakefulness was due as much to her irritation at herself as to anything Lionel had done. Young people in love are more thin-skinned than they themselves are aware, and small troubles loom large when one is between sleeping and waking. At all events, Johanna, after a short doze, became very definitely awake. The night was calm and a cool breeze carried the scent of the gurse to her as she lay in bed. Too restless to sleep, she put on her dressinggown and sat by the window. The events of the last few days kept coming and going pendulum-wise through her brain. It was maddening. Suddenly she heard a cry from the direction of the Hock. Her heart lost a beat, for its like she had never heard; it was almost indescribable—a harsh, cracked yell, breaking into a shriek from the overstrain of its intensity. A challenge, a call, a defiance—all three seemed to be in if. Then the voice sounded again, less terrifying tills lime, for it was more a mourning, and deeper, the cry of one baffled. After that, silence. “ Johanna shivered, closed the window and tip-toed back to bed. She covered her ears, fearful lest she should hear those eerie sounds again. But she could not drive away the thought of them. At all events, it had tlie effect of banishing (he worries of that afternoon from her mind. Weary, she soon fell asleep, overstrained by her emotions; If she had listened longer at the window she would have heard more. Lionel felt restless, too. Johanna, although she had said little, had evidently been piqued. He had never seen her in such a mood before; it was altogether absurd and ridiculous. Naturally it made him think more of the Fairy Child than he otherwise would have done. Strange little thing she was, fascinating in her wild way, too; a thing of gossamer and moonshine, so different from jolly, solid Johanna. Imagine Johanna trying to sing those songs I Like a loyal lover, he switched off from the dangerous line on which his comparisons were running. | He had not undressed when he : went to his room. He, too, sat by the window and looked out into tho night. Lighting his pipe, he watched the smoke weaving itself into ghostly ■ figures agains the background of the > ’•pcs. ; ’dcnly he thought he heard tho und of shaken branches in tho |