A Night in a Crypt
By A. Le Braz
It had been a great day at Guernoter. The principal servants from several neighbouring farms had met there to give assistance. The supper had been abundant, with plenty to drink also, according to custom. When they had all eaten and drunk as much as they wanted, they made a circle round the fire, the men lighted their pipes, the women went to their spinning-wheels, and a general conversation took place. First of all, as may be imagined, they discussed the events of the day and its work. The labourers belonging to Guernoter, and those from the other farms who had come to help them, had started at three o’clock that morning for St Michel-en-Grève,—a journey of five leagues—a long journey there and back over heaps of wet sand.
They discussed the carts and horses, praised the great grey horse belonging to Roc’h-Laz, the best worker on the road, and talked about the villages they had passed through, all agreeing that the best inn for cider was that kept by Moullek at Plonmillian.
“Yes,” added Mandez Merrien, a young bachelor, “and if they would give me a dozen pints of that, every day, I would willingly personate the “Ankou” of Plonmillian for a week or two!”1
1 “L’Ankou” is the impersonation of death. In the church of Plonmillian there is a curious dust-covered statuette, said to be that of Yves do Plonmillian, which, being of somewhat terrible and threatening appearance, fulfils, in the popular imagination, the idea of the “Ankou,” the foreteller of death.
“Do not joke on that subject, Mandez,” said the mistress of the house; “you may have to do with the “Ankou” before you think!”
This suggestion turned the conversation to the subject of death and the dead. A servant quoted the case of some one who had mocked at the “Ankou” of Plonmillian, and who was that same evening found drowned.
“These are old women’s stories,” laughed one of the company.
“The dead are dead,” added another; “the dead cannot harm the living.”
“All the same,” replied the servant, “if you were forced to spend the night in the crypt you would lower your tone!”
All the young men exclaimed against this, in chorus.
When men have had a little to drink they are ready to cope with the devil, horns and all!
That is, so far as words go. In action they are not always so courageous.
And this was certainly the case that evening at Guernoter.
Yvon Lonarn, the master, had only drunk moderately, but some of his guests had taken too much. He had placed himself in a nook of the chimney corner, from whence he could watch all that was going on amongst them.
On hearing the young men crying out thus against the servant for her speech, he joined in.
“Well,” he said, speaking very seriously, “it shall not be said that I let slip such a fine opportunity of proving the mettle of you young fellows. I will give a six franc piece tomorrow morning to whichever of you has the courage to spend this night in the crypt!”
The youths looked at each other, forcing a laugh, and making believe to treat the matter as a mere jest. One or two crept towards the door.
“Come, come!” Lonarn continued, “do you take it in? I said a six franc piece. A six franc piece to be gained all in one night. You don’t often get the chance of such a windfall. Who accepts?”
Not one accepted. Everyone sought a pretext. Mandez Merrien was the first to find one.
“I would willingly accept the wager,” he said, “if the day’s work had not been so hard and long, but to-night, Yvon Lonarn, I would not take twenty six-franc pieces in exchange for my bed of hay in the stable at MezonMeur.”
And thereupon he rose to go away.
The rest applauded his view, and prepared to follow his example.
The master of Guernoter was on the point of launching out upon them a few words of scathing irony, when from amongst the women a timid little voice was heard.
“Master,” said the little voice, “would you give me the same as one of them? Would you give me six francs if I did what they dare not do?”
The questioner was a little girl of thirteen or fourteen years of age, but so small and fragile that she did not look more than ten. Her name was Monica (or Monik, as she was called). She had no other name, for she had no knowledge of who her parents were. She had been taken in at the farm out of compassion, and she acted as cow-keeper. She had no wages, but was fed and clothed. Her voice was hardly ever heard in the evenings when the household sat round the fire. She wound the thread spun by the other servants, and she fulfilled her task silently and apart, though she might occasionally be heard murmuring a prayer, for she was devout, and religious ideas were more to her than aught besides.
Great was the astonishment of the farmer’s wife when she heard Monik’s voice, and her seemingly ill-considered words.
“Listen to the little minx,” she exclaimed.
“Is it not truly said that money is the ruin of souls? Here is a wretched girl, who, for six francs would risk her life and her soul, if she might do as she would. Are you not ashamed of yourself, you little good-for-nothing?”
“Believe me, mistress, were I to gain this money, I would not use it badly,” humbly replied the little cow-keeper.
“You shall make whatever use you please of it,” said the farmer, “if you can gain it. I am not sorry to see a wee woman like you taking up a wager which daunted those men. But if you accept, we shall go with you to the crypt; we shall shut the door upon you, and you will not come out till daybreak, when we shall come and let you out.”
And this was done, in spite of the indignant protests of the mistress of the farm.
The crypt was full of bones. But as soon as Monik entered, the bones drew up against the walls, piling themselves upon each other, so as to make space for her to lie down, as if she was in her bed,
Monik, first of all knelt down and begged the dead to protect her, and then laid herself on the dank earth, saturated with the odour of death.
Hardly had she stretched herself upon it, than a gentle drowsiness fell upon her, and sweet, soft, distant melodies hovered about her, lulling her to sleep.
She forgot that she was in a charnel-house. She seemed to be away, she knew not where, in a land of sapphire blue, but all was dim, and she could see nothing distinctly. She tried to open her eyes, but her eyelids were as heavy as lead.
And thus she slept the whole night through, a supernatural slumber.
At daybreak she woke, surprised to find herself in the crypt. The door was open, and the master of Guernoter was saying to her, “Here is the six franc piece, Monik. It is yours, you have honestly earned it.”
“I thank you, master,” said the girl.
To the church she went with her silver piece. The Rector was in his Confessional. She entered it, told him what she had done, and handing him the money, begged him to say a Mass for the soul in Purgatory who had most need of help.
“May be, one of my unknown family may benefit by it,” she said. “For this object I have always dreamed of earning something, ever since I was old enough to understand. The Dead know that, and they watched over me last night.”
“Very well,” answered the Rector, after giving her Absolution; “you shall have your desire. The Mass I am about to say shall be for your intention.”
When the Mass was over, and she was ready to set out with lightened heart for Guernoter, she came across a white-haired man in the porch. He looked as old as Adam, and yet he was upright, and he walked without difficulty.
He stopped the girl, and made her a low bow. “Young maiden;” he said, “will you take this note to Kersaliou for me?”
“Certainly, venerable sir,” she answered, taking the note he held out to her.
The old man smiled so kindly and thanked her so gratefully that Monik could not help thinking about his goodness as she went along towards Kersaliou. Never before had she felt so happy and light-hearted “What a fine face he had!” she thought to herself.
Kersaliou was an estate, to which, before the Revolution, the farm of Guernoter belonged. An old avenue of beech trees led up to it. When the little cow-keeper entered this avenue, the leaves of the beech trees began to rustle, and well-nigh to sing, as if each of them was a bird.
“I don’t know how it is,” thought Monica; “but I feel as if some wonderful happiness was coming to me to-day. It seems to me as if my meeting with the old man would bring me good luck!”
Just as she was going into the court in front of the Château of Kersaliou, she met its proprietor. She wished him “Good-morning.”
“Where are you going, little one?” he enquired.
“To your house, Monsieur de Kersaliou.”
“And what do you want at my house?”
“To take you this note, which has been put into my hands for you.”
And she related her encounter in the church porch, and told how grand and beautiful the old man looked, notwithstanding his great age.
“Should you recognise him, do you think, if you were to see his picture?”
“Of course I should recognise him.”
“Come with me, then.”
He took her into the Château and through all the rooms. Although Kersaliou had lost much of its former magnificence, the rooms had still an imposing appearance. On the walls, hung, in richly gilded frames, portraits of the most celebrated members of the noble family of de Kersaliou.
The present proprietor led Monica from one to another of these. Stopping before each, he asked her, “Is this he?”
“No!” she each time answered; “it is not he.”
Up to every picture the owner led Monica, and she looked attentively at each as she came before it, but in none could she recognise the venerable and imposing countenance of the old man she had seen in the porch.
The owner of Kersaliou stood silent a moment, with an anxious, disappointed air.
Suddenly he put his finger to his forehead. “Follow me to the loft,” said he to the girl.
This loft was full of things belonging to the olden times,—tattered hangings, broken statues, and old pictures riddled with holes. The gentleman began searching amongst the pictures. As he extricated them, one by one, out of the heap of rubbish, be handed them to Monica, who wiped them with the back of her apron.
“Here he is!” suddenly exclaimed the girl.
She had recognised the face of the old man, though the portrait was somewhat discoloured.
“All right,” said the gentleman. “Now we will go down to my study.”
He opened a big book, in which all the names of all the members of his family were inscribed.
“My dear Monica,” he said, “the old man you met in the porch was the greatgrandfather of my grandfather. He has been dead three hundred years. For three hundred years he has suffered in Purgatory for the want of a Mass. And it was necessary that this Mass should be paid for spontaneously by a poor person, out of his or her small earnings. You have done this, as is testified by the note you have brought me from the dead man, and which is in his own writing. Thanks to you, my ancestor of six generations ago has been delivered. He bids me recompense you in a manner that shall be worthy of him and of me. For the future, you shall be a servant in my house, and I promise that you shall be well treated. Do you consent to this?”
The poor little cow-keeper was so far from expecting such good luck, that she seemed as if rooted to the spot and unable to articulate a single word.
But the proprietor of Kersaliou quite comprehended that surprise and delight kept her silent.
From that day forward she lived at the Château, and she was very happy there. As the farmer’s wife at Guernoter used to say, “she had earned a good deal with her six francs!”
(Related by Marie Louise Bellec, dressmaker, Port-Blanc.)
Another Version of the Same Story
By A. Le Braz
A Young dressmaker in the neighbourhood of Penmarc’h had great devotion to the Dead, (“L’Anaon”). One evening, as she was returning home from her work very late, she heard a movement and something like stifled moans coming from out the brambles which bordered the road. She asked, “Who is there?” No one answered. She concluded that it was a Soul who wanted help. The next morning she went early to the church, and asked to have a Mass said—” for that Soul in Purgatory who needed but one Mass to be delivered.”
The Mass was said.
She was present at this Mass. As she was leaving the church, she met a young man in the churchyard who was dressed all in white.
The young man addressed her, saying,—
“You are a dressmaker by trade?”
“Yes, sir.”
“How much do you earn daily in the houses you work in?”
“Sixpence.”
“Well, if you would like to gain fifteen pence a day, go to Audierne. You will see a white house at the corner of the marketplace. Knock, and ask for the mistress of the house, and say that I sent you.”
The girl obeyed. The mistress of the house did not at first receive her kindly.
“I do not know,” she said, “who you mean. I have not asked anyone to send me a workwoman.”
The girl could not help fixing her eyes on a jet brooch worn by the mistress, in which a miniature was set.
“Pardon me, madame,” she said, after a moment’s pause; “you have in your brooch the portrait of the person who sent me here.”
“It is impossible; that is the portrait of my son, and he gas been dead ten years.”
“It was your son, then, whom I met. I can swear it by our Lord and His Blessed Mother!”
The old woman then insisted on hearing the whole story. The girl kept nothing from her; she told her of the sounds she had heard in the bushes the night before, of the Mass she had had said that morning, after which she had come across the young man, habited in white, in the churchyard.
The mother understood that she owed to her her son’s deliverance from Purgatory. She kept her with her till her death, and left her all her property.
(Related by a girl named Kerhoas, at Quimper.)
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