The Unicorn from the Stars

I have read a long passage about it years ago. But, Martin, there is another kind of inspiration, or rather an obsession or possession. A diabolical power comes into one’s body, or overshadows it. Those whose bodies are taken hold of in this way, jugglers, and witches, and the like, can often tell what is happening in distant places, or what is going to happen, but when they come out of that state they remember nothing. I think you said⁠— Martin That I could not remember. Father John You remembered something, but not all. Nature is a great sleep; there are dangerous and evil spirits in her dreams, but God is above Nature. She is a darkness, but He makes everything clear; He is light. Martin All is clear now. I remember all, or all that matters to me. A poor man brought me a word, and I know what I have to do. Father John Ah, I understand, words were put into his mouth. I have read of such things. God sometimes uses some common man as his messenger. Martin You may have passed the man who brought it on the road. He left me but now. Father John Very likely, very likely, that is the way it happened. Some plain, unnoticed man has sometimes been sent with a command. Martin I saw the unicorns trampling in my dream. They were breaking the world. I am to destroy, destruction was the word the messenger spoke. Father John To destroy? Martin To bring again the old disturbed exalted life, the old splendour. Father John You are not the first that dream has come to. Gets up, and walks up and down. It has been wandering here and there, calling now to this man, now to that other. It is a terrible dream. Martin Father John, you have had the same thought. Father John Men were holy then, there were saints everywhere. There was reverence; but now it is all work, business, how to live a long time. Ah, if one could change it all in a minute, even by war and violence! There is a cell where Saint Ciaran used to pray; if one could bring that time again! Martin Do not deceive me. You have had the command. Father John Why are you questioning me? You are asking me things that I have told to no one but my confessor. Martin We must gather the crowds together, you and I. Father John I have dreamed your dream, it was long ago. I had your vision. Martin And what happened? Father John Harshly. It was stopped; that was an end. I was sent to the lonely parish where I am, where there was no one I could lead astray. They have left me there. We must have patience; the world was destroyed by water, it has yet to be consumed by fire. Martin Why should we be patient? To live seventy years, and others to come after us and live seventy years it may be; and so from age to age, and all the while the old splendour dying more and more. A noise of shouting. Andrew, who has been standing at the door, comes in. Andrew Martin says truth, and he says it well. Planing the side of a cart or a shaft, is that life? It is not. Sitting at a desk writing letters to the man that wants a coach, or to the man that won’t pay for the one he has got, is that life, I ask you? Thomas arguing at you and putting you down⁠—“Andrew, dear Andrew, did you put the tyre on that wheel yet?” Is that life? No, it is not. I ask you all, what do you remember when you are dead? It’s the sweet cup in the corner of the widow’s drinking-house that you remember. Ha, ha, listen to that shouting! That is what the lads in the village will remember to the last day they live. Martin Why are they shouting? What have you told them? Andrew Never you mind; you left that to me. You bade me to lift their hearts and I did lift them. There is not one among them but will have his head like a blazing tar-barrel before morning. What did your friend the beggar say? The juice of the grey barley, he said. Father John You accursed villain! You have made them drunk! Andrew Not at all, but lifting them to the stars. That is what Martin bade me to do, and there is no one can say I did not do it. A shout at door, and beggars push in a barrel. They cry, “Hi! for the noble master!” and point at Andrew. Johnny It’s not him, it’s that one! Points at Martin. Father John Are you bringing this devil’s work in at the very door? Go out of this, I say! get out! Take these others with you! Martin No, no; I asked them in, they must not be turned out. They are my guests. Father John Drive them out of your uncle’s house! Martin Come, Father, it is better for you to go. Go back to your own place. I have taken the command. It is better perhaps for you that you did not take it. Father John and Martin go out. Biddy It is well for that old lad he didn’t come between ourselves and our luck. Himself to be after his meal, and ourselves staggering with the hunger! It would be right to have flayed him and to have made bags of his skin. Nanny What a hurry you are in to get your enough! Look at the grease on your frock yet, with the dint of the dabs you put in your pocket! Doing cures and foretellings is it? You starved pot-picker, you! Biddy That you may be put up tomorrow to take the place of that decent son of yours that had the yard of the gaol wore with walking it till this morning! Nanny If he had, he had a mother to come to, and he would know