It's Hard To Be Holy

EP. 70: The Veiled Lady

Offensive Language. Reader Discretion Advised.

'Would you like to hear a ghost story?' was Alan Carr's greeting for the Author on the third morning, and without waiting for her to answer, he went on with a brief disclaimer: 'I have my own way of telling it, which was the Mrs. Lynch way originally, but everyone had their  spin, depending on what scared the children nearest to them most—rather, what scared them the most. My mother used to tell it to my sisters, but in her version, she liked to emphasize the Veiled Lady's pregnancy, and Pa liked to tell it that she ran off with a dago. But Mrs. Lynch's was the classic, you know?'

'Sorry,' said the Author, taking her seat upon the couch, '—the Veiled—'

'Lady.' His lip, already doused with grey smoke split apart into that leering grin. 'It was one of my favorites...'

And so he began:

'Once upon a time, and not a very nice time at that, there lived a Young Girl in St. Gregory's Parish. She was not popular, not beautiful, and she was often forgotten by her neighbors and family alike; and, truthfully, the Young Girl preferred it that way. She, being rather too intelligent for her neighbors, and her own good, liked solitude. She liked to be left to her own devices, and it was common place to see her under the willow tree of the graveyard with a good book in hand. She was happiest this way, and so, she thought, would always be.

And yet! 

The happiness of a child does not last forever. Indeed, as the years went on and the Young Girl became a woman, concern for her well-being grew. Namely, the concern of her parents. While the contemporaries of their daughter had all grown gracefully and married and had children of their own, their child had remained steadfastly stubborn in her aloofness and cultivated seclusion. They had tried their best to break her of this habit; they had tried everything they knew to encourage their girl. They would schedule the most eligible bachelors of St. Gregory's, who would come in their Sunday best, all primped and gussied up. Yet, the Young Woman would not budge, and she turned these would-be-swains away with an impatient wave of her hand, until at last, one day, out of desperate frustration, the Young Woman's father declared to her that she would be married to the next man who stepped across their hearth, whether she liked it or not.

Oh, how the Young Woman was enraged, and to spite her father's wishes, took out advertisements in that week's obituary column declaring herself dead. When that didn't work, as of course it wouldn't, and her father had thoroughly whipped her for her insolence and for the spending of his money, the Young Woman barricaded herself in her bedroom, where the sounds of her cries and gnashing of teeth and vows never to again leave her cell filled the whole of the house and wafted melancholically out into the street.

Nearly a whole year passed, and still, the Young Woman would not give in, only surviving off the meager rations her mother managed to sneak her.

And then! Then...on one particular summer's eve, when the sorrows of the Young Woman were at their loudest, a Young Gentleman, not from St. Gregory's, happened upon the parish. Poor soul was dreadfully lost, and being a gentleman of some repute, had the persistent feeling that he was in a place he should not have been. The eyes of the parishioners followed him about as he wandered the many streets, but when the Gentleman dared ask for directions, the parishioners, being wary of such intrusions, turned their backs on the man and feigned deafness.

Eve turned to night, and the Young Gentleman grew despondent, and fear took him, and he saw little eyes everywhere he went, red eyes in the dark.

Ah! But suddenly, providence on the wind! He heard a cry! High and mournful it wailed, and the Young Gentlemen, drawn to the beauty of its timbre, followed the sound, staggering onwards in the hope of salvation, until he came upon Bailey Road, and saw, what he first thought could only be an angel, perched on the windowsill of her room, wailing to the heavens