Tis the Lord's Work

Abstract

Tis the Lord's Work Stephen McQuiggan (bio) The harsh rapping roused Father Gorman from the limbo of the hearth, his joints grumbling as he rose stiffly to answer the door. He peered out through the window but saw only the swirl of snow dancing against the moon—a moon so big and bright he had taken it as a portent of ill omen the first moment he saw it, trudging through the small copse from the churchyard to his home. I'll go out hunting again, he thought distractedly (and of late his thoughts were distracted easily), whenever the storm abates. It was very late. There must have been a death in the village; no one would be abroad at such a time, and in such weather, otherwise. The door rapped and rattled once more. "Okay, okay," grumbled the priest, "spare the horses, I'm coming." He heaved open the warped oak, letting in a wind that chilled him like an exhalation of the grave. A man stood on his porch, his head uncovered and his ragged clothes soaked through, small drifts of snow on his shoulder as if he had been stationary for a long while, summoning up the courage to knock. Father Gorman squinted at him through the storm—a lost traveller perhaps, a pedlar in need of shelter, but not a local from the village. "Are you the Holy Man?" asked the stranger before the priest could so much as greet him. The quaint earnestness of the question made Father Gorman smile. "I am," he said, "now come in before one of us catches our death flapping our jaws." He smiled again as the man methodically wiped his boots on the mat before entering; there was enough snow on his back to flood the hallway, but he came in like a prissy spinster nonetheless. "Get yourself to the fire, my son, and I'll brew up a nice cup of tea… or perhaps you'd prefer a wee dram of something harder?" "Is alcohol not a sin, Father?" "It would be a sin to refuse it on a night such as this." The priest led the way into the small parlour, eyeing up his visitor for size. "I've [End Page 19] a few old clothes left from the charity drive," he said, "that might fit you in a pinch. I'll go fetch them while you change by the hearth." He stopped by the door. "What's your name, son?" The man, steam rising from his tattered shirt, looked back at him as if he were about to cry. "I'd tell you if I could, Father, I surely would." The priest studied him for signs of drunkenness; he was steady enough on his feet, but drink was a blight in these parts lately, especially now the crops had failed and the children missing. The stranger looked sober enough though, as he smiled ruefully. "They called me Slop the last place I stayed." "That's not a very dignified name." "The one who sent me here, he calls me Ephraim… I like that, it sounds proper." "The one who sent you?" asked the priest, but Slop was busy stripping, shaking the snow off like a drenched dog before the fire. "Well, we'll talk in a while. You get yourself sorted, and I'll be back with something to warm the cockles, eh?" Father Gorman bustled into the back room, fetching a shirt and some trousers from a mouldy old sack and wincing at the tang of acrid sweat that still clung to them. He paused in the hallway—he could see the damp tracks of his own slippers trailing back from the slush at the front door, but of his visitor's prints there was no sign. He shivered, chastising himself for being a Dolly Daydream, and hurried back to the cosy parlour. "Can I ask you something, Father," asked Slop on his return, "and will you answer me true?" The priest hid a smile; how often had he assuaged the guilt of the peasantry with a well tongued piece of scripture. It was touching. It was also a relief that some of the...