Macey

“ A GHOST at large in Montclair, New Jersey? As soon a matinée of the Folies Bergères in Old Trinity! I never would have believed it for an instant if it hadn't been for Lew Macey.
It did not require a clairvoyant to see that Macey believed it, though. Ordinarily he is a prematurely settled sort of chap, bald at thirty, wearing thick double lenses, getting his lightest recreation out of reading The New Republic, and all that. Just the type of build you'd expect to find in an anchor man in the city bowling league, but refined by education and thought instead of coarsened by beer and exercise. ”

“ I concluded, “and he's a mighty intelligent dog. Half bull and half collie, isn't he, Lew?”
Macey nodded acquiescence. “Yes. Good watchdog. Crazy, though—just as crazy as the rest of us.”
Masters spread his long hands flat on the table, palms down. “Well, Mr. Macey,” he began, “Hoffman and I are just hungering for a chance at being entertained by a real spook. Do you think that if we went out to Montclair this evening with you we could be satisfied?”
Macey's mouth twitched, I think with anger. “Yes!” he answered gruffly. “I wont answer for what happens to you, though!” ”

“ Macey seemed reluctant to make the admission. “Ethel has, though. And my dog Pete!”
“You say your dog has seen ghosts?” I asked incredulously.
Macey bowed somberly. “Pete is as crazy as the rest of us. When the noises start, he runs up and down the house with his hair standing up in a ruff around his neck and along the ridge of his back. Now and then he stops and howls at something in the empty room from which the noise is coming! If it were a person, he would bark. No, he howls like a wolf!” ”

“ There!” shrilled Lew Macey, starting up from the chair he was occupying in the living-room.
“Come on, Bert!” exclaimed Masters from between clenched teeth. He drew his revolver and ran up the front stairway three steps at a time. I was on his heels.
Before we reached the landing, all was quiet above, but we hurried to the point from which the noise had seemed to come. Pete, the dog, was there, standing in the middle of the upstairs hall, whimpering. His hair stood up all along his back just as Macey had said. ”

“ This meant concentrated thought on Masters' part. Ergo he had some new idea!
“Shall we go up—” I began, but at that moment a blood-curdling shriek of terrific pain smote us like a blow. It was the death-wail we had heard before! It came in full agonized volume from the dining-room downstairs! Like mad men we sped down the steps again and burst into the dining-room.
I think that it was not until Lew Macey fainted at my side that the full meaning of the scene before me came to my mind. The six-foot glass top of the dining-room table was one huge pool of blood! ”

“ And it is not only in religious matters that her sympathies are so broad. The sententious dulness of Mr Macey is as much within the range of her feelings as the manliness of Adam Bede or the scholastic pride of old Bardo. ”

“ How d'you suppose I got the wires in? I build a house about every ten or eleven months. Make about fifteen thousand a year beside my—hm!—salary as ghost, so I can afford to laugh at the loss of this.”
Masters snapped around quickly. “Yes, and you can keep on laughing for about ten years, Mr. Seppel!” he announced. “Take him away, Bixby, and hold him for charges.”
DESPITE the joker's protestations, he was led away. For my part I think he was lucky, since Lew Macey at that moment was meditating nothing less than homicide.
Macey cooled down somewhat as Masters started speaking. ”

“ She, an adventurer in amateur lawlessness saw in him something kindred at heart.
And so when a newspaper came to her in which she recognized with her keen insight Lawrence Macey's face under Graeme Mackenzie's name, and a story of embezzlement of trust company and other funds from the Omaha Central Western Trust of half a million, she had not been wholly surprised. Instead, she felt almost a sense of elation. The man was neither better nor worse than herself. ”

“ Solomon Macey, a small hale old man, with an abundant crop of long white hair reaching nearly to his shoulders, advanced to the indicated spot, bowing reverently while he fiddled, as much as to say that he respected the company though he respected the key-note more. As soon as he had repeated the tune and lowered his fiddle, he bowed again to the Squire and the Rector, and said, "I hope I see your honour and your reverence well, and wishing you health and long life and a happy New Year. ”

“ Constance felt unconsciously the shift which he had skilfully made in their positions. Instead of being the pursuer, she was now the pursued, at least in their conversation. He had admitted nothing of what her quick intuition told her.
Yet she felt an admiration for the sang-froid of Macey. She felt a spell thrown over her by the magnetic eyes that seemed to search her own. They were large eyes, the eyes of a dreamer, rather than of a practical man, eyes of a man who goes far and travels long with the woman on whom he fixes them solely. ”

“ She felt that he was a man vibrating with physical and mental power, long latent, which nothing but a strong will held in check, a man by whom she could be fascinated, yet of whom she was just a little bit afraid.
With Macey, it would have been difficult to analyze his feelings. He had found in Constance a woman who had seen the world in all its phases, yet had come through unstained by what would have drowned some in the depths of the under-world, or thrust others into the degradation of the demi-monde, at least. He admired and respected her. He, the dreamer, saw in her the practical. ”

“ But Maciek was only a poor labourer, and though he was afraid of the giants, and would gladly have made room for them, he could not leave until he had loaded up his sledge. He did not rest now or rub his frozen hands; he worked as fast as he could, so that the night and the winter storms should not overtake him.
The sky grew darker and darker with clouds; mists rose in the forests and froze into fine crystals which instantly covered Maciek's sukmana, the child's shawl, and the horses' manes with a crackling crust. ”

“ In Dobrzyn there were numbers of sagacious old men—men versed in Latin, who from their youth up had practised at the bar; there were numbers of richer men: but of all the family the poor and simple Maciek was the most highly honoured, not only as a swordsman made famous by his switch, but as a man of wise and sure judgment, who knew the history of the country and the traditions of the family, and was equally well versed in law and farming. He knew likewise the secrets of hunting and of medicine; they even ascribed to him (though this the priest denied) a knowledge of higher, superhuman things. ”

“ General Mace, it appeared, was an old friend of Miss Carthew’s father and was staying by himself at Folkestone. General Mace had fought in the Indian Mutiny and was exactly what a general should be, very tall with a white moustache fiercely curling and a rigid back that bent inwards like a bow and a magnificent ebony walking-stick and a gruff voice. General Mace seemed to take a fancy to Michael and actually invited him to go for a walk with him next day at ten o’clock. ”

“ The shoemaker could read, and—what gave him a special charm, and no little authority in Maciej's eyes—he could scrawl the eighteen letters of his Christian and surname, although slowly, and always with considerable difficulty. To Maciej's credit, on the other hand, besides his physical strength—that [9] brute force which impresses even those who are not lame—stood the fact that he took service more from motives of comradeship than of necessity. For he possessed capital of his own, having made several hundred roubles, which were deposited at present at the shoemaker's house. ”

“ Baker. At last, however, he acted, having concluded, as I supposed, that there was little chance of getting Mr. Wallet back. There was some show of letting the men choose, but it amounted to nothing. Macy was made fifth mate, and the other mates moved up a peg, so that Mr. Brown was second mate. That pleased me, and the appointment of Macy pleased Peter, for he said that there was not a better man on the ship. I agreed with him in that. Macy was one of the finest specimens of man I have ever seen. ”

“ Furniture standing far enough apart to suit the average man hampered Maciej. He could not take two steps in the house without knocking against something. He trod cautiously and very slowly, continually looking round; and he always had the ashamed air of a man who feels himself out of place and is persuaded that his strongest efforts will not save him from doing absurd things. I had seen Maciej a few times when, in Światełki's absence, he had taken his place in the shop, where the accommodation was fairly limited. ”

“ Mackay and Ruvigny, with the English and Huguenot cavalry, had succeeded in passing the bog at a place where two horsemen could scarcely ride abreast. Saint Ruth at first laughed when he saw the Blues, in single file, struggling through the morass under a fire which every moment laid some gallant hat and feather on the earth. "What do they mean?" he asked; and then he swore that it was pity to see such fine fellows rushing to certain destruction. "Let them cross, however;" he said. "The more they are, the more we shall kill." ”

“ Talmash was the fifth man that set foot on the Connaught shore. The Irish, taken unprepared, fired one confused volley and fled, leaving their commander, Maxwell, a prisoner. The conquerors clambered up the bank over the remains of walls shattered by a cannonade of ten days. Mackay heard his men cursing and swearing as they stumbled among the rubbish. "My lads," cried the stout old Puritan in the midst of the uproar, "you are brave fellows; but do not swear. We have more reason to thank God for the goodness which He has shown us this day than to take His name in vain." ”

“ Macías was a gentleman of the Grand Master's, Don Enrique de Villena. Among the ladies who attended on this nobleman was one with whose beauty our poet became captivated; and neither the seeing her married to another, the reproofs of the Grand Master, nor, in fact, the prison into which he ordered him to be consigned, could conquer his fatal attachment. The husband, fired with wrath, concerted with the alcaide of the tower in which his rival was imprisoned, and found means to dart at him, through a window, the lance he bore, and with it pierced him to the heart. ”

“ The British consul, Mr. Frater, lent him a chair and a bed. There was one old Chinese, who kept a shop near by, and who seemed inclined to be friendly to the queer barbarian with the black beard. He presented him with an old pewter lamp, and the house was furnished complete.
Mackay sat down at his one table, the first night after he was settled. The damp air was hot and heavy, and swarms of tormenting mosquitoes filled the room. Through the open door came the murmur of the river, and from far down in the village the sounds of harsh, clamorous voices. ”

“ The incidents upon which the following ballad has its foundation occurred about the year 1660. Thomas Macy was one of the first, if not the first white settler of Nantucket. The career of Macy is briefly but carefully outlined in James S. Pike’s The New Puritan. ”

“ Mackay, accompanied by one trusty servant, spurred bravely through the thickest of the claymores and targets, and reached a point from which he had a view of the field. His whole army had disappeared, with the exception of some Borderers whom Leven had kept together, and of Hastings's regiment, which had poured a murderous fire into the Celtic ranks, and which still kept unbroken order. All the men that could be collected were only a few hundreds. ”

“ The caitiff reeled three paces back, and let the maiden go.
Yet glared he fiercely round him, and growled in harsh, fell tone,
"She's mine, and I will have her, I seek but for mine own:
She is my slave, born in my house, and stolen away and sold,
The year of the sore sickness, ere she was twelve hours old. ”

“ But you ought to know by now that I am not a man to be trifled with; no man, let alone a woman, is going to set a course for Macy O’Shea to steer by. And, to come to the point at once, I want you to understand that Carl Ristow’s daughter is coming here. ”

“ Three-quarters of an hour later found Mac, suitably adorned, sitting on a bench at Helmeih Station having his boots and bandolier polished by four jabbering, disreputable "Gyppie" youngsters, who swore glibly the while the most lurid English oaths. Incidentally, they often terminated an exceptionally fluent flow with "Eh, Mistah Mickkenzie?" the usual mode of native address to New Zealanders after the High Commissioner's visit, which sometimes ruffled Mac's dignity, but more often amused him. ”

“ On his arrival at the Mawhera Pa on March 2nd, 1860, Mackay found S. M. Mackley, a Nelson settler, and seven Massacre Bay natives there. They had travelled down the coast from Collingwood, Mackley’s mission being the location of an area suitable for farming purposes. Fortunately, in his youth, he had studied for the medical profession, and, having a few simple remedies with him, he treated Mackay’s knee with such good effect that that indomitable man was ready for the road again in a few days. ”

“ Sprinkler yelled: "We can get along alone without you; long live our marshal, the Maciek of Macieks! Let him have the baton!" The Dobrzynskis cried, "We beg you to take it!" but the rest of the gentry shouted with one voice, "We forbid it!" The throng was breaking up into two groups, and, nodding their heads in contrary directions, one faction cried, "We forbid," and the other, "We beg you."
Old Maciek sat in their midst the one dumb man, and his head alone was unmoved. ”