LUKY:
DO YOU believe in ghosts? I never used to, since my Dutch father - that laconic exploder of myths - always told me they don't exist. However, since I married an Irishman, I changed my mind somewhat. To the memory of my father I'll concede that I've never actually seen a ghost, but my Irish husband claimed that he saw more than one, and since he usually told the truth I was inclined to believe him.
Irish ghosts and Dutch ones
Moreover, I could believe in an Irish ghost before a Dutch one. You see, the Dutch are great tidyers. They love a mess because this gives them something to clean up. Your old ruin, your deserted cottage - such buildings have little future in Holland. Before you can say Jack Robinson, the roadrollers arrive and the entire edifice is razed. What they can't knock down, they restore, and that's almost as bad, because it is the air of neglect that give historical monuments their impact.
Air of antiquity
Let's now cross the Irish Sea. What do we find? Ancient abbeys, mossgrown cottages and rickety signposts abound,none of which would stand a chance of survival in Holland. The Irish have a great sense of history, in addition to which they believe in letting sleeping dogs lie. In the city of Waterford from where the beautiful Waterford crystal comes, there stands a tower which looks made up entirely of boulders. "Why don't they demolish that?" I asked my husband. He was horrified, and looked furtively behind him before whispering confidentially that this tower had stood in this place since the year one thousand. "That's no excuse", I said unimpressed. But if I know the Irish, that tower will be there another thousand years.
Now if I were a ghost, I'd prefer to settle in Waterford rather than in one of those towers in Amsterdam, where a carillon peals out on the hour and scaffolding is regularly erected to give the place a facelift and the tourists a thrill.
A handsome stranger
I was talking to an Irish friend along these lines and mentioned another old Waterford building my husband had pointed out to me. He had told me that it was once visited by a handsome stranger who was invited by his hosts to play cards. Someone dropped a card on the floor. Bending down to pick it up, he spotted the feet of the guest. From under that rich cloak and satin trousers there peeped out two cloven hooves. "That's the Irish", my friend said, "I was raised on stories of handsome strangers with cloven hooves. You'd find them particularly on the dance floor, we were told. For years after, when a man asked me to dance I'd look at his feet before accepting."
Bancroft Copper Mine
Never mind the cloven hoofed; you meet nice ghosts as well, and not only in Ireland. My husband swears by all he holds dear that he saw one underground in Bancroft copper mine. The man wore no helmet, a flagrant breach of the most elementary safety rule. "I got up to stop him", my husband says, "when he turned the most beautiful smile on me. 'Good evening, Bwana', he said, and walked on.
"I had greeted him back before remembering that his helmet was missing, so I rushed after him to remind him of regulations, but he had passed beyond a doorway. When I opened it I could see no one."
Lo Long One
"I went into the working place and asked the other men if they had seen a tall miner minus hat. Pandemonium followed! Tools were dropped and impediments brushed aside as they raced towards the cage in a body."
To the uninitiated, a cage is what they call the underground lift. "Lo Long One", someone gasped.
"When they had calmed down," my husband continued, "I discovered that the Long One was a ghost who frequently haunted that particular section, and everyone was afraid of meeting him."
A gentle person
Do I believe this story? All I can tell you is that for weeks after the incident my husband took his rosary underground with him when he went on duty, and all the holy medals he could lay his hands on. I worried about the Long One with the beautiful smile. Why I wondered, is he wandering around underground? A gentle person like that ought to be at rest. So I had a Mass said for the Long One and felt better about him afterwards.
Before we jeer at another ghost story, we ought to reflect: perhaps the reason we've never met a ghost is because we don't have the sensitivity needed, rather than being too sensible as I had always believed.
Speaking for myself, however, I feel that's just as well.
*Photograph taken by Catherine Nicolette. Please feel free to use copyright free for any worthy purpose.
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