Whilst doing some research about the women of Belfast we came across this Christmas short story from 1894 by the writer Rosa Mulholland

If you've been on my 'Dead Interesting Women' Friars Bush Tour you'll know that Rosa Mulholland's father, and some other members of her family are buried in Friars Bush. Born in Belfast, Rosa Mulholland was a novellist, poet and playwright who also wrote short stories for newspapers and magazines. This story appeared in the newspapers in December 1894 and we're pretty sure it hasn't seen the light of day since, so we've reproduced it here in full using the same layout as Rosa intended. Its not the most cheerful of Christmas stories, its fair to say, but we hope you enjoy it.

THE SNOWY CHRISTMAS

BY ROSA MULHOLLAND

Snowed up in a lonely inn amongst Irish mountains the writer of this little record paid a dreamy heed to the loose scraps of romantic retrospect which fluted about from the lips of those who came and went about the hearth place. They leaped and fell in fitful snatches just as did the blaze in the shadows; and amongst the rest the following little history glimmered forth from the smoke and wrought itself for the listener into a lasting shape in the embers. Referring to the fearful fall of 18 - which is remembered with horror in the district, they called it the story of the Snowy Christmas. Knowing what the words mean it seems hard to turn ones eye from the blank of the end and dash warmly into the beginning:  for the beginning was warm and bright and this page should open, as a small door opens, into a garden of sunshine. It was August the glorious golden month. Hills were flushed with crimson ether and Glens were dim with purple mystery.  Valley rivers ran red at sunset and rainbows hung about the waterfalls. The bronzed cornfields palpitated faint for joy when a stray breeze crept over a hedge and fanned their hot hearts and in the cabin doorways the women joined their brown hands above their eyes while looking for the reapers coming home.

It was a sultry afternoon the curlews on the burning beach below had not energy to scream as the flowing tide flushed like fire to their feet, where they perched luxuriously on the wet stones. and the fishermen’s boats drifted idly out into the dazzling western haze, as though toil and trouble were a bygone dream and they steered to the shores of eternal rest. High up on the stretch of golden moor a white cottage flung the shadow of its gable on the hot ground, and the faint smoke from its chimney hovered sleepily above in the lustrous air. The door lay open and the threshold stone was boldly marked with a red breadth of light. Beyond it there was a cooler hall, at present deliciously filled with the murmurous echoes of a pleasant voice ebbing and flowing from somewhere near.  A white door opened from either side of the passage. In one of the rooms beyond these, a pretty little chintz draperied parlour, a pale lady was lying on a sofa. A great vase of fern stood beside her on the floor, and the green blinds were half let down filling the place with a cool dreamy atmosphere. The other room was the cottage kitchen, tiny, white and glittering. A strong-featured old woman wearing a brilliant handkerchief folded like a turban over her white cap sat by the hearth tending some cakes which were “browning” over the fire, and at the white- curtained window, flung wide open to the top, a young girl was baking at a table. Her gown was brown gingham, no brooch fastened her collar, a white apron was tied around her waist, and her sleeves were rolled up over her arms past her elbows. Many housemaids would have been discontented to wear her dress yet a glance must convince the most dull of comprehension that this little baker was a lady.

She prattled gaily as she baked, now and again tossing her head to shake back the waving dark hair from her throat and forehead, or flashing around a merry look from her bright face at the old servant.

“Its very ominous, certainly”, she said, cutting out her cakes with an air of mock seriousness:” the tongs have twice fallen right across the hearth without any awkwardness of yours therefore, most surely a stranger is to come. And then you had an awful dream last week, which makes it doubly sure that if a stranger does come something terrible will be the consequence. What do you think he will do Bab -decapitate us all? Or bring an enchanter's wand and change us into ducks and geese? That would not be so bad this hot weather. It would be so nice to swim in the lake all day!”

Bab shook her head. “It’s all very well for you to have your fun out of it, Miss Elsie”,

 she said “but I hope he mayn’t darken our door,  that's all!” Elsie laughed blithely as she untied her apron and laughed again as she ran up the one little flight of white painted steps to her small bedroom under the eaves. Coming quickly down again in her outdoor dress with a basket in her hand she looked in at the kitchen and said:

“ I am going for some moss and flowers Bab. Have the kettle boiling for Mama will want her tea. And Bab, if I meet the stranger, I will send him to you. Oh, perhaps he is coming to take ‘The House’!”

Not waiting to see the result of this suggestion, Elsie tripped through the door out on the sunshiny heath. ‘The House’ was a large pile, standing solitary in a wooded recess, between hills, not far distant. It stood upon the lands of Elsie’s ancestors and the setting sun was just now blazing on the windows of her old nursery. In that nursery Bab had sung her to sleep and taught her her prayers, and if Elsie’s bright youth cared little that her life had fallen from its worldly high estate, the faithful servant fretted sorely over the cruel chance and could do not tolerate the idea of a stranger in the old house.  Elsie sauntered slowly along in the sun filling her basket with mosses and water lilies. She stood up to her waist amongst the rushes, and shading her eyes gazed round and round the welkin. All the earth was quiet; heavily, sultrily still, and at rest. Eternal ridges of mountains prisoned it between purple walls. A dull fever throbbed in its veins, but there was no effort, no varied action.  Elsie had heard of the “busy world” and often wondered what it must be to behold the works of men, to be one in a crowd, to have variety in ones days, to see new faces, to make new friends. “It is so still”, she murmured, “so eternally and tolerably still. Nothing changing, nothing renewing, nothing passing away. Nature going through her slow monotonous courses; time making us older; and still the same dull, dull quiet life! Oh that I had a pair of wings to fly over yonder mountain, with its smiling, denying face, half amused at and half pitying my restlessness, or that I could paddle a boat right over that golden line, out so far where the ships passed like ghosts! There are plenty of paths to cloudland streaming down the air in coloured labyrinths ending in golden vistas; and they are crowded with travellers, fancies and wishes, and hopes coming and going; but on that one weary, drowsy, yellow road that leads out into the world where men and women live and work there is never a shadow, never a speck! Babs tongs!”  she repeated, smiling to herself. “I wish some one - man, woman or child - would come and rouse us up a little, before we die of stagnation. Heigh ho! Mama says she had plenty of friends once; but nobody minds us now. Well! I don't care; only one does tire of baking bread and gathering flowers and going out for walks. And I wish I had not read that novel; it was a delightful treat but I don't think it was good for me.”

She smiled again as she came near the house and looked up at the windows. “Now if I were in earnest with all this grumbling”, she said, “how wicked I should be! For it is a blessed thing to have such a pleasant little home to come to, and a dear patient mother waiting for her tea!”

At this moment Bab appeared on the threshold gesticulating wildly and mysteriously. “Why what is the matter?” cried Elsie.

 “He’s come!” gasped Bab while her turban nodded with frenzied impulse.

“Who?”  asked Elsie opening her eyes wide.

“The stranger. He came up the road a bit ago, as tall and as grand as you please. And he asks, “Is this Mrs Leonards house? And I don't know what came over me that I said ’Yes’ or I might have sent him about his business. But he's in the parlour; and oh! Miss Elsie dear, hurry in and get him out of this as fast as you can!”

Bab   opened the parlour door, and Elsie advanced to it, mechanically, quite bewildered and only half understanding the old servant, only half prepared to see a real stranger in the room with her mother.  She walked in fresh and bright after her ramble, with her curly hair somewhat tossed, straying in picturesque rings and tendrils from under her slouched hat, and with her basket of mosses under her arm. A gentleman was sitting by her mother's couch and as he rose up at her entrance the girl almost sank into the earth with shyness. She heard her mother say “Elsie, this is Mr North, the son of your father's friend who went to India. He has only been a short time in England and he has kindly come to see us”.  

Elsie, having nothing to say, gave him her hand and then sat down. Too shy to look,  she sat gazing at the fire and listening to the pleasant bass voice which was so unheard of a novelty in that  small parlour . She fell into a reverie of pleased wonder at the strange new sensation of having a friend. Where had he come from? Had he really travelled that speckless yellow road; or had he landed with a fleet in the bay or strode across the hills.?

“You’re not perhaps aware”, said Elsie’s mother “that there is no hotel for very many miles from here. If you will accept such mountain hospitality as we have to offer it will be given most gladly”.

The pale lady said this with a pink flush on her white cheek, whilst there hovered about her an echo of that sweet stately dignity which in past years had so well become the mistress of ‘The House’.

And then the stranger, having gladly accepted the invitation, went into the hall to look after his gun; and Elsie, trying to shake off her bewilderment, went upstairs to lay aside her hat. She brushed back her curls, and shook out her dress, and tied a blue ribbon under her collar, and then her toilette was complete; for Elsie in summertime, except on Sundays, never thought of wearing anything better than a gingham gown. As she came downstairs the stranger stood at the open hall -door and Elsie, having conquered her first impulse to turn and fly up again, came soberly down and saw him plainly for the first time; for before he had only been to her a vague, kindly presence. He was tall and strongly made, handsome and brave looking, with a bronzed skin and sunny eyes. The light fell on the little maiden herself as she came down the stairs with a strange spell checking her steps and revealing the frank light in her eyes.  Elsie did not realise what a miniature place it must seem to him altogether , this travelled man;  a miniature house and a miniature young lady (not more so in stature than in the very small amount of the usual requirements which sufficed to proclaim her the lady) who dared to wear gingham at tea time,  and yet approached with as stately a little step as though she were clad in silks and laces.  Phillip North must however have found it a pleasant picture which the sunset illuminated before him, for his eyes kindled and a delicate thrill of appreciation hovered tenderly on his lips.  Elsie tried to say something polite as she passed close by, but meeting those warm observant eyes fixed upon her she relapsed into shyness, and retreated to the kitchen, where Bab was preparing tea.

A glass dish of water lilies stood in the centre of the tea table and Phillip North said, “I think I saw you gathering these”. They were the first words he had spoken to her and Elsie  coloured and overflowed a cup,  and then looked up in surprise and said “Did you? Where?”

“Down by the side of a little lake. And after you had got them you stood for a long time in a brown study, looking at the sky”

And this was all the conversation they had till after tea. Then Elsie’s mother, having

 conversed too much and too eagerly for her strength,  lay resting on her sofa,  and Elsie,  looking out into the starry shades of the twilight from the open window,  forgot her reserve and found herself talking quite frankly to the stranger,  telling him how she spent her time (not concealing the fact that she baked the bread) what books she read,  and a number of other small things too trifling to be recorded. And then the moon appeared between two mountains large and yellow in the soft purple light; and Phillip North enraptured Elsie by telling her that he had beheld no finer scene in any land. Then he described to her countries whose very names made her cheek throb. Poor little Elsie! That was a night never to be forgotten while the light stayed in those earnest eyes.

One evening soon afterwards it happened that Elsie came to the door just as Phillip North arrived from the moors with his gun and his dogs and his days spoil. He stooped and laid the dead game at her feet and passed on to put away his gun. Some wild idea suggesting the poem of ‘Hiawatha’ flashed fierily through her brain and sent a fearful delight tangling through her veins. She stood pale and trembling, like one who had got a blow, then rushed upstairs and threw herself on her bed in a passion of tears - why she did not dare to know. She felt something cold on her face, and looking up saw one of Phillips dogs staring at her with mute sympathy. She leaned forward to kiss his rough face, but checked herself, pushing him fiercely from her, and drove him from the room.

Weeks passed and still Phillip North stayed, and still Mrs Leonard observing him, weighing his words and his looks, and studying his character - still Elsie’s mother was glad that he stayed. And even Bab had forgotten her dream and blessed him for a kindly gentleman. And Elsie, tripping happily about her household work, did not care if he saw her through the open window baking her bread; nor was she ashamed when one day he came in asked her for one of her cakes fresh from the fire. And so her life wore on towards that sunniest point where the glad feet were to stop, where the music was to be hushed, and the light to go down. Oh dead eyes! If you can look back on life, how do you thank God for the blissful brightness that blinded you to the end and let the grave open beneath you unawares!

Was it the creeping on of the shadow of death, that restlessness which would not let Elsie be happy in peace? Or was it the ghost of Babs foolish superstition rising after she herself had laid it? At evening, when she closed the door upon the sad mountains, Elsie longed so to shut out the world that they three might stay together thus forever. At night she lay broad awake assuring herself “Our friend is here”. Then the shadow would reply “How long will he be here? He will go and you will never behold him again, never,  never till the last trumpet shall sound”. And  weary and feverish she would rise when the dawn had swept away the night – clouds  and in the fresh pale morning,  while the birds chirruped sleepily under the eaves she would haunt the restful  house, stealing out to feed and pet Phillips dogs and then in again to watch the sunrise,  now from one window and now from another,  reading the pale scrolls of early clouds and wondering at how recklessly we sleep away half or bright youth, drowning in dull dreams happy moments whose fast waning  measure has been meted out to us with a nice balance. And at last when her eyes grew pained with vigil she would steal to the garden and bring a handful of flowers and place them on her pillow, and laying her cheek against their cool sweetness, would fall asleep.  

One day Elsie, having been down on the beach, came in with the glorious light on her face and told her mother a story, over which the pale lady cried, as women sometimes do when very happy. But Elsie could only look out upon the mountains with a transfigured countenance, and whispered triumphantly, “What can come now, unless death?” The glory vanished from her face and she crept away to pray for that which God saw not right to give.

 Philip North bought ‘The House’ and thither Elsie’s mother was to return in the spring, when Elsie had become its mistress.  So being mercifully blinded, they planned in the gladness of their hearts. And Elsie went with Phillip one evening to view the old place and arrange about alterations and furnishing. She went in her pretty simple dress and straw-hat walking by Phillips side over the moors and through the wood, and across the threshold into the deserted house, flinging   back shutters and letting in the light, and making the silent old rooms ring back the echoes of her quick feet and merry voice. And so they agreed how this room and that should be appointed. And Phillip made notes of all, for he was going back to the world to make many arrangements before Christmas Day which was to be their wedding.

 November came and Phillip went, and in the joy of receiving his first letter Elsie forgot the pain of parting. One week went by, wet and dreary, and the next set in with heavy snow; falling, falling, whirling and drifting night and day, till dykes were filled up, and roads were blocked, and all landmarks were lost. On the first white morning Elsie stood at the window, with some dainty needlework in her hand, watching and smiling at the eddying flakes, thinking that of how soon their cruel white sting would freeze up her young life, how soon the pitiless drifts would seal her dead eyes.

There were no more letters; the mails were stopped. Thick and unceasing the snow fell. The valleys, like overflowing seas, rose to the knees of the mountains. Dwellers in the lowlands fled for shelter to their friends on the hills and forgot where their homes had been. Streams and rivers lay congealed like blood in the veins of the dead.

Every morning the day stared at Elsie with its white blank face where she sat holding her mother's hand - her mother, whom the long piercing cold of that cruel snow was killing, whilst with daily sullen denial it forbid all aid to approach her. Day after day she sat so, holding the thin hand while weeks went on and December was half spent, gazing out at the imploring hills and the mourning trees, trying to pray with patient courage while her eyes searched the relentless sky in vain for mercy.

Downstairs a lamp burned constantly in the garnished parlour.  Christmas decorations had been made and white curtains were looped with the red and green of the holly. Bab kept the fire burning on the lamp trimmed, and Elsie stole down now and again to see that all was neat and bright, for the thaw might come any day, Phillip might arrive and her mother recover.

And the pale lady who lay upstairs knowing herself to be dying , spoke bright words to the child whom she feared to leave lonely,  urging her to omit no preparation to have all things brightly in readiness,  so that when the thaw should come and Phillip arrive,  her own wasting life might yet have a little time to burn,  even until she beheld that which her heart craved to see accomplished.

“Christmas Day will be bright, love,” she would murmur, stroking the faithful little hand that held hers so strongly, as if it would not give up its grasp to death. “I dreamed this morning that the day had come, and the sun was shining, and you and I were both dressed in white, and I was quite well again . I know it will be a bright day”.

 And then the pale lady would turn her fast changing face  to where she could see the chimneys of her old home,  and thinking who knows what thoughts of the happy days passed under its roof-  tree she would gaze  away above the white hills beyond with the eyes of one whose  soul goes with them,  trying to learn the track,  trying to go accustomed to the path by which it soon must go on its lonely journey to the unknown land.

And so the hearth was swept and the walls were garnished and the lamp and fire burned brightly downstairs; and above Elsie’s white dress lay in her room like a wreath from the pitiless snow outside, which had drifted in through the window and remained there undisturbed. And the wind moaned around the house, rattling at the locks of the doors as if to warn that one was coming to whom closed doors were nothing. And that one came in the dead of a dark night and summoned the pale lady from sleep. And opening her eyes, she recognised the call, and riveting one last prayerful gaze upon the dear face beside her, she turned her own from the world and followed the messenger. Oh pulseless earth! Oh tearless sky! You  had no pity for the longing life that would fain have lingered yet a little space,  how then could you melt for the unpraying dead that lay there meekly defying  you in its shroud with its patient hands folded, waiting so still till  you vouchsafed it a grave;   or for the stricken figure that sat at its feet with a brain dulled  from studying hour by hour the changed  features in their unsympathising repose,  where all the flood - gates of warmth had been suddenly locked and sat with the seal of that chill , unheeding smile?

So Elsie sat at her dead mother's feet and old Bab came and went heartbroken, and could not coax her to weep nor rest. And still the wedding gown lay in the next room, and the lamp burned downstairs and the wind rattled at the locks and still the earth and sky were a blank.

At last the thaw commenced slowly to work. Life began to appear, and passages were cleared here and there. And one or two of those kind Christians, the poor, with difficulty found Elsie’s mother a grave. And after that was done, Elsie, shunning the garnished parlour and the lorn bedroom, crept into the kitchen and laid her head on Babs knees. Late in the evening she roused herself and asked if it was not Christmas Eve. Yes it was the eve of her wedding day.

“Then Bab,” she said, “we must have everything ready.  Mister North will be here tonight.” Bab shook her head. “No, no, Miss Elsie, the thaw has done something, but not as much as that. Its dark already, and no human bein’ could know his way from the moor beyond where the roads cross. He’d most likely take the one that goes out to the Black Crags and if he did he'd go down headlong as sure as heaven and earth!”

Elsie sat up straight and stared at the old woman and then put up her hand to her head as if to collect her per shattered wits. “Someone must go,” she said, “and watch on the moor all night to show him the way when he comes. He will be there as sure as God is above us.  I feel it Bab! I know it! Cannot someone go?”

“Oh no, no Miss Elsie!” cried Bab wringing her hands at her young mistresses white distraught face; “ no one could stay there the night through,  he'd be foundered dead before mornin’”.

“You are sure of it? Ask someone; I must know”.

 Bab went to enquire and came back. It was as she had said, no one dared venture to pass a night on the moor, the snow might come on again at any moment.

“Then God help me!” moaned Elsie as she crept from the kitchen and felt her way upstairs in the dark. She went into her own room, where the wedding gown still lay, and she could see from the window that line of moor where the roads met. There, with hands locked in her lap, and strained eyes fixed on the distance and white cheek close to the pane, she sat. The sky had cleared a little, and the moon had ventured out, looking pale and meek, as if she too had her troubles and wept away all her brightness. Twelve o clock struck, and Bab, who had vainly tried to move her mistress, had perforce laid her own weary head on a bed in the room off Elsie’s and fallen asleep. One o clock and the night had brightened and the moon shone clear and brilliant on the white ridges and levels of mountains and valleys. Two, and still Elsie sat fixed and nothing had changed. Three, and the moon began to sink away among cloud drifts low on the hills. Four struck in the hall, and the sound roused Elsie from a state of numbness like stupor into which she had fallen. Was it the shock that had made her start to her feet and, with bent brows, and strained eyes glazed towards the moor, whilst all her frame shook with the agony of suspense? Was it fate that pointed to her a black something moving in the dim distance like one riding on with difficulty? Another instant and the window is flung open and head and shoulders are thrust out. A low groan “My God!”  bursts from her as the shadow seems to pause and then move away into that dim distance. Fleet as thought she has left the window, dashed from the room, and is gone.

Till her death poor old Bab remembered with remorse how heavily she slept that night, till she seemed to dream that Miss Elsie’s figure flashed past her through the room in which she lay.  The vision made her sleep uneasily, and she awoke troubled, and rising to reassure herself, searched the house for her young mistress. In vain, one room was empty and another was empty.  Elsie was gone.

Who shall tell where? The moor – fowls that screamed past her as she struggled on, fired to supernatural effort by the strength of her purpose, plunging through snow wreaths, stumbling over fences and clogged marshes with her eyes fixed on those Black Crags? Or the moon that pitied her as she fell and bled and rose and fought on again as she must have done terribly, piteously often, ere those fatal rocks were won?

Oh those pitiless white waste, how they must have frozen the blood in that brave battling young heart! How they must have stung that daring soul with bitter wounds ere it could acknowledge its defeat! How they must have torn the plodding feet with treacherous stones and rocks ere they carried her to her goal - death! But the moon waned and the grey Christmas dawn broke, and a traveller, riding with difficulty along the partially cleared road paused suddenly thinking he heard his own name called a sharp, clear, bitter cry, fading suddenly into silence. “Phillip! Phillip!” Oh, that last woeful cry, falling into stillness just as the poor heart broke! And he, the watched and prayed for, entered at last the garnished home; but the hearth that had glowed so brightly for him all through the long, long weeks was quenched forever,  and the heart whose love had fed its flame,  and the fingers that had trimmed the lamp, and the lips that had kissed the little love - gifts lying about, where were they?

Ay, where? Who shall guess from what hollow gulf of snow, from the feet of what cruel rock, the tide carried the dead girl? The seagulls may scream her miserieres, and the waves roll their muffled drums over her head, but no human mourner will ever kneel at her grave, for the body of Elsie Leonard was never found.  Phillip North still lives, but wherever he goes the vision of that figure out on the snow in the red dawn will haunt him till death, and the echo of that last bitter cry, “Phillip! Phillip!” ring in his ears.

This is the story of the Snowy Christmas. It is told over the logs in the cabins at night, and children will turn pale if in the wintry gloaming a plover sobs from seaward, or a curlew cries over the Black Crags.

THE END