The
most famous pooka on stage and in film was the giant rabbit HARVEY.
Although immortalized by Jimmy Stewart as a movie and television special,
the lead part was played frequently in the theater by Joe E. Brown (as
the photo depicts).
The local in-house number rang on the telephone. Now what? I had said Mass at 6:45 AM, but was still half asleep. Who would want me before 9:00 in the morning? I picked up the phone.
"Yes, this is Father Jenkins," I said.
"Oh Father, I am so sorry to ring your room this early but there is a young woman and her child to see you downstairs," stated the secretary.
"Do you know what she wants?" I asked.
"No Father, she said she simply had to talk to a priest. Monsignor is having his oatmeal."
"Okay, I'll come down. For God's sake don't take the boss away from his breakfast. It could be a tough enough day as it is."
"I got you Father. I'll put her in the first parlor.
Thanks."
I walked into my bathroom and placed my head under the sink. The cold water felt good. Why was it that my sleep always resembled a coma? I did not stay up all that late.
Maybe my natural state was asleep and the waking moments only short interludes to make sure the machine stayed fueled up?
I put on my shirt but had to fumble around for the collar tab. I received two extra collars with every clerical shirt I bought. Now, I could only find one and this morning not even that. I swear I think gremlins play around with my things while I am out or unconscious. I found a spare collar on the floor next to a white sock which was more hole than sock. I went downstairs.
I had a couple of dollars in my pocket if this should be what I thought it was. It was hard to believe the number of women with a child who had come to our door in dire straights, often with the same story. Every one of them seemed to have a broken car and was traveling to North Carolina or Florida. Any relatives? No, not around here, we're only traveling through you see. Oh, my poor baby. We slept in the cold car last night. You're hungry, aren't you dear. As soon as her tears came out and the big eyes of the kid zeroed in on you, you knew you were hooked. Sometimes I wondered if priesthood was not synonymous with sucker.
I opened the parlor door and entered. Immediately, I recognized them. This woman was regularly at church with her son, maybe four years old. She even came on weekdays. I wondered what was up?
"Hi, Father Jenkins. I am sorry to come unannounced but there was something I felt I had to talk to a priest about," she said.
"Sure, what's the problem?" I queried. She seemed nervous about something. She was wringing her hands.
"I am almost afraid to tell you. You might think I am crazy. As a matter of fact, I am not sure about the whole thing at all."
"Just tell me," I said, "and we'll go from there. We can keep it private and I won't make swift judgments. Okay?"
"Alright." She hesitated. "I visit this elderly woman in my spare time at the Carriage Hill Home. She is a very religious Episcopalian woman. I pray and read the Scriptures for her. We have very nice visits. I had been seeing her for almost a year when she told me something which has greatly upset me. I am afraid to go back."
"How come?" I wondered. "What happened?"
"I noticed one day as I was talking to her that she was looking past me, toward the wall. I turned around, but no one was there. I asked her about it and she said that she would rather not talk about it. I let it go, but I became more and more aware of her staring at a particular spot in the room. I become obsessed with watching where she was looking. Always, her eyes seemed to stare into the same empty space. It was getting on my nerves, so I confronted her again with it. She told me this time what it was about. I almost wish I had not asked."
"What did she say?" I was genuinely interested now.
"I cannot recall the actual word she called it, but whatever it was, it appeared as an Indian."
"What did?" I asked.
"The thing she was looking at, the thing I could not see, was an Indian."
I promised her I would not make swift judgments. I kept my mouth closed. However, I began to imagine hearing eerie music in the background and Rod Sterling inviting me into the Twilight Zone. I continued to listen.
"You'll have to explain," I nudged.
"She told me that when she was young her great uncle died. Standing with her parents at his deathbed, she overheard him telling her parents that he was giving this spectre or ghost to the child. There was some argument, but his health was so bad, that they let it pass. At the funeral a few days later, she noticed a tall Indian, very much like the wooden ones in cigar stores, standing next to the grave.
He stood absolutely motionless. When she mentioned what she saw to her parents, her mother and father looked at each other with concerned expressions but refused to speak about it right then. After the funeral they turned to leave; however, she noticed that the Indian was following her. It has done so til today. No one else can see it. She was very frightened but her parents later told her that it could not hurt her. This thing or familiar had been passed on in the family for many generations, so many in fact that its origin was shrouded in their gypsy ancestry. She was warned never to recognize his presence or to call upon him. If she did, he would be impelled to do her bidding for the rest of her life. They can do the most awful things. Many years have passed, over half a century, and in all that time, she has never once spoke to him. She knows full well how dire the consequences might then become for others as well as for her own immortal soul."
I paused before responding. This lady speaking to me was no looney. She was a responsible and surprisingly pious parishioner, the kind of which we wished we had more.
"That's quite some story, do you believe it?" I asked.
"Well, she is a nice woman father; but I thought maybe her years may have clouded things a little bit for her. At least I hoped so, the whole thing gave me the shivers. I tried my best to forget it. I thought I had until Tuesday."
She began to wring her hands again. "I did not tell anyone about the story she gave me, not even my husband. You are the first I have told. But, now someone else knows. You see, Tuesday I took my little boy over with me to cheer her up. She really likes children. Tommy told her a story and she gave him a piece of candy. That is all that happened."
"So what's the problem?" I inquired.
"On the way to the car, Tommy looked up to me and asked me, 'Mommy, who is the Indian?'"
I froze. It was the kind of chill we got as children when we were alone in a room and suddenly someone cut off the lights.
I tried to put the incident out of my mind. The day would be too busy for me to get caught up in hocus-pocus mumbo-jumbo. There had to be a logical explanation for the incident. Maybe the child overheard them earlier? Or, maybe she discussed it with her husband and the child was told something by the father? Maybe it was just coincidence? No, I guess that last possibility would not wash.
Bondage to evil might not merely be a personal struggle. The sins of one generation are often visited upon the next. Just as we might transmit our faith and the life of grace to our children; we also forget our duty to God and pass on something quite different, even sinister. May we only call upon the name of Jesus as our loving Savior, trusting God alone.