Hang it around
your neck, and if Terence troubles you, hold it up before you and
before him. I have always said that Terence was one of the Good
People, and I never believed it more than this minute. If he is one of
them, he cannot come near the cross, and the iron will be a terror to
him too. If he tries to come too near to you, touch him with it, and
then we'll see."
"Why can he not come near the cross?" Kathleen asked.
"Because," Mrs. O'Brien said, "the Good People are a kind of spirits,
and no spirits can do you any harm if you hold the cross before you,
or if you make the sign of the cross. Did I never tell you what the
Good People were? They were angels and lived in Heaven once. When
Satan and his angels rebelled against God and were driven out of
Heaven, the angels that are the Good People were driven out too. They
were not good enough to stay in Heaven, and they were not bad enough
to fall as Satan and his angels fell, so some of them stayed on the
land and some of them stayed in the sea. And so they will live till
the Day of Judgment, and then, some say, they will vanish like dew
when it dries away; and some say that they will be saved like the
souls of Christians.
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