Dylks, Joseph C. -- Fiction; Frontier and pioneer life -- Ohio -- Fiction; Impostors and imposture -- Fiction
“Well, sir, so they kep' on all that day and all the next night, prayun',
and singun', and readun' the Bible. The next mornun' when they started
Brother Enraghty felt kind o' cold all over, and his teeth chattered, and
Dylks looked at him hard in the face, and says he, 'Time is precious now.
This is the time for work. I now reveal unto you that you are Paul the
Apostle.'”
“And what did Paul the Apostle say? Did he own up that he was Paul?”
Reverdy halted in his tale. “Look here, Squire! I don't feel just right,
havun' you say such things. It sounds--well, like profane swearun'.”
“Any worse than Dylks or Enraghty? You go right ahead, Abel. I'll take
the responsibility before the law.”
“Well,” Reverdy continued with a reluctance that passed as he went on,
“what Dylks told him was that he would increase his faith, so't he could
see the sights of his power, and glorify him among men, and then Enraghty
he commenced to git warm ag'in, and Dylks he turned up his eyes and kep'
still, and it was so bright all round him that it made the daylight like
dusk, and Dylks made him hark if he didn't hear a kind of rush in the air,
and Dylks said it was the adversary of souls, but he would conquer him.
They came into a deep holler in the woods and there they see the devil
standun' in their way, and Dylks he lights and hollers out, 'Fear not,
Paul; this day my work is done,' and he went towards Satan and Satan he
raised his burnun' wings and bristled his scales, and stuck out his forked
tongue and dropped melted fire from it; and he rolled his eyes in his
head, hissun' and bubblun' like sinners boilun' in hell's kittles. Then
Dylks he got down on his knees and prayed, and got up and give his shout
of Salvation, and the devil's wings fell, and he took in his tongue, and
his eyes stood still, and Dylks he blowed his breath at him, and Satan he
turned and jumped, and every jump he give the ground shook, and Dylks and
the balance of 'em follered him till the devil come to Brother Mason's
house, and then he jumped through the shut winder out of sight. They found
Brother Mason's son David in bed sick, but he got up and took Dylks in his
arms and called him his Savior, and everybody got down on their knees and
prayed, and their faces was shinun' beautiful, and Dylks he walks round
David Mason, and rubs his hands over him, and says, 'I bind the devil for
a thousand years,' and he hugged David, and said, 'The work is done.' And
he wouldn't stay to preach there, but told 'em they must come back with
him to the Temple here in Leatherwood. On the way back he wouldn't talk at
all, hardly, but just kep' sayun', 'The perfect work is done,' and he
didn't give his shout any more; just snorted.”
Braile's pipe had gone out, but he pulled at it two or three times,
before he said, “Well, Abel, I don't wonder Sally is excited. I suppose
_you_ would be, if you believed a word of this yarn?”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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