The hand that came back

Many, many years ago the villagers of Dudelange sat one evening in the inn telling of the adventures they had come through in their lives during the night pasture. They spoke of wolves and werewolves, of ghosts and witches who teased and frightened the herdsmen in the night hours.

Among all these wonders the talk naturally came round to the gallows and to the criminal who had been dangling from it for some days. A crafty fellow in the company, who was forever boasting of his fearlessness, wanted to give proof of his courage that same evening. For a wager he offered to go up to the nearby gallows hill that very night, and at the midnight hour at that.

The undertaking seemed a little too bold to his comrades, for very strange things were told of the gallows hill, and especially of the spot they call the Scherr. It was said never to have been quite safe there. To reach it one had to go through a gloomy hollow way, on one side of which the gallows stood, while on the other the white lady, d’Josfer vum Gehansbiörg, showed herself by night.

The wager was accepted. At the midnight hour our hero made his way to the Scherr. He stepped up to the gallows without flinching, and so that his comrades should have no doubt about the performance of his feat, he even cut the right hand from the hanged man and took it away as evidence.

Back at the inn he played all sorts of tricks with the severed hand. He set it against his glass, pulled at the cut tendons, and so brought the glass thus gripped to his mouth to drain it.

After the company had parted, the hand was carried back to the Scherr, to the gallows.

The next morning, however, when our fearless knight woke from sleep and opened his eyes, he saw with horror the severed hand lying beside his bed. Aghast, he jumped up and carried it back to the gallows. But in vain. That same evening, as he went to lie down, it lay before his bed again. He could carry it off as often as he liked, he was not rid of it; it always came back.

The mother of the tormented fellow told the parish priest the whole story and begged him to put an end to the ghastly business. The priest was a very devout man, and it was rumoured of him that he possessed the power and the secret of making himself proof against harm, that he could summon and banish spirits. He had the severed hand laid before him, and after taking many secret precautions he ordered it to be buried beside the corpse, after which it was never seen again.

But the young daredevil was never able to forget the ghostly hand. From that hour he declined and was ailing until the end of his life. He never did any good again, my informant concluded.

Some late travellers who went through the Scherr valley at night were whipped by this hand until they reached the bridge at Kayl.