{See important transcriber’s notes at the end.}
VARNEY, THE VAMPYRE:
OR,
THE FEAST OF BLOOD.
=A Romance.=
“Art thou a spirit of health or goblin damned?”
——————————
LONDON:
PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY E. LLOYD, 12, SALISBURY SQUARE,
FLEET-STREET.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I. MIDNIGHT.—THE HAIL-STORM.—THE DREADFUL VISITOR.—THE
VAMPYRE.
II. THE ALARM.—THE PISTOL SHOT.—THE PURSUIT AND ITS
CONSEQUENCES.
III. THE DISAPPEARANCE OF THE BODY.—FLORA’S RECOVERY AND
MADNESS.—THE OFFER OF ASSISTANCE FROM SIR FRANCIS
VARNEY.
IV. THE MORNING.—THE CONSULTATION.—THE FEARFUL SUGGESTION.
V. THE NIGHT WATCH.—THE PROPOSAL.—THE MOONLIGHT.—THE
FEARFUL ADVENTURE.
VI. A GLANCE AT THE BANNERWORTH FAMILY.—THE PROBABLE
CONSEQUENCES OF THE MYSTERIOUS APPARITION’S APPEARANCE.
VII. THE VISIT TO THE VAULT OF THE BANNERWORTHS, AND ITS
UNPLEASANT RESULT.—THE MYSTERY.
VIII. THE COFFIN.—THE ABSENCE OF THE DEAD.—THE MYSTERIOUS
CIRCUMSTANCE, AND THE CONSTERNATION OF GEORGE.
IX. THE OCCURRENCES OF THE NIGHT AT THE HALL.—THE SECOND
APPEARANCE OF THE VAMPYRE, AND THE PISTOL-SHOT.
X. THE RETURN FROM THE VAULT.—THE ALARM, AND THE SEARCH
AROUND THE HALL.
XI. THE COMMUNICATIONS TO THE LOVER.—THE HEART’S DESPAIR.
XII. CHARLES HOLLAND’S SAD FEELINGS.—THE PORTRAIT.—THE
OCCURRENCE OF THE NIGHT AT THE HALL.
XIII. THE OFFER FOR THE HALL.—THE VISIT TO SIR FRANCIS
VARNEY.—THE STRANGE RESEMBLANCE.—A DREADFUL
SUGGESTION.
XIV. HENRY’S AGREEMENT WITH SIR FRANCIS VARNEY.—THE SUDDEN
ARRIVAL AT THE HALL.—FLORA’S ALARM.
XV. THE OLD ADMIRAL AND HIS SERVANT.—THE COMMUNICATION
FROM THE LANDLORD OF THE NELSON’S ARMS.
XVI. THE MEETING OF THE LOVERS IN THE GARDEN.—AN AFFECTING
SCENE.—THE SUDDEN APPEARANCE OF SIR FRANCIS VARNEY.
XVII. THE EXPLANATION.—THE ARRIVAL OF THE ADMIRAL AT THE
HOUSE.—A SCENE OF CONFUSION, AND SOME OF ITS RESULTS.
XVIII. THE ADMIRAL’S ADVICE.—THE CHALLENGE TO THE
VAMPYRE.—THE NEW SERVANT AT THE HALL.
XIX. FLORA IN HER CHAMBER.—HER FEARS.—THE MANUSCRIPT.—AN
ADVENTURE.
XX. THE DREADFUL MISTAKE.—THE TERRIFIC INTERVIEW IN THE
CHAMBER.—THE ATTACK OF THE VAMPYRE.
XXI. THE CONFERENCE BETWEEN THE UNCLE AND NEPHEW, AND THE
ALARM.
XXII. THE CONSULTATION.—THE DETERMINATION TO LEAVE THE HALL.
XXIII. THE ADMIRAL’S ADVICE TO CHARLES HOLLAND.—THE CHALLENGE
TO THE VAMPYRE.
XXIV. THE LETTER TO CHARLES.—THE QUARREL.—THE ADMIRAL’S
NARRATIVE.—THE MIDNIGHT MEETING.
XXV. THE ADMIRAL’S OPINION.—THE REQUEST OF CHARLES.
XXVI. THE MEETING BY MOONLIGHT IN THE PARK.—THE TURRET
WINDOW IN THE HALL.—THE LETTERS.
XXVII. THE NOBLE CONFIDENCE OF FLORA BANNERWORTH IN HER
LOVER.—HER OPINION OF THE THREE LETTERS.—THE
ADMIRAL’S ADMIRATION.
XXVIII. MR. MARCHDALE’S EXCULPATION OF HIMSELF.—THE SEARCH
THROUGH THE GARDENS.—THE SPOT OF THE DEADLY
STRUGGLE.—THE MYSTERIOUS PAPER.
XXIX. A PEEP THROUGH AN IRON GRATING.—THE LONELY PRISONER IN
HIS DUNGEON.—THE MYSTERY.
XXX. THE VISIT OF FLORA TO THE VAMPYRE.—THE OFFER.—THE
SOLEMN ASSEVERATION.
XXXI. SIR FRANCIS VARNEY AND HIS MYSTERIOUS VISITOR.—THE
STRANGE CONFERENCE.
XXXII. THE THOUSAND POUNDS.—THE STRANGER’S PRECAUTIONS.
XXXIII. THE STRANGE INTERVIEW.—THE CHASE THROUGH THE HALL.
XXXIV. THE THREAT.—ITS CONSEQUENCES.—THE RESCUE, AND SIR
FRANCIS VARNEY’S DANGER.
XXXV. THE EXPLANATION.—MARCHDALE’S ADVICE.—THE PROJECTED
REMOVAL, AND THE ADMIRAL’S ANGER.
XXXVI. THE CONSULTATION.—THE DUEL AND ITS RESULTS.
XXXVII. SIR FRANCIS VARNEY’S SEPARATE OPPONENTS.—THE
INTERPOSITION OF FLORA.
XXXVIII. MARCHDALE’S OFFER.—THE CONSULTATION AT BANNERWORTH
HALL.—THE MORNING OF THE DUEL.
XXXIX. THE STORM AND THE FIGHT.-THE ADMIRAL’S REPUDIATION OF
HIS PRINCIPAL.
XL. THE POPULAR RIOT.—SIR FRANCIS VARNEY’S DANGER.—THE
SUGGESTION AND ITS RESULTS.
XLI. {Number skipped}
XLII. {Number skipped}
XLIII. {Number skipped}
XLIV. VARNEY’S DANGER, AND HIS RESCUE.—THE PRISONER AGAIN,
AND THE SUBTERRANEAN VAULT.
XLV. THE OPEN GRAVES.—THE DEAD BODIES.—A SCENE OF TERROR.
XLVI. THE PREPARATIONS FOR LEAVING BANNERWORTH HALL, AND THE
MYSTERIOUS CONDUCT OF THE ADMIRAL AND MR. CHILLINGWORTH.
XLVII. THE REMOVAL FROM THE HALL.—THE NIGHT WATCH, AND THE
ALARM.
XLVIII. THE STAKE AND THE DEAD BODY.
XLIX. THE MOB’S ARRIVAL AT SIR FRANCIS VARNEY’S.—THE ATTEMPT
TO GAIN ADMISSION.
L. THE MOB’S ARRIVAL AT SIR FRANCIS VARNEY’S.—THE ATTEMPT
TO GAIN ADMISSION.
LI. THE ATTACK UPON THE VAMPYRE’S HOUSE.—THE STORY OF THE
ATTACK.—THE FORCING OF THE DOORS, AND THE STRUGGLE.
LII. THE INTERVIEW BETWEEN THE MOB AND SIR FRANCIS
VARNEY.—THE MYSTERIOUS DISAPPEARANCE.—THE WINE
CELLARS.
LIII. THE DESTRUCTION OF SIR FRANCIS VARNEY’S HOUSE BY
FIRE.—THE ARRIVAL OF THE MILITARY, AND A SECOND MOB.
LIV. THE BURNING OF VARNEY’S HOUSE.—A NIGHT SCENE.—POPULAR
SUPERSTITION.
LV. THE RETURN OF THE MOB AND MILITARY TO THE TOWN.—THE
MADNESS OF THE MOB.—THE GROCER’S REVENGE.
LVI. THE DEPARTURE OF THE BANNERWORTHS FROM THE HALL.—THE
NEW ABODE.—JACK PRINGLE, PILOT.
LVII. THE LONELY WATCH, AND THE ADVENTURE IN THE DESERTED
HOUSE.
LVIII. THE ARRIVAL OF JACK PRINGLE.—MIDNIGHT AND THE
VAMPYRE.—THE MYSTERIOUS HAT.
LIX. THE WARNING.—THE NEW PLAN OF OPERATION.—THE INSULTING
MESSAGE FROM VARNEY.
LX. THE INTERRUPTED BREAKFAST AT SIR FRANCIS VARNEY’S.
LXI. THE MYSTERIOUS STRANGER.—THE PARTICULARS OF THE
SUICIDE AT BANNERWORTH HALL.
LXII. THE MYSTERIOUS MEETING IN THE RUIN AGAIN.—THE
VAMPYRE’S ATTACK UPON THE CONSTABLE.
LXIII. THE GUESTS AT THE INN, AND THE STORY OF THE DEAD UNCLE.
LXIV. THE VAMPIRE IN THE MOONLIGHT.—THE FALSE FRIEND.
LXV. VARNEY’S VISIT TO THE DUNGEON OF THE LONELY PRISONER IN
THE RUINS.
LXVI. FLORA BANNERWORTH’S APPARENT INCONSISTENCY.—THE ADMIRAL’S
CIRCUMSTANCES AND ADVICE.—MR. CHILLINGWORTH’S MYSTERIOUS
ABSENCE.
LXVII. THE ADMIRAL’S STORY OF THE BEAUTIFUL BELINDA.
LXVIII. MARCHDALE’S ATTEMPTED VILLANY, AND THE RESULT.
LXIX. FLORA BANNERWORTH AND HER MOTHER.—THE EPISODE OF
CHIVALRY.
LXX. THE FUNERAL OF THE STRANGER OF THE INN.—THE POPULAR
COMMOTION, AND MRS. CHILLINGWORTH’S APPEAL TO THE
MOB.—THE NEW RIOT.—THE HALL IN DANGER.
LXXI. THE STRANGE MEETING AT THE HALL BETWEEN MR.
CHILLINGWORTH AND THE MYSTERIOUS FRIEND OF VARNEY.
LXXII. THE STRANGE STORY.—THE ARRIVAL OF THE MOB AT THE HALL,
AND THEIR DISPERSION.
LXXIII. THE VISIT OF THE VAMPIRE.—THE GENERAL MEETING.
LXXIV. THE MEETING OF CHARLES AND FLORA.
LXXV. MUTUAL EXPLANATIONS, AND THE VISIT TO THE RUINS.
LXXVI. THE SECOND NIGHT-WATCH OF MR. CHILLINGWORTH AT THE HALL.
LXXVII. VARNEY IN THE GARDEN.—THE COMMUNICATION OF DR.
CHILLINGWORTH TO THE ADMIRAL AND HENRY.
LXXVIII. THE ALTERCATION BETWEEN VARNEY AND THE EXECUTIONER IN
THE HALL.—THE MUTUAL AGREEMENT.
LXXIX. THE VAMPYRE’S DANGER.—THE LAST REFUGE.—THE RUSE OF
HENRY BANNERWORTH.
LXXX. THE DISCOVERY OF THE BODY OF MARCHDALE IN THE RUINS BY
THE MOB.—THE BURNING OF THE CORPSE.—THE MURDER OF THE
HANGMAN.
LXXXI. THE VAMPYRE’S FLIGHT.—HIS DANGER, AND THE LAST PLACE
OF REFUGE.
LXXXII. CHARLES HOLLAND’S PURSUIT OF THE VAMPYRE.—THE
DANGEROUS INTERVIEW.
LXXXIII. THE MYSTERIOUS ARRIVAL AT THE INN.—THE HUNGARIAN
NOBLEMAN.—THE LETTER TO VARNEY.
LXXXIV. THE EXCITED POPULACE.—VARNEY HUNTED.—THE PLACE OF
REFUGE.
LXXXV. THE HUNGARIAN NOBLEMAN GETS INTO DANGER.—HE IS FIRED
AT, AND SHOWS SOME OF HIS QUALITY.
LXXXVI. THE DISCOVERY OF THE POCKET BOOK OF MARMADUKE
BANNERWORTH.—ITS MYSTERIOUS CONTENTS.
LXXXVII. THE HUNT FOR VARNEY.—THE HOUSE-TOPS.—THE MIRACULOUS
ESCAPE.—THE LAST PLACE OF REFUGE.—THE COTTAGE.
LXXXVIII. THE RECEPTION OF THE VAMPYRE BY FLORA.—VARNEY SUBDUED.
LXXXIX. TELLS WHAT BECAME OF THE SECOND VAMPYRE WHO SOUGHT
VARNEY.
XC. DR. CHILLINGWORTH AT THE HALL.—THE ENCOUNTER OF
MYSTERY.—THE CONFLICT.—THE RESCUE, AND THE PICTURE.
XCI. THE GRAND CONSULTATION BROKEN UP BY MRS. CHILLINGWORTH,
AND THE DISAPPEARANCE OF VARNEY.
XCII. THE MISADVENTURE OF THE DOCTOR WITH THE PICTURE.
XCIII. THE ALARM AT ANDERBURY.—THE SUSPICIONS OF THE
BANNERWORTH FAMILY, AND THE MYSTERIOUS COMMUNICATION.
XCIV. THE VISITOR, AND THE DEATH IN THE SUBTERRANEAN PASSAGE.
XCV. THE MARRIAGE IN THE BANNERWORTH FAMILY ARRANGED.
XCVI. THE BARON TAKES ANDERBURY HOUSE, AND DECIDES UPON
GIVING A GRAND ENTERTAINMENT.
XCVII. THE ADMIRAL’S PREPARATIONS, AND THE VISIT TO DEARBROOK.
XCVIII. THE INTERVIEW WITH THE QUAKER AT DEARBROOK.
XCIX. THE BARON BECOMES MASTER OF ANDERBURY-ON-THE-MOUNT, AND
BEGINS TO CONGRATULATE HIMSELF.—THE DREAM.
C. MR. LEEK SPECULATES UPON THE BARON’S MATRIMONIAL
INTENTIONS.
CI. THE GRAND ENTERTAINMENT GIVEN BY THE BARON AT ANDERBURY
HOUSE, AND HIS ANNOUNCEMENT.
CII. THE WEDDING FEAST.—THE ADMIRAL’S DISAPPOINTMENT.
CIII. DR. CHILLINGWORTH MAKES URGENT INQUIRIES FOR THE VAMPYRE;
AND THE LAWYER GIVES SOME ADVICE CONCERNING THE QUAKER.
CIV. THE BONE-HOUSE OF THE CHURCHYARD OF ANDERBURY.—THE
RESUSCITATION.—THE FIGHT, AND THE ESCAPE OF THE
DEAD.—THE BOAT, AND THE VAIN PURSUIT.
CV. THE BARON PROPOSES FOR HELEN WILLIAMS, AND IS DULY
ACCEPTED, WITH A COMPLIMENT ON HIS BEAUTY.
CVI. THE PREPARATIONS FOR THE BARON’S MARRIAGE.—THE YOUNG
LOVER, AND THE REMONSTRANCE.
CVII. THE YOUNG SAILOR SAVED BY JACK PRINGLE TURNS OUT TO BE AN
IMPORTANT PERSONAGE.
CVIII. THE DECISION AGAINST THE DOCTOR, AND MORE NEWS OF VARNEY,
THE VAMPYRE.
CIX. THE PREPARATIONS FOR THE WEDDING OF THE BARON STOLMUYER
OF SALTZBURGH.
CX. JACK PRINGLE CALLS UPON MRS. WILLIAMS, AND TELLS HER A
PIECE OF HIS MIND UPON AFFAIRS IN GENERAL.
CXI. THE WEDDING-DAY FIXED, AND THE GUESTS INVITED.
CXII. THE SINGULAR INVITATION TO THE BARON’S WEDDING.
CXIII. JAMES ANDERSON SEEKS AND OBTAINS AN INTERVIEW WITH MRS.
WILLIAMS.
CXIV. MRS. WILLIAMS’S MANŒUVRE TO GET RID OF ANDERSON.
CXV. THE RETURN OF THE RESUSCITATED MAN, AND THE ROBBERY AT
ANDERBURY HOUSE.
CXVI. JACK PRINGLE FALLS IN LOVE, AND HAS RATHER AN UNHAPPY
ADVENTURE WITH A BOLD DRAGOON.
CXVII. THE PROPOSAL OF JACK PRINGLE TO TAKE ANDERSON TO THE
WEDDING.
CXVIII. THE BARON’S PREPARATIONS FOR THE MARRIAGE, AND THE
WEDDING MORNING.
CXIX. A RATHER STRANGE CIRCUMSTANCE AT THE BARON’S WEDDING.
CXX. THE HUNT FOR THE VAMPYRE IN THE SUBTERRANEAN PASSAGE.
CXXI. THE DEATH OF THE INQUISITIVE GUEST.—THE ESCAPE OF SIR
FRANCIS VARNEY.
CXXII. MRS. WILLIAMS VISITS THE BANNERWORTHS AT THE INN.—THE
MARRIAGE OF JAMES ANDERSON WITH HELEN.
CXXIII. MRS. WILLIAMS TAKES THE INITIATIVE, AND NEARLY CATCHES AN
ADMIRAL.
CXXIV. {Number skipped}
CXXV. {Number skipped}
CXXVI. THE ADMIRAL IN A BREEZE.—A GENERAL COMMOTION, AND JACK
PRINGLE MUCH WANTED, BUT NOT TO BE FOUND.
CXXVII. A CHANGE OF SCENE AND CIRCUMSTANCES.—AN EVENT IN LONDON.
CXXVIII. THE NEW LODGER.—A NIGHT ALARM.—A MYSTERIOUS
CIRCUMSTANCE.
CXXIX. THE UNSUCCESSFUL PURSUIT.—MR. SMITH’S DISAPPOINTMENT,
AND THE TESTIMONY OF MRS. MEREDITH.
CXXX. A BREAKFAST SCENE.—A MATCH-MAKING MOTHER.
CXXXI. MRS. MEREDITH’S FRIEND.—EXCHANGE OF SERVICES, AND
COMPACT.
CXXXII. THE EXPLANATION, AND THE PROPOSAL.—A TETE-A-TETE.
CXXXIII. MRS. MEREDITH’S CONSULTATION WITH MR. TWISSEL, AND HER
RESOLVE.
CXXXIV. THE INTRODUCTION.—THE ATTORNEY’S FIRST FEELER.
CXXXV. MR. TWISSEL’S MISADVENTURES.—THE CONSEQUENCES OF BEING
FOUND IN THE BANK WITHOUT GIVING A SATISFACTORY ACCOUNT
OF YOUR BUSINESS THERE.—AN UNPLEASANT DILEMMA.
CXXXVI. AN EVENING WITH COLONEL DEVERILL.—THE STRATAGEM OF MRS.
MEREDITH.
CXXXVII. THE DIFFICULTIES TO BE ENCOUNTERED IN THE CHOICE OF A
BRIDESMAID.
CXXXVIII. MR. TWISSEL’S MISFORTUNES, AND HIS RESOLUTION NEVER TO
GIVE IN.
CXXXIX. MRS. MEREDITH HAS A CONVERSATION WITH MR. TWISSEL.—THE
ANNOUNCEMENT, AND THE INVITATION.
CXL. A PLEASANT EVENING.—THE BRIDESMAIDS.
CXLI. A NEW CHARACTER.—MISS TWISSEL’S VISITOR.—THE INVITATIONS.
CXLII. THE WEDDING MORNING.—DISRUPTION OF HARMONY, AND THE NEW
ACQUAINTANCE.—THE CONCLUSION.
CXLIII. A SCENE IN WINCHESTER CATHEDRAL.—THE CATHEDRAL ROBBERS.—A
STORM.—THE VAULTS BENEATH THE AISLE.—THE FLIGHT OF THE
ROBBERS, AND THE RESUSCITATED CORPSE.
CXLIV. THE STAR HOTEL, AND THE STRANGER’S ARRIVAL.—A REMARKABLE
COUNTENANCE.—THE ILLNESS AND DEATH OF THE STRANGER.—A
STRANGE REQUEST COMPLIED WITH.
CXLV. A RURAL SCENE BY MOONLIGHT.—THE STORM.—AN ACCIDENT ON THE
ROAD.—A NEW AND STRANGE ACQUAINTANCE ACQUIRED.—A
DISAPPOINTMENT.
CXLVI. THE ALARM AT THE INN.—BED-CHAMBER TERRORS.—A NIGHT SCENE
A MORNING SUCCEEDING TO A NIGHT OF ADVENTURE.
CXLVII. (No title)
CXLVIII THE ROAD, AND THE TRAVELLERS.—THE PLEASURES OF DOING
GOOD.—THE BEGGAR WOMAN.—SIR FRANCIS VARNEY A
PHILANTHROPIST.
CXLIX. THE ENTRANCE INTO BATH.—A NEW SCENE.—THE HOTEL AND THE
LODGINGS.—THE ATTENTIONS OF SIR FRANCIS VARNEY.
CL. SIR FRANCIS VARNEY IN BATH.—THE OLD WOMAN AND HER
FANCIES.—THE MURDER IN BATH.—THE TREASURE.
CLI. THE SCENE AT THE HOTEL.—THE RELATION OF THE CAUSE OF SIR
FRANCIS VARNEY’S PALENESS.
CLII. THE SCENE OF THE MURDER.—THE VISIT TO THE HOUSE.—THE
MYSTERIOUS DISAPPEARANCE OF THE TREASURE.
CLIII. THE ASSEMBLY.—SIR FRANCIS’S FIRST OVERTURES TO MARY
STEVENS.—THE BREAKFAST SCENE.—AND THE HONOUR DECLINED.
CLIV. THE TWO SISTERS.—MARY STEVENS’S DISLIKE OF SIR FRANCIS
VARNEY.—A USELESS SUIT.—DISUNION.
CLV. THE EFFECTS OF PERSEVERANCE.—SIR FRANCIS VARNEY AND MARY
STEVENS.—AN EVENING PARTY AND CONVERSATION.
CLVI. THE WEDDING MORNING.—THE PROGRESS OF JUSTICE, AND THE
DISCOVERY OF THE MURDERER.—THE DISSIPATION OF A SCENE.
CLVII. THE MURDER IN THE WOOD DEL NOTTI.—A NEAPOLITAN SCENE.
CLVIII. A MAIDEN’S MIND DISTURBED.—AN EASY WAY OF PROMOTING
COMFORT OF CONSCIENCE.—THE MONK.
CLIX. THE WATCH BY THE DEAD MAN’S SIDE.—THE DEAD ALIVE.—THE
DEATH-STRUGGLE, AND THE MURDER OF THE MONK.
CLX. THE DEVIL A MONK WOULD BE.—THE DEMAND FOR ADMISSION INTO
THE CONVENT OF ST MARY MAGDALEN.—THE PORTRESS AND THE MONK.
CLXI. FATHER FRANCIS’S INTERVIEW WITH THE ABBESS OF ST MARY
MAGDALEN.—THE OBJECTS AND WISHES OF THE HOLY FATHER.
CLXII. THE CELL OF THE NEOPHYTE.—THE INTERVIEW.—THE UNEXPECTED
TURN GIVEN TO THE AFFAIRS AT THE CONVENT OF ST MARY
MAGDALEN.
CLXIII. THE NUN’S ATTEMPTED ESCAPE FROM THE CONVENT OF ST MARY
MAGDALEN.—THE PURSUIT AND THE DISCLOSURE.—THE ESCAPE OF
THE PRETENDED MONK.
CLXIV. THE STORM.—A SHIPWRECK AT SEA.—THE HAPLESS FATE OF THE
MARINERS.
CLXV. THE FISHERMEN.—THE DESPAIRING CRY OF THE MARINERS.—THE
BREAKERS FROM THE SHORE.
CLXVI. THE ONE BODY WASHED ASHORE.—THE FIRST REQUEST.—THE
SHIPWRECKED STRANGER.
CLXVII. THE FISHERMAN’S COTTAGE.—THE FIRESIDE, AND THE TRAVELLER’S
BED.
CLXVIII. THE NIGHT IN THE FISHERMAN’S BUT THE MIDNIGHT FEAST OF
BLOOD.—THE CHASE, AND THE GUN-SHOT.
CLXIX. THE ASSASSINS ON THE RIALTO.—THE ATTACK AND DEFEAT.—THE
STRANGER.
CLXX. COUNT POLLIDORI’S PALACE.—SIGNORA ISABELLA, THE COUNT’S
DAUGHTER.—THE INTRODUCTION.
CLXXI. THE OPINIONS OF DOCTOR PILLETTO.—THE STRANGER’S ACCOUNT OF
HIMSELF.—THE WELCOME OF THE SIGNORA.
CLXXII. THE COUNT POLLIDORI’S RECOVERY.—THE INTERVIEW WITH THE
SIGNORA ISABELLA.—THE CONSENT.
CLXXIII. THE WEDDING MORNING.—THE NEW ARRIVAL.—THE DISAPPEARANCE
OF THE VAMPYRE BRIDEGROOM.
CLXXIV. THE TWO HIGHWAYMEN.—THE MURDER AT THE GIBBET’S FOOT.—THE
RIDE TO THE GOLDEN PIPPIN.
CLXXV. THE HORRORS IN THE NIGHT.—THE DISCOVERY IN THE
ROAD.—CONTENTION BETWEEN MAN AND HORSE.—COMFORTABLE
QUARTERS IN THE GOLDEN PIPPIN.
CLXXVI. THE GRAZIER’S RELATION, AND HIS FIRST TERRORS.—THE EFFECTS
OF GOOD CHEER, AND THE SUDDEN INTERRUPTION TO A PLEASANT
PARTY.
CLXXVII. THE MYSTERIOUS STRANGER’S ARRIVAL.—THE CONSTERNATION OF
THE GUESTS.—THE GRAZIER’S TERRORS, AND POWERS OF
IDENTITY.—THE LANDLORD’S DAUGHTER.
CLXXVIII. THE MIDNIGHT CRY OF ALARM.—THE VAMPYRE’S MEAL.—THE CHASE
ACROSS THE FIELDS.—THE DEATH OF THE LANDLORD’S DAUGHTER.
CLXXIX. THE HOTEL.—THE FASHIONABLE ARRIVAL.—THE YOUNGE HEIRESS.
CLXXX. THE SECOND ARRIVAL AT THE LONDON HOTEL.—THE MYSTERIOUS
GUEST.
CLXXXI. THE NIGHT ALARM.—A SCENE OF CONFUSION.—MR. BLUE SUSPECTED.
CLXXXII. THE WAITER TELLS THE STORY OF THE LAKES’ DISTURBANCE TO
GEORGE AND FRANCIS.
CLXXXIII. THE COMMUNICATION OF THE SERVANTS RESPECTING THE LAKE
FAMILY.
CLXXXIV. THE MYSTERIOUS STRANGER.—THE NIGHT WATCH.
CLXXXV. THE VAMPYRE’S FEAST.—THE ALARM AND THE PURSUIT.
CLXXXVI. THE MEETING IN ST JAMES’S PARK.
CLXXXVII. THE CHURCHYARD AT HAMPSTEAD.—THE RESUSCITATION OF A
VAMPYRE.
CLXXXVIII. THE VAMPYRE.—THE FLIGHT.—THE WATCHMAN IN THE VALE OF
HEALTH.
CLXXXIX. MISS LAKE PASSES A FATEFUL NIGHT.—THE IMPOSTOR PUNISHED.
CXC. THE VAMPYRE DISCOVERED.—THE ESCAPE ON THE THAMES.
CXCI. THE PLOT DISCOVERED.—THE LETTER LEFT AT THE HOTEL BY THE
VAMPYRE.
CXCII. THE MEETING IN THE MORNING AT THE HOTEL.—THE PREPARATIONS
OF THE ATTORNEY.
CXCIII THE VAMPYRE’S VISIT TO THE BARRACKS AT KINGSTON.—THE YOUNG
OFFICER.
CXCIV. AN ECLAIRCISSEMENT.—THE INNOCENT TRIUMPHANT.
CXCV. THE VAMPYRE HAS SERIOUS THOUGHTS.—THE DREAM.—THE
RESOLUTION.
CXCVI. THE SCOTCH PACKET SHIP.—THE SUICIDE.
CXCVII. THE OLD MANOR HOUSE.—THE RESCUE.—VARNEY’S DESPAIR.
CXCVIII. A FAMILY SCENE.—THE SISTERS.—THE HORRIBLE ALARM.
CXCIX. THE SEXTON’S AVARICE.—THE DEAD AND THE LIVING.—THE RING.
CC. THE RECOVERY.—THE SEXTON’S FRIGHT.—THE COMPACT.
CCI. THE NIGHT ALARM.—THE VAMPYRE’S ATTACK ON THE BRIDE.
CCII. THE DEFILE IN THE ROCKS.—THE HORSEMAN AND THE ACCIDENT.
CCIII. THE DISAPPOINTMENT AT THE GRANGE.—THE NEWS OF DESPAIR.—THE
FINDING THE BODY.
CCIV. THE SICK CHAMBER AT THE GRANGE.—THE NIGHT.
CCV. A MIDNIGHT ALARM.—THE CHASE.—THE MYSTERY.
CCVI. THE SIGHT OF TERROR.—THE DOCTOR’S SUSPICIONS.—THE NIGHT
WATCH.
CCVII. FAMILY TROUBLES.—THE HOUSE OF MOURNING.
CCVIII. THE NIGHT WATCH.—THE SURPRISE.—THE CHASE.
CCIX. THE FUNERAL.—A STRANGE INCIDENT.
CCX. THE STRANGE VISITOR TO THE OLD CHURCH AT NIGHT.
CCXI. WILL STEPHENS’S VISIT TO THE FAMILY VAULT WITH THE
SAW-DUST, AND WHAT HE SAW THERE.
CCXII. THE APPARITION IN THE CHURCH.—WILL STEPHENS’S SWOON.—THE
MORNING.
CCXIII. THE ALARM FROM THE BELFRY.—THE BEADLE IN A QUANDARY.
CCXIV. THE CLERGYMAN’S VISIT TO THE VAULT.—RESCUE OF THE SEXTON.
CCXV. THE YOUNG LOVER’S MIDNIGHT WATCH.
CCXVI. THE HORRORS OF THE GRAVE.—A FRIGHTFUL ADVENTURE.
CCXVII. THE MIDNIGHT HOUR.—THE STONE SLAB.—THE VAMPYRE.
CCXVIII. THE YOUNG GIRL IN THE VILLAGE, AND THE AWFUL VISIT.
CCXIX. THE AWFUL SUPPOSITION.—A RESOLUTION.
CCXX. THE GRAND CONSULTATION AT THE ALE-HOUSE.—THE AWFUL
SUGGESTION.
CCXXI. THE NIGHT WATCH.—THE VAULT.
CCXXII. THE MADMAN.—THE VAMPYRE.
CCXXIII. THE HUNT OF THE VAMPYRE.
CCXXIII. THE FATE OF SIR GEORGE.—THE CROSS-ROAD.
CCXXV. THE SOLITARY MAN.—VARNEY’S DESPAIR.
CCXXVI. THE STRANGE GUEST.—THE LITTLE CHAPEL.—VARNEY’S NARRATIVE.
CCXXVII. VARNEY OPENS THE VAST STORE-HOUSE OF HIS MEMORY.
CCXXVIII. THE FLIGHT OF THE VAMPYRE.—THE MASS.
CCXXIX. THE MYSTERIOUS DISAPPEARANCE.
CCXXX. VARNEY GIVES SOME PERSONAL ACCOUNT OF HIMSELF.
CCXXXI. A SINGULAR INTERVIEW, AND THE CONSEQUENCES OF PASSION.
CCXXXII. VARNEY’S NARRATIVE CONTINUED.
CCXXXIII. THE NIGHT ATTACK.—THE HORRIBLE CONCLUSION.
CCXXXIV. VARNEY DETAILS HIS SECOND DEATH.
CCXXXV. THE PALACE GARDEN IN ST JAMES’S.
CCXXXVI. AN ADVENTURE.—THE CARBINE SHOT.—THE DEATH.
CCXXXVII. THE TOTAL DESTRUCTION OF VARNEY THE VAMPYRE, AND
CONCLUSION.
PREFACE
The unprecedented success of the romance of “Varney the Vampyre,” leave
the Author but little to say further, than that he accepts that success
and its results as gratefully as it is possible for any one to do
popular favors.
A belief in the existence of Vampyres first took its rise in Norway
and Sweden, from whence it rapidly spread to more southern regions,
taking a firm hold of the imaginations of the more credulous portion of
mankind.
The following romance is collected from seemingly the most authentic
sources, and the Author must leave the question of credibility entirely
to his readers, not even thinking that he his peculiarly called upon to
express his own opinion upon the subject.
Nothing has been omitted in the life of the unhappy Varney, which could
tend to throw a light upon his most extraordinary career, and the fact
of his death just as it is here related, made a great noise at the time
through Europe, and is to be found in the public prints for the year
1713.
With these few observations, the Author and Publisher, are well content
to leave the work in the hands of a public, which has stamped it with
an approbation far exceeding their most sanguine expectations, and
which is calculated to act as the strongest possible incentive to
the production of other works, which in a like, or perchance a still
further degree may be deserving of public patronage and support.
To the whole of the Metropolitan Press for their laudatory notices, the
Author is peculiarly obliged.
_London Sep. 1847_
[Illustration: “The girl has swooned, and the vampyre is at his
hideous repast!”]
CHAPTER I.
——“How graves give up their dead.
And how the night air hideous grows
With shrieks!”
MIDNIGHT.—THE HAIL-STORM.—THE DREADFUL VISITOR.—THE VAMPYRE.
The solemn tones of an old cathedral clock have announced midnight—the
air is thick and heavy—a strange, death-like stillness pervades all
nature. Like the ominous calm which precedes some more than usually
terrific outbreak of the elements, they seem to have paused even in
their ordinary fluctuations, to gather a terrific strength for the
great effort. A faint peal of thunder now comes from far off. Like a
signal gun for the battle of the winds to begin, it appeared to awaken
them from their lethargy, and one awful, warring hurricane swept over a
whole city, producing more devastation in the four or five minutes it
lasted, than would a half century of ordinary phenomena.
It was as if some giant had blown upon some toy town, and scattered
many of the buildings before the hot blast of his terrific breath; for
as suddenly as that blast of wind had come did it cease, and all was as
still and calm as before.
Sleepers awakened, and thought that what they had heard must be the
confused chimera of a dream. They trembled and turned to sleep again.
All is still—still as the very grave. Not a sound breaks the magic
of repose. What is that—a strange, pattering noise, as of a million
of fairy feet? It is hail—yes, a hail-storm has burst over the city.
Leaves are dashed from the trees, mingled with small boughs; windows
that lie most opposed to the direct fury of the pelting particles of
ice are broken, and the rapt repose that before was so remarkable in
its intensity, is exchanged for a noise which, in its accumulation,
drowns every cry of surprise or consternation which here and there
arose from persons who found their houses invaded by the storm.
Now and then, too, there would come a sudden gust of wind that in its
strength, as it blew laterally, would, for a moment, hold millions of
the hailstones suspended in mid air, but it was only to dash them with
redoubled force in some new direction, where more mischief was to be
done.
Oh, how the storm raged! Hail—rain—wind. It was, in very truth, an
awful night.
• • • • •
There is an antique chamber in an ancient house. Curious and quaint
carvings adorn the walls, and the large chimney-piece is a curiosity of
itself. The ceiling is low, and a large bay window, from roof to floor,
looks to the west. The window is latticed, and filled with curiously
painted glass and rich stained pieces, which send in a strange, yet
beautiful light, when sun or moon shines into the apartment. There is
but one portrait in that room, although the walls seem panelled for the
express purpose of containing a series of pictures. That portrait is of
a young man, with a pale face, a stately brow, and a strange expression
about the eyes, which no one cared to look on twice.
There is a stately bed in that chamber, of carved walnut-wood is it
made, rich in design and elaborate in execution; one of those works
of art which owe their existence to the Elizabethan era. It is hung
with heavy silken and damask furnishing; nodding feathers are at its
corners—covered with dust are they, and they lend a funereal aspect to
the room. The floor is of polished oak.
God! how the hail dashes on the old bay window! Like an occasional
discharge of mimic musketry, it comes clashing, beating, and cracking
upon the small panes; but they resist it—their small size saves them;
the wind, the hail, the rain, expend their fury in vain.
The bed in that old chamber is occupied. A creature formed in all
fashions of loveliness lies in a half sleep upon that ancient couch—a
girl young and beautiful as a spring morning. Her long hair has escaped
from its confinement and streams over the blackened coverings of the
bedstead; she has been restless in her sleep, for the clothing of the
bed is in much confusion. One arm is over her head, the other hangs
nearly off the side of the bed near to which she lies. A neck and
bosom that would have formed a study for the rarest sculptor that ever
Providence gave genius to, were half disclosed. She moaned slightly in
her sleep, and once or twice the lips moved as if in prayer—at least
one might judge so, for the name of Him who suffered for all came once
faintly from them.
She has endured much fatigue, and the storm does not awaken her; but
it can disturb the slumbers it does not possess the power to destroy
entirely. The turmoil of the elements wakes the senses, although it
cannot entirely break the repose they have lapsed into.
Oh, what a world of witchery was in that mouth, slightly parted, and
exhibiting within the pearly teeth that glistened even in the faint
light that came from that bay window. How sweetly the long silken
eyelashes lay upon the cheek. Now she moves, and one shoulder is
entirely visible—whiter, fairer than the spotless clothing of the bed
on which she lies, is the smooth skin of that fair creature, just
budding into womanhood, and in that transition state which presents
to us all the charms of the girl—almost of the child, with the more
matured beauty and gentleness of advancing years.
Was that lightning? Yes—an awful, vivid, terrifying flash—then a
roaring peal of thunder, as if a thousand mountains were rolling one
over the other in the blue vault of Heaven! Who sleeps now in that
ancient city? Not one living soul. The dread trumpet of eternity could
not more effectually have awakened any one.
The hail continues. The wind continues. The uproar of the elements
seems at its height. Now she awakens—that beautiful girl on the antique
bed; she opens those eyes of celestial blue, and a faint cry of alarm
bursts from her lips. At least it is a cry which, amid the noise and
turmoil without, sounds but faint and weak. She sits upon the bed and
presses her hands upon her eyes. Heavens! what a wild torrent of wind,
and rain, and hail! The thunder likewise seems intent upon awakening
sufficient echoes to last until the next flash of forked lightning
should again produce the wild concussion of the air. She murmurs a
prayer—a prayer for those she loves best; the names of those dear to
her gentle heart come from her lips; she weeps and prays; she thinks
then of what devastation the storm must surely produce, and to the
great God of Heaven she prays for all living things. Another flash—a
wild, blue, bewildering flash of lightning streams across that bay
window, for an instant bringing out every colour in it with terrible
distinctness. A shriek bursts from the lips of the young girl, and
then, with eyes fixed upon that window, which, in another moment, is
all darkness, and with such an expression of terror upon her face as it
had never before known, she trembled, and the perspiration of intense
fear stood upon her brow.
“What—what was it?” she gasped; “real, or a delusion? Oh, God, what was
it? A figure tall and gaunt, endeavouring from the outside to unclasp
the window. I saw it. That flash of lightning revealed it to me. It
stood the whole length of the window.”
There was a lull of the wind. The hail was not falling so
thickly—moreover, it now fell, what there was of it, straight, and yet
a strange clattering sound came upon the glass of that long window.
It could not be a delusion—she is awake, and she hears it. What can
produce it? Another flash of lightning—another shriek—there could be
now no delusion.
A tall figure is standing on the ledge immediately outside the long
window. It is its finger-nails upon the glass that produces the sound
so like the hail, now that the hail has ceased. Intense fear paralysed
the limbs of that beautiful girl. That one shriek is all she can
utter—with hands clasped, a face of marble, a heart beating so wildly
in her bosom, that each moment it seems as if it would break its
confines, eyes distended and fixed upon the window, she waits, frozen
with horror. The pattering and clattering of the nails continue. No
word is spoken, and now she fancies she can trace the darker form of
that figure against the window, and she can see the long arms moving to
and fro, feeling for some mode of entrance. What strange light is that
which now gradually creeps up into the air? red and terrible—brighter
and brighter it grows. The lightning has set fire to a mill, and the
reflection of the rapidly consuming building falls upon that long
window. There can be no mistake. The figure is there, still feeling for
an entrance, and clattering against the glass with its long nails, that
appear as if the growth of many years had been untouched. She tries to
scream again but a choking sensation comes over her, and she cannot. It
is too dreadful—she tries to move—each limb seems weighed down by tons
of lead—she can but in a hoarse faint whisper cry,—
“Help—help—help—help!”
And that one word she repeats like a person in a dream. The red glare
of the fire continues. It throws up the tall gaunt figure in hideous
relief against the long window. It shows, too, upon the one portrait
that is in the chamber, and that portrait appears to fix its eyes upon
the attempting intruder, while the flickering light from the fire makes
it look fearfully life-like. A small pane of glass is broken, and the
form from without introduces a long gaunt hand, which seems utterly
destitute of flesh. The fastening is removed, and one-half of the
window, which opens like folding doors, is swung wide open upon its
hinges.
And yet now she could not scream—she could not move.
“Help!—help!—help!” was all she could say. But, oh, that look of terror
that sat upon her face, it was dreadful—a look to haunt the memory for
a life-time—a look to obtrude itself upon the happiest moments, and
turn them to bitterness.
The figure turns half round, and the light falls upon the face. It
is perfectly white—perfectly bloodless. The eyes look like polished
tin; the lips are drawn back, and the principal feature next to those
dreadful eyes is the teeth—the fearful looking teeth—projecting like
those of some wild animal, hideously, glaringly white, and fang-like.
It approaches the bed with a strange, gliding movement. It clashes
together the long nails that literally appear to hang from the finger
ends. No sound comes from its lips. Is she going mad—that young and
beautiful girl exposed to so much terror? she has drawn up all her
limbs; she cannot even now say help. The power of articulation is gone,
but the power of movement has returned to her; she can draw herself
slowly along to the other side of the bed from that towards which the
hideous appearance is coming.
But her eyes are fascinated. The glance of a serpent could not have
produced a greater effect upon her than did the fixed gaze of those
awful, metallic-looking eyes that were bent on her face. Crouching down
so that the gigantic height was lost, and the horrible, protruding,
white face was the most prominent object, came on the figure. What was
it?—what did it want there?—what made it look so hideous—so unlike an
inhabitant of the earth, and yet to be on it?
Now she has got to the verge of the bed, and the figure pauses. It
seemed as if when it paused she lost the power to proceed. The clothing
of the bed was now clutched in her hands with unconscious power. She
drew her breath short and thick. Her bosom heaves, and her limbs
tremble, yet she cannot withdraw her eyes from that marble-looking
face. He holds her with his glittering eye.
The storm has ceased—all is still. The winds are hushed; the church
clock proclaims the hour of one; a hissing sound comes from the throat
of the hideous being, and he raises his long, gaunt arms—the lips move.
He advances. The girl places one small foot from the bed on to the
floor. She is unconsciously dragging the clothing with her. The door
of the room is in that direction—can she reach it? Has she power to
walk?—can she withdraw her eyes from the face of the intruder, and so
break the hideous charm? God of Heaven! is it real, or some dream so
like reality as to nearly overturn the judgment for ever?
The figure has paused again, and half on the bed and half out of it
that young girl lies trembling. Her long hair streams across the
entire width of the bed. As she has slowly moved along she has left it
streaming across the pillows. The pause lasted about a minute—oh, what
an age of agony. That minute was, indeed, enough for madness to do its
full work in.
With a sudden rush that could not be foreseen—with a strange howling
cry that was enough to awaken terror in every breast, the figure seized
the long tresses of her hair, and twining them round his bony hands he
held her to the bed. Then she screamed—Heaven granted her then power
to scream. Shriek followed shriek in rapid succession. The bed-clothes
fell in a heap by the side of the bed—she was dragged by her long
silken hair completely on to it again. Her beautifully rounded limbs
quivered with the agony of her soul. The glassy, horrible eyes of the
figure ran over that angelic form with a hideous satisfaction—horrible
profanation. He drags her head to the bed’s edge. He forces it back
by the long hair still entwined in his grasp. With a plunge he seizes
her neck in his fang-like teeth—a gush of blood, and a hideous sucking
noise follows. _The girl has swooned, and the vampyre is at his hideous
repast!_
• • • • •
CHAPTER II.
THE ALARM.—THE PISTOL SHOT.—THE PURSUIT AND ITS CONSEQUENCES.
Lights flashed about the building, and various room doors opened;
voices called one to the other. There was an universal stir and
commotion among the inhabitants.
“Did you hear a scream, Harry?” asked a young man, half-dressed, as he
walked into the chamber of another about his own age.
“I did—where was it?”
“God knows. I dressed myself directly.”
“All is still now.”
“Yes; but unless I was dreaming there was a scream.”
“We could not both dream there was. Where did you think it came from?”
“It burst so suddenly upon my ears that I cannot say.”
There was a tap now at the door of the room where these young men were,
and a female voice said,—
“For God’s sake, get up!”
“We are up,” said both the young men, appearing.
“Did you hear anything?”
“Yes, a scream.”
“Oh, search the house—search the house; where did it come from—can you
tell?”
“Indeed we cannot, mother.”
Another person now joined the party. He was a man of middle age, and,
as he came up to them, he said,—
“Good God! what is the matter?”
Scarcely had the words passed his lips, than such a rapid succession
of shrieks came upon their ears, that they felt absolutely stunned by
them. The elderly lady, whom one of the young men had called mother,
fainted, and would have fallen to the floor of the corridor in which
they all stood, had she not been promptly supported by the last comer,
who himself staggered, as those piercing cries came upon the night
air. He, however, was the first to recover, for the young men seemed
paralysed.
“Henry,” he cried, “for God’s sake support your mother. Can you doubt
that these cries come from Flora’s room?”
The young man mechanically supported his mother, and then the man
who had just spoken darted back to his own bed-room, from whence he
returned in a moment with a pair of pistols, and shouting,—
“Follow me, who can!” he bounded across the corridor in the direction
of the antique apartment, from whence the cries proceeded, but which
were now hushed.
That house was built for strength, and the doors were all of oak, and
of considerable thickness. Unhappily, they had fastenings within, so
that when the man reached the chamber of her who so much required help,
he was helpless, for the door was fast.
“Flora! Flora!” he cried; “Flora, speak!”
All was still.
“Good God!” he added; “we must force the door.”
“I hear a strange noise within,” said the young man, who trembled
violently.
“And so do I. What does it sound like?”
“I scarcely know; but it nearest resembles some animal eating, or
sucking some liquid.”
“What on earth can it be? Have you no weapon that will force the door?
I shall go mad if I am kept here.”
“I have,” said the young man. “Wait here a moment.”
He ran down the staircase, and presently returned with a small, but
powerful, iron crow-bar.
“This will do,” he said.
“It will, it will.—Give it to me.”
“Has she not spoken?”
“Not a word. My mind misgives me that something very dreadful must have
happened to her.”
“And that odd noise!”
“Still goes on. Somehow, it curdles the very blood in my veins to hear
it.”
The man took the crow-bar, and with some difficulty succeeded in
introducing it between the door and the side of the wall—still it
required great strength to move it, but it did move, with a harsh,
crackling sound.
“Push it!” cried he who was using the bar, “push the door at the same
time.”
The younger man did so. For a few moments the massive door resisted.
Then, suddenly, something gave way with a loud snap—it was a part of
the lock,—and the door at once swung wide open.
How true it is that we measure time by the events which happen within a
given space of it, rather than by its actual duration.
To those who were engaged in forcing open the door of the antique
chamber, where slept the young girl whom they named Flora, each moment
was swelled into an hour of agony; but, in reality, from the first
moment of the alarm to that when the loud cracking noise heralded the
destruction of the fastenings of the door, there had elapsed but very
few minutes indeed.
“It opens—it opens,” cried the young man.
“Another moment,” said the stranger, as he still plied the
crowbar—“another moment, and we shall have free ingress to the chamber.
Be patient.”
This stranger’s name was Marchdale; and even as he spoke, he succeeded
in throwing the massive door wide open, and clearing the passage to the
chamber.
To rush in with a light in his hand was the work of a moment to the
young man named Henry; but the very rapid progress he made into the
apartment prevented him from observing accurately what it contained,
for the wind that came in from the open window caught the flame of the
candle, and although it did not actually extinguish it, it blew it so
much on one side, that it was comparatively useless as a light.
“Flora—Flora!” he cried.
Then with a sudden bound something dashed from off the bed. The
concussion against him was so sudden and so utterly unexpected, as well
as so tremendously violent, that he was thrown down, and, in his fall,
the light was fairly extinguished.
All was darkness, save a dull, reddish kind of light that now and then,
from the nearly consumed mill in the immediate vicinity, came into the
room. But by that light, dim, uncertain, and flickering as it was, some
one was seen to make for the window.
Henry, although nearly stunned by his fall, saw a figure, gigantic in
height, which nearly reached from the floor to the ceiling. The other
young man, George, saw it, and Mr. Marchdale likewise saw it, as did
the lady who had spoken to the two young men in the corridor when first
the screams of the young girl awakened alarm in the breasts of all the
inhabitants of that house.
The figure was about to pass out at the window which led to a kind of
balcony, from whence there was an easy descent to a garden.
Before it passed out they each and all caught a glance of the
side-face, and they saw that the lower part of it and the lips were
dabbled in blood. They saw, too, one of those fearful-looking, shining,
metallic eyes which presented so terrible an appearance of unearthly
ferocity.
No wonder that for a moment a panic seized them all, which paralysed
any exertions they might otherwise have made to detain that hideous
form.
But Mr. Marchdale was a man of mature years; he had seen much of life,
both in this and in foreign lands; and he, although astonished to the
extent of being frightened, was much more likely to recover sooner
than his younger companions, which, indeed, he did, and acted promptly
enough.
“Don’t rise, Henry,” he cried. “Lie still.”
Almost at the moment he uttered these words, he fired at the figure,
which then occupied the window, as if it were a gigantic figure set in
a frame.
The report was tremendous in that chamber, for the pistol was no toy
weapon, but one made for actual service, and of sufficient length and
bore of barrel to carry destruction along with the bullets that came
from it.
“If that has missed its aim,” said Mr. Marchdale, “I’ll never pull a
trigger again.”
As he spoke he dashed forward, and made a clutch at the figure he felt
convinced he had shot.
The tall form turned upon him, and when he got a full view of the face,
which he did at that moment, from the opportune circumstance of the
lady returning at the instant with a light she had been to her own
chamber to procure, even he, Marchdale, with all his courage, and that
was great, and all his nervous energy, recoiled a step or two, and
uttered the exclamation of, “Great God!”
That face was one never to be forgotten. It was hideously flushed with
colour—the colour of fresh blood; the eyes had a savage and remarkable
lustre; whereas, before, they had looked like polished tin—they now
wore a ten times brighter aspect, and flashes of light seemed to dart
from them. The mouth was open, as if, from the natural formation of the
countenance, the lips receded much from the large canine looking teeth.
A strange howling noise came from the throat of this monstrous figure,
and it seemed upon the point of rushing upon Mr. Marchdale. Suddenly,
then, as if some impulse had seized upon it, it uttered a wild and
terrible shrieking kind of laugh; and then turning, dashed through the
window, and in one instant disappeared from before the eyes of those
who felt nearly annihilated by its fearful presence.
“God help us!” ejaculated Henry.
Mr. Marchdale drew a long breath, and then, giving a stamp on the
floor, as if to recover himself from the state of agitation into which
even he was thrown, he cried,—
“Be it what or who it may, I’ll follow it.”
“No—no—do not,” cried the lady.
“I must, I will. Let who will come with me—I follow that dreadful form.”
As he spoke, he took the road it took, and dashed through the window
into the balcony.
“And we, too, George,” exclaimed Henry; “we will follow Mr. Marchdale.
This dreadful affair concerns us more nearly than it does him.”
The lady who was the mother of these young men, and of the beautiful
girl who had been so awfully visited, screamed aloud, and implored
of them to stay. But the voice of Mr. Marchdale was heard exclaiming
aloud,—
“I see it—I see it; it makes for the wall.”
They hesitated no longer, but at once rushed into the balcony, and from
thence dropped into the garden.
The mother approached the bed-side of the insensible, perhaps the
murdered girl; she saw her, to all appearance, weltering in blood, and,
overcome by her emotions, she fainted on the floor of the room.
When the two young men reached the garden, they found it much lighter
than might have been fairly expected; for not only was the morning
rapidly approaching, but the mill was still burning, and those
mingled lights made almost every object plainly visible, except when
deep shadows were thrown from some gigantic trees that had stood for
centuries in that sweetly wooded spot. They heard the voice of Mr.
Marchdale, as he cried,—
“There—there—towards the wall. There—there—God! how it bounds along.”
The young men hastily dashed through a thicket in the direction from
whence his voice sounded, and then they found him looking wild and
terrified, and with something in his hand which looked like a portion
of clothing.
“Which way, which way?” they both cried in a breath.
He leant heavily on the arm of George, as he pointed along a vista of
trees, and said in a low voice,—
“God help us all. It is not human. Look there—look there—do you not see
it?”
They looked in the direction he indicated. At the end of this vista
was the wall of the garden. At that point it was full twelve feet in
height, and as they looked, they saw the hideous, monstrous form they
had traced from the chamber of their sister, making frantic efforts to
clear the obstacle.
Then they saw it bound from the ground to the top of the wall, which
it very nearly reached, and then each time it fell back again into the
garden with such a dull, heavy sound, that the earth seemed to shake
again with the concussion. They trembled—well indeed they might, and
for some minutes they watched the figure making its fruitless efforts
to leave the place.
“What—what is it?” whispered Henry, in hoarse accents. “God, what can
it possibly be?”
“I know not,” replied Mr. Marchdale. “I did seize it. It was cold and
clammy like a corpse. It cannot be human.”
“Not human?”
“Look at it now. It will surely escape now.”
“No, no—we will not be terrified thus—there is Heaven above us. Come
on, and, for dear Flora’s sake, let us make an effort yet to seize this
bold intruder.”
“Take this pistol,” said Marchdale. “It is the fellow of the one I
fired. Try its efficacy.”
“He will be gone,” exclaimed Henry, as at this moment, after many
repeated attempts and fearful falls, the figure reached the top of
the wall, and then hung by its long arms a moment or two, previous to
dragging itself completely up.
The idea of the appearance, be it what it might, entirely escaping,
seemed to nerve again Mr. Marchdale, and he, as well as the two young
men, ran forward towards the wall. They got so close to the figure
before it sprang down on the outer side of the wall, that to miss
killing it with the bullet from the pistol was a matter of utter
impossibility, unless wilfully.
Henry had the weapon, and he pointed it full at the tall form with a
steady aim. He pulled the trigger—the explosion followed, and that the
bullet did its office there could be no manner of doubt, for the figure
gave a howling shriek, and fell headlong from the wall on the outside.
“I have shot him,” cried Henry, “I have shot him.”
CHAPTER III.
THE DISAPPEARANCE OF THE BODY.—FLORA’S RECOVERY AND MADNESS.—THE
OFFER OF ASSISTANCE FROM SIR FRANCIS VARNEY.
“He is human!” cried Henry; “I have surely killed him.”
“It would seem so,” said Mr. Marchdale. “Let us now hurry round to the
outside of the wall, and see where he lies.”
This was at once agreed to, and the whole three of them made what
expedition they could towards a gate which led into a paddock, across
which they hurried, and soon found themselves clear of the garden wall,
so that they could make way towards where they fully expected to find
the body of him who had worn so unearthly an aspect, but who it would
be an excessive relief to find was human.
So hurried was the progress they made, that it was scarcely possible to
exchange many words as they went; a kind of breathless anxiety was upon
them, and in the speed they disregarded every obstacle, which would,
at any other time, have probably prevented them from taking the direct
road they sought.
It was difficult on the outside of the wall to say exactly which was
the precise spot which it might be supposed the body had fallen on;
but, by following the wall in its entire length, surely they would come
upon it.
They did so; but, to their surprise, they got from its commencement
to its further extremity without finding any dead body, or even any
symptoms of one having lain there.
At some parts close to the wall there grew a kind of heath, and,
consequently, the traces of blood would be lost among it, if it so
happened that at the precise spot at which the strange being had
seemed to topple over, such vegetation had existed. This was to be
ascertained; but now, after traversing the whole length of the wall
twice, they came to a halt, and looked wonderingly in each other’s
faces.
“There is nothing here,” said Harry.
“Nothing,” added his brother.
“It could not have been a delusion,” at length said Mr. Marchdale, with
a shudder.
“A delusion?” exclaimed the brothers. “That is not possible; we all saw
it.”
“Then what terrible explanation can we give?”
“By heavens! I know not,” exclaimed Henry. “This adventure surpasses
all belief, and but for the great interest we have in it, I should
regard it with a world of curiosity.”
“It is too dreadful,” said George; “for God’s sake, Henry, let us
return to ascertain if poor Flora is killed.”
“My senses,” said Henry, “were all so much absorbed in gazing at that
horrible form, that I never once looked towards her further than
to see that she was, to appearance, dead. God help her! poor—poor,
beautiful Flora. This is, indeed, a sad, sad fate for you to come to.
Flora—Flora—”
“Do not weep, Henry,” said George. “Rather let us now hasten home,
where we may find that tears are premature. She may yet be living and
restored to us.”
“And,” said Mr. Marchdale, “she may be able to give us some account of
this dreadful visitation.”
“True—true,” exclaimed Henry; “we will hasten home.”
They now turned their steps homewards, and as they went they much
blamed themselves for all leaving home together, and with terror
pictured what might occur in their absence to those who were now
totally unprotected.
“It was a rash impulse of us all to come in pursuit of this dreadful
figure,” remarked Mr. Marchdale; “but do not torment yourself, Henry.
There may be no reason for your fears.”
At the pace they went, they very soon reached the ancient house, and
when they came in sight of it, they saw lights flashing from the
windows, and the shadows of faces moving to and fro, indicating that
the whole household was up, and in a state of alarm.
Henry, after some trouble, got the hall door opened by a terrified
servant, who was trembling so much that she could scarcely hold the
light she had with her.
“Speak at once, Martha,” said Henry. “Is Flora living?”
“Yes; but——”
“Enough—enough! Thank God she lives; where is she now?”
“In her own room, Master Henry. Oh, dear—oh, dear, what will become of
us all?”
Henry rushed up the staircase, followed by George and Mr. Marchdale,
nor paused he once until he reached the room of his sister.
“Mother,” he said, before he crossed the threshold, “are you here?”
“I am, my dear—I am. Come in, pray come in, and speak to poor Flora.”
“Come in, Mr. Marchdale,” said Henry—“come in; we make no stranger of
you.”
They all then entered the room.
Several lights had been now brought into that antique chamber, and, in
addition to the mother of the beautiful girl who had been so fearfully
visited, there were two female domestics, who appeared to be in the
greatest possible fright, for they could render no assistance whatever
to anybody.
The tears were streaming down the mother’s face, and the moment she saw
Mr. Marchdale, she clung to his arm, evidently unconscious of what she
was about, and exclaimed,—
“Oh, what is this that has happened—what is this? Tell me, Marchdale!
Robert Marchdale, you whom I have known even from my childhood, you
will not deceive me. Tell me the meaning of all this?”
“I cannot,” he said, in a tone of much emotion. “As God is my judge, I
am as much puzzled and amazed at the scene that has taken place here
to-night as you can be.”
The mother wrung her hands and wept.
“It was the storm that first awakened me,” added Marchdale; “and then I
heard a scream.”
The brothers tremblingly approached the bed. Flora was placed in a
sitting, half-reclining posture, propped up by pillows. She was quite
insensible, and her face was fearfully pale; while that she breathed
at all could be but very faintly seen. On some of her clothing, about
the neck, were spots of blood, and she looked more like one who had
suffered some long and grievous illness, than a young girl in the prime
of life and in the most robust health, as she had been on the day
previous to the strange scene we have recorded.
“Does she sleep?” said Henry, as a tear fell from his eyes upon her
pallid cheek.
“No,” replied Mr. Marchdale. “This is a swoon, from which we must
recover her.”
Active measures were now adopted to restore the languid circulation,
and, after persevering in them for some time, they had the satisfaction
of seeing her open her eyes.
Her first act upon consciousness returning, however, was to utter a
loud shriek, and it was not until Henry implored her to look around
her, and see that she was surrounded by none but friendly faces, that
she would venture again to open her eyes, and look timidly from one to
the other. Then she shuddered, and burst into tears as she said,—
“Oh, Heaven, have mercy upon me—Heaven, have mercy upon me, and save me
from that dreadful form.”
“There is no one here, Flora,” said Mr. Marchdale, “but those who love
you, and who, in defence of you, if needs were would lay down their
lives.”
“Oh, God! Oh, God!”
“You have been terrified. But tell us distinctly what has happened? You
are quite safe now.”
She trembled so violently that Mr. Marchdale recommended that some
stimulant should be given to her, and she was persuaded, although not
without considerable difficulty, to swallow a small portion of some
wine from a cup. There could be no doubt but that the stimulating
effect of the wine was beneficial, for a slight accession of colour
visited her cheeks, and she spoke in a firmer tone as she said,—
“Do not leave me. Oh, do not leave me, any of you. I shall die if left
alone now. Oh, save me—save me. That horrible form! That fearful face!”
“Tell us how it happened, dear Flora?” said Henry.
“Or would you rather endeavour to get some sleep first?” suggested Mr.
Marchdale.
“No—no—no,” she said, “I do not think I shall ever sleep again.”
“Say not so; you will be more composed in a few hours, and then you can
tell us what has occurred.”
“I will tell you now. I will tell you now.”
She placed her hands over her face for a moment, as if to collect her
scattered, thoughts, and then she added,—
“I was awakened by the storm, and I saw that terrible apparition at the
window. I think I screamed, but I could not fly. Oh, God! I could not
fly. It came—it seized me by the hair. I know no more. I know no more.”
She passed her hand across her neck several times, and Mr. Marchdale
said, in an anxious voice,—
“You seem, Flora, to have hurt your neck—there is a wound.”
“A wound!” said the mother, and she brought a light close to the bed,
where all saw on the side of Flora’s neck a small punctured wound; or,
rather two, for there was one a little distance from the other.
It was from these wounds the blood had come which was observable upon
her night clothing.
“How came these wounds?” said Henry.
“I do not know,” she replied. “I feel very faint and weak, as if I had
almost bled to death.”
“You cannot have done so, dear Flora, for there are not above
half-a-dozen spots of blood to be seen at all.”
Mr. Marchdale leaned against the carved head of the bed for support,
and he uttered a deep groan. All eyes were turned upon him, and Henry
said, in a voice of the most anxious inquiry,—
“You have something to say, Mr. Marchdale, which will throw some light
upon this affair.”
“No, no, no, nothing!” cried Mr. Marchdale, rousing himself at once
from the appearance of depression that had come over him. “I have
nothing to say, but that I think Flora had better get some sleep if she
can.”
“No sleep—no sleep for me,” again screamed Flora. “Dare I be alone to
sleep?”
“But you shall not be alone, dear Flora,” said Henry. “I will sit by
your bedside and watch you.”
She took his hand in both hers, and while the tears chased each other
down her cheeks, she said,—
“Promise me, Henry, by all your hopes of Heaven, you will not leave me.”
“I promise!”
She gently laid herself down, with a deep sigh, and closed her eyes.
“She is weak, and will sleep long,” said Mr. Marchdale.
“You sigh,” said Henry. “Some fearful thoughts, I feel certain, oppress
your heart.”
“Hush—hush!” said Mr. Marchdale, as he pointed to Flora. “Hush! not
here—not here.”
“I understand,” said Henry.
“Let her sleep.”
There was a silence of some few minutes’ duration. Flora had dropped
into a deep slumber. That silence was first broken by George, who said,—
“Mr. Marchdale, look at that portrait.”
He pointed to the portrait in the frame to which we have alluded, and
the moment Marchdale looked at it he sunk into a chair as he exclaimed,—
[Illustration: George and Marchdale observe the portrait.]
“Gracious Heaven, how like!”
“It is—it is,” said Henry. “Those eyes——”
“And see the contour of the countenance, and the strange shape of the
mouth.”
“Exact—exact.”
“That picture shall be moved from here. The sight of it is at once
sufficient to awaken all her former terrors in poor Flora’s brain if
she should chance to awaken and cast her eyes suddenly upon it.”
“And is it so like him who came here?” said the mother.
“It is the very man himself,” said Mr. Marchdale. “I have not been in
this house long enough to ask any of you whose portrait that may be?”
“It is,” said Henry, “the portrait of Sir Runnagate Bannerworth, an
ancestor of ours, who first, by his vices, gave the great blow to the
family prosperity.”
“Indeed. How long ago?”
“About ninety years.”
“Ninety years. ’Tis a long while—ninety years.”
“You muse upon it.”
“No, no. I do wish, and yet I dread——”
“What?”
“To say something to you all. But not here—not here. We will hold a
consultation on this matter to-morrow. Not now—not now.”
“The daylight is coming quickly on,” said Henry; “I shall keep my
sacred promise of not moving from this room until Flora awakens; but
there can be no occasion for the detention of any of you. One is
sufficient here. Go all of you, and endeavour to procure what rest you
can.”
“I will fetch you my powder-flask and bullets,” said Mr. Marchdale;
“and you can, if you please, reload the pistols. In about two hours
more it will be broad daylight.”
This arrangement was adopted. Henry did reload the pistols, and placed
them on a table by the side of the bed, ready for immediate action, and
then, as Flora was sleeping soundly, all left the room but himself.
Mrs. Bannerworth was the last to do so. She would have remained, but
for the earnest solicitation of Henry, that she would endeavour to get
some sleep to make up for her broken night’s repose, and she was indeed
so broken down by her alarm on Flora’s account, that she had not power
to resist, but with tears flowing from her eyes, she sought her own
chamber.
And now the calmness of the night resumed its sway in that evil-fated
mansion; and although no one really slept but Flora, all were still.
Busy thought kept every one else wakeful. It was a mockery to lie
down at all, and Henry, full of strange and painful feelings as he
was, preferred his present position to the anxiety and apprehension on
Flora’s account which he knew he should feel if she were not within the
sphere of his own observation, and she slept as soundly as some gentle
infant tired of its playmates and its sports.
CHAPTER IV.
THE MORNING.—THE CONSULTATION.—THE FEARFUL SUGGESTION.
What wonderfully different impressions and feelings, with regard to
the same circumstances, come across the mind in the broad, clear, and
beautiful light of day to what haunt the imagination, and often render
the judgment almost incapable of action, when the heavy shadow of night
is upon all things.
There must be a downright physical reason for this effect—it is so
remarkable and so universal. It seems that the sun’s rays so completely
alter and modify the constitution of the atmosphere, that it produces,
as we inhale it, a wonderfully different effect upon the nerves of the
human subject.
We can account for this phenomenon in no other way. Perhaps never in
his life had he, Henry Bannerworth, felt so strongly this transition of
feeling as he now felt it, when the beautiful daylight gradually dawned
upon him, as he kept his lonely watch by the bedside of his slumbering
sister.
That watch had been a perfectly undisturbed one. Not the least sight or
sound of any intrusion had reached his senses. All had been as still as
the very grave.
And yet while the night lasted, and he was more indebted to the rays
of the candle, which he had placed upon a shelf, for the power to
distinguish objects than to the light of the morning, a thousand uneasy
and strange sensations had found a home in his agitated bosom.
He looked so many times at the portrait which was in the panel that at
length he felt an undefined sensation of terror creep over him whenever
he took his eyes off it.
He tried to keep himself from looking at it, but he found it vain, so
he adopted what, perhaps, was certainly the wisest, best plan, namely,
to look at it continually.
He shifted his chair so that he could gaze upon it without any effort,
and he placed the candle so that a faint light was thrown upon it, and
there he sat, a prey to many conflicting and uncomfortable feelings,
until the daylight began to make the candle flame look dull and sickly.
Solution for the events of the night he could find none. He racked his
imagination in vain to find some means, however vague, of endeavouring
to account for what occurred, and still he was at fault. All was to him
wrapped in the gloom of the most profound mystery.
And how strangely, too, the eyes of that portrait appeared to look upon
him—as if instinct with life, and as if the head to which they belonged
was busy in endeavouring to find out the secret communings of his soul.
It was wonderfully well executed that portrait; so life-like, that the
very features seemed to move as you gazed upon them.
“It shall be removed,” said Henry. “I would remove it now, but that it
seems absolutely painted on the panel, and I should awake Flora in any
attempt to do so.”
He arose and ascertained that such was the case, and that it would
require a workman, with proper tools adapted to the job, to remove the
portrait.
“True,” he said, “I might now destroy it, but it is a pity to obscure a
work of such rare art as this is; I should blame myself if I were. It
shall be removed to some other room of the house, however.”
Then, all of a sudden, it struck Henry how foolish it would be to
remove the portrait from the wall of a room which, in all likelihood,
after that night, would be uninhabited; for it was not probable that
Flora would choose again to inhabit a chamber in which she had gone
through so much terror.
“It can be left where it is,” he said, “and we can fasten up, if we
please, even the very door of this room, so that no one need trouble
themselves any further about it.”
The morning was now coming fast, and just as Henry thought he would
partially draw a blind across the window, in order to shield from the
direct rays of the sun the eyes of Flora, she awoke.
“Help—help!” she cried, and Henry was by her side in a moment.
“You are safe, Flora—you are safe,” he said.
“Where is it now?” she said.
“What—what, dear Flora?”
“The dreadful apparition. Oh, what have I done to be made thus
perpetually miserable?”
“Think no more of it, Flora.”
“I must think. My brain is on fire! A million of strange eyes seem
gazing on me.”
“Great Heaven! she raves,” said Henry.
“Hark—hark—hark! He comes on the wings of the storm. Oh, it is most
horrible—horrible!”
Henry rang the bell, but not sufficiently loudly to create any alarm.
The sound reached the waking ear of the mother, who in a few moments
was in the room.
“She has awakened,” said Henry, “and has spoken, but she seems to me to
wander in her discourse. For God’s sake, soothe her, and try to bring
her mind round to its usual state.”
“I will, Henry—I will.”
“And I think, mother, if you were to get her out of this room, and into
some other chamber as far removed from this one as possible, it would
tend to withdraw her mind from what has occurred.”
“Yes; it shall be done. Oh, Henry, what was it—what do you think it
was?”
“I am lost in a sea of wild conjecture. I can form no conclusion; where
is Mr. Marchdale?”
“I believe in his chamber.”
“Then I will go and consult with him.”
Henry proceeded at once to the chamber, which was, as he knew, occupied
by Mr. Marchdale; and as he crossed the corridor, he could not but
pause a moment to glance from a window at the face of nature.
As is often the case, the terrific storm of the preceding evening had
cleared the air, and rendered it deliciously invigorating and lifelike.
The weather had been dull, and there had been for some days a certain
heaviness in the atmosphere, which was now entirely removed.
The morning sun was shining with uncommon brilliancy, birds
were singing in every tree and on every bush; so pleasant, so
spirit-stirring, health-giving a morning, seldom had he seen. And the
effect upon his spirits was great, although not altogether what it
might have been, had all gone on as it usually was in the habit of
doing at that house. The ordinary little casualties of evil fortune had
certainly from time to time, in the shape of illness, and one thing or
another, attacked the family of the Bannerworths in common with every
other family, but here suddenly had arisen a something at once terrible
and inexplicable.
He found Mr. Marchdale up and dressed, and apparently in deep and
anxious thought. The moment he saw Henry, he said,—
“Flora is awake, I presume.”
“Yes, but her mind appears to be much disturbed.”
“From bodily weakness, I dare say.”
“But why should she be bodily weak? she was strong and well, ay, as
well as she could ever be in all her life. The glow of youth and health
was on her cheeks. Is it possible that, in the course of one night, she
should become bodily weak to such an extent?”
“Henry,” said Mr. Marchdale, sadly, “sit down. I am not, as you know, a
superstitious man.”
“You certainly are not.”
“And yet, I never in all my life was so absolutely staggered as I have
been by the occurrences of to-night.”
“Say on.”
“There is a frightful, a hideous solution of them; one which every
consideration will tend to add strength to, one which I tremble to name
now, although, yesterday, at this hour, I should have laughed it to
scorn.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes, it is so. Tell no one that which I am about to say to you. Let
the dreadful suggestion remain with ourselves alone, Henry Bannerworth.”
“I—I am lost in wonder.”
“You promise me?”
“What—what?”
“That you will not repeat my opinion to any one.”
“I do.”
“On your honour.”
“On my honour, I promise.”
Mr. Marchdale rose, and proceeding to the door, he looked out to see
that there were no listeners near. Having ascertained then that they
were quite alone, he returned, and drawing a chair close to that on
which Henry sat, he said,—
“Henry, have you never heard of a strange and dreadful superstition
which, in some countries, is extremely rife, by which it is supposed
that there are beings who never die.”
“Never die!”
“Never. In a word, Henry, have you never heard of—of—I dread to
pronounce the word.”
“Speak it. God of Heaven! let me hear it.”
“_A vampyre!_”
Henry sprung to his feet. His whole frame quivered with emotion; the
drops of perspiration stood upon his brow, as, in a strange, hoarse
voice, he repeated the words,—
“A vampyre!”
“Even so; one who has to renew a dreadful existence by human blood—one
who lives on for ever, and must keep up such a fearful existence upon
human gore—one who eats not and drinks not as other men—a vampyre.”
Henry dropped into his seat, and uttered a deep groan of the most
exquisite anguish.
“I could echo that groan,” said Marchdale, “but that I am so thoroughly
bewildered I know not what to think.”
“Good God—good God!”
“Do not too readily yield belief in so dreadful a supposition, I pray
you.”
“Yield belief!” exclaimed Henry, as he rose, and lifted up one of his
hands above his head. “No; by Heaven, and the great God of all, who
there rules, I will not easily believe aught so awful and so monstrous.”
“I applaud your sentiment, Henry; not willingly would I deliver up
myself to so frightful a belief—it is too horrible. I merely have told
you of that which you saw was on my mind. You have surely before heard
of such things.”
“I have—I have.”
“I much marvel, then, that the supposition did not occur to you, Henry.”
“It did not—it did not, Marchdale. It—it was too dreadful, I suppose,
to find a home in my heart. Oh! Flora, Flora, if this horrible idea
should once occur to you, reason cannot, I am quite sure, uphold you
against it.”
“Let no one presume to insinuate it to her, Henry. I would not have it
mentioned to her for worlds.”
“Nor I—nor I. Good God! I shudder at the very thought—the mere
possibility; but there is no possibility, there can be none. I will not
believe it.”
“Nor I.”
“No; by Heaven’s justice, goodness, grace, and mercy, I will not
believe it.”
“’Tis well sworn, Henry; and now, discarding the supposition that Flora
has been visited by a vampyre, let us seriously set about endeavouring,
if we can, to account for what has happened in this house.”
“I—I cannot now.”
“Nay, let us examine the matter; if we can find any natural
explanation, let us cling to it, Henry, as the sheet-anchor of our very
souls.”
“Do you think. You are fertile in expedients. Do you think, Marchdale;
and, for Heaven’s sake, and for the sake of our own peace, find out
some other way of accounting for what has happened, than the hideous
one you have suggested.”
“And yet my pistol bullets hurt him not; he has left the tokens of his
presence on the neck of Flora.”
“Peace, oh! peace. Do not, I pray you, accumulate reasons why I should
receive such a dismal, awful superstition. Oh, do not, Marchdale, as
you love me!”
“You know that my attachment to you,” said Marchdale, “is sincere; and
yet, Heaven help us!”
His voice was broken by grief as he spoke, and he turned aside his head
to hide the bursting tears that would, despite all his efforts, show
themselves in his eyes.
“Marchdale,” added Henry, after a pause of some moments’ duration, “I
will sit up to-night with my sister.”
“Do—do!”
“Think you there is a chance it may come again?”
“I cannot—I dare not speculate upon the coming of so dreadful a
visitor, Henry; but I will hold watch with you most willingly.”
“You will, Marchdale?”
“My hand upon it. Come what dangers may, I will share them with you,
Henry.”
“A thousand thanks. Say nothing, then, to George of what we have been
talking about. He is of a highly susceptible nature, and the very idea
of such a thing would kill him.”
“I will; be mute. Remove your sister to some other chamber, let me beg
of you, Henry; the one she now inhabits will always be suggestive of
horrible thoughts.”
“I will; and that dreadful-looking portrait, with its perfect likeness
to him who came last night.”
“Perfect indeed. Do you intend to remove it?”
“I do not. I thought of doing so; but it is actually on the panel in
the wall, and I would not willingly destroy it, and it may as well
remain where it is in that chamber, which I can readily now believe
will become henceforward a deserted one in this house.”
“It may well become such.”
“Who comes here? I hear a step.”
There was a tap at the door at this moment, and George made his
appearance in answer to the summons to come in. He looked pale and ill;
his face betrayed how much he had mentally suffered during that night,
and almost directly he got into the bed-chamber he said,—
“I shall, I am sure, be censured by you both for what I am going to
say; but I cannot help saying it, nevertheless, for to keep it to
myself would destroy me.”
“Good God, George! what is it?” said Mr. Marchdale.
“Speak it out!” said Henry.
“I have been thinking of what has occurred here, and the result of that
thought has been one of the wildest suppositions that ever I thought I
should have to entertain. Have you never heard of a vampyre?”
Henry sighed deeply, and Marchdale was silent.
“I say a vampyre,” added George, with much excitement in his manner.
“It is a fearful, a horrible supposition; but our poor, dear Flora has
been visited by a vampyre, and I shall go completely mad!”
He sat down, and covering his face with his hands, he wept bitterly and
abundantly.
“George,” said Henry, when he saw that the frantic grief had in some
measure abated—“be calm, George, and endeavour to listen to me.”
“I hear, Henry.”
“Well, then, do not suppose that you are the only one in this house to
whom so dreadful a superstition has occurred.”
“Not the only one?”
“No; it has occurred to Mr. Marchdale also.”
“Gracious Heaven!”
“He mentioned it to me; but we have both agreed to repudiate it with
horror.”
“To—repudiate—it?”
“Yes, George.”
“And yet—and yet—”
“Hush, hush! I know what you would say. You would tell us that our
repudiation of it cannot affect the fact. Of that we are aware; but yet
will we disbelieve that which a belief in would be enough to drive us
mad.”
“What do you intend to do?”
“To keep this supposition to ourselves, in the first place; to guard it
most zealously from the ears of Flora.”
“Do you think she has ever heard of vampyres?”
“I never heard her mention that in all her reading she had gathered
even a hint of such a fearful superstition. If she has, we must be
guided by circumstances, and do the best we can.”
“Pray Heaven she may not!”
“Amen to that prayer, George,” said Henry. “Mr. Marchdale and I intend
to keep watch over Flora to-night.”
“May not I join you?”
“Your health, dear George, will not permit you to engage in such
matters. Do you seek your natural repose, and leave it to us to do the
best we can in this most fearful and terrible emergency.”
“As you please, brother, and as you please, Mr. Marchdale. I know I am
a frail reed, and my belief is that this affair will kill me quite. The
truth is, I am horrified—utterly and frightfully horrified. Like my
poor, dear sister, I do not believe I shall ever sleep again.”
“Do not fancy that, George,” said Marchdale. “You very much add to the
uneasiness which must be your poor mother’s portion, by allowing this
circumstance to so much affect you. You well know her affection for you
all, and let me therefore, as a very old friend of hers, entreat you to
wear as cheerful an aspect as you can in her presence.”
“For once in my life,” said George, sadly, “I will; to my dear mother,
endeavour to play the hypocrite.”
“Do so,” said Henry. “The motive will sanction any such deceit as that,
George, be assured.”
The day wore on, and Poor Flora remained in a very precarious
situation. It was not until mid-day that Henry made up his mind he
would call in a medical gentleman to her, and then he rode to the
neighbouring market-town, where he knew an extremely intelligent
practitioner resided. This gentleman Henry resolved upon, under a
promise of secrecy, making a confidant of; but, long before he reached
him, he found he might well dispense with the promise of secrecy.
He had never thought, so engaged had he been with other matters, that
the servants were cognizant of the whole affair, and that from them he
had no expectation of being able to keep the whole story in all its
details. Of course such an opportunity for tale-bearing and gossiping
was not likely to be lost; and while Henry was thinking over how he
had better act in the matter, the news that Flora Bannerworth had been
visited in the night by a vampyre—for the servants named the visitation
such at once—was spreading all over the county.
As he rode along, Henry met a gentleman on horseback who belonged to
the county, and who, reining in his steed, said to him,
“Good morning, Mr. Bannerworth.”
“Good morning,” responded Henry, and he would have ridden on, but the
gentleman added,—
“Excuse me for interrupting you, sir; but what is the strange story
that is in everybody’s mouth about a vampyre?”
Henry nearly fell off his horse, he was so much astonished, and,
wheeling the animal around, he said,—
“In everybody’s mouth!”
“Yes; I have heard it from at least a dozen persons.”
“You surprise me.”
“It is untrue? Of course I am not so absurd as really to believe about
the vampyre; but is there no foundation at all for it? We generally
find that at the bottom of these common reports there is a something
around which, as a nucleus, the whole has formed.”
“My sister is unwell.”
“Ah, and that’s all. It really is too bad, now.”
“We had a visitor last night.”
“A thief, I suppose?”
“Yes, yes—I believe a thief. I do believe it was a thief, and she was
terrified.”
“Of course, and upon such a thing is grafted a story of a vampyre, and
the marks of his teeth being in her neck, and all the circumstantial
particulars.”
“Yes, yes.”
“Good morning, Mr. Bannerworth.”
Henry bade the gentleman good morning, and much vexed at the publicity
which the affair had already obtained, he set spurs to his horse,
determined that he would speak to no one else upon so uncomfortable a
theme. Several attempts were made to stop him, but he only waved his
hand and trotted on, nor did he pause in his speed till he reached the
door of Mr. Chillingworth, the medical man whom he intended to consult.
Henry knew that at such a time he would be at home, which was the
case, and he was soon closeted with the man of drugs. Henry begged his
patient hearing, which being accorded, he related to him at full length
what had happened, not omitting, to the best of his remembrance, any
one particular. When he had concluded his narration, the doctor shifted
his position several times, and then said,—
“That’s all?”
“Yes—and enough too.”
“More than enough, I should say, my young friend. You astonish me.”
“Can you form any supposition, sir, on the subject?”
“Not just now. What is your own idea?”
“I cannot be said to have one about it. It is too absurd to tell you
that my brother George is impressed with a belief a vampyre has visited
the house.”
“I never in all my life heard a more circumstantial narrative in favour
of so hideous a superstition.”
“Well, but you cannot believe—”
“Believe what?”
“That the dead can come to life again, and by such a process keep up
vitality.”
“Do you take me for a fool?”
“Certainly not.”
“Then why do you ask me such questions?”
“But the glaring facts of the case.”
“I don’t care if they were ten times more glaring, I won’t believe it.
I would rather believe you were all mad, the whole family of you—that
at the full of the moon you all were a little cracked.”
“And so would I.”
“You go home now, and I will call and see your sister in the course of
two hours. Something may turn up yet, to throw some new light upon this
strange subject.”
With this understanding Henry went home, and he took care to ride as
fast as before, in order to avoid questions, so that he got back to his
old ancestral home without going through the disagreeable ordeal of
having to explain to any one what had disturbed the peace of it.
When Henry reached his home, he found that the evening was rapidly
coming on, and before he could permit himself to think upon any other
subject, he inquired how his terrified sister had passed the hours
during his absence.
He found that but little improvement had taken place in her, and that
she had occasionally slept, but to awaken and speak incoherently, as if
the shock she had received had had some serious effect upon her nerves.
He repaired at once to her room, and, finding that she was awake, he
leaned over her, and spoke tenderly to her.
“Flora,” he said, “dear Flora, you are better now?”
“Harry, is that you?”
“Yes, dear.”
“Oh, tell me what has happened?”
“Have you not a recollection, Flora?”
“Yes, yes, Henry; but what was it? They none of them will tell me what
it was, Henry.”
“Be calm, dear. No doubt some attempt to rob the house.”
“Think you so?”
“Yes; the bay window was peculiarly adapted for such a purpose; but now
that you are removed here to this room, you will be able to rest in
peace.”
“I shall die of terror, Henry. Even now those eyes are glaring on me so
hideously. Oh, it is fearful—it is very fearful, Henry. Do you not pity
me, and no one will promise to remain with me at night.”
“Indeed, Flora, you are mistaken, for I intend to sit by your bedside
armed, and so preserve you from all harm.”
She clutched his hand eagerly, as she said,—
“You will, Henry. You will, and not think it too much trouble, dear
Henry.”
“It can be no trouble, Flora.”
“Then I shall rest in peace, for I know that the dreadful vampyre
cannot come to me when you are by.”
“The what, Flora?”
“The vampyre, Henry. It was a vampyre.”
“Good God, who told you so?”
“No one. I have read of them in the book of travels in Norway, which
Mr. Marchdale lent us all.”
“Alas, alas!” groaned Henry. “Discard, I pray you, such a thought from
your mind.”
“Can we discard thoughts. What power have we but from that mind, which
is ourselves?”
“True, true.”
“Hark, what noise is that? I thought I heard a noise. Henry, when you
go, ring for some one first. Was there not a noise?”
“The accidental shutting of some door, dear.”
“Was it that?”
“It was.”
“Then I am relieved. Henry, I sometimes fancy I am in the tomb, and
that some one is feasting on my flesh. They do say, too, that those who
in life have been bled by a vampyre, become themselves vampyres, and
have the same horrible taste for blood as those before them. Is it not
horrible?”
“You only vex yourself by such thoughts, Flora. Mr. Chillingworth is
coming to see you.”
“Can he minister to a mind diseased?”
“But yours is not, Flora. Your mind is healthful, and so, although his
power extends not so far, we will thank Heaven, dear Flora, that you
need it not.”
She sighed deeply, as she said,—
“Heaven help me! I know not, Henry. The dreadful being held on by my
hair. I must have it all taken off. I tried to get away, but it dragged
me back—a brutal thing it was. Oh, then at that moment, Henry, I felt
as if something strange took place in my brain, and that I was going
mad! I saw those glazed eyes close to, mine—I felt a hot, pestiferous
breath upon my face—help—help!”
“Hush! my Flora, hush! Look at me.”
“I am calm again. It fixed its teeth in my throat. Did I faint away?”
“You did, dear; but let me pray you to refer all this to imagination;
or at least the greater part of it.”
“But you saw it.”
“Yes——”
“All saw it.”
“We all saw some man—a housebreaker—it must have been some
housebreaker. What more easy, you know, dear Flora, than to assume some
such disguise?”
“Was anything stolen?”
“Not that I know of; but there was an alarm, you know.”
Flora shook her head, as she said, in a low voice,—
“That which came here was more than mortal. Oh, Henry, if it had but
killed me, now I had been happy; but I cannot live—I hear it breathing
now.”
“Talk of something else, dear Flora,” said the much distressed Henry;
“you will make yourself much worse, if you indulge yourself in these
strange fancies.”
“Oh, that they were but fancies!”
“They are, believe me.”
“There is a strange confusion in my brain, and sleep comes over me
suddenly, when I least expect it. Henry, Henry, what I was, I shall
never, never be again.”
“Say not so. All this will pass away like a dream, and leave so faint a
trace upon your memory, that the time will come when you will wonder it
ever made so deep an impression on your mind.”
“You utter these words, Henry,” she said, “but they do not come from
your heart. Ah, no, no, no! Who comes?”
The door was opened by Mrs. Bannerworth, who said,—
“It is only me, my dear. Henry, here is Dr. Chillingworth in the
dining-room.”
Henry turned to Flora, saying,—
“You will see him, dear Flora? You know Mr. Chillingworth well.”
“Yes, Henry, yes, I will see him, or whoever you please.”
“Shew Mr. Chillingworth up,” said Henry to the servant.
In a few moments the medical man was in the room, and he at once
approached the bedside to speak to Flora, upon whose pale countenance
he looked with evident interest, while at the same time it seemed
mingled with a painful feeling—at least so his own face indicated.
“Well, Miss Bannerworth,” he said, “what is all this I hear about an
ugly dream you have had?”
“A dream?” said Flora, as she fixed her beautiful eyes on his face.
“Yes, as I understand.”
She shuddered, and was silent.
“Was it not a dream, then?” added Mr. Chillingworth.
She wrung her hands, and in a voice of extreme anguish and pathos,
said,—
“Would it were a dream—would it were a dream! Oh, if any one could but
convince me it was a dream!”
“Well, will you tell me what it was?”
“Yes, sir, it was a vampyre.”
Mr. Chillingworth glanced at Henry, as he said, in reply to Flora’s
words,—
“I suppose that is, after all, another name, Flora, for the nightmare?”
“No—no—no!”
“Do you really, then, persist in believing anything so absurd, Miss
Bannerworth?”
“What can I say to the evidence of my own senses?” she replied. “I saw
it, Henry saw it, George saw, Mr. Marchdale, my mother—all saw it. We
could not all be at the same time the victims of the same delusion.”
“How faintly you speak.”
“I am very faint and ill.”
“Indeed. What wound is that on your neck?”
A wild expression came over the face of Flora; a spasmodic action of
the muscles, accompanied with a shuddering, as if a sudden chill had
come over the whole mass of blood took place, and she said,—
“It is the mark left by the teeth of the vampyre.”
The smile was a forced one upon the face of Mr. Chillingworth.
“Draw up the blind of the window, Mr. Henry,” he said, “and let me
examine this puncture to which your sister attaches so extraordinary a
meaning.”
The blind was drawn up, and a strong light was thrown into the room.
For full two minutes Mr. Chillingworth attentively examined the two
small wounds in the neck of Flora. He took a powerful magnifying
glass from his pocket, and looked at them through it, and after his
examination was concluded, he said,—
“They are very trifling wounds, indeed.”
“But how inflicted?” said Henry.
“By some insect, I should say, which probably—it being the season for
many insects—has flown in at the window.”
“I know the motive,” said Flora “which prompts all these suggestions;
it is a kind one, and I ought to be the last to quarrel with it; but
what I have seen, nothing can make me believe I saw not, unless I am,
as once or twice I have thought myself, really mad.”
“How do you now feel in general health?”
“Far from well; and a strange drowsiness at times creeps over me. Even
now I feel it.”
She sunk back on the pillows as she spoke and closed her eyes with a
deep sigh.
Mr. Chillingworth beckoned Henry to come with him from the room, but
the latter had promised that he would remain with Flora; and as Mrs.
Bannerworth had left the chamber because she was unable to control her
feelings, he rang the bell, and requested that his mother would come.
She did so, and then Henry went down stairs along with the medical man,
whose opinion he was certainly eager to be now made acquainted with.
As soon as they were alone in an old-fashioned room which was called
the oak closet, Henry turned to Mr. Chillingworth, and said,—
“What, now, is your candid opinion, sir? You have seen my sister, and
those strange indubitable evidences of something wrong.”
“I have; and to tell you candidly the truth, Mr. Henry, I am sorely
perplexed.”
“I thought you would be.”
“It is not often that a medical man likes to say so much, nor is it,
indeed, often prudent that he should do so, but in this case I own I am
much puzzled. It is contrary to all my notions upon all such subjects.”
“Those wounds, what do you think of them?”
“I know not what to think. I am completely puzzled as regards them.”
“But, but do they not really bear the appearance of being bites?”
“They really do.”
“And so far, then, they are actually in favour of the dreadful
supposition which poor Flora entertains.”
“So far they certainly are. I have no doubt in the world of their
being bites; but we not must jump to a conclusion that the teeth which
inflicted them were human. It is a strange case, and one which I feel
assured must give you all much uneasiness, as, indeed, it gave me; but,
as I said before, I will not let my judgment give in to the fearful and
degrading superstition which all the circumstances connected with this
strange story would seem to justify.”
“It is a degrading superstition.”
“To my mind your sister seems to be labouring under the effect of some
narcotic.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes; unless she really has lost a quantity of blood, which loss has
decreased the heart’s action sufficiently to produce the languor under
which she now evidently labours.”
“Oh, that I could believe the former supposition, but I am confident
she has taken no narcotic; she could not even do so by mistake, for
there is no drug of the sort in the house. Besides, she is not heedless
by any means. I am quite convinced she has not done so.”
“Then I am fairly puzzled, my young friend, and I can only say that I
would freely have given half of what I am worth to see that figure you
saw last night.”
“What would you have done?”
“I would not have lost sight of it for the world’s wealth.”
“You would have felt your blood freeze with horror. The face was
terrible.”
“And yet let it lead me where it liked I would have followed it.”
“I wish you had been here.”
“I wish to Heaven I had. If I thought there was the least chance of
another visit I would come and wait with patience every night for a
month.”
“I cannot say,” replied Henry. “I am going to sit up to-night with my
sister, and I believe, our friend Mr. Marchdale will share my watch
with me.”
Mr. Chillingworth appeared to be for a few moments lost in thought, and
then suddenly rousing himself, as if he found it either impossible to
come to any rational conclusion upon the subject, or had arrived at one
which he chose to keep to himself, he said,—
“Well, well, we must leave the matter at present as it stands. Time
may accomplish something towards its development; but at present so
palpable a mystery I never came across, or a matter in which human
calculation was so completely foiled.”
“Nor I—nor I.”
“I will send you some medicines, such as I think will be of service to
Flora, and depend upon seeing me by ten o’clock to-morrow morning.”
“You have, of course, heard something,” said Henry to the doctor, as he
was pulling on his gloves, “about vampyres.”
“I certainly have, and I understand that in some countries,
particularly Norway and Sweden, the superstition is a very common one.”
“And in the Levant.”
“Yes. The ghouls of the Mahometans are of the same description of
beings. All that I have heard of the European vampyre has made it a
being which can be killed, but is restored to life again by the rays of
a full moon falling on the body.”
“Yes, yes, I have heard as much.”
“And that the hideous repast of blood has to be taken very frequently,
and that if the vampyre gets it not he wastes away, presenting the
appearance of one in the last stage of a consumption, and visibly, so
to speak, dying.”
“That is what I have understood.”
“To-night, do you know, Mr. Bannerworth, is the full of the moon.”
Henry started.
“If now you had succeeded in killing——. Pshaw, what am I saying. I
believe I am getting foolish, and that the horrible superstition is
beginning to fasten itself upon me as well as upon all of you. How
strangely the fancy will wage war with the judgment in such a way as
this.”
“The full of the moon,” repeated Henry, as he glanced towards the
window, “and the night is near at hand.”
“Banish these thoughts from your mind,” said the doctor, “or else, my
young friend, you will make yourself decidedly ill. Good evening to
you, for it is evening. I shall see you to-morrow morning.”
Mr. Chillingworth appeared now to be anxious to go, and Henry no longer
opposed his departure; but when he was gone a sense of great loneliness
came over him.
“To-night,” he repeated, “is the full of the moon. How strange that
this dreadful adventure should have taken place just the night before.
’Tis very strange. Let me see—let me see.”
He took from the shelves of a book case the work which Flora had
mentioned, entitled, “Travels in Norway,” in which work he found some
account of the popular belief in vampyres.
He opened the work at random, and then some of the leaves turned over
of themselves to a particular place, as the leaves of a book will
frequently do when it has been kept open a length of time at that part,
and the binding stretched there more than anywhere else. There was a
note at the bottom of one of the pages at this part of the book, and
Henry read as follows:—
“With regard to these vampyres, it is believed by those who are
inclined to give credence to so dreadful a superstition, that they
always endeavour to make their feast of blood, for the revival of their
bodily powers, on some evening immediately preceding a full moon,
because if any accident befall them, such as being shot, or otherwise
killed or wounded, they can recover by lying down somewhere where the
full moon’s rays will fall upon them.”
Henry let the book drop from his hands with a groan and a shudder.
CHAPTER V.
THE NIGHT WATCH.—THE PROPOSAL.—THE MOONLIGHT.—THE FEARFUL ADVENTURE.
A kind of stupefaction came over Henry Bannerworth, and he sat for
about a quarter of an hour scarcely conscious of where he was, and
almost incapable of anything in the shape of rational thought. It was
his brother, George, who roused him by saying, as he laid his hand upon
his shoulder,—
“Henry, are you asleep?”
Henry had not been aware of his presence, and he started up as if he
had been shot.
“Oh, George, is it you?” he said.
“Yes, Henry, are you unwell?”
“No, no; I was in a deep reverie.”
“Alas! I need not ask upon what subject,” said George, sadly. “I sought
you to bring you this letter.”
“A letter to me?”
“Yes, you see it is addressed to you, and the seal looks as if it came
from someone of consequence.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes, Henry. Read it, and see from whence it comes.”
There was just sufficient light by going to the window to enable Henry
to read the letter, which he did aloud.
It ran thus:—
“Sir Francis Varney presents his compliments to Mr. Beaumont,
and is much concerned to hear that some domestic affliction has
fallen upon him. Sir Francis hopes that the genuine and loving
sympathy of a neighbour will not be regarded as an intrusion,
and begs to proffer any assistance or counsel that may be
within the compass of his means.
“Ratford Abbey.”
“Sir Francis Varney!” said Henry, “who is he?”
“Do you not remember, Henry,” said George, “we were told a few days
ago, that a gentleman of that name had become the purchaser of the
estate of Ratford Abbey.”
“Oh, yes, yes. Have you seen him?”
“I have not.”
“I do not wish to make any new acquaintance, George. We are very
poor—much poorer indeed than the general appearance of this place,
which, I fear, we shall soon have to part with, would warrant any one
believing. I must, of course, return a civil answer to this gentleman,
but it must be such an one as shall repress familiarity.”
“That will be difficult to do while we remain here, when we come to
consider the very close proximity of the two properties, Henry.”
“Oh, no, not at all. He will easily perceive that we do not want to
make acquaintance with him, and then, as a gentleman, which doubtless
he is, he will give up the attempt.”
“Let it be so, Henry. Heaven knows I have no desire to form any new
acquaintance with any one, and more particularly under our present
circumstances of depression. And now, Henry, you must permit me, as I
have had some repose, to share with you your night watch in Flora’s
room.”
“I would advise you not, George; your health, you know, is very far
from good.”
“Nay, allow me. If not, then the anxiety I shall suffer will do me more
harm than the watchfulness I shall keep up in her chamber.”
This was an argument which Henry felt himself the force of too strongly
not to admit it in the case of George, and he therefore made no further
opposition to his wish to make one in the night watch.
“There will be an advantage,” said George, “you see, in three of us
being engaged in this matter, because, should anything occur, two can
act together, and yet Flora may not be left alone.”
“True, true, that is a great advantage.”
Now a soft gentle silvery light began to spread itself over the
heavens. The moon was rising, and as the beneficial effects of the
storm of the preceding evening were still felt in the clearness of the
air, the rays appeared to be more lustrous and full of beauty than they
commonly were.
Each moment the night grew lighter, and by the time the brothers were
ready to take their places in the chamber of Flora, the moon had risen
considerably.
Although neither Henry nor George had any objection to the company of
Mr. Marchdale, yet they gave him the option, and rather in fact urged
him not to destroy his night’s repose by sitting up with them; but he
said,—
“Allow me to do so; I am older, and have calmer judgment than you can
have. Should anything again appear, I am quite resolved that it shall
not escape me.”
“What would you do?”
“With the name of God upon my lips,” said Mr. Marchdale, solemnly, “I
would grapple with it.”
“You laid hands upon it last night.”
“I did, and have forgotten to show you what I tore from it. Look
here,—what should you say this was?”
He produced a piece of cloth, on which was an old-fashioned piece of
lace, and two buttons. Upon a close inspection, this appeared to be a
portion of the lapel of a coat of ancient times, and suddenly, Henry,
with a look of intense anxiety, said,—
“This reminds me of the fashion of garments very many years ago, Mr.
Marchdale.”
“It came away in my grasp as if rotten and incapable of standing any
rough usage.”
“What a strange unearthly smell it has!”
“Now you mention it yourself,” added Mr. Marchdale, “I must confess it
smells to me as if it had really come from the very grave.”
“It does—it does. Say nothing of this relic of last night’s work to any
one.”
“Be assured I shall not. I am far from wishing to keep up in any one’s
mind proofs of that which I would fain, very fain refute.”
Mr. Marchdale replaced the portion of the coat which the figure had
worn in his pocket, and then the whole three proceeded to the chamber
of Flora.
• • • • •
It was within a very few minutes of midnight, the moon had climbed high
in the heavens, and a night of such brightness and beauty had seldom
shown itself for a long period of time.
Flora slept, and in her chamber sat the two brothers and Mr. Marchdale,
silently, for she had shown symptoms of restlessness, and they much
feared to break the light slumber into which she had fallen.
Occasionally they had conversed in whispers, which could not have the
effect of rousing her, for the room, although smaller than the one she
had before occupied, was still sufficiently spacious to enable them to
get some distance from the bed.
Until the hour of midnight now actually struck, they were silent, and
when the last echo of the sounds had died away, a feeling of uneasiness
came over them, which prompted some conversation to get rid of it.
“How bright the moon is now,” said Henry, in a low tone.
“I never saw it brighter,” replied Marchdale. “I feel as if I were
assured that we shall not to-night be interrupted.”
“It was later than this,” said Henry.
“It was—it was.”
“Do not then yet congratulate us upon no visit.”
“How still the house is!” remarked George; “it seems to me as if I had
never found it so intensely quiet before.”
“It is very still.”
“Hush! she moves.”
Flora moaned in her sleep, and made a slight movement. The curtains
were all drawn closely round the bed to shield her eyes from the bright
moonlight which streamed into the room so brilliantly. They might have
closed the shutters of the window, but this they did not like to do, as
it would render their watch there of no avail at all, inasmuch as they
would not be able to see if any attempt was made by any one to obtain
admittance.
A quarter of an hour longer might have thus passed when Mr. Marchdale
said in a whisper,—
“A thought has just struck me that the piece of coat I have, which I
dragged from the figure last night, wonderfully resembles in colour and
appearance the style of dress of the portrait in the room which Flora
lately slept in.”
“I thought of that,” said Henry, “when first I saw it; but, to tell the
honest truth, I dreaded to suggest any new proof connected with last
night’s visitation.”
“Then I ought not to have drawn your attention to it,” said Mr.
Marchdale, “and regret I have done so.”
“Nay, do not blame yourself on such an account,” said Henry. “You are
quite right, and it is I who am too foolishly sensitive. Now, however,
since you have mentioned it, I must own I have a great desire to test
the accuracy of the observation by a comparison with the portrait.”
“That may easily be done.”
“I will remain here,” said George, “in case Flora awakens, while you
two go if you like. It is but across the corridor.”
Henry immediately rose, saying—
“Come, Mr. Marchdale, come. Let us satisfy ourselves at all events upon
this point at once. As George says it is only across the corridor, and
we can return directly.”
“I am willing,” said Mr. Marchdale, with a tone of sadness.
There was no light needed, for the moon stood suspended in a cloudless
sky, so that from the house being a detached one, and containing
numerous windows, it was as light as day.
Although the distance from one chamber to the other was only across the
corridor, it was a greater space than these words might occupy, for the
corridor was wide, neither was it directly across, but considerably
slanting. However, it was certainly sufficiently close at hand for any
sound of alarm from one chamber to reach another without any difficulty.
A few moments sufficed to place Henry and Mr. Marchdale in that antique
room, where, from the effect of the moonlight which was streaming over
it, the portrait on the panel looked exceedingly life like.
And this effect was probably the greater because the rest of the room
was not illuminated by the moon’s rays, which came through a window
in the corridor, and then at the open door of that chamber upon the
portrait.
Mr. Marchdale held the piece of cloth he had close to the dress of the
portrait, and one glance was sufficient to show the wonderful likeness
between the two.
“Good God!” said Henry, “it is the same.”
Mr. Marchdale dropped the piece of cloth and trembled.
“This fact shakes even your scepticism,” said Henry.
“I know not what to make of it.”
“I can tell you something which bears upon it. I do not know if you are
sufficiently aware of my family history to know that this one of my
ancestors, I wish I could say worthy ancestors, committed suicide, and
was buried in his clothes.”
“You—you are sure of that?”
“Quite sure.”
“I am more and more bewildered as each moment some strange
corroborative fact of that dreadful supposition we so much shrink from
seems to come to light and to force itself upon our attention.”
There was a silence of a few moments duration, and Henry had turned
towards Mr. Marchdale to say something, when the cautious tread of a
footstep was heard in the garden, immediately beneath that balcony.
A sickening sensation came over Henry, and he was compelled to lean
against the wall for support, as in scarcely articulate accents he said—
“The vampyre—the vampyre! God of heaven, it has come once again!”
“Now, Heaven inspire us with more than mortal courage,” cried Mr.
Marchdale, and he dashed open the window at once, and sprang into the
balcony.
Henry in a moment recovered himself sufficiently to follow him, and
when he reached his side in the balcony, Marchdale said, as he pointed
below,—
“There is some one concealed there.”
“Where—where?”
“Among the laurels. I will fire a random shot, and we may do some
execution.”
“Hold!” said a voice from below; “don’t do any such thing, I beg of
you.”
“Why, that is Mr. Chillingworth’s voice,” cried Henry.
“Yes, and it’s Mr. Chillingworth’s person, too,” said the doctor, as he
emerged from among some laurel bushes.
“How is this?” said Marchdale.
“Simply that I made up my mind to keep watch and ward to-night outside
here, in the hope of catching the vampyre. I got into here by climbing
the gate.”
“But why did you not let me know?” said Henry.
“Because I did not know myself, my young friend, till an hour and a
half ago.”
“Have you seen anything?”
“Nothing. But I fancied I heard something in the park outside the wall.”
“Indeed!”
“What say you, Henry,” said Mr. Marchdale, “to descending and taking a
hasty examination of the garden and grounds?”
“I am willing; but first allow me to speak to George, who otherwise
might be surprised at our long absence.”
Henry walked rapidly to the bed chamber of Flora, and he said to
George,—
“Have you any objection to being left alone here for about half an
hour, George, while we make an examination of the garden?”
“Let me have some weapon and I care not. Remain here while I fetch a
sword from my own room.”
Henry did so, and when George returned with a sword, which he always
kept in his bed-room, he said,—
“Now go, Henry. I prefer a weapon of this description to pistols much.
Do not be longer gone than necessary.”
“I will not, George, be assured.”
George was then left alone, and Henry returned to the balcony,
where Mr. Marchdale was waiting for him. It was a quicker mode of
descending to the garden to do so by clambering over the balcony than
any other, and the height was not considerable enough to make it very
objectionable, so Henry and Mr. Marchdale chose that way of joining Mr.
Chillingworth.
“You are, no doubt, much surprised at finding me here,” said the
doctor; “but the fact is, I half made up my mind to come while I was
here; but I had not thoroughly done so, therefore I said nothing to you
about it.”
“We are much indebted to you,” said Henry, “for making the attempt.”
“I am prompted to it by a feeling of the strongest curiosity.”
“Are you armed, sir?” said Marchdale.
“In this stick,” said the doctor, “is a sword, the exquisite temper of
which I know I can depend upon, and I fully intended to run through any
one whom I saw that looked in the least of the vampyre order.”
“You would have done quite right,” replied Mr. Marchdale. “I have a
brace of pistols here, loaded with ball; will you take one, Henry, if
you please, and then we shall be all armed.”
Thus, then, prepared for any exigency, they made the whole round of the
house; but found all the fastenings secure, and everything as quiet as
possible.
“Suppose, now, we take a survey of the park outside the garden wall,”
said Mr. Marchdale.
This was agreed to; but before they had proceeded far, Mr. Marchdale
said,—
“There is a ladder lying on the wall; would it not be a good plan
to place it against the very spot the supposed vampyre jumped over
last night, and so, from a more elevated position, take a view of the
open meadows. We could easily drop down on the outer side, if we saw
anything suspicious.”
“Not a bad plan,” said the doctor. “Shall we do it?”
“Certainly,” said Henry; and they accordingly carried the ladder, which
had been used for pruning the trees, towards the spot at the end of the
long walk, at which the vampyre had made good, after so many fruitless
efforts, his escape from the premises.
They made haste down the long vista of trees until they reached the
exact spot, and then they placed the ladder as near as possible,
exactly where Henry, in his bewilderment on the evening before, had
seen the apparition from the grave spring to.
“We can ascend singly,” said Marchdale; “but there is ample space for
us all there to sit on the top of the wall and make our observations.”
This was seen to be the case, and in about a couple of minutes they had
taken up their positions on the wall, and, although the height was but
trifling, they found that they had a much more extensive view than they
could have obtained by any other means.
“To contemplate the beauty of such a night as this,” said Mr.
Chillingworth, “is amply sufficient compensation for coming the
distance I have.”
“And who knows,” remarked Marchdale, “we may yet see something which
may throw a light upon our present perplexities? God knows that I
would give all I can call mine in the world to relieve you and your
sister, Henry Bannerworth, from the fearful effect which last night’s
proceedings cannot fail to have upon you.”
“Of that I am well assured, Mr. Marchdale,” said Henry. “If the
happiness of myself and family depended upon you, we should be happy
indeed.”
“You are silent, Mr. Chillingworth,” remarked Marchdale, after a slight
pause.
“Hush!” said Mr. Chillingworth—“hush—hush!”
“Good God! what do you hear?” cried Henry.
The doctor laid his hand upon Henry’s arm as he said,—
“There is a young lime tree yonder to the right.”
“Yes—yes.”
“Carry your eye from it in a horizontal line, as near as you can,
towards the wood.”
Henry did so, and then he uttered a sudden exclamation of surprise, and
pointed to a rising spot of ground, which was yet, in consequence of
the number of tall trees in its vicinity, partially enveloped in shadow.
“What is that?” he said.
“I see something,” said Marchdale. “By Heaven! it is a human form lying
stretched there.”
“It is—as if in death.”
“What can it be?” said Chillingworth.
“I dread to say,” replied Marchdale; “but to my eyes, even at this
distance, it seems like the form of him we chased last night.”
“The vampyre?”
“Yes—yes. Look, the moonbeams touch him. Now the shadows of the trees
gradually recede. God of Heaven! the figure moves.”
Henry’s eyes were rivetted to that fearful object, and now a scene
presented itself which filled them all with wonder and astonishment,
mingled with sensations of the greatest awe and alarm.
As the moonbeams, in consequence of the luminary rising higher and
higher in the heavens, came to touch this figure that lay extended on
the rising ground, a perceptible movement took place in it. The limbs
appeared to tremble, and although it did not rise up, the whole body
gave signs of vitality.
“The vampyre—the vampyre!” said Mr. Marchdale. “I cannot doubt it
now. We must have hit him last night with the pistol bullets, and the
moonbeams are now restoring him to a new life.”
Henry shuddered, and even Mr. Chillingworth turned pale. But he was the
first to recover himself sufficiently to propose some course of action,
and he said,—
“Let us descend and go up to this figure. It is a duty we owe to
ourselves as much as to society.”
“Hold a moment,” said Mr. Marchdale, as he produced a pistol. “I am
an unerring shot, as you well know, Henry. Before we move from this
position we now occupy, allow me to try what virtue may be in a bullet
to lay that figure low again.”
“He is rising!” exclaimed Henry.
Mr. Marchdale levelled the pistol—he took a sure and deliberate aim,
and then, just as the figure seemed to be struggling to its feet, he
fired, and, with a sudden bound, it fell again.
[Illustration: Marchdale fires at the fleeing figure.]
“You have hit it,” said Henry.
“You have indeed,” exclaimed the doctor. “I think we can go now.”
“Hush!” said Marchdale—“Hush! Does it not seem to you that, hit it as
often as you will, the moonbeams will recover it?”
“Yes—yes,” said Henry, “they will—they will.”
“I can endure this no longer,” said Mr. Chillingworth, as he sprung
from the wall. “Follow me or not, as you please, I will seek the spot
where this being lies.”
“Oh, be not rash,” cried Marchdale. “See, it rises again, and its form
looks gigantic.”
“I trust in Heaven and a righteous cause,” said the doctor, as he drew
the sword he had spoken of from the stick, and threw away the scabbard.
“Come with me if you like, or I go alone.”
Henry at once jumped down from the wall, and then Marchdale followed
him, saying,—
“Come on; I will not shrink.”
They ran towards the piece of rising ground; but before they got to it,
the form rose and made rapidly towards a little wood which was in the
immediate neighbourhood of the hillock.
“It is conscious of being pursued,” cried the doctor. “See how it
glances back, and then increases its speed.”
“Fire upon it, Henry,” said Marchdale.
He did so; but either his shot did not take effect, or it was quite
unheeded, if it did, by the vampyre, which gained the wood before
they could have a hope of getting sufficiently near it to effect, or
endeavour to effect, a capture.
“I cannot follow it there,” said Marchdale. “In open country I would
have pursued it closely; but I cannot follow it into the intricacies of
a wood.”
“Pursuit is useless there,” said Henry. “It is enveloped in the deepest
gloom.”
“I am not so unreasonable,” remarked Mr. Chillingworth, “as to wish you
to follow into such a place as that. I am confounded utterly by this
affair.”
“And I,” said Marchdale. “What on earth is to be done?”
“Nothing—nothing!” exclaimed Henry, vehemently; “and yet I have,
beneath the canopy of Heaven, declared that I will, so help me God!
spare neither time nor trouble in the unravelling of this most fearful
piece of business. Did either of you remark the clothing which this
spectral appearance wore?”
“They were antique clothes,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “such as might
have been fashionable a hundred years ago, but not now.”
“Such was my impression,” added Marchdale.
“And such my own,” said Henry, excitedly. “Is it at all within the
compass of the wildest belief that what we have seen is a vampyre, and
no other than my ancestor who, a hundred years ago, committed suicide?”
There was so much intense excitement, and evidence of mental suffering,
that Mr. Chillingworth took him by the arm, saying,—
“Come home—come home; no more of this at present; you will but make
yourself seriously unwell.”
“No—no—no.”
“Come home now, I pray you; you are by far too much excited about this
matter to pursue it with the calmness which should be brought to bear
upon it.”
“Take advice, Henry,” said Marchdale, “take advice, and come home at
once.”
“I will yield to you; I feel that I cannot control my own feelings—I
will yield to you, who, as you say, are cooler on this subject than I
can be. Oh, Flora, Flora, I have no comfort to bring to you now.”
Poor Henry Bannerworth appeared to be in a complete state of mental
prostration, on account of the distressing circumstances that had
occurred so rapidly and so suddenly in his family, which had had quite
enough to contend with without having superadded to every other evil
the horror of believing that some preternatural agency was at work
to destroy every hope of future happiness in this world, under any
circumstances.
He suffered himself to be led home by Mr. Chillingworth and Marchdale;
he no longer attempted to dispute the dreadful fact concerning
the supposed vampyre; he could not contend now against all the
corroborating circumstances that seemed to collect together for the
purpose of proving that which, even when proved, was contrary to all
his notions of Heaven, and at variance with all that was recorded and
established as part and parcel of the system of nature.
“I cannot deny,” he said, when they had reached home, “that such
things are possible; but the probability will not bear a moment’s
investigation.”
“There are more things,” said Marchdale, solemnly, “in Heaven, and on
earth, than are dreamed of in our philosophy.”
“There are indeed, it appears,” said Mr. Chillingworth.
“And are you a convert?” said Henry, turning to him.
“A convert to what?”
“To a belief in—in—these vampyres?”
“I? No, indeed; if you were to shut me up in a room full of vampyres, I
would tell them all to their teeth that I defied them.”
“But after what we have seen to-night?”
“What have we seen?”
“You are yourself a witness.”
“True; I saw a man lying down, and then I saw a man get up; he seemed
then to be shot, but whether he was or not he only knows; and then I
saw him walk off in a desperate hurry. Beyond that, I saw nothing.”
“Yes; but, taking such circumstances into combination with others, have
you not a terrible fear of the truth of the dreadful appearance?”
“No—no; on my soul, no. I will die in my disbelief of such an outrage
upon Heaven as one of these creatures would most assuredly be.”
“Oh! that I could think like you; but the circumstance strikes too
nearly to my heart.”
“Be of better cheer, Henry—be of better cheer,” said Marchdale; “there
is one circumstance which we ought to consider, it is that, from all we
have seen, there seems to be some things which would favour an opinion,
Henry, that your ancestor, whose portrait hangs in the chamber which
was occupied by Flora, is the vampyre.”
“The dress was the same,” said Henry.
“I noted it was.”
“And I.”
“Do you not, then, think it possible that something might be done to
set that part of the question at rest?”
“What—what?”
“Where is your ancestor buried?”
“Ah! I understand you now.”
“And I,” said Mr. Chillingworth; “you would propose a visit to his
mansion?”
“I would,” added Marchdale; “anything that may in any way tend
to assist in making this affair clearer, and divesting it of its
mysterious circumstances, will be most desirable.”
Henry appeared to rouse for some moments and then he said,—
“He, in common with many other members of the family, no doubt occupies
place in the vault under the old church in the village.”
“Would it be possible,” asked Marchdale, “to get into that vault
without exciting general attention?”
“It would,” said Henry; “the entrance to the vault is in the flooring
of the pew which belongs to the family in the old church.”
“Then it could be done?” asked Mr. Chillingworth.
“Most undoubtedly.”
“Will you undertake such an adventure?” said Mr. Chillingworth. “It may
ease your mind.”
“He was buried in the vault, and in his clothes,” said Henry, musingly;
“I will think of it. About such a proposition I would not decide
hastily. Give me leave to think of it until to-morrow.”
“Most certainly.”
They now made their way to the chamber of Flora, and they heard from
George that nothing of an alarming character had occurred to disturb
him on his lonely watch. The morning was now again dawning, and Henry
earnestly entreated Mr. Marchdale to go to bed, which he did, leaving
the two brothers to continue as sentinels by Flora’s bed-side, until
the morning light should banish all uneasy thoughts.
Henry related to George what had taken place outside the house, and the
two brothers held a long and interesting conversation for some hours
upon that subject, as well as upon others of great importance to their
welfare. It was not until the sun’s early rays came glaring in at the
casement that they both rose, and thought of awakening Flora, who had
now slept soundly for so many hours.
CHAPTER VI.
A GLANCE AT THE BANNERWORTH FAMILY.—THE PROBABLE CONSEQUENCES OF THE
MYSTERIOUS APPARITION’S APPEARANCE.
Having thus far, we hope, interested our readers in the fortunes of a
family which had become subject to so dreadful a visitation, we trust
that a few words concerning them, and the peculiar circumstances in
which they are now placed, will not prove altogether out of place, or
unacceptable. The Bannerworth family then were well known in the part
of the country where they resided. Perhaps, if we were to say they were
better known by name than they were liked, on account of that name, we
should be near the truth, for it had unfortunately happened that for a
very considerable time past the head of the family had been the very
worst specimen of it that could be procured. While the junior branches
were frequently amiable and most intelligent, and such in mind and
manner as were calculated to inspire goodwill in all who knew them, he
who held the family property, and who resided in the house now occupied
by Flora and her brothers, was a very so-so sort of character.
This state of things, by some strange fatality, had gone on for nearly
a hundred years, and the consequence was what might have been fairly
expected, namely—that, what with their vices and what with their
extravagancies, the successive heads of the Bannerworth family had
succeeded in so far diminishing the family property that, when it came
into the hands of Henry Bannerworth, it was of little value, on account
of the numerous encumbrances with which it was saddled.
The father of Henry had not been a very brilliant exception to the
general rule, as regarded the head of the family. If he were not quite
so bad as many of his ancestors, that gratifying circumstance was to
be accounted for by the supposition that he was not quite so bold, and
that the change in habits, manners, and laws, which had taken place in
a hundred years, made it not so easy for even a landed proprietor to
play the petty tyrant.
He had, to get rid of those animal spirits which had prompted many of
his predecessors to downright crimes, had recourse to the gaming table,
and, after raising whatever sums he could upon the property which
remained, he naturally, and as might have been fully expected, lost
them all.
He was found lying dead in the garden of the house one day, and by his
side was his pocket-book, on one leaf of which, it was the impression
of the family, he had endeavoured to write something previous to his
decease, for he held a pencil firmly in his grasp.
The probability was that he had felt himself getting ill, and, being
desirous of making some communication to his family which pressed
heavily upon his mind, he had attempted to do so, but was stopped by
the too rapid approach of the hand of death.
For some days previous to his decease, his conduct had been extremely
mysterious. He had announced an intention of leaving England for
ever—of selling the house and grounds for whatever they would fetch
over and above the sums for which they were mortgaged, and so clearing
himself of all encumbrances.
He had, but a few hours before he was found lying dead, made the
following singular speech to Henry,—
“Do not regret, Henry, that the old house which has been in our family
so long is about to be parted with. Be assured that, if it is but for
the first time in my life, I have good and substantial reasons now for
what I am about to do. We shall be able to go some other country, and
there live like princes of the land.”
Where the means were to come from to live like a prince, unless Mr.
Bannerworth had some of the German princes in his eye, no one knew
but himself, and his sudden death buried with him that most important
secret.
There were some words written on the leaf of his pocket-book, but
they were of by far too indistinct and ambiguous a nature to lead to
anything. They were these:—
“The money is ———”
And then there was a long scrawl of the pencil, which seemed to have
been occasioned by his sudden decease.
Of course nothing could be made of these words, except in the way of a
contradiction, as the family lawyer said, rather more facetiously than
a man of law usually speaks, for if he had written “The money is not,”
he would have been somewhere remarkably near the truth.
However, with all his vices he was regretted by his children, who chose
rather to remember him in his best aspect than to dwell upon his faults.
For the first time then, within the memory of man, the head of the
family of the Bannerworths was a gentleman, in every sense of the word.
Brave, generous, highly educated, and full of many excellent and noble
qualities—for such was Henry, whom we have introduced to our readers
under such distressing circumstances.
And now, people said, that the family property having been all
dissipated and lost, there would take place a change, and that the
Bannerworths would have to take to some course of honourable industry
for a livelihood, and that then they would be as much respected as they
had before been detested and disliked.
Indeed, the position which Henry held was now a most precarious one—for
one of the amazingly clever acts of his father had been to encumber
the property with overwhelming claims, so that when Henry administered
to the estate, it was doubted almost by his attorney if it were at all
desirable to do so.
An attachment, however, to the old house of his family, had induced the
young man to hold possession of it as long as he could, despite any
adverse circumstance which might eventually be connected with it.
Some weeks, however, only after the decease of his father, and when he
fairly held possession, a sudden and a most unexpected offer came to
him from a solicitor in London, of whom he knew nothing, to purchase
the house and grounds, for a client of his, who had instructed him so
to do, but whom he did not mention.
The offer made was a liberal one, and beyond the value of the place.
The lawyer who had conducted Henry’s affairs for him since his father’s
decease, advised him by all means to take it; but after a consultation
with his mother and sister, and George, they all resolved to hold by
their own house as long as they could, and, consequently, he refused
the offer.
He was then asked to let the place, and to name his own price for the
occupation of it; but that he would not do; so the negotiation went off
altogether, leaving only, in the minds of the family, much surprise
at the exceeding eagerness of some one, whom they knew not, to get
possession of the place on any terms.
There was another circumstance perhaps which materially aided in
producing a strong feeling on the minds of the Bannerworths, with
regard to remaining where they were.
That circumstance occurred thus: a relation of the family, who was now
dead, and with whom had died all his means, had been in the habit, for
the last half dozen years of his life, of sending a hundred pounds to
Henry, for the express purpose of enabling him and his brother George
and his sister Flora to take a little continental or home tour, in the
autumn of the year.
A more acceptable present, or for a more delightful purpose, to young
people, could not be found; and, with the quiet, prudent habits of all
three of them, they contrived to go far and to see much for the sum
which was thus handsomely placed at their disposal.
In one of those excursions, when among the mountains of Italy, an
adventure occurred which placed the life of Flora in imminent hazard.
They were riding along a narrow mountain path, and, her horse slipping,
she fell over the ledge of a precipice.
In an instant, a young man, a stranger to the whole party, who was
travelling in the vicinity, rushed to the spot, and by his knowledge
and exertions, they felt convinced her preservation was effected.
He told her to lie quiet; he encouraged her to hope for immediate
succour; and then, with much personal exertion, and at immense risk
to himself, he reached the ledge of rock on which she lay, and then
he supported her until the brothers had gone to a neighbouring house,
which, bye-the-bye, was two good English miles off, and got assistance.
[Illustration: Charles reaches to rescue Flora from the ledge.]
There came on, while they were gone, a terrific storm, and Flora felt
that but for him who was with her she must have been hurled from the
rock, and perished in an abyss below, which was almost too deep for
observation.
Suffice it to say that she was rescued; and he who had, by his
intrepidity, done so much towards saving her, was loaded with the most
sincere and heartfelt acknowledgements by the brothers as well as by
herself.
He frankly told them that his name was Holland; that he was travelling
for amusement and instruction, and was by profession an artist.
He travelled with them for some time; and it was not at all to be
wondered at, under the circumstances, that an attachment of the
tenderest nature should spring up between him and the beautiful girl,
who felt that she owed to him her life.
Mutual glances of affection were exchanged between them, and it was
arranged that when he returned to England, he should come at once as an
honoured guest to the house of the family of the Bannerworths.
All this was settled satisfactorily with the full knowledge and
acquiescence of the two brothers, who had taken a strange attachment
to the young Charles Holland, who was indeed in every way likely to
propitiate the good opinion of all who knew him.
Henry explained to him exactly how they were situated, and told him
that when he came he would find a welcome from all, except possibly his
father, whose wayward temper he could not answer for.
Young Holland stated that he was compelled to be away for a term of two
years, from certain family arrangements he had entered into, and that
then he would return and hope to meet Flora unchanged as he should be.
It happened that this was the last of the continental excursions of
the Bannerworths, for, before another year rolled round, the generous
relative who had supplied them with the means of making such delightful
trips was no more; and, likewise, the death of the father had occurred
in the manner we have related, so that there was no chance, as had been
anticipated and hoped for by Flora, of meeting Charles Holland on the
continent again, before his two years of absence from England should be
expired.
Such, however, being the state of things, Flora felt reluctant to give
up the house, where he would be sure to come to look for her, and her
happiness was too dear to Henry to induce him to make any sacrifice of
it to expediency.
Therefore was it that Bannerworth Hall, as it was sometimes called, was
retained, and fully intended to be retained at all events until after
Charles Holland had made his appearance, and his advice (for he was, by
the young people, considered as one of the family) taken, with regard
to what was advisable to be done.
With one exception this was the state of affairs at the hall, and that
exception relates to Mr. Marchdale.
He was a distant relation of Mrs. Bannerworth, and, in early life, had
been sincerely and tenderly attached to her. She, however, with the
want of steady reflection of a young girl, as she then was, had, as is
generally the case among several admirers, chosen the very worst; that
is, the man who treated her with the most indifference, and who paid
her the least attention, was of course, thought the most of, and she
gave her hand to him.
That man was Mr. Bannerworth. But future experience had made her
thoroughly awake to her former error; and, but for the love she bore
her children, who were certainly all that a mother’s heart could wish,
she would often have deeply regretted the infatuation which had induced
her to bestow her hand in the quarter she had done so.
About a month after the decease of Mr. Bannerworth, there came one to
the hall, who desired to see the widow. That one was Mr. Marchdale.
It might have been some slight tenderness towards him which had never
left her, or it might be the pleasure merely of seeing one whom she had
known intimately in early life, but, be that as it may, she certainly
gave him a kindly welcome; and he, after consenting to remain for some
time as a visitor at the hall, won the esteem of the whole family by
his frank demeanour and cultivated intellect.
He had travelled much and seen much, and he had turned to good account
all he had seen, so that not only was Mr. Marchdale a man of sterling
sound sense, but he was a most entertaining companion.
His intimate knowledge of many things concerning which they knew little
or nothing; his accurate modes of thought, and a quiet, gentlemanly
demeanour, such as is rarely to be met with, combined to make him
esteemed by the Bannerworths. He had a small independence of his own,
and being completely alone in the world, for he had neither wife nor
child, Marchdale owned that he felt a pleasure in residing with the
Bannerworths.
Of course he could not, in decent terms, so far offend them as to offer
to pay for his subsistence, but he took good care that they should
really be no losers by having him as an inmate, a matter which he could
easily arrange by little presents of one kind and another, all of which
he managed should be such as were not only ornamental, but actually
spared his kind entertainers some positive expense which otherwise they
must have gone to.
Whether or not this amiable piece of manœuvring was seen through by the
Bannerworths it is not our purpose to inquire. If it was seen through,
it could not lower him in their esteem, for it was probably just what
they themselves would have felt a pleasure in doing under similar
circumstances, and if they did not observe it, Mr. Marchdale would,
probably, be all the better pleased.
Such then may be considered by our readers as a brief outline of the
state of affairs among the Bannerworths—a state which was pregnant with
changes, and which changes were now likely to be rapid and conclusive.
How far the feelings of the family towards the ancient house of their
race would be altered by the appearance at it of so fearful a visitor
as a vampyre, we will not stop to inquire, inasmuch as such feelings
will develop themselves as we proceed.
That the visitation had produced a serious effect upon all the
household was sufficiently evident, as well among the educated as among
the ignorant. On the second morning, Henry received notice to quit
his service from the three servants he with difficulty had contrived
to keep at the hall. The reason why he received such notice he knew
well enough, and therefore he did not trouble himself to argue about a
superstition to which he felt now himself almost compelled to give way;
for how could he say there was no such thing as a vampyre, when he had,
with his own eyes, had the most abundant evidence of the terrible fact?
He calmly paid the servants, and allowed them to leave him at once
without at all entering into the matter, and, for the time being,
some men were procured, who, however, came evidently with fear and
trembling, and probably only took the place, on account of not being
able to procure any other. The comfort of the household was likely
to be completely put an end to, and reasons now for leaving the hall
appeared to be most rapidly accumulating.
CHAPTER VII.
THE VISIT TO THE VAULT OF THE BANNERWORTHS, AND ITS UNPLEASANT
RESULT.—THE MYSTERY.
Henry and his brother roused Flora, and after agreeing together that it
would be highly imprudent to say anything to her of the proceedings of
the night, they commenced a conversation with her in encouraging and
kindly accents.
“Well, Flora,” said Henry, “you see you have been quite undisturbed
to-night.”
“I have slept long, dear Henry.”
“You have, and pleasantly too, I hope.”
“I have not had any dreams, and I feel much refreshed, now, and quite
well again.”
“Thank Heaven!” said George.
“If you will tell dear mother that I am awake, I will get up with her
assistance.”
The brothers left the room, and they spoke to each other of it as a
favourable sign, that Flora did not object to being left alone now, as
she had done on the preceding morning.
“She is fast recovering, now, George,” said Henry. “If we could now but
persuade ourselves that all this alarm would pass away, and that we
should hear no more of it, we might return to our old and comparatively
happy condition.”
“Let us believe, Henry, that we shall.”
“And yet, George, I shall not be satisfied in my mind, until I have
paid a visit.”
“A visit? Where?”
“To the family vault.”
“Indeed, Henry! I thought you had abandoned that idea.”
“I had. I have several times abandoned it; but it comes across my mind
again and again.”
“I much regret it.”
“Look you, George; as yet, everything that has happened has tended to
confirm a belief in this most horrible of all superstitions concerning
vampyres.”
“It has.”
“Now, my great object, George, is to endeavour to disturb such a state
of things, by getting something, however slight, or of a negative
character, for the mind to rest upon on the other side of the question.”
“I comprehend you, Henry.”
“You know that at present we are not only led to believe, almost
irresistibly, that we have been visited here by a vampyre, but that
that vampyre is our ancestor, whose portrait is on the panel of the
wall of the chamber into which he contrived to make his way.”
“True, most true.”
“Then let us, by an examination of the family vault, George, put an
end to one of the evidences. If we find, as most surely we shall, the
coffin of the ancestor of ours, who seems, in dress and appearance, so
horribly mixed up in this affair, we shall be at rest on that head.”
“But consider how many years have elapsed.”
“Yes, a great number.”
“What then, do you suppose, could remain of any corpse placed in a
vault so long ago?”
“Decomposition must of course have done its work, but still there must
be a something to show that a corpse has so undergone the process
common to all nature. Double the lapse of time surely could not
obliterate all traces of that which had been.”
“There is reason in that, Henry.”
“Besides, the coffins are all of lead, and some of stone, so that they
cannot have all gone.”
“True, most true.”
“If in the one which, from the inscription and the date, we discover to
be that of our ancestor whom we seek, we find the evident remains of a
corpse, we shall be satisfied that he has rested in his tomb in peace.”
“Brother, you seem bent on this adventure,” said George; “if you go, I
will accompany you.”
“I will not engage rashly in it, George. Before I finally decide, I
will again consult with Mr. Marchdale. His opinion will weigh much with
me.”
“And in good time, here he comes across the garden,” said George, as he
looked from the window of the room in which they sat.
It was Mr. Marchdale, and the brothers warmly welcomed him as he
entered the apartment.
“You have been early afoot,” said Henry.
“I have,” he said. “The fact is, that although at your solicitation
I went to bed, I could not sleep, and I went out once more to search
about the spot where we had seen the—the I don’t know what to call it,
for I have a great dislike to naming it a vampyre.”
“There is not much in a name,” said George.
“In this instance there is,” said Marchdale. “It is a name suggestive
of horror.”
“Made you any discovery?” said Henry.
“None whatever.”
“You saw no trace of any one?”
“Not the least.”
“Well, Mr. Marchdale, George and I were talking over this projected
visit to the family vault.”
“Yes.”
“And we agreed to suspend our judgments until we saw you, and learned
your opinion.”
“Which I will tell you frankly,” said Mr. Marchdale, “because I know
you desire it freely.”
“Do so.”
“It is, that you make the visit.”
“Indeed.”
“Yes, and for this reason. You have now, as you cannot help having, a
disagreeable feeling, that you may find that one coffin is untenanted.
Now, if you do find it so, you scarcely make matters worse, by
an additional confirmation of what already amounts to a strong
supposition, and one which is likely to grow stronger by time.”
“True, most true.”
“On the contrary, if you find indubitable proofs that your ancestor has
slept soundly in the tomb, and gone the way of all flesh, you will find
yourselves much calmer, and that an attack is made upon the train of
events which at present all run one way.”
“That is precisely the argument I was using to George,” said Henry, “a
few moments since.”
“Then let us go,” said George, “by all means.”
“It is so decided then,” said Henry.
“Let it be done with caution,” replied Mr. Marchdale.
“If any one can manage it, of course we can.”
“Why should it not be done secretly and at night? Of course we lose
nothing by making a night visit to a vault into which daylight, I
presume, cannot penetrate.”
“Certainly not.”
“Then let it be at night.”
“But we shall surely require the concurrence of some of the church
authorities.”
“Nay, I do not see that,” interposed Mr. Marchdale. “It is the vault
actually vested in and belonging to yourself you wish to visit, and,
therefore, you have right to visit it in any manner or at any time that
may be most suitable to yourself.”
“But detection in a clandestine visit might produce unpleasant
consequences.”
“The church is old,” said George, “and we could easily find means of
getting into it. There is only one objection that I see, just now, and
that is, that we leave Flora unprotected.”
“We do, indeed,” said Henry. “I did not think of that.”
“It must be put to herself, as a matter for her own consideration,”
said Mr. Marchdale, “if she will consider herself sufficiently safe
with the company and protection of your mother only.”
“It would be a pity were we not all three present at the examination of
the coffin,” remarked Henry.
“It would, indeed. There is ample evidence,” said Mr. Marchdale, “but
we must not give Flora a night of sleeplessness and uneasiness on that
account, and the more particularly as we cannot well explain to her
where we are going, or upon what errand.”
“Certainly not.”
“Let us talk to her, then, about it,” said Henry. “I confess I am much
bent upon the plan, and fain would not forego it; neither should I like
other than that we three should go together.”
“If you determine, then, upon it,” said Marchdale, “we will go
to-night; and, from your acquaintance with the place, doubtless you
will be able to decide what tools are necessary.”
“There is a trap-door at the bottom of the pew,” said Henry; “it is not
only secured down, but it is locked likewise, and I have the key in my
possession.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes; immediately beneath is a short flight of stone steps, which
conduct at once into the vault.”
“Is it large?”
“No; about the size of a moderate chamber, and with no intricacies
about it.”
“There can be no difficulties, then.”
“None whatever, unless we meet with actual personal interruption, which
I am inclined to think is very far from likely. All we shall require
will be a screwdriver, with which to remove the screws, and then
something with which to wrench open the coffin.”
“Those we can easily provide, along with lights,” remarked Mr.
Marchdale. “I hope to Heaven that this visit to the tomb will have the
effect of easing your minds, and enabling you to make a successful
stand against the streaming torrent of evidence that has poured in upon
us regarding this most fearful of apparitions.”
“I do, indeed, hope so,” added Henry; “and now I will go at once to
Flora, and endeavour to convince her she is safe without us to-night.”
“By-the-bye, I think,” said Marchdale, “that if we can induce Mr.
Chillingworth to come with us, it will be a great point gained in the
investigation.”
“He would,” said Henry, “be able to come to an accurate decision with
respect to the remains—if any—in the coffin, which we could not.”
“Then have him, by all means,” said George. “He did not seem averse
last night to go on such an adventure.”
“I will ask him when he makes his visit this morning upon Flora; and
should he not feel disposed to join us, I am quite sure he will keep
the secret of our visit.”
All this being arranged, Henry proceeded to Flora, and told her that he
and George, and Mr. Marchdale wished to go out for about a couple of
hours in the evening after dark, if she felt sufficiently well to feel
a sense of security without them.
Flora changed colour, and slightly trembled, and then, as if ashamed of
her fears, she said,—
“Go, go; I will not detain you. Surely no harm can come to me in
presence of my mother.”
“We shall not be gone longer than the time I mention to you,” said
Henry.
“Oh, I shall be quite content. Besides, am I to be kept thus in fear
all my life? Surely, surely not. I ought, too, to learn to defend
myself.”
Henry caught at the idea, as he said,—
“If fire-arms were left you, do you think you would have courage to use
them?”
“I do, Henry.”
“Then you shall have them; and let me beg of you to shoot any one
without the least hesitation who shall come into your chamber.”
“I will, Henry. If ever human being was justified in the use of deadly
weapons, I am now. Heaven protect me from a repetition of the visit to
which I have now been once subjected. Rather, oh, much rather would I
die a hundred deaths than suffer what I have suffered.”
“Do not allow it, dear Flora, to press too heavily upon your mind
in dwelling upon it in conversation. I still entertain a sanguine
expectation that something may arise to afford a far less dreadful
explanation of what has occurred than what you have put upon it. Be
of good cheer, Flora, we shall go one hour after sunset, and return
in about two hours from the time at which we leave here, you may be
assured.”
Notwithstanding this ready and courageous acquiescence of Flora in the
arrangement, Henry was not without his apprehension that when the night
should come again, her fears would return with it; but he spoke to Mr.
Chillingworth upon the subject, and got that gentleman’s ready consent
to accompany them.
He promised to meet them at the church porch exactly at nine o’clock,
and matters were all arranged, and Henry waited with much eagerness and
anxiety now for the coming night, which he hoped would dissipate one
of the fearful deductions which his imagination had drawn from recent
circumstances.
He gave to Flora a pair of pistols of his own, upon which he knew he
could depend, and he took good care to load them well, so that there
could be no likelihood whatever of their missing fire at a critical
moment.
“Now, Flora,” he said, “I have seen you use fire-arms when you were
much younger than you are now, and therefore I need give you no
instructions. If any intruder does come, and you do fire, be sure you
take a good aim, and shoot low.”
“I will, Henry, I will; and you will be back in two hours?”
“Most assuredly I will.”
The day wore on, evening came, and then deepened into night. It turned
out to be a cloudy night, and therefore the moon’s brilliance was
nothing near equal to what it had been on the preceding night Still,
however, it had sufficient power over the vapours that frequently
covered it for many minutes together, to produce a considerable light
effect upon the face of nature, and the night was consequently very
far, indeed, from what might be called a dark one.
George, Henry, and Marchdale, met in one of the lower rooms of the
house, previous to starting upon their expedition; and after satisfying
themselves that they had with them all the tools that were necessary,
inclusive of the same small, but well-tempered iron crow-bar with which
Marchdale had, on the night of the visit of the vampyre, forced open
the door of Flora’s chamber, they left the hall, and proceeded at a
rapid pace towards the church.
“And Flora does not seem much alarmed,” said Marchdale, “at being left
alone?”
“No,” replied Henry, “she has made up her mind with a strong natural
courage which I knew was in her disposition to resist as much as
possible the depressing effects of the awful visitation she has
endured.”
“It would have driven some really mad.”
“It would, indeed; and her own reason tottered on its throne, but,
thank Heaven, she has recovered.”
“And I fervently hope that, through her life,” added Marchdale, “she
may never have such another trial.”
“We will not for a moment believe that such a thing can occur twice.”
“She is one among a thousand. Most young girls would never at all have
recovered the fearful shock to the nerves.”
“Not only has she recovered,” said Henry, “but a spirit, which I am
rejoiced to see, because it is one which will uphold her, of resistance
now possesses her.”
“Yes, she actually—I forgot to tell you before—but she actually asked
me for arms to resist any second visitation.”
“You much surprise me.”
“Yes, I was surprised, as well as pleased, myself.”
“I would have left her one of my pistols had I been aware of her having
made such a request. Do you know if she can use fire-arms?”
“Oh, yes; well.”
“What a pity. I have them both with me.”
“Oh, she is provided.”
“Provided?”
“Yes; I found some pistols which I used to take with me on the
continent, and she has them both well loaded, so that if the vampyre
makes his appearance, he is likely to meet with rather a warm
reception.”
“Good God! was it not dangerous?”
“Not at all, I think.”
“Well, you know best, certainly, of course. I hope the vampyre may
come, and that we may have the pleasure, when we return, of finding him
dead. By-the-bye, I—I—. Bless me, I have forgot to get the materials
for lights, which I pledged myself to do.”
“How unfortunate.”
“Walk on slowly, while I run back and get them.”
“Oh, we are too far——”
“Hilloa!” cried a man at this moment, some distance in front of them.
“It is Mr. Chillingworth,” said Henry.
“Hilloa,” cried the worthy doctor again. “Is that you, my friend, Henry
Bannerworth?”
“It is,” cried Henry.
Mr. Chillingworth now came up to them and said,—
“I was before my time, so rather than wait at the church porch, which
would have exposed me to observation perhaps, I thought it better to
walk on, and chance meeting with you.”
“You guessed we should come this way?”
“Yes, and so it turns out, really. It is unquestionably your most
direct route to the church.”
“I think I will go back,” said Mr. Marchdale.
“Back!” exclaimed the doctor; “what for?”
“I forgot the means of getting lights. We have candles, but no means of
lighting them.”
“Make yourselves easy on that score,” said Mr. Chillingworth. “I am
never without some chemical matches of my own manufacture, so that as
you have the candles, that can be no bar to our going on a once.”
“That is fortunate,” said Henry.
“Very,” added Marchdale; “for it seems a mile’s hard walking for me, or
at least half a mile from the hall. Let us now push on.”
They did push on, all four walking at a brisk pace. The church,
although it belonged to the village, was not in it. On the contrary,
it was situated at the end of a long lane, which was a mile nearly
from the village, in the direction of the hall; therefore, in going to
it from the hall, that amount of distance was saved, although it was
always called and considered the village church.
It stood alone, with the exception of a glebe house and two cottages,
that were occupied by persons who held situations about the sacred
edifice, and who were supposed, being on the spot, to keep watch and
ward over it.
It was an ancient building of the early English style of architecture,
or rather Norman, with one of those antique, square, short towers,
built of flint stones firmly embedded in cement, which, from time, had
acquired almost the consistency of stone itself. There were numerous
arched windows, partaking something of the more florid gothic style,
although scarcely ornamental enough to be called such. The edifice
stood in the centre of a grave-yard, which extended over a space of
about half an acre, and altogether it was one of the prettiest and most
rural old churches within many miles of the spot.
Many a lover of the antique and of the picturesque, for it was both,
went out of his way while travelling in the neighbourhood to look at
it, and it had an extensive and well-deserved reputation as a fine
specimen of its class and style of building.
In Kent, to the present day, are some fine specimens of the old
Roman style of church, building; and, although they are as rapidly
pulled down as the abuse of modern architects, and the cupidity of
speculators, and the vanity of clergymen can possibly encourage,
in order to erect flimsy, Italianised structures in their stead,
yet sufficient of them remain dotted over England to interest the
traveller. At Willesden there is a church of this description, which
will well repay a visit. This, then, was the kind of building into
which it was the intention of our four friends to penetrate, not on
an unholy, or an unjustifiable errand, but on one which, proceeding
from good and proper motives, it was highly desirable to conduct in as
secret a manner as possible.
The moon was more densely covered by clouds than it had yet been that
evening, when they reached the little wicket-gate which led into the
churchyard, through which was a regularly used thoroughfare.
“We have a favourable night,” remarked Henry, “for we are not so likely
to be disturbed.”
“And now, the question is, how are we to get in?” said Mr.
Chillingworth, as he paused, and glanced up at the ancient building.
“The doors,” said George, “would effectually resist us.”
“How can it be done, then?”
“The only way I can think of,” said Henry, “is to get out one of the
small, diamond-shaped panes of glass from one of the low windows, and
then we can one of us put in our hands, and undo the fastening, which
is very simple, when the window opens like a door, and it is but a step
into the church.”
“A good way,” said Marchdale. “We will lose no time.”
They walked round the church till they came to a very low window
indeed, near to an angle of the wall, where a huge abutment struck far
out into the burial-ground.
“Will you do it, Henry?” said George.
“Yes. I have often noticed the fastenings. Just give me a slight hoist
up, and all will be right.”
George did so, and Henry with his knife easily bent back some of the
leadwork which held in one of the panes of glass, and then got it out
whole. He handed it down to George, saying,—
“Take this, George. We can easily replace it when we leave, so that
there can be no signs left of any one having been here at all.”
George took the piece of thick, dim-coloured glass, and in another
moment Henry had succeeded in opening the window, and the mode of
ingress to the old church was fair and easy before them all, had there
been ever so many.
“I wonder,” said Marchdale, “that a place so inefficiently protected
has never been robbed.”
“No wonder at all,” remarked Mr. Chillingworth. “There is nothing to
take that I am aware of that would repay anybody the trouble of taking.”
“Indeed!”
“Not an article. The pulpit, to be sure, is covered with faded velvet;
but beyond that, and an old box, in which I believe nothing is left but
some books, I think there is no temptation.”
“And that, Heaven knows, is little enough, then.”
“Come on,” said Henry. “Be careful; there is nothing beneath the
window, and the depth is about two feet.”
Thus guided, they all got fairly into the sacred edifice, and then
Henry closed the window, and fastened it on the inside, as he said,—
“We have nothing to do now but to set to work opening a way into the
vault, and I trust that Heaven will pardon me for thus desecrating the
tomb of my ancestors, from a consideration of the object I have in view
by so doing.”
“It does seem wrong thus to tamper with the secrets of the tomb,”
remarked Mr. Marchdale.
“The secrets of a fiddlestick!” said the doctor. “What secrets has the
tomb, I wonder?”
“Well, but, my dear sir——”
“Nay, my dear sir, it is high time that death, which is, then, the
inevitable fate of us all, should be regarded with more philosophic
eyes than it is. There are no secrets in the tomb but such as may well
be endeavoured to be kept secret.”
“What do you mean?”
“There is one which very probably we shall find unpleasantly revealed.”
“Which is that?”
“The not over pleasant odour of decomposed animal remains—beyond that I
know of nothing of a secret nature that the tomb can show us.”
“Ah, your profession hardens you to such matters.”
“And a very good thing that it does, or else, if all men were to look
upon a dead body as something almost too dreadful to look upon, and by
far too horrible to touch, surgery would lose its value, and crime, in
many instances of the most obnoxious character, would go unpunished.”
“If we have a light here,” said Henry, “we shall run the greatest
chance in the world of being seen, for the church has many windows.”
“Do not have one, then, by any means,” said Mr. Chillingworth. “A match
held low down in the pew may enable us to open the vault.”
“That will be the only plan.”
Henry led them to the pew which belonged to his family, and in the
floor of which was the trap door.
“When was it last opened?” inquired Marchdale.
“When my father died,” said Henry; “some ten months ago now, I should
think.”
“The screws, then, have had ample time to fix themselves with fresh
rust.”
“Here is one of my chemical matches,” said Mr. Chillingworth, as he
suddenly irradiated the pew with a clear and beautiful flame, that
lasted about a minute.
The heads of the screws were easily discernible, and the short time
that the light lasted had enabled Henry to turn the key he had brought
with him in the lock.
“I think that without a light now,” he said, “I can turn the screws
well.”
“Can you?”
“Yes; there are but four.”
“Try it, then.”
Henry did so, and from the screws having very large heads, and being
made purposely, for the convenience of removal when required, with deep
indentations to receive the screw-driver, he found no difficulty in
feeling for the proper places, and extracting the screws without any
more light than was afforded to him from the general whitish aspect of
the heavens.
“Now, Mr. Chillingworth,” he said, “another of your matches, if you
please. I have all the screws so loose that I can pick them up with my
fingers.”
“Here,” said the doctor.
In another moment the pew was as light as day, and Henry succeeded in
taking out the few screws, which he placed in his pocket for their
greater security, since, of course, the intention was to replace
everything exactly as it was found, in order that not the least surmise
should arise in the mind of any person that the vault had been opened,
and visited for any purpose whatever, secretly or otherwise.
[Illustration: The men open the trap door, lighted by a match.]
“Let us descend,” said Henry. “There is no further obstacle, my
friends. Let us descend.”
“If any one,” remarked George, in a whisper, as they slowly descended
the stairs which conducted into the vault—“if any one had told me that
I should be descending into a vault for the purpose of ascertaining if
a dead body, which had been nearly a century there, was removed or not,
and had become a vampyre, I should have denounced the idea as one of
the most absurd that ever entered the brain of a human being.”
“We are the very slaves of circumstances,” said Marchdale, “and we
never know what we may do, or what we may not. What appears to us so
improbable as to border even upon the impossible at one time, is at
another the only course of action which appears feasibly open to us to
attempt to pursue.”
They had now reached the vault, the floor of which was composed of flat
red tiles, laid in tolerable order the one beside the other. As Henry
had stated, the vault was by no means of large extent. Indeed, several
of the apartments for the living, at the hall, were much larger than
was that one destined for the dead.
The atmosphere was damp and noisome, but not by any means so bad as
might have been expected, considering the number of months which had
elapsed since last the vault was opened to receive one of its ghastly
and still visitants.
“Now for one of your lights. Mr. Chillingworth. You say you have the
candles, I think, Marchdale, although you forgot the matches.”
“I have. They are here.”
Marchdale took from his pocket a parcel which contained several wax
candles, and when it was opened, a smaller packet fell to the ground.
“Why, these are instantaneous matches,” said Mr. Chillingworth, as he
lifted the small packet up.
“They are; and what a fruitless journey I should have had back to the
hall,” said Mr. Marchdale, “if you had not been so well provided as you
are with the means of getting a light. These matches, which I thought
I had not with me, have been, in the hurry of departure, enclosed, you
see, with the candles. Truly, I should have hunted for them at home in
vain.”
Mr. Chillingworth lit the wax candle which was now handed to him by
Marchdale, and in another moment the vault from one end of it to the
other was quite clearly discernible.
CHAPTER VIII.
THE COFFIN.—THE ABSENCE OF THE DEAD.—THE MYSTERIOUS CIRCUMSTANCE, AND
THE CONSTERNATION OF GEORGE.
They were all silent for a few moments as they looked around them
with natural feelings of curiosity. Two of that party had of course
never been in that vault at all, and the brothers, although they had
descended into it upon the occasion, nearly a year before, of their
father being placed in it, still looked upon it with almost as curious
eyes as they who now had their first sight of it.
If a man be at all of a thoughtful or imaginative cast of mind, some
curious sensations are sure to come over him, upon standing in such a
place, where he knows around him lie, in the calmness of death, those
in whose veins have flowed kindred blood to him—who bore the same name,
and who preceded him in the brief drama of his existence, influencing
his destiny and his position in life probably largely by their actions
compounded of their virtues and their vices.
Henry Bannerworth and his brother George were just the kind of persons
to feel strongly such sensations. Both were reflective, imaginative,
educated young men, and, as the light from the wax candle flashed upon
their faces, it was evident how deeply they felt the situation in which
they were placed.
Mr. Chillingworth and Marchdale were silent. They both knew what was
passing in the minds of the brothers, and they had too much delicacy to
interrupt a train of thought which, although from having no affinity
with the dead who lay around, they could not share in, yet they
respected. Henry at length, with a sudden start, seemed to recover
himself from his reverie.
“This is a time for action, George,” he said, “and not for romantic
thought. Let us proceed.”
“Yes, yes,” said George, and he advanced a step towards the centre of
the vault.
“Can you find out among all these coffins, for there seem to be nearly
twenty,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “which is the one we seek?”
“I think we may,” replied Henry. “Some of the earlier coffins of our
race, I know, were made of marble, and others of metal, both of which
materials, I expect, would withstand the encroaches of time for a
hundred years, at least.”
“Let us examine,” said George.
There were shelves or niches built into the walls all round, on which
the coffins were placed, so that there could not be much difficulty in
a minute examination of them all, the one after the other.
When, however, they came to look, they found that “decay’s offensive
fingers” had been more busy than they could have imagined, and that
whatever they touched of the earlier coffins crumbled into dust before
their very fingers.
In some cases the inscriptions were quite illegible, and, in others,
the plates that had borne them had fallen on to the floor of the vault,
so that it was impossible to say to which coffin they belonged.
Of course, the more recent and fresh-looking coffins they did not
examine, because they could not have anything to do with the object of
that melancholy visit.
“We shall arrive at no conclusion,” said George. “All seems to have
rotted away among those coffins where we might expect to find the one
belonging to Marmaduke Bannerworth, our ancestor.”
“Here is a coffin plate,” said Marchdale, taking one from the floor.
He handed it to Mr. Chillingworth, who, upon an inspection of it, close
to the light, exclaimed,—
“It must have belonged to the coffin you seek.”
“What says it?”
“Ye mortale remains of
Marmaduke Bannerworth, Yeoman.
God reste his soule.
A.D. 1640.”
“It is the plate belonging to his coffin,” said Henry, “and now our
search is fruitless.”
“It is so, indeed,” exclaimed George, “for how can we tell to which of
the coffins that have lost the plates this one really belongs?”
“I should not be so hopeless,” said Marchdale. “I have, from time to
time, in the pursuit of antiquarian lore, which I was once fond of,
entered many vaults, and I have always observed that an inner coffin of
metal was sound and good, while the outer one of wood had rotted away,
and yielded at once to the touch of the first hand that was laid upon
it.”
“But, admitting that to be the case,” said Henry, “how does that assist
us in the identification of a coffin?”
“I have always, in my experience, found the name and rank of the
deceased engraved upon the lid of the inner coffin, as well as being
set forth in a much more perishable manner on the plate which was
secured to the outer one.”
“He is right,” said Mr. Chillingworth. “I wonder we never thought of
that. If your ancestor was buried in a leaden coffin, there will be no
difficulty in finding which it is.”
Henry seized the light, and proceeding to one of the coffins, which
seemed to be a mass of decay, he pulled away some of the rotted wood
work, and then suddenly exclaimed,—
“You are quite right. Here is a firm strong leaden coffin within,
which, although quite black, does not otherwise appear to have
suffered.”
“What is the inscription on that?” said George.
With difficulty the name on the lid was deciphered, but it was found
not to be the coffin of him whom they sought.
“We can make short work of this,” said Marchdale, “by only examining
those leaden coffins which have lost the plates from off their outer
cases. There do not appear to be many in such a state.”
He then, with another light, which he lighted from the one that Henry
now carried, commenced actively assisting in the search, which was
carried on silently for more than ten minutes.
Suddenly Mr. Marchdale cried, in a tone of excitement,—
“I have found it. It is here.”
They all immediately surrounded the spot where he was, and then he
pointed to the lid of a coffin, which he had been rubbing with his
handkerchief, in order to make the inscription more legible, and said,—
“See. It is here.”
By the combined light of the candles they saw the words,—
“Marmaduke Bannerworth, Yeoman, 1640.”
“Yes, there can be no mistake here,” said Henry. “This is the coffin,
and it shall be opened.”
“I have the iron crowbar here,” said Marchdale. “It is an old friend of
mine, and I am accustomed to the use of it. Shall I open the coffin?”
“Do so—do so,” said Henry.
They stood around in silence, while Mr. Marchdale, with much care,
proceeded to open the coffin, which seemed of great thickness, and was
of solid lead.
It was probably the partial rotting of the metal, in consequence of the
damps of that place, that made it easier to open the coffin than it
otherwise would have been, but certain it was that the top came away
remarkably easily. Indeed, so easily did it come off, that another
supposition might have been hazarded, namely, that it had never at all
been effectually fastened.
[Illustration: Marchdale opens the coffin with the crowbar.]
The few moments that elapsed were ones of very great suspense to every
one there present; and it would, indeed, be quite safe to assert, that
all the world was for the time forgotten in the absorbing interest
which appertained to the affair which was in progress.
The candles were now both held by Mr. Chillingworth, and they were so
held as to cast a full and clear light upon the coffin. Now the lid
slid off, and Henry eagerly gazed into the interior.
There lay something certainly there, and an audible “Thank God!”
escaped his lips.
“The body is there!” exclaimed George.
“All right,” said Marchdale, “here it is. There is something, and what
else can it be?”
“Hold the lights,” said Mr. Chillingworth; “hold the lights, some of
you; let us be quite certain.”
George took the lights, and Mr. Chillingworth, without any hesitation,
dipped his hands at once into the coffin, and took up some fragments of
rags which were there. They were so rotten, that they fell to pieces in
his grasp, like so many pieces of tinder.
There was a death-like pause for some few moments, and then Mr.
Chillingworth said, in a low voice,—
“There is not the least vestige of a dead body here.”
Henry gave a deep groan, as he said,—
“Mr. Chillingworth, can you take upon yourself to say that no corpse
has undergone the process of decomposition in this coffin?”
“To answer your question exactly, as probably in your hurry you have
worded it,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “I cannot take upon myself to say
any such thing; but this I can say, namely, that in this coffin there
are no animal remains, and that it is quite impossible that any corpse
enclosed here could, in any lapse of time, have so utterly and entirely
disappeared.”
“I am answered,” said Henry.
“Good God!” exclaimed George, “and has this but added another damning
proof, to those we have already on our minds, of one of the most
dreadful superstitions that ever the mind of man conceived?”
“It would seem so,” said Marchdale, sadly.
“Oh, that I were dead! This is terrible. God of heaven, why are these
things? Oh, if I were but dead, and so spared the torture of supposing
such things possible.”
“Think again, Mr. Chillingworth; I pray you think again,” cried
Marchdale.
“If I were to think for the remainder of my existence,” he replied, “I
could come to no other conclusion. It is not a matter of opinion; it is
a matter of fact.”
“You are positive, then,” said Henry, “that the dead body of Marmaduke
Bannerworth is not rested here?”
“I am positive. Look for yourselves. The lead is but slightly
discoloured; it looks tolerably clean and fresh; there is not a vestige
of putrefaction—no bones, no dust even.”
They did all look for themselves, and the most casual glance was
sufficient to satisfy the most sceptical.
“All is over,” said Henry; “let us now leave this place; and all I can
now ask of you, my friends, is to lock this dreadful secret deep in
your own hearts.”
“It shall never pass my lips,” said Marchdale.
“Nor mine, you may depend,” said the doctor. “I was much in hopes that
this night’s work would have had the effect of dissipating, instead of
adding to, the gloomy fancies that now possess you.”
“Good heavens!” cried George, “can you call them fancies, Mr.
Chillingworth?”
“I do, indeed.”
“Have you yet a doubt?”
“My young friend, I told you from the first, that I would not believe
in your vampyre; and I tell you now, that if one was to come and lay
hold of me by the throat, as long as I could at all gasp for breath I
would tell him he was a d——d impostor.”
“This is carrying incredulity to the verge of obstinacy.”
“Far beyond it, if you please.”
“You will not be convinced?” said Marchdale.
“I most decidedly, on this point, will not.”
“Then you are one who would doubt a miracle, if you saw it with your
own eyes.”
“I would, because I do not believe in miracles. I should endeavour
to find some rational and some scientific means of accounting for
the phenomenon, and that’s the very reason why we have no miracles
now-a-days, between you and I, and no prophets and saints, and all that
sort of thing.”
“I would rather avoid such observations in such a place as this,” said
Marchdale.
“Nay, do not be the moral coward,” cried Mr. Chillingworth, “to make
your opinions, or the expression of them, dependent upon any certain
locality.”
“I know not what to think,” said Henry; “I am bewildered quite. Let us
now come away.”
Mr. Marchdale replaced the lid of the coffin, and then the little party
moved towards the staircase. Henry turned before he ascended, and
glanced back into the vault.
“Oh,” he said, “if I could but think there had been some mistake, some
error of judgment, on which the mind could rest for hope.”
“I deeply regret,” said Marchdale, “that I so strenuously advised this
expedition. I did hope that from it would have resulted much good.”
“And you had every reason so to hope,” said Chillingworth. “I advised
it likewise, and I tell you that its result perfectly astonishes me,
although I will not allow myself to embrace at once all the conclusions
to which it would seem to lead me.”
“I am satisfied,” said Henry; “I know you both advised me for the best.
The curse of Heaven seems now to have fallen upon me and my house.”
“Oh, nonsense!” said Chillingworth. “What for?”
“Alas! I know not.”
“Then you may depend that Heaven would never act so oddly. In the first
place, Heaven don’t curse anybody; and, in the second, it is too just
to inflict pain where pain is not amply deserved.”
They ascended the gloomy staircase of the vault. The countenances of
both George and Henry were very much saddened, and it was quite evident
that their thoughts were by far too busy to enable them to enter into
any conversation. They did not, and particularly George, seem to hear
all that was said to them. Their intellects seemed almost stunned by
the unexpected circumstance of the disappearance of the body of their
ancestor.
All along they had, although almost unknown to themselves, felt a
sort of conviction that they must find some remains of Marmaduke
Bannerworth, which would render the supposition, even in the most
superstitious minds, that he was the vampyre, a thing totally and
physically impossible.
But now the whole question assumed a far more bewildering shape. The
body was not in its coffin—it had not there quietly slept the long
sleep of death common to humanity. Where was it then? What had become
of it? Where, how, and under what circumstances had it been removed?
Had it itself burst the bands that held it, and hideously stalked forth
into the world again to make one of its seeming inhabitants, and kept
up for a hundred years a dreadful existence by such adventures as it
had consummated at the hall, where, in the course of ordinary human
life, it had once lived?
All these were questions which irresistibly pressed themselves upon the
consideration of Henry and his brother. They were awful questions.
And yet, take any sober, sane, thinking, educated man, and show him
all that they had seen, subject him to all to which they had been
subjected, and say if human reason, and all the arguments that the
subtlest brain could back it with, would be able to hold out against
such a vast accumulation of horrible evidences, and say—“I don’t
believe it.”
Mr. Chillingworth’s was the only plan. He would not argue the question.
He said at once,—
“I will not believe this thing—upon this point I will yield to no
evidence whatever.”
That was the only way of disposing of such a question; but there are
not many who could so dispose of it, and not one so much interested in
it as were the brothers Bannerworth, who could at all hope to get into
such a state of mind.
The boards were laid carefully down again, and the screws replaced.
Henry found himself unequal to the task, so it was done by Marchdale,
who took pains to replace everything in the same state in which they
had found it, even to the laying even the matting at the bottom of the
pew.
Then they extinguished the light, and, with heavy hearts, they all
walked towards the window, to leave the sacred edifice by the same
means they had entered it.
“Shall we replace the pane of glass?” said Marchdale.
“Oh, it matters not—it matters not,” said Henry, listlessly; “nothing
matters now. I care not what becomes of me—I am getting weary of a life
which now must be one of misery and dread.”
“You must not allow yourself to fall into such a state of mind as
this,” said the doctor, “or you will become a patient of mine very
quickly.”
“I cannot help it.”
“Well, but be a man. If there are serious evils affecting you, fight
out against them the best way you can.”
“I cannot.”
“Come, now, listen to me. We need not, I think, trouble ourselves about
the pane of glass, so come along.”
He took the arm of Henry and walked on with him a little in advance of
the others.
“Henry,” he said, “the best way, you may depend, of meeting evils, be
they great or small, is to get up an obstinate feeling of defiance
against them. Now, when anything occurs which is uncomfortable to me, I
endeavour to convince myself, and I have no great difficulty in doing
so, that I am a decidedly injured man.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes; I get very angry, and that gets up a kind of obstinacy, which
makes me not feel half so much mental misery as would be my portion, if
I were to succumb to the evil, and commence whining over it, as many
people do, under the pretence of being resigned.”
“But this family affliction of mine transcends anything that anybody
else ever endured.”
“I don’t know that; but it is a view of the subject which, if I were
you, would only make me more obstinate.”
“What can I do?”
“In the first place, I would say to myself, ‘There may or there may
not be supernatural beings, who, from some physical derangement of the
ordinary nature of things, make themselves obnoxious to living people;
if there are, d—n them! There may be vampyres; and if there are, I defy
them.’ Let the imagination paint its very worst terrors; let fear do
what it will and what it can in peopling the mind with horrors. Shrink
from nothing, and even then I would defy them all.”
“Is not that like defying Heaven?”
“Most certainly not; for in all we say and in all we do we act from the
impulses of that mind which is given to us by Heaven itself. If Heaven
creates an intellect and a mind of a certain order, Heaven will not
quarrel that it does the work which it was adapted to do.”
“I know these are your opinions. I have heard you mention them before.”
“They are the opinions of every rational person. Henry Bannerworth,
because they will stand the test of reason; and what I urge upon
you is, not to allow yourself to be mentally prostrated, even if a
vampyre has paid a visit to your house. Defy him, say I—fight him.
Self-preservation is a great law of nature, implanted in all our
hearts; do you summon it to your aid.”
“I will endeavour to think as you would have me. I thought more than
once of summoning religion to my aid.”
“Well, that is religion.”
“Indeed!”
“I consider so, and the most rational religion of all. All that we read
about religion that does not seem expressly to agree with it, you may
consider as an allegory.”
“But, Mr. Chillingworth, I cannot and will not renounce the sublime
truths of Scripture. They may be incomprehensible; they may be
inconsistent; and some of them may look ridiculous; but still they are
sacred and sublime, and I will not renounce them although my reason may
not accord with them, because they are the laws of Heaven.”
No wonder this powerful argument silenced Mr. Chillingworth, who was
one of those characters in society who hold most dreadful opinions, and
who would destroy religious beliefs, and all the different sects in the
world, if they could, and endeavour to introduce instead some horrible
system of human reason and profound philosophy.
But how soon the religious man silences his opponent; and let it not be
supposed that, because his opponent says no more upon the subject, he
does so because he is disgusted with the stupidity of the other; no, it
is because he is completely beaten, and has nothing more to say.
The distance now between the church and the hall was nearly traversed,
and Mr. Chillingworth, who was a very good man, notwithstanding his
disbelief in certain things of course paved the way for him to hell,
took a kind leave of Mr. Marchdale and the brothers, promising to call
on the following morning and see Flora.
Henry and George then, in earnest conversation with Marchdale,
proceeded homewards. It was evident that the scene in the vault had
made a deep and saddening impression upon them, and one which was not
likely easily to be eradicated.
CHAPTER IX.
THE OCCURRENCES OF THE NIGHT AT THE HALL.—THE SECOND APPEARANCE OF THE
VAMPYRE, AND THE PISTOL-SHOT.
Despite the full and free consent which Flora had given to her brothers
to entrust her solely to the care of her mother and her own courage at
the hall, she felt greater fear creep over her after they were gone
than she chose to acknowledge.
A sort of presentiment appeared to come over her that some evil was
about to occur, and more than once she caught herself almost in the act
of saying,—
“I wish they had not gone.”
Mrs. Bannerworth, too, could not be supposed to be entirely destitute
of uncomfortable feelings, when she came to consider how poor a guard
she was over her beautiful child, and how much terror might even
deprive of the little power she had, should the dreadful visitor again
make his appearance.
“But it is but for two hours,” thought Flora, “and two hours will soon
pass away.”
There was, too, another feeling which gave her some degree of
confidence, although it arose from a bad source, inasmuch as it was
one which showed powerfully how much her mind was dwelling on the
particulars of the horrible belief in the class of supernatural beings,
one of whom she believed had visited her.
That consideration was this. The two hours of absence from the hall
of its male inhabitants, would be from nine o’clock until eleven, and
those were not the two hours during which she felt that she would be
most timid on account of the vampyre.
“It was after midnight before,” she thought, “when it came, and perhaps
it may not be able to come earlier. It may not have the power, until
that time, to make its hideous visits, and, therefore, I will believe
myself safe.”
She had made up her mind not to go to bed until the return of her
brothers, and she and her mother sat in a small room that was used as a
breakfast-room, and which had a latticed window that opened on to the
lawn.
This window had in the inside strong oaken shutters, which had been
fastened as securely as their construction would admit of some time
before the departure of the brothers and Mr. Marchdale on that
melancholy expedition, the object of which, if it had been known to
her, would have added so much to the terrors of poor Flora.
It was not even guessed at, however remotely, so that she had not the
additional affliction of thinking, that while she was sitting there, a
prey to all sorts of imaginative terrors, they were perhaps gathering
fresh evidence, as, indeed, they were, of the dreadful reality of the
appearance which, but for the collateral circumstances attendant upon
its coming and its going, she would fain have persuaded herself was but
the vision of a dream.
It was before nine that the brothers started, but in her own mind Flora
gave them to eleven, and when she heard ten o’clock sound from a clock
which stood in the hall, she felt pleased to think that in another hour
they would surely be at home.
“My dear,” said her mother, “you look more like yourself, now.”
“Do, I, mother?”
“Yes, you are well again.”
“Ah, if I could forget——”
“Time, my dear Flora, will enable you to do so, and all the fear of
what made you so unwell will pass away. You will soon forget it all.”
“I will hope to do so.”
“Be assured that, some day or another, something will occur, as Henry
says, to explain all that has happened, in some way consistent with
reason and the ordinary nature of things, my dear Flora.”
“Oh, I will cling to such a belief; I will get Henry, upon whose
judgment I know I can rely, to tell me so, and each time that I hear
such words from his lips, I will contrive to dismiss some portion of
the terror which now, I cannot but confess, clings to my heart.”
Flora laid her hand upon her mother’s arm, and in a low, anxious tone
of voice, said,—“Listen, mother.”
Mrs. Bannerworth turned pale, as she said,—“Listen to what, dear?”
“Within these last ten minutes,” said Flora, “I have thought three or
four times that I heard a slight noise without. Nay, mother, do not
tremble—it may be only fancy.”
Flora herself trembled, and was of a death-like paleness; once or twice
she passed her hand across her brow, and altogether she presented a
picture of much mental suffering.
They now conversed in anxious whispers, and almost all they said
consisted in anxious wishes for the return of the brothers and Mr.
Marchdale.
“You will be happier and more assured, my dear, with some company,”
said Mrs. Bannerworth. “Shall I ring for the servants, and let them
remain in the room with us, until they who are our best safeguards next
to Heaven return?”
“Hush—hush—hush, mother!”
“What do you hear?”
“I thought—I heard a faint sound.”
“I heard nothing, dear.”
“Listen again, mother. Surely I could not be deceived so often. I have
now, at least, six times heard a sound as if some one was outside by
the windows.”
“No, no, my darling, do not think; your imagination is active and in a
state of excitement.”
“It is, and yet——”
“Believe me, it deceives you.”
“I hope to Heaven it does!”
There was a pause of some minutes’ duration, and then Mrs. Bannerworth
again urged slightly the calling of some of the servants, for she
thought that their presence might have the effect of giving a different
direction to her child’s thoughts; but Flora saw her place her hand
upon the bell, and she said,—
“No, mother, no—not yet, not yet. Perhaps I am deceived.”
Mrs. Bannerworth upon this sat down, but no sooner had she done so than
she heartily regretted she had not rung the bell, for, before another
word could be spoken, there came too perceptibly upon their ears for
there to be any mistake at all about it, a strange scratching noise
upon the window outside.
A faint cry came from Flora’s lips, as she exclaimed, in a voice of
great agony,—
“Oh, God!—oh, God! It has come again!”
Mrs. Bannerworth became faint, and unable to move or speak at all; she
could only sit like one paralysed, and unable to do more than listen to
and see what was going on.
The scratching noise continued for a few seconds, and then altogether
ceased. Perhaps, under ordinary circumstances, such a sound outside the
window would have scarcely afforded food for comment at all, or, if it
had, it would have been attributed to some natural effect, or to the
exertions of some bird or animal to obtain admittance to the house.
But there had occurred now enough in that family to make any little
sound of wonderful importance, and these things which before would have
passed completely unheeded, at all events without creating much alarm,
were now invested with a fearful interest.
When the scratching noise ceased, Flora spoke in a low, anxious
whisper, as she said,—
“Mother, you heard it then?”
Mrs. Bannerworth tried to speak, but she could not; and then suddenly,
with a loud clash, the bar, which on the inside appeared to fasten
the shutters strongly, fell as if by some invisible agency, and the
shutters now, but for the intervention of the window, could be easily
pushed open from without.
Mrs. Bannerworth covered her face with her hands, and, after rocking to
and fro for a moment, she fell off her chair, having fainted with the
excess of terror that came over her.
For about the space of time in which a fast speaker could count twelve,
Flora thought her reason was leaving her, but it did not. She found
herself recovering; and there she sat, with her eyes fixed upon the
window, looking more like some exquisitely-chiselled statue of despair
than a being of flesh and blood, expecting each moment to have its eyes
blasted by some horrible appearance, such as might be supposed to drive
her to madness.
And now again came the strange knocking or scratching against the glass
of the window.
This continued for some minutes, during which it appeared likewise to
Flora that some confusion was going on at another part of the house,
for she fancied she heard voices and the banging of doors.
It seemed to her as if she must have sat looking at the shutters of
that window a long time before she saw them shake, and then one wide
hinged portion of them slowly opened.
Once again horror appeared to be on the point of producing madness in
her brain, and then, as before, a feeling of calmness rapidly ensued.
She was able to see plainly that something was by the window, but what
it was she could not plainly discern, in consequence of the lights
she had in the room. A few moments, however, sufficed to settle that
mystery, for the window was opened and a figure stood before her.
One glance, one terrified glance, in which her whole soul was
concentrated, sufficed to shew her who and what the figure was. There
was the tall, gaunt form—there was the faded ancient apparel—the
lustrous metallic-looking eyes—its half-opened mouth, exhibiting the
tusk-like teeth! It was—yes, it was—_the vampyre!_
[Illustration: The vampyre approaches Flora.]
It stood for a moment gazing at her, and then in the hideous way it
had attempted before to speak, it apparently endeavoured to utter some
words which it could not make articulate to human ears. The pistols
lay before Flora. Mechanically she raised one, and pointed it at the
figure. It advanced a step, and then she pulled the trigger.
A stunning report followed. There was a loud cry of pain, and the
vampyre fled. The smoke and the confusion that was incidental to the
spot prevented her from seeing if the figure walked or ran away. She
thought she heard a crashing sound among the plants outside the window,
as if it had fallen, but she did not feel quite sure.
It was no effort of any reflection, but a purely mechanical movement,
that made her raise the other pistol, and discharge that likewise in
the direction the vampyre had taken. Then casting the weapon away, she
rose, and made a frantic rush from the room. She opened the door, and
was dashing out, when she found herself caught in the circling arms of
some one who either had been there waiting, or who had just at that
moment got there.
The thought that it was the vampyre, who by some mysterious means
had got there, and was about to make her his prey, now overcame her
completely, and she sunk into a state of utter insensibility on the
moment.
CHAPTER X.
THE RETURN FROM THE VAULT.—THE ALARM, AND THE SEARCH AROUND THE HALL.
It so happened that George and Henry Bannerworth, along with Mr.
Marchdale, had just reached the gate which conducted into the garden of
the mansion when they all were alarmed by the report of a pistol. Amid
the stillness of the night, it came upon them with so sudden a shock,
that they involuntarily paused, and there came from the lips of each an
expression of alarm.
“Good heavens!” cried George, “can that be Flora firing at any
intruder?”
“It must be,” cried Henry; “she has in her possession the only weapons
in the house.”
Mr. Marchdale turned very pale, and trembled slightly, but he did not
speak.
“On, on,” cried Henry; “for God’s sake, let us hasten on.”
As he spoke, he cleared the gate at a bound, and at a terrific pace he
made towards the house, passing over beds, and plantations, and flowers
heedlessly, so that he went the most direct way to it.
Before, however, it was possible for any human speed to accomplish
even half of the distance, the report of the other shot came upon his
ears, and he even fancied he heard the bullet whistle past his head
in tolerably close proximity. This supposition gave him a clue to the
direction at all events from whence the shots proceeded, otherwise he
knew not from which window they were fired, because it had not occurred
to him, previous to leaving home, to inquire in which room Flora and
his mother were likely to be seated waiting his return.
He was right as regarded the bullet. It was that winged messenger of
death which had passed his head in such very dangerous proximity, and
consequently he made with tolerable accuracy towards the open window
from whence the shots had been fired.
The night was not near so dark as it had been, although even yet it was
very far from being a light one, and he was soon enabled to see that
there was a room, the window of which was wide open, and lights burning
on the table within. He made towards it in a moment, and entered it.
To his astonishment, the first objects he beheld were Flora and a
stranger, who was now supporting her in his arms. To grapple him by
the throat was the work of a moment, but the stranger cried aloud in a
voice which sounded familiar to Henry,—
“Good God, are you all mad?”
Henry relaxed his hold, and looked in his face.
“Gracious heavens, it is Mr. Holland!” he said.
“Yes; did you not know me?”
Henry was bewildered. He staggered to a seat, and, in doing so, he saw
his mother, stretched apparently lifeless upon the floor. To raise
her was the work of a moment, and then Marchdale and George, who had
followed him as fast as they could, appeared at the open window.
Such a strange scene as that small room now exhibited had never been
equalled in Bannerworth Hall. There was young Mr. Holland, of whom
mention has already been made, as the affianced lover of Flora,
supporting her fainting form. There was Henry doing equal service
to his mother; and on the floor lay the two pistols, and one of the
candles which had been upset in the confusion; while the terrified
attitudes of George and Mr. Marchdale at the window completed the
strange-looking picture.
“What is this—oh! what has happened?” cried George.
“I know not—I know not,” said Henry. “Some one summon the servants; I
am nearly mad.”
Mr. Marchdale at once rung the bell, for George looked so faint and
ill as to be incapable of doing so; and he rung it so loudly and so
effectually, that the two servants who had been employed suddenly upon
the others leaving came with much speed to know what was the matter.
“See to your mistress,” said Henry. “She is dead, or has fainted. For
God’s sake, let who can give me some account of what has caused all
this confusion here.”
“Are you aware, Henry,” said Marchdale, “that a stranger is present in
the room?”
He pointed to Mr. Holland as he spoke, who, before Henry could reply,
said,—
“Sir, I may be a stranger to you, as you are to me, and yet no stranger
to those whose home this is.”
“No, no,” said Henry, “you are no stranger to us, Mr. Holland, but are
thrice welcome—none can be more welcome. Mr. Marchdale, this is Mr
Holland, of whom you have heard me speak.”
“I am proud to know you, sir,” said Marchdale.
“Sir, I thank you,” replied Holland, coldly.
It will so happen; but, at first sight, it appeared as if those two
persons had some sort of antagonistic feeling towards each other, which
threatened to prevent effectually their ever becoming intimate friends.
The appeal of Henry to the servants to know if they could tell him what
had occurred was answered in the negative. All they knew was that they
had heard two shots fired, and that, since then, they had remained
where they were, in a great fright, until the bell was rung violently.
This was no news at all and, therefore, the only chance was, to wait
patiently for the recovery of the mother, or of Flora, from one or the
other of whom surely some information could be at once then procured.
Mrs. Bannerworth was removed to her own room, and so would Flora have
been; but Mr. Holland, who was supporting her in his arms, said,—
“I think the air from the open window is recovering her, and it is
likely to do so. Oh, do not now take her from me, after so long an
absence. Flora, Flora, look up; do you not know me? You have not yet
given me one look of acknowledgement. Flora, dear Flora!”
The sound of his voice seemed to act as the most potent of charms in
restoring her to consciousness; it broke through the death-like trance
in which she lay, and, opening her beautiful eyes, she fixed them upon
his face, saying,—
“Yes, yes; it is Charles—it is Charles.”
She burst into a hysterical flood of tears, and clung to him like some
terrified child to its only friend in the whole wide world.
[Illustration: Flora clings to Charles.]
“Oh, my dear friends,” cried Charles Holland, “do not deceive me; has
Flora been ill?”
“We have all been ill,” said George.
“All ill?”
“Ay, and nearly mad,” exclaimed Harry.
Holland looked from one to the other in surprise, as well he might,
nor was that surprise at all lessened when Flora made an effort to
extricate herself from his embrace, as she exclaimed,—
“You must leave me—you must leave me, Charles, for ever! Oh! never,
never look upon my face again!”
“I—I am bewildered,” said Charles.
“Leave me, now,” continued Flora; “think me unworthy; think what you
will, Charles, but I cannot, I dare not, now be yours.”
“Is this a dream?”
“Oh, would it were. Charles, if we had never met, you would be
happier—I could not be more wretched.”
“Flora, Flora, do you say these words of so great cruelty to try my
love?”
“No, as Heaven is my judge, I do not.”
“Gracious Heaven, then, what do they mean?”
Flora shuddered, and Henry, coming up to her, took her hand in his
tenderly, as he said,—
“Has it been again?”
“It has.”
“You shot it?”
“I fired full upon it, Henry, but it fled.”
“It did—fly?”
“It did, Henry, but it will come again—it will be sure to come again.”
“You—you hit it with the bullet?” interposed Mr. Marchdale. “Perhaps
you killed it?”
“I think I must have hit it, unless I am mad.”
Charles Holland looked from one to the other with such a look of
intense surprise, that George remarked it, and said at once to him,—
“Mr. Holland, a full explanation is due to you, and you shall have it.”
“You seem the only rational person here,” said Charles. “Pray what is
it that everybody calls ‘_it_?’”
“Hush—hush!” said Henry; “you shall hear soon, but not at present.”
“Hear me, Charles,” said Flora. “From this moment mind, I do release
you from every vow, from every promise made to me of constancy and
love; and if you are wise, Charles, and will be advised, you will now
this moment leave this house never to return to it.”
“No,” said Charles—“no; by Heaven I love you, Flora! I have come to say
again all that in another clime I said with joy to you. When I forget
you, let what trouble may oppress you, may God forget me, and my own
right hand forget to do me honest service.”
“Oh! no more—no more!” sobbed Flora.
“Yes, much more, if you will tell me of words which shall be stronger
than others in which to paint my love, my faith, and my constancy.”
“Be prudent,” said Henry. “Say no more.”
“Nay, upon such a theme I could speak for ever. You may cast me off,
Flora; but until you tell me you love another, I am yours till the
death, and then with a sanguine hope at my heart that we shall meet
again, never, dearest, to part.”
Flora sobbed bitterly.
“Oh!” she said, “this is the unkindest blow of all—this is worse than
all.”
“Unkind!” echoed Holland.
“Heed her not,” said Henry; “she means not you.”
“Oh, no—no!” she cried. “Farewell, Charles—dear Charles.”
“Oh, say that word again!” he exclaimed, with animation. “It is the
first time such music has met my ears.”
“It must be the last.”
“No, no—oh, no.”
“For your own sake I shall be able now, Charles, to show you that I
really loved you.”
“Not by casting me from you?”
“Yes, even so. That will be the way to show you that I love you.”
She held up her hands wildly, as she added, in an excited voice,—
“The curse of destiny is upon me! I am singled out as one lost and
accursed. Oh, horror—horror! would that I were dead!” Charles
staggered back a pace or two until he came to the table, at which he
clutched for support. He turned very pale as he said, in a faint voice,—
“Is—is she mad, or am I?”
“Tell him I am mad, Henry,” cried Flora. “Do not, oh, do not make his
lonely thoughts terrible with more than that. Tell him I am mad.”
“Come with me,” whispered Henry to Holland. “I pray you come with me at
once, and you shall know all.”
“I—will.”
“George, stay with Flora for a time. Come, come, Mr. Holland, you
ought, and you shall know all; then you can come to a judgment for
yourself. This way, sir. You cannot, in the wildest freak of your
imagination, guess that which I have now to tell you.”
Never was mortal man so utterly bewildered by the events of the last
hour of his existence as was now Charles Holland, and truly he might
well be so. He had arrived in England, and made what speed he could to
the house of a family whom he admired for their intelligence, their
high culture, and in one member of which his whole thoughts of domestic
happiness in this world were centered, and he found nothing but
confusion, incoherence, mystery, and the wildest dismay.
Well might he doubt if he were sleeping or waking—well might he ask if
he or they were mad.
And now, as, after a long, lingering look of affection upon the pale,
suffering face of Flora, he followed Henry from the room, his thoughts
were busy in fancying a thousand vague and wild imaginations with
respect to the communication which was promised to be made to him.
But, as Henry had truly said to him, not in the wildest freak of
his imagination could he conceive of any thing near the terrible
strangeness and horror of that which he had to tell him, and
consequently he found himself closeted with Henry in a small private
room, removed from the domestic part of the hall, to the full in as
bewildered a state as he had been from the first.
CHAPTER XI.
THE COMMUNICATIONS TO THE LOVER.—THE HEART’S DESPAIR.
Consternation is sympathetic, and any one who had looked upon the
features of Charles Holland, now that he was seated with Henry
Bannerworth, in expectation of a communication which his fears told him
was to blast all his dearest and most fondly cherished hopes for ever,
would scarce have recognised in him the same young man who, one short
hour before, had knocked so loudly, and so full of joyful hope and
expectation, at the door of the hall.
But so it was. He knew Henry Bannerworth too well to suppose that any
unreal cause could blanch his cheek. He knew Flora too well to imagine
for one moment that caprice had dictated the, to him, fearful words of
dismissal she had uttered to him.
Happier would it at that time have been for Charles Holland had she
acted capriciously towards him, and convinced him that his true heart’s
devotion had been cast at the feet of one unworthy of so really noble
a gift. Pride would then have enabled him, no doubt, successfully to
resist the blow. A feeling of honest and proper indignation at having
his feelings trifled with, would, no doubt, have sustained him, but,
alas! the case seemed widely different.
True, she implored him to think of her no more—no longer to cherish
in his breast the fond dream of affection which had been its guest
so long; but the manner in which she did so brought along with it an
irresistible conviction, that she was making a noble sacrifice of
her own feelings for him, from some cause which was involved in the
profoundest mystery.
But now he was to hear all. Henry had promised to tell him, and as he
looked into his pale, but handsomely intellectual face, he half dreaded
the disclosure he yet panted to hear.
“Tell me all, Henry—tell me all,” he said. “Upon the words that come
from your lips I know I can rely.”
“I will have no reservations with you,” said Henry, sadly. “You
ought to know all, and you shall. Prepare yourself for the strangest
revelation you ever heard.”
“Indeed!”
“Ay. One which in hearing you may well doubt; and one which, I hope,
you will never find an opportunity of verifying.”
“You speak in riddles.”
“And yet speak truly, Charles. You heard with what a frantic vehemence
Flora desired you to think no more of her?”
“I did—I did.”
“She was right. She is a noble-hearted girl for uttering those words. A
dreadful incident in our family has occurred, which might well induce
you to pause before uniting your fate with that of any member of it.”
“Impossible. Nothing can possibly subdue the feelings of affection I
entertain for Flora. She is worthy of any one, and, as such, amid all
changes—all mutations of fortune, she shall be mine.”
“Do not suppose that any change of fortune has produced the scene you
were witness to.”
“Then, what else?”
“I will tell you, Holland. In all your travels, and in all your
reading, did you ever come across anything about vampyres?”
“About what?” cried Charles, drawing his chair forward a little. “About
what?”
“You may well doubt the evidence of your own ears, Charles Holland,
and wish me to repeat what I said. I say, do you know anything about
vampyres?”
Charles Holland looked curiously in Henry’s face, and the latter
immediately added,—
“I can guess what is passing in your mind at present, and I do not
wonder at it. You think I must be mad.”
“Well, really, Henry, your extraordinary question——”
“I knew it. Were I you, I should hesitate to believe the tale; but the
fact is, we have every reason to believe that one member of our own
family is one of those horrible preternatural beings called vampyres.”
“Good God, Henry, can you allow your judgment for a moment to stoop to
such a supposition?”
“That is what I have asked myself a hundred times; but, Charles
Holland, the judgment, the feelings, and all the prejudices, natural
and acquired, must succumb to actual ocular demonstration. Listen to
me, and do not interrupt me. You shall know all, and you shall know it
circumstantially.”
Henry then related to the astonished Charles Holland all that had
occurred, from the first alarm of Flora, up to that period when he,
Holland, caught her in his arms as she was about to leave the room.
“And now,” he said, in conclusion, “I cannot tell what opinion you may
come to as regards these most singular events. You will recollect that
here is the unbiased evidence of four or five people to the facts, and,
beyond that, the servants, who have seen something of the horrible
visitor.”
“You bewilder me, utterly,” said Charles Holland.
“As we are all bewildered.”
“But—but, gracious Heaven! it cannot be.”
“It is.”
“No—no. There is—there must be yet some dreadful mistake.”
“Can you start any supposition by which we can otherwise explain any of
the phenomena I have described to you? If you can, for Heaven’s sake do
so, and you will find no one who will cling to it with more tenacity
than I.”
“Any other species or kind of supernatural appearance might admit of
argument; but this, to my perception, is too wildly improbable—too much
at variance with all we see and know of the operations of nature.”
“It is so. All that we have told ourselves repeatedly, and yet is all
human reason at once struck down by the few brief words of—‘We have
seen it.’”
“I would doubt my eyesight.”
“One might; but many cannot be labouring under the same delusion.”
“My friend, I pray you, do not make me shudder at the supposition that
such a dreadful thing as this is at all possible.”
“I am, believe me, Charles, most unwilling to oppress anyone with the
knowledge of these evils; but you are so situated with us, that you
ought to know, and you will clearly understand that you may, with
perfect honour, now consider yourself free from all engagements you
have entered into with Flora.”
“No, no! By Heaven, no!”
“Yes, Charles. Reflect upon the consequences now of a union with such a
family.”
“Oh, Henry Bannerworth, can you suppose me so dead to all good feeling,
so utterly lost to honourable impulses, as to eject from my heart her
who has possession of it entirely, on such a ground as this?”
“You would be justified.”
“Coldly justified in prudence I might be. There are a thousand
circumstances in which a man may be justified in a particular course of
action, and that course yet may be neither honourable nor just. I love
Flora; and were she tormented by the whole of the supernatural world,
I should still love her. Nay, it becomes, then, a higher and a nobler
duty on my part to stand between her and those evils, if possible.”
“Charles—Charles,” said Henry, “I cannot of course refuse to you my
meed of praise and admiration for your generosity of feeling; but,
remember, if we are compelled, despite all our feelings and all our
predilections to the contrary, to give in to a belief in the existence
of vampyres, why may we not at once receive as the truth all that is
recorded of them?”
“To what do you allude?”
“To this. That one who has been visited by a vampyre, and whose blood
has formed a horrible repast for such a being, becomes, after death,
one of the dreadful race, and visits others in the same way.”
“Now this must be insanity,” cried Charles.
“It bears the aspect of it, indeed,” said Henry; “oh, that you could by
some means satisfy yourself that I am mad.”
“There may be insanity in this family,” thought Charles, with such an
exquisite pang of misery, that he groaned aloud.
“Already,” added Henry, mournfully, “already the blighting influence
of the dreadful tale is upon you, Charles. Oh, let me add my advice to
Flora’s entreaties. She loves you, and we all esteem you; fly, then,
from us, and leave us to encounter our miseries alone. Fly from us,
Charles Holland, and take with you our best wishes for happiness which
you cannot know here.”
“Never,” cried Charles; “I devote my existence to Flora. I will not
play the coward, and fly from one whom I love, on such grounds. I
devote my life to her.”
Henry could not speak for emotion for several minutes, and when at
length, in a faltering voice, he could utter some words, he said,—
“God of heaven, what happiness is marred by these horrible events? What
have we all done to be the victims of such a dreadful act of vengeance?”
“Henry, do not talk in that way,” cried Charles. “Rather let us bend
all our energies to overcoming the evil, than spend any time in useless
lamentations. I cannot even yet give in to a belief in the existence of
such a being as you say visited Flora.”
“But the evidences.”
“Look you here, Henry; until I am convinced that some things have
happened which it is totally impossible could happen by any human means
whatever, I will not ascribe them to supernatural influence.”
“But what human means, Charles, could produce what I have now narrated
to you?”
“I do not know, just at present, but I will give the subject the most
attentive consideration. Will you accommodate me here for a time?”
“You know you are as welcome here as if the house were your own, and
all that it contains.”
“I believe so, most truly. You have no objection, I presume, to my
conversing with Flora upon this strange subject?”
“Certainly not. Of course you will be careful to say nothing which can
add to her fears.”
“I shall be most guarded, believe me. You say that your brother George,
Mr. Chillingworth, yourself, and this Mr. Marchdale, have all been
cognisant of the circumstances.”
“Yes—yes.”
“Then with the whole of them you permit me to hold free communication
upon the subject?”
“Most certainly.”
“I will do so then. Keep up good heart, Henry, and this affair, which
looks so full of terror at first sight, may yet be divested of some of
its hideous aspect.”
“I am rejoiced, if anything can rejoice me now,” said Henry, “to see
you view the subject with so much philosophy.”
“Why,” said Charles, “you made a remark of your own, which enabled me,
viewing the matter in its very worst and most hideous aspect, to gather
hope.”
“What was that?”
“You said, properly and naturally enough, that if ever we felt that
there was such a weight of evidence in favour of a belief in the
existence of vampyres that we are compelled to succumb to it, we might
as well receive all the popular feelings and superstitions concerning
them likewise.”
“I did. Where is the mind to pause, when once we open it to the
reception of such things?”
“Well, then, if that be the case, we will watch this vampyre and catch
it.”
“Catch it?”
“Yes; surely it can be caught; as I understand, this species of being
is not like an apparition, that may be composed of thin air, and
utterly impalpable to the human touch, but it consists of a revivified
corpse.”
“Yes, yes.”
“Then it is tangible and destructible. By Heaven! if ever I catch a
glimpse of any such thing, it shall drag me to its home, be that where
it may, or I will make it prisoner.”
“Oh, Charles! you know not the feeling of horror that will come across
you when you do. You have no idea of how the warm blood will seem to
curdle in your veins, and how you will be paralysed in every limb.”
“Did you feel so?”
“I did.”
“I will endeavour to make head against such feelings. The love of
Flora shall enable me to vanquish them. Think you it will come again
to-morrow?”
“I can have no thought the one way or the other.”
“It may. We must arrange among us all, Henry, some plan of watching
which, without completely prostrating our health and strength, will
always provide that one shall be up all night and on the alert.”
“It must be done.”
“Flora ought to sleep with the consciousness now that she has ever at
hand some intrepid and well-armed protector, who is not only himself
prepared to defend her, but who can in a moment give an alarm to us
all, in case of necessity requiring it.”
“It would be a dreadful capture to make to seize a vampyre,” said Henry.
“Not at all; it would be a very desirable one. Being a corpse
revivified, it is capable of complete destruction, so as to render it
no longer a scourge to any one.”
“Charles, Charles, are you jesting with me, or do you really give any
credence to the story?”
“My dear friend, I always make it a rule to take things at their worst,
and then I cannot be disappointed. I am content to reason upon this
matter as if the fact of the existence of a vampyre were thoroughly
established, and then to think upon what is best to be done about it.”
“You are right.”
“If it should turn out then that there is an error in the fact, well
and good—we are all the better off; but if otherwise, we are prepared,
and armed at all points.”
“Let it be so, then. It strikes me, Charles, that you will be the
coolest and the calmest among us all on this emergency; but the hour
now waxes late, I will get them to prepare a chamber for you, and at
least to-night, after what has occurred already, I should think we can
be under no apprehension.”
“Probably not. But, Henry, if you would allow me to sleep in that room
where the portrait hangs of him whom you suppose to be the vampyre, I
should prefer it.”
“Prefer it!”
“Yes; I am not one who courts danger for danger’s sake, but I would
rather occupy that room, to see if the vampyre, who perhaps has a
partiality for it, will pay me a visit.”
“As you please, Charles. You can have the apartment. It is in the same
state as when occupied by Flora. Nothing has been, I believe, removed
from it.”
“You will let me, then, while I remain here, call it my room?”
“Assuredly.”
This arrangement was accordingly made to the surprise of all the
household, not one of whom would, indeed, have slept, or attempted to
sleep there for any amount of reward. But Charles Holland had his own
reasons for preferring that chamber, and he was conducted to it in the
course of half an hour by Henry, who looked around it with a shudder,
as he bade his young friend good night.
CHAPTER XII.
CHARLES HOLLAND’S SAD FEELINGS.—THE PORTRAIT.—THE OCCURRENCE OF THE
NIGHT AT THE HALL.
Charles Holland wished to be alone, if ever any human being had wished
fervently to be so. His thoughts were most fearfully oppressive. The
communication that had been made to him by Henry Bannerworth, had about
it too many strange, confirmatory circumstances to enable him to treat
it, in his own mind, with the disrespect that some mere freak of a
distracted and weak imagination would, most probably, have received
from him.
He had found Flora in a state of excitement which could arise only from
some such terrible cause as had been mentioned by her brother, and then
he was, from an occurrence which certainly never could have entered
into his calculations, asked to forego the bright dream of happiness
which he had held so long and so rapturously to his heart.
How truly he found that the course of true love ran not smooth; and yet
how little would any one have suspected that from such a cause as that
which now oppressed his mind, any obstruction would arise.
Flora might have been fickle and false; he might have seen some other
fairer face, which might have enchained his fancy, and woven for him
a new heart’s chain; death might have stepped between him and the
realization of his fondest hopes; loss of fortune might have made
the love cruel which would have yoked to its distresses a young and
beautiful girl, reared in the lap of luxury, and who was not, even by
those who loved her, suffered to feel, even in later years, any of the
pinching necessities of the family.
All these things were possible—some of them were probable; and yet none
of them had occurred. She loved him still; and he, although he had
looked on many a fair face, and basked in the sunny smiles of beauty,
had never for a moment forgotten her faith, or lost his devotion to his
own dear English girl.
Fortune he had enough for both; death had not even threatened to rob
him of the prize of such a noble and faithful heart which he had won.
But a horrible superstition had arisen, which seemed to place at once
an impassable abyss between them, and to say to him, in a voice of
thundering denunciation,——
“Charles Holland, will you have a vampyre for your bride?”
The thought was terrific. He paced the gloomy chamber to and fro with
rapid strides, until the idea came across his mind that by so doing he
might not only be proclaiming to his kind entertainers how much he was
mentally distracted, but he likewise might be seriously distracting
them.
The moment this occurred to him he sat down, and was profoundly still
for some time. He then glanced at the light which had been given to
him, and he found himself almost unconsciously engaged in a mental
calculation as to how long it would last him in the night.
Half ashamed, then, of such terrors, as such a consideration would seem
to indicate, he was on the point of hastily extinguishing it, when he
happened to cast his eyes on the now mysterious and highly interesting
portrait in the panel.
The picture, as a picture, was well done, whether it was a correct
likeness or not of the party whom it represented. It was one of those
kind of portraits that seem so life-like, that, as you look at them,
they seem to return your gaze fully, and even to follow you with their
eyes from place to place.
By candle-light such an effect is more likely to become striking and
remarkable than by daylight; and now, as Charles Holland shaded his own
eyes from the light, so as to cast its full radiance upon the portrait,
he felt wonderfully interested in its life-like appearance.
“Here is true skill,” he said; “such as I have not before seen. How
strangely this likeness of a man whom I never saw seems to gaze upon
me.”
Unconsciously, too, he aided the effect, which he justly enough called
life-like, by a slight movement of the candle, such as any one not
blessed with nerves of iron would be sure to make, and such a movement
made the face look as if it was inspired with vitality.
Charles remained looking at the portrait for a considerable period of
time. He found a kind of fascination in it which prevented him from
drawing his eyes away from it. It was not fear which induced him to
continue gazing on it, but the circumstance that it was a likeness of
the man who, after death, was supposed to have borrowed so new and so
hideous an existence, combined with its artistic merits, chained him to
the spot.
“I shall now,” he said, “know that face again, let me see it where I
may, or under what circumstances I may. Each feature is now indelibly
fixed upon my memory—I never can mistake it.”
He turned aside as he uttered these words, and as he did so his eyes
fell upon a part of the ornamental frame which composed the edge of the
panel, and which seemed to him to be of a different colour from the
surrounding portion.
Curiosity and increased interest prompted him at once to make a closer
inquiry into the matter; and, by a careful and diligent scrutiny, he
was almost induced to come to the positive opinion, that at no very
distant period in time past, the portrait had been removed from the
place it occupied.
When once this idea, even vague and indistinct as it was, in
consequence of the slight grounds he formed it on, had got possession
of his mind, he felt most anxious to prove its verification or its
fallacy.
He held the candle in a variety of situations, so that its light fell
in different ways on the picture; and the more he examined it, the more
he felt convinced that it must have been moved lately.
It would appear as if, in its removal, a piece of the old oaken carved
framework of the panel had been accidentally broken off, which caused
the new look of the fracture, and that this accident, from the nature
of the broken bit of framing, could have occurred in any other way
than from an actual or attempted removal of the picture, he felt was
extremely unlikely.
He set down the candle on a chair near at hand, and tried if the panel
was fast in its place. Upon the very first touch, he felt convinced
it was not so, and that it easily moved. How to get it out, though,
presented a difficulty, and to get it out was tempting.
“Who knows,” he said to himself, “what may be behind it? This is an
old baronial sort of hall, and the greater portion of it was, no
doubt, built at a time when the construction of such places as hidden
chambers and intricate staircases were, in all buildings of importance,
considered a disiderata.”
That he should make some discovery behind the portrait, now became an
idea that possessed him strongly, although he certainly had no definite
grounds for really supposing that he should do so.
Perhaps the wish was more father to the thought than he, in the partial
state of excitement he was in, really imagined; but so it was. He felt
convinced that he should not be satisfied until he had removed that
panel from the wall, and seen what was immediately behind it.
After the panel containing the picture had been placed where it was, it
appeared that pieces of moulding had been inserted all around, which
had had the effect of keeping it in its place, and it was a fracture of
one of these pieces which had first called Charles Holland’s attention
to the probability of the picture having been removed. That he should
have to get two, at least, of the pieces of moulding away, before he
could hope to remove the picture, was to him quite apparent, and he
was considering how he should accomplish such a result, when he was
suddenly startled by a knock at his chamber door.
Until that sudden demand for admission at his door came, he scarcely
knew to what a nervous state he had worked himself up. It was an odd
sort of tap—one only—a single tap, as if some one demanded admittance,
and wished to awaken his attention with the least possible chance of
disturbing any one else.
“Come in,” said Charles, for he knew he had not fastened his door;
“come in.”
There was no reply, but after a moment’s pause, the same sort of low
tap came again.
Again he cried “come in,” but, whoever it was, seemed determined that
the door should be opened for him, and no movement was made from the
outside. A third time the tap came, and Charles was very close to the
door when he heard it, for with a noiseless step he had approached it
intending to open it. The instant this third mysterious demand for
admission came, he did open it wide. There was no one there! In an
instant he crossed the threshold into the corridor, which ran right and
left. A window at one end of it now sent in the moon’s rays, so that
it was tolerably light, but he could see no one. Indeed, to look for
any one, he felt sure was needless, for he had opened his chamber-door
almost simultaneously with the last knock for admission.
“It is strange,” he said, as he lingered on the threshold of his room
door for some moments; “my imagination could not so completely deceive
me. There was most certainly a demand for admission.”
Slowly, then, he returned to his room again, and closed the door behind
him.
“One thing is evident,” he said, “that if I am in this apartment to be
subjected to these annoyances, I shall get no rest, which will soon
exhaust me.”
This thought was a very provoking one, and the more he thought that
he should ultimately find a necessity for giving up that chamber he
had himself asked as a special favour to be allowed to occupy, the
more vexed he became to think what construction might be put upon his
conduct for so doing.
“They will all fancy me a coward,” he thought, “and that I dare not
sleep here. They may not, of course, say so, but they will think that
my appearing so bold was one of those acts of bravado which I have not
courage to carry fairly out.”
Taking this view of the matter was just the way to enlist a young man’s
pride in staying, under all circumstances, where he was, and, with a
slight accession of colour, which, even although he was alone, would
visit his cheeks, Charles Holland said aloud,—
“I will remain the occupant of this room come what may, happen what
may. No terrors, real or unsubstantial, shall drive me from it; I will
brave them all, and remain here to brave them.”
Tap came the knock at the door again, and now, with more an air of
vexation than fear, Charles turned again towards it, and listened. Tap
in another minute again succeeded, and much annoyed, he walked close
to the door, and laid his hand upon the lock, ready to open it at the
precise moment of another demand for admission being made.
He had not to wait long. In about half a minute it came again, and,
simultaneously with the sound, the door flew open. There was no one to
be seen; but, as he opened the door, he heard a strange sound in the
corridor—a sound which scarcely could be called a groan, and scarcely
a sigh, but seemed a compound of both, having the agony of the one
combined with the sadness of the other. From what direction it came he
could not at the moment decide, but he called out,—
“Who’s there? who’s there?”
The echo of his own voice alone answered him for a few moments, and
then he heard a door open, and a voice, which he knew to be Henry’s,
cried,—
“What is it? who speaks?”
“Henry,” said Charles.
“Yes—yes—yes.”
“I fear I have disturbed you.”
“You have been disturbed yourself, or you would not have done so. I
shall be with you in a moment.”
Henry closed his door before Charles Holland could tell him not to come
to him, as he intended to do, for he felt ashamed to have, in a manner
of speaking, summoned assistance for so trifling a cause of alarm
as that to which he had been subjected. However, he could not go to
Henry’s chamber to forbid him from coming to his, and, more vexed than
before, he retired to his room again to await his coming.
He left the door open now, so that Henry Bannerworth, when he had got
on some articles of dress, walked in at once, saying,—
“What has happened, Charles?”
“A mere trifle, Henry, concerning which I am ashamed you should have
been at all disturbed.”
“Never mind that, I was wakeful.”
“Did you hear me open my door?”
“I heard a door open, which kept me listening, but I could not decide
which door it was till I heard your voice in the corridor.”
“Well, it was this door; and I opened it twice in consequence of the
repeated taps for admission that came to it; some one has been knocking
at it, and, when I go to it, lo! I can see nobody.”
“Indeed!”
“Such is the case.”
“You surprise me.”
“I am very sorry to have disturbed you, because, upon such a ground, I
do not feel that I ought to have done so; and, when I called out in the
corridor, I assure you it was with no such intention.”
“Do not regret it for a moment,” said Henry; “you were quite justified
in making an alarm on such an occasion.”
“It’s strange enough, but still it may arise from some accidental
cause; admitting, if we did but know it, of some ready enough
explanation.”
“It may, certainly, but, after what has happened already, we may well
suppose a mysterious connexion between any unusual sight or sound, and
the fearful ones we have already seen.”
“Certainly we may.”
“How earnestly that strange portrait seems to look upon us, Charles.”
“It does, and I have been examining it carefully. It seems to have been
removed lately.”
“Removed!”
“Yes, I think, as far as I can judge, that it has been taken from its
frame; I mean, that the panel on which it is painted has been taken
out.”
“Indeed!”
“If you touch it you will find it loose, and, upon a close examination,
you will perceive that a piece of the moulding which holds it in its
place has been chipped off, which is done in such a place that I think
it could only have arisen during the removal of the picture.”
“You must be mistaken.”
“I cannot, of course, take upon myself, Henry, to say precisely such is
the case,” said Charles.
“But there is no one here to do so.”
“That I cannot say. Will you permit me and assist me to remove it? I
have a great curiosity to know what is behind it.”
“If you have, I certainly will do so. We thought of taking it away
altogether, but when Flora left this room the idea was given up as
useless. Remain here a few moments, and I will endeavour to find
something which shall assist us in its removal.”
Henry left the mysterious chamber in order to search in his own for
some means of removing the frame-work of the picture, so that the panel
would slip easily out, and while he was gone, Charles Holland continued
gazing upon it with greater interest, if possible, than before.
In a few minutes Henry returned, and although what he had succeeded in
finding were very inefficient implements for the purpose, yet with this
aid the two young men set about the task.
It is said, and said truly enough, that “where there is a will there is
a way,” and although the young men had no tools at all adapted for the
purpose, they did succeed in removing the moulding from the sides of
the panel, and then by a little tapping at one end of it, and using a
knife as a lever at the other end of the panel, they got it fairly out.
[Illustration: The men remove the picture from the wall.]
Disappointment was all they got for their pains. On the other side
there was nothing but a rough wooden wall, against which the finer and
more nicely finished oak panelling of the chamber rested.
“There is no mystery here,” said Henry.
“None whatever,” said Charles, as he tapped the wall with his knuckles,
and found it all hard and sound. “We are foiled.”
“We are indeed.”
“I had a strange presentiment, now,” added Charles, “that we should
make some discovery that would repay us for our trouble. It appears,
however, that such is not to be the case; for you see nothing presents
itself to us but the most ordinary appearances.”
“I perceive as much; and the panel itself, although of more than
ordinary thickness, is, after all, but a bit of planed oak, and
apparently fashioned for no other object than to paint the portrait on.”
“True. Shall we replace it?”
Charles reluctantly assented, and the picture was replaced in its
original position. We say Charles reluctantly assented, because,
although he had now had ocular demonstration that there was really
nothing behind the panel but the ordinary wood-work which might have
been expected from the construction of the old house, yet he could not,
even with such a fact staring him in the face, get rid entirely of the
feeling that had come across him, to the effect that the picture had
some mystery or another.
“You are not yet satisfied,” said Henry, as he observed the doubtful
look of Charles Holland’s face.
“My dear friend,” said Charles, “I will not deceive you. I am much
disappointed that we have made no discovery behind that picture.”
“Heaven knows we have mysteries enough in our family,” said Henry.
Even as he spoke they were both startled by a strange clattering noise
at the window, which was accompanied by a shrill, odd kind of shriek,
which sounded fearful and preternatural on the night air.
“What is that?” said Charles.
“God only knows,” said Henry.
The two young men naturally turned their earnest gaze in the direction
of the window, which we have before remarked was one unprovided with
shutters, and there, to their intense surprise, they saw, slowly rising
up from the lower part of it, what appeared to be a human form. Henry
would have dashed forward, but Charles restrained him, and drawing
quickly from its case a large holster pistol, he levelled it carefully
at the figure, saying in a whisper,—
“Henry, if I don’t hit it, I will consent to forfeit my head.”
He pulled the trigger—a loud report followed—the room was filled with
smoke, and then all was still. A circumstance, however, had occurred,
as a consequence of the concussion of air produced by the discharge
of the pistol, which neither of the young men had for the moment
calculated upon, and that was the putting out of the only light they
there had.
[Illustration: Charles fires the pistol at the window.]
In spite of this circumstance, Charles, the moment he had discharged
the pistol, dropped it and sprung forward to the window. But here he
was perplexed, for he could not find the old fashioned, intricate
fastening which held it shut, and he had to call to Henry,—
“Henry! For God’s sake open the window for me, Henry! The fastening of
the window is known to you, but not to me. Open it for me.”
Thus called upon, Henry sprung forward, and by this time the report of
the pistol had effectually alarmed the whole household. The flashing
of lights from the corridor came into the room, and in another minute,
just as Henry succeeded in getting the window wide open, and Charles
Holland had made his way on to the balcony, both George Bannerworth and
Mr. Marchdale entered the chamber, eager to know what had occurred. To
their eager questions Henry replied,—
“Ask me not now;” and then calling to Charles, he said,—“Remain where
you are, Charles, while I run down to the garden immediately beneath
the balcony.”
“Yes—yes,” said Charles.
Henry made prodigious haste, and was in the garden immediately below
the bay window in a wonderfully short space of time. He spoke to
Charles, saying,—
“Will you now descend? I can see nothing here; but we will both make a
search.”
George and Mr. Marchdale were both now in the balcony, and they would
have descended likewise, but Henry said,—
“Do not all leave the house. God only knows, now, situated as we are,
what might happen.”
“I will remain, then,” said George. “I have been sitting up to-night as
the guard, and, therefore, may as well continue to do so.”
Marchdale and Charles Holland clambered over the balcony, and easily,
from its insignificant height, dropped into the garden. The night
was beautiful, and profoundly still. There was not a breath of air
sufficient to stir a leaf on a tree, and the very flame of the candle
which Charles had left burning in the balcony burnt clearly and
steadily, being perfectly unruffled by any wind.
It cast a sufficient light close to the window to make everything very
plainly visible, and it was evident at a glance that no object was
there, although had that figure, which Charles shot at, and no doubt
hit, been flesh and blood, it must have dropped immediately below.
As they looked up for a moment after a cursory examination of the
ground, Charles exclaimed,—
“Look at the window! As the light is now situated, you can see the hole
made in one of the panes of glass by the passage of the bullet from my
pistol.”
They did look, and there the clear, round hole, without any starring,
which a bullet discharged close to a pane of glass will make in it, was
clearly and plainly discernible.
“You must have hit him,” said Henry.
“One would think so,” said Charles; “for that was the exact place where
the figure was.”
“And there is nothing here,” added Marchdale. “What can we think of
these events—what resource has the mind against the most dreadful
suppositions concerning them?”
Charles and Henry were both silent; in truth, they knew not what to
think, and the words uttered by Marchdale were too strikingly true to
dispute for a moment. They were lost in wonder.
“Human means against such an appearance as we saw to-night,” said
Charles, “are evidently useless.”
“My dear young friend,” said Marchdale, with much emotion, as he
grasped Henry Bannerworth’s hand, and the tears stood in his eyes as
he did so,—“my dear young friend, these constant alarms will kill you.
They will drive you, and all whose happiness you hold dear, distracted.
You must control these dreadful feelings, and there is but one chance
that I can see of getting now the better of these.”
“What is that?”
“By leaving this place for ever.”
“Alas! am I to be driven from the home of my ancestors from such a
cause as this? And whither am I to fly? Where are we to find a refuge?
To leave here will be at once to break up the establishment which is
now held together, certainly upon the sufferance of creditors, but
still to their advantage, inasmuch as I am doing what no one else would
do, namely, paying away to within the scantiest pittance the whole
proceeds of the estate that spreads around me.”
“Heed nothing but an escape from such horrors as seem to be
accumulating now around you.”
“If I were sure that such a removal would bring with it such a
corresponding advantage, I might, indeed, be induced to risk all to
accomplish it.”
“As regards poor dear Flora,” said Mr. Marchdale, “I know not what to
say, or what to think; she has been attacked by a vampyre, and after
this mortal life shall have ended, it is dreadful to think there may
be a possibility that she, with all her beauty, all her excellence and
purity of mind, and all those virtues and qualities which should make
her the beloved of all, and which do, indeed, attach all hearts towards
her, should become one of that dreadful tribe of beings who cling to
existence by feeding, in the most dreadful manner, upon the life blood
of others—oh, it is too dreadful to contemplate! Too horrible—too
horrible!”
“Then wherefore speak of it?” said Charles, with some asperity. “Now,
by the great God of Heaven, who sees all our hearts, I will not give
in to such a horrible doctrine! I will not believe it; and were death
itself my portion for my want of faith, I would this moment die in my
disbelief of anything so truly fearful!”
“Oh, my young friend,” added Marchdale, “if anything could add to the
pangs which all who love, and admire, and respect Flora Bannerworth
must feel at the unhappy condition in which she is placed, it would be
the noble nature of you, who, under happier auspices, would have been
her guide through life, and the happy partner of her destiny.”
“As I will be still.”
“May Heaven forbid it! We are now among ourselves, and can talk freely
upon such a subject. Mr. Charles Holland, if you wed, you would look
forward to being blessed with children—those sweet ties which bind
the sternest hearts to life with so exquisite a bondage. Oh, fancy,
then, for a moment, the mother of your babes coming at the still hour
of midnight to drain from their veins the very life blood she gave
to them. To drive you and them mad with the expected horror of such
visitations—to make your nights hideous—your days but so many hours
of melancholy retrospection. Oh, you know not the world of terror, on
the awful brink of which you stand, when you talk of making Flora
Bannerworth a wife.”
“Peace! oh, peace!” said Henry.
“Nay, I know my words are unwelcome,” continued Mr. Marchdale. “It
happens, unfortunately for human nature, that truth and some of our
best and holiest feelings are too often at variance, and hold a sad
contest——”
“I will hear no more of this,” cried Charles Holland.—“I will hear no
more.”
“I have done,” said Mr. Marchdale.
“And ’twere well you had not begun.”
“Nay, say not so. I have but done what I considered was a solemn duty.”
“Under that assumption of doing duty—a solemn duty—heedless of the
feelings and the opinions of others,” said Charles, sarcastically,
“more mischief is produced—more heart-burnings and anxieties caused,
than by any other two causes of such mischievous results combined. I
wish to hear no more of this.”
“Do not be angered with Mr. Marchdale, Charles,” said Henry. “He can
have no motive but our welfare in what he says. We should not condemn a
speaker because his words may not sound pleasant to our ears.”
“By Heaven!” said Charles, with animation, “I meant not to be
illiberal; but I will not, because I cannot see a man’s motives for
active interference in the affairs of others, always be ready, merely
on account of such ignorance, to jump to a conclusion that they must be
estimable.”
“To-morrow, I leave this house,” said Marchdale.
“Leave us?” exclaimed Henry.
“Ay, for ever.”
“Nay, now, Mr. Marchdale, is this generous?”
“Am I treated generously by one who is your own guest, and towards whom
I was willing to hold out the honest right hand of friendship?”
Henry turned to Charles Holland, saying,—
“Charles, I know your generous nature. Say you meant no offence to my
mother’s old friend.”
“If to say I meant no offence,” said Charles, “is to say I meant no
insult, I say it freely.”
“Enough,” cried Marchdale; “I am satisfied.”
“But do not,” added Charles, “draw me any more such pictures as the one
you have already presented to my imagination, I beg of you. From the
storehouse of my own fancy I can find quite enough to make me wretched,
if I choose to be so; but again and again do I say I will not allow
this monstrous superstition to tread me down, like the tread of a giant
on a broken reed. I will contend against it while I have life to do so.”
“Bravely spoken.”
“And when I desert Flora Bannerworth, may Heaven, from that moment,
desert me!”
“Charles!” cried Henry, with emotion, “dear Charles, my more than
friend—brother of my heart—noble Charles!”
“Nay, Henry, I am not entitled to your praises. I were base indeed to
be other than that which I purpose to be. Come weal or woe—come what
may, I am the affianced husband of your sister, and she, and she only,
can break asunder the tie that binds me to her.”
CHAPTER XIII.
THE OFFER FOR THE HALL.—THE VISIT TO SIR FRANCIS VARNEY.—THE STRANGE
RESEMBLANCE.—A DREADFUL SUGGESTION.
The party made a strict search through every nook and corner of the
garden, but it proved to be a fruitless one; not the least trace of any
one could be found. There was only one circumstance, which was pondered
over deeply by them all, and that was that, beneath the window of the
room in which Flora and her mother sat while the brothers were on their
visit to the vault of their ancestors, were visible marks of blood to a
considerable extent.
It will be remembered that Flora had fired a pistol at the spectral
appearance, and that immediately upon that it had disappeared, after
uttering a sound which might well be construed into a cry of pain from
a wound.
That a wound then had been inflicted upon some one, the blood beneath
the window now abundantly testified; and when it was discovered, Henry
and Charles made a very close examination indeed of the garden, to
discover what direction the wounded figure, be it man or vampyre, had
taken.
But the closest scrutiny did not reveal to them a single spot of blood,
beyond the space immediately beneath the window;—there the apparition
seemed to have received its wound, and then, by some mysterious means,
to have disappeared.
At length, wearied with the continued excitement, combined with want of
sleep, to which they had been subjected, they returned to the hall.
Flora, with the exception of the alarm she experienced from the firing
of the pistol, had met with no disturbance, and that, in order to
spare her painful reflections, they told her was merely done as a
precautionary measure, to proclaim to any one who might be lurking
in the garden that the inmates of the house were ready to defend
themselves against any aggression.
Whether or not she believed this kind deceit they knew not. She only
sighed deeply, and wept. The probability is, that she more than
suspected the vampyre had made another visit, but they forbore to press
the point; and, leaving her with her mother, Henry and George went from
her chamber again—the former to endeavour to seek some repose, as it
would be his turn to watch on the succeeding night, and the latter to
resume his station in a small room close to Flora’s chamber, where it
had been agreed watch and ward should be kept by turns while the alarm
lasted.
At length, the morning again dawned upon that unhappy family, and to
none were its beams more welcome.
The birds sang their pleasant carols beneath the window. The sweet,
deep-coloured autumnal sun shone upon all objects with a golden lustre;
and to look abroad, upon the beaming face of nature, no one could for a
moment suppose, except from sad experience, that there were such things
as gloom, misery, and crime, upon the earth.
“And must I,” said Henry, as he gazed from a window of the hall upon
the undulating park, the majestic trees, the flowers, the shrubs,
and the many natural beauties with which the place was full,—“must I
be chased from this spot, the home of myself and of my kindred, by a
phantom—must I indeed seek refuge elsewhere, because my own home has
become hideous?”
It was indeed a cruel and a painful thought! It was one he yet would
not, could not be convinced was absolutely necessary. But now the sun
was shining; it was morning; and the feelings, which found a home in
his breast amid the darkness, the stillness, and the uncertainty of
night, were chased away by those glorious beams of sunlight, that fell
upon hill, valley, and stream, and the thousand sweet sounds of life
and animation that filled that sunny air!
Such a revulsion of feeling was natural enough. Many of the distresses
and mental anxieties of night vanish with the night, and those which
oppressed the heart of Henry Bannerworth were considerably modified.
He was engaged in these reflections when he heard the sound of
the lodge bell, and as a visitor was now somewhat rare at this
establishment, he waited with some anxiety to see to whom he was
indebted for so early a call.
In the course of a few minutes, one of the servants came to him with a
letter in her hand.
It bore a large handsome seal, and, from its appearance, would seem to
have come from some personage of consequence. A second glance at it
shewed him the name of “Varney” in the corner, and, with some degree of
vexation, he muttered to himself,
“Another condoling epistle from the troublesome neighbour whom I have
not yet seen.”
“If you please, sir,” said the servant who had brought him the letter,
“as I’m here, and you are here, perhaps you’ll have no objection to
give me what I’m to have for the day and two nights as I’ve been here,
cos I can’t stay in a family as is so familiar with all sorts o’
ghostesses; I ain’t used to such company.”
“What do you mean?” said Henry.
The question was a superfluous one; too well he knew what the woman
meant, and the conviction came across his mind strongly that no
domestic would consent to live long in a house which was subject to
such dreadful visitations.
“What does I mean!” said the woman,—“why, sir, if it’s all the same to
you, I don’t myself come of a wampyre family, and I don’t choose to
remain in a house where there is sich things encouraged. That’s what I
means, sir.”
“What wages are owing to you?” said Henry.
“Why, as to wages, I only comed here by the day.”
“Go, then, and settle with my mother. The sooner you leave this house,
the better.”
“Oh, indeed. I’m sure I don’t want to stay.”
This woman was one of those who were always armed at all points for
a row, and she had no notion of concluding any engagement, of any
character whatever, without some disturbance; therefore, to see Henry
take what she said with such provoking calmness was aggravating in
the extreme; but there was no help for such a source of vexation. She
could find no other ground of quarrel than what was connected with the
vampyre, and, as Henry would not quarrel with her on such a score, she
was compelled to give it up in despair.
When Henry found himself alone, and free from the annoyance of this
woman, he turned his attention to the letter he held in his hand, and
which, from the autograph in the corner, he knew came from his new
neighbour, Sir Francis Varney, whom, by some chance or another, he had
never yet seen.
To his great surprise, he found that the letter contained the following
words:—
Dear Sir,—“As a neighbour, by purchase of an estate contiguous
to your own, I am quite sure you have excused, and taken in
good part, the cordial offer I made to you of friendship and
service some short time since; but now, in addressing to you a
distinct proposition, I trust I shall meet with an indulgent
consideration, whether such proposition be accordant with your
views or not.
“What I have heard from common report induces me to believe
that Bannerworth Hall cannot be a desirable residence for
yourself, or your amiable sister. If I am right in that
conjecture, and you have any serious thought of leaving the
place, I would earnestly recommend you, as one having some
experience in such descriptions of property, to sell it at once.
“Now, the proposition with which I conclude this letter is, I
know, of a character to make you doubt the disinterestedness of
such advice; but that it is disinterested, nevertheless, is a
fact of which I can assure my own heart, and of which I beg to
assure you. I propose, then, should you, upon consideration,
decide upon such a course of proceeding, to purchase of you the
Hall. I do not ask for a bargain on account of any extraneous
circumstances which may at the present time depreciate the
value of the property, but I am willing to give a fair price
for it. Under these circumstances, I trust, sir, that you will
give a kindly consideration to my offer, and even if you reject
it, I hope that, as neighbours, we may live long in peace and
amity, and in the interchange of those good offices which
should subsist between us. Awaiting your reply,
“Believe me to be, dear sir,
“Your very obedient servant,
“+Francis Varney+.
“To Henry Bannerworth, Esq.”
Henry, after having read this most unobjectionable letter through,
folded it up again, and placed it in his pocket. Clasping his hands,
then, behind his back, a favourite attitude of his when he was in deep
contemplation, he paced to and fro in the garden for some time in deep
thought.
“How strange,” he muttered. “It seems that every circumstance combines
to induce me to leave my old ancestral home. It appears as if
everything now that happened had that direct tendency. What can be the
meaning of all this? ’Tis very strange—amazingly strange. Here arise
circumstances which are enough to induce any man to leave a particular
place. Then a friend, in whose single-mindedness and judgment I know I
can rely, advises the step, and immediately upon the back of that comes
a fair and candid offer.”
There was an apparent connexion between all these circumstances which
much puzzled Henry. He walked to and fro for nearly an hour, until
he heard a hasty footstep approaching him, and upon looking in the
direction from whence it came, he saw Mr. Marchdale.
“I will seek Marchdale’s advice,” he said, “upon this matter. I will
hear what he says concerning it.”
“Henry,” said Marchdale, when he came sufficiently near to him for
conversation, “why do you remain here alone?”
“I have received a communication from our neighbour, Sir Francis
Varney,” said Henry.
“Indeed!”
“It is here. Peruse it for yourself, and then tell me, Marchdale,
candidly what you think of it.”
“I suppose,” said Marchdale, as he opened the letter, “it is another
friendly note of condolence on the state of your domestic affairs,
which, I grieve to say, from the prattling of domestics, whose tongues
it is quite impossible to silence, have become food for gossip all over
the neighbouring villages and estates.”
“If anything could add another pang to those I have already been made
to suffer,” said Henry, “it would certainly arise from being made the
food of vulgar gossip. But read the letter, Marchdale. You will find
its contents of a more important character than you anticipate.”
“Indeed!” said Marchdale, as he ran his eyes eagerly over the note.
When he had finished it he glanced at Henry, who then said,—
“Well, what is your opinion?”
“I know not what to say, Henry. You know that my own advice to you has
been to get rid of this place.”
“It has.”
“With the hope that the disagreeable affair connected with it now may
remain connected with it as a house, and not with you and yours as a
family.”
“It may be so.”
“There appears to me every likelihood of it.”
“I do not know,” said Henry, with a shudder. “I must confess,
Marchdale, that to my own perceptions it seems more probable that the
infliction we have experienced from the strange visitor, who seems now
resolved to pester us with visits, will rather attach to a family than
to a house. The vampyre may follow us.”
“If so, of course the parting with the Hall would be a great pity, and
no gain.”
“None in the least.”
“Henry, a thought has struck me.”
“Let’s hear it, Marchdale.”
“It is this:—Suppose you were to try the experiment of leaving the Hall
without selling it. Suppose for one year you were to let it to some
one, Henry.”
“It might be done.”
“Ay, and it might, with very great promise and candour, be proposed
to this very gentleman, Sir Francis Varney, to take it for one year,
to see how he liked it before becoming the possessor of it. Then if
he found himself tormented by the vampyre, he need not complete the
purchase, or if you found that the apparition followed you from hence,
you might yourself return, feeling that perhaps here, in the spots
familiar to your youth, you might be most happy, even under such
circumstances as at present oppress you.”
“Most happy!” ejaculated Henry.
“Perhaps I should not have used that word.”
“I am sure you should not,” said Henry, “when you speak of me.”
“Well—well; let us hope that the time may not be very far distant when
I may use the term happy, as applied to you, in the most conclusive and
the strongest manner it can be used.”
“Oh,” said Henry, “I will hope; but do not mock me with it now,
Marchdale, I pray you.”
“Heaven forbid that I should mock you!”
“Well—well; I do not believe you are the man to do so to any one. But
about this affair of the house.”
“Distinctly, then, if I were you, I would call upon Sir Francis Varney,
and make him an offer to become a tenant of the Hall for twelve months,
during which time you could go where you please, and test the fact of
absence ridding you or not ridding you of the dreadful visitant who
makes the night here truly hideous.”
“I will speak to my mother, to George, and to my sister of the matter.
They shall decide.”
Mr. Marchdale now strove in every possible manner to raise the spirits
of Henry Bannerworth, by painting to him the future in far more radiant
colours than the present, and endeavouring to induce a belief in his
mind that a short period of time might after all replace in his mind,
and in the minds of those who were naturally so dear to him, all their
wonted serenity.
Henry, although he felt not much comfort from these kindly efforts, yet
could feel gratitude to him who made them; and after expressing such
a feeling to Marchdale, in strong terms, he repaired to the house, in
order to hold a solemn consultation with those whom he felt ought to
be consulted as well as himself as to what steps should be taken with
regard to the Hall.
The proposition, or rather the suggestion, which had been made by
Marchdale upon the proposition of Sir Francis Varney, was in every
respect so reasonable and just, that it met, as was to be expected,
with the concurrence of every member of the family.
Flora’s cheeks almost resumed some of their wonted colour at the mere
thought now of leaving that home to which she had been at one time so
much attached.
“Yes, dear Henry,” she said, “let us leave here if you are agreeable so
to do, and in leaving this house, we will believe that we leave behind
us a world of terror.”
“Flora,” remarked Henry, in a tone of slight reproach, “if you were so
anxious to leave Bannerworth Hall, why did you not say so before this
proposition came from other mouths? You know your feelings upon such a
subject would have been laws to me.”
“I knew you were attached to the old house,” said Flora; “and, besides,
events have come upon us all with such fearful rapidity, there has
scarcely been time to think.”
“True—true.”
“And you will leave, Henry?”
“I will call upon Sir Francis Varney myself, and speak to him upon the
subject.”
A new impetus to existence appeared now to come over the whole family,
at the idea of leaving a place which always would be now associated
in their minds with so much terror. Each member of the family felt
happier, and breathed more freely than before, so that the change which
had come over them seemed almost magical. And Charles Holland, too, was
much better pleased, and he whispered to Flora,—
“Dear Flora, you will now surely no longer talk of driving from you the
honest heart that loves you?”
“Hush, Charles, hush!” she said; “meet me an hour hence in the garden,
and we will talk of this.”
“That hour will seem an age,” he said.
Henry, now, having made a determination to see Sir Francis Varney,
lost no time in putting it into execution. At Mr. Marchdale’s own
request, he took him with him, as it was desirable to have a third
person present in the sort of business negotiation which was going
on. The estate which had been so recently entered upon by the person
calling himself Sir Francis Varney, and which common report said he had
purchased, was a small, but complete property, and situated so close
to the grounds connected with Bannerworth Hall, that a short walk soon
placed Henry and Mr. Marchdale before the residence of this gentleman,
who had shown so kindly a feeling towards the Bannerworth family.
“Have you seen Sir Francis Varney?” asked Henry of Mr. Marchdale, as he
rung the gate-bell.
“I have not. Have you?”
“No; I never saw him. It is rather awkward our both being absolute
strangers to his person.”
“We can but send in our names, however; and, from the great vein of
courtesy that runs through his letter, I have no doubt but we shall
receive the most gentlemanly reception from him.”
A servant in handsome livery appeared at the iron-gates, which opened
upon a lawn in the front of Sir Francis Varney’s house, and to this
domestic Henry Bannerworth handed his card, on which he had written, in
pencil, likewise the name of Mr. Marchdale.
“If your master,” he said, “is within, we shall be glad to see him.”
“Sir Francis is at home, sir,” was the reply, “although not very well.
If you will be pleased to walk in, I will announce you to him.”
Henry and Marchdale followed the man into a handsome enough
reception-room, where they were desired to wait while their names were
announced.
“Do you know if this gentleman be a baronet,” said Henry, “or a knight
merely?”
“I really do not; I never saw him in my life, or heard of him before he
came into this neighbourhood.”
“And I have been too much occupied with the painful occurrences of this
hall to know anything of our neighbours. I dare say Mr. Chillingworth,
if we had thought to ask him, would have known something concerning
him.”
“No doubt.”
This brief colloquy was put an end to by the servant, who said,—
“My master, gentlemen, is not very well; but he begs me to present his
best compliments, and to say he is much gratified with your visit, and
will be happy to see you in his study.”
Henry and Marchdale followed the man up a flight of stone stairs, and
then they were conducted through a large apartment into a smaller
one. There was very little light in this small room; but at the
moment of their entrance a tall man, who was seated, rose, and,
touching the spring of a blind that was to the window, it was up
in a moment, admitting a broad glare of light. A cry of surprise,
mingled with terror, came from Henry Bannerworth’s lip. _The original
of the portrait on the panel stood before him!_ There was the lofty
stature, the long, sallow face, the slightly projecting teeth, the
dark, lustrous, although somewhat sombre eyes; the expression of the
features—all were alike.
[Illustration: The men behold Sir Varney, with surprise.]
“Are you unwell, sir?” said Sir Francis Varney, in soft, mellow
accents, as he handed a chair to the bewildered Henry.
“God of Heaven!” said Henry; “how like!”
“You seem surprised, sir. Have you ever seen me before?”
Sir Francis drew himself up to his full height, and cast a strange
glance upon Henry, whose eyes were rivetted upon his face, as if with a
species of fascination which he could not resist.
“Marchdale,” Henry gasped; “Marchdale, my friend, Marchdale. I—I am
surely mad.”
“Hush! be calm,” whispered Marchdale.
“Calm—calm—can you not see? Marchdale, is this a dream? Look—look—oh!
look.”
“For God’s sake, Henry, compose yourself.”
“Is your friend often thus?” said Sir Francis Varney, with the same
mellifluous tone which seemed habitual to him.
“No, sir, he is not; but recent circumstances have shattered his
nerves; and, to tell the truth, you bear so strong a resemblance to an
old portrait, in his house, that I do not wonder so much as I otherwise
should at his agitation.”
“Indeed.”
“A resemblance!” said Henry; “a resemblance! God of Heaven! it is the
face itself.”
“You much surprise me,” said Sir Francis.
Henry sunk into the chair which was near him, and he trembled
violently. The rush of painful thoughts and conjectures that came
through his mind was enough to make any one tremble. “Is this the
vampyre?” was the horrible question that seemed impressed upon his very
brain, in letters of flame. “Is this the vampyre?”
“Are you better, sir?” said Sir Francis Varney, in his bland, musical
voice. “Shall I order any refreshment for you?”
“No—no,” gasped Henry; “for the love of truth tell me! Is—is your name
really Varney!”
“Sir?”
“Have you no other name to which, perhaps, a better title you could
urge?”
“Mr. Bannerworth, I can assure you that I am too proud of the name of
the family to which I belong to exchange it for any other, be it what
it may.”
“How wonderfully like!”
“I grieve to see you so much distressed, Mr. Bannerworth. I presume
ill health has thus shattered your nerves?”
“No; ill health has not done the work. I know not what to say, Sir
Francis Varney, to you; but recent events in my family have made the
sight of you full of horrible conjectures.”
“What mean you, sir?”
“You know, from common report, that we have had a fearful visitor at
our house.”
“A vampyre, I have heard,” said Sir Francis Varney, with a bland, and
almost beautiful smile, which displayed his white glistening teeth to
perfection.
“Yes; a vampyre, and—and——”
“I pray you go on, sir; you surely are far above the vulgar
superstition of believing in such matters?”
“My judgment is assailed in too many ways and shapes for it to hold out
probably as it ought to do against so hideous a belief, but never was
it so much bewildered as now.”
“Why so?”
“Because——”
“Nay, Henry,” whispered Mr. Marchdale, “it is scarcely civil to tell
Sir Francis to his face, that he resembles a vampyre.”
“I must, I must.”
“Pray, sir,” interrupted Varney to Marchdale, “permit Mr. Bannerworth
to speak here freely. There is nothing in the whole world I so much
admire as candour.”
“Then you so much resemble the vampyre,” added Henry, “that—that I know
not what to think.”
“Is it possible?” said Varney.
“It is a damning fact.”
“Well, it’s unfortunate for me, I presume? Ah!”
Varney gave a twinge of pain, as if some sudden bodily ailment had
attacked him severely.
“You are unwell, sir?” said Marchdale.
“No, no—no,” he said; “I—hurt my arm, and happened accidentally to
touch the arm of this chair with it.”
“A hurt?” said Henry.
“Yes, Mr. Bannerworth.”
“A—a wound?”
“Yes, a wound, but not much more than skin deep. In fact, little beyond
an abrasion of the skin.”
“May I inquire how you came by it?”
“Oh, yes. A slight fall.”
“Indeed.”
“Remarkable, is it not? Very remarkable. We never know a moment when,
from some most trifling cause, we may receive really some serious
bodily hurt. How true it is, Mr. Bannerworth, that in the midst of life
we are in death.”
“And equally true, perhaps,” said Henry, “that in the midst of death
there may be found a horrible life.”
“Well, I should not wonder. There are really so many strange things in
this world, that I have left off wondering at anything now.”
“There are strange things,” said Henry. “You wish to purchase of me the
Hall, sir?”
“If you wish to sell.”
“You—you are perhaps attached to the place? Perhaps you recollected it,
sir, long ago?”
“Not very long,” smiled Sir Francis Varney. “It seems a nice
comfortable old house; and the grounds, too, appear to be amazingly
well wooded, which, to one of rather a romantic temperament like
myself, is always an additional charm to a place. I was extremely
pleased with it the first time I beheld it, and a desire to call myself
the owner of it took possession of my mind. The scenery is remarkable
for its beauty, and, from what I have seen of it, it is rarely to be
excelled. No doubt you are greatly attached to it.”
“It has been my home from infancy,” returned Henry, “and being also the
residence of my ancestors for centuries, it is natural that I should be
so.”
“True—true.”
“The house, no doubt, has suffered much,” said Henry, “within the last
hundred years.”
“No doubt it has. A hundred years is a tolerable long space of time,
you know.”
“It is, indeed. Oh, how any human life which is spun out to such an
extent, must lose its charms, by losing all its fondest and dearest
associations.”
“Ah, how true,” said Sir Francis Varney. He had some minutes previously
touched a bell, and at this moment a servant brought in on a tray some
wine and refreshments.
CHAPTER XIV.
HENRY’S AGREEMENT WITH SIR FRANCIS VARNEY.—THE SUDDEN ARRIVAL AT THE
HALL.—FLORA’S ALARM.
On the tray which the servant brought into the room, were refreshments
of different kinds, including wine, and after waving his hand for the
domestic to retire, Sir Francis Varney said,—
“You will be better, Mr. Bannerworth, for a glass of wine after your
walk, and you too, sir. I am ashamed to say, I have quite forgotten
your name.”
“Marchdale.”
“Mr. Marchdale. Ay, Marchdale. Pray, sir, help yourself.”
[Illustration: Sir Varney offers refreshments to the gentlemen.]
“You take nothing yourself?” said Henry.
“I am under a strict regimen,” replied Varney. “The simplest diet alone
does for me, and I have accustomed myself to long abstinence.”
“He will not eat or drink,” muttered Henry, abstractedly.
“Will you sell me the Hall?” said Sir Francis Varney.
Henry looked in his face again, from which he had only momentarily
withdrawn his eyes, and he was then more struck than ever with the
resemblance between him and the portrait on the panel of what had been
Flora’s chamber. What made that resemblance, too, one about which there
could scarcely be two opinions, was the mark or cicatrix of a wound in
the forehead, which the painter had slightly indented in the portrait,
but which was much more plainly visible on the forehead of Sir Francis
Varney. Now that Henry observed this distinctive mark, which he had not
done before, he could feel no doubt, and a sickening sensation came
over him at the thought that he was actually now in the presence of one
of those terrible creatures, vampyres.
“You do not drink,” said Varney. “Most young men are not so modest with
a decanter of unimpeachable wine before them. I pray you help yourself.”
“I cannot.”
Henry rose as he spoke, and turning to Marchdale, he said, in addition,—
“Will you come away?”
“If you please,” said Marchdale, rising.
“But you have not, my dear sir,” said Varney, “given me yet any answer
about the Hall?”
“I cannot yet,” answered Henry, “I will think. My present impression
is, to let you have it on whatever terms you may yourself propose,
always provided you consent to one of mine.”
“Name it.”
“That you never show yourself in my family.”
“How very unkind. I understand you have a charming sister, young,
beautiful, and accomplished. Shall I confess, now, that I had hopes of
making myself agreeable to her?”
“You make yourself agreeable to her? The sight of you would blast her
for ever, and drive her to madness.”
“Am I so hideous?”
“No, but—you are——”
“What am I?”
“Hush, Henry, hush,” cried Marchdale. “Remember you are in this
gentleman’s house.”
“True, true. Why does he tempt me to say these dreadful things? I do
not want to say them.”
“Come away, then—come away at once. Sir Francis Varney, my friend, Mr.
Bannerworth, will think over your offer, and let you know. I think you
may consider that your wish to become the purchaser of the Hall will be
complied with.”
“I wish to have it,” said Varney, “and I can only say, that if I am
master of it, I shall be very happy to see any of the family on a visit
at any time.”
“A visit!” said Henry, with a shudder. “A visit to the tomb were far
more desirable. Farewell, sir.”
“Adieu,” said Sir Francis Varney, and he made one of the most elegant
bows in the world, while there came over his face a peculiarity of
expression that was strange, if not painful, to contemplate. In another
minute Henry and Marchdale were clear of the house, and with feelings
of bewilderment and horror, which beggar all description, poor Henry
allowed himself to be led by the arm by Marchdale to some distance,
without uttering a word. When he did speak, he said,—
“Marchdale, it would be charity of some one to kill me.”
“To kill you!”
“Yes, for I am certain otherwise that I must go mad.”
“Nay, nay; rouse yourself.”
“This man, Varney, is a vampyre.”
“Hush! hush!”
“I tell you, Marchdale,” cried Henry, in a wild, excited manner, “he
is a vampyre. He is the dreadful being who visited Flora at the still
hour of midnight, and drained the life-blood from her veins. He is a
vampyre. There are such things. I cannot doubt now. Oh, God, I wish now
that your lightnings would blast me, as here I stand, for ever into
annihilation, for I am going mad to be compelled to feel that such
horrors can really have existence.”
“Henry—Henry.”
“Nay, talk not to me. What can I do? Shall I kill him? Is it not a
sacred duty to destroy such a thing? Oh, horror—horror. He must be
killed—destroyed—burnt, and the very dust to which he is consumed must
be scattered to the winds of Heaven. It would be a deed well done,
Marchdale.”
“Hush! hush! These words are dangerous.”
“I care not.”
“What if they were overheard now by unfriendly ears? What might not be
the uncomfortable results? I pray you be more cautious what you say of
this strange man.”
“I must destroy him.”
“And wherefore?”
“Can you ask? Is he not a vampyre?”
“Yes; but reflect, Henry, for a moment upon the length to which you
might carry out so dangerous an argument. It is said that vampyres
are made by vampyres sucking the blood of those who, but for that
circumstance, would have died and gone to decay in the tomb along with
ordinary mortals; but that being so attacked during life by a vampyre,
they themselves, after death, become such.”
“Well—well, what is that to me?”
“Have you forgotten Flora?”
A cry of despair came from poor Henry’s lips, and in a moment he seemed
completely, mentally and physically, prostrated.
“God of Heaven!” he moaned, “I had forgotten her!”
“I thought you had.”
“Oh, if the sacrifice of my own life would suffice to put an end to
all this accumulating horror, how gladly would I lay it down. Ay, in
any way—in any way. No mode of death should appall me. No amount of
pain make me shrink. I could smile then upon the destroyer, and say,
‘welcome—welcome—most welcome.’”
“Rather, Henry, seek to live for those whom you love than die for them.
Your death would leave them desolate. In life you may ward off many a
blow of fate from them.”
“I may endeavour so to do.”
“Consider that Flora may be wholly dependent upon such kindness as you
may be able to bestow upon her.”
“Charles clings to her.”
“Humph!”
“You do not doubt him?”
“My dear friend, Henry Bannerworth, although I am not an old man, yet I
am so much older than you that I have seen a great deal of the world,
and am, perhaps, far better able to come to accurate judgments with
regard to individuals.”
“No doubt—no doubt; but yet——”
“Nay, hear me out. Such judgments, founded upon experience, when
uttered have all the character of prophecy about them. I, therefore,
now prophecy to you that Charles Holland will yet be so stung with
horror at the circumstance of a vampyre visiting Flora, that he will
never make her his wife.”
“Marchdale, I differ from you most completely,” said Henry. “I know
that Charles Holland is the very soul of honour.”
“I cannot argue the matter with you. It has not become a thing of fact.
I have only sincerely to hope that I am wrong.”
“You are, you may depend, entirely wrong. I cannot be deceived in
Charles. From you such words produce no effect but one of regret that
you should so much err in your estimate of any one. From any one but
yourself they would have produced in me a feeling of anger I might have
found it difficult to smother.”
“It has often been my misfortune through life,” said Mr. Marchdale,
sadly, “to give the greatest offence where I feel the truest
friendship, because it is in such quarters that I am always tempted to
speak too freely.”
“Nay, no offence,” said Henry. “I am distracted, and scarcely know what
I say. Marchdale, I know you are my sincere friend; but, as I tell you,
I am nearly mad.”
“My dear Henry, be calmer. Consider upon what is to be said concerning
this interview at home.”
“Ay; that is a consideration.”
“I should not think it advisable to mention the disagreeable fact, that
in your neighbour you think you have found out the nocturnal disturber
of your family.”
“No—no.”
“I would say nothing of it. It is not at all probable that, after what
you have said to him, this Sir Francis Varney, or whatever his real
name may be, will obtrude himself upon you.”
“If he should he surely dies.”
“He will, perhaps, consider that such a step would be dangerous to him.”
“It would be fatal, so help me, Heaven, and then would I take especial
care that no power of resuscitation should ever enable that man again
to walk the earth.”
“They say that only way of destroying a vampyre is to fix him to the
earth with a stake, so that he cannot move, and then, of course,
decomposition will take its course, as in ordinary cases.”
“Fire would consume him, and be a quicker process,” said Henry. “But
these are fearful reflections, and, for the present, we will not pursue
them. Now to play the hypocrite, and endeavour to look composed and
serene to my mother, and to Flora, while my heart is breaking.”
The two friends had by this time reached the hall, and leaving his
friend Marchdale, Henry Bannerworth, with feelings of the most
unenviable description, slowly made his way to the apartment occupied
by his mother and sister.
CHAPTER XV.
THE OLD ADMIRAL AND HIS SERVANT.—THE COMMUNICATION FROM THE LANDLORD
OF THE NELSON’S ARMS.
While those matters of most grave and serious import were going on
at the Hall, while each day, and almost each hour in each day, was
producing more and more conclusive evidence upon a matter which
at first had seemed too monstrous to be at all credited, it may
well be supposed what a wonderful sensation was produced among the
gossip-mongers of the neighbourhood by the exaggerated reports that had
reached them.
The servants, who had left the Hall on no other account, as they
declared, but sheer fright at the awful visits of the vampyre,
spread the news far and wide, so that in the adjoining villages and
market-towns the vampyre of Bannerworth Hall became quite a staple
article of conversation.
Such a positive godsend for the lovers of the marvellous had not
appeared in the country side within the memory of that sapient
individual—the oldest inhabitant.
And, moreover, there was one thing which staggered some people of
better education and maturer judgments, and that was, that the more
they took pains to inquire into the matter, in order, if possible, to
put an end to what they considered a gross lie from the commencement,
the more evidence they found to stagger their own senses upon the
subject.
Everywhere then, in every house, public as well as private, something
was being continually said of the vampyre. Nursery maids began to think
a vampyre vastly superior to “old scratch and old bogie” as a means of
terrifying their infant charges into quietness, if not to sleep, until
they themselves became too much afraid upon the subject to mention it.
But nowhere was gossiping carried on upon the subject with more
systematic fervour than at an inn called the Nelson’s Arms, which was
in the high street of the nearest market town to the Hall.
[Illustration: Outside the inn called the Nelson’s Arms.]
There, it seemed as if the lovers of the horrible made a point
of holding their head quarters, and so thirsty did the numerous
discussions make the guests, that the landlord was heard to declare
that he, from his heart, really considered a vampyre as very nearly
equal to a contested election.
It was towards evening of the same day that Marchdale and Henry made
their visit to Sir Francis Varney, that a postchaise drew up to the
inn we have mentioned. In the vehicle were two persons of exceedingly
dissimilar appearance and general aspect.
One of these people was a man who seemed fast verging upon seventy
years of age, although, from his still ruddy and embrowned complexion
and stentorian voice, it was quite evident he intended yet to keep time
at arm’s-length for many years to come.
He was attired in ample and expensive clothing, but every article had
a naval animus about it, if we may be allowed such an expression with
regard to clothing. On his buttons was an anchor, and the general
assortment and colour of the clothing as nearly assimilated as possible
to the undress naval uniform of an officer of high rank some fifty or
sixty years ago.
His companion was a younger man, and about his appearance there was no
secret at all. He was a genuine sailor, and he wore the shore costume
of one. He was hearty-looking, and well dressed, and evidently well fed.
As the chaise drove up to the door of the inn, this man made an
observation to the other to the following effect,—
“A-hoy!”
“Well, you lubber, what now?” cried the other.
“They call this the Nelson’s Arms; and you know, shiver me, that for
the best half of his life he had but one.”
“D—n you!” was the only rejoinder he got for this observation; but,
with that, he seemed very well satisfied.
“Heave to!” he then shouted to the postillion, who was about to drive
the chaise into the yard. “Heave to, you lubberly son of a gun! we
don’t want to go into dock.”
“Ah!” said the old man, “let’s get out, Jack. This is the port; and, do
you hear, and be cursed to you, let’s have no swearing, d—n you, nor
bad language, you lazy swab.”
“Aye, aye,” cried Jack; “I’ve not been ashore now a matter o’ ten
years, and not larnt a little shore-going politeness, admiral, I
ain’t been your _walley de sham_ without larning a little about land
reckonings. Nobody would take me for a sailor now, I’m thinking,
admiral.”
“Hold your noise!”
“Aye, aye, sir.”
Jack, as he was called, bundled out of the chaise when the door was
opened, with a movement so closely resembling what would have ensued
had he been dragged out by the collar, that one was tempted almost to
believe that such a feat must have been accomplished all at once by
some invisible agency.
He then assisted the old gentleman to alight, and the landlord of the
inn commenced the usual profusion of bows with which a passenger by a
postchaise is usually welcomed in preference to one by a stage coach.
“Be quiet, will you!” shouted the admiral, for such indeed he was. “Be
quiet.”
“Best accommodation, sir—good wine—well-aired beds—good attendance—fine
air——”
“Belay there,” said Jack; and he gave the landlord what no doubt he
considered a gentle admonition, but which consisted of such a dig in
the ribs, that he made as many evolutions as the clown in a pantomime
when he vociferates hot codlings.
“Now, Jack, where’s the sailing instructions?” said his master.
“Here, sir, in the locker,” said Jack, as he took from his pocket a
letter, which he handed to the admiral.
“Won’t you step in, sir?” said the landlord, who had begun now to
recover a little from the dig in the ribs.
“What’s the use of coming into port and paying harbour dues, and all
that sort of thing, till we know if it’s the right, you lubber, eh?”
“No; oh, dear me, sir, of course—God bless me, what can the old
gentleman mean?”
The admiral opened the letter, and read:—
“If you stop at the Nelson’s Arms at Uxotter, you will hear of
me, and I can be sent for, when I will tell you more.
“Yours, very obediently and humbly,
“+Josiah Crinkles+.”
“Who the deuce is he?”
“This is Uxotter, sir,” said the landlord; “and here you are, sir, at
the Nelson’s Arms. Good beds—good wine—good——”
“Silence!”
“Yes, sir—oh, of course.”
“Who the devil is Josiah Crinkles?”
“Ha! ha! ha! ha! Makes me laugh, sir. Who the devil indeed! They do
say the devil and lawyers, sir, know something of each other—makes me
smile.”
“I’ll make you smile on the other side of that d——d great hatchway of a
mouth of yours in a minute. Who is Crinkles?”
“Oh, Mr. Crinkles, sir, everybody knows. A most respectable attorney,
sir, indeed, a highly respectable man, sir.”
“A lawyer?”
“Yes, sir, a lawyer.”
“Well, I’m d—d!”
Jack gave a long whistle, and both master and man looked at each other
aghast.
“Now, hang me!” cried the admiral, “if ever I was so taken in in all my
life.”
“Ay, ay, sir,” said Jack.
“To come a hundred and seventy miles see a d—d swab of a rascally
lawyer.”
“Ay, ay, sir.”
“I’ll smash him—Jack!”
“Yer honour?”
“Get into the chaise again.”
“Well, but where’s Master Charles? Lawyers, in course, sir, is all
blessed rogues; but, howsomedever, he may have for once in his life
this here one of ’em have told us of the right channel, and if so be as
he has, don’t be the Yankee to leave him among the pirates. I’m ashamed
on you.”
“You infernal scoundrel; how dare you preach to me in such a way, you
lubberly rascal?”
“Cos you desarves it.”
“Mutiny—mutiny—by Jove! Jack, I’ll have you put in irons—you’re a
scoundrel, and no seaman.”
“No seaman!—no seaman!”
“Not a bit of one.”
“Very good. It’s time, then, as I was off the purser’s books. Good bye
to you; I only hopes as you may get a better seaman to stick to you and
be your _walley de sham_ nor Jack Pringle, that’s all the harm I wish
you. You didn’t call me no seaman in the Bay of Corfu, when the bullets
were scuttling our nobs.”
“Jack, you rascal, give us your fin. Come here, you d—d villain. You’ll
leave me, will you?”
“Not if I know it.”
“Come in, then.”
“Don’t tell me I’m no seaman. Call me a wagabone if you like, but don’t
hurt my feelings. There I’m as tender as a baby, I am.—Don’t do it.”
“Confound you, who is doing it?”
“The devil.”
“Who is?”
“Don’t, then.”
Thus wrangling, they entered the inn, to the great amusement of several
bystanders, who had collected to hear the altercation between them.
“Would you like a private room, sir?” said the landlord.
“What’s that to you?” said Jack.
“Hold your noise, will you?” cried his master. “Yes, I should like a
private room, and some grog.”
“Strong as the devil!” put in Jack.
“Yes, sir—yes, sir. Good wines—good beds—good——”
“You said all that before, you know,” remarked Jack, as he bestowed
upon the landlord another terrific dig in the ribs.
“Hilloa!” cried the admiral, “you can send for that infernal lawyer,
Mister Landlord.”
“Mr. Crinkles, sir?”
“Yes, yes.”
“Who may I have the honour to say, sir, wants to see him?”
“Admiral Bell.”
“Certainly, admiral, certainly. You’ll find him a very conversible,
nice, gentlemanly little man, sir.”
“And tell him as Jack Pringle is here, too,” cried the seaman.
“Oh, yes, yes—of course,” said the landlord, who was in such a state of
confusion from the digs in the ribs he had received, and the noise his
guests had already made in his house, that, had he been suddenly put
upon his oath, he would scarcely have liked to say which was the master
and which was the man.
“The idea now, Jack,” said the admiral, “of coming all this way to see
a lawyer.”
“Ay, ay, sir.”
“If he’d said he was a lawyer, we would have known what to do. But it’s
a take in, Jack.”
“So I think. Howsomdever, we’ll serve him out when we catch him, you
know.”
“Good—so we will.”
“And, then, again, he may know something about Master Charles, sir, you
know. Lord love him, don’t you remember when he came aboard to see you
once at Portsmouth?”
“Ah! I do, indeed.”
“And how he said he hated the French, and quite a baby, too. What
perseverance and sense. ‘Uncle,’ says he to you, ‘when I’m a big man,
I’ll go in a ship, and fight all the French in a heap,’ says he. ‘And
beat ’em, my boy, too,’ says you; cos you thought he’d forgot that; and
then he says, ‘what’s the use of saying that, stupid?—don’t we always
beat ’em?’”
The admiral laughed and rubbed his hands, as he cried aloud,—
“I remember, Jack—I remember him. I was stupid to make such a remark.”
“I know you was—a d——d old fool I thought you.”
“Come, come. Hilloa, there!”
“Well, then, what do you call me no seaman for?”
“Why, Jack, you bear malice like a marine.”
“There you go again. Good bye. Do you remember when we were yard arm to
yard arm with those two Yankee frigates, and took ’em both? You didn’t
call me a marine then, when the scuppers were running with blood. Was I
a seaman then?”
“You were, Jack—you were; and you saved my life.”
“I didn’t.”
“You did.”
“I say I didn’t—it was a marlin-spike.”
“But I say you did, you rascally scoundrel.—I say you did, and I won’t
be contradicted in my own ship.”
“Call this your ship?”
“No, d—n it—I——”
“Mr. Crinkles,” said the landlord, flinging the door wide open, and so
at once putting an end to the discussion which always apparently had a
tendency to wax exceedingly warm.
“The shark, by G—d!” said Jack.
A little, neatly dressed man made his appearance, and advanced rather
timidly into the room. Perhaps he had heard from the landlord that the
parties who had sent for him were of rather a violent sort.
“So you are Crinkles, are you?” cried the admiral. “Sit down, though
you are a lawyer.”
“Thank you, sir. I am an attorney, certainly, and my name as certainly
is Crinkles.”
“Look at that.”
The admiral placed the letter in the little lawyer’s hands, who said,—
“Am I to read it?”
“Yes, to be sure.”
“Aloud?”
“Read it to the devil, if you like, in a pig’s whisper, or a West India
hurricane.”
“Oh, very good, sir. I—I am willing to be agreeable, so I’ll read it
aloud, if it’s all the same to you.”
He then opened the letter, and read as follows:—
“To Admiral Bell.
“Admiral,—Being, from various circumstances, aware that you
take a warm and a praiseworthy interest in your nephew, Charles
Holland, I venture to write to you concerning a matter in which
your immediate and active co-operation with others may rescue
him from a condition which will prove, if allowed to continue,
very much to his detriment, and ultimate unhappiness.
“You are, then, hereby informed, that he, Charles Holland, has,
much earlier than he ought to have done, returned to England,
and that the object of his return is to contract a marriage
into a family in every way objectionable, and with a girl who
is highly objectionable.
“You, admiral, are his nearest and almost his only relative
in the world; you are the guardian of his property, and,
therefore, it becomes a duty on your part to interfere to save
him from the ruinous consequences of a marriage, which is sure
to bring ruin and distress upon himself and all who take an
interest in his welfare.
“The family he wishes to marry into is named Bannerworth, and
the young lady’s name is Flora Bannerworth. When, however, I
inform you that a _vampyre_ is in that family, and that if he
marries into it, he marries a vampyre, and will have vampyres
for children, I trust I have said enough to warn you upon the
subject, and to induce you to lose no time in repairing to the
spot.
“If you stop at the Nelson’s Arms at Uxotter, you will hear of
me. I can be sent for, when I will tell you more.
“Yours, very obediently and humbly,
“+Josiah Crinkles+.”
“P.S. I enclose you Dr. Johnson’s definition of a vampyre,
which is as follows:
“+Vampyre+ (a German blood-sucker)—by which you perceive
how many vampyres, from time immemorial, must have been well
entertained at the expense of John Bull, at the court of St.
James, where nothing hardly is to be met with but German
blood-suckers.”
• • • • •
[Illustration: Crinkles reads the letter to the admiral.]
The lawyer ceased to read, and the amazed look with which he glanced
at the face of Admiral Bell would, under any other circumstances, have
much amused him. His mind, however, was by far too much engrossed
with a consideration of the danger of Charles Holland, his nephew, to
be amused at anything; so, when he found that the little lawyer said
nothing, he bellowed out,—
“Well, sir?”
“We—we—well,” said the attorney.
“I’ve sent for you, and here you are, and here I am, and here’s Jack
Pringle. What have you got to say?”
“Just this much,” said Mr. Crinkles, recovering himself a little, “just
this much, sir, that I never saw that letter before in all my life.”
“You—never—saw—it?”
“Never.”
“Didn’t you write it?”
“On my solemn word of honour, sir, I did not.”
Jack Pringle whistled, and the admiral looked puzzled. Like the admiral
in the song, too, he “grew paler,” and then Mr. Crinkles added,—
“Who has forged my name to a letter such as this, I cannot imagine.
As for writing to you, sir, I never heard of your existence, except
publicly, as one of those gallant officers who have spent a long life
in nobly fighting their country’s battles, and who are entitled to the
admiration and the applause of every Englishman.”
Jack and the admiral looked at each other in amazement, and then the
latter exclaimed,—
“What! This from a lawyer?”
“A lawyer, sir,” said Crinkles, “may know how to appreciate the deeds
of gallant men, although he may not be able to imitate them. That
letter, sir, is a forgery, and I now leave you, only much gratified
at the incident which has procured me the honour of an interview with
a gentleman, whose name will live in the history of his country. Good
day, sir! Good day!”
“No! I’m d——d if you go like that,” said Jack, as he sprang to the
door, and put his back against it. “You shall take a glass with me in
honour of the wooden walls of Old England, d——e, if you was twenty
lawyers.”
“That’s right, Jack,” said the admiral. “Come, Mr. Crinkles, I’ll
think, for your sake, there may be two decent lawyers in the world, and
you one of them. We must have a bottle of the best wine the ship—I mean
the house—can afford together.”
“If it is your command, admiral, I obey with pleasure,” said the
attorney; “and although I assure you, on my honour, I did not write
that letter, yet some of the matters mentioned in it are so generally
notorious here, that I can afford you information concerning them.”
“Can you?”
“I regret to say I can, for I respect the parties.”
“Sit down, then—sit down. Jack, run to the steward’s room and get the
wine. We will go into it now starboard and larboard. Who the deuce
could have written that letter?”
“I have not the least idea, sir.”
“Well—well, never mind; it has brought me here, that’s something, so I
won’t grumble much at it. I didn’t know my nephew was in England, and I
dare say he didn’t know I was; but here we both are, and I won’t rest
till I’ve seen him, and ascertained how the what’s-its-name——”
“The vampyre.”
“Ah! the vampyre.”
“Shiver my timbers!” said Jack Pringle, who now brought in some wine
much against the remonstrances of the waiters of the establishment,
who considered that he was treading upon their vested interests by so
doing.—“Shiver my timbers, if I knows what a _wamphigher_ is, unless
he’s some distant relation to Davy Jones!”
“Hold your ignorant tongue,” said the admiral; “nobody wants you to
make a remark, you great lubber!”
“Very good,” said Jack, and he sat down the wine on the table, and
then retired to the other end of the room, remarking to himself that
he was not called a great lubber on a certain occasion, when bullets
were scuttling their nobs, and they were yard arm and yard arm with God
knows who.
“Now, mister lawyer,” said Admiral Bell, who had about him a large
share of the habits of a rough sailor. “Now, mister lawyer, here is a
glass first to our better acquaintance, for d——e, if I don’t like you!”
“You are very good, sir.”
“Not at all. There was a time, when I’d just as soon have thought of
asking a young shark to supper with me in my own cabin as a lawyer, but
I begin to see that there may be such a thing as a decent, good sort
of a fellow seen in the law; so here’s good luck to you, and you shall
never want a friend or a bottle while Admiral Bell has a shot in the
locker.”
“Gammon,” said Jack.
“D—n you, what do you mean by that?” roared the admiral, in a furious
tone.
“I wasn’t speaking to you,” shouted Jack, about two octaves higher.
“It’s two boys in the street as is pretending they’re a going to fight,
and I know d—d well they won’t.”
“Hold your noise.”
“I’m going. I wasn’t told to hold my noise, when our nobs were being
scuttled off Beyrout.”
“Never mind him, mister lawyer,” added the admiral. “He don’t know what
he’s talking about. Never mind him. You go on and tell me all you know
about the—the——”
“The vampyre!”
“Ah! I always forget the names of strange fish. I suppose, after all,
it’s something of the mermaid order?”
“That I cannot say, sir; but certainly the story, in all its painful
particulars, has made a great sensation all over the country.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes, sir. You shall hear how it occurred. It appears that one night
Miss Flora Bannerworth, a young lady of great beauty, and respected and
admired by all who knew her was visited by a strange being who came in
at the window.”
“My eye,” said Jack, “it waren’t me, I wish it had a been.”
“So petrified by fear was she, that she had only time to creep half out
of the bed, and to utter one cry of alarm, when the strange visitor
seized her in his grasp.”
“D—n my pig tail,” said Jack, “what a squall there must have been, to
be sure.”
“Do you see this bottle?” roared the admiral.
“To be sure, I does; I think as it’s time I seed another.”
“You scoundrel, I’ll make you feel it against that d——d stupid head of
yours, if you interrupt this gentleman again.”
“Don’t be violent.”
“Well, as I was saying,” continued the attorney, “she did, by great
good fortune, manage to scream, which had the effect of alarming the
whole house. The door of her chamber, which was fast, was broken open.”
“Yes, yes——”
“Ah,” cried Jack.
“You may imagine the horror and the consternation of those who entered
the room to find her in the grasp of a fiend-like figure, whose teeth
were fastened on her neck, and who was actually draining her veins of
blood.”
“The devil!”
“Before any one could lay hands sufficiently upon the figure to detain
it, it had fled precipitately from its dreadful repast. Shots were
fired after it in vain.”
“And they let it go?”
“They followed it, I understand, as well as they were able, and saw
it scale the garden wall of the premises; there it escaped, leaving,
as you may well imagine, on all their minds, a sensation of horror
difficult to describe.”
“Well, I never did hear anything the equal of that. Jack, what do you
think of it?”
“I haven’t begun to think, yet,” said Jack.
“But what about my nephew, Charles?” added the admiral.
“Of him I know nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“Not a word, admiral. I was not aware you had a nephew, or that
any gentleman bearing that, or any other relationship to you, had
any sort of connexion with these mysterious and most unaccountable
circumstances. I tell you all I have gathered from common report about
this vampyre business. Further I know not, I assure you.”
“Well, a man can’t tell what he don’t know. It puzzles me to think who
could possibly have written me this letter.”
“That I am completely at a loss to imagine,” said Crinkles. “I assure
you, my gallant sir, that I am much hurt at the circumstance of any
one using my name in such a way. But, nevertheless, as you are here,
permit me to say, that it will be my pride, my pleasure, and the boast
of the remainder of my existence, to be of some service to so gallant
a defender of my country, and one whose name, along with the memory of
his deeds, is engraved upon the heart of every Briton.”
“Quite ekal to a book, he talks,” said Jack. “I never could read one
myself, on account o’ not knowing how, but I’ve heard ’em read, and
that’s just the sort o’ incomprehensible gammon.”
“We don’t want any of your ignorant remarks,” said the admiral, “so you
be quiet.”
“Ay, ay, sir.”
“Now, Mister Lawyer, you are an honest fellow, and an honest fellow is
generally a sensible fellow.”
“Sir, I thank you.”
“If so be as what this letter says is true, my nephew Charles has got
a liking for this girl, who has had her neck bitten by a vampyre, you
see.”
“I perceive, sir.”
“Now what would you do?”
“One of the most difficult, as well, perhaps, as one of the most
ungracious of tasks,” said the attorney, “is to interfere with family
affairs. The cold and steady eye of reason generally sees things in
such very different lights to what they appear to those whose feelings
and whose affections are much compromised in their results.”
“Very true. Go on.”
“Taking, my dear sir, what in my humble judgment appears to be a
reasonable view of this subject, I should say it would be a dreadful
thing for your nephew to marry into a family any member of which was
liable to the visitations of a vampyre.”
“It wouldn’t be pleasant.”
“The young lady might have children.”
“Oh, lots,” cried Jack.
“Hold your noise, Jack.”
“Ay, ay, sir.”
“And she might herself actually, when after death she became a vampyre,
come and feed on her own children.”
“Become a vampyre! What, is she going to be a vampyre too?”
“My dear sir, don’t you know that it is a remarkable fact, as regards
the physiology of vampyres, that whoever is bitten by one of those
dreadful beings, becomes a vampyre?”
“The devil!”
“It is a fact, sir.”
“Whew!” whistled Jack; “she might bite us all, and we should be a whole
ship’s crew o’ _wamphighers_. There would be a confounded go!”
“It’s not pleasant,” said the admiral, as he rose from his chair, and
paced to and fro in the room, “it’s not pleasant. Hang me up at my own
yard-arm if it is.”
“Who said it was?” cried Jack.
“Who asked you, you brute?”
“Well, sir,” added Mr. Crinkles, “I have given you all the information
I can; and I can only repeat what I before had the honour of saying
more at large, namely, that I am your humble servant to command, and
that I shall be happy to attend upon you at any time.”
“Thank ye—thank ye, Mr.—a—a——”
“Crinkles.”
“Ah, Crinkles. You shall hear from me again, sir, shortly. Now that I
am down here, I will see to the very bottom of this affair, were it
deeper than fathom ever sounded. Charles Holland was my poor sister’s
son; he’s the only relative I have in the wide world, and his happiness
is dearer to my heart than my own.”
Crinkles turned aside, and, by the twinkle of his eyes, one might
premise that the honest little lawyer was much affected.
“God bless you, sir,” he said; “farewell.”
“Good day to you.”
“Good-bye, lawyer,” cried Jack. “Mind how you go. D—n me, if you don’t
seem a decent sort of fellow, and, after all, you may give the devil
a clear berth, and get into heaven’s straits with a flowing sheet,
provided as you don’t, towards the end of the voyage, make any lubberly
blunders.”
The old admiral threw himself into a chair with a deep sigh.
“Jack,” said he.
“Aye, aye, sir.”
“What’s to be done now?”
Jack opened the window to discharge the superfluous moisture from an
enormous quid he had indulged himself with while the lawyer was telling
about the vampyre, and then again turning his face towards his master,
he said,—
“Do! What shall we do? Why, go at once and find out Charles, our
_nevy_, and ask him all about it, and see the young lady, too, and lay
hold o’ the _wamphigher_ if we can, as well, and go at the whole affair
broadside to broadside, till we make a prize of all the particulars,
after which we can turn it over in our minds agin, and see what’s to be
done.”
“Jack, you are right. Come along.”
“I knows I am. Do you know now which way to steer?”
“Of course not. I never was in this latitude before, and the channel
looks intricate. We will hail a pilot, Jack, and then we shall be all
right, and if we strike it will be his fault.”
“Which is a mighty great consolation,” said Jack. “Come along.”
CHAPTER XVI.
THE MEETING OF THE LOVERS IN THE GARDEN.—AN AFFECTING SCENE.—THE
SUDDEN APPEARANCE OF SIR FRANCIS VARNEY.
Our readers will recollect that Flora Bannerworth had made an
appointment with Charles Holland in the garden of the hall. This
meeting was looked forward to by the young man with a variety of
conflicting feelings, and he passed the intermediate time in a most
painful state of doubt as to what would be its result.
The thought that he should be much urged by Flora to give up all
thoughts of making her his, was a most bitter one to him, who loved her
with so much truth and constancy, and that she would say all she could
to induce such a resolution in his mind he felt certain. But to him the
idea of now abandoning her presented itself in the worst of aspects.
“Shall I,” he said, “sink so low in my own estimation, as well as
in hers, and in that of all honourable-minded persons, as to desert
her now in the hour of affliction? Dare I be so base as actually or
virtually to say to her, ‘Flora, when your beauty was undimmed by
sorrow—when all around you seemed life and joy, I loved you selfishly
for the increased happiness which you might bestow upon me; but now the
hand of misfortune presses heavily upon you—you are not what you were,
and I desert you?’ Never—never—never!”
Charles Holland, it will be seen by some of our more philosophic
neighbours, felt more acutely than he reasoned; but let his errors
of argumentation be what they may, can we do other than admire the
nobility of soul which dictated such a self-denying generous course as
that he was pursuing?
As for Flora, Heaven only knows if at that precise time her intellect
had completely stood the test of the trying events which had nearly
overwhelmed it.
The two grand feelings that seemed to possess her mind were fear of the
renewed visit of the vampyre, and an earnest desire to release Charles
Holland from his repeated vows of constancy towards her.
Feeling, generosity, and judgment, all revolted holding a young man to
such a destiny as hers. To link him to her fate, would be to make him
to a real extent a sharer in it, and the more she heard fall from his
lips in the way of generous feelings of continued attachment to her,
the more severely did she feel that he would suffer most acutely if
united to her.
And she was right. The very generosity of feeling which would have
now prompted Charles Holland to lead Flora Bannerworth to the altar,
even with the marks of the vampyre’s teeth upon her throat, gave an
assurance of a depth of feeling which would have made him an ample
haven in all her miseries, in all her distresses and afflictions.
What was familiarly in the family at the Hall called the garden, was a
semicircular piece of ground shaded in several directions by trees, and
which was exclusively devoted to the growth of flowers. The piece of
ground was nearly hidden from the view of the house, and in its centre
was a summer-house, which at the usual season of the year was covered
with all kinds of creeping plants of exquisite perfumes, and rare
beauty. All around, too, bloomed the fairest and sweetest of flowers,
which a rich soil and a sheltered situation could produce.
Alas! though, of late many weeds had straggled up among their more
estimable floral culture, for the decayed fortunes of the family had
prevented them from keeping the necessary servants, to place the Hall
and its grounds in a state of neatness, such as it had once been the
pride of the inhabitants of the place to see them. It was then in this
flower-garden that Charles and Flora used to meet.
As may be supposed, he was on the spot before the appointed hour,
anxiously expecting the appearance of her who was so really and truly
dear to him. What to him were the sweet flowers that there grew in such
happy luxuriance and heedless beauty? Alas, the flower that to his
mind was fairer than them all, was blighted, and in the wan cheek of
her whom he loved, he sighed to see the lily usurping the place of the
radiant rose.
“Dear, dear Flora,” he ejaculated, “you must indeed be taken from
this place, which is so full of the most painful remembrances now,
I cannot think that Mr. Marchdale somehow is a friend to me, but
that conviction, or rather impression, does not paralyze my judgment
sufficiently to induce me not to acknowledge that his advice is good.
He might have couched it in pleasanter words—words that would not, like
daggers, each have brought a deadly pang home to my heart, but still I
do think that in his conclusion he was right.”
A light sound, as of some fairy footstep among the flowers, came upon
his ears, and turning instantly to the direction from whence the
sound proceeded, he saw what his heart had previously assured him of,
namely, that it was his Flora who was coming.
Yes, it was she; but, ah, how pale, how wan—how languid and full of
the evidences of much mental suffering was she. Where now was the
elasticity of that youthful step? Where now was that lustrous beaming
beauty of mirthfulness, which was wont to dawn in those eyes?
Alas, all was changed. The exquisite beauty of form was there, but
the light of joy which had lent its most transcendent charms to that
heavenly face, was gone. Charles was by her side in a moment. He had
her hand clasped in his, while his disengaged one was wound tenderly
around her taper waist.
“Flora, dear, dear Flora,” he said, “you are better. Tell me that you
feel the gentle air revives you?”
She could not speak. Her heart was too full of woe.
“Oh; Flora, my own, my beautiful,” he added, in those tones which
come so direct from the heart, and which are so different from any
assumption of tenderness. “Speak to me, dear, dear Flora—speak to me if
it be but a word.”
“Charles,” was all she could say, and then she burst into a flood of
tears, and leant so heavily upon his arm, that it was evident but for
that support she must have fallen.
Charles Holland welcomed those, although they grieved him so much that
he could have accompanied them with his own, but then he knew that she
would be soon now more composed, and that they would relieve the heart
whose sorrows called them into existence.
He forbore to speak to her until he found this sudden gush of feeling
was subsiding into sobs, and then in low, soft accents, he again
endeavoured to breathe comfort to her afflicted and terrified spirit.
“My Flora,” he said, “remember that there are warm hearts that love
you. Remember that neither time nor circumstance can change such
endearing affection as mine. Ah, Flora, what evil is there in the
whole world that love may not conquer, and in the height of its noble
feelings laugh to scorn.”
“Oh, hush, hush, Charles, hush.”
“Wherefore, Flora, would you still the voice of pure affection? I love
you surely, as few have ever loved. Ah, why would you forbid me to give
such utterance as I may to those feelings which fill up my whole heart?”
“No—no—no.”
“Flora, Flora, wherefore do you say no?”
“Do not, Charles, now speak to me of affection or love. Do not tell me
you love me now.”
“Not tell you I love you! Ah, Flora, if my tongue, with its poor
eloquence to give utterance to such a sentiment, were to do its office,
each feature of my face would tell the tale. Each action would show to
all the world how much I loved you.”
“I must not now hear this. Great God of Heaven give me strength to
carry out the purpose of my soul.”
“What purpose is it, Flora, that you have to pray thus fervently for
strength to execute? Oh, if it savour aught of treason against love’s
majesty, forget it. Love is a gift from Heaven. The greatest and the
most glorious gift it ever bestowed upon its creatures. Heaven will not
aid you in repudiating that which is the one grand redeeming feature
that rescues human nature from a world of reproach.”
Flora wrung her hands despairingly as she said,—
“Charles, I know I cannot reason with you. I know I have not power of
language, aptitude of illustration, nor depth of thought to hold a
mental contention with you.”
“Flora, for what do I contend?”
“You, you speak of love.”
“And I have, ere this, spoken to you of love unchecked.”
“Yes, yes. Before this.”
“And now, wherefore not now? Do not tell me you are changed.”
“I am changed, Charles. Fearfully changed. The curse of God has fallen
upon me, I know not why. I know not that in word or in thought I have
done evil, except perchance unwittingly, and yet—the vampyre.”
“Let not that affright you.”
“Affright me! It has killed me.”
“Nay, Flora,—you think too much of what I still hope to be susceptible
of far more rational explanation.”
“By your own words, then, Charles, I must convict you. I cannot, I dare
not be yours, while such a dreadful circumstance is hanging over me,
Charles; if a more rational explanation than the hideous one which my
own fancy gives to the form that visits me can be found, find it, and
rescue me from despair and from madness.”
They had now reached the summer-house, and as Flora uttered these words
she threw herself on to a seat, and covering her beautiful face with
her hands, she sobbed convulsively.
“You have spoken,” said Charles, dejectedly. “I have heard that which
you wished to say to me.”
“No, no. Not all, Charles.”
“I will be patient, then, although what more you may have to add
should tear my very heart-strings.”
“I—I have to add, Charles,” she said, in a tremulous voice, “that
justice, religion, mercy—every human attribute which bears the name of
virtue, calls loudly upon me no longer to hold you to vows made under
different auspices.”
“Go on, Flora.”
“I then implore you, Charles, finding me what I am, to leave me to the
fate which it has pleased Heaven to cast upon me. I do not ask you,
Charles, not to love me.”
“’Tis well. Go on, Flora.”
“Because I should like to think that, although I might never see you
more, you loved me still. But you must think seldom of me, and you must
endeavour to be happy with some other——”
“You cannot, Flora, pursue the picture you yourself would draw. These
words come not from your heart.”
“Yes—yes—yes.”
“Did you ever love me?”
“Charles, Charles, why will you add another pang to those you know must
already rend my heart?”
“No, Flora, I would tear my own heart from my bosom ere I would add one
pang to yours. Well I know that gentle maiden modesty would seal your
lips to the soft confession that you loved me. I could not hope the joy
of hearing you utter these words. The tender devoted lover is content
to see the truthful passion in the speaking eyes of beauty. Content is
he to translate it from a thousand acts, which, to eyes that look not
so acutely as a lover’s, bear no signification; but when you tell me to
seek happiness with another, well may the anxious question burst from
my throbbing heart of, ‘Did you ever love me, Flora?’”
Her senses hung entranced upon his words. Oh, what a witchery is in the
tongue of love. Some even of the former colour of her cheek returned
as, forgetting all for the moment but that she was listening to the
voice of him, the thoughts of whom had made up the day dream of her
happiness, she gazed upon his face.
His voice ceased. To her it seemed as if some music had suddenly left
off in its most exquisite passage. She clung to his arm—she looked
imploringly up to him. Her head sunk upon his breast as she cried,
“Charles, Charles, I did love you. I do love you now.”
“Then let sorrow and misfortune shake their grisly locks in vain,” he
cried. “Heart to heart—hand to hand with me, defy them.”
He lifted up his arms towards Heaven as he spoke, and at the moment
came such a rattling peal of thunder, that the very earth seemed to
shake upon its axis.
A half scream of terror burst from the lips of Flora, as she cried,—
“What was that?”
“Only thunder,” said Charles, calmly.
“’Twas an awful sound.”
“A natural one.”
“But at such a moment, when you were defying Fate to injure us. Oh!
Charles, is it ominous?”
“Flora, can you really give way to such idle fancies?”
“The sun is obscured.”
“Ay, but it will shine all the brighter for its temporary eclipse. The
thunder-storm will clear the air of many noxious vapours; the forked
lightning has its uses as well as its powers of mischief. Hark! there
again!”
Another peal, of almost equal intensity to the other, shook the
firmament. Flora trembled.
“Charles,” she said, “this is the voice of Heaven. We must part—we must
part for ever. I cannot be yours.”
“Flora, this is madness. Think again, dear Flora. Misfortunes for a
time will hover over the best and most fortunate of us; but, like the
clouds that now obscure the sweet sunshine, will pass away, and leave
no trace behind them. The sunshine of joy will shine on you again.”
There was a small break in the clouds, like a window looking into
Heaven. From it streamed one beam of sunlight, so bright, so dazzling,
and so beautiful, that it was a sight of wonder to look upon. It fell
upon the face of Flora; it warmed her cheek; it lent lustre to her pale
lips and tearful eyes; it illumined that little summer-house as if it
had been the shrine of some saint.
“Behold!” cried Charles, “where is your omen now?”
“God of Heaven!” cried Flora; and she stretched out her arms.
[Illustration: A beam of sunlight illuminates Flora, Charles, and the
house.]
“The clouds that hover over your spirit now,” said Charles, “shall pass
away. Accept this beam of sunlight as a promise from God.”
“I will—I will. It is going.”
“It has done its office.”
The clouds closed over the small orifice, and all was gloom again as
before.
“Flora,” said Charles, “you will not ask me now to leave you?”
She allowed him to clasp her to his heart. It was beating for her, and
for her only.
“You will let me, Flora, love you still?”
Her voice, as she answered him, was like the murmur of some distant
melody the ears can scarcely translate to the heart.
“Charles we will live, love, and die together.”
And now there was a wrapt stillness in that summer-house for many
minutes—a trance of joy. They did not speak, but now and then she would
look into his face with an old familiar smile, and the joy of his heart
was near to bursting in tears from his eyes.
• • • • •
A shriek burst from Flora’s lips—a shriek so wild and shrill that
it awakened echoes far and near. Charles staggered back a step, as
if shot, and then in such agonised accents as he was long indeed in
banishing the remembrance of, she cried,—
“The vampyre! the vampyre!”
CHAPTER XVII.
THE EXPLANATION.—THE ARRIVAL OF THE ADMIRAL AT THE HOUSE.—A SCENE OF
CONFUSION, AND SOME OF ITS RESULTS.
So sudden and so utterly unexpected a cry of alarm from Flora, at such
a time might well have the effect of astounding the nerves of any one,
and no wonder that Charles was for a few seconds absolutely petrified
and almost unable to think.
Mechanically, then, he turned his eyes towards the door of the
summer-house, and there he saw a tall, thin man, rather elegantly
dressed, whose countenance certainly, in its wonderful resemblance to
the portrait on the panel, might well appall any one.
The stranger stood in the irresolute attitude on the threshold of the
summer-house of one who did not wish to intrude, but who found it as
awkward, if not more so now, to retreat than to advance.
[Illustration: Sir Varney stands before Charles and Flora, who are
cowering.]
Before Charles Holland could summon any words to his aid, or think
of freeing himself from the clinging grasp of Flora, which was wound
around him, the stranger made a very low and courtly bow, after which
he said, in winning accents,—
“I very much fear that I am an intruder here. Allow me to offer my
warmest apologies, and to assure you, sir, and you, madam, that I had
no idea any one was in the arbour. You perceive the rain is falling
smartly, and I made towards here, seeing it was likely to shelter me
from the shower.”
These words were spoken in such a plausible and courtly tone of voice,
that they might well have become any drawing-room in the kingdom.
Flora kept her eyes fixed upon him during the utterance of these words;
and as she convulsively clutched the arm of Charles, she kept on
whispering,—
“The vampyre! the vampyre!”
“I much fear,” added the stranger, in the same bland tones, “that I
have been the cause of some alarm to the young lady!”
“Release me,” whispered Charles to Flora. “Release me; I will follow
him at once.”
“No, no—do not leave me—do not leave me. The vampyre—the dreadful
vampyre!”
“But, Flora——”
“Hush—hush—hush! It speaks again.”
“Perhaps I ought to account for my appearance in the garden at all,”
added the insinuating stranger. “The fact is, I came on a visit——”
Flora shuddered.
“To Mr. Henry Bannerworth,” continued the stranger; “and finding the
garden-gate open, I came in without troubling the servants, which I
much regret, as I can perceive I have alarmed and annoyed the lady.
Madam, pray accept of my apologies.”
“In the name of God, who are you?” said Charles.
“My name is Varney.”
“Oh, yes. You are the Sir Francis Varney, residing close by, who bears
so fearful a resemblance to——”
“Pray go on, sir. I am all attention.”
“To a portrait here.”
“Indeed! Now I reflect a moment, Mr. Henry Bannerworth did incidentally
mention something of the sort. It’s a most singular coincidence.”
The sound of approaching footsteps was now plainly heard, and in a few
moments Henry and George, along with Mr. Marchdale, reached the spot.
Their appearance showed that they had made haste, and Henry at once
exclaimed,—
“We heard, or fancied we heard, a cry of alarm.”
“You did hear it,” said Charles Holland. “Do you know this gentleman?”
“It is Sir Francis Varney.”
“Indeed!”
Varney bowed to the new comers, and was altogether as much at his ease
as everybody else seemed quite the contrary. Even Charles Holland found
the difficulty of going up to such a well-bred, gentlemanly man, and
saying, “Sir, we believe you to be a vampyre”—to be almost, if not
insurmountable.
“I cannot do it,” he thought, “but I will watch him.”
“Take me away,” whispered Flora. “’Tis he—’tis he. Oh, take me away,
Charles.”
“Hush, Flora, hush. You are in some error; the accidental resemblance
should not make us be rude to this gentleman.”
“The vampyre!—it is the vampyre!”
“Are you sure, Flora?”
“Do I know your features—my own—my brother’s? Do not ask me to doubt—I
cannot. I am quite sure. Take me from his hideous presence, Charles.”
“The young lady, I fear, is very much indisposed,” remarked Sir Francis
Varney, in a sympathetic tone of voice. “If she will accept of my arm,
I shall esteem it a great honour.”
“No—no—no!—God! no,” cried Flora.
“Madam, I will not press you.”
He bowed, and Charles led Flora from the summer-house towards the hall.
“Flora,” he said, “I am bewildered—I know not what to think. That man
most certainly has been fashioned after the portrait which is on the
panel in the room you formerly occupied; or it has been painted from
him.”
“He is my midnight visitor!” exclaimed Flora. “He is the vampyre;—this
Sir Francis Varney is the vampyre.”
“Good God! What can be done?”
“I know not. I am nearly distracted.”
“Be calm, Flora. If this man be really what you name him, we now know
from what quarter the mischief comes, which is, at all events, a point
gained. Be assured we shall place a watch upon him.”
“Oh, it is terrible to meet him here.”
“And he is so wonderfully anxious, too, to possess the Hall.”
“He is—he is.”
“It looks strange, the whole affair. But, Flora, be assured of one
thing, and that is, of your own safety.”
“Can I be assured of that?”
“Most certainly. Go to your mother now. Here we are, you see, fairly
within doors. Go to your mother, dear Flora, and keep yourself quiet.
I will return to this mysterious man now with a cooler judgment than I
left him.”
“You will watch him, Charles?”
“I will, indeed.”
“And you will not let him approach the house here alone?”
“I will not.”
“Oh, that the Almighty should allow such beings to haunt the earth!”
“Hush, Flora, hush! we cannot judge of his allwise purpose.”
“’Tis hard that the innocent should be inflicted with its presence.”
Charles bowed his head in mournful assent.
“Is it not very, very dreadful?”
“Hush—hush! Calm yourself, dearest, calm yourself. Recollect that all
we have to go upon in this matter is a resemblance, which, after all,
may be accidental. But leave it all to me, and be assured that now I
have some clue to this affair, I will not lose sight of it, or of Sir
Francis Varney.”
So saying, Charles surrendered Flora to the care of her mother, and
then was hastening back to the summer-house, when he met the whole
party coming towards the Hall, for the rain was each moment increasing
in intensity.
“We are returning,” remarked Sir Francis Varney, with a half bow and a
smile, to Charles.
“Allow me,” said Henry, “to introduce you, Mr. Holland, to our
neighbour, Sir Francis Varney.”
Charles felt himself compelled to behave with courtesy, although his
mind was so full of conflicting feelings as regarded Varney; but there
was no avoiding, without such brutal rudeness as was inconsistent with
all his pursuits and habits, replying in something like the same strain
to the extreme courtly politeness of the supposed vampyre.
“I will watch him closely,” thought Charles. “I can do no more than
watch him closely.”
Sir Francis Varney seemed to be a man of the most general and
discursive information. He talked fluently and pleasantly upon all
sorts of topics, and notwithstanding he could not but have heard what
Flora had said of him, he asked no questions whatever upon that subject.
This silence as regarded a matter which would at once have induced some
sort of inquiry from any other man, Charles felt told much against him,
and he trembled to believe for a moment that, after all, it really
might be true.
“Is he a vampyre?” he asked himself. “Are there vampyres, and is this
man of fashion—this courtly, talented, educated gentleman one?” It was
a perfectly hideous question.
“You are charmingly situated here,” remarked Varney, as, after
ascending the few steps that led to the hall door, he turned and looked
at the view from that slight altitude.
“The place has been much esteemed,” said Henry, “for its picturesque
beauties of scenery.”
“And well it may be. I trust, Mr. Holland, the young lady is much
better?”
“She is, sir,” said Charles.
“I was not honoured by an introduction.”
“It was my fault,” said Henry, who spoke to his extraordinary guest
with an air of forced hilarity. “It was my fault for not introducing
you to my sister.”
“And that was your sister?”
“It was, sir.”
“Report has not belied her—she is beautiful. But she looks rather pale,
I thought. Has she bad health?”
“The best of health.”
“Indeed! Perhaps the little disagreeable circumstance, which is made so
much food for gossip in the neighbourhood, has affected her spirits?”
“It has.”
“You allude to the supposed visit here of a vampyre?” said Charles, as
he fixed his eyes upon Varney’s face.
“Yes, I allude to the supposed appearance of a supposed vampyre in
this family,” said Sir Francis Varney, as he returned the earnest gaze
of Charles, with such unshrinking assurance, that the young man was
compelled, after about a minute, nearly to withdraw his own eyes.
“He will not be cowed,” thought Charles. “Use has made him familiar to
such cross-questioning.”
It appeared now suddenly to occur to Henry that he had said something
at Varney’s own house which should have prevented him from coming to
the Hall, and he now remarked,—
“We scarcely expected the pleasure of your company here, Sir Francis
Varney.”
“Oh, my dear sir, I am aware of that; but you roused my curiosity. You
mentioned to me that there was a portrait here amazingly like me.”
“Did I?”
“Indeed you did, or how could I know it? I wanted to see if the
resemblance was so perfect.”
“Did you hear, sir,” added Henry, “that my sister was alarmed at your
likeness to that portrait?”
“No, really.”
“I pray you walk in, and we will talk more at large upon that matter.”
“With great pleasure. One leads a monotonous life in the country, when
compared with the brilliancy of a court existence. Just now I have no
particular engagement. As we are near neighbours I see no reason why
we should not be good friends, and often interchange such civilities
as make up the amenities of existence, and which, in the country, more
particularly, are valuable.”
Henry could not be hypocrite enough to assent to this; but still, under
the present aspect of affairs, it was impossible to return any but a
civil reply; so he said,—
“Oh, yes, of course—certainly. My time is very much occupied, and my
sister and mother see no company.”
“Oh, now, how wrong.”
“Wrong, sir?”
“Yes, surely. If anything more than another tends to harmonize
individuals, it is the society of that fairer half of the creation
which we love for their very foibles. I am much attached to the softer
sex—to young persons full of health. I like to see the rosy checks,
where the warm blood mantles in the superficial veins, and all is
loveliness and life.”
Charles shrank back, and the word “Demon” unconsciously escaped his
lips.
Sir Francis took no manner of notice of the expression, but went on
talking, as if he had been on the very happiest terms with every one
present.
“Will you follow me, at once, to the chamber where the portrait hangs,”
said Henry, “or will you partake of some refreshment first?”
“No refreshment for me,” said Varney. “My dear friend, if you will
permit me to call you such, this is a time of the day at which I never
do take any refreshment.”
“Nor at any other,” thought Henry.
They all went to the chamber where Charles had passed one very
disagreeable night, and when they arrived, Henry pointed to the
portrait on the panel, saying—
“There, Sir Francis Varney, is your likeness.”
He looked, and, having walked up to it, in an under tone, rather as if
he were conversing with himself than making a remark for any one else
to hear, he said—
“It is wonderfully like.”
“It is, indeed,” said Charles.
“If I stand beside it, thus,” said Varney, placing himself in a
favourable attitude for comparing the two faces, “I dare say you will
be more struck with the likeness than before.”
So accurate was it now, that the same light fell upon his face as that
under which the painter had executed the portrait, that all started
back a step or two.
“Some artists,” remarked Varney, “have the sense to ask where a
portrait is to be hung before they paint it, and then they adapt their
lights and shadows to those which would fall upon the original, were it
similarly situated.”
“I cannot stand this,” said Charles to Henry; “I must question him
farther.”
“As you please, but do not insult him.”
“I will not.”
“He is beneath my roof now, and, after all, it is but a hideous
suspicion we have of him.”
“Rely upon me.”
Charles stepped forward, and once again confronting Varney, with an
earnest gaze, he said—
“Do you know, sir, that Miss Bannerworth declares the vampyre she
fancies to have visited this chamber to be, in features, the exact
counterpart of this portrait?”
“Does she indeed?”
“She does, indeed.”
“And perhaps, then, that accounts for her thinking that I am the
vampyre, because I bear a strong resemblance to the portrait.”
“I should not be surprised,” said Charles.
“How very odd.”
“Very.”
“And yet entertaining. I am rather amused than otherwise. The idea of
being a vampyre. Ha! ha! If ever I go to a masquerade again, I shall
certainly assume the character of a vampyre.”
“You would do it well.”
“I dare say, now, I should make quite a sensation.”
“I am certain you would. Do you not think, gentlemen, that Sir Francis
Varney would enact the character to the very life? By Heavens, he would
do it so well that one might, without much difficulty, really imagine
him a vampyre.”
“Bravo—bravo,” said Varney, as he gently folded his hands together,
with that genteel applause that may even be indulged in in a box at
the opera itself. “Bravo. I like to see young persons enthusiastic;
it looks as if they had some of the real fire of genius in their
composition. Bravo—bravo.”
This was, Charles thought, the very height and acme of impudence, and
yet what could he do? What could he say? He was foiled by the downright
coolness of Varney.
As for Henry, George, and Mr. Marchdale, they had listened to what was
passing between Sir Francis and Charles in silence. They feared to
diminish the effect of anything Charles might say, by adding a word of
their own; and, likewise, they did not wish to lose one observation
that might come from the lips of Varney.
But now Charles appeared to have said all he had to say, he turned to
the window and looked out. He seemed like a man who had made up his
mind, for a time, to give up some contest in which he had been engaged.
And, perhaps, not so much did he give it up from any feeling or
consciousness of being beaten, as from a conviction that it could be
the more effectually, at some other and far more eligible opportunity,
renewed.
Varney now addressed Henry, saying,—
“I presume the subject of our conference, when you did me the honour of
a call, is no secret to any one here?”
“None whatever,” said Henry.
“Then, perhaps, I am too early in asking you if you have made up your
mind?”
“I have scarcely, certainly, had time to think.”
“My dear sir, do not let me hurry you; I much regret, indeed, the
intrusion.”
“You seem anxious to possess the Hall,” remarked Mr. Marchdale, to
Varney.
“I am.”
“Is it new to you?”
“Not quite. I have some boyish recollections connected with this
neighbourhood, among which Bannerworth Hall stands sufficiently
prominent.”
“May I ask how long ago that was?” said Charles Holland, rather
abruptly.
“I do not recollect, my enthusiastic young friend,” said Varney. “How
old are you?”
“Just about twenty-one.”
“You are, then, for your age, quite a model of discretion.”
It would have been difficult for the most accurate observer of human
nature to have decided whether this was said truthfully or ironically,
so Charles made no reply to it whatever.
“I trust,” said Henry, “we shall induce you, as this is your first
visit, Sir Francis Varney, to the Hall, to partake of some thing.”
“Well, well, a cup of wine——”
“Is at your service.”
Henry now led the way to a small parlour, which, although by no
means one of the showiest rooms of the house, was, from the care and
exquisite carving with which it abounded, much more to the taste of any
who possessed an accurate judgment in such works of art.
Then wine was ordered, and Charles took an opportunity of whispering to
Henry,—
“Notice well if he drinks.”
“I will.”
“Do you see that beneath his coat there is a raised place, as if his
arm was bound up?”
“I do.”
“There, then, was where the bullet from the pistol fired by Flora, when
we were at the church, hit him.”
“Hush! for God’s sake, hush! you are getting into a dreadful state of
excitement, Charles; hush! hush!”
“And can you blame——”
“No, no; but what can we do?”
“You are right. Nothing can we do at present. We have a clue now, and
be it our mutual inclination, as well as duty, to follow it. Oh, you
shall see how calm I will be!”
“For Heaven’s sake, be so. I have noted that his eyes flash upon yours
with no friendly feeling.”
“His friendship were a curse.”
“Hush! he drinks!”
“Watch him.”
“I will.”
“Gentlemen all,” said Sir Francis Varney, in such soft, dulcet tones,
that it was quite a fascination to hear him speak; “gentlemen all,
being as I am, much delighted with your company, do not accuse me of
presumption, if I drink now, poor drinker as I am, to our future merry
meetings.”
He raised the wine to his lips, and seemed to drink, after which he
replaced the glass upon the table.
Charles glanced at it, it was still full.
“You have not drank, Sir Francis Varney,” he said.
“Pardon me, enthusiastic young sir,” said Varney, “perhaps you will
have the liberality to allow me to take my wine how I please and when I
please.”
“Your glass is full.”
“Well, sir?”
“Will you drink it?”
“Not at any man’s bidding, most certainly. If the fair Flora
Bannerworth would grace the board with her sweet presence, methinks I
could then drink on, on, on.”
“Hark you, sir,” cried Charles, “I can bear no more of this. We have
had in this house most horrible and damning evidence that there are
such things as vampyres.”
“Have you really? I suppose you eat raw pork at supper, and so had the
nightmare?”
“A jest is welcome in its place, but pray hear me out, sir, if it suit
your lofty courtesy to do so.”
“Oh, certainly.”
“Then I say we believe, as far as human judgment has a right to go,
that a vampyre has been here.”
“Go on, it’s interesting. I always was a lover of the wild and the
wonderful.”
“We have, too,” continued Charles, “some reason to believe that you are
the man.”
Varney tapped his forehead as he glanced at Henry, and said,—
“Oh, dear, I did not know. You should have told me he was a little
wrong about the brain; I might have quarrelled with the lad. Dear me,
how lamentable for his poor mother.”
“This will not do, Sir Francis Varney _alias_ Bannerworth.”
“Oh—oh! Be calm—be calm.”
“I defy you to your teeth, sir! No, God, no! Your teeth!”
“Poor lad! Poor lad!”
“You are a cowardly demon, and here I swear to devote myself to your
destruction.”
Sir Francis Varney drew himself up to his full height, and that was
immense, as he said to Henry,—
“I pray you, Mr. Bannerworth, since I am thus grievously insulted
beneath your roof, to tell me if your friend here be mad or sane?”
“He’s not mad.”
“Then——”
“Hold, sir! The quarrel shall be mine. In the name of my persecuted
sister—in the name of Heaven. Sir Francis Varney, I defy you.”
Sir Francis, in spite of his impenetrable calmness, appeared somewhat
moved, as he said,—
“I have already endured insult sufficient—I will endure no more. If
there are weapons at hand——”
“My young friend,” interrupted Mr. Marchdale, stepping between the
excited men, “is carried away by his feelings, and knows not what he
says. You will look upon it in that light, Sir Francis.”
“We need no interference,” exclaimed Varney, his hitherto bland voice
changing to one of fury. “The hot blooded fool wishes to fight, and he
shall—to the death—to the death.”
“And I say he shall not,” exclaimed Mr. Marchdale, taking Henry by
the arm. “George,” he added, turning to the young man, “assist me in
persuading your brother to leave the room. Conceive the agony of your
sister and mother if anything should happen to him.”
Varney smiled with a devilish sneer, as he listened to these words, and
then he said,—
“As you will—as you will. There will be plenty of time, and perhaps
better opportunity, gentlemen. I bid you good day.”
And with provoking coolness, he then moved towards the door, and
quitted the room.
“Remain here,” said Marchdale; “I will follow him, and see that he
quits the premises.”
He did so, and the young men, from the window, beheld Sir Francis
walking slowly across the garden, and then saw Mr. Marchdale follow on
his track.
While they were thus occupied, a tremendous ringing came at the gate,
but their attention was so rivetted to what was passing in the garden,
that they paid not the least attention to it.
CHAPTER XVIII.
THE ADMIRAL’S ADVICE.—THE CHALLENGE TO THE VAMPYRE.—THE NEW SERVANT
AT THE HALL.
The violent ringing of the bell continued uninterruptedly until at
length George volunteered to answer it. The fact was, that now there
was no servant at all in the place for, after the one who had recently
demanded of Henry her dismissal had left, the other was terrified to
remain alone, and had precipitately gone from the house, without even
going through the ceremony of announcing her intention to do so. To be
sure, she sent a boy for her money afterwards, which may be considered
a great act of condescension.
Suspecting, then, this state of things, George himself hastened to
the gate, and, being not over well pleased at the continuous and
unnecessary ringing which was kept up at it, he opened it quickly, and
cried, with more impatience, by a vast amount, than was usual with him.
“Who is so impatient that he cannot wait a seasonable time for the door
to be opened?”
“And who the d—l are you?” cried one who was immediately outside.
“Who do you want?” cried George.
“Shiver my timbers!” cried Admiral Bell, for it was no other than that
personage. “What’s that to you?”
“Ay, ay,” added Jack, “answer that if you can, you shore-going-looking
swab.”
“Two madmen, I suppose,” ejaculated George, and he would have closed
the gate upon them; but Jack introduced between it and the post the end
of a thick stick, saying,—
“Avast there! None of that; we have had trouble enough to get in. If
you are the family lawyer, or the chaplain, perhaps you’ll tell us
where Mister Charley is.”
“Once more I demand of you who you want?” said George, who was now
perhaps a little amused at the conduct of the impatient visitors.
“We want the admiral’s _nevey_,” said Jack.
“But how do I know who is the admiral’s _nevey_, as you call him.”
“Why, Charles Holland, to be sure. Have you got him aboard or not?”
“Mr. Charles Holland is certainly here; and, if you had said at once,
and explicitly, that you wished to see him, I could have given you a
direct answer.”
“He is here?” cried the admiral.
“Most certainly.”
“Come along, then; yet, stop a bit. I say, young fellow, just before we
go any further, tell us if he has maimed the vampyre?”
“The what?”
“The _wamphigher_,” said Jack, by way of being, as he considered, a
little more explanatory than the admiral.
“I do not know what you mean,” said George; “if you wish to see Mr.
Charles Holland walk in and see him. He is in this house; but, for
myself, as you are strangers to me, I decline answering any questions,
let their import be what they may.”
“Hilloa! who are they?” suddenly cried Jack, as he pointed to two
figures some distance off in the meadows, who appeared to be angrily
conversing.
George glanced in the direction towards which Jack pointed, and there
he saw Sir Francis Varney and Mr. Marchdale standing within a few paces
of each other, and apparently engaged in some angry discussion.
[Illustration: Sir Varney struggles with Marchdale, observed by George,
Jack, and the admiral.]
His first impulse was to go immediately towards them; but, before he
could execute even that suggestion of his mind, he saw Varney strike
Marchdale, and the latter fell to the ground.
“Allow me to pass,” cried George, as he endeavoured to get by the
rather unwieldy form of the admiral. But, before he could accomplish
this, for the gate was narrow, he saw Varney, with great swiftness,
make off, and Marchdale, rising to his feet, came towards the Hall.
When Marchdale got near enough to the garden-gate to see George, he
motioned to him to remain where he was, and then, quickening his pace,
he soon came up to the spot.
“Marchdale,” cried George, “you have had an encounter with Sir Francis
Varney.”
“I have,” said Marchdale, in an excited manner. “I threatened to follow
him, but he struck me to the earth as easily as I could a child. His
strength is superhuman.”
“I saw you fall.”
“I believe, but that he was observed, he would have murdered me.”
“Indeed!”
“What, do you mean to say that lankey, horse-marine looking fellow is
as bad as that!” said the admiral.
Marchdale now turned his attention to the two new comers, upon whom he
looked with some surprise, and then, turning to George, he said,—
“Is this gentleman a visitor?”
“To Mr. Holland, I believe he is,” said George; “but I have not the
pleasure of knowing his name.”
“Oh, you may know my name as soon as you like,” cried the admiral. “The
enemies of old England know it, and I don’t care if all the world knows
it. I’m old Admiral Bell, something of a hulk now, but still able to
head a quarter-deck if there was any need to do so.”
“Ay, ay,” cried Jack, and taking from his pocket a boatswain’s whistle,
he blew a blast so long, and loud, and shrill, that George was fain to
cover his ears with his hands to shut out the brain-piercing, and, to
him unusual sound.
“And are you, then, a relative,” said Marchdale, “of Mr. Holland’s,
sir, may I ask?”
“I’m his uncle, and be d—d to him, if you must know, and some one has
told me that the young scamp thinks of marrying a mermaid, or a ghost,
or a vampyre, or some such thing, so, for the sake of the memory of his
poor mother, I’ve come to say no to the bargain, and d—n me, who cares.”
“Come in, sir,” said George, “I will conduct you to Mr. Holland. I
presume this is your servant?”
“Why, not exactly. That’s Jack Pringle, he was my boatswain, you see,
and now he’s a kind o’ something betwixt and between. Not exactly a
servant.”
“Ay, ay, sir,” said Jack. “Have it all your own way, though we is paid
off.”
“Hold your tongue, you audacious scoundrel, will you.”
“Oh, I forgot, you don’t like anything said about paying off, cos it
puts you in mind of——”
“Now, d—n you, I’ll have you strung up to the yard-arm, you dog, if you
don’t belay there.”
“I’m done. All’s right.”
By this time the party, including the admiral, Jack, George
Bannerworth, and Marchdale, had got more than half-way across the
garden, and were observed by Charles Holland and Henry, who had come to
the steps of the hall to see what was going on. The moment Charles saw
the admiral a change of colour came over his face, and he exclaimed,—
“By all that’s surprising, there is my uncle!”
“Your uncle!” said Henry.
“Yes, as good a hearted a man as ever drew breath, and yet, withal, as
full of prejudices, and as ignorant of life, as a child.”
Without waiting for any reply from Henry, Charles Holland rushed
forward, and seizing his uncle by the hand, he cried, in tones of
genuine affection,—
“Uncle, dear uncle, how came you to find me out?”
“Charley, my boy,” cried the old man, “bless you; I mean, confound
your d—d impudence; you rascal, I’m glad to see you; no, I ain’t, you
young mutineer. What do you mean by it, you ugly, ill-looking, d—d fine
fellow—my dear boy. Oh, you infernal scoundrel.”
All this was accompanied by a shaking of the hand, which was enough to
dislocate anybody’s shoulder, and which Charles was compelled to bear
as well as he could.
It quite prevented him from speaking, however, for a few moments, for
it nearly shook the breath out of him. When, then, he could get in a
word, he said,—
“Uncle, I dare say you are surprised.”
“Surprised! D—n me, I am surprised.”
“Well, I shall be able to explain all to your satisfaction, I am sure.
Allow me now to introduce you to my friends.”
Turning then to Henry, Charles said,—
“This is Mr. Henry Bannerworth, uncle; and this Mr. George Bannerworth,
both good friends of mine; and this is Mr. Marchdale, a friend of
theirs, uncle.”
“Oh, indeed!”
“And here you see Admiral Bell, my most worthy, but rather eccentric
uncle.”
“Confound your impudence.”
“What brought him here I cannot tell; but he is a brave officer, and a
gentleman.”
“None of your nonsense,” said the admiral.
“And here you sees Jack Pringle,” said that individual, introducing
himself, since no one appeared inclined to do that office for him, “a
tar for all weathers. One as hates the French, and is never so happy as
when he’s alongside o’ some o’ those lubberly craft blazing away.”
“That’s uncommonly true,” remarked the admiral.
“Will you walk in, sir?” said Henry, courteously. “Any friend of
Charles Holland’s is most welcome here. You will have much to excuse us
for, because we are deficient in servants at present, in consequence
of some occurrences in our family, which your nephew has our full
permission to explain to you in full.”
“Oh, very good, I tell you what it is, all of you, what I’ve seen of
you, d—e, I like, so here goes. Come along, Jack.”
The admiral walked into the house, and as he went, Charles Holland said
to him,—
“How came you to know I was here, uncle?”
“Some fellow wrote me a despatch.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes, saying as you was a going to marry some odd sort of fish as it
wasn’t at all the thing to introduce into the family.”
“Was—was a vampyre mentioned?”
“That’s the very thing.”
“Hush, uncle—hush.”
“What for?”
“Do not, I implore, hint at such a thing before these kind friends of
mine. I will take an opportunity within the next hour of explaining
all to you, and you shall form your own kind and generous judgement
upon circumstances in which my honour and my happiness are so nearly
concerned.”
“Gammon,” said the admiral.
“What, uncle?”
“Oh, I know you want to palaver me into saying it’s all right. I
suppose if my judgment and generosity don’t like it, I shall be an old
fool, and a cursed goose?”
“Now, uncle.”
“Now, _nevey_.”
“Well, well—no more at present. We will talk over this at leisure. You
promise me to say nothing about it until you have heard my explanation,
uncle?”
“Very good. Make it as soon as you can, and as short as you can, that’s
all I ask of you.”
“I will, I will.”
Charles was to the full as anxious as his uncle could be to enter upon
the subject, some remote information of which, he felt convinced, had
brought the old man down to the Hall. Who it could have been that so
far intermeddled with his affairs as to write to him, he could not
possibly conceive.
A very few words will suffice to explain the precise position in which
Charles Holland was. A considerable sum of money had been left to him,
but it was saddled with the condition that he should not come into
possession of it until he was one year beyond the age which is usually
denominated that of discretion, namely, twenty-one. His uncle, the
admiral, was the trustee of his fortune, and he, with rare discretion,
had got the active and zealous assistance of a professional gentleman
of great honour and eminence to conduct the business for him.
This gentleman had advised that for the two years between the ages of
twenty and twenty-two, Charles Holland should travel, inasmuch as in
English society he would find himself in an awkward position, being for
one whole year of age, and yet waiting for his property.
Under such circumstances, reasoned the lawyer, a young man, unless he
is possessed of very rare discretion indeed, is almost sure to get
fearfully involved with money-lenders. Being of age, his notes, and
bills, and bonds would all be good, and he would be in a ten times
worse situation than a wealthy minor.
All this was duly explained to Charles, who, rather eagerly than
otherwise, caught at the idea of a two years wander on the continent,
where he could visit so many places, which to a well read young man
like himself, and one of a lively imagination, were full of the most
delightful associations.
But the acquaintance with Flora Bannerworth effected a great revolution
in his feelings. The dearest, sweetest spot on earth became that which
she inhabited. When the Bannerworths left him abroad, he knew not what
to do with himself. Everything, and every pursuit in which he had
before taken a delight, became most distasteful to him. He was, in
fact, in a short time, completely “used up,” and then he determined
upon returning to England, and finding out the dear object of his
attachment at once. This resolution was no sooner taken, than his
health and spirits returned to him, and with what rapidity he could,
he now made his way to his native shores.
The two years were so nearly expired, that he made up his mind he would
not communicate either with his uncle, the admiral, or the professional
gentleman upon whose judgment he set so high and so just a value.
And at the Hall he considered he was in perfect security from any
interruption, and so he would have been, but for that letter which was
written to Admiral Bell, and signed Josiah Crinkles, but which Josiah
Crinkles so emphatically denied all knowledge of. Who wrote it, remains
at present one of those mysteries which time, in the progress of our
narrative, will clear up.
The opportune, or rather the painful juncture at which Charles Holland
had arrived at Bannerworth Hall, we are well cognisant of. Where he
expected to find smiles he found tears, and the family with whom he had
fondly hoped he should pass a time of uninterrupted happiness, he found
plunged in the gloom incidental to an occurrence of the most painful
character.
Our readers will perceive, too, that coming as he did with an utter
disbelief in the vampyre, Charles had been compelled, in some measure,
to yield to the overwhelming weight of evidence which had been brought
to bear upon the subject, and although he could not exactly be said
to believe in the existence and the appearance of the vampyre at
Bannerworth Hall, he was upon the subject in a most painful state of
doubt and indecision.
Charles now took an opportunity to speak to Henry privately, and inform
him exactly how he stood with his uncle, adding—
“Now, my dear friend, if you forbid me, I will not tell my uncle of
this sad affair, but I must own I would rather do so fully and freely,
and trust to his own judgment upon it.”
“I implore you to do so,” said Henry. “Conceal nothing. Let him know
the precise situation and circumstances of the family by all means.
There is nothing so mischievous as secrecy; I have the greatest dislike
to it. I beg you tell him all.”
“I will; and with it, Henry, I will tell him that my heart is
irrevocably Flora’s.”
“Your generous clinging to one whom your heart saw and loved, under
very different auspices,” said Henry, “believe me, Charles, sinks deep
into my heart. She has related to me something of a meeting she had
with you.”
“Oh, Henry, she may tell you what I said; but there are no words which
can express the depth of my tenderness. ’Tis only time which can prove
how much I love her.”
“Go to your uncle,” said Henry, in a voice of emotion. “God bless you,
Charles. It is true you would have been fully justified in leaving my
sister; but the nobler and the more generous path you have chosen has
endeared you to us all.”
“Where is Flora now?” said Charles.
“She is in her own room. I have persuaded her, by some occupation,
to withdraw her mind from a too close and consequently painful
contemplation of the distressing circumstances in which she feels
herself placed.”
“You are right. What occupation best pleases her?”
“The pages of romance once had a charm for her gentle spirit.”
“Then come with me, and, from among the few articles I brought with
me here, I can find some papers which may help her to pass some merry
hours.”
Charles took Henry to his room, and, unstrapping a small valise, he
took from it some manuscript papers, one of which he handed to Henry,
saying—
“Give that to her; it contains an account of a wild adventure, and
shows that human nature may suffer much more—and that wrongfully
too—than came ever under our present mysterious affliction.”
“I will,” said Henry; “and, coming from you, I am sure it will have a
more than ordinary value in her eyes.”
“I will now,” said Charles, “seek my uncle. I will tell him how I love
her; and at the end of my narration, if he should not object, I would
fain introduce her to him, that he might himself see that, let what
beauty may have met his gaze, her peer he never yet met with, and may
in vain hope to do so.”
“You are partial, Charles.”
“Not so. ’Tis true I look upon her with a lover’s eyes, but I look
still with those of truthful observation.”
“Well, I will speak to her about seeing your uncle, and let you know.
No doubt, he will not be at all averse to an interview with any one who
stands high in your esteem.”
The young men now separated—Henry, to seek his beautiful sister; and
Charles, to communicate to his uncle the strange particulars connected
with Varney, the Vampyre.
CHAPTER XIX.
FLORA IN HER CHAMBER.—HER FEARS.—THE MANUSCRIPT.—AN ADVENTURE.
Henry found Flora in her chamber. She was in deep thought when he
tapped at the door of the room, and such was the state of nervous
excitement in which she was that even the demand for admission made
by him to the room was sufficient to produce from her a sudden cry of
alarm.
“Who—who is there?” she then said, in accents full of terror.
“’Tis I, dear Flora,” said Henry.
She opened the door in an instant, and, with a feeling of grateful
relief, exclaimed—
“Oh, Henry, is it only you?”
“Who did you suppose it was, Flora?”
She shuddered.
“I—I—do not know; but I am so foolish now, and so weak-spirited, that
the slightest noise is enough to alarm me.”
“You must, dear Flora, fight up, as I had hoped you were doing, against
this nervousness.”
“I will endeavour. Did not some strangers come a short time since,
brother?”
“Strangers to us, Flora, but not to Charles Holland. A relative of
his—an uncle whom he much respects, has found him out here, and has now
come to see him.”
“And to advise him,” said Flora, as she sunk into a chair, and
wept bitterly; “to advise him, of course, to desert, as he would a
pestilence, a vampyre bride.”
“Hush, hush! for the sake of Heaven, never make use of such a phrase,
Flora. You know not what a pang it brings to my heart to hear you.”
“Oh, forgive me, brother.”
“Say no more of it, Flora. Heed it not. It may be possible—in fact,
it may well be supposed as more than probable—that the relative of
Charles Holland may shrink from sanctioning the alliance, but do you
rest securely in the possession of the heart which I feel convinced is
wholly yours, and which, I am sure, would break ere it surrendered you.”
A smile of joy came across Flora’s pale but beautiful face, as she
cried,—
“And you, dear brother—you think so much of Charles’s faith?”
“As Heaven is my judge, I do.”
“Then I will bear up with what strength God may give me against all
things that seek to depress me; I will not be conquered.”
“You are right, Flora; I rejoice to find in you such a disposition.
Here is some manuscript which Charles thinks will amuse you, and he
bade me ask you if you would be introduced to his uncle.”
“Yes, yes—willingly.”
“I will tell him so; I know he wishes it, and I will tell him so. Be
patient, dear Flora, and all may yet be well.”
“But, brother, on your sacred word, tell me do you not think this Sir
Francis Varney is the vampyre?”
“I know not what to think, and do not press me for a judgment now. He
shall be watched.”
Henry left his sister, and she sat for some moments in silence with the
papers before her that Charles had sent her.
“Yes,” she then said, gently, “he loves me—Charles loves me; I ought
to be very, very happy. He loves me. In those words are concentrated
a whole world of joy—Charles loves me—he will not forsake me. Oh,
was there ever such dear love—such fond devotion?—never, never. Dear
Charles. He loves me—he loves me!”
The very repetition of these words had a charm for Flora—a charm which
was sufficient to banish much sorrow; even the much-dreaded vampyre was
forgotten while the light of love was beaming upon her, and she told
herself,—
“He is mine!—he is mine! He loves me truly.”
After a time, she turned to the manuscript which her brother had
brought her, and, with a far greater concentration of mind than she had
thought it possible she could bring to it, considering the many painful
subjects of contemplation that she might have occupied herself with,
she read the pages with very great pleasure and interest.
The tale was one which chained her attention both by its incidents and
the manner of its recital. It commenced as follows, and was entitled,
“Hugo de Verole; or, the Double Plot.”
In a very mountainous part of Hungary lived a nobleman whose paternal
estates covered many a mile of rock and mountain land, as well as some
fertile valleys, in which reposed a hardy and contented peasantry.
The old Count de Hugo de Verole had quitted life early, and had
left his only son, the then Count Hugo de Verole, a boy of scarcely
ten years, under the guardianship of his mother, an arbitrary and
unscrupulous woman.
The count, her husband, had been one of those quiet, even-tempered men,
who have no desire to step beyond the sphere in which they are placed;
he had no cares, save those included in the management of his estate,
the prosperity of his serfs, and the happiness of those, around him.
His death caused much lamentation throughout his domains, it was
so sudden and unexpected, being in the enjoyment of his health and
strength until a few hours previous, and then his energies became
prostrated by pain and disease. There was a splendid funeral ceremony,
which, according to the usages of his house, took place by torch-light.
So great and rapid were the ravages of disease, that the count’s body
quickly became a mass of corruption. All were amazed at the phenomena,
and were heartily glad when the body was disposed of in the place
prepared for its reception in the vaults of his own castle. The guests
who came to witness the funeral, and attend the count’s obsequies,
and to condole with the widow on the loss she had sustained, were
entertained sumptuously for many days.
The widow sustained her part well. She was inconsolable for the loss
of her husband, and mourned his death bitterly. Her grief appeared
profound, but she, with difficulty, subdued it to within decent bounds,
that she might not offend any of her numerous guests.
However, they left her with the assurances of their profound regard,
and then when they were gone, when the last guest had departed, and
were no longer visible to the eye of the countess, as she gazed from
the battlements, then her behaviour changed totally.
She descended from the battlements, and then with an imperious gesture
she gave her orders that all the gates of the castle should be closed,
and a watch set. All signs of mourning she ordered to be laid on one
side save her own, which she wore, and then she retired to her own
apartment, where she remained unseen.
Here the countess remained in profound meditation for nearly two days,
during which time the attendants believed she was praying for the
welfare of the soul of their deceased master, and they feared she would
starve herself to death if she remained any longer.
Just as they had assembled together for the purpose of either recalling
her from her vigils or breaking open the door, they were amazed to see
the countess open the room-door, and stand in the midst of them.
“What do you here?” she demanded, in a stern voice.
The servants were amazed and terrified at her contracted brow, and
forgot to answer the question she put to them.
“What do you do here?”
“We came, my lady, to see—see—if—if you were well.”
“And why?”
“Because we hadn’t seen your ladyship these two days, and we thought
that your grief was so excessive that we feared some harm might befall
you.”
The countess’s brows contracted for a few seconds, and she was about to
make a hasty reply, but she conquered the desire to do so, and merely
said,—
“I am not well, I am faint; but, had I been dying, I should not have
thanked you for interfering to prevent me; however, you acted for the
best, but do so no more. Now prepare me some food.”
The servants, thus dismissed, repaired to their stations, but with
such a degree of alacrity, that they sufficiently showed how much they
feared their mistress.
The young count, who was only in his sixth year, knew little about the
loss he had sustained; but after a day or two’s grief, there was an end
of his sorrow for the time.
That night there came to the castle-gate a man dressed in a black
cloak, attended by a servant. They were both mounted on good horses,
and they demanded to be admitted to the presence of the Countess de
Hugo de Verole.
The message was carried to the countess, who started, but said,—
“Admit the stranger.”
Accordingly the stranger was admitted, and shown into the apartment
where the countess was sitting.
At a signal the servants retired, leaving the countess and the stranger
alone. It was some moments ere they spoke, and then the countess said
in a low tone,—
“You are come?”
“I am come.”
“You cannot now, you see, perform your threat. My husband, the count,
caught a putrid disease, and he is no more.”
“I cannot indeed do what I intended, inform your husband of your
amours; but I can do something as good, and which will give you as much
annoyance.”
“Indeed.”
“Aye, more, it will cause you to be hated. I can spread reports.”
“You can.”
“And these may ruin you.”
“They may.”
“What do you intend to do? Do you intend that I shall be an enemy or a
friend? I can be either, according to my will.”
“What, do you desire to be either?” inquired the countess, with a
careless tone.
“If you refuse my terms, you can make me an implacable enemy, and if
you grant them, you can make me a useful friend and auxiliary,” said
the stranger.
“What would you do if you were my enemy?” inquired the countess.
“It is hardly my place,” said the stranger, “to furnish you with a
knowledge of my intentions, but I will say this much, that the bankrupt
Count of Morven is your lover.”
“Well?”
“And in the second place, that you were the cause of the death of your
husband.”
“How dare you, sir——”
“I dare say so much, and I dare say, also, that the Count of Morven
bought the drug of me, and that he gave it to you, and that you gave it
to the count your husband.”
“And what could you do if you were my friend?” inquired the countess,
in the same tone, and without emotion.
“I should abstain from doing all this; should be able to put any one
else out of your way for you, when you get rid of this Count of Morven,
as you assuredly will; for I know him too well not to be sure of that.”
“Get rid of him!”
“Exactly, in the same manner you got rid of the old count.”
“Then I accept your terms.”
“It is agreed, then?”
“Yes, quite.”
“Well, then, you must order me some rooms in a tower, where I can
pursue my studies in quiet.”
“You will be seen and noticed—all will be discovered.”
“No, indeed, I will take care of that, I can so far disguise myself
that he will not recognise me, and you can give out I am a philosopher
or necromancer, or what you will; no one will come to me—they will be
terrified.”
“Very well.”
“And the gold?”
“Shall be forthcoming as soon as I can get it. The count has placed all
his gold in safe keeping, and all I can seize are the rents as they
become due.”
“Very well; but let me have them. In the meantime you must provide for
me, as I have come here with the full intention of staying here, or in
some neighbouring town.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes; and my servant must be discharged, as I want none here.”
The countess called to an attendant and gave the necessary orders,
and afterwards remained some time with the stranger, who had thus so
unceremoniously thrust himself upon her, and insisted upon staying
under such strange and awful circumstances.
• • • • •
The Count of Morven came a few weeks after, and remained some days
with the countess. They were ceremonious and polite until they had a
moment to retire from before people, when the countess changed her cold
disdain to a cordial and familiar address.
“And now, my dear Morven,” she exclaimed, as soon as they were
unobserved—“and now, my dear Morven, that we are not seen, tell me,
what have you been doing with yourself?”
“Why, I have been in some trouble. I never had gold that would stay by
me. You know my hand was always open.”
“The old complaint again.”
“No; but having come to the end of my store, I began to grow serious.”
“Ah, Morven!” said the countess, reproachfully.
“Well, never mind; when my purse is low my spirits sink, as the mercury
does with the cold. You used to say my spirits were mercurial—I think
they were.”
“Well, what did you do?”
“Oh, nothing.”
“Was that what you were about to tell me?” inquired the countess.
“Oh, dear, no. You recollect the Italian quack of whom I bought the
drug you gave to the count, and which put an end to his days—he wanted
more money. Well, as I had no more to spare, I could spare no more to
him, and he turned vicious, and threatened. I threatened, too, and he
knew I was fully able and willing to perform any promise I might make
to him on that score. I endeavoured to catch him, as he had already
began to set people off on the suspicious and marvellous concerning me,
and if I could have come across him, I would have laid him very low
indeed.”
“And you could not find him?”
“No, I could not.”
“Well, then, I will tell you where he is at this present moment.”
“You?”
“Yes, I.”
“I can scarcely credit my senses at what you say,” said Count Morven.
“My worthy doctor, you are little better than a candidate for divine
honours. But where is he?”
“Will you promise to be guided by me?” said the countess.
“If you make it a condition upon which you grant the information, I
must.”
“Well, then, I take that as a promise.”
“You may. Where—oh, where is he?”
“Remember your promise. Your doctor is at this moment in this castle.”
“This castle?”
“Yes, this castle.”
“Surely there must be some mistake; it is too much fortune at once.”
“He came here for the same purpose he went to you.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes, to get more money by extortion, and a promise to poison anybody I
liked.”
“D——n! it is the offer he made to me, and he named you.”
“He named you to me, and said I should be soon tired of you.”
“You have caged him?”
“Oh, dear, no; he has a suite of apartments in the eastern tower, where
he passes for a philosopher, or a wizard, as people like best.”
“How?”
“I have given him leave there.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes; and what is more amazing is, that he is to aid me in poisoning
you when I have become tired of you.”
“This is a riddle I cannot unravel; tell me the solution.”
“Well, dear, listen,—he came to me and told me of something I already
knew, and demanded money and a residence for his convenience, and I
have granted him the asylum.”
“You have?”
“I have.”
“I see; I will give him an inch or two of my Andrea Ferrara.”
“No—no.”
“Do you countenance him?”
“For a time. Listen—we want men in the mines; my late husband sent very
few to them of late years, and therefore they are getting short of men
there.”
“Aye, aye.”
“The thing will be for you to feign ignorance of the man, and then you
will be able to get him seized, and placed in the mines, for such men
as he are dangerous, and carry poisoned weapons.”
“Would he not be better out of the world at once; there would be no
escape, and no future contingencies?”
“No—no. I will have no more lives taken; and he will be made useful;
and, moreover, he will have time to reflect upon the mistake he had
made in threatening me.”
“He was paid for the job, and he had no future claim. But what about
the child?”
“Oh, he may remain for some time longer here with us.”
“It will be dangerous to do so,” said the count; “he is now ten years
old, and there is no knowing what may be done for him by his relatives.”
“They dare not enter the gates of this castle Morven.”
“Well, well; but you know he might have travelled the same road as his
father, and all would be settled.”
“No more lives, as I told you; but we can easily secure him some other
way, and we shall be equally as free from him and them.”
“That is enough—there are dungeons, I know, in this castle, and he can
be kept there safe enough.”
“He can; but that is not what I propose. We can put him into the mines
and confine him as a lunatic.”
“Excellent!”
“You see, we must make those mines more productive somehow or other;
they would be so, but the count would not hear of it; he said it was so
inhuman, they were so destructive of life.”
“Psha! what were the mines intended for if not for use?”
“Exactly—I often said so, but he always put a negative to it.”
“We’ll make use of an affirmative, my dear countess, and see what will
be the result in a change of policy. By the way, when will our marriage
be celebrated?”
“Not for some months.”
“How, so long? I am impatient.”
“You must restrain your impatience—but we must have the boy settled
first, and the count will have been dead a longer time then, and we
shall not give so much scandal to the weak-minded fools that were his
friends, for it will be dangerous to have so many events happen about
the same period.”
“You shall act as you think proper—but the first thing to be done will
be, to get this cunning doctor quietly out of the way.”
“Yes.”
“I must contrive to have him seized, and carried to the mines.”
“Beneath the tower in which he lives is a trap-door and a vault, from
which, by means of another trap and vault, is a long subterranean
passage that leads to a door that opens into one end of the mines; near
this end live several men whom you must give some reward to, and they
will, by concert, seize him, and set him to work.”
“And if he will not work?”
“Why, they will scourge him in such a manner, that he would be afraid
even of a threat of a repetition of the same treatment.”
“That will do. But I think the worthy doctor will split himself with
rage and malice, he will be like a caged tiger.”
“But he will be denuded of his teeth and claws,” replied the countess,
smiling; “therefore he will have leisure to repent of having threatened
his employers.”
• • • • •
Some weeks passed over, and the Count of Morven contrived to become
acquainted with the doctor. They appeared to be utter strangers to
each other, though each knew the other; the doctor having disguised
himself, he believed the disguise impenetrable and therefore sat at
ease.
“Worthy doctor,” said the count to him, one day; “you have, no doubt,
in your studies, become acquainted with many of the secrets of science.”
“I have, my lord count; I may say there are few that are not known to
Father Aldrovani. I have spent many years in research.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes; the midnight lamp has burned till the glorious sun has reached
the horizon, and brings back the day, and yet have I been found beside
my books.”
“’Tis well; men like you should well know the value of the purest and
most valuable metals the earth produces?”
“I know of but one—that is gold!”
“’Tis what I mean.”
“But ’tis hard to procure from the bowels of the earth—from the heart
of these mountains by which we are surrounded.”
“Yes, that is true. But know you not the owners of this castle and
territory possess these mines and work them?”
“I believe they do; but I thought they had discontinued working them
some years.”
“Oh, no! that was given out to deceive the government, who claimed so
much out of its products.”
“Oh! ah! aye, I see now.”
“And ever since they have been working it privately, and storing bars
of gold up in the vaults of this——”
“Here, in this castle?”
“Yes; beneath this very tower—it being the least frequented—the
strongest, and perfectly inaccessible from all sides, save the
castle—it was placed there for the safest deposit.”
“I see; and there is much gold deposited in the vaults?”
“I believe there is an immense quantity in the vaults.”
“And what is your motive for telling me of this hoard of the precious
metal?”
“Why, doctor, I thought that you or I could use a few bars; and that,
if we acted in concert, we might be able to take away, at various
times, and secrete, in some place or other, enough to make us rich men
for all our lives.”
“I should like to see this gold before I said anything about it,”
replied the doctor, thoughtfully.
“As you please; do you find a lamp that will not go out by the sudden
draughts of air, or have the means of relighting it, and I will
accompany you.”
“When?”
“This very night, good doctor, when you shall see such a golden harvest
you never yet hoped for, or even believed in.”
“To-night be it, then,” replied the doctor. “I will have a lamp that
will answer our purpose, and some other matters.”
“Do, good doctor,” and the count left the philosopher’s cell.
• • • • •
“The plan takes,” said the count to the countess, “give me the keys,
and the worthy man will be in safety before daylight.”
“Is he not suspicious?”
“Not at all.”
• • • • •
That night, about an hour before midnight,—the Count Morven stole
towards the philosopher’s room. He tapped at the door.
“Enter,” said the philosopher.
The count entered, and saw the philosopher seated, and by him a lamp of
peculiar construction, and incased in gauze wire, and a cloak.
“Are you ready?” inquired the count.
“Quite,” he replied.
“Is that your lamp?”
“It is.”
“Follow me, then, and hold the lamp tolerably high, as the way is
strange, and the steps steep.”
“Lead on.”
“You have made up your mind, I dare say, as to what share of the
undertaking you will accept of with me.”
“And what if I will not?” said the philosopher, coolly.
“It falls to the ground, and I return the keys to their place.”
“I dare say I shall not refuse, if you have not deceived me as to the
quantity and purity of the metal they have stored up.”
“I am no judge of these metals, doctor. I am no assayest; but I believe
you will find what I have to show you will far exceed your expectations
on that head.”
“’Tis well; proceed.”
They had now got to the first vault, in which stood the first door,
and, with some difficulty, they opened the vault door.
“It has not been opened for some time,” said the philosopher.
“I dare say not, they seldom used to go here, from what I can learn,
though it is kept a great secret.”
“And we can keep it so, likewise.”
“True.”
They now entered the vault, and came to the second door, which opened
into a kind of flight of steps, cut out of the solid rock, and then
along a passage cut out of the mountain, of some kind of stone, but not
so hard as the rock itself.
“You see,” said the count, “what care has been taken to isolate
the place, and detach it from the castle, so that it should not be
dependent upon the possessor of the castle. This is the last door but
one, and now prepare yourself for a surprise, doctor, this will be an
extraordinary one.”
So saying, the count opened the door, and stepped on one side, when the
doctor approached the place, and was immediately thrust forward by the
count and he rolled down some steps into the mine, and was immediately
seized by some of the miners, who had been stationed there for that
purpose, and carried to a distant part of the mine, there to work for
the remainder of his life.
[Illustration: The Count Morven hurling the doctor down the turret
stairs.]
The count, seeing all secure, refastened the doors, and returned to
the castle. A few weeks after this the body of a youth, mangled and
disfigured, was brought to the castle, which the countess said was her
son’s body.
The count had immediately secured the real heir, and thrust him into
the mines, there to pass a life of labour and hopeless misery.
• • • • •
There was a high feast held. The castle gates were thrown open, and
everybody who came were entertained without question.
This was on the occasion of the count’s and countess’s marriage. It
seemed many months after the death of her son, whom she affected to
mourn for a long time.
However, the marriage took place, and in all magnificence and
splendour. The countess again appeared arrayed in splendour and beauty:
she was proud and haughty, and the count was imperious.
In the mean time, the young Count de Hugo de Verole was confined in the
mines, and the doctor with him.
By a strange coincidence, the doctor and the young count became
companions, and the former, meditating projects of revenge, educated
the young count as well as he was able for several years in the mines,
and cherished in the young man a spirit of revenge. They finally
escaped together, and proceeded to Leyden, where the doctor had
friends, and where he placed his pupil at the university, and thus made
him a most efficient means of revenge, because the education of the
count gave him a means of appreciating the splendour and rank he had
been deprived of. He, therefore, determined to remain at Leyden until
he was of age, and then apply to his father’s friends, and then to his
sovereign, to dispossess and punish them both for their double crime.
The count and countess lived on in a state of regal splendour. The
immense revenue of his territory, and the treasure the late count had
amassed, as well as the revenue that the mines brought in, would have
supported a much larger expenditure than even their tastes disposed
them to enjoy.
They had heard nothing of the escape of the doctor and the young
count. Indeed, those who knew of it held their peace and said nothing
about it, for they feared the consequences of their negligence. The
first intimation they received was at the hands of a state messenger,
summoning them to deliver up the castle revenues and treasure of the
late count.
This was astounding to them, and they refused to do so, but were soon
after seized upon by a regiment of cuirassiers sent to take them, and
they were accused of the crime of murder at the instance of the doctor.
They were arraigned and found guilty, and, as they were of the
patrician order, their execution was delayed, and they were committed
to exile. This was done out of favour to the young count, who did not
wish to have his family name tainted by a public execution, or their
being confined like convicts.
The count and countess quitted Hungary, and settled in Italy, where
they lived upon the remains of the Count of Morven’s property, shorn of
all their splendour but enough to keep them from being compelled to do
any menial office.
The young count took possession of his patrimony and his treasure at
last, such as was left by his mother and her paramour.
The doctor continued to hide his crime from the young count, and the
perpetrators denying all knowledge of it, he escaped; but he returned
to his native place, Leyden, with a reward for his services from the
young count.
Flora rose from her perusal of the manuscript, which here ended, and
even as she did so, she heard a footstep approaching her chamber door.
CHAPTER XX.
THE DREADFUL MISTAKE.—THE TERRIFIC INTERVIEW IN THE CHAMBER.—THE
ATTACK OF THE VAMPYRE.
The footstep which Flora, upon the close of the tale she had been
reading, heard approaching her apartment, came rapidly along the
corridor.
“It is Henry, returned to conduct me to an interview with Charles’s
uncle,” she said. “I wonder, now, what manner of man he is. He should
in some respects resemble Charles; and if he do so, I shall bestow upon
him some affection for that alone.”
Tap—tap came upon the chamber door.
Flora was not at all alarmed now, as she had been when Henry brought
her the manuscript. From some strange action of the nervous system, she
felt quite confident, and resolved to brave everything. But then she
felt quite sure that it was Henry, and before the knocking had taken
her by surprise.
“Come in,” she said, in a cheerful voice. “Come in.”
The door opened with wonderful swiftness—a figure stepped into the
room, and then closed it as rapidly, and stood against it. Flora tried
to scream, but her tongue refused its office; a confused whirl of
sensations passed through her brain—she trembled, and an icy coldness
came over her. It was Sir Francis Varney, the vampyre!
He had drawn up his tall, gaunt frame to its full height, and crossed
his arms upon his breast; there was a hideous smile upon his sallow
countenance, and his voice was deep and sepulchral, as he said,—
“Flora Bannerworth, hear that which I have to say, and hear it calmly.
You need have nothing to fear. Make an alarm—scream, or shout for help,
and, by the hell beneath us, you are lost!”
There was a death-like, cold, passionless manner about the utterance
of these words, as if they were spoken mechanically, and came from no
human lips.
Flora heard them, and yet scarcely comprehended them; she stepped
slowly back till she reached a chair, and there she held for support.
The only part of the address of Varney that thoroughly reached her
ears, was that if she gave any alarm some dreadful consequences were to
ensue. But it was not on account of these words that she really gave no
alarm; it was because she was utterly unable to do so.
“Answer me,” said Varney. “Promise that you will hear that which I have
to say. In so promising you commit yourself to no evil, and you shall
hear that which shall give you much peace.”
It was in vain she tried to speak; her lips moved, but she uttered no
sound.
“You are terrified,” said Varney, “and yet I know not why. I do not
come to do you harm, although harm have you done me. Girl, I come to
rescue you from a thraldom of the soul under which you now labour.”
There was a pause of some moments’ duration, and then, faintly, Flora
managed to say,—
“Help! help! Oh, help me, Heaven!”
Varney made a gesture of impatience, as he said,—
“Heaven works no special matters now. Flora Bannerworth, if you have as
much intellect as your nobility and beauty would warrant the world in
supposing, you will listen to me.”
“I—I hear,” said Flora, as she still, dragging the chair with her,
increased the distance between them.
“’Tis well. You are now more composed.”
She fixed her eyes upon the face of Varney with a shudder. There
could be no mistake. It was the same which, with the strange, glassy
looking eyes, had glared upon her on that awful night of the storm,
when she was visited by the vampyre. And Varney returned that gaze
unflinchingly. There was a hideous and strange contortion of his face
now as he said,—
“You are beautiful. The most cunning statuary might well model some
rare work of art from those rounded limbs, that were surely made to
bewitch the gazer. Your skin rivals the driven snow—what a face of
loveliness, and what a form of enchantment.”
She did not speak, but a thought came across her mind, which at once
crimsoned her cheek—she knew she had fainted on the first visit of the
vampyre, and now he, with a hideous reverence, praised beauties which
he might have cast his demoniac eyes over at such a time.
“You understand me,” he said. “Well, let that pass. I am something
allied to humanity yet.”
“Speak your errand,” gasped Flora, “or come what may, I scream for help
to those who will not be slow to render it.”
“I know it.”
“You know I will scream?”
“No; you will hear me. I know they would not be slow to tender help to
you, but you will not call for it; I will present to you no necessity.”
“Say on—say on.”
“You perceive I do not attempt to approach you; my errand is one of
peace.”
“Peace from you! Horrible being, if you be really what even now my
appalled imagination shrinks from naming you, would not even to you
absolute annihilation be a blessing?”
“Peace, peace. I came not here to talk on such a subject. I must
be brief, Flora Bannerworth, for time presses. I do not hate you.
Wherefore should I? You are young, and you are beautiful, and you bear
a name which should command, and does command, some portion of my best
regard.”
“There is a portrait,” said Flora, “in this house.”
“No more—no more. I know what you would say.”
“It is yours.”
“The house, and all within, I covet,” he said, uneasily. “Let that
suffice. I have quarrelled with your brother—I have quarrelled with one
who just now fancies he loves you.”
“Charles Holland loves me truly.”
“It does not suit me now to dispute that point with you. I have the
means of knowing more of the secrets of the human heart than common
men. I tell you, Flora Bannerworth, that he who talks to you of
love, loves you not but with the fleeting fancy of a boy; and there
is one who hides deep in his heart a world of passion, one who has
never spoken to you of love, and yet who loves you with a love as far
surpassing the evanescent fancy of this boy Holland, as does the mighty
ocean the most placid lake that ever basked in idleness beneath a
summer’s sun.”
There was a wonderful fascination in the manner now of Varney. His
voice sounded like music itself. His words flowed from his tongue, each
gently and properly accented, with all the charm of eloquence.
Despite her trembling horror of that man—despite her fearful opinion,
which might be said to amount to a conviction of what he really was,
Flora felt an irresistible wish to hear him speak on. Ay, despite,
too, the ungrateful theme to her heart which he had now chosen as
the subject of his discourse, she felt her fear of him gradually
dissipating, and now when he made a pause, she said,—
“You are much mistaken. On the constancy and truth of Charles Holland,
I would stake my life.”
“No doubt, no doubt.”
“Have you spoken now that which you had to say?”
“No, no. I tell you I covet this place, I would purchase it, but having
with your bad-tempered brothers quarrelled, they will hold no further
converse with me.”
“And well they may refuse.”
“Be, that as it may, sweet lady, I come to you to be my mediator. In
the shadow of the future I can see many events which are to come.”
“Indeed.”
“It is so. Borrowing some wisdom from the past, and some from resources
I would not detail to you, I know that if I have inflicted much misery
upon you, I can spare you much more. Your brother or your lover will
challenge me.”
“Oh, no, no.”
“I say such will happen, and I can kill either. My skill as well as my
strength is superhuman.”
“Mercy! mercy!” gasped Flora. “I will spare either or both on a
condition.”
“What fearful condition?”
“It is not a fearful one. Your terrors go far before the fact. All I
wish, maiden, of you is to induce these imperious brothers of yours to
sell or let the Hall to me.”
“Is that all?”
“It is. I ask no more, and, in return, I promise you not only that I
will not fight with them, but that you shall never see me again. Rest
securely, maiden, you will be undisturbed by me.”
“Oh, God! that were indeed an assurance worth the striving for,” said
Flora.
“It is one you may have. But—”
“Oh, I knew—my heart told me there was yet some fearful condition to
come.”
“You are wrong again. I only ask of you that you keep this meeting a
secret.”
“No, no, no—I cannot.”
“Nay, what so easy?”
“I will not; I have no secrets from those I love.”
“Indeed, you will find soon the expediency of a few at least; but if
you will not, I cannot urge it longer. Do as your wayward woman’s
nature prompts you.”
There was a slight, but a very slight, tone of aggravation in these
words, and the manner in which they were uttered.
As he spoke, he moved from the door towards the window, which opened
into a kitchen garden. Flora shrunk as far from him as possible, and
for a few moments they regarded each other in silence.
“Young blood,” said Varney, “mantles in your veins.”
She shuddered with terror.
“Be mindful of the condition I have proposed to you. I covet
Bannerworth Hall.”
“I—I hear.”
“And I must have it. I will have it, although my path to it be through
a sea of blood. You understand me, maiden? Repeat what has passed
between us or not, as you please. I say, beware of me, if you keep not
the condition I have proposed.”
“Heaven knows that this place is becoming daily more hateful to us
all,” said Flora.
“Indeed!”
“You well might know so much. It is no sacrifice to urge it now. I will
urge my brother.”
“Thanks—a thousand thanks. You may not live to regret even having made
a friend of Varney——”
“The vampyre!” said Flora.
He advanced towards her a step, and she involuntarily uttered a scream
of terror.
In an instant his hand clasped her waist with the power of an iron
vice; she felt his hot breath flushing on her cheek. Her senses reeled,
and she found herself sinking. She gathered all her breath and all her
energies into one piercing shriek, and then she fell to the floor.
There was a sudden crash of broken glass, and then all was still.
[Illustration: Flora sinks as Varney clasps her waist.]
CHAPTER XXI.
THE CONFERENCE BETWEEN THE UNCLE AND NEPHEW, AND THE ALARM.
Meanwhile Charles Holland had taken his uncle by the arm, and led him
into a private room.
“Dear uncle,” he said, “be seated, and I will explain everything
without reserve.”
“Seated!—nonsense! I’ll walk about,” said the admiral. “D—n me! I’ve
no patience to be seated, and very seldom had or have. Go on now, you
young scamp.”
“Well—well; you abuse me, but I am quite sure, had you been in my
situation, you would have acted precisely as I have done.”
“No, I shouldn’t.”
“Well, but, uncle——”
“Don’t think to come over me by calling me uncle. Hark you,
Charles—from this moment I won’t be your uncle any more.”
“Very well, sir.”
“It ain’t very well. And how dare you, you buccaneer, call me sir, eh?
I say, how dare you?”
“I will call you anything you like.”
“But I won’t be called anything I like. You might as well call me at
once Morgan, the Pirate, for he was called anything he liked. Hilloa,
sir! how dare you laugh, eh? I’ll teach you to laugh at me. I wish I
had you on board ship—that’s all, you young rascal. I’d soon teach you
to laugh at your superior officer, I would.”
“Oh, uncle, I did not laugh at you.”
“What did you laugh at, then?”
“At the joke.”
“Joke. D—n me, there was no joke at all!”
“Oh, very good.”
“And it ain’t very good.”
Charles knew very well that, this sort of humour, in which was the
old admiral, would soon pass away, and then that he would listen to
him comfortably enough; so he would not allow the least exhibition of
petulance or mere impatience to escape himself, but contented himself
by waiting until the ebullition of feeling fairly worked itself out.
“Well, well,” at length said the old man, “you have dragged me here,
into a very small and a very dull room, under pretence of having
something to tell me, and I have heard nothing yet.”
“Then I will now tell you,” said Charles. “I fell in love——”
“Bah!”
“With Flora Bannerworth, abroad; she is not only the most beautiful of
created beings——”
“Bah!”
“But her mind is of the highest order of intelligence, honour, candour,
and all amiable feelings——”
“Bah!”
“Really, uncle, if you say ‘Bah!’ to everything, I cannot go on.”
“And what the deuce difference, sir, does it make to you, whether I say
‘Bah!’ or not?”
“Well, I love her. She came to England, and, as I could not exist, but
was getting ill, and should, no doubt, have died if I had not done so,
I came to England.”
“But d——e, I want to know about the mermaid.”
“The vampyre, you mean, sir?”
“Well, well, the vampyre.”
“Then, uncle, all I can tell you is, that it is supposed a vampyre came
one night and inflicted a wound upon Flora’s neck with his teeth, and
that he is still endeavouring to renew his horrible existence from the
young, pure blood that flows through her veins.”
“The devil he is!”
“Yes. I am bewildered, I must confess, by the mass of circumstances
that have combined to give the affair a horrible truthfulness. Poor
Flora is much injured in health and spirits; and when I came home, she,
at once, implored me to give her up, and think of her no more, for she
could not think of allowing me to unite my fate with hers, under such
circumstances.”
“She did?”
“Such were her words, uncle. She implored me—she used that word,
‘implore’—to fly from her, to leave her to her fate, to endeavour to
find happiness with some one else.”
“Well?”
“But I saw her heart was breaking.”
“What o’ that?”
“Much of that, uncle. I told her that when I deserted her in the hour
of misfortune that I hoped Heaven would desert me. I told her that if
her happiness was wrecked, to cling yet to me, and that with what power
and what strength God had given me, I would stand between her and all
ill.”
“And what then?”
“She—she fell upon my breast and wept and blessed me. Could I desert
her—could I say to her, ‘My dear girl, when you were full of health
and beauty, I loved you, but now that sadness is at your heart I leave
you?’ Could I tell her that, uncle, and yet call myself a man?”
“No!” roared the old admiral, in a voice that made the room echo again;
“and I tell you what, if you had done so, d—n you, you puppy, I’d have
braced you, and—and married the girl myself. I would, d——e, but I
would.”
“Dear uncle!”
“Don’t dear me, sir. Talk of deserting a girl when the signal of
distress, in the shape of a tear, is in her eye!”
“But I——”
“You are a wretch—a confounded lubberly boy—a swab—a d—d bad grampus.”
“You mistake, uncle.”
“No, I don’t. God bless you, Charles, you shall have her—if a whole
ship’s crew of vampyres said no, you shall have her. Let me see
her—just let me see her.”
The admiral gave his lips a vigorous wipe with his sleeve, and Charles
said hastily,—
“My dear uncle, you will recollect that Miss Bannerworth is quite a
young lady.”
“I suppose she is.”
“Well, then, for God’s sake, don’t attempt to kiss her.”
“Not kiss her! d——e, they like it. Not kiss her, because she’s a young
lady! D——e, do you think I’d kiss a corporal of marines?”
“No, uncle; but you know young ladies are very delicate.”
“And ain’t I delicate—shiver my timbers, ain’t I delicate? Where is
she? that’s what I want to know.”
“Then you approve of what I have done?”
“You are a young scamp, but you have got some of the old admiral’s
family blood in you, so don’t take any credit for acting like an honest
man—you couldn’t help it.”
“But if I had not so acted,” said Charles, with a smile, “what would
have become of the family blood, then?”
“What’s that to you? I would have disowned you, because that very thing
would have convinced me you were an impostor, and did not belong to the
family at all.”
“Well, that would have been one way of getting over the difficulty.”
“No difficulty at all. The man who deserts the good ship that carries
him through the waves, or the girl that trusts her heart to him, ought
to be chopped up into meat for wild monkeys.”
“Well, I think so too.”
“Of course you do.”
“Why, of course?”
“Because it’s so d——d reasonable that, being a nephew of mine, you
can’t possibly help it.”
“Bravo, uncle! I had no idea you were so argumentative.”
“Hadn’t you, spooney; you’d be an ornament to the gun-room, you would;
but where’s the ‘young lady’ who is so infernal delicate—where is she,
I say?”
“I will fetch her, uncle.”
“Ah, do; I’ll be bound, now, she’s one of the right build—a good
figure-head, and don’t make too much stern-way.”
“Well, well, whatever you do, now don’t pay her any compliments, for
your efforts in that line are of such a very doubtful order, that I
shall dread to hear you.”
“You be off, and mind your own business; I haven’t been at sea forty
years without picking up some out-and-out delicate compliments to say
to a young lady.”
“But do you really imagine, now, that the deck of a man-of-war is a
nice place to pick up courtly compliments in?”
“Of course I do. There you hear the best of language, d——e! You don’t
know what you are talking about, you fellows that have stuck on shore
all your lives; it’s we seamen who learn life.”
“Well, well—hark!”
“What’s that?”
“A cry—did you not hear a cry?”
“A signal of distress, by G—d!”
In their efforts to leave the room, the uncle and nephew for about a
minute actually blocked up the door-way, but the superior bulk of the
admiral prevailed, and after nearly squeezing poor Charles flat, he got
out first.
But this did not avail him, for he knew not where to go. Now, the
second scream which Flora had uttered when the vampyre had clasped her
waist came upon their ears, and, as they were outside the room, it
acted well as a guide in which direction to come.
Charles fancied correctly enough at once that it proceeded from the
room which was called “Flora’s own room,” and thitherward accordingly
he dashed at tremendous speed.
Henry, however, happened to be nearer at hand, and, moreover, he did
not hesitate a moment, because he knew that Flora was in her own room;
so he reached it first, and Charles saw him rush in a few moments
before he could reach the room.
The difference of time, however, was very slight, and Henry had only
just raised Flora from the floor as Charles appeared.
“God of Heaven!” cried the latter, “what has happened?”
“I know not,” said Henry; “as God is my judge, I know not. Flora,
Flora, speak to us! Flora! Flora!”
“She has fainted!” cried Charles. “Some water may restore her. Oh,
Henry, Henry, is not this horrible?”
“Courage! courage!” said Henry, although his voice betrayed what a
terrible state of anxiety he was himself in; “you will find water in
that decanter, Charles. Here is my mother, too! Another visit! God help
us!”
Mrs. Bannerworth sat down on the edge of the sofa which was in the
room, and could only wring her hands and weep.
“Avast!” cried the admiral, making his appearance. “Where’s the enemy,
lads?”
“Uncle,” said Charles, “uncle, uncle, the vampyre has been here
again—the dreadful vampyre!”
“D—n me, and he’s gone, too, and carried half the window with him. Look
there!”
It was literally true; the window, which was a long latticed one, was
smashed through.
“Help! oh, help!” said Flora, as the water that was dashed in her face
began to recover her.
“You are safe!” cried Henry, “you are safe!”
“Flora,” said Charles; “you know my voice, dear Flora? Look up, and you
will see there are none here but those who love you.”
Flora opened her eyes timidly as the said,—
“Has it gone?”
“Yes, yes, dear,” said Charles. “Look around you; here are none but
true friends.”
“And tried friends, my dear,” said Admiral Bell, “excepting me; and
whenever you like to try me, afloat or ashore, d—n me, shew me Old
Nick himself, and I won’t shrink—yard arm and yard arm—grapnel to
grapnel—pitch pots and grenades!”
“This is my uncle, Flora,” said Charles.
“I thank you, sir,” said Flora, faintly.
“All right!” whispered the admiral to Charles; “what a figure-head, to
be sure! Poll at Swansea would have made just about four of her, but
she wasn’t so delicate, d—n me!”
“I should think not.”
“You are right for once in a way, Charley.”
“What was it that alarmed you?” said Charles, tenderly, as he now took
one of Flora’s hands in his.
“Varney—Varney, the vampyre.”
“Varney!” exclaimed Henry; “Varney here!”
“Yes, he came in at that door; and when I screamed, I suppose—for I
hardly was conscious—he darted out through the window.”
“This,” said Henry, “is beyond all human patience. By Heaven! I cannot
and will not endure it.”
“It shall be my quarrel,” said Charles; “I shall go at once and defy
him. He shall meet me.”
“Oh, no, no, no,” said Flora, as she clung convulsively to Charles.
“No, no; there is a better way.”
“What way?”
“The place has become full of terrors. Let us leave it. Let him, as he
wishes, have it.”
“Let _him_ have it?”
“Yes, yes. God knows, if it purchase an immunity from these visits, we
may well be overjoyed. Remember that we have ample reason to believe
him more than human. Why should you allow yourselves to risk a personal
encounter with such a man, who might be glad to kill you that he might
have an opportunity of replenishing his own hideous existence from your
best heart’s blood?”
The young men looked aghast.
“Besides,” added Flora, “you cannot tell what dreadful powers of
mischief he may have, against which human courage might be of no avail.”
“There is truth and reason,” said Mr. Marchdale, stepping forward, “in
what Flora says.”
“Only let me come across him, that’s all,” said Admiral Bell, “and I’ll
soon find out what he is. I suppose he’s some long slab of a lubber
after all, ain’t he, with no strength.”
“His strength is immense,” said Marchdale. “I tried to seize him, and
I fell beneath his arm as if I had been struck by the hammer of a
Cyclops.”
“A what?” cried the admiral.
“A Cyclops.”
“D—n me, I served aboard the Cyclops eleven years, and never saw a very
big hammer aboard of her.”
“What on earth is to be done?” said Henry.
“Oh,” chimed in the admiral, “there’s always a bother about what’s to
be done on earth. Now, at sea, I could soon tell you what was to be
done.”
“We must hold a solemn consultation over this matter,” said Henry. “You
are safe now, Flora.”
“Oh, be ruled by me. Give up the Hall.”
“You tremble.”
“I do tremble, brother, for what may yet ensue. I implore you to give
up the Hall. It is but a terror to us now—give it up. Have no more to
do with it. Let us make terms with Sir Francis Varney. Remember, we
dare not kill him.”
“He ought to be smothered,” said the admiral.
“It is true,” remarked Henry, “we dare not, even holding all the
terrible suspicions we do, take his life.”
“By foul means certainly not,” said Charles, “were he ten times a
vampyre. I cannot, however, believe that he is so invulnerable as he is
represented.”
“No one represents him here,” said Marchdale. “I speak, sir, because I
saw you glance at me. I only know that, having made two unsuccessful
attempts to seize him, he eluded me, once by leaving in my grasp a
piece of his coat, and the next time he struck me down, and I feel yet
the effects of the terrific blow.”
“You hear?” said Flora.
“Yes, I hear,” said Charles.
“For some reason,” added Marchdale, in a tone of emotion, “what I say
seems to fall always badly upon Mr. Holland’s ear. I know not why; but
if it will give him any satisfaction, I will leave Bannerworth Hall
to-night.”
“No, no, no,” said Henry; “for the love of Heaven, do not let us
quarrel.”
“Hear, hear,” cried the admiral. “We can never fight the enemy well if
the ship’s crew are on bad terms. Come now, you Charles, this appears
to be an honest, gentlemanly fellow—give him your hand.”
“If Mr. Charles Holland,” said Marchdale, “knows aught to my prejudice
in any way, however slight, I here beg of him to declare it at once,
and openly.”
“I cannot assert that I do,” said Charles.
“Then what the deuce do you make yourself so disagreeable for, eh?”
cried the admiral.
“One cannot help one’s impression and feelings,” said Charles; “but I
am willing to take Mr. Marchdale’s hand.”
“And I yours, young sir,” said Marchdale, “in all sincerity of spirit,
and with good will towards you.”
They shook hands; but it required no conjuror to perceive that it was
not done willingly or cordially. It was a handshaking of that character
which seemed to imply on each side, “I don’t like you, but I don’t know
positively any harm of you.”
“There now,” said the admiral, “that’s better.”
“Now, let us hold counsel about this Varney,” said Henry. “Come to
the parlour all of you, and we will endeavour to come to some decided
arrangement.”
“Do not weep, mother,” said Flora. “All may yet be well. We will leave
this place.”
“We will consider that question, Flora,” said Henry; “and believe me
your wishes will go a long way with all of us, as you may well suppose
they always would.”
They left Mrs. Bannerworth with Flora, and proceeded to the small oaken
parlour, in which were the elaborate and beautiful carvings which have
been before mentioned.
Henry’s countenance, perhaps, wore the most determined expression of
all. He appeared now as if he had thoroughly made up his mind to do
something which should have a decided tendency to put a stop to the
terrible scenes which were now day by day taking place beneath that
roof.
Charles Holland looked serious and thoughtful, as if he were revolving
some course of action in his mind concerning which he was not quite
clear.
Mr. Marchdale was more sad and depressed, to all appearance, than any
of them.
As for the admiral, he was evidently in a state of amazement, and knew
not what to think. He was anxious to do something, and yet what that
was to be he had not the most remote idea, any more than as if he was
not at all cognisant of any of those circumstances, every one of which
was so completely out of the line of his former life and experience.
George had gone to call on Mr. Chillingworth, so he was not present at
the first part of this serious council of war.
CHAPTER XXII.
THE CONSULTATION.—THE DETERMINATION TO LEAVE THE HALL.
This was certainly the most seriously reasonable meeting which had been
held at Bannerworth Hall on the subject of the much dreaded vampyre.
The absolute necessity for doing something of a decisive character was
abundantly apparent, and when Henry promised Flora that her earnest
wish to leave the house should not be forgotten as an element in the
discussion which was about to ensue, it was with a rapidly growing
feeling on his own part, to the effect that that house, associated even
as it was with many endearing recollections, was no home for him.
Hence he was the more inclined to propose a departure from the Hall
if it could possibly be arranged satisfactorily in a pecuniary point
of view. The pecuniary point of view, however, in which Henry was
compelled to look at the subject, was an important and a troublesome
one.
We have already hinted at the very peculiar state of the finances of
the family; and, in fact, although the income derivable from various
sources ought to have been amply sufficient to provide Henry, and
those who were dependent upon him, with a respectable livelihood, yet
it was nearly all swallowed up by the payment of regular instalments
upon family debts incurred by his father. And the creditors took great
credit to themselves that they allowed of such an arrangement, instead
of sweeping off all before them, and leaving the family to starve.
The question, therefore, or, at all events, one of the questions, now
was, how far would a departure from the Hall of him, Henry, and the
other branches of the family, act upon that arrangement?
During a very few minutes’ consideration, Henry, with the frank
and candid disposition which was so strong a characteristic of his
character, made up his mind to explain all this fully to Charles
Holland and his uncle.
When once he formed such a determination he was not likely to be slow
in carrying it into effect, and no sooner, then, were the whole of them
seated in the small oaken parlour than he made an explicit statement of
his circumstances.
“But,” said Mr. Marchdale, when he had done, “I cannot see what right
your creditors have to complain of where you live, so long as you
perform your contract to them.”
“True; but they always expected me, I knew, to remain at the Hall, and
if they chose, why, of course, at any time, they could sell off the
whole property for what it would fetch, and pay themselves as far as
the proceeds would go. At all events, I am quite certain there could be
nothing at all left for me.”
“I cannot imagine,” added Mr. Marchdale, “that any men could be so
unreasonable.”
“It is scarcely to be borne,” remarked Charles Holland, with more
impatience than he usually displayed, “that a whole family are to be
put to the necessity of leaving their home for no other reason than the
being pestered by such a neighbour as Sir Francis Varney. It makes one
impatient and angry to reflect upon such a state of things.”
“And yet they are lamentably true,” said Henry. “What can we do?”
“Surely there must be some sort of remedy.”
“There is but one that I can imagine, and that is one we all alike
revolt from. We might kill him.”
“That is out of the question.”
“Of course my impression is that he bears the same name really as
myself, and that he is my ancestor, from whom was painted the portrait
on the panel.”
“Have circumstances really so far pressed upon you,” said Charles
Holland, “as at length to convince you that this man is really the
horrible creature we surmise he may be?”
“Dare we longer doubt it?” cried Henry, in a tone of excitement. “He is
the vampyre.”
“I’ll be hanged if I believe it,” said Admiral Bell! “Stuff and
nonsense! Vampyre, indeed! Bother the vampyre.”
“Sir,” said Henry, “you have not had brought before you, painfully,
as we have, all the circumstances upon which we, in a manner, feel
compelled to found this horrible belief. At first incredulity was a
natural thing. We had no idea that ever we could be brought to believe
in such a thing.”
“That is the case,” added Marchdale. “But, step by step, we have
been driven from utter disbelief in this phenomenon to a trembling
conviction that it must be true.”
“Unless we admit that, simultaneously, the senses of a number of
persons have been deceived.”
“That is scarcely possible.”
“Then do you mean really to say there are such fish?” said the admiral.
“We think so.”
“Well, I’m d—d! I have heard all sorts of yarns about what fellows have
seen in one ocean and another; but this does beat them all to nothing.”
“It is monstrous,” exclaimed Charles.
There was a pause of some few moments’ duration, and then Mr. Marchdale
said, in a low voice,—
“Perhaps I ought not to propose any course of action until you, Henry,
have yourself done so; but even at the risk of being presumptuous, I
will say that I am firmly of opinion you ought to leave the Hall.”
“I am inclined to think so, too,” said Henry.
“But the creditors?” interposed Charles.
“I think they might be consulted on the matter beforehand,” added
Marchdale, “when no doubt they would acquiesce in an arrangement which
could do them no harm.”
“Certainly, no harm,” said Henry, “for I cannot take the estate with
me, as they well know.”
“Precisely. If you do not like to sell it, you can let it.”
“To whom?”
“Why, under the existing circumstances, it is not likely you would get
any tenant for it than the one who has offered himself.”
“Sir Francis Varney?”
“Yes. It seems to be a great object with him to live here, and it
appears to me, that notwithstanding all that has occurred, it is most
decidedly the best policy to let him.”
Nobody could really deny the reasonableness of this advice, although it
seemed strange, and was repugnant to the feelings of them all, as they
heard it. There was a pause of some seconds’ duration, and then Henry
said,—
“It does, indeed, seem singular, to surrender one’s house to such a
being.”
“Especially,” said Charles, “after what has occurred.”
“True.”
“Well,” said Mr. Marchdale, “if any better plan of proceeding, taking
the whole case into consideration, can be devised, I shall be most
happy.”
“Will you consent to put off all proceedings for three days?” said
Charles Holland, suddenly.
“Have you any plan, my dear sir?” said Mr. Marchdale.
“I have, but it is one which I would rather say nothing about for the
present.”
“I have no objection,” said Henry, “I do not know that three days can
make any difference in the state of affairs. Let it be so, if you wish,
Charles.”
“Then I am satisfied,” said Charles. “I cannot but feel that, situated
as I am regarding Flora, this is almost more my affair than even yours,
Henry.”
“I cannot see that,” said Henry. “Why should you take upon yourself
more of the responsibility of these affairs than I, Charles? You induce
in my mind a suspicion that you have some desperate project in your
imagination, which by such a proposition you would seek to reconcile me
to.”
Charles was silent, and Henry then added,—
“Now, Charles, I am quite convinced that what I have hinted at is the
fact. You have conceived some scheme which you fancy would be much
opposed by us?”
“I will not deny that I have,” said Charles. “It is one, however, which
you must allow me for the present to keep locked in my own breast.”
“Why will you not trust us?”
“For two reasons.”
“Indeed!”
“The one is, that I have not yet thoroughly determined upon the course
I project; and the other is, that it is one in which I am not justified
in involving any one else.”
“Charles, Charles,” said Henry, despondingly; “only consider for a
moment into what new misery you may plunge poor Flora, who is, Heaven
knows, already sufficiently afflicted, by attempting an enterprise
which even we, who are your friends, may unwittingly cross you in the
performance of.”
“This is one in which I fear no such result. It cannot so happen. Do
not urge me.”
“Can’t you say at once what you think of doing?” said the old admiral.
“What do you mean by turning your sails in all sorts of directions so
oddly? You sneak, why don’t you be what do you call it—explicit?”
“I cannot, uncle.”
“What, are you tongue-tied?”
“All here know well,” said Charles, “that if I do not unfold my mind
fully, it is not that I fear to trust any one present, but from some
other most special reason.”
“Charles, I forbear to urge you further,” said Henry, “and only implore
you to be careful.”
At this moment the room door opened, and George Bannerworth,
accompanied by Mr. Chillingworth, came in.
“Do not let me intrude,” said the surgeon; “I fear, as I see you
seated, gentlemen, that my presence must be a rudeness and a
disturbance to some family consultation among yourselves?”
“Not at all, Mr. Chillingworth,” said Henry. “Pray be seated; we are
very glad indeed to see you. Admiral Bell, this is a friend on whom we
can rely—Mr. Chillingworth.”
“And one of the right sort, I can see,” said the admiral, as he shook
Mr. Chillingworth by the hand.
“Sir, you do me much honour,” said the doctor.
“None at all, none at all; I suppose you know all about this infernal
odd vampyre business?”
“I believe I do, sir.”
“And what do you think of it?”
“I think time will develop the circumstances sufficiently to convince
us all that such things cannot be.”
“D—n me, you are the most sensible fellow, then, that I have yet met
with since I have been in this neighbourhood; for everybody else is so
convinced about the vampyre, that they are ready to swear by him.”
“It would take much more to convince me. I was coming over here when I
met Mr. George Bannerworth coming to my house.”
“Yes,” said George, “and Mr. Chillingworth has something to tell us of
a nature confirmatory of our own suspicions.”
“It is strange,” said Henry; “but any piece of news, come it from what
quarter it may, seems to be confirmatory, in some degree or another, of
that dreadful belief in vampyres.”
“Why,” said the doctor, “when Mr. George says that my news is of such a
character, I think he goes a little too far. What I have to tell you, I
do not conceive has anything whatever to do with the fact, or one fact
of there being vampyres.”
“Let us hear it,” said Henry.
“It is simply this, that I was sent for by Sir Francis Varney myself.”
“You sent for?”
“Yes; he sent for me by a special messenger to come to him, and when I
went, which, under the circumstances, you may well guess, I did with
all the celerity possible, I found it was to consult me about a flesh
wound in his arm, which was showing some angry symptoms.”
“Indeed.”
“Yes, it was so. When I was introduced to him I found him lying on a
couch, and looking pale and unwell. In the most respectful manner, he
asked me to be seated, and when I had taken a chair, he added,—”
“‘Mr. Chillingworth, I have sent for you in consequence of a slight
accident which has happened to my arm. I was incautiously loading some
fire-arms, and discharged a pistol so close to me that the bullet
inflicted a wound on my arm.’”
“‘If you will allow me,’ said I, ‘to see the wound, I will give you my
opinion.’”
“He then showed me a jagged wound, which had evidently been caused by
the passage of a bullet, which, had it gone a little deeper, must have
inflicted serious injury. As it was, the wound was but trifling.”
“He had evidently been attempting to dress it himself, but finding some
considerable inflammation, he very likely got a little alarmed.”
“You dressed the wound?”
“I did.”
“And what do you think of Sir Francis Varney, now that you have had so
capital an opportunity,” said Henry, “of a close examination of him?”
“Why, there is certainly something odd about him which I cannot well
define, but, take him altogether, he can be a very gentlemanly man
indeed.”
“So he can.”
“His manners are easy and polished; he has evidently mixed in good
society, and I never, in all my life, heard such a sweet, soft, winning
voice.”
“That is strictly him. You noticed, I presume, his great likeness to
the portrait on the panel?”
“I did. At some moments, and viewing his face in some particular
lights, it showed much more strongly than at others. My impression was
that he could, when he liked, look much more like the portrait on the
panel than when he allowed his face to assume its ordinary appearance.”
“Probably such an impression would be produced upon your mind,” said
Charles, “by some accidental expression of the countenance which even
he was not aware of, and which often occurs in families.”
“It may be so.”
“Of course you did not hint, sir, at what has passed here with regard
to him?” said Henry.
“I did not. Being, you see, called in professionally, I had no right to
take advantage of that circumstance to make any remarks to him about
his private affairs.”
“Certainly not.”
“It was all one to me whether he was a vampyre or not, professionally,
and however deeply I might feel, personally, interested in the matter,
I said nothing to him about it, because, you see, if I had, he would
have had a fair opportunity of saying at once, ‘Pray, sir, what is that
to you?’ and I should have been at a loss what to reply.”
“Can we doubt,” said Henry, “but that this very wound has been
inflicted upon Sir Francis Varney, by the pistol-bullet which was
discharged at him by Flora?”
“Everything leads to such an assumption certainly,” said Charles
Holland.
“And yet you cannot even deduce from that the absolute fact of Sir
Francis Varney being a vampyre?”
“I do not think, Mr. Chillingworth,” said Marchdale, “anything would
convince you but a visit from him, and an actual attempt to fasten upon
some of your own veins.”
“That would not convince me,” said Chillingworth.
“Then you will not be convinced?”
“I certainly will not. I mean to hold out to the last. I said at the
first, and I say so still, that I never will give way to this most
outrageous superstition.”
“I wish I could think with you,” said Marchdale, with a shudder; “but
there may be something in the very atmosphere of this house which
has been rendered hideous by the awful visits that have been made to
it, which forbids me to disbelieve in those things which others more
happily situated can hold at arm’s length, and utterly repudiate.”
“There may be,” said Henry; “but as to that, I think, after the very
strongly expressed wish of Flora, I will decide upon leaving the house.”
“Will you sell it or let it?”
“The latter I should much prefer,” was the reply.
“But who will take it now, except Sir Francis Varney? Why not at once
let him have it? I am well aware that this does sound odd advice, but
remember, we are all the creatures of circumstances, and that, in some
cases where we least like it, we must swim with the stream.”
“That you will not decide upon, however, at present,” said Charles
Holland, as he rose.
“Certainly not; a few days can make no difference.”
“None for the worse, certainly, and possibly much for the better.”
“Be it so; we will wait.”
“Uncle,” said Charles, “will you spare me half an hour of your company?”
“An hour, my boy, if you want it,” said the admiral, rising from his
chair.
“Then this consultation is over,” said Henry, “and we quite understand
that to leave the Hall is a matter determined on, and that in a few
days a decision shall be come to as to whether Varney the Vampyre shall
be its tenant or not.”
CHAPTER XXIII.
THE ADMIRAL’S ADVICE TO CHARLES HOLLAND.—THE CHALLENGE TO THE VAMPYRE.
When Charles Holland got his uncle into a room by themselves, he said,—
“Uncle, you are a seaman, and accustomed to decide upon matters of
honour. I look upon myself as having been most grievously insulted by
this Sir Francis Varney. All accounts agree in representing him as a
gentleman. He goes openly by a title, which, if it were not his, could
easily be contradicted; therefore, on the score of position in life,
there is no fault to find with him. What would you do if you were
insulted by a gentleman?”
The old admiral’s eyes sparkled, and he looked comically in the face of
Charles, as he said,—
“I know now where you are steering.”
“What would you do, uncle?”
“Fight him!”
“I knew you would say so, and that’s just what I want to do as regards
Sir Francis Varney.”
“Well, my boy, I don’t know that you can do better. He must be a
thundering rascal, whether he is a vampyre or not; so if you feel that
he has insulted you, fight him by all means, Charles.”
“I am much pleased, uncle, to find that you take my view of the
subject,” said Charles. “I knew that if I mentioned such a thing to the
Bannerworths, they would endeavour all in their power to persuade me
against it.”
“Yes, no doubt; because they are all impressed with a strange fear of
this fellow’s vampyre powers. Besides, if a man is going to fight, the
fewer people he mentions it to most decidedly the better, Charles.”
“I believe that is the fact, uncle. Should I overcome Varney, there
will most likely be at once an end to the numerous and uncomfortable
perplexities of the Bannerworths as regards him; and if he overcome me,
why, then, at all events, I shall have made an effort to rescue Flora
from the dread of this man.”
“And then he shall fight me,” added the admiral, “so he shall have two
chances, at all events, Charles.”
“Nay, uncle, that would, you know, scarcely be fair. Besides, if
I should fall, I solemnly bequeath Flora Bannerworth to your good
offices. I much fear that the pecuniary affairs of poor Henry,—from no
fault of his, Heaven knows,—are in a very bad state, and that Flora may
yet live to want some kind and able friend.”
“Never fear, Charles. The young creature shall never want while the old
admiral has got a shot in the locker.”
“Thank you, uncle, thank you. I have ample cause to know, and to be
able to rely upon your kind and generous nature. And now about the
challenge?”
“You write it, boy, and I’ll take it.”
“Will you second me, uncle?”
“To be sure I will. I wouldn’t trust anybody else to do so on any
account. You leave all the arrangements with me, and I’ll second you as
you ought to be seconded.”
“Then I will write it at once, for I have received injuries at the
hands of that man, or devil, be he what he may, that I cannot put
up with. His visit to the chamber of her whom I love would alone
constitute ample ground of action.”
“I should say it rather would, my boy.”
“And after this corroborative story of the wound, I cannot for a moment
doubt that Sir Francis Varney is the vampyre, or the personifier of the
vampyre.”
“That’s clear enough, Charles. Come, just you write your challenge, my
boy, at once, and let me have it.”
“I will, uncle.”
Charles was a little astonished, although pleased, at his uncle’s
ready acquiescence in his fighting a vampyre, but that circumstance he
ascribed to the old man’s habits of life, which made him so familiar
with strife and personal contentions of all sorts, that he did not
ascribe to it that amount of importance which more peaceable people
did. Had he, while he was writing the note to Sir Francis Varney, seen
the old admiral’s face, and the exceedingly cunning look it wore,
he might have suspected that the acquiescence in the duel was but a
seeming acquiescence. This, however, escaped him, and in a few moments
he read to his uncle the following note:—
“+To Sir Francis Varney+.
“Sir,—The expressions made use of towards me by you, as well
as general circumstances, which I need not further allude to
here, induce me to demand of you that satisfaction due from one
gentleman to another. My uncle, Admiral Bell, is the bearer of
this note, and will arrange preliminaries with any friend you
may choose to appoint to act in your behalf. I am, sir, yours,
&c.
“+Charles Holland+.”
“Will that do?” said Charles.
“Capital!” said the admiral.
“I am glad you like it.”
“Oh, I could not help liking it. The least said and the most to the
purpose, always pleases me best; and this explains nothing, and demands
all you want—which is a fight; so it’s all right, you see, and nothing
can be possibly better.”
Charles did glance in his uncle’s face, for he suspected, from the
manner in which these words were uttered, that the old man was amusing
himself a little at his expense. The admiral, however, looked so
supernaturally serious that Charles was foiled.
“I repeat, it’s a capital letter,” he said.
“Yes, you said so.”
“Well, what are you staring at?”
“Oh, nothing.”
“Do you doubt my word?”
“Not at all, uncle; only I thought there was a degree of irony in the
manner in which you spoke.”
“None at all, my boy. I never was more serious in all my life.”
“Very good. Then you will remember that I leave my honour in this
affair completely in your hands.”
“Depend upon me, my boy.”
“I will, and do.”
“I’ll be off and see the fellow at once.”
The admiral bustled out of the room, and in a few moments Charles heard
him calling loudly,—
“Jack—Jack Pringle, you lubber, where are you?—Jack Pringle, I say.”
“Ay, ay, sir,” said Jack, emerging from the kitchen, where he had been
making himself generally useful in assisting Mrs. Bannerworth, there
being no servant in the house, to cook some dinner for the family.
“Come on, you rascal, we are going for a walk.”
“The rations will be served out soon,” growled Jack.
“We shall be back in time, you cormorant, never fear. You are always
thinking of eating and drinking, you are, Jack; and I’ll be hanged if I
think you ever think of anything else. Come on, will you; I’m going on
rather a particular cruise just now, so mind what you are about.”
“Aye, aye, sir,” said the tar, and these two originals, who so
perfectly understood each other, walked away, conversing as they went,
and their different voices coming upon the ear of Charles, until
distance obliterated all impression of the sound.
Charles paced to and fro in the room where he had held this brief and
conclusive conversation with his uncle. He was thoughtful, as any one
might well be who knew not but that the next four-and-twenty hours
would be the limit of his sojourn in this world.
“Oh, Flora—Flora!” he at length said, “how happy we might to have been
together—how happy we might have been! but all is past now, and there
seems nothing left us but to endure. There it but one chance, and that
is in my killing this fearful man who is invested with so dreadful an
existence. And if I do kill him in fair and in open fight, I will take
care that his mortal frame has no power again to revisit the glimpses
of the moon.”
It was strange to imagine that such was the force of many concurrent
circumstances, that a young man like Charles Holland, of first-rate
abilities and education, should find it necessary to give in so far
to a belief which was repugnant to all his best feelings and habits
of thought, as to be reasoning with himself upon the best means of
preventing the resuscitation of the corpse of a vampyre. But so it was.
His imagination had yielded to a succession of events which very few
persons indeed could have held out against.
“I have heard and read,” he said, as he continued his agitated and
uneasy walk, “of how these dreadful beings are to be in their graves.
I have heard of stakes being driven through the body so as to pin it
to the earth until the gradual progress of decay has rendered its
revivification a thing of utter and total impossibility. Then, again,”
he added, after a slight pause, “I have heard of their being burned,
and the ashes gathered to the winds of Heaven to prevent them from ever
again uniting or assuming human form.”
These were disagreeable and strange fancies, and he shuddered while he
indulged in them. He felt a kind of trembling horror come over him even
at the thought of engaging in conflict with a being, who perhaps, had
lived more than a hundred years.
“That portrait,” he thought, “on the panel, is the portrait of a man in
the prime of life. If it be the portrait of Sir Francis Varney, by the
date which the family ascribe to it he must be nearly one hundred and
fifty years of age now.”
This was a supposition which carried the imagination to a vast amount
of strange conjectures.
“What changes he must have witnessed about him in that time,” thought
Charles. “How he must have seen kingdoms totter and fall, and how many
changes of habits, of manners, and of customs must he have become a
spectator of. Renewing too, ever and anon, his fearful existence by
such fearful means.”
This was a wide field of conjecture for a fertile imagination, and now
that he was on the eve of engaging with such a being in mortal combat,
on behalf of her he loved, the thoughts it gave rise to came more
strongly and thickly upon him than ever they had done before.
“But I will fight him,” he suddenly said, “for Flora’s sake, were he a
hundred times more hideous a being than so many evidences tend to prove
him. I will fight with him, and it may be my fate to rid the world of
such a monster in human form.”
Charles worked himself up to a kind of enthusiasm by which he almost
succeeded in convincing himself that, in attempting the destruction of
Sir Francis Varney, he was the champion of human nature.
It would be aside from the object of these pages, which is to record
facts as they occurred, to enter into the metaphysical course of
reasoning which came across Charles’s mind; suffice it to say that he
felt nothing shaken as regarded his resolve to meet Varney the Vampyre,
and that he made up his mind the conflict should be one of life or
death.
“It must be so,” he said. “It must be so. Either he or I must fall in
the fight which shall surely be.”
He now sought Flora, for how soon might he now be torn from her for
ever by the irresistible hand of death. He felt that, during the few
brief hours which now would only elapse previous to his meeting with
Sir Francis Varney, he could not enjoy too much of the society of her
who reigned supreme in his heart, and held in her own keeping his best
affections.
But while Charles is thus employed, let us follow his uncle and Jack
Pringle to the residence of Varney, which, as the reader is aware, was
so near at hand that it required not many minutes’ sharp walking to
reach it.
The admiral knew well he could trust Jack with any secret, for long
habits of discipline and deference to the orders of superiors takes
off the propensity to blabbing which, among civilians who are not
accustomed to discipline, is so very prevalent. The old man therefore
explained to Jack what he meant to do, and it received Jack’s full
approval; but as in the enforced detail of other matters it must come
out, we will not here prematurely enter into the admiral’s plans.
When they reached the residence of Sir Francis Varney, they were
received courteously enough, and the admiral desired Jack to wait for
him in the handsome hall of the house, while he was shewn up stairs to
the private room of the vampyre.
“Confound the fellow!” muttered the old admiral, “he is well lodged at
all events. I should say he was not one of those sort of vampyres who
have nowhere to go to but their own coffins when the evening comes.”
The room into which the admiral was shewn had green blinds to it,
and they were all drawn down. It is true that the sun was shining
brightly outside, although transiently, but still a strange green
tinge was thrown over everything in the room, and more particularly
did it appear to fall upon the face of Varney, converting his usually
sallow countenance into a still more hideous and strange colour. He was
sitting upon a couch, and, when the admiral came in, he rose, and said,
in a deep-toned voice, extremely different to that he usually spoke in,—
“My humble home is much honoured, sir, by your presence in it.”
“Good morning,” said the admiral. “I have come to speak to you, sir,
rather seriously.”
“However abrupt this announcement may sound to me,” said Varney, “I
am quite sure I shall always hear, with the most profound respect,
whatever Admiral Bell may have to say.”
“There is no respect required,” said the admiral, “but only a little
attention.”
Sir Francis bowed in a stately manner, saying,—
“I shall be quite unhappy if you will not be seated, Admiral Bell.”
“Oh, never mind that, Sir Francis Varney, if you be Sir Francis Varney;
for you may be the devil himself, for all I know. My nephew, Charles
Holland, considers that, one way and another, he has a very tolerable
quarrel with you.”
“I much grieve to hear it.”
“Do you?”
“Believe me, I do. I am most scrupulous in what I say; and an assertion
that I am grieved, you may thoroughly and entirely depend upon.”
“Well, well, never mind that; Charles Holland is a young man just
entering into life. He loves a girl who is, I think, every way worthy
of him.”
“Oh, what a felicitous prospect!”
“Just hear me out, if you please.”
“With pleasure, sir—with pleasure.”
“Well, then, when a young, hot-headed fellow thinks he has a good
ground of quarrel with anybody, you will not be surprised at his
wanting to fight it out.”
“Not at all.”
“Well, then, to come to the point, my nephew, Charles Holland, has a
fancy for fighting with you.”
“Ah!”
“You take it d——d easy.”
“My dear sir, why should I be uneasy? He is not my nephew, you know.
I shall have no particular cause, beyond those feelings of common
compassion which I hope inhabit my breast as well as every one else’s.”
“What do you mean?”
“Why, he is a young man just, as you say, entering into life, and I
cannot help thinking it would be a pity to cut him off like a flower in
the bud, so very soon.”
“Oh, you make quite sure, then, of settling him, do you?”
“My dear sir, only consider; he might be very troublesome, indeed; you
know young men are hot-headed and troublesome. Even if I were only to
maim him, he might be a continual and never-ceasing annoyance to me. I
think I should be absolutely, in a manner of speaking, compelled to cut
him off.”
“The devil you do!”
“As you say, sir.”
“D—n your assurance, Mr. Vampyre, or whatever odd fish you may be.”
“Admiral Bell, I never called upon you and received a courteous
reception, and then insulted you.”
“Then why do you talk of cutting off a better man than yourself? D—n
it, what would you say to him cutting you off?”
“Oh, as for me, my good sir, that’s quite another thing. Cutting me off
is very doubtful.”
Sir Francis Varney gave a strange smile as he spoke, and shook his
head, as if some most extraordinary and extravagant proposition had
been mooted, which it was scarcely worth the while of anybody possessed
of common sense to set about expecting.
Admiral Bell felt strongly inclined to get into a rage, but he
repressed the idea as much as he could, although, but for the curious
faint green light that came through the blinds, his heightened colour
would have sufficiently proclaimed what state of mind he was in.
“Mr. Varney,” he said, “all this is quite beside the question; but,
at all events, if it have any weight at all, it ought to have a
considerable influence in deciding you to accept of what terms I
propose.”
“What are they, sir?”
“Why, that you permit me to espouse my nephew Charles’s quarrel, and
meet you instead of him.”
“You meet me?”
“Yes; I’ve met a better man more than once before. It can make no
difference to you.”
“I don’t know that, Admiral Bell. One generally likes, in a duel, to
face him with whom one has had the misunderstanding, be it on what
grounds it may.”
“There’s some reason, I know, in what you say; but, surely, if I am
willing, you need not object.”
“And is your nephew willing thus to shift the danger and the job of
resenting his own quarrels on to your shoulders?”
“No; he knows nothing about it. He has written you a challenge, of
which I am the bearer, but I voluntarily, and of my own accord, wish to
meet you instead.”
“This is a strange mode of proceeding.”
“If you will not accede to it, and fight him first, and any harm comes
to him, you shall fight me afterwards.”
“Indeed.”
“Yes, indeed you shall, however surprised you may look.”
“As this appears to be quite a family affair, then,” said Sir Francis
Varney, “it certainly does appear immaterial which of you I fight with
first.”
“Quite so; now you take a sensible view of the question. Will you meet
me?”
“I have no particular objection. Have you settled all your affairs, and
made your will?”
“What’s that to you?”
“Oh, I only asked, because there is generally so much food for
litigation if a man dies intestate, and is worth any money.”
“You make devilish sure,” said the admiral, “of being the victor. Have
you made your will?”
“Oh, my will,” smiled Sir Francis; “that, my good sir, is quite an
indifferent affair.”
“Well, make it or not, as you like. I am old, I know, but I can pull a
trigger as well as any one.”
“Do what?”
“Pull a trigger.”
“Why, you don’t suppose I resort to any such barbarous modes of
fighting?”
“Barbarous! Why, how do you fight then?”
“As a gentleman, with my sword.”
“Swords! Oh, nonsense! nobody fights with swords now-a-days. That’s all
exploded.”
“I cling to the customs and the fashions of my youth,” said Varney.
“I have been, years ago, accustomed always to wear a sword, and to be
without one now vexes me.”
“Pray, how many years ago?”
“I am older than I look, but that is not the question. I am willing to
meet you with swords if you like. You are no doubt aware that, as the
challenged party, I am entitled to the choice of weapons.”
“I am.”
“Then you cannot object to my availing myself of the one in the use of
which I am perfectly unequalled.”
“Indeed.”
“Yes, I am, I think, the first swordsman in Europe; I have had immense
practice.”
“Well, sir, you have certainly made a most unexpected choice of
weapons. I can use a sword still, but am by no means a master of
fencing. However, it shall not be said that I went back from my word,
and let the chances be as desperate as they may, I will meet you.”
“Very good.”
“With swords?”
“Ay, with swords; but I must have everything properly arranged, so that
no blame can rest on me, you know. As you will be killed, you are safe
from all consequences, but I shall be in a very different position;
so, if you please, I must have this meeting got up in such a manner as
shall enable me to prove, to whoever may question me on the subject,
that you had fair play.”
“Oh, never fear that.”
“But I do fear it. The world, my good sir, is censorious, and you
cannot stop people from saying extremely ill-natured things.”
“What do you require, then?”
“I require you to send me a friend with a formal challenge.”
“Well?”
“Then I shall refer him to a friend of mine, and they two must settle
everything between them.”
“Is that all?”
“Not quite. I will have a surgeon on the ground, in case, when I pink
you, there should be a chance of saving your life. It always looks
humane.”
“When you pink me?”
“Precisely.”
“Upon my word, you take these affairs easy. I suppose you have had a
few of them?”
“Oh, a good number. People like yourself worry me into them, I don’t
like the trouble, I assure you; it is no amusement to me. I would
rather, by a great deal, make some concession than fight, because I
will fight with swords, and the result is then so certain that there is
no danger in the matter to me.”
“Hark you, Sir Francis Varney. You are either a very clever actor, or a
man, as you say, of such skill with your sword, that you can make sure
of the result of a duel. You know, therefore, that it is not fair play
on your part to fight a duel with that weapon.”
“Oh, I beg your pardon there. I never challenge anybody, and when
foolish people will call me out, contrary to my inclination, I think I
am bound to take what care of myself I can.”
“D—n me, there’s some reason in that, too,” said the admiral; “but why
do you insult people?”
“People insult me first.”
“Oh, nonsense!”
“How should you like to be called a vampyre, and stared at as if you
were some hideous natural phenomenon?”
“Well, but——”
“I say, Admiral Bell, how should you like it? I am a harmless country
gentleman, and because, in the heated imaginations of some member of
a crack-brained family, some housebreaker has been converted into
a vampyre, I am to be pitched upon as the man, and insulted and
persecuted accordingly.”
“But you forget the proofs.”
“What proofs?”
“The portrait, for one.”
“What! Because there is an accidental likeness between me and an old
picture, am I to be set down as a vampyre? Why, when I was in Austria
last, I saw an old portrait of a celebrated court fool, and you so
strongly resemble it, that I was quite struck when I first saw you
with the likeness; but I was not so unpolite as to tell you that I
considered you were the court fool turned vampyre.”
“D—n your assurance!”
“And d—n yours, if you come to that.”
The admiral was fairly beaten. Sir Francis Varney was by far too
long-headed and witty for him. After now in vain endeavouring to find
something to say, the old man buttoned up his coat in a great passion,
and looking fiercely at Varney, he said,—
“I don’t pretend to a gift of the gab. D—n me, it ain’t one of my
peculiarities; but though you may talk me down, you sha’n’t keep me
down.”
“Very good, sir.”
“It is not very good. You shall hear from me.”
“I am willing.”
“I don’t care whether you are willing or not. You shall find that when
once I begin to tackle an enemy, I don’t so easily leave him. One or
both of us, sir, is sure to sink.”
“Agreed.”
“So say I. You shall find that I’m a tar for all weathers, and if you
were a hundred and fifty vampyres all rolled into one, I’d tackle you
somehow.”
The admiral walked to the door in high dudgeon; when he was near to it,
Varney said, in some of his most winning and gentle accents,—
“Will you not take some refreshment, sir before you go from my humble
house?”
“No!” roared the admiral.
“Something cooling?”
“No!”
“Very good, sir. A hospitable host can do no more than offer to
entertain his guests.”
Admiral Bell turned at the door, and said, with some degree of intense
bitterness,
“You look rather poorly. I suppose, to-night, you will go and suck
somebody’s blood, you shark—you confounded vampyre! You ought to be
made to swallow a red-hot brick, and then let dance about till it
digests.”
Varney smiled as he rang the bell, and said to a servant,—
“Show my very excellent friend Admiral Bell out. He will not take any
refreshments.”
The servant bowed, and preceded the admiral down the staircase; but, to
his great surprise, instead of a compliment in the shape of a shilling
or half-a-crown for his pains, he received a tremendous kick behind,
with a request to go and take it to his master, with his compliments.
[Illustration: Admiral Bell vents his spleen on Varney’s servant.]
The fume that the old admiral was in beggars all description. He walked
to Bannerworth Hall at such a rapid pace, that Jack Pringle had the
greatest difficulty in the world to keep up with him, so as to be at
all within speaking distance.
“Hilloa, Jack,” cried the old man, when they were close to the Hall.
“Did you see me kick that fellow?”
“Ay, ay, sir.”
“Well, that’s some consolation, at any rate, if somebody saw it. It
ought to have been his master, that’s all I can say to it, and I wish
it had.”
“How have you settled it, sir?”
“Settled what?”
“The fight, sir.”
“D—n me, Jack, I haven’t settled it at all.”
“That’s bad, sir.”
“I know it is; but it shall be settled for all that, I can tell him,
let him vapour as much as he may about pinking me, and one thing and
another.”
“Pinking you, sir?”
“Yes. He wants to fight with cutlasses, or toasting-forks, d—n me,
I don’t know exactly which, and then he must have a surgeon on the
ground, for fear when he pinks me I shouldn’t slip my cable in a
regular way, and he should be blamed.”
Jack gave a long whistle, as he replied,—
“Going to do it, sir?”
“I don’t know now what I’m going to do. Mind, Jack, mum is the word.”
“Ay, ay, sir.”
“I’ll turn the matter over in my mind, and then decide upon what had
best be done. If he pinks me, I’ll take d—d good care he don’t pink
Charles.”
“No, sir, don’t let him do that. A _wamphigher_, sir, ain’t no good
opponent to anybody. I never seed one afore, but it strikes me as the
best way to settle him, would be to shut him up in some little bit of a
cabin, and then smoke him with brimstone, sir.”
“Well, well, I’ll consider, Jack, I’ll consider. Something must be
done, and that quickly too. Zounds, here’s Charles—what the deuce shall
I say to him, by way of an excuse, I wonder, for not arranging his
affair with Varney? Hang me, if I ain’t taken aback now, and don’t know
where to place a hand.”
CHAPTER XXIV.
THE LETTER TO CHARLES.—THE QUARREL.—THE ADMIRAL’S NARRATIVE.—THE
MIDNIGHT MEETING.
It was Charles Holland who now advanced hurriedly to meet the admiral.
The young man’s manner was anxious. He was evidently most intent
upon knowing what answer could be sent by Sir Francis Varney to his
challenge.
“Uncle,” he said, “tell me at once, will he meet me? You can talk of
particulars afterwards, but now tell me at once if he will meet me?”
“Why, as to that,” said the admiral, with a great deal of fidgetty
hesitation, “you see, I can’t exactly say.”
“Not say!”
“No. He’s a very odd fish. Don’t you think he’s a very odd fish, Jack
Pringle?”
“Ay, ay, sir.”
“There, you hear, Charles, that Jack is of my opinion that your
opponent is an odd fish.”
“But, uncle, why trifle with my impatience thus? Have you seen Sir
Francis Varney?”
“Seen him. Oh, yes.”
“And what did he say?”
“Why, to tell the truth, my lad, I advise you not to fight with him at
all.”
“Uncle, is this like you? This advice from you, to compromise my
honour, after sending a man a challenge?”
“D—n it all, Jack, I don’t know how to get out of it,” said the
admiral. “I tell you what it is, Charles, he wants to fight with
swords; and what on earth is the use of your engaging with a fellow who
has been practising at his weapon for more than a hundred years?”
“Well, uncle, if any one had told me that you would be terrified by
this Sir Francis Varney into advising me not to fight, I should have
had no hesitation whatever in saying such a thing was impossible.”
“I terrified?”
“Why, you advise me not to meet this man, even after I have challenged
him.”
“Jack,” said the admiral, “I can’t carry it on, you see. I never could
go on with anything that was not as plain as an anchor, and quite
straightforward. I must just tell all that has occurred.”
“Ay, ay, sir. The best way.”
“You think so, Jack?”
“I know it is, sir, always axing pardon for having a opinion at all,
excepting when it happens to be the same as yourn, sir.”
“Hold your tongue, you libellous villain! Now, listen to me, Charles. I
got up a scheme of my own.”
Charles gave a groan, for he had a very tolerable appreciation of
his uncle’s amount of skill in getting up a scheme of any kind or
description.
“Now here am I,” continued the admiral, “an old hulk, and not fit for
use any more. What’s the use of me, I should like to know? Well, that’s
settled. But you are young and hearty, and have a long life before you.
Why should you throw away your life upon a lubberly vampyre?”
“I begin to perceive now, uncle,” said Charles, reproachfully, “why
you, with such apparent readiness, agreed to this duel taking place.”
“Well, I intended to fight the fellow myself, that’s the long and short
of it, boy.”
“How could you treat me so?”
“No nonsense, Charles. I tell you it was all in the family. I intended
to fight him myself. What was the odds whether I slipped my cable with
his assistance, or in the regular course a little after this? That’s
the way to argufy the subject; so, as I tell you, I made up my mind to
fight him myself.”
Charles looked despairingly, but said,—
“What was the result?”
“Oh, the result! D—n me, I suppose that’s to come. The vagabond won’t
fight like a Christian. He says he’s quite willing to fight anybody
that calls him out, provided it’s all regular.”
“Well—well.”
“And he, being the party challenged—for he says he never himself
challenges anybody, as he is quite tired of it—must have his choice of
weapons.”
“He is entitled to that; but it is generally understood now-a-days that
pistols are the weapons in use among gentlemen for such purposes.”
“Ah, but he won’t understand any such thing, I tell you. He will fight
with swords.”
“I suppose he is, then, an adept at the use of the sword?”
“He says he is.”
“No doubt—no doubt. I cannot blame a man for choosing, when he has
the liberty of choice, that weapon in the use of which he most
particularly, from practice, excels.”
“Yes; but if he be one half the swordsman he has had time enough,
according to all accounts, to be, what sort of chance have you with
him?”
“Do I hear you reasoning thus?”
“Yes, to be sure you do. I have turned wonderfully prudent, you see; so
I mean to fight him myself, and mind, now, you have nothing whatever to
do with it.”
“An effort of prudence that, certainly.”
“Well, didn’t I say so?”
“Come—come, uncle, this won’t do. I have challenged Sir Francis Varney,
and I must meet him with any weapon he may, as the challenged party,
choose to select. Besides, you are not, I dare say, aware that I am a
very good fencer, and probably stand as fair a chance as Varney in a
contest with swords.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes, uncle. I could not be so long on the continent as I have been
without picking up a good knowledge of the sword, which is so popular
all over Germany.”
“Humph! but only consider, this d—d fellow is no less than a hundred
and fifty years old.”
“I care not.”
“Yes, but I do.”
“Uncle, uncle, I tell you I will fight with him; and if you do not
arrange matters for me so that I can have the meeting with this man,
which I have myself sought, and cannot, even if I wished, now recede
from with honour, I must seek some other less scrupulous friend to do
so.”
“Give me an hour or two to think of it, Charles,” said the admiral.
“Don’t speak to any one else, but give me a little time. You shall have
no cause of complaint. Your honour cannot suffer in my hands.”
“I will wait your leisure, uncle; but remember that such affairs as
these, when once broached, had always better be concluded with all
convenient dispatch.”
“I know that, boy—I know that.”
The admiral walked away, and Charles, who really felt much fretted at
the delay which had taken place, returned to the house.
He had not been there long, when a lad, who had been temporarily hired
during the morning by Henry to answer the gate, brought him a note,
saying,—
“A servant, sir, left this for you just now.”
“For me?” said Charles, as he glanced at the direction. “This is
strange, for I have no acquaintance about here. Does any one wait?”
“No, sir.”
The note was properly directed to him, therefore Charles Holland at
once opened it. A glance at the bottom of the page told him that it
came from his enemy, Sir Francis Varney, and then he read it with much
eagerness. It ran thus:—
“+Sir+,—Your uncle, as he stated himself to be, Admiral Bell,
was the bearer to me, as I understood him this day, of a
challenge from you. Owing to some unaccountable hallucination
of intellect, he seemed to imagine that I intended to set
myself up as a sort of animated target, for any one to shoot at
who might have a fancy so to do.
“According to this eccentric view of the case, the admiral had
the kindness to offer to fight me first, when, should he not
have the good fortune to put me out of the world, you were to
try your skill, doubtless.
“I need scarcely say that I object to these family
arrangements. You have challenged me, and, fancying the offence
sufficient, you defy me to mortal combat. If, therefore, I
fight with any one at all, it must be with you.
“You will clearly understand me, sir, that I do not accuse
you of being at all privy to this freak of intellect of your
uncle’s. He, no doubt, alone conceived it, with a laudable
desire on his part of serving you. If, however, to meet me, do
so to-night, in the middle of the park surrounding your own
friends estate.
“There is a pollard oak growing close to a small pool; you,
no doubt, have noticed the spot often. Meet me there, if you
please, and any satisfaction you like I will give you, at
twelve o’clock this night.
“Come alone, or you will not see me. It shall be at your own
option entirely, to convert the meeting into a hostile one or
not. You need send me no answer to this. If you are at the
place I mention at the time I have named, well and good. If you
an not, I can only, if I please, imagine that you shrink from a
meeting with
“+Francis Varney+.”
Charles Holland read this letter twice over carefully, and then folding
it up, and placing it in his pocket, he said,—
“Yes, I will meet him; he may be assured that I will meet him. He shall
find that I do not shrink from Francis Varney. In the name of honour,
love, virtue, and Heaven, I will meet this man, and it shall go hard
with me but I will this night wring from him the secret of what he
really is. For the sake of her who is so dear to me—for her sake, I
will meet this man, or monster, be he what he may.”
It would have been far more prudent had Charles informed Henry
Bannerworth or George of his determination to meet the vampyre that
evening, but he did not do so. Somehow he fancied it would be some
reproach against his courage if he did not go, and go alone, too, for
he could not help suspecting that, from the conduct of his uncle, Sir
Francis Varney might have got up an opinion inimical to his courage.
With all the eager excitement of youth, there was nothing that arrayed
itself to his mind in such melancholy and uncomfortable colours as an
imputation upon his courage.
“I will show this vampyre, if he be such,” he said, “that I am not
afraid to meet him, and alone, too, at his own hour—at midnight, even
when, if his preternatural powers be of more avail to him than at any
other time, he can attempt, if he dare, to use them.”
Charles resolved upon going armed, and with the greatest care he loaded
his pistols, and placed them aside ready for action, when the time
should come to set out to meet the vampyre at the spot in the park
which had been particularly alluded to in his letter.
This spot was perfectly well known to Charles; indeed, no one could
be a single day at Bannerworth Hall without noticing it, so prominent
an object was that pollard oak, standing, as it did, alone, with the
beautiful green sward all around it. Near to it was the pool which had
been mentioned, which was, in reality, a fish-pond, and some little
distance off commenced the thick plantation, among the intricacies
of which Sir Francis Varney, or the vampyre, had been supposed to
disappear, after the revivification of his body at the full of the moon.
This spot was in view of several of the windows of the house, so that
if the night should happen to be a very light one, and any of the
inhabitants of the Hall should happen to have the curiosity to look
from those particular windows, no doubt the meeting between Charles
Holland and the vampyre would be seen.
This, however, was a contingency which was nothing to Charles, whatever
it might be to Sir Francis Varney, and he scarcely at all considered
it as worth consideration. He felt more happy and comfortable now that
everything seemed to be definitively arranged by which he could come
to some sort of explanation with that mysterious being who had so
effectually, as yet, succeeded in destroying his peace of mind and his
prospects of happiness.
“I will this night force him to declare himself,” thought Charles.
“He shall tell me who and what he really is, and by some means I will
endeavour to put an end to those frightful persecutions which Flora has
suffered.”
This was a thought which considerably raised Charles’s spirits, and
when he sought Flora again, which he now did, she was surprised to see
him so much more easy and composed in his mind, which was sufficiently
shown by his manner, than he had been but so short a time before.
“Charles,” she said, “what has happened to give such an impetus to your
spirits?”
“Nothing, dear Flora, nothing; but I have been endeavouring to throw
from my mind all gloomy thoughts, and to convince myself that in the
future you and I, dearest, may yet be very happy.”
“Oh, Charles, if I could but think so.”
“Endeavour, Flora, to think so. Remember how much our happiness is
always in our own power, Flora, and that, let fate do her worst, so
long as we are true to each other, we have a recompense for every ill.”
“Oh, indeed, Charles, that is a dear recompense.”
“And it is well that no force of circumstances short of death itself
can divide us.”
“True, Charles, true, and I am more than ever now bound to look upon
you with a loving heart; for have you not clung to me generously under
circumstances which, if any at all could have justified you in rending
asunder every tie which bound us together, surely would have done so
most fully.”
“It is misfortune and distress that tries love,” said Charles. “It
is thus that the touchstone is applied to see if it be current gold
indeed, or some base metal, which by a superficial glitter imitates it.”
“And your love is indeed true gold.”
“I am unworthy of one glance from those dear eyes if it were not.”
“Oh, if we could but go from here, I think then we might be happy. A
strong impression is upon my mind, and has been so for some time, that
these persecutions to which I have been subjected are peculiar to this
house.”
“Think you so?”
“I do, indeed!”
“It may be so, Flora. You are aware that your brother has made up his
mind that he will leave the Hall.”
“Yes, yes.”
“And that only in deference to an expressed wish of mine he put off the
carrying such a resolve into effect for a few days.”
“He said so much.”
“Do not, however, imagine, dearest Flora, that those few days will be
idly spent.”
“Nay, Charles, I could not imagine so.”
“Believe me, I have some hopes that in that short space of time I shall
be able to accomplish yet something which shall have a material effect
upon the present posture of affairs.”
“Do not run into danger, Charles.”
“I will not. Believe me, Flora, I have too much appreciation of the
value of an existence which is blessed by your love, to encounter any
needless risks.”
“You say needless. Why do you not confide in me, and tell me if the
object you have in view to accomplish in the few days delay is a
dangerous one at all.”
“Will you forgive me, Flora, if for once I keep a secret from you?”
“Then, Charles, along with the forgiveness I must conjure up a host of
apprehensions.”
“Nay, why so?”
“You would tell me if there were no circumstances that you feared would
fill me with alarm.”
“Now, Flora, your fears and not your judgment condemn me. Surely you
cannot think me so utterly heedless as to court danger for danger’s
sake.”
“No, not so——”
“You pause.”
“And yet you have a sense of what you call honour, which, I fear, would
lead you into much risk.”
“I have a sense of honour; but not that foolish one which hangs far
more upon the opinions of others than my own. If I thought a course of
honour lay before me, and all the world, in a mistaken judgment, were
to condemn it as wrong, I would follow it.”
“You are right, Charles; you are right. Let me pray of you to be
careful, and, at all events, to interpose no more delay to our leaving
this house than you shall feel convinced is absolutely necessary for
some object of real and permanent importance.”
Charles promised Flora Bannerworth that for her sake, as well as his
own, he would be most specially careful of his safety; and then in such
endearing conversation as may be well supposed to be dictated by such
hearts as theirs another happy hour was passed away.
They pictured to themselves the scene where first they met, and with a
world of interest hanging on every word they uttered, they told each
other of the first delightful dawnings of that affection which had
sprung up between them, and which they fondly believed neither time nor
circumstance would have the power to change or subvert.
In the meantime the old admiral was surprised that Charles was
so patient, and had not been to him to demand the result of his
deliberation.
But he knew not on what rapid pinions time flies, when in the presence
of those whom we love. What was an actual hour, was but a fleeting
minute to Charles Holland, as he sat with Flora’s hand clasped in his,
and looking at her sweet face.
At length a clock striking reminded him of his engagement with his
uncle, and he reluctantly rose.
“Dear Flora,” he said, “I am going to sit up to watch to-night, so be
under no sort of apprehension.”
“I will feel doubly safe,” she said.
“I have now something to talk to my uncle about, and must leave you.”
Flora smiled, and held out her hand to him. He pressed it to his heart.
He knew not what impulse came over him then, but for the first time he
kissed the cheek of the beautiful girl.
With a heightened colour she gently repulsed him. He took a long
lingering look at her as he passed out of the room, and when the door
was closed between them, the sensation he experienced was as if some
sudden cloud had swept across the face of the sun, dimming to a vast
extent its precious lustre.
A strange heaviness came across his spirits, which before had been so
unaccountably raised. He felt as if the shadow of some coming evil
was resting on his soul—as if some momentous calamity was preparing
for him, which would almost be enough to drive him to madness, and
irredeemable despair.
“What can this be,” he exclaimed, “that thus oppresses me? What
feeling is this that seems to tell me, I shall never again see Flora
Bannerworth?”
Unconsciously he uttered these words, which betrayed the nature of his
worst forebodings.
“Oh, this is weakness,” he then added. “I must fight out against this;
it is mere nervousness. I must not endure it, I will not suffer myself
thus to become the sport of imagination. Courage, courage, Charles
Holland. There are real evils enough, without your adding to them by
those of a disordered fancy. Courage, courage, courage.”
CHAPTER XXV.
THE ADMIRAL’S OPINION.—THE REQUEST OF CHARLES.
Charles then sought the admiral, whom he found with his hands behind
him, pacing to and fro in one of the long walks of the garden,
evidently in a very unsettled state of mind. When Charles appeared, he
quickened his pace, and looked in such a state of unusual perplexity
that it was quite ridiculous to observe him.
“I suppose, uncle, you have made up your mind thoroughly by this time?”
“Well, I don’t know that.”
“Why, you have had long enough surely to think over it. I have not
troubled you soon.”
“Well, I cannot exactly say you have, but, somehow or another, I don’t
think very fast, and I have an unfortunate propensity after a time of
coming exactly round to where I began.”
“Then, to tell the truth, uncle, you can come to no sort of conclusion.”
“Only one.”
“And what may that be?”
“Why, that you are right in one thing, Charles, which is, that having
sent a challenge to this fellow of a vampyre, you must fight him.”
“I suspect that that is a conclusion you had from the first, uncle?”
“Why so?”
“Because it is an obvious and a natural one. All your doubts, and
trouble, and perplexities, have been to try and find some excuse for
not entertaining that opinion, and now that you really find it in vain
to make it, I trust that you will accede as you first promised to do,
and not seek by any means to thwart me.”
“I will not thwart you, my boy, although in my opinion you ought not to
fight with a vampyre.”
“Never mind that. We cannot urge that as a valid excuse, so long as he
chooses to deny being one. And after all, if he be really wrongfully
suspected, you must admit that he is a very injured man.”
“Injured!—nonsense. If he is not a vampyre, he’s some other
out-of-the-way sort of fish, you may depend. He’s the oddest-looking
fellow ever I came across in all my born days, ashore or afloat.”
“Is he?”
“Yes, he is; and yet, when I come to look at the thing again, in my
mind, some droll sights that I have seen come across my memory. The sea
is the place for wonders and for mysteries. Why, we see more in a day
and a night there, than you landsmen could contrive to make a whole
twelvemonth’s wonder of.”
“But you never saw a vampyre, uncle?”
“Well, I don’t know that. I didn’t know anything about vampyres till I
came here; but that was my ignorance, you know. There might have been
lots of vampyres where I’ve been, for all I know.”
“Oh, certainly; but as regards this duel, will you wait now until
to-morrow morning, before you take any further steps in the matter?”
“Till to-morrow morning?”
“Yes, uncle.”
“Why, only a little while ago, you were all eagerness to have something
done off-hand.”
“Just so; but now I have a particular reason for waiting until
to-morrow morning.”
“Have you? Well, as you please, boy—as you please. Have everything your
own way.”
“You are very kind, uncle; and now I have another favour to ask of you.”
“What is it?”
“Why, you know that Henry Bannerworth receives but a very small sum
out of the whole proceeds of the estate here, which ought, but for his
father’s extravagance, to be wholly at his disposal.”
“So I have heard.”
“I am certain he is at present distressed for money, and I have not
much. Will you lend me fifty pounds, uncle, until my own affairs are
sufficiently arranged to enable you to pay yourself again?”
“Will I! of course I will.”
“I wish to offer that sum as an accommodation to Henry. From me, I dare
say he will receive it freely, because he must be convinced how freely
it is offered; and, besides, they look upon me now almost as a member
of the family, in consequence of my engagement with Flora.”
“Certainly, and quite correct too; there’s a fifty-pound note, my boy;
take it, and do what you like with it, and when you want any more, come
to me for it.”
“I knew I could trespass thus far on your kindness, uncle.”
“Trespass! It’s no trespass at all.”
“Well, we will not fall out about the terms in which I cannot help
expressing my gratitude to you for many favours. To-morrow, you will
arrange the duel for me.”
“As you please. I don’t altogether like going to that fellow’s house
again.”
“Well, then, we can manage, I dare say, by note.”
“Very good. Do so. He puts me in mind altogether of a circumstance that
happened a good while ago, when I was at sea, and not so old a man as I
am now.”
“Puts you in mind of a circumstance, uncle?”
“Yes; he’s something like a fellow that figured in an affair that I
know a good deal about; only I do think as my chap was more mysterious
by a d—d sight than this one.”
“Indeed!”
“Oh, dear, yes. When anything happens in an odd way at sea, it is as
odd again as anything that occurs on land, my boy, you may depend.”
“Oh, you only fancy that, uncle, because you have spent so long a time
at sea.”
“No, I don’t imagine it, you rascal. What can you have on shore equal
to what we have at sea? Why, the sights that come before us would make
you landsmen’s hairs stand up on end, and never come down again.”
“In the ocean, do you mean, that you see those sights, uncle?”
“To be sure. I was once in the southern ocean, in a small frigate,
looking out for a seventy-four we were to join company with, when a man
at the mast-head sung out that he saw her on the larboard bow. Well, we
thought it was all right enough, and made away that quarter, when what
do you think it turned out to be?”
“I really cannot say.”
“The head of a fish.”
“A fish!”
“Yes! a d—d deal bigger than the hull of a vessel. He was swimming
along with his head just what I dare say he considered a shaving or so
out of the water.”
“But where were the sails, uncle?”
“The sails?”
“Yes; your man at the mast-head must have been a poor seaman not to
have missed the sails.”
“All, that’s one of your shore-going ideas, now. You know nothing
whatever about it. I’ll tell you where the sails were, master Charley.”
“Well, I should like to know.”
“The spray, then, that he dashed up with a pair of fins that were close
to his head, was in such a quantity, and so white, that they looked
just like sails.”
“Oh!”
“Ah! you may say ‘oh!’ but we all saw him—the whole ship’s crew; and we
sailed alongside of him for some time, till he got tired of us, and
suddenly dived down, making such a vortex in the water, that the ship
shook again, and seemed for about a minute as if she was inclined to
follow him to the bottom of the sea.”
“And what do you suppose it was, uncle?”
“How should I know?”
“Did you ever see it again?”
“Never; though others have caught a glimpse of him now and then in the
same ocean, but never came so near him as we did, that ever I heard of,
at all events. They may have done so.”
“It is singular!”
“Singular or not, it’s a fool to what I can tell you. Why, I’ve seen
things that, if I were to set about describing them to you, you would
say I was making up a romance.”
“Oh, no; it’s quite impossible, uncle, any one could ever suspect you
of such a thing.”
“You’d believe me, would you?”
“Of course I would.”
“Then here goes. I’ll just tell you now of a circumstance that I
haven’t liked to mention to anybody yet.”
“Indeed! why so?”
“Because I didn’t want to be continually fighting people for not
believing it; but here you have it:—”
We were outward bound; a good ship, a good captain, and good messmates,
you know, go far towards making a prosperous voyage a pleasant and
happy one, and on this occasion we had every reasonable prospect of all.
Our hands were all tried men—they had been sailors from infancy; none
of your French craft, that serve an apprenticeship and then become land
lubbers again. Oh, no, they were stanch and true, and loved the ocean
as the sluggard loves his bed, or the lover his mistress.
Ay, and for the matter of that, the love was a more enduring and a
more healthy love, for it increased with years, and made men love one
another, and they would stand by each other while they had a limb to
lift—while they were able to chew a quid or wink an eye, leave alone
wag a pigtail.
We were outward bound for Ceylon, with cargo, and were to bring spices
and other matters home from the Indian market. The ship was new and
good—a pretty craft; she sat like a duck upon the water, and a stiff
breeze carried her along the surface of the waves without your rocking,
and pitching, and tossing, like an old wash-tub at a mill-tail, as I
have had the misfortune to sail in more than once afore.
No, no, we were well laden, and well pleased, and weighed anchor with
light hearts and a hearty cheer.
Away we went down the river, and soon rounded the North Foreland, and
stood out in the Channel. The breeze was a steady and stiff one, and
carried us through the water as though it had been made for us.
“Jack,” said I to a messmate of mine, as he stood looking at the skies,
then at the sails, and finally at the water, with a graver air than I
thought was at all consistent with the occasion or circumstances.
“Well,” he replied.
“What ails you? You seem as melancholy as if we were about to cast lots
who should be eaten first. Are you well enough?”
“I am hearty enough, thank Heaven,” he said, “but I don’t like this
breeze.”
“Don’t like the breeze!” said I; “why, mate, it is as good and kind a
breeze as ever filled a sail. What would you have, a gale?”
“No, no; I fear that.”
“With such a ship, and such a set of hearty able seamen, I think we
could manage to weather out the stiffest gale that ever whistled
through a yard.”
“That may be; I hope it is, and I really believe and think so.”
“Then what makes you so infernally mopish and melancholy?”
“I don’t know, but can’t help it. It seems to me as though there was
something hanging over us, and I can’t tell what.”
“Yes, there are the colours, Jack, at the masthead; they are flying
over us with a hearty breeze.”
“Ah! ah!” said Jack, looking up at the colours, and then went away
without saying anything more, for he had some piece of duty to perform.
I thought my messmate had something on his mind that caused him to
feel sad and uncomfortable, and I took no more notice of it; indeed,
in the course of a day or two he was as merry as any of the rest, and
had no more melancholy that I could perceive, but was as comfortable as
anybody.
We had a gale off the coast of Biscay, and rode it out without the loss
of a spar or a yard; indeed, without the slightest accident or rent of
any kind.
“Now, Jack, what do you think of our vessel?” said I.
“She’s like a duck upon water, rises and falls with the waves, and
doesn’t tumble up and down like a hoop over stones.”
“No, no; she goes smoothly and sweetly; she is a gallant craft, and
this is her first voyage, and I predict a prosperous one.”
“I hope so,” he said.
Well, we went on prosperously enough for about three weeks; the ocean
was as calm and as smooth as a meadow, the breeze light but good, and
we stemmed along majestically over the deep blue waters, and passed
coast after coast, though all around was nothing but the apparently
pathless main in sight.
“A better sailer I never stepped into,” said the captain one day; “it
would be a pleasure to live and die in such a vessel.”
Well, as I said, we had been three weeks or thereabouts, when one
morning, after the sun was up and the decks washed, we saw a strange
man sitting on one of the water-casks that were on deck, for, being
full, we were compelled to stow some of them on deck.
[Illustration: The sudden appearance of the unknown visitant to the
sailors.]
You may guess those on deck did a little more than stare at this
strange and unexpected apparition. By jingo, I never saw men open their
eyes wider in all my life, nor was I any exception to the rule. I
stared, as well I might; but we said nothing for some minutes, and the
stranger looked calmly on us, and then cocked his eye with a nautical
air up at the sky, as if he expected to receive a twopenny-post letter
from St. Michael, or a _billet doux_ from the Virgin Mary.
“Where has he come from?” said one of the men in a low tone to his
companion, who was standing by him at that moment.
“How can I tell?” replied his companion. “He may have dropped from the
clouds; he seems to be examining the road; perhaps he is going back.”
The stranger sat all this time with the most extreme and provoking
coolness and unconcern; he deigned us but a passing notice, but it was
very slight.
He was a tall, spare man—what is termed long and lathy—but he was
evidently a powerful man. He had a broad chest, and long, sinewy
arms, a hooked nose, and a black, eagle eye. His hair was curly, but
frosted by age; it seemed as though it had been tinged with white at
the extremities, but he was hale and active otherwise, to judge from
appearances.
Notwithstanding all this, there was a singular repulsiveness about him
that I could not imagine the cause, or describe; at the same time there
was an air of determination in his wild and singular-looking eyes,
and over their whole there was decidedly an air and an appearance so
sinister as to be positively disagreeable.
“Well,” said I, after we had stood some minutes, “where did you come
from, shipmate?”
He looked at me and then up at the sky, in a knowing manner.
“Come, come, that won’t do; you have none of Peter Wilkins’s wings, and
couldn’t come on the ærial dodge; it won’t do; how did you get here?”
He gave me an awful wink, and made a sort of involuntary movement,
which jumped him up a few inches, and he bumped down again on the
water-cask.
“That’s as much as to say,” thought I, “that he’s sat himself on it.”
“I’ll go and inform the captain,” said I, “of this affair; he’ll hardly
believe me when I tell him, I am sure.”
So saying, I left the deck and went to the cabin, where the captain
was at breakfast, and related to him what I had seen respecting the
stranger. The captain looked at me with an air of disbelief, and said,—
“What?—do you mean to say there’s a man on board we haven’t seen
before?”
“Yes, I do, captain. I never saw him afore, and he’s sitting beating
his heels on the water-cask on deck.”
“The devil!”
“He is, I assure you, sir; and he won’t answer any questions.”
“I’ll see to that. I’ll see if I can’t make the lubber say something,
providing his tongue’s not cut out. But how came he on board? Confound
it, he can’t be the devil, and dropped from the moon.”
“Don’t know, captain,” said I. “He is evil-looking enough, to my mind,
to be the father of evil, but it’s ill bespeaking attentions from that
quarter at any time.”
“Go on, lad; I’ll come up after you.”
I left the cabin, and I heard the captain coming after me. When I
got on deck, I saw he had not moved from the place where I left him.
There was a general commotion among the crew when they heard of the
occurrence, and all crowded round him, save the man at the wheel, who
had to remain at his post.
The captain now came forward, and the men fell a little back as
he approached. For a moment the captain stood silent, attentively
examining the stranger, who was excessively cool, and stood the
scrutiny with the same unconcern that he would had the captain been
looking at his watch.
“Well, my man,” said the captain, “how did you come here?”
“I’m part of the cargo,” he said, with an indescribable leer.
“Part of the cargo be d——d!” said the captain, in sudden rage, for he
thought the stranger was coming his jokes too strong. “I know you are
not in the bills of lading.”
“I’m contraband,” replied the stranger; “and my uncle’s the great cham
of Tartary.”
The captain stared, as well he might, and did not speak for some
minutes; all the while the stranger kept kicking his heels against the
water-casks and squinting up at the skies; it made us feel very queer.
“Well, I must confess you are not in the regular way of trading.”
“Oh, no,” said the stranger; “I am contraband—entirely contraband.”
“And how did you come on board?”
At this question the stranger again looked curiously up at the skies,
and continued to do so for more than a minute; he then turned his gaze
upon the captain.
“No, no,” said the captain; “eloquent dumb show won’t do with me; you
didn’t come, like Mother Shipton, upon a birch broom. How did you come
on board my vessel?”
“I walked on board,” said the stranger.
“You walked on board; and where did you conceal yourself?”
“Below.”
“Very good; and why didn’t you stay below altogether?”
“Because I wanted fresh air. I’m in a delicate state of health, you
see; it doesn’t do to stay in a confined place too long.”
“Confound the binnacle!” said the captain; it was his usual oath when
anything bothered him, and he could not make it out. “Confound the
binnacle!—what a delicate-looking animal you are. I wish you had stayed
where you were; your delicacy would have been all the same to me.
Delicate, indeed!”
“Yes, very,” said the stranger, coolly.
There was something so comic in the assertion of his delicateness of
health, that we should all have laughed; but we were somewhat scared,
and had not the inclination.
“How have you lived since you came on board?” inquired the captain.
“Very indifferently.”
“But how? What have you eaten? and what have you drank?”
“Nothing, I assure you. All I did while was below was——”
“What?”
“Why, I sucked my thumbs like a polar bear in its winter quarters.”
And as he spoke the stranger put his two thumbs into his mouth, and
extraordinary thumbs they were, too, for each would have filled an
ordinary man’s mouth.
“These,” said the stranger, pulling them out, and gazing at them
wistfully, and with a deep sigh he continued,—
“These were thumbs at one time; but they are nothing now to what they
were.”
“Confound the binnacle!” muttered the captain to himself, and then he
added, aloud,—
“It’s cheap living, however; but where are you going to, and why did
you come aboard?”
“I wanted a cheap cruise, and I am going there and back.”
“Why, that’s where we are going,” said the captain.
“Then we are brothers,” exclaimed the stranger, hopping off the
water-cask like a kangaroo, and bounding towards the captain, holding
out his hand as though he would have shaken hands with him.
“No, no,” said the captain; “I can’t do it.”
“Can’t do it!” exclaimed the stranger, angrily. “What do you mean?”
“That I can’t have anything to do with contraband articles; I am a fair
trader, and do all above board. I haven’t a chaplain on board, or he
should offer up prayers for your preservation, and the recovery of your
health, which seems so delicate.”
“That be——”
The stranger didn’t finish the sentence; he merely screwed his mouth up
into an incomprehensible shape, and puffed out a lot of breath, with
some force, and which sounded very much like a whistle; but, oh, what
thick breath he had, it was as much like smoke as anything I ever saw,
and so my shipmate said.
“I say, captain,” said the stranger, as he saw him pacing the deck.
“Well.”
“Just send me up some beef and biscuit, and some coffee royal—be sure
it’s royal, do you hear, because I’m partial to brandy, it’s the only
good thing there is on earth.”
I shall not easily forget the captain’s look as he turned towards the
stranger, and gave his huge shoulders a shrug, as much as to say,—
“Well, I can’t help it now; he’s here, and I can’t throw him overboard.”
The coffee, beef, and biscuit were sent him, and the stranger seemed to
eat them with great _gout_, and drank the coffee with much relish, and
returned the things, saying,
“Your captain is an excellent cook; give him my compliments.”
I thought the captain would think that was but a left-handed
compliment, and look more angry than pleased, but no notice was taken
of it.
It was strange, but this man had impressed upon all in the vessel some
singular notion of his being more than he should be—more than a mere
mortal, and not one endeavoured to interfere with him; the captain
was a stout and dare-devil a fellow as you would well meet with, yet
he seemed tacitly to acknowledge more than he would say, for he never
after took any further notice of the stranger nor he of him.
They had barely any conversation, simply a civil word when they first
met, and so forth; but there was little or no conversation of any kind
between them.
The stranger slept upon deck, and lived upon deck entirely; he never
once went below after we saw him, and his own account of being below so
long.
This was very well, but the night-watch did not enjoy his society, and
would have willingly dispensed with it at that hour so particularly
lonely and dejected upon the broad ocean, and perhaps a thousand miles
away from the nearest point of land.
At this dread and lonely hour, when no sound reaches the ear and
disturbs the wrapt stillness of the night, save the whistling of the
wind through the cordage, or an occasional dash of water against the
vessel’s side, the thoughts of the sailor are fixed on far distant
objects—his own native land and the friends and loved ones he has left
behind him.
He then thinks of the wilderness before, behind, and around him; of
the immense body of water, almost in places bottomless; gazing upon
such a scene, and with thoughts as strange and indefinite as the very
boundless expanse before him, it is no wonder if he should become
superstitious; the time and place would, indeed unbidden, conjure up
thoughts and feelings of a fearful character and intensity.
The stranger at such times would occupy his favourite seat on the water
cask, and looking up at the sky and then on the ocean, and between
whiles he would whistle a strange, wild, unknown melody.
The flesh of the sailors used to creep up in knots and bumps when they
heard it; the wind used to whistle as an accompaniment and pronounce
fearful sounds to their ears.
The wind had been highly favourable from the first, and since the
stranger had been discovered it had blown fresh, and we went along at
a rapid rate, stemming the water, and dashing the spray off from the
bows, and cutting the water like a shark.
This was very singular to us, we couldn’t understand it, neither could
the captain, and we looked very suspiciously at the stranger, and
wished him at the bottom, for the freshness of the wind now became a
gale, and yet the ship came through the water steadily, and away we
went before the wind, as if the devil drove us; and mind I don’t mean
to say he didn’t.
The gale increased to a hurricane, and though we had not a stitch of
canvass out, yet we drove before the gale as if we had been shot out of
the mouth of a gun.
The stranger still sat on the water casks, and all night long he kept
up his infernal whistle. Now, sailors don’t like to hear any one
whistle when there’s such a gale blowing over their heads—it’s like
asking for more; but he would persist, and the louder and stronger the
wind blew, the louder he whistled.
At length there came a storm of rain, lightning, and wind. We were
tossed mountains high, and the foam rose over the vessel, and often
entirely over our heads, and the men were lashed to their posts to
prevent being washed away.
But the stranger still lay on the water casks, kicking his heels and
whistling his infernal tune, always the same. He wasn’t washed away
nor moved by the action of the water; indeed, we heartily hoped and
expected to see both him and the water cask floated overboard at every
minute; but, as the captain said,—
“Confound the binnacle! the old water tub seems as if it were screwed
on to the deck, and won’t move off and he on the top of it.”
There was a strong inclination to throw him overboard, and the men
conversed in low whispers, and came round the captain, saying,—
“We have come, captain, to ask you what you think of this strange man
who has come so mysteriously on board?”
“I can’t tell what to think, lads; he’s past thinking about—he’s
something above my comprehension altogether, I promise you.”
“Well, then, we are thinking much of the same thing, captain.”
“What do you mean?”
“That he ain’t exactly one of our sort.”
“No, he’s no sailor, certainly; and yet, for a land lubber, he’s about
as rum a customer as ever I met with.”
“So he is, sir.”
“He stands salt water well; and I must say that I couldn’t lay a top of
those water casks in that style very well.”
“Nor nobody amongst us, sir.”
“Well, then, he’s in nobody’s way, is he?—nobody wants to take his
berth, I suppose?”
The men looked at each other somewhat blank; they didn’t understand the
meaning at all—far from it; and the idea of any one’s wanting to take
the stranger’s place on the water casks was so outrageously ludicrous,
that at any other time they would have considered it a devilish good
joke and have never ceased laughing at it.
He paused some minutes, and then one of them said,—
“It isn’t that we envy him his berth, captain, ’cause nobody else could
live there for a moment. Any one amongst us that had been there would
have been washed overboard a thousand times over.”
“So they would,” said the captain.
“Well, sir, he’s more than us.”
“Very likely; but how can I help that?”
“We think he’s the main cause of all this racket in the heavens—the
storm and hurricane; and that, in short, if he remains much longer we
shall all sink.”
“I am sorry for it. I don’t think we are in any danger, and had the
strange being any power to prevent it, he would assuredly do so, lest
he got drowned.”
“But we think if he were thrown overboard all would be well.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes, captain, you may depend upon it he’s the cause of all the
mischief. Throw him overboard and that’s all we want.”
“I shall not throw him overboard, even if I could do such a thing; and
I am by no means sure of anything of the kind.”
“We do not ask it, sir.”
“What do you desire?”
“Leave to throw him overboard—it is to save our own lives.”
“I can’t let you do any such thing; he’s in nobody’s way.”
“But he’s always a whistling. Only hark now, and in such a hurricane as
this, it is dreadful to think of it. What else can we do, sir?—he’s not
human.”
At this moment, the stranger’s whistling came clear upon their ears;
there was the same wild, unearthly notes as before, but the cadences
were stronger, and there was a supernatural clearness in all the tones.
“There now,” said another, “he’s kicking the water cask with his heels.”
“Confound the binnacle!” said the captain; “it sounds like short peals
of thunder. Go and talk to him, lads.”
“And if that won’t do, sir, may we—”
“Don’t ask me any questions. I don’t think a score of the best men that
were ever born could move him.”
“I don’t mind trying,” said one.
Upon this the whole of the men moved to the spot where the water casks
were standing and the stranger lay.
There was he, whistling like fury, and, at the same time, beating his
heels to the tune against the empty casks. We came up to him, and he
took no notice of us at all, but kept on in the same way.
“Hilloa!” shouted one.
“Hilloa!” shouted another.
No notice, however, was taken of us, and one of our number, a big,
herculean fellow, an Irishman, seized him by the leg, either to make
him get up, or, as we thought, to give him a lift over our heads into
the sea. However, he had scarcely got his fingers round the calf of the
leg, when the stranger pinched his leg so tight against the water cask,
that he could not move, and was as effectually pinned as if he had been
nailed there. The stranger, after he had finished a bar of the music,
rose gradually to a sitting posture, and without the aid of his hands,
and looking the unlucky fellow in the face, he said,—
“Well, what do you want?”
“My hand,” said the fellow.
“Take it then,” he said.
He did take it, and we saw that there was blood on it.
The stranger stretched out his left hand, and taking him by the breech,
he lifted him, without any effort, upon the water-cask beside him.
We all stared at this, and couldn’t help it; and we were quite
convinced we could not throw him overboard, but he would probably have
no difficulty in throwing us overboard.
“Well, what do you want?” he again exclaimed to us all.
We looked at one another, and had scarce courage to speak; at length I
said,—
“We wish you to leave off whistling.”
“Leave off whistling!” he said. “And why should I do anything of the
kind?”
“Because it brings the wind.”
“Ha! ha! why, that’s the very reason I am whistling, to bring the wind.”
“But we don’t want so much.”
“Pho! pho! you don’t know what’s good for you—it’s a beautiful breeze,
and not a bit too stiff.”
“It’s a hurricane.”
“Nonsense.”
“But it is.”
“Now you see how I’ll prove you are wrong in a minute. You see my hair,
don’t you?” he said, after he took off his cap. “Very well, look now.”
He got up on the water-cask, and stood bolt upright; and running his
fingers through his hair, made it all stand straight on end.
“Confound the binnacle!” said the captain, “if ever I saw the like.”
“There,” said the stranger, triumphantly, “don’t tell me there’s any
wind to signify; don’t you see, it doesn’t even move one of my grey
hairs; and if it blew as hard as you say, I am certain it would move a
hair.”
“Confound the binnacle!” muttered the captain as he walked away. “D—n
the cabouse, if he ain’t older than I am—he’s too many for me and
everybody else.”
“Are you satisfied?”
What could we say?—we turned away and left the place, and stood at our
quarters—there was no help for it—we were compelled to grin and abide
by it.
As soon as we had left the place he put his cap on again and sat down
on the water-casks, and then took leave of his prisoner, whom he set
free, and there lay at full length on his back, with his legs hanging
down. Once more he began to whistle most furiously, and beat time with
his feet.
For full three weeks did he continue at this game night and day,
without any interruption, save such as he required to consume enough
coffee royal, junk, and biscuit, as would have served three hearty men.
Well, about that time, one night the whistling ceased and he began
to sing—oh! it was singing—such a voice! Gog and Magog in Guildhall,
London, when they spoke were nothing to him—it was awful; but the wind
calmed down to a fresh and stiff breeze. He continued at this game for
three whole days and nights, and on the fourth it ceased, and when we
went to take his coffee royal to him he was gone.
We hunted about everywhere, but he was entirely gone, and in three
weeks after we safely cast anchor, having performed our voyage in a
good month under the usual time; and had it been an old vessel she
would have leaked and started like a tub from the straining; however,
we were glad enough to get in, and were curiously inquisitive as to
what was put in our vessel to come back with, for as the captain said,—
“Confound the binnacle! I’ll have no more contraband articles if I can
help it.”
CHAPTER XXVI.
THE MEETING BY MOONLIGHT IN THE PARK.—THE TURRET WINDOW IN THE
HALL.—THE LETTERS.
The old admiral showed such a strong disposition to take offence at
Charles if he should presume, for a moment, to doubt the truth of the
narrative that was thus communicated to him, that the latter would not
anger him by so doing, but confined his observations upon it to saying
that he considered it was very wonderful, and very extraordinary, and
so on, which very well satisfied the old man.
The day was now, however, getting far advanced, and Charles Holland
began to think of his engagement with the vampyre. He read and read
the letter over and over again, but he could not come to a correct
conclusion as to whether it intended to imply that he, Sir Francis
Varney, would wish to fight him at the hour and place mentioned, or
merely give him a meeting as a preliminary step.
He was rather, on the whole, inclined to think that some explanation
would be offered by Varney, but at all events he persevered in his
determination of going well armed, lest anything in the shape of
treachery should be intended.
As nothing of any importance occurred now in the interval of time till
nearly midnight, we will at once step to that time, and our readers
will suppose it to be a quarter to twelve o’clock at night, and
young Charles Holland on the point of leaving the house, to keep his
appointment by the pollard oak, with the mysterious Sir Francis Varney.
He placed his loaded pistols conveniently in his pocket, so that at a
moment’s notice he could lay hands on them, and then wrapping himself
up in a travelling cloak he had brought with him to Bannerworth Hall,
he prepared to leave his chamber.
The moon still shone, although now somewhat on the wane, and although
there were certainly many clouds in the sky they were but of a light
fleecy character, and very little interrupted the rays of light that
came from the nearly full disc of the moon.
From his window he could not perceive the spot in the park where he
was to meet Varney, because the room in which he was occupied not a
sufficiently high place in the house to enable him to look over a belt
of trees that stopped the view. From almost any of the upper windows
the pollard oak could be seen.
It so happened now that the admiral had been placed in a room
immediately above the one occupied by his nephew, and, as his mind
was full of how he should manage with regard to arranging the
preliminaries of the duel between Charles and Varney on the morrow, he
found it difficult to sleep; and after remaining in bed about twenty
minutes, and finding that each moment he was only getting more and
more restless, he adopted a course which he always did under such
circumstances.
He rose and dressed himself again, intending to sit up for an hour and
then turn into bed and try a second time to get to sleep. But he had no
means of getting a light, so he drew the heavy curtain from before the
window, and let in as much of the moonlight as he could.
This window commanded a most beautiful and extensive view, for from it
the eye could carry completely over the tops of the tallest trees, so
that there was no interruption whatever to the prospect, which was as
extensive as it was delightful.
Even the admiral, who never would confess to seeing much beauty in
scenery where water formed not a large portion of it, could not resist
opening his window and looking out, with a considerable degree of
admiration, upon wood and dale, as they were illuminated by the moon’s
rays, softened, and rendered, if anything, more beautiful by the light
vapours, through which they had to struggle to make their way.
Charles Holland, in order to avoid the likelihood of meeting with any
one who would question him as to where he was going, determined upon
leaving his room by the balcony, which, as we are aware, presented
ample facilities for his so doing.
He cast a glance at the portrait in the panel before he left the
apartment, and then saying—
“For you, dear Flora, for you I essay this meeting with the fearful
original of that portrait,” he immediately opened his window, and
stepped out on to the balcony.
Young and active as was Charles Holland, to descend from that balcony
presented to him no difficulty whatever, and he was, in a very few
moments, safe in the garden of Bannerworth Hall.
He never thought, for a moment, to look up, or he would, in an instant,
have seen the white head of his old uncle, as it was projected over the
sill of the window of his chamber.
[Illustration: The admiral watches Charles’s midnight departure from
the Hall.]
The drop of Charles from the balcony of his window, just made
sufficient noise to attract the admiral’s attention, and, then, before
he could think of making any alarm, he saw Charles walking hastily
across a grass plot, which was sufficiently in the light of the moon to
enable the admiral at once to recognise him, and leave no sort of doubt
as to his positive identity.
Of course, upon discovering that it was Charles, the necessity for
making an alarm no longer existed, and, indeed, not knowing what it
was that had induced him to leave his chamber, a moment’s reflection
suggested to him the propriety of not even calling to Charles, lest he
should defeat some discovery which he might be about to make.
“He has heard something, or seen something,” thought the admiral, “and
is gone to find out what it is. I only wish I was with him; but up here
I can do nothing at all, that’s quite clear.”
Charles, he saw, walked very rapidly, and like a man who has some fixed
destination which he wishes to reach as quickly as possible.
When he dived among the trees which skirted one side of the flower
gardens, the admiral was more puzzled than ever, and he said—
“Now where on earth is he off to? He is fully dressed, and has his
cloak about him.”
After a few moments’ reflection he decided that, having seen something
suspicious, Charles must have got up, and dressed himself, to fathom it.
The moment this idea became fairly impressed upon his mind, he left his
bedroom, and descended to where one of the brothers he knew was sitting
up, keeping watch during the night. It was Henry who was so on guard;
and when the admiral came into the room, he uttered an expression of
surprise to find him up, for it was now some time past twelve o’clock.
“I have come to tell you that Charles has left the house,” said the
admiral.
“Left the house?”
“Yes; I saw him just now go across the garden.”
“And you are sure it was he?”
“Quite sure. I saw him by the moonlight cross the green plot.”
“Then you may depend he has seen or heard something, and gone alone to
find out what it is rather than give any alarm.”
“That is just what I think.”
“It must be so. I will follow him, if you can show me exactly which way
he went.”
“That I can easily. And in case I should have made any mistake, which
it is not at all likely, we can go to his room first and see if it is
empty.”
“A good thought, certainly; that will at once put an end to all doubt
upon the question.”
They both immediately proceeded to Charles’s room, and then the
admiral’s accuracy of identification of his nephew was immediately
proved by finding that Charles was not there, and that the window was
wide open.
“You see I am right,” said the admiral.
“You are,” cried Henry; “but what have we here?”
“Where?”
“Here on the dressing-table. Here are no less than three letters, all
laid as it on purpose to catch the eye of the first one who might enter
the room.”
“Indeed!”
“You perceive them?”
Henry held them to the light, and after a moment’s inspection of them,
he said, in a voice of much surprise,—
“Good God! what is the meaning of this?”
“The meaning of what?”
“The letters are addressed to parties in the house here. Do you not
see?”
“To whom?”
“One to Admiral Bell——”
“The deuce!”
“Another to me, and the third to my sister Flora. There is some new
mystery here.”
The admiral looked at the superscription of one of the letters which
was handed to him in silent amazement. Then he cried,—
“Set down the light, and let us read them.”
Henry did so, and then they simultaneously opened the epistles which
were severally addressed to them. There was a silence, as of the very
grave, for some moments, and then the old admiral staggered to a seat,
as he exclaimed,—
“Am I dreaming—am I dreaming?”
“Is this possible?” said Henry, in a voice of deep emotion, as he
allowed the note addressed to him to drop on to the floor.
“D—n it, what does yours say?” cried the old admiral, in a louder tone.
“Read it—what says yours?”
“Read it—I’m amazed.”
The letters were exchanged, and read by each with the same breathless
attention they had bestowed upon their own; after which, they both
looked at each other in silence, pictures of amazement, and the most
absolute state of bewilderment.
Not to keep our readers in suspense, we at once transcribe each of
these letters.
The one to the admiral contained these words,—
“+My dear Uncle+,
“Of course you will perceive the prudence of keeping this
letter to yourself, but the fact is, I have now made up my mind
to leave Bannerworth Hall.
“Flora Bannerworth is not now the person she was when first I
knew her and loved her. Such being the case, and she having
altered, not I, she cannot accuse me of fickleness.
“I still love the Flora Bannerworth I first knew, but I cannot
make my wife one who is subject to the visitations of a vampyre.
“I have remained here long enough now to satisfy myself that
this vampyre business is no delusion. I am quite convinced
that it is a positive fact, and that, after death, Flora will
herself become one of the horrible existences known by that
name.
“I will communicate to you from the first large city on the
continent whither I am going, at which I make any stay, and in
the meantime, make what excuses you like at Bannerworth Hall,
which I advise you to leave as quickly as you can, and believe
me to be, my dear uncle, yours truly,
“+Charles Holland+.”
Henry’s letter was this:—
“+My dear Sir+,
“If you calmly and dispassionately consider the painful and
distressing circumstances in which your family are placed,
I am sure that, far from blaming me for the step which this
note will announce to you I have taken, you will be the first
to give me credit for acting with an amount of prudence and
foresight which was highly necessary under the circumstances.
“If the supposed visits of a vampyre to your sister Flora had
turned out, as first I hoped they would, a delusion, and been
in any satisfactory manner explained away I should certainly
have felt pride and pleasure in fulfilling my engagement to
that young lady.
“You must, however, yourself feel that the amount of evidence
in favour of a belief that an actual vampyre has visited Flora,
enforces a conviction of its truth.
“I cannot, therefore, make her my wife under such very singular
circumstances.
“Perhaps you may blame me for not taking at once advantage of
the permission given me to forego my engagement when first I
came to your house; but the fact is, I did not then in the
least believe in the existence of the vampyre, but since a
positive conviction of that most painful fact has now forced
itself upon me, I beg to decline the honour of an alliance
which I had at one time looked forward to with the most
considerable satisfaction.
“I shall be on the continent as fast as conveyances can take
me, therefore, should you entertain any romantic notions of
calling me to an account for a course of proceeding I think
perfectly and fully justifiable, you will not find me.
“Accept the assurances of my respect for yourself and pity for
your sister, and believe me to be, my dear sir, your sincere
friend,
“+Charles Holland+.”
These two letters might well make the admiral stare at Henry
Bannerworth, and Henry stare at him.
An occurrence so utterly and entirely unexpected by both of them, was
enough to make them doubt the evidence of their own senses. But there
were the letters, as a damning evidence of the outrageous fact, and
Charles Holland was gone.
It was the admiral who first recovered from the stunning effect of the
epistles, and he, with a gesture of perfect fury, exclaimed,—
“The scoundrel—the cold-blooded villain! I renounce him for ever! he is
no nephew of mine; he is some d—d imposter! Nobody with a dash of my
family blood in his veins would have acted so to save himself from a
thousand deaths.”
“Who shall we trust now,” said Henry, “when those whom we take to our
inmost hearts deceive us thus? This is the greatest shock I have yet
received. If there be a pang greater than another, surely it is to
be found in the faithlessness and heartlessness of one we loved and
trusted.”
“He is a scoundrel!” roared the admiral. “D—n him, he’ll die on a
dunghill, and that’s too good a place for him. I cast him off—I’ll
find him out, and old as I am, I’ll fight him—I’ll wring his neck, the
rascal; and, as for poor dear Miss Flora, God bless her! I’ll—I’ll
marry her myself, and make her an admiral.—I’ll marry her myself. Oh,
that I should be uncle to such a rascal!”
“Calm yourself,” said Henry, “no one can blame you.”
“Yes, you can; I had no right to be his uncle, and I was an old fool to
love him.”
The old man sat down, and his voice became broken with emotion as he
said,—
“Sir, I tell you I would have died willingly rather than this should
have happened. This will kill me now,—I shall die now of shame and
grief.”
Tears gushed from the admiral’s eyes and the sight of the noble old
man’s emotion did much to calm the anger of Henry which, although he
said but little, was boiling at his heart like a volcano.
“Admiral Bell,” he said, “you have nothing to do with this business;
we can not blame you for the heartlessness of another. I have but one
favour to ask of you.”
“What—what can I do?”
“Say no more about him at all.”
“I can’t help saying something about him. You ought to turn me out of
the house.”
“Heaven forbid! What for?”
“Because I’m his uncle—his d—d old fool of an uncle, that always
thought so much of him.”
“Nay, my good sir, that was a fault on the right side, and cannot
discredit you. I thought him the most perfect of human beings.”
“Oh, if I could but have guessed this.”
“It was impossible. Such duplicity never was equalled in this world—it
was impossible to foresee it.”
“Hold—hold! did he give you fifty pounds?”
“What?”
“Did he give you fifty pounds?”
“Give me fifty pounds! Most decidedly not; what made you think of such
a thing?”
“Because to-day he borrowed fifty pounds of me, he said, to lend to
you.”
“I never heard of the transaction until this moment.”
“The villain!”
“No, doubt, sir, he wanted that amount to expedite his progress abroad.”
“Well, now, damme, if an angel had come to me and said ‘Hilloa! Admiral
Bell, your nephew, Charles Holland, is a thundering rogue,’ I should
have said ‘You’re a liar!’”
“This is fighting against facts, my dear sir. He is gone—mention him no
more; forget him, as I shall endeavour myself to do, and persuade my
poor sister to do.”
“Poor girl! what can we say to her?”
“Nothing, but give her all the letters, and let her be at once
satisfied of the worthlessness of him she loved.”
“The best way. Her woman’s pride will then come to her help.”
“I hope it will. She is of an honourable race, and I am sure she will
not condescend to shed a tear for such a man as Charles Holland has
proved himself to be.”
“D—n him, I’ll find him out, and make him fight you. He shall give you
satisfaction.”
“No, no.”
“No? But he shall.”
“I cannot fight with him.”
“You cannot?”
“Certainly not. He is too far beneath me now. I cannot fight on
honourable terms with one whom I despise as too dishonourable to
contend with. I have nothing now but silence and contempt.”
“I have though, for I’ll break his neck when I see him, or he shall
break mine. The villain! I’m ashamed to stay here, my young friend.”
“How mistaken a view you take of this matter, my dear sir. As Admiral
Bell, a gentleman, a brave officer, and a man of the purest and most
unblemished honour, you confer a distinction upon us by your presence
here.”
The admiral wrung Henry by the hand, as he said,—
“To-morrow—wait till to-morrow; we will talk over this matter to
morrow—I cannot to-night, I have not patience; but to-morrow, my dear
boy, we will have it all out. God bless you. Good night.”
CHAPTER XXVII.
THE NOBLE CONFIDENCE OF FLORA BANNERWORTH IN HER LOVER.—HER OPINION OF
THE THREE LETTERS.—THE ADMIRAL’S ADMIRATION.
To describe the feelings of Henry Bannerworth on the occasion of this
apparent defalcation from the path of rectitude and honour by his
friend, as he had fondly imagined Charles Holland to be, would be next
to impossible.
If, as we have taken occasion to say, it be a positive fact, that a
noble and a generous mind feels more acutely any heartlessness of this
description from one on whom it has placed implicit confidence, than
the most deliberate and wicked of injuries from absolute strangers, we
can easily conceive that Henry Bannerworth was precisely the person to
feel most acutely the conduct which all circumstances appeared to fix
upon Charles Holland, upon whose faith, truth, and honour, he would
have staked his very existence but a few short hours before.
With such a bewildered sensation that he scarcely knew where he walked
or whither to betake himself, did he repair to his own chamber, and
there he strove, with what energy he was able to bring to the task, to
find out some excuses, if he could, for Charles’s conduct. But he could
find none. View it in what light he would, it presented but a picture
of the most heartless selfishness it had ever been his lot to encounter.
The tone of the letters, too, which Charles had written, materially
aggravated the moral delinquency of which he had been guilty; better,
far better, had he not attempted an excuse at all than have attempted
such excuses as were there put down in those epistles.
A more cold blooded, dishonourable proceeding could not possibly be
conceived.
It would appear, that while he entertained a doubt with regard to the
reality of the visitation of the vampyre to Flora Bannerworth, he
had been willing to take to himself abundance of credit for the most
honourable feelings, and to induce a belief in the minds of all that an
exalted feeling of honour, as well as a true affection that would know
no change, kept him at the feet of her whom he loved.
Like some braggart, who, when there is no danger, is a very hero, but
who, the moment he feels convinced he will be actually and truly called
upon for an exhibition of his much-vaunted prowess, had Charles Holland
deserted the beautiful girl, who, if anything, had now certainly, in
her misfortunes, a far higher claim upon his kindly feeling than before.
Henry could not sleep, although, at the request of George, who offered
to keep watch for him the remainder of the night he attempted to do so.
He in vain said to himself, “I will banish from my mind this most
unworthy subject. I have told Admiral Bell that contempt is the only
feeling I can now have for his nephew, and yet I now find myself
dwelling upon him, and upon his conduct, with a perseverance which is a
foe to my repose.”
At length came the welcome and beautiful light of day, and Henry rose
fevered and unrefreshed.
His first impulse now was to hold a consultation with his brother
George, as to what was to be done, and George advised that Mr.
Marchdale, who as yet knew nothing of the matter, should be immediately
informed of it, and consulted, as being probably better qualified than
either of them to come to a just, a cool, and a reasonable opinion upon
the painful circumstance, which it could not be expected that either of
them would be able to view calmly.
“Let it be so, then,” said Henry; “Mr. Marchdale shall decide for us.”
They at once sought this friend of the family, who was in his own
bed-room, and when Henry knocked at the door, Marchdale opened it
hurriedly, eagerly inquiring what was the matter.
“There is no alarm,” said Henry. “We have only come to tell you of
a circumstance which has occurred during the night, and which will
somewhat surprise you.”
“Nothing calamitous, I hope?”
“Vexatious; and yet, I think it is a matter upon which we ought almost
to congratulate ourselves. Read those two letters, and give us your
candid opinion upon them.”
Henry placed in Mr. Marchdale’s hands the letter addressed to himself,
as well as that to the admiral.
Marchdale read them both with marked attention, but he did not exhibit
in his countenance so much surprise as regret.
When he had finished, Henry said to him,—
“Well, Marchdale, what think you of this new and extraordinary episode
in our affairs?”
“My dear young friends,” said Marchdale, in a voice of great emotion,
“I know not what to say to you. I have no doubt but that you are both
of you much astonished at the receipt of these letters, and equally so
at the sudden absence of Charles Holland.”
“And are not you?”
“Not so much as you, doubtless, are. The fact is, I never did entertain
a favourable opinion of the young man, and he knew it. I have been
accustomed to the study of human nature under a variety of aspects; I
have made it a matter of deep, and I may add, sorrowful, contemplation,
to study and remark those minor shades of character which commonly
escape observation wholly. And, I repeat, I always had a bad opinion of
Charles Holland, which he guessed, and hence he conceived a hatred to
me, which more than once, as you cannot but remember, showed itself in
little acts of opposition and hostility.”
“You much surprise me.”
“I expected to do so. But you cannot help remembering that at one time
I was on the point of leaving here solely on his account.”
“You were so.”
“Indeed I should have done so, but that I reasoned with myself upon the
subject, and subdued the impulse of the anger which some years ago,
when I had not seen so much of the world, would have guided me.”
“But why did you not impart to us your suspicions? We should at least,
then, have been prepared for such a contingency as has occurred.”
“Place yourself in my position, and then ask yourself what you would
have done. Suspicion is one of those hideous things which all men
should be most specially careful not only how they entertain at all,
but how they give expression to. Besides, whatever may be the amount of
one’s own internal conviction with regard to the character of any one,
there is just a possibility that one may be wrong.”
“True, true.”
“That possibility ought to keep any one silent who has nothing but
suspicion to go upon, however cautious it may make him, as regards
his dealings with the individual. I only suspected from little minute
shades of character, that would peep out in spite of him, that Charles
Holland was not the honourable man he would fain have had everybody
believe him to be.”
“And had you from the first such a feeling?”
“I had.”
“It is very strange.”
“Yes; and what is more strange still, is that he from the first seemed
to know it; and despite a caution which I could see he always kept
uppermost in his thoughts, he could not help speaking tartly to me at
times.”
“I have noticed that,” said George.
“You may depend it is a fact,” added Marchdale, “that nothing so much
excites the deadly and desperate hatred of a man who is acting a
hypocritical part, as the suspicion, well grounded or not, that another
sees and understands the secret impulses of his dishonourable heart.”
“I cannot blame you, or any one else, Mr. Marchdale,” said Henry, “that
you did not give utterance to your secret thoughts, but I do wish that
you had done so.”
“Nay, dear Henry,” replied Mr. Marchdale, “believe me, I have made this
matter a subject of deep thought, and have abundance of reasons why I
ought not to have spoken to you upon the subject.”
“Indeed!”
“Indeed I have, and not among the least important is the one, that if
I had acquainted you with my suspicions, you would have found yourself
in the painful position of acting a hypocritical part yourself towards
this Charles Holland, for you must either have kept the secret that he
was suspected, or you must have shewn it to him by your behaviour.”
“Well, well. I dare say, Marchdale, you acted for the best. What shall
we do now?”
“Can you doubt?”
“I was thinking of letting Flora at once know the absolute and complete
worthlessness of her lover, so that she could have no difficulty in
at once tearing herself from him by the assistance of the natural
pride which would surely come to her aid, upon finding herself so much
deceived.”
“The test may be possible.”
“You think so?”
“I do, indeed.”
“Here is a letter, which of course remains unopened, addressed to
Flora by Charles Holland. The admiral rather thought it would hurt her
feelings to deliver her such an epistle, but I must confess I am of a
contrary opinion upon that point, and think now the more evidence she
has of the utter worthlessness of him who professed to love her with
so much disinterested affection, the better it will be for her.”
“You could not, possibly, Henry, have taken a more sensible view of the
subject.”
“I am glad you agree with me.”
“No reasonable man could do otherwise, and from what I have seen of
Admiral Bell, I am sure, upon reflection, he will be of the same
opinion.”
“Then it shall be so. The first shock to poor Flora may be severe,
but we shall then have the consolation of knowing that it is the only
one, and that in knowing the very worst, she has no more on that score
to apprehend. Alas, alas! the hand of misfortune now appears to have
pressed heavily upon us indeed. What in the name of all that is unlucky
and disastrous, will happen next, I wonder?”
“What can happen?” said Marchdale; “I think you have now got rid of the
greatest evil of all—a false friend.”
“We have, indeed.”
“Go, then, to Flora; assure her that in the affection of others who
know no falsehood, she will find a solace from every ill. Assure her
that there are hearts that will place themselves between her and every
misfortune.”
Mr. Marchdale was much affected as he spoke. Probably he felt deeper
than he chose to express the misfortunes of that family for whom he
entertained so much friendship. He turned aside his head to hide the
traces of emotion which, despite even his great powers of self-command,
would shew themselves upon his handsome and intelligent countenance.
Then it appeared as if his noble indignation had got, for a few brief
moments, the better of all prudence, and he exclaimed,—
“The villain! the worse than villain! who would, with a thousand
artifices, make himself beloved by a young, unsuspecting, and beautiful
girl, but then to leave her to the bitterness of regret, that she had
ever given such a man a place in her esteem. The heartless ruffian!”
“Be calm, Mr. Marchdale, I pray you be calm,” said George; “I never saw
you so much moved.”
“Excuse me,” he said, “excuse me; I am much moved, and I am human. I
cannot always, let me strive my utmost, place a curb upon my feelings.”
“They are feelings which do you honour.”
“Nay, nay, I am foolish to have suffered myself to be led away into
such a hasty expression of them. I am accustomed to feel acutely and to
feel deeply, but it is seldom I am so much overcome as this.”
“Will you accompany us to the breakfast room at once, Mr. Marchdale,
where we will make this communication to Flora; you will then be able
to judge by her manner of receiving it, what it will be best to say to
her.”
“Come, then, and pray be calm. The least that is said upon this painful
and harassing subject, after this morning, will be the best.”
“You are right—you are right.”
Mr. Marchdale hastily put on his coat. He was dressed, with the
exception of that one article of apparel, when the brothers came to his
chamber, and then he came to the breakfast-parlour where the painful
communication was to be made to Flora of her lover’s faithlessness.
Flora was already seated in that apartment. Indeed, she had been
accustomed to meet Charles Holland there before others of the family
made their appearance, but, alas! this morning the kind and tender
lover was not there.
The expression that sat upon the countenances of her brothers, and of
Mr. Marchdale, was quite sufficient to convince her that something more
serious than usual had occurred, and she at the moment turned very
pale. Marchdale observed this change of change of countenance in her,
and he advanced towards her, saying,—
“Calm yourself, Flora, we have something to communicate to you, but it
is a something which should excite indignation, and no other feeling,
in your breast.”
[Illustration: Flora’s agony on the disappearance of Charles Holland.]
“Brother, what is the meaning of this?” said Flora, turning aside from
Marchdale, and withdrawing the hand which he would have taken.
“I would rather have Admiral Bell here before I say anything,” said
Henry, “regarding a matter in which he cannot but feel much interested
personally.”
“Here he is,” said the admiral, who at that moment had opened the door
of the breakfast room. “Here he is, so now fire away, and don’t spare
the enemy.”
“And Charles?” said Flora, “where is Charles?”
“D—n Charles!” cried the admiral, who had not been much accustomed to
control his feelings.
“Hush! hush!” said Henry; “my dear sir, hush! do not indulge now in
any invectives. Flora, here are three letters; you will see that the
one which is unopened is addressed to yourself. However, we wish you
to read the whole three of them, and then to form your own free and
unbiased opinion.”
Flora looked as pale as a marble statue, when she took the letters into
her hands. She let the two that were open fall on the table before
her, while she eagerly broke the seal of that which was addressed to
herself.
Henry, with an instinctive delicacy, beckoned every one present to the
window, so that Flora had not the pain of feeling that any eyes were
fixed upon her but those of her mother, who had just come into the
room, while she was perusing those documents which told such a tale of
heartless dissimulation.
“My dear child,” said Mrs. Bannerworth, “you are ill.”
“Hush! mother—hush!” said Flora, “let me know all.”
She read the whole of the letters through, and then, as the last one
dropped from her grasp, she exclaimed,—
“Oh, God! oh, God! what is all that has occurred compared to this?
Charles—Charles—Charles!”
“Flora!” exclaimed Henry, suddenly turning from the window. “Flora, is
this worthy of you?”
“Heaven now support me!”
“Is this worthy of the name you bear, Flora? I should have thought,
and I did hope, that woman’s pride would have supported you.”
“Let me implore you,” added Marchdale, “to summon indignation to your
aid, Miss Bannerworth.”
“Charles—Charles—Charles!” she again exclaimed, as she wrung her hands
despairingly.
“Flora, if anything could add a sting to my already irritated
feelings,” said Henry, “this conduct of yours would.”
“Henry—brother, what mean you? Are you mad?”
“Are you, Flora?”
“God, I wish now that I was.”
“You have read those letters, and yet you call upon the name of him who
wrote them with frantic tenderness.”
“Yes, yes,” she cried; “frantic tenderness is the word. It is with
frantic tenderness I call upon his name, and ever will.—Charles!
Charles!—dear Charles!”
“This surpasses all belief,” said Marchdale.
“It is the frenzy of grief,” added George; “but I did not expect it of
her. Flora—Flora, think again.”
“Think—think—the rush of thought distracts. Whence came these
letters?—where did you find these most disgraceful forgeries?”
“Forgeries!” exclaimed Henry; and he staggered back, as if someone had
struck him a blow.
“Yes, forgeries!” screamed Flora. “What has become of Charles Holland?
Has he been murdered by some secret enemy, and then these most vile
fabrications made up in his name? Oh, Charles, Charles, are you lost to
me for ever?”
[Illustration: Flora disowns the letters of Charles Holland as being
forgeries.]
“Good God!” said Henry; “I did not think of that.”
“Madness!—madness!” cried Marchdale.
“Hold!” shouted the admiral. “Let me speak to her.”
He pushed every one aside, and advanced to Flora. He seized both her
hands in his own, and in a tone of voice that was struggling with
feeling, he cried,—
“Look at me, my dear; I’m an old man—old enough to be your grandfather,
so you needn’t mind looking me steadily in the face. Look at me, I want
to ask you a question.”
Flora raised her beautiful eyes, and looked the old weather-beaten
admiral full in the face.
Oh! what a striking contrast did those two persons present to each
other. That young and beautiful girl, with her small, delicate,
childlike hands clasped, and completely hidden in the huge ones of the
old sailor, the white, smooth skin contrasting wonderfully with his
wrinkled, hardened features.
“My dear,” he cried, “you have read those—those d——d letters, my dear?”
“I have, sir.”
“And what do you think of them?”
“They were not written by Charles Holland, your nephew.”
A choking sensation seemed to come over the old man, and he tried to
speak, but in vain. He shook the hands of the young girl violently,
until he saw that he was hurting her, and then, before she could be
aware of what he was about, he gave her a kiss on the cheek, as he
cried,—
“God bless you—God bless you! You are the sweetest, dearest little
creature that ever was, or that ever will be, and I’m a d——d old fool,
that’s what I am. These letters were not written by my nephew, Charles.
He is incapable of writing them, and, d—n me, I shall take shame to
myself as long as I live for ever thinking so.”
“Dear sir,” said Flora, who somehow or another did not seem at all
offended at the kiss which the old man had given her; “dear sir, how
could you believe, for one moment, that they came from him? There has
been some desperate villany on foot. Where is he?—oh, find him, if he
be yet alive. If they who have thus striven to steal from him that
honour, which is the jewel of his heart, have murdered him, seek them
out, sir, in the sacred name of justice, I implore you.”
“I will—I will. I don’t renounce him; he is my nephew still—Charles
Holland—my own dear sister’s son; and you are the best girl, God bless
you, that ever breathed. He loved you—he loves you still; and if he’s
above ground, poor fellow, he shall yet tell you himself he never saw
those infamous letters.”
“You—you will seek for him?” sobbed Flora, and the tears gushed from
her eyes. “Upon you, sir, who, as I do, feel assured of his innocence,
I alone rely. If all the world say he is guilty, we will not think so.”
“I’m d——d if we do.”
Henry had sat down by the table, and, with his hands clasped together,
seemed in an agony of thought.
He was now roused by a thump on the back by the admiral, who cried,—
“What do you think, now, old fellow? D—n it, things look a little
different now.”
“As God is my judge,” said Henry, holding up his hands, “I know not
what to think, but my heart and feelings all go with you and with
Flora, in your opinion of the innocence of Charles Holland.”
“I knew you would say that, because you could not possibly help it, my
dear boy. Now we are all right again, and all we have got to do is to
find out which way the enemy has gone, and then give chase to him.”
“Mr. Marchdale, what do you think of this new suggestion,” said George
to that gentleman.
“Pray, excuse me,” was his reply; “I would much rather not be called
upon to give an opinion.”
“Why, what do you mean by that?” said the admiral.
“Precisely what I say, sir.”
“D—n me, we had a fellow once in the combined fleets, who never had an
opinion till after something had happened, and then he always said that
was just what he thought.”
“I was never in the combined, or any other fleet, sir,” said Marchdale,
coldly.
“Who the devil said you were?” roared the admiral.
Marchdale merely hawed.
“However,” added the admiral, “I don’t care, and never did, for
anybody’s opinion, when I know I am right. I’d back this dear girl here
for opinions, and good feelings, and courage to express them, against
all the world, I would, any day. If I was not the old hulk I am, I
would take a cruise in any latitude under the sun, if it was only for
the chance of meeting with just such another.”
“Oh, lose no time!” said Flora. “If Charles is not to be found in
the house, lose no time in searching for him, I pray you; seek him,
wherever there is the remotest probability he may chance to be. Do not
let him think he is deserted.”
“Not a bit of it,” cried the admiral. “You make your mind easy, my
dear. If he’s above ground, we shall find him out, you may depend upon
it. Come along master Henry, you and I will consider what had best be
done in this uncommonly ugly matter.”
Henry and George followed the admiral from the breakfast-room, leaving
Marchdale there, who looked serious and full of melancholy thought.
It was quite clear that he considered Flora had spoken from the
generous warmth of her affection as regarded Charles Holland, and not
from the convictions which reason would have enforced her to feel.
When he was now alone with her and Mrs. Bannerworth, he spoke in a
feeling and affectionate tone regarding the painful and inexplicable
events which had transpired.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
MR. MARCHDALE’S EXCULPATION OF HIMSELF.—THE SEARCH THROUGH THE
GARDENS.—THE SPOT OF THE DEADLY STRUGGLE.—THE MYSTERIOUS PAPER.
It was, perhaps, very natural that, with her feelings towards Charles
Holland, Flora should shrink from every one who seemed to be of a
directly contrary impression, and when Mr. Marchdale now spoke, she
showed but little inclination to hear what he had to say in explanation.
The genuine and unaffected manner, however, in which he spoke, could
not but have its effect upon her, and she found herself compelled to
listen, as well as, to a great extent, approve of the sentiments that
fell from his lips.
“Flora,” he said, “I beg that you will here, in the presence of your
mother, give me a patient hearing. You fancy that, because I cannot
join so glibly as the admiral in believing that these letters are
forgeries, I must be your enemy.”
“Those letters,” said Flora, “were not written by Charles Holland.”
“That is your opinion.”
“It is more than an opinion. He could not write them.”
“Well, then, of course, if I felt inclined, which Heaven alone knows
I do not, I could not hope successfully to argue against such a
conviction. But I do not wish to do so. All I want to impress upon you
is, that I am not to be blamed for doubting his innocence; and, at the
same time, I wish to assure you that no one in this house would feel
more exquisite satisfaction than I in seeing it established.”
“I thank you for so much,” said Flora; “but as, to my mind, his
innocence has never been doubted, it needs to me no establishing.”
“Very good. You believe these letters forgeries?”
“I do.”
“And that the disappearance of Charles Holland is enforced, and not of
his own free will?”
“I do.”
“Then you may rely upon my unremitting exertions night and day to find
him and any suggestion you can make, which is likely to aid in the
search, shall, I pledge myself, be fully carried out.”
“I thank you, Mr. Marchdale.”
“My dear,” said the mother, “rely on Mr. Marchdale.”
“I will rely on any one who believe Charles Holland innocent of writing
those odious letters, mother—I rely upon the admiral. He will aid me
heart and hand.”
“And so will Mr. Marchdale.”
“I am glad to hear it.”
“And yet doubt it, Flora,” said Marchdale, dejectedly. “I am very sorry
that such should be the case; I will not, however, trouble you any
further, nor, give me leave to assure you, will I relax in my honest
endeavours to clear up this mystery.”
So saying, Mr. Marchdale bowed, and left the room, apparently more
vexed than he cared to express at the misconstruction which had
been put upon his conduct and motives. He at once sought Henry and
the admiral, to whom he expressed his most earnest desire to aid in
attempting to unravel the mysterious circumstances which had occurred.
“This strongly-expressed opinion of Flora,” he remarked, “is of course
amply sufficient to induce us to pause before we say one word more
that shall in any way sound like a condemnation of Mr. Holland. Heaven
forbid that I should.”
“No,” said the admiral; “don’t.”
“I do not intend.”
“I would not advise anybody.”
“Sir, if you use that as a threat——”
“A threat?”
“Yes; I must say, it sounded marvellously like one.”
“Oh, dear, no—quite a mistake. I consider that every man has a fair
right to the enjoyment of his opinion. All I have to remark is, that
I shall, after what has occurred, feel myself called upon to fight
anybody who says those letters were written by my nephew.”
“Indeed, sir!”
“Ah, indeed.”
“You will permit me to say such is a strange mode of allowing every one
the free enjoyment of his opinion.”
“Not at all.”
“Whatever pains and penalties may be the result, Admiral Bell, of
differing with so infallible authority as yourself, I shall do so
whenever my judgment induces me.”
“You will?”
“Indeed I will.”
“Very good. You know the consequences.”
“As to fighting you, I should refuse to do so.”
“Refuse?”
“Yes; most certainly.”
“Upon what ground?”
“Upon the ground that you were a madman.”
“Come,” now interposed Henry, “let me hope that, for my sake as well as
for Flora’s, this dispute will proceed no further.”
“I have not courted it,” said Marchdale. “I have much temper, but I am
not a stick or a stone.”
“D——e, if I don’t think,” said the admiral, “you are a bit of both.”
“Mr. Henry Bannerworth,” said Marchdale, “I am your guest, and but for
the duty I feel in assisting in the search for Mr. Charles Holland, I
should at once leave your house.”
“You need not trouble yourself on my account,” said the admiral; “if I
find no clue to him in the neighbourhood for two or three days, I shall
be off myself.”
“I am going,” said Henry, rising, “to search the garden and adjoining
meadows; if you two gentlemen choose to come with me, I shall of course
be happy of your company; if, however, you prefer remaining here to
wrangle, you can do so.”
This had the effect, at all events, of putting a stop to the dispute
for the present, and both the admiral and Mr. Marchdale accompanied
Henry on his search. That search was commenced immediately under the
balcony of Charles Holland’s window, from which the admiral had seen
him emerge.
There was nothing particular found there, or in the garden. Admiral
Bell pointed out accurately the route he had seen Charles take across
the grass plot just before he himself left his chamber to seek Henry.
Accordingly, this route was now taken, and it led to a low part of
the garden wall, which any one of ordinary vigour could easily have
surmounted.
“My impression is,” said the admiral, “that he got over here.”
“The ivy appears to be disturbed,” remarked Henry.
“Suppose we mark the spot, and then go round to it on the outer side?”
suggested George.
This was agreed to; for, although the young man might have chosen
rather to clamber over the wall than go round, it was doubtful if the
old admiral could accomplish such a feat.
The distance round, however, was not great, and as they had cast over
the wall a handful of flowers from the garden to mark the precise spot,
it was easily discoverable.
The moment they reached it, they were panic-stricken by the appearances
which it presented. The grass was for some yards round about completely
trodden up, and converted into mud. There were deep indentations of
feet-marks in all directions, and such abundance of evidence that some
most desperate struggle had recently taken place there, that the most
sceptical person in the world could not have entertained any doubt upon
the subject.
Henry was the first to break the silence with which they each regarded
the broken ground.
“This is conclusive to my mind,” he said, with a deep sigh. “Here has
poor Charles been attacked.”
“God keep him!” exclaimed Marchdale, “and pardon me my doubts—I am now
convinced.”
The old admiral gazed about him like one distracted. Suddenly he cried—
“They have murdered him. Some fiends in the shape of men have murdered
him, and Heaven only knows for what.”
“It seems but too probable,” said Henry. “Let us endeavour to trace the
footsteps. Oh! Flora, Flora, what terrible news this will be to you.”
“A horrible supposition comes across my mind,” said George. “What if he
met the vampyre?”
“It may have been so,” said Marchdale, with a shudder. “It is a point
which we should endeavour to ascertain, and I think we may do so.”
“How!”
“By some inquiry as to whether Sir Francis Varney was from home at
midnight last night.”
“True; that might be done.”
“The question, suddenly put to one of his servants, would, most
probably, be answered as a thing of course.”
“It would.”
“Then that shall be decided upon. And now, my friends, since you have
some of you thought me luke-warm in this business, I pledge myself
that, should it be ascertained that Varney was from home at midnight
last evening, I will defy him personally, and meet him hand to hand.”
“Nay, nay,” said Henry, “leave that course to younger hands.”
“Why so?”
“It more befits me to be his challenger.”
“No, Henry. You are differently situated to what I am.”
“How so?”
“Remember, that I am in the world a lone man; without ties or
connexions. If I lose my life, I compromise no one by my death; but you
have a mother and a bereaved sister to look to who will deserve your
care.”
“Hilloa,” cried the admiral, “what’s this?”
“What?” cried each, eagerly, and they pressed forward to where the
admiral was stooping to the ground to pick up something which was
nearly completely trodden into the grass.
He with some difficulty raised it. It was a small slip of paper, on
which was some writing, but it was so much covered with mud as not to
be legible.
“If this be washed,” said Henry, “I think we shall be able to read it
clearly.”
“We can soon try that experiment,” said George. “And as the footsteps,
by some mysterious means, show themselves nowhere else but in this one
particular spot, any further pursuit of inquiry about here appears
useless.”
“Then we will return to the house,” said Henry, “and wash the mud from
this paper.”
“There is one important point,” remarked Marchdale, “which it appears
to me we have all overlooked.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes.”
“What may that be?”
“It is this. Is any one here sufficiently acquainted with the
handwriting of Mr. Charles Holland to come to an opinion upon the
letters?”
“I have some letters from him,” said Henry, “which we received while on
the continent, and I dare say Flora has likewise.”
“Then they should be compared with the alleged forgeries.”
“I know his handwriting well,” said the admiral. “The letters bear so
strong a resemblance to it that they would deceive anybody.”
“Then you may depend,” remarked Henry, “some most deep-laid and
desperate plot is going on.”
“I begin,” added Marchdale, “to dread that such must be the case.
What say you to claiming the assistance of the authorities, as well
as offering a large reward for any information regarding Mr. Charles
Holland?”
“No plan shall be left untried, you may depend.”
They had now reached the house, and Henry having procured some clean
water, carefully washed the paper which had been found among the
trodden grass. When freed from the mixture of clay and mud which had
obscured it, they made out the following words,—
“—— it be so well. At the next full moon seek a convenient spot, and it
can be done. The signature is, to my apprehension, perfect. The money
which I hold, in my opinion, is much more in amount than you imagine,
must be ours; and as for ——”
Here the paper was torn across, and no further words were visible upon
it.
Mystery seemed now to be accumulating upon mystery; each one, as it
showed itself darkly, seeming to bear some remote relation to what
preceded it; and yet only confusing it the more.
That this apparent scrap of a letter had dropped from some one’s pocket
during the fearful struggle, of which there were such ample evidences,
was extremely probable; but what it related to, by whom it was written,
or by whom dropped, were unfathomable mysteries.
In fact, no one could give an opinion upon these matters at all; and
after a further series of conjectures, it could only be decided, that
unimportant as the scrap of paper appeared now to be, it should be
preserved, in case it should, as there was a dim possibility that it
might, become a connecting link in some chain of evidence at another
time.
“And here we are,” said Henry, “completely at fault, and knowing not
what to do.”
“Well, it is a hard case,” said the admiral, “that, with all the will
in the world to be up and doing something, we are lying here like a
fleet of ships in a calm, as idle as possible.”
“You perceive we have no evidence to connect Sir Francis Varney with
this affair, either nearly or remotely,” said Marchdale.
“Certainly not,” replied Henry.
“But yet, I hope you will not lose sight of the suggestion I proposed,
to the effect of ascertaining if he were from home last night.”
“But how is that to be carried out?”
“Boldly.”
“How boldly?”
“By going at once, I should advise, to his house, and asking the first
one of his domestics you may happen to see.”
“I will go over,” cried George; “on such occasions as these one cannot
act upon ceremony.”
He seized his hat, and without waiting for a word from any one
approving or condemning his going, off he went.
“If,” said Henry, “we find that Varney has nothing to do with the
matter, we are completely at fault.”
“Completely,” echoed Marchdale.
“In that case, admiral, I think we ought to defer to your feelings upon
the subject, and do whatever you suggest should be done.”
“I shall offer a hundred pounds reward to any one who can and will
bring any news of Charles.”
“A hundred pounds is too much,” said Marchdale.
“Not at all; and while I am about it, since the amount is made a
subject of discussion, I shall make it two hundred, and that may
benefit some rascal who is not so well paid for keeping the secret as I
will pay him for disclosing it.”
“Perhaps you are right,” said Marchdale.
“I know I am, as I always am.”
Marchdale could not forbear a smile at the opinionated old man, who
thought no one’s opinion upon any subject at all equal to his own; but
he made no remark, and only waited, as did Henry, with evident anxiety
for the return of George.
The distance was not great, and George certainly performed his errand
quickly, for he was back in less time than they had thought he could
return in. The moment he came into the room, he said, without waiting
for any inquiry to be made of him,—
“We are at fault again. I am assured that Sir Francis Varney never
stirred from home after eight o’clock last evening.”
“D—n it, then,” said the admiral, “let us give the devil his due. He
could not have had any hand in this business.”
“Certainly not.”
“From whom, George, did you get your information?” asked Henry, in a
desponding tone.
“From, first of all, one of his servants, whom I met away from the
house, and then from one whom I saw at the house.”
“There can be no mistake, then?”
“Certainly none. The servants answered me at once, and so frankly that
I cannot doubt it.”
The door of the room was slowly opened, and Flora came in. She looked
almost the shadow of what she had been but a few weeks before. She was
beautiful, but she almost realised the poet’s description of one who
had suffered much, and was sinking into an early grave, the victim of a
broken heart:—
“She was more beautiful than death,
And yet as sad to look upon.”
Her face was of a marble paleness, and as she clasped her hands,
and glanced from face to face, to see if she could gather hope and
consolation from the expression of any one, she might have been taken
for some exquisite statue of despair.
“Have you found him?” she said. “Have you found Charles?”
“Flora, Flora,” said Henry, as he approached her.
“Nay, answer me; have you found him? You went to seek him. Dead or
alive, have you found him?”
“We have not, Flora.”
“Then I must seek him myself. None will search for him as I will
search; I must myself seek him. ’Tis true affection that can alone be
successful in such a search.”
“Believe me, dear Flora, that all has been done which the shortness
of the time that has elapsed would permit. Further measures will now
immediately be taken. Rest assured, dear sister, that all will be done
that the utmost zeal can suggest.”
“They have killed him! they have killed him!” she said, mournfully.
“Oh, God, they have killed him! I am not now mad, but the time will
come when I must surely be maddened. The vampyre has killed Charles
Holland—the dreadful vampyre!”
“Nay, now, Flora, this is frenzy.”
“Because he loved me has he been destroyed. I know it, I know it. The
vampyre has doomed me to destruction. I am lost, and all who loved me
will be involved in one common ruin on my account. Leave me all of you
to perish. If, for iniquities done in our family, some one must suffer
to appease the divine vengeance, let that one be me, and only me.”
“Hush, sister, hush!” cried Henry. “I expected not this from you. The
expressions you use are not your expressions. I know you better. There
is abundance of divine mercy, but no divine vengeance. Be calm, I pray
you.”
“Calm! calm!”
“Yes. Make an exertion of that intellect we all know you to possess.
It is too common a thing with human nature, when misfortune overtakes
it, to imagine that such a state of things is specially arranged. We
quarrel with Providence because it does not interfere with some special
miracle in our favour; forgetting that, being denizens of this earth,
and members of a great social system, we must be subject occasionally
to the accidents which will disturb its efficient working.”
“Oh, brother, brother!” she exclaimed, as she dropped into a seat, “you
have never loved.”
“Indeed!”
“No; you have never felt what it was to hold your being upon the breath
of another. You can reason calmly, because you cannot know the extent
of feeling you are vainly endeavouring to combat.”
“Flora, you do me less than justice. All I wish to impress upon your
mind is, that you are not in any way picked out by Providence to
be specially unhappy—that there is no perversion of nature on your
account.”
“Call you that hideous vampyre form that haunts me no perversion of
ordinary nature?”
“What is is natural,” said Marchdale.
“Cold reasoning to one who suffers as I suffer. I cannot argue with
you; I can only know that I am most unhappy—most miserable.”
“But that will pass away, sister, and the sun of your happiness may
smile again.”
“Oh, if I could but hope!”
“And wherefore should you deprive yourself of that poorest privilege of
the most unhappy?”
“Because my heart tells me to despair.”
“Tell it you won’t, then,” cried Admiral Bell. “If you had been at
sea as long as I have, Miss Bannerworth, you would never despair of
anything at all.”
“Providence guarded you,” said Marchdale.
“Yes, that’s true enough, I dare say, I was in a storm once off Cape
Ushant, and it was only through Providence, and cutting away the
mainmast myself, that we succeeded in getting into port.”
“You have one hope,” said Marchdale to Flora, as he looked in her wan
face.
“One hope?”
“Yes. Recollect you have one hope.”
“What is that?”
“You think that, by removing from this place, you may find that peace
which is here denied you.”
“No, no, no.”
“Indeed. I thought that such was your firm conviction.”
“It was; but circumstances have altered.”
“How?”
“Charles Holland has disappeared here, and here must I remain to seek
for him.”
“True he may have disappeared here,” remarked Marchdale; “and yet that
may be no argument for supposing him still here.”
“Where, then, is he?”
“God knows how rejoiced I should be if I were able to answer your
question. I must seek him, dead or alive! I must see him yet before I
bid adieu to this world, which has now lost all its charms for me.”
“Do not despair,” said Henry; “I will go to the town now at once, to
make known our suspicions that he has met with some foul play. I will
set every means in operation that I possibly can to discover him. Mr.
Chillingworth will aid me, too; and I hope that not many days will
elapse, Flora, before some intelligence of a most satisfactory nature
shall be brought to you on Charles Holland’s account.”
“Go, go, brother; go at once.”
“I go now at once.”
“Shall I accompany you?” said Marchdale.
“No. Remain here to keep watch over Flora’s safety while I am gone; I
can alone do all that can be done.”
“And don’t forget to offer the two hundred pounds reward,” said the
admiral, “to any one who can bring us news of Charles, on which we can
rely.”
“I will not.”
“Surely—surely something must result from that,” said Flora, as she
looked in the admiral’s face, as if to gather encouragement in her
dawning hopes from its expression.
“Of course it will, my dear,” he said. “Don’t you be downhearted; you
and I are of one mind in this affair, and of one mind we will keep. We
won’t give up our opinions for anybody.”
“Our opinions,” she said, “of the honour and honesty of Charles
Holland. That is what we will adhere to.”
“Of course we will.”
“Ah, sir, it joys me, even in the midst of this, my affliction, to find
one at least who is determined to do him full justice. We cannot find
such contradictions in nature as that a mind, full of noble impulses,
should stoop to such a sudden act of selfishness as those letters would
attribute to Charles Holland. It cannot—cannot be.”
“You are right, my dear. And now, Master Henry, you be off, will you,
if you please.”
“I am off now. Farewell, Flora, for a brief space.”
“Farewell, brother; and Heaven speed you on your errand.”
“Amen to that,” cried the admiral; “and now, my dear, if you have got
half an hour to spare, just tuck your arm under mine, and take a walk
with me in the garden, for I want to say something to you.”
“Most willingly,” said Flora.
“I would not advise you to stray far from the house, Miss Bannerworth,”
said Marchdale.
“Nobody asked you for advice,” said the admiral. “D——e, do you want to
make out that I ain’t capable of taking care of her?”
“No, no; but——”
“Oh, nonsense! Come along, my dear; and if all the vampyres and odd
fish that were ever created were to come across our path, we would
settle them somehow or another. Come along, and don’t listen to
anybody’s croaking.”
CHAPTER XXIX.
A PEEP THROUGH AN IRON GRATING.—THE LONELY PRISONER IN HIS
DUNGEON.—THE MYSTERY.
Without forestalling the interest of our story, or recording a fact in
its wrong place, we now call our readers’ attention to a circumstance
which may, at all events, afford some food for conjecture.
Some distance from the Hall, which, from time immemorial, had been the
home and the property of the Bannerworth family, was an ancient ruin
known by the name of the Monks’ Hall.
It was conjectured that this ruin was the remains of some one of those
half monastic, half military buildings which, during the middle ages,
were so common in almost every commanding situation in every county of
England.
At a period of history when the church arrogated to itself an amount
of political power which the intelligence of the spirit of the age now
denies to it, and when its members were quite ready to assert at any
time the truth of their doctrines by the strong arm of power, such
buildings as the one, the old grey ruins of which were situated near to
Bannerworth Hall, were erected.
Ostensibly for religious purposes, but really as a stronghold for
defence, as well as for aggression, this Monks’ Hall, as it was
called, partook quite as much of the character of a fortress, as of an
ecclesiastical building.
The ruins covered a considerable extent, of ground, but the only part
which seemed successfully to have resisted the encroaches of time, at
least to a considerable extent, was a long, hall in which the jolly
monks no doubt feasted and caroused.
Adjoining to this hall, were the walls of other parts of the building,
and at several places there were small, low, mysterious-looking doors
that led, heaven knows where, into some intricacies and labyrinths
beneath the building, which no one had, within the memory of man, been
content to run the risk of losing himself in.
It was related that among these subterranean passages and arches there
were pitfalls and pools of water; and whether such a statement was true
or not, it certainly acted as a considerable damper upon the vigour of
curiosity.
This ruin was so well known in the neighbourhood, and had become from
earliest childhood so familiar to the inhabitants of Bannerworth Hall,
that one would as soon expect an old inhabitant of Ludgate-hill to make
some remark about St. Paul’s, as any of them to allude to the ruins of
Monks’ Hall.
They never now thought of going near to it, for in infancy they had
sported among its ruins, and it had become one of those familiar
objects which, almost, from that very familiarity, cease to hold a
place in the memories of those who know it so well.
It is, however, to this ruin we would now conduct our readers,
premising that what we have to say concerning it now, is not precisely
in the form of a connected portion of our narrative.
• • • • •
It is evening—the evening of that first day of heart loneliness to poor
Flora Bannerworth. The lingering rays of the setting sun are gilding
the old ruins with a wondrous beauty. The edges of the decayed stones
seem now to be tipped with gold, and as the rich golden refulgence of
light gleams upon the painted glass which still adorned a large window
of the hall, a flood of many-coloured beautiful light was cast within,
making the old flag-stones, with which the interior was paved, look
more like some rich tapestry, laid down to do honour to a monarch.
So picturesque and so beautiful an aspect did the ancient ruin wear,
that to one with a soul to appreciate the romantic and the beautiful,
it would have amply repaid the fatigue of a long journey now to see it.
And as the sun sank to rest, the gorgeous colours that it cast upon
the mouldering wall, deepened from an appearance of burnished gold to
a crimson hue, and from that again the colour changed to a shifting
purple, mingling with the shadows of the evening, and so gradually
fading away into absolute darkness.
The place is as silent as the tomb—a silence far more solemn than could
have existed, had there been no remains of a human habitation; because
even these time-worn walls were suggestive of what once had been;
and the wrapt stillness which now pervaded them brought with them a
melancholy feeling for the past.
There was not even the low hum of insect life to break the stillness of
these ancient ruins.
And now the last rays of the sun are gradually fading away. In a
short time all will be darkness. A low gentle wind is getting up, and
beginning slightly to stir the tall blades of grass that have shot
up between some of the old stones. The silence is broken, awfully
broken, by a sudden cry of despair; such a cry as might come from some
imprisoned spirit, doomed to waste an age of horror in a tomb.
And yet it was scarcely to be called a scream, and not all a groan. It
might have come from some one on the moment of some dreadful sacrifice,
when the judgment had not sufficient time to call courage to its aid,
but involuntarily had induced that sound which might not be repeated.
A few startled birds flew from odd holes and corners about the ruins,
to seek some other place of rest. The owl hooted from a corner of what
had once been a belfry, and a dreamy-looking bat flew out from a cranny
and struck itself headlong against a projection.
Then all was still again. Silence resumed its reign, and if there had
been a mortal ear to drink in that sudden sound, the mind might well
have doubted if fancy had not more to do with the matter than reality.
From out a portion of the ruins that was enveloped in the deepest
gloom, there now glides a figure. It is of gigantic height, and it
moves along with a slow and measured tread. An ample mantle envelopes
the form, which might well have been taken for the spirit of one of the
monks who, centuries since, had made that place their home.
It walked the whole length of the ample hall we have alluded to, and
then, at the window from which had streamed the long flood of many
coloured light, it paused.
For more than ten minutes this mysterious looking figure there stood.
At length there passed something on the outside of the window, that
looked like the shadow of a human form.
Then the tall, mysterious, apparition-looking man turned, and sought a
side entrance to the hall.
Then he paused, and, in about a minute, he was joined by another who
must have been he who had so recently passed the stained glass window
on the outer side.
There was a friendly salutation between these two beings, and they
walked to the centre of the hall, where they remained for some time in
animated conversation.
From the gestures they used, it was evident that the subject of their
discourse was one of deep and absorbing interest to both. It was one,
too, upon which, after a time, they seemed a little to differ, and more
than once they each assumed attitudes of mutual defiance.
This continued until the sun had so completely sunk, that twilight was
beginning sensibly to wane, and then gradually the two men appeared to
have come to a better understanding, and whatever might be the subject
of their discourse, there was some positive result evidently arrived at
now.
They spoke in lower tones. They used less animated gestures than
before; and, after a time, they both walked slowly down the hall
towards the dark spot from whence the first tall figure had so
mysteriously emerged.
• • • • •
There is a dungeon—damp and full of the most unwholesome
exhalations—deep under ground it seems, and, in its excavations, it
would appear as if some small land springs had been liberated, for the
earthen floor was one continued extent of moisture.
From the roof, too, came perpetually the dripping of water, which fell
with sullen, startling splashes in the pool below.
At one end, and near to the roof,—so near that to reach it, without
the most efficient means from the inside, was a matter of positive
impossibility—is a small iron grating, and not much larger than might
be entirely obscured by any human face that might be close to it from
the outside of the dungeon.
That dreadful abode is tenanted. In one corner, on a heap of straw,
which appears freshly to have been cast into the place, lies a hopeless
prisoner.
It is no great stretch of fancy to suppose, that it is from his lips
came the sound of terror and of woe that had disturbed the repose of
that lonely spot.
The prisoner is lying on his back; a rude bandage round his head, on
which were numerous spots of blood, would seem to indicate that he had
suffered personal injury in some recent struggle. His eyes were open.
They were fixed despairingly, perhaps unconsciously, upon that small
grating which looked into the upper world.
That grating slants upwards, and looks to the west, so that any one
confined in that dreary dungeon might be tantalized, on a sweet
summer’s day, by seeing the sweet blue sky, and occasionally the white
clouds flitting by in that freedom which he cannot hope for.
The carol of a bird, too, might reach him there. Alas! sad remembrance
of life, and joy, and liberty.
But now all is deepening gloom. The prisoner sees nothing—hears
nothing; and the sky is not quite dark. That small grating looks like a
strange light-patch in the dungeon wall.
Hark! some footstep sounds upon his ear. The creaking of a door
follows—a gleam of light shines into the dungeon, and the tall
mysterious-looking figure in the cloak stands before the occupant of
that wretched place.
Then comes in the other man, and he carries in his hand writing
materials. He stoops to the stone couch on which the prisoner lies, and
offers him a pen, as he raises him partially from the miserable damp
pallet.
But there is no speculation in the eyes of that oppressed man. In vain
the pen is repeatedly placed in his grasp, and a document of some
length, written on parchment, spread out before him to sign. In vain is
he held up now by both the men, who have thus mysteriously sought him
in his dungeon; he has not power to do as they would wish him. The pen
falls from his nerveless grasp, and, with a deep sigh, when they cease
to hold him up, he falls heavily back upon the stone couch.
[Illustration: The mysterious visitants to the prisoner in Monk’s Hall.]
Then the two men looked at each other for about a minute silently;
after which he who was the shorter of the two raised one hand, and,
in a voice of such concentrated hatred and passion as was horrible to
hear, he said,—
“D——n!”
The reply of the other was a laugh; and then he took the light from the
floor, and motioned the one who seemed so little able to control his
feelings of bitterness and disappointment to leave the place with him.
With a haste and vehemence, then, which showed how much angered he was,
the shorter man of the two now rolled up the parchment, and placed it
in a breast-pocket of his coat.
He cast a withering look of intense hatred on the form of the
nearly-unconscious prisoner, and then prepared to follow the other.
But when they reached the door of the dungeon, the taller man of the
two paused, and appeared for a moment or two to be in deep thought;
after which he handed the lamp he carried to his companion, and
approached the pallet of the prisoner.
He took from his pocket a small bottle, and, raising the head of the
feeble and wounded man, he poured some portion of the contents into his
mouth, and watched him swallow it.
The other looked on in silence, and then they both slowly left the
dreary dungeon.
• • • • •
The wind rose, and the night had deepened into the utmost darkness. The
blackness of a night, unillumined by the moon, which would not now rise
for some hours, was upon the ancient ruins. All was calm and still, and
no one would have supposed that aught human was within those ancient,
dreary looking walls.
Time will show who it was who lay in that unwholesome dungeon, as
well as who were they who visited him so mysteriously, and retired
again with feelings of such evident disappointment with the document
it seemed of such importance, at least to one of them, to get that
unconscious man to sign.
CHAPTER XXX.
THE VISIT OF FLORA TO THE VAMPYRE.—THE OFFER.—THE SOLEMN ASSEVERATION.
Admiral Bell had, of course, nothing particular to communicate to
Flora in the walk he induced her to take with him in the gardens of
Bannerworth Hall, but he could talk to her upon a subject which was
sure to be a welcome one, namely, of Charles Holland.
And not only could he talk to her of Charles, but he was willing to
talk of him in the style of enthusiastic commendation which assimilated
best with her own feelings. No one but the honest old admiral, who was
as violent in his likes and his dislikes as any one could possibly
be, could just then have conversed with Flora Bannerworth to her
satisfaction of Charles Holland.
He expressed no doubts whatever concerning Charles’s faith, and to
his mind, now that he had got that opinion firmly fixed in his mind,
everybody that held a contrary one he at once denounced as a fool or a
rogue.
“Never you mind, Miss Flora,” he said; “you will find, I dare say, that
all will come right eventually. D—n me! the only thing that provokes me
in the whole business is, that I should have been such an old fool as
for a moment to doubt Charles.”
“You should have known him better, sir.”
“I should, my dear, but I was taken by surprise, you see, and that was
wrong, too, for a man who has held a responsible command.”
“But the circumstances, dear sir, were of a nature to take every one by
surprise.”
“They were, they were. But now, candidly speaking, and I know I can
speak candidly to you; do you really think this Varney is the vampyre?”
“I do.”
“You do? Well, then, somebody must tackle him, that’s quite clear; we
can’t put up with his fancies always.”
“What can be done?”
“Ah, that I don’t know, but something must be done, you know. He wants
this place; Heaven only knows why or wherefore he has taken such a
fancy to it; but he has done so, that is quite clear. If it had a good
sea view, I should not be so much surprised; but there’s nothing of the
sort, so it’s no way at all better than any other shore-going stupid
sort of house, that you can see nothing but land from.”
“Oh, if my brother would but make some compromise with him to restore
Charles to us and take the house, we might yet be happy.”
“D—n it! then you still think that he has a hand in spiriting away
Charles?”
“Who else could do so?”
“I’ll be hanged if I know. I do feel tolerably sure, and I have good
deal of reliance upon your opinion, my dear; I say, I do feel tolerably
sure; but, if I was d—d sure, now, I’d soon have it out of him.”
“For my sake, Admiral Bell, I wish now to extract one promise from you.”
“Say your say, my dear, and I’ll promise you.”
“You will not then expose yourself to the danger of any personal
conflict with that most dreadful man, whose powers of mischief we do
not know, and therefore cannot well meet or appreciate.”
“Whew! is that what you mean?”
“Yes; you will, I am sure, promise me so much.”
“Why, my dear, you see the case is this. In affairs of fighting, the
less ladies interfere the better.”
“Nay, why so?”
“Because—because, you see, a lady has no reputation for courage to keep
up. Indeed, it’s rather the other way, for we dislike a bold woman as
much as we hold in contempt a cowardly man.”
“But if you grant to us females that in consequence of our affections,
we are not courageous, you must likewise grant how much we are doomed
to suffer from the dangers of those whom we esteem.”
“You would be the last person in the world to esteem a coward.”
“Certainly. But there is more true courage often in not fighting than
in entering into a contest.”
“You are right enough there, my dear.”
“Under ordinary circumstances, I should not oppose your carrying out
the dictates of your honour, but now, let me entreat you not to meet
this dreadful man, if man he can be called, when you know not how
unfair the contest may be.”
“Unfair?”
“Yes. May he not have some means of preventing you from injuring him,
and of overcoming you, which no mortal possesses?”
“He may.”
“Then the supposition of such a case ought to be sufficient ground for
at once inducing you to abandon all idea of meeting with him.”
“My dear, I’ll consider of this matter.”
“Do so.”
“There is another thing, however, which now you will permit me to ask
of you as a favour.”
“It is granted ere it is spoken.”
“Very good. Now you must not be offended with what I am going to say,
because, however it may touch that very proper pride which you, and
such as you, are always sure to possess, you are fortunately at all
times able to call sufficient judgment to your aid to enable you to see
what is really offensive and what is not.”
“You alarm me by such a preface.”
“Do I? then here goes at once. Your brother Henry, poor fellow, has
enough to do, has he not, to make all ends meet.”
A flush of excitement came over Flora’s cheek as the old admiral thus
bluntly broached a subject of which she already knew the bitterness to
such a spirit as her brother’s.
“You are silent,” continued the old man; “by that I guess I am not
wrong in my I supposition; indeed it is hardly a supposition at all,
for Master Charles told me as much, and no doubt he had it from a
correct quarter.”
“I cannot deny it, sir.”
“Then don’t. It ain’t worth denying, my dear. Poverty is no crime, but,
like being born a Frenchman, it’s a d——d misfortune.”
Flora could scarcely refuse a smile, as the nationality of the old
admiral peeped out even in the midst of his most liberal and best
feelings.
“Well,” he continued, “I don’t intend that he shall have so much
trouble as he has had. The enemies of his king and his country shall
free him from his embarrassments.”
“The enemies?”
“Yes; who else?”
“You speak in riddles, sir.”
“Do I? Then I’ll soon make the riddles plain. When I went to sea I was
worth nothing—as poor as a ship’s cat after the crew had been paid off
for a month. Well, I began fighting away as hard and fast as I could,
and the more I fought, and the more hard knocks I gave and took, the
more money I got.”
“Indeed.”
“Yes; prize after prize we hauled into port, and at last the French
vessels wouldn’t come out of their harbours.”
“What did you do then?”
“What did we do then? Why what was the most natural thing in the whole
world for us to do, we did.”
“I cannot guess.”
“Well, I am surprised at that. Try again.”
“Oh, yes; I can guess now. How could I have been so dull? You went and
took them out.”
“To be sure we did—to be sure we did, my dear; that’s how we managed
them. And, do you see, at the end of the war I found myself with lots
of prize money, all wrung from old England’s enemies, and I intend that
some of it shall find it’s way to your brother’s pocket; and you see
that will bear out just what I said, that the enemies of his king and
his country shall free him from his difficulties—don’t you see?”
“I see your noble generosity, admiral.”
“Noble fiddlestick! Now I have mentioned this matter to you, my dear,
and I don’t so much mind talking to you about such matters as I should
to your brother, I want you to do me the favour of managing it all for
me.”
“How, sir?”
“Why, just this way. You must find out how much money will free your
brother just now from a parcel of botherations that beset him, and
then I will give it to you, and you can hand it to him, you see, so I
need not say anything about it; and if he speaks to me on the subject
at all, I can put him down at once by saying, ‘avast there, it’s no
business of mine.’”
“And can you, dear admiral, imagine that I could conceal the generous
source from where so much assistance came?”
“Of course; it will come from you. I take a fancy to make you a present
of a sum of money; you do with it what you please—it’s yours, and I
have no right and no inclination to ask you what use you put it to.”
Tears gushed from the eyes of Flora as she tried to utter some word,
but could not. The admiral swore rather fearfully, and pretended to
wonder much what on earth she could be crying for. At length, after the
first gush of feeling was over, she said,—
“I cannot accept of so much generosity, sir—I dare not.”
“Dare not!”
“No; I should think meanly of myself were I to take advantage of the
boundless munificence of your nature.”
“Take advantage! I should like to see anybody take advantage of me,
that’s all.”
“I ought not to take the money of you. I will speak to my brother, and
well I know how much he will appreciate the noble, generous offer, my
dear sir.”
“Well, settle it your own way, only remember I have a right to do what
I like with my own money.”
“Undoubtedly.”
“Very good. Then as that is undoubted, whatever I lend to him, mind I
give to you, so it’s as broad as it’s long, as the Dutchman said, when
he looked at the new ship that was built for him, and you may as well
take it yourself you see, and make no more fuss about it.”
“I will consider,” said Flora, with much emotion—“between this time and
the same hour to-morrow I will consider, sir, and if you can find any
words more expressive of heartfelt gratitude than others, pray imagine
that I have used them with reference to my own feelings towards you for
such an unexampled offer of friendship.”
“Oh, bother—stuff.”
The admiral now at once changed the subject, and began to talk of
Charles—a most grateful theme to Flora, as may well be supposed. He
related to her many little particulars connected with him which all
tended to place his character in a most amiable light, and as her ears
drank in the words of commendation of him she loved, what sweeter
music could there be to her than the voice of that old weather-beaten
rough-spoken man.
“The idea,” he added, to a warm eulogium he had uttered concerning
Charles—“the idea that he could write those letters my dear, is quite
absurd.”
“It is, indeed. Oh, that we could know what had become of him!”
“We shall know. I don’t think but what he’s alive. Something seems to
assure me that we shall some of these days look upon his face again.”
“I am rejoiced to hear you say so.”
“We will stir heaven and earth to find him. If he were killed, do you
see, there would have been some traces of him now at hand; besides, he
would have been left lying where the rascals attacked him.”
Flora shuddered.
“But don’t you fret yourself. You may depend that the sweet little
cherub that sits up aloft has looked after him.”
“I will hope so.”
“And now, my dear, Master Henry will soon be home, I am thinking, and
as he has quite enough disagreeables on his own mind to be able to
spare a few of them, you will take the earliest opportunity, I am sure,
of acquainting him with the little matter we have been talking about,
and let me know what he says.”
“I will—I will.”
“That’s right. Now, go in doors, for there’s a cold air blowing here,
and you are a delicate plant rather just now—go in and make yourself
comfortable and easy. The worst storm must blow over at last.”
CHAPTER XXXI.
SIR FRANCIS VARNEY AND HIS MYSTERIOUS VISITOR.—THE STRANGE CONFERENCE.
Sir Francis Varney is in what he calls his own apartment. It is night,
and a dim and uncertain light from a candle which has been long
neglected, only serves to render obscurity more perplexing. The room
is a costly one. One replete with all the appliances of refinement and
luxury which the spirit and the genius of the age could possibly supply
him with, but there is upon his brow the marks of corroding care, and
little does that most mysterious being seem to care for all the rich
furnishing of that apartment in which he sits.
His cadaverous-looking face is even paler and more death-like-looking
than usual; and, if it can be conceived possible that such an one can
feel largely interested in human affairs, to look at him, we could well
suppose that some interest of no common magnitude was at stake.
Occasionally, too, he muttered some unconnected words, no doubt
mentally filling up the gaps which rendered the sentences incomplete;
and being unconscious, perhaps, that he was giving audible utterance to
any of his dark and secret meditations.
At length he rose, and with an anxious expression of countenance, he
went to the window, and looked out into the darkness of the night. All
was still, and not an object was visible. It was that pitchy darkness
without, which, for some hours, when the moon is late in lending her
reflected beams, comes over the earth’s surface.
“It is near the hour,” he muttered. “It is now very near the hour;
surely he will come, and yet I know not why I should fear him, although
I seem to tremble at the thought of his approach. He will surely come.
Once a year—only once does he visit me, and then ’tis but to take the
price which he has compelled me to pay for that existence, which but
for him had been long since terminated. Sometimes I devoutly wish it
were.”
With a shudder he returned to the seat he had so recently left, and
there for some time he appeared to meditate in silence.
Suddenly now, a clock, which was in the hall of that mansion he had
purchased, sounded the hour loudly.
“The time has come,” said Sir Francis. “The time has come. He will
surely soon be here. Hark! hark!”
Slowly and distinctly he counted the strokes of the clock, and, when
they had ceased, he exclaimed, with sudden surprise—
“Eleven! But eleven! How have I been deceived. I thought the hour of
midnight was at hand.”
He hastily consulted the watch he wore, and then he indeed found, that
whatever he had been looking forward to with dread for some time past,
as certain to ensue, at or about twelve o’ clock, had yet another hour
in which to prey upon his imagination.
“How could I have made so grievous an error?” he exclaimed. “Another
hour of suspense and wonder as to whether that man be among the living
or the dead. I have thought of raising my hand against his life, but
some strange mysterious feeling has always staid me; and I have let
him come and go freely, while an opportunity might well have served me
to put such a design into execution. He is old, too—very old, and yet
he keeps death at a distance. He looked pale, but far from unwell or
failing, when last I saw him. Alas! a whole hour yet to wait. I would
that this interview were over.”
That extremely well known and popular disease called the fidgets, now
began, indeed, to torment Sir Francis Varney. He could not sit—he could
not walk, and, somehow or another, he never once seemed to imagine that
from the wine cup he should experience any relief, although, upon a
side table, there stood refreshments of that character. And thus some
more time passed away, and he strove to cheat it of its weariness by
thinking of a variety of subjects; but as the fates would have it,
there seemed not one agreeable reminiscence in the mind of that most
inexplicable man, and the more he plunged into the recesses of memory
the more uneasy, not to say almost terrified, he looked and became.
A shuddering nervousness came across him, and, for a few moments, he
sat as if he were upon the point of fainting. By a vigorous effort,
however, he shook this off, and then placing before him the watch,
which now indicated about the quarter past eleven, he strove with a
calmer aspect to wait the coming of him whose presence, when he did
come, would really be a great terror, since the very thought beforehand
produced so much hesitation and apparent dismay.
In order too, if possible, then to further withdraw himself from a too
painful consideration of those terrors, which in due time the reader
will be acquainted with the cause of, he took up a book, and plunging
at random into its contents, he amused his mind for a time with the
following brief narrative:—
The wind howled round the gable ends of Bridport House in sudden and
furious gusts, while the inmates sat by the fire-side, gazing in
silence upon the blazing embers of the huge fire that shed a red and
bright light all over the immense apartment in which they all sat.
It was an ancient looking place, very large, end capable of containing
a number of guests. Several were present.
An aged couple were seated in tall high straight-backed chairs. They
were the owners of that lordly mansion, and near them sat two young
maidens of surpassing beauty; they were dissimilar, and yet there was a
slight likeness, but of totally different complexions.
The one had tresses of raven black; eyebrows, eyelashes, and eyes were
all of the same hue; she was a beautiful and proud-looking girl, her
complexion clear, with the hue of health upon her cheeks, while a smile
played around her lips. The glance of the eye was sufficient to thrill
through the whole soul.
The other maiden was altogether different; her complexion altogether
fairer—her hair of sunny chestnut, and her beautiful hazel eyes were
shaded by long brown eyelashes, while a playful smile also lit up her
countenance. She was the younger of the two.
The attention of the two young maidens had been directed to the words
of the aged owner of the house, for he had been speaking a few moments
before.
There were several other persons present, and at some little distance
were many of the domestics who were not denied the privilege of warmth
and rest in the presence of their master.
These were not the times, when, if servants sat down, they were deemed
idle; but the daily task done, then the evening hour was spent by the
fire-side.
“The wind howls and moans,” said an aged domestic, “in an awful manner.
I never heard the like.”
“It seems as though some imprisoned spirit was waiting for the repose
that had been denied on earth,” said the old lady, as she shifted her
seat and gazed steadily on the fire.
“Ay,” said her aged companion, “it is a windy night, and there will be
a storm before long, or I’m mistaken.”
“It was just such a night as that my son Henry left his home,” said
Mrs. Bradley, “just such another—only it had the addition of sleet and
rain.”
The old man sighed at the mention of his son’s name, a tear stood in
the eyes of the maidens, while one looked silently at the other, and
seemed to exchange glances.
“I would that I might again see him before my body seeks its final home
in the cold remorseless grave.”
“Mother,” said the fairest of the two maidens, “do not talk thus, let
us hope that we yet may have many years of happiness together.”
“Many, Emma?”
“Yes, mamma, many.”
“Do you know that I am very old, Emma, very old indeed, considering
what I have suffered, such a life of sorrow and ill health is at least
equal to thirty years added to my life.”
“You may have deceived yourself, aunt,” said the other maiden; “at all
events, you cannot count upon life as certain, for the strongest often
go first, while those who seem much more likely to fall, by care, as
often live in peace and happiness.”
“But I lead no life of peace and happiness, while Henry Bradley is not
here; besides, my life might be passed without me seeing him again.”
“It is now two years since he was here last,” said the old man.
“This night two years was the night on which he left.”
“This night two years?”
“Yes.”
“It was this night two years,” said one of the servant men, “because
old Dame Poutlet had twins on that night.”
“A memorable circumstance.”
“And one died at a twelvemonth old,” said the man; “and she had a dream
which foretold the event.”
“Ay, ay.”
“Yes, and moreover she’s had the same dream again last Wednesday was a
week,” said the man.
“And lost the other twin?”
“Yes sir, this morning.”
“Omens multiply,” said the aged man; “I would that it would seem to
indicate the return of Henry to his home.”
“I wonder where he can have gone to, or what he could have done all
this time; probably he may not be in the land of the living.”
“Poor Henry,” said Emma.
“Alas, poor boy! We may never see him again—it was a mistaken act of
his, and yet he knew not otherwise how to act or escape his father’s
displeasure.”
“Say no more—say no more upon that subject; I dare not listen to it.
God knows I know quite enough,” said Mr. Bradley; “I knew not he would
have taken my words so to heart as he did.”
“Why,” said the old woman, “he thought you meant what you said.”
There was a long pause, during which all gazed at the blazing fire,
seemingly wrapt in their own meditation.
Henry Bradley, the son of the apparently aged couple, had left that
day two years, and wherefore had he left the home of his childhood?
wherefore had he, the heir to large estates, done this?
He had dared to love without his father’s leave, and had refused the
offer his father made him of marrying a young lady whom he had chosen
for him, but whom he could not love.
It was as much a matter of surprise to the father that the son should
refuse, as it was to the son that his father should contemplate such a
match.
“Henry,” said the father, “you have been thought of by me, I have made
proposals for marrying you to the daughter of our neighbour, Sir Arthur
Onslow.”
“Indeed, father!”
“Yes; I wish you to go there with me to see the young lady.”
“In the character of a suitor?”
“Yes,” replied the father, “certainly; it’s high time you were settled.”
“Indeed, I would rather not go, father; I have no intention of marrying
just yet. I do not desire to do so.”
This was an opposition that Mr. Bradley had not expected from his son,
and which his imperious temper could ill brook, and with a darkened
brow he said,—
“It is not much, Henry, that I trespass upon your obedience; but when I
do so, I expect that you will obey me.”
“But, father, this matter affects me for my whole life.”
“That is why I have deliberated so long and carefully over it.”
“But it is not unreasonable that I should have a voice in the affair,
father, since it may render me miserable.”
“You shall have a voice.”
“Then I say no to the whole regulation,” said Henry, decisively.
“If you do so you forfeit my protection, much more favour; but you had
better consider over what you have said. Forget it, and come with me.”
“I cannot.”
“You will not?”
“No, father; I cannot do as you wish me; my mind is fully made up upon
that matter.”
“And so is mine. You either do as I would have you, or you leave the
house, and seek your own living, and you are a beggar.”
“I should prefer being such,” said Henry, “than to marry any young
lady, and be unable to love her.”
“That is not required.”
“No! I am astonished! Not necessary to love the woman you marry!”
“Not at all; if you act justly towards her she ought to be grateful;
and it is all that is requisite in the marriage state. Gratitude will
beget love, and love in one begets love in the other.”
“I will not argue with you, father, upon the matter. You are a better
judge than I; you have had more experience.”
“I have.”
“And it would be useless to speak upon the subject; but of this I can
speak—my own resolve—that I will not marry the lady in question.”
The son had all the stern resolve of the father, but he had also very
good reasons for what he did. He loved, and was beloved in return; and
hence he would not break his faith with her whom he loved.
To have explained this to his father would have been to gain nothing
except an accession of anger, and he would have made a new demand upon
his (the son’s) obedience, by ordering him to discard from his bosom
the image that was there indelibly engraven.
“You will not marry her whom I have chosen for your bride?”
“I cannot.”
“Do not talk to me of can and can’t, when I speak of will and wont. It
Is useless to disguise the fact. You have your free will in the matter.
I shall take no answer but yes or no.”
“Then, no, father.”
“Good, sir; and now we are strangers.”
With that Mr. Bradley turned abruptly from his son, and left him to
himself.
It was the first time they had any words of difference together, and it
was sudden and soon terminated.
Henry Bradley was indignant at what had happened; he did not think his
father would have acted as he had done in this instance; but he was too
much interested in the fate of another to hesitate for a moment. Then
came the consideration as to what he should do, now that he had arrived
at such a climax.
His first thoughts turned to his mother and sister. He could not leave
the house without bidding them good-bye. He determined to see his
mother, for his father had left the Hall upon a visit.
Mrs. Bradley and Emma were alone when he entered their apartment, and
to them he related all that had passed between himself and father.
They besought him to stay, to remain there, or at least in the
neighbourhood; but he was resolved to quit the place altogether for a
time, as he could do nothing there, and he might chance to do something
elsewhere.
Upon this, they got together all the money and such jewels as they
could spare, which in all amounted to a considerable sum; then taking
an affectionate leave of his mother and sister, Henry left the Hall—not
before he had taken a long and affectionate farewell of one other who
lived within those walls.
This was no other than the raven-eyed maiden who sat by the fire side,
and listened attentively to the conversation that was going on. She
was his love—she, a poor cousin. For her sake he had braved all his
father’s anger, and attempted to seek his fortune abroad.
This done, he quietly left the Hall, without giving any one any
intimation of where he was going.
Old Mr. Bradley, when he had said so much to his son, was highly
incensed at what he deemed his obstinacy; and he thought the threat
hanging over him would have had a good effect; but he was amazed when
he discovered that Henry had indeed left the Hall, and he knew not
whither.
For some time he comforted himself with the assurance that he would,
he must return; but, alas! he came not, and this was the second
anniversary of that melancholy day, which no one more repented of and
grieved for, than did poor Mr. Bradley.
“Surely, surely he will return, or let us know where he is,” he said;
“he cannot be in need, else he would have written to us for aid.”
“No, no,” said Mrs. Bradley; “it is, I fear, because he has not
written, that he is in want; he would never write if he was in poverty,
lest he should cause us unhappiness at his fate. Were he doing well,
we should hear of it, for he would be proud of the result of his own
unaided exertions.”
“Well, well,” said Mr. Bradley, “I can say no more; if I was hasty, so
was he; but it is passed. I would forgive all the past, if I could but
see him once again—once again!”
“How the wind howls,” added the aged man; “and it’s getting worse and
worse.”
“Yes, and the snow is coming down now in style,” said one of the
servants, who brought in some fresh logs which were piled up on the
fire, and he shook the white flakes off his clothes.
“It will be a heavy fall before morning,” said one of the men.
“Yes, it has been gathering for some days; it will be much warmer than
it has been when it is all down.”
“So it will—so it will.”
At that moment there was a knocking at the gate, and the dogs burst
into a dreadful uproar from their kennels.
“Go, Robert,” said Mr. Bradley, “and see who it is that knocks such a
night as this; it is not fit or safe that a dog should be out in it.”
The man went out, and shortly returned, saying,—
“So please you, sir, there is a traveller that has missed his way, and
desires to know if he can obtain shelter here, or if any one can be
found to guide him to the nearest inn.”
“Bid him come in; we shall lose no warmth because there is one more
before the fire.”
The stranger entered, and said,—
“I have missed my way, and the snow comes down so thick and fast, and
is whirled in such eddies, that I fear, by myself, I should fall into
some drift, and perish before morning.”
“Do not speak of it, sir,” said Mr. Bradley; “such a night as this is a
sufficient apology for the request you make, and an inducement to me
to grant it most willingly.”
“Thanks,” replied the stranger; “the welcome is most seasonable.”
“Be seated, sir; take your seat by the ingle; it is warm.”
The stranger seated himself, and seemed lost in reflection, as he gazed
intently on the blazing logs. He was a robust man, with great whiskers
and beard, and, to judge from his outward habiliments, he was a stout
man.
“Have you travelled far?”
“I have, sir.”
“You appear to belong to the army, if I mistake not?”
“I do, sir.”
There was a pause; the stranger seemed not inclined to speak of himself
much; but Mr. Bradley continued,—
“Have you come from foreign service, sir? I presume you have.”
“Yes; I have not been in this country more than six days.”
“Indeed; shall we have peace think you?”
“I do so, and I hope it may be so, for the sake of many who desire to
return to their native land, and to those they love best.”
Mr. Bradley heaved a deep sigh, which was echoed softly by all present,
and the stranger looked from one to another, with a hasty glance, and
then turned his gaze upon the fire.
“May I ask, sir, if you have any person whom you regard in the army—any
relative?”
“Alas! I have—perhaps, I ought to say I had a son. I know not, however,
where he is gone.”
“Oh! a runaway; I see.”
“Oh, no; he left because there were some family differences, and now, I
would, that he were once more here.”
“Oh!” said the stranger, softly, “differences and mistakes will happen
now and then, when least desired.”
At this moment, an old hound who had lain beside Ellen Mowbray, she who
wore the coal-black tresses, lifted his head at the difference in sound
that was noticed in the stranger’s voice. He got up and slowly walked
up to him, and began to smell around him, and, in another moment, he
rushed at him with a cry of joy, and began to lick and caress him in
the most extravagant manner. This was followed by a cry of joy in all
present.
“It is Henry!” exclaimed Ellen Mowbray, rising and rushing into his
arms.
It was Henry, and he threw off the several coats he had on, as well as
the large beard he wore to disguise himself.
The meeting was a happy one; there was not a more joyful house than
that within many miles around. Henry was restored to the arms of those
who loved him, and, in a month, a wedding was celebrated between him
and his cousin Ellen.
• • • • •
Sir Francis Varney glanced at his watch. It indicated but five minutes
to twelve o’clock, and he sprang to his feet. Even as he did so, a loud
knocking at the principal entrance to his house awakened every echo
within its walls.
CHAPTER XXXII.
THE THOUSAND POUNDS.—THE STRANGER’S PRECAUTIONS.
Varney moved not now, nor did he speak, but, like a statue, he stood,
with his unearthly looking eyes rivetted upon the door of the apartment.
In a few moments one of his servants came, and said—
“Sir, a person is here, who says he wants to see you. He desired me to
say, that he had ridden far, and that moments were precious when the
tide of life was ebbing fast.”
“Yes! yes!” gasped Varney; “admit him, I know him! Bring him here? It
is—an—old friend—of mine.”
He sank into a chair, and still he kept his eyes fixed upon that door
through which his visitor must come. Surely some secret of dreadful
moment must be connected with him whom Sir Francis expected—dreaded—and
yet dared not refuse to see. And now a footstep approaches—a slow and
a solemn footstep—it pauses a moment at the door of the apartment, and
then the servant flings it open, and a tall man enters. He is enveloped
in the folds of a horseman’s cloak, and there is the clank of spurs
upon his heels as he walks into the room.
[Illustration: The visit of the unknown to Sir Francis Varney.]
Varney rose again, but he said not a word; and for a few moments they
stood opposite each other in silence. The domestic has left the room,
and the door is closed, so that there was nothing to prevent them
from conversing; and, yet, silent they continued for some minutes. It
seemed as if each was most anxious that the other should commence the
conversation first.
And yet there was nothing so very remarkable in the appearance of that
stranger, which should entirely justify Sir Francis Varney, in feeling
so much alarm at his presence. He certainly was a man past the prime
of life; and he looked like one who had battled much with misfortune,
and as if time had not passed so lightly over his brow, but that it had
left deep traces of its progress.
The only thing positively bad about his countenance, was to be found in
his eyes. There there was a most ungracious and sinister expression, a
kind of lurking and suspicious look, as if he were always resolving in
his mind some deep laid scheme, which might be sufficient to circumvent
the whole of mankind.
Finding, probably, that Varney would not speak first, he let his cloak
fall more loosely about him, and in a low, deep tone, he said,
“I presume I was expected?”
“You were,” said Varney. “It is the day, and it is the hour.”
“You are right. I like to see you so mindful. You don’t improve in
looks since——”
“Hush—hush! no more of that; can we not meet without a dreadful
allusion to the past? There needs nothing to remind me of it; and your
presence here now shows that you are not forgetful. Speak not of that
fearful episode. Let no words combine to place it in a tangible shape
to human understanding. I cannot, dare not, hear you speak of that.”
“It is well,” said the stranger; “as you please. Let our interview be
brief. You know my errand?”
“I do. So fearful a drag upon limited means, is not likely to be
readily forgotten.”
“Oh, you are too ingenious—too full of well laid schemes, and too
apt and ready in their execution, to feel, as any fearful drag, the
conditions of our bargain. Why do you look at me so earnestly?”
“Because,” said Varney—and he trembled as he spoke—“because each
lineament of your countenance brings me back to the recollection of the
only scene in life that made me shudder, and which I cannot think of,
even with the indifference of contempt. I see it all before my mind’s
eye, coming in frightful panoramic array, those incidents, which even
to dream of, are sufficient to drive the soul to madness; the dread of
this annual visit, hangs upon me like a dark cloud upon my very heart;
it sits like some foul incubus, destroying its vitality, and dragging
me, from day to day, nearer to that tomb, from whence not as before, I
can emerge.”
“You have been among the dead?” said the stranger.
“I have.”
“And yet are mortal.”
“Yes,” repeated Varney, “yes, and yet am mortal.”
“It was I that plucked you back to that world, which, to judge from
your appearance, has had since that eventful period but few charms for
you. By my faith you look like——”
“Like what I am,” interrupted Varney. “This is a subject that once a
year gets frightfully renewed between us. For weeks before your visit I
am haunted by frightful recollections, and it takes me many weeks after
you are gone, before I can restore myself to serenity. Look at me; am I
not an altered man?”
“In faith you are,” said the stranger “I have no wish to press upon you
painful recollections. And yet ’tis strange to me that upon such a man
as you, the event to which you allude should produce so terrible an
impression.”
“I have passed through the agony of death,” said Varney, “and have
again endured the torture—for it is such—of the re-union of the body
and the soul; not having endured so much, not the faintest echo of such
feelings can enter into your imagination.”
“There may be truth in that, and yet, like a fluttering moth round a
flame, it seems to me, that when I do see you, you take a terrific kind
of satisfaction in talking of the past.”
“That is strictly true,” said Varney; “the images with which my mind is
filled are frightful. Pent up do they remain for twelve long months.
I can speak to you, and you only, without disguise, and thus does it
seem to me that I get rid of the uneasy load of horrible imaginings.
When you are gone, and have been gone a sufficient lapse of time, my
slumbers are not haunted with frightful images—I regain a comparative
peace, until the time slowly comes around again, when we are doomed to
meet.”
“I understand you. You seem well lodged here?”
“I have ever kept my word, and sent to you, telling you where I am.”
“You have, truly. I have no shadow of complaint to make against you.
No one could have more faithfully performed his bond than you have.
I give you ample credit for all that, and long may you live still to
perform your conditions.”
“I dare not deceive you, although to keep such faith I may be compelled
to deceive a hundred others.”
“Of that I cannot judge. Fortune seems to smile upon you; you have not
as yet disappointed me.”
“And will not now,” said Varney. “The gigantic and frightful penalty of
disappointing you, stares me in the face. I dare not do so.”
He took from his pocket, as he spoke, a clasped book, from which he
produced several bank notes, which he placed before the stranger.
“A thousand pounds,” he said; “that is the agreement.”
“It is to the very letter. I do not return to you a thousand thanks—we
understand each other better than to waste time with idle compliment.
Indeed I will go quite as far as to say, truthfully, that did not my
necessities require this amount from you, you should have the boon, for
which you pay that price at a much cheaper rate.”
“Enough! enough!” said Varney. “It is strange, that your face should
have been the last I saw, when the world closed upon me, and the first
that met my eyes when I was again snatched back to life! Do you pursue
still your dreadful trade?”
“Yes,” said the stranger, “for another year, and then, with such a
moderate competence as fortune has assigned me, I retire, to make way
for younger and abler spirits.”
“And then,” said Varney, “shall you still require of me such an amount
as this?”
“No; this is my last visit but one. I shall be just and liberal towards
you. You are not old; and I have no wish to become the clog of your
existence. As I have before told you, it is my necessity, and not my
inclination, that sets the value upon the service I rendered you.”
“I understand you, and ought to thank you. And in reply to so much
courtesy, be assured, that when I shudder at your presence, it is not
that I regard you with horror, as an individual, but it is because the
sight of you awakens mournfully the remembrance of the past.”
“It is clear to me,” said the stranger; “and now I think we part with
each other in a better spirit than we ever did before; and when we meet
again, the remembrance that it is the last time, will clear away the
gloom that I now find hanging over you.”
“It may! it may! With what an earnest gaze you still regard me!”
“I do. It does appear to me most strange, that time should not have
obliterated the effects which I thought would have ceased with their
cause. You are no more the man that in my recollection you once were,
than I am like a sporting child.”
“And I never shall be,” said Varney; “never—never again! This self-same
look which the hand of death had placed upon me, I shall ever wear.
I shudder at myself, and as I oft perceive the eye of idle curiosity
fixed steadfastly upon me, I wonder in my inmost heart, if even the
wildest guesser hits upon the cause why I am not like unto other men?”
“No. Of that you may depend there is no suspicion; but I will leave you
now; we part such friends, as men situated as we are can be. Once again
shall we meet, and then farewell for ever.”
“Do you leave England, then?”
“I do. You know my situation in life. It is not one which offers me
inducements to remain. In some other land, I shall win the respect and
attention I may not hope for here. There my wealth will win many golden
opinions; and casting, as best I may, the veil of forgetfulness over my
former life, my declining years may yet be happy. This money, that I
have had of you from time to time, has been more pleasantly earned than
all beside. Wrung, as it has been, from your fears, still have I taken
it with less reproach. And now, farewell!”
Varney rang for a servant to show the stranger from the house, and
without another word they parted.
Then, when he was alone, that mysterious owner of that costly home drew
a long breath of apparently exquisite relief.
“That is over!—that is over!” he said. “He shall have the other
thousand pounds, perchance, sooner than he thinks. With all expedition
I will send it to him. And then on that subject I shall be at peace.
I shall have paid a large sum; but that which I purchased was to me
priceless. It was my life!—it was my life itself! That possession
which the world’s wealth cannot restore! And shall I grudge these
thousands, which have found their way into this man’s hands? No! ’Tis
true, that existence, for me, has lost some of its most resplendent
charms. ’Tis true, that I have no earthly affections, and that shunning
companionship with all, I am alike shunned by all; and yet, while the
life-blood still will circulate within my shrunken veins, I cling to
vitality.”
He passed into an inner room, and taking from a hook, on which it hung,
a long, dark-coloured cloak, he enveloped his tall, unearthly figure
within its folds. Then, with his hat in his hand, he passed out of his
house, and appeared to be taking his way towards Bannerworth House.
Surely it must be guilt of no common die that could oppress a man so
destitute of human sympathies as Sir Francis Varney. The dreadful
suspicions that hovered round him with respect to what he was, appeared
to gather confirmation from every act of his existence.
Whether or not this man, to whom he felt bound to pay annually so
large a sum, was in the secret, and knew him to be something more than
earthly, we cannot at present declare; but it would seem from the tenor
of their conversation as if such were the fact.
Perchance he had saved him from the corruption of the tomb, by placing
out, on some sylvan spot, where the cold moonbeams fell, the apparently
lifeless form, and now claimed so large a reward for such a service,
and the necessary secrecy contingent upon it.
We say this may be so, and yet again some more natural and rational
explanation may unexpectedly present itself; and there may be yet a
dark page in Sir Francis Varney’s life’s volume, which will place him
in a light of superadded terrors to our readers.
Time, and the now rapidly accumulating incidents of our tale, will soon
tear aside the veil of mystery that now envelopes some of our _dramatis
personæ_.
And let us hope that in the development of those incidents we shall be
enabled to rescue the beautiful Flora Bannerworth from the despairing
gloom that is around her. Let us hope and even anticipate that we
shall see her smile again; that the roseate hue of health will again
revisit her cheeks, the light buoyancy of her step return, and that as
before she may be the joy of all around her, dispensing and receiving
happiness.
And, he too, that gallant fearless lover, he whom no chance of time
or tide could sever from the object of his fond affections, he who
listened to nothing but the dictates of his heart’s best feelings,
let us indulge a hope that he will have a bright reward, and that the
sunshine of a permanent felicity will only seem the brighter for the
shadows that for a time have obscured its glory.
CHAPTER XXXIII.
THE STRANGE INTERVIEW.—THE CHASE THROUGH THE HALL.
It was with the most melancholy aspect that anything human could well
bear, that Sir Francis Varney took his lonely walk, although perhaps
in saying so much, probably we are instituting a comparison which
circumstances scarcely empower us to do; for who shall say that that
singular man, around whom a very atmosphere of mystery seemed to be
perpetually increasing, was human?
Averse as we are to believe in the supernatural, or even to invest
humanity with any preternatural powers, the more than singular facts
and circumstances surrounding the existence and the acts of that man
bring to the mind a kind of shuddering conviction, that if he be
indeed really mortal he still must possess some powers beyond ordinary
mortality, and be walking the earth for some unhallowed purposes,
such as ordinary men with the ordinary attributes of human nature can
scarcely guess at.
Silently and alone he took his way through that beautiful tract of
country, comprehending such picturesque charms of hill and dale which
lay between his home and Bannerworth Hall. He was evidently intent upon
reaching the latter place by the shortest possible route, and in the
darkness of that night, for the moon had not yet risen, he showed no
slight acquaintance with the intricacies of that locality, that he was
at all enabled to pursue so undeviatingly a tract as that which he took.
He muttered frequently to himself low, indistinct words as he went,
and chiefly did they seem to have reference to that strange interview
he had so recently had with one who, from some combination of
circumstances scarcely to be guessed at, evidently exercised a powerful
control over him, and was enabled to make a demand upon his pecuniary
resources of rather startling magnitude.
And yet, from a stray word or two, which were pronounced more
distinctly, he did not seem to be thinking in anger over that
interview; but it would appear that it rather had recalled to his
remembrance circumstances of a painful and a degrading nature, which
time had not been able entirely to obliterate from his recollection.
“Yes, yes,” he said, as he paused upon the margin of the wood, to the
confines of which he, or what seemed to be he, had once been chased
by Marchdale and the Bannerworths—“yes, the very sight of that man
recalls all the frightful pageantry of a horrible tragedy, which I can
never—never forget. Never can it escape my memory, as a horrible, a
terrific fact; but it is the sight of this man alone that can recall
all its fearful minutiæ to my mind, and paint to my imagination, in the
most vivid colours, every, the least particular connected with that
time of agony. These periodical visits much affect me. For months I
dread them, and for months I am but slowly recovering from the shocks
they give me. ‘But once more,’ he says—‘but once more,’ and then we
shall not meet again. Well, well; perchance before that time arrives, I
may be able to possess myself of those resources which will enable me
to forestall his visit, and so at least free myself from the pang of
expecting him.”
He paused at the margin of the wood, and glanced in the direction of
Bannerworth Hall. By the dim light which yet showed from out the light
sky, he could discern the ancient gable ends, and turret-like windows;
he could see the well laid out gardens, and the grove of stately firs
that shaded it from the northern blasts, and, as he gazed, a strong
emotion seemed to come over him, such as no one could have supposed
would for one moment have possessed the frame of one so apparently
unconnected with all human sympathies.
“I know this spot well,” he said, “and my appearance here on that
eventful occasion, when the dread of my approach induced a crime only
second to murder itself, was on such a night as this, when all was so
still and calm around, and when he who, at the merest shadow of my
presence, rather chose to rush on death than be assured it was myself.
Curses on the circumstances that so foiled me! I should have been most
wealthy. I should have possessed the means of commanding the adulation
of those who now hold me but cheaply; but still the time may come. I
have a hope yet, and that greatness which I have ever panted for, that
magician-like power over my kind, which the possession of ample means
alone can give, may yet be mine.”
Wrapping his cloak more closely around him, he strode forward with
that long, noiseless step which was peculiar to him. Mechanically he
appeared to avoid those obstacles of hedge and ditch which impeded
his pathway. Surely he had come that road often, or he would not
so easily have pursued his way. And now he stood by the edge of a
plantation which in some measure protected from trespassers the more
private gardens of the Hall, and there he paused, as if a feeling of
irresolution had come over him, or it might be, as indeed it seemed
from his subsequent conduct, that he had come without any fixed
intention, or if with a fixed intention, without any regular plan of
carrying it into effect.
Did he again dream of intruding into any of the chambers of that
mansion, with the ghastly aspect of that terrible creation with which,
in the minds of its inhabitants, he seemed to be but too closely
identified? He was pale, attenuated, and trembled. Could it be that so
soon it had become necessary to renew the life-blood in his veins in
the awful manner which it is supposed the vampyre brood are compelled
to protract their miserable existence?
It might be so, and that he was even now reflecting upon how once more
he could kindle the fire of madness in the brain of that beautiful
girl, who he had already made so irretrievably wretched.
He leant against an aged tree, and his strange, lustrous-looking eyes
seemed to collect every wandering scintillation of light that was
around, and to shine with preternatural intensity.
“I must, I will,” he said, “be master of Bannerworth Hall. It must come
to that. I have set an existence upon its possession, and I will have
it; and then, if with my own hands I displace it brick by brick and
stone by stone, I will discover that hidden secret which no one but
myself now dreams of. It shall be done by force or fraud, by love or by
despair, I care not which; the end shall sanctify all means. Ay, even
if I wade through blood to my desire, I say it shall be done.”
There was a holy and a still calmness about the night much at variance
with the storm of angry passion that appeared to be momentarily
gathering power in the breast of that fearful man. Not the least sound
came from Bannerworth Hall, and it was only occasionally that from
afar off on the night air there came the bark of some watchdog, or the
low of distant cattle. All else was mute save when the deep sepulchral
tones of that man, if man he was, gave an impulse to the soft air
around him.
With a strolling movement as if he were careless if he proceeded in
that direction or not, he still went onward toward the house, and
now he stood by that little summer-house once so sweet and so dear a
retreat, in which the heart-stricken Flora had held her interview with
him whom she loved with a devotion unknown to meaner minds.
This spot scarcely commanded any view of the house, for so enclosed was
it among evergreens and blooming flowers, that it seemed like a very
wilderness of nature, upon which, with liberal hand, she had showered
down in wild luxuriance her wildest floral beauties.
In and around that spot the night air was loaded with sweets. The
mingled perfume of many flowers made that place seem a very paradise.
But oh, how sadly at variance with that beauty and contentedness of
nature was he who stood amidst such beauty! All incapable as he was of
appreciating its tenderness, or of gathering the faintest moral from
its glory.
“Why am I here?” he said. “Here, without fixed design or stability of
purpose, like some miser who has hidden his own hoards so deeply within
the bowels of the earth he cannot hope that he shall ever again be able
to bring them to the light of day. I hover around this spot which I
feel—which I know—contains my treasure, though I cannot lay my hands
upon it, or exult in its glistening beauty.”
Even as he spoke he cowered down like some guilty thing, for he heard a
faint footstep upon the garden path. So light, so fragile was the step,
that, in the light of day, the very hum of summer insects would have
drowned the noise; but he heard it, that man of crime—of unholy and
awful impulses. He heard it, and he shrunk down among the shrubs and
flowers till he was hidden completely from observation amid a world of
fragrant essences.
Was it some one stealthily in that place even as he was, unwelcome or
unknown? or was it one who had observed him intrude upon the privacy of
those now unhappy precincts, and who was coming to deal upon him that
death which, vampyre though he might be, he was yet susceptible of from
mortal hands?
The footstep advanced, and lower down he shrunk until his coward-heart
beat against the very earth itself. He knew that he was unarmed,
a circumstance rare with him, and only to be accounted for by the
disturbance of his mind consequent upon the visit of that strange man
to his house, whose presence had awakened so many conflicting emotions.
Nearer and nearer still came that light footstep, and his deep-seated
fears would not let him perceive that it was not the step of caution or
of treachery, but owed its lightness to the natural grace and freedom
of movement of its owner.
The moon must have arisen, although obscured by clouds, through which
it cast but a dim radiance, for the night had certainly grown lighter;
so that although there were no strong shadows cast, a more diffused
brightness was about all things, and their outlines looked not so
dancing, and confused the one with the other.
He strained his eyes in the direction whence the sounds proceeded, and
then his fears for his personal safety vanished, for he saw it was a
female form that was slowly advancing towards him.
His first impulse was to rise, for with the transient glimpse he got of
it, he knew that it must be Flora Bannerworth; but a second thought,
probably one of intense curiosity to know what could possibly have
brought her to such a spot at such a time, restrained him, and he was
quiet. But if the surprise of Sir Francis Varney was great to see Flora
Bannerworth at such a time in such a place, we have no doubt, that
with the knowledge which our readers have of her, their astonishment
would more than fully equal his; and when we come to consider, that
since that eventful period when the sanctity of her chamber had been
so violated by that fearful midnight visitant, it must appear somewhat
strange that she could gather courage sufficient to wander forth alone
at such an hour.
Had she no dread of meeting that unearthly being? Did the possibility
that she might fall into his ruthless grasp, not come across her
mind with a shuddering consciousness of its probability? Had she no
reflection that each step she took, was taking her further and further
from those who would aid her in all extremities? It would seem not,
for she walked onward, unheeding, and apparently unthinking of the
presence, possible or probable, of that bane of her existence.
But let us look at her again. How strange and spectral-like she moves
along; there seems no speculation in her countenance, but with a
strange and gliding step, she walks like some dim shadow of the past
in that ancient garden. She is very pale, and on her brow there is the
stamp of suffering; her dress is a morning robe, she holds it lightly
round her, and thus she moves forward towards that summer-house which
probably to her was sanctified by having witnessed those vows of pure
affection, which came from the lips of Charles Holland, about whose
fate there now hung so great a mystery.
Has madness really seized upon the brain of that beautiful girl? Has
the strong intellect really sunk beneath the oppressions to which
it has been subjected? Does she now walk forth with a disordered
intellect, the queen of some fantastic realm, viewing the material
world with eyes that are not of earth; shunning perhaps that which she
should have sought, and, perchance, in her frenzy, seeking that which
in a happier frame of mind she would have shunned.
Such might have been the impression of any one who had looked upon her
for a moment, and who knew the disastrous scenes through which she had
so recently passed; but we can spare our readers the pangs of such a
supposition. We have bespoken their love for Flora Bannerworth, and
we are certain that she has it; therefore would we spare them, even
for a few brief moments, from imagining that cruel destiny had done
its worst, and that the fine and beautiful spirit we have so much
commended had lost its power of rational reflection. No; thank Heaven,
such is not the case. Flora Bannerworth is not mad, but under the
strong influence of some eccentric dream, which has pictured to her
mind images which have no home but in the airy realms of imagination.
She has wandered forth from her chamber to that sacred spot where she
had met him she loved, and heard the noblest declaration of truth and
constancy that ever flowed from human lips.
Yes, she is sleeping; but, with a precision such as the somnambulist
so strangely exerts, she trod the well-known paths slowly, but surely,
toward that summer’s bower, where her dreams had not told her lay
crouching that most hideous spectre of her imagination, Sir Francis
Varney. He who stood between her and her heart’s best joy; he who had
destroyed all hope of happiness, and who had converted her dearest
affections into only so many causes of greater disquietude than the
blessings they should have been to her.
Oh! could she have imagined but for one moment that he was there, with
what an eagerness of terror would she have flown back again to the
shelter of those walls, where at least was to be found some protection
from the fearful vampyre’s embrace, and where she would be within
hail of friendly hearts, who would stand boldly between her and every
thought of harm.
But she knew it not, and onwards she went until the very hem of her
garment touched the face of Sir Francis Varney.
And he was terrified—he dared not move—he dared not speak! The idea
that she had died, and that this was her spirit, come to wreak some
terrible vengeance upon him, for a time possessed him, and so paralysed
with fear was he, that he could neither move nor speak.
It had been well if, during that trance of indecision in which his
coward heart placed him, Flora had left the place, and again sought her
home; but unhappily such an impulse came not over her; she sat upon
that rustic seat, where she had reposed when Charles had clasped her
to his heart, and through her very dream the remembrance of that pure
affection came across her, and in the tenderest and most melodious
accents, she said,—
“Charles! Charles! and do you love me still? No—no; you have not
forsaken me. Save me, save me from the vampyre!”
She shuddered, and Sir Francis Varney heard her weeping.
“Fool that I am,” he muttered, “to be so terrified. She sleeps. This
is one of the phases which a disordered imagination oft puts on. She
sleeps, and perchance this may be an opportunity of further increasing
the dread of my visitation, which shall make Bannerworth Hall far too
terrible a dwelling-place for her; and well I know, if she goes, they
will all go. It will become a deserted house, and that is what I want.
A house, too, with such an evil reputation, that none but myself, who
have created that reputation, will venture within its walls:—a house,
which superstition will point out as the abode of evil spirits;—a
house, as it were, by general opinion, ceded to the vampyre. Yes, it
shall be my own; fit dwelling-place for a while for me. I have sworn
it shall be mine, and I will keep my oath, little such as I have to do
with vows.”
He rose, and moved slowly to the narrow entrance of the summer-house;
a movement he could make, without at all disturbing Flora, for the
rustic seat, on which she sat, was at its further extremity. And
there he stood, the upper part of his gaunt and hideous form clearly
defined upon the now much lighter sky, so that if Flora Bannerworth
had not been in that trance of sleep in which she really was, one
glance upward would let her see the hideous companion she had, in that
once much-loved spot—a spot hitherto sacred to the best and noblest
feelings, but now doomed for ever to be associated with that terrific
spectre of despair.
But she was in no state to see so terrible a sight. Her hands were over
her face, and she was weeping still.
“Surely, he loves me,” she whispered; “he has said he loved me, and
he does not speak in vain. He loves me still, and I shall again look
upon his face, a Heaven to me! Charles! Charles! you will come again?
Surely, they sin against the divinity of love, who would tell me that
you love me not!”
“Ha!” muttered Varney, “this passion is her first, and takes a strong
hold on her young heart—she loves him—but what are human affections
to me? I have no right to count myself in the great muster-roll of
humanity. I look not like an inhabitant of the earth, and yet am on it.
I love no one, expect no love from any one, but I will make humanity a
slave to me; and the lip-service of them who hate me in their hearts,
shall be as pleasant jingling music to my ear, as if it were quite
sincere! I will speak to this girl; she is not mad—perchance she may
be.”
There was a diabolical look of concentrated hatred upon Varney’s face,
as he now advanced two paces towards the beautiful Flora.
CHAPTER XXXIV.
THE THREAT.—ITS CONSEQUENCES.—THE RESCUE, AND SIR FRANCIS VARNEY’S
DANGER.
Sir Francis Varney now paused again, and he seemed for a few moments to
gloat over the helpless condition of her whom he had so determined to
make his victim; there was no look of pity in his face, no one touch
of human kindness could be found in the whole expression of those
diabolical features; and if he delayed making the attempt to strike
terror into the heart of that unhappy, but beautiful being, it could
not be from any relenting feeling, but simply, that he wished for a
few moments to indulge his imagination with the idea of perfecting his
villany more effectually.
Alas! and they who would have flown to her rescue,—they, who for her
would have chanced all accidents, ay, even life itself, were sleeping,
and knew not of the loved one’s danger. She was alone, and far enough
from the house, to be driven to that tottering verge where sanity ends,
and the dream of madness, with all its terrors, commences.
But still she slept—if that half-waking sleep could indeed be
considered as any thing akin to ordinary slumber—still she slept, and
called mournfully upon her lover’s name; and in tender, beseeching
accents, that should have melted even the stubbornest hearts, did she
express her soul’s conviction that he loved her still.
The very repetition of the name of Charles Holland seemed to be galling
to Sir Francis Varney. He made a gesture of impatience, as she again
uttered it, and then stepping forward, he stood within a pace of where
she sat, and in a fearfully distinct voice he said,—
“Flora Bannerworth, awake! awake! and look upon me, although the sight
blast you, and drive you to despair. Awake! awake!”
It was not the sound of the voice which aroused her from that strange
slumber. It is said that those who sleep in that eccentric manner, are
insensible to sounds, but that the lightest touch will arouse them in
an instant; and so it was in this case, for Sir Francis Varney, as he
spoke, laid upon the hand of Flora two of his cold, corpse-like looking
fingers. A shriek burst from her lips, and although the confusion of
her memory and conceptions was immense, yet she was awake, and the
somnambulistic trance had left her.
“Help, help!” she cried. “Gracious Heavens! Where am I?”
Varney spoke not, but he spread out his long, thin arms in such a
manner that he seemed almost to encircle her, while he touched her not,
so that escape became a matter of impossibility, and to attempt to do
so, must have been to have thrown herself into his hideous embrace.
[Illustration: Flora encounters Varney in the summer-house.]
She could obtain but a single view of the face and figure of him who
opposed her progress, but, slight as that view was, it more than
sufficed. The very extremity of fear came across her, and she sat like
one paralysed; the only evidence of existence she gave consisting in
the words,—
“The vampyre—the vampyre!”
“Yes,” said Varney, “the vampyre. You know me, Flora
Bannerworth—Varney, the vampyre; your midnight guest at that feast of
blood. I am the vampyre. Look upon me well; shrink not from my gaze.
You will do well not to shun me, but to speak to me in such a shape
that I may learn to love you.”
Flora shook as in a convulsion, and she looked as white as any marble
statue.
“This is horrible!” she said. “Why does not Heaven grant me the death I
pray for?”
“Hold!” said Varney. “Dress not up in the false colours of the
imagination that which in itself is sufficiently terrific to need
none of the allurements of romance. Flora Bannerworth, you are
persecuted—persecuted by me, the vampyre. It is my fate to persecute
you; for there are laws to the invisible as well as the visible
creation that force even such a being as I am to play my part in the
great drama of existence. I am a vampyre; the sustenance that supports
this frame must be drawn from the life-blood of others.”
“Oh, horror—horror!”
“But most I do affect the young and beautiful. It is from the veins of
such as thou art, Flora Bannerworth, that I would seek the sustenance
I’m compelled to obtain for my own exhausted energies. But never yet,
in all my long career—a career extending over centuries of time—never
yet have I felt the soft sensation of human pity till I looked on thee,
exquisite piece of excellence. Even at the moment when the reviving
fluid from the gushing fountain of your veins was warming at my heart,
I pitied and I loved you. Oh, Flora! even I can now feel the pang of
being what I am!”
There was a something in the tone, a touch of sadness in the manner,
and a deep sincerity in these words, that in some measure disabused
Flora of her fears. She sobbed hysterically, and a gush of tears came
to her relief, as, in almost inarticulate accents, she said,—
“May the great God forgive even you!”
“I have need of such a prayer,” exclaimed Varney—“Heaven knows I have
need of such a prayer. May it ascend on the wings of the night air to
the throne of Heaven. May it be softly whispered by ministering angels
to the ear of Divinity. God knows I have need of such a prayer!”
“To hear you speak in such a strain,” said Flora, “calms the excited
fancy, and strips even your horrible presence of some of its maddening
influence.”
“Hush,” said the vampire, “you must hear more—you must know more ere
you speak of the matters that have of late exercised an influence of
terror over you.”
“But how came I here?” said Flora, “tell me that. By what more than
earthly power have you brought me to this spot? If I am to listen to
you, why should it not be at some more likely time and place?”
“I have powers,” said Varney, assuming from Flora’s words, that she
would believe such arrogance—“I have powers which suffice to bend many
purposes to my will—powers incidental to my position, and therefore
is it I have brought you here to listen to that which should make you
happier than you are.”
“I will attend,” said Flora. “I do not shudder now; there’s an icy
coldness through my veins, but it is the night air—speak, I will attend
you.”
“I will. Flora Bannerworth, I am one who has witnessed time’s mutations
on man and on his works, and I have pitied neither; I have seen the
fall of empires, and sighed not that high reaching ambition was toppled
to the dust. I have seen the grave close over the young and the
beautiful—those whom I have doomed by my insatiable thirst for human
blood to death, long ere the usual span of life was past, but I never
loved till now.”
“Can such a being as you,” said Flora “be susceptible of such an
earthly passion?”
“And wherefore not?”
“Love is either too much of heaven, or too much of earth to find a home
with thee.”
“No, Flora, no! it may be that the feeling is born of pity. I will
save you—I will save you from a continuance of the horrors that are
assailing you.”
“Oh! then may Heaven have mercy in your hour of need!”
“Amen!”
“May you even yet know peace and joy above.”
“It is a faint and straggling hope—but if achieved, it will be through
the interposition of such a spirit as thine, Flora, which has already
exercised so benign an influence upon my tortured soul, as to produce
the wish within my heart, to do a least one unselfish action.”
“That wish,” said Flora, “shall be father to the deed. Heaven has
boundless mercy yet.”
“For thy sweet sake, I will believe so much, Flora Bannerworth; it is
a condition with my hateful race, that if we can find one human heart
to love us, we are free. If, in the face of Heaven, you will consent to
be mine, you will snatch me from a continuance of my frightful doom,
and for your pure sake, and on your merits, shall I yet know heavenly
happiness. Will you be mine?”
A cloud swept from off the face of the moon, and a slant ray fell upon
the hideous features of the vampire. He looked as if just rescued from
some charnel-house, and endowed for a space with vitality to destroy
all beauty and harmony in nature, and drive some benighted soul to
madness.
“No, no, no!” shrieked Flora, “never!”
“Enough,” said Varney, “I am answered. It was a bad proposal. I am a
vampyre still.”
“Spare me! spare me!”
“Blood!”
Flora sank upon her knees, and uplifted her hands to heaven. “Mercy,
mercy!” she said.
“Blood!” said Varney, and she saw his hideous, fang-like teeth. “Blood!
Flora Bannerworth, the vampyre’s motto. I have asked you to love me,
and you will not—the penalty be yours.”
“No, no!” said Flora. “Can it be possible that even you, who have
already spoken with judgment and precision, can be so unjust? you must
feel that, in all respects, I have been a victim, most gratuitously—a
sufferer, while there existed no just cause that I should suffer; one
who has been tortured, not from personal fault, selfishness, lapse
of integrity, or honourable feelings, but because you have found it
necessary, for the prolongation of your terrific existence, to attack
me as you have done. By what plea of honour, honesty, or justice, can
I be blamed for not embracing an alternative which is beyond all human
control?—I cannot love you.”
“Then be content to suffer. Flora Bannerworth, will you not, even for a
time, to save yourself and to save me, become mine?”
“Horrible proposition!”
“Then am I doomed yet, perhaps, for many a cycle of years, to spread
misery and desolation around me; and yet I love you with a feeling
which has in it more of gratefulness and unselfishness than ever yet
found a home within my breast. I would fain save you, although you
cannot save me; there may yet be a chance, which shall enable you to
escape from the persecution of my presence.”
“Oh! glorious chance!” said Flora. “Which way can it come? tell me
how I may embrace it, and such grateful feelings as a heart-stricken
mourner can offer to him who has rescued her from her deep affliction,
shall yet be yours.”
“Hear me, then, Flora Bannerworth, while I state to you some
particulars of mysterious existence, of such beings as myself, which
never yet have been breathed to mortal ears.”
Flora looked intently at him, and listened, while, with a serious
earnestness of manner, he detailed to her something of the physiology
of the singular class of beings which the concurrence of all
circumstances tended to make him appear.
“Flora,” he said, “it is not that I am so enamoured of an existence to
be prolonged only by such frightful means, which induces me to become
a terror to you or to others. Believe me, that if my victims, those
whom my insatiable thirst for blood make wretched, suffer much, I,
the vampyre, am not without my moments of unutterable agony. But it
is a mysterious law of our nature, that as the period approaches when
the exhausted energies of life require a new support from the warm,
gushing fountain of another’s veins, the strong desire to live grows
upon us, until, in a paroxysm of wild insanity, which will recognise no
obstacles, human or divine, we seek a victim.”
“A fearful state!” said Flora.
“It is so; and, when the dreadful repast is over, then again the
pulse beats healthfully, and the wasted energies of a strange kind
of vitality are restored to us, we become calm again, but with that
calmness comes all the horror, all the agony of reflection, and we
suffer far more than tongue can tell.”
“You have my pity,” said Flora; “even you have my pity.”
“I might well demand it, if such a feeling held a place within your
breast. I might well demand your pity, Flora Bannerworth, for never
crawled an abject wretch upon the earth’s rotundity, so pitiable as I.”
“Go on, go on.”
“I will, and with such brief conclusions as I may. Having once attacked
any human being, we feel a strange, but terribly impulsive desire
again to seek that person for more blood. But I love you, Flora; the
small amount of sensibility that still lingers about my preternatural
existence, acknowledges in you a pure and better spirit. I would fain
save you.”
“Oh! tell me how I may escape the terrible infliction.”
“That can only be done by flight. Leave this place, I implore you!
leave it as quickly as the movement may be made. Linger not—cast not
one regretful look behind you on your ancient home. I shall remain
in this locality for years. Let me lose sight of you, I will not
pursue you; but, by force of circumstances, I am myself compelled to
linger here. Flight is the only means by which you may avoid a doom as
terrific as that which I endure.”
“But tell me,” said Flora, after a moment’s pause, during which she
appeared to be endeavouring to gather courage to ask some fearful
question; “tell me if it be true that those who have once endured the
terrific attack of a vampyre, become themselves, after death, one of
that dread race?”
“It is by such means,” said Varney, “that the frightful brood
increases; but time and circumstances must aid the development of the
new and horrible existence. You, however, are safe.”
“Safe! Oh! say that word again.”
“Yes, safe; not once or twice will the vampyre’s attack have sufficient
influence on your mortal frame, as to induce a susceptibility on your
part to become coexistent with such as he. The attacks must be often
repeated, and the termination of mortal existence must be a consequence
essential, and direct from those attacks, before such a result may be
anticipated.”
“Yes, yes; I understand.”
“If you were to continue my victim from year to year, the energies of
life would slowly waste away, till like some faint taper’s gleam,
consuming more sustenance than it received, the veriest accident would
extinguish your existence, and then, Flora Bannerworth, you might
become a vampyre.”
“Oh! horrible! most horrible!”
“If by chance, or by design, the least glimpse of the cold moonbeams
rested on your apparently lifeless remains, you would rise again and be
one of us—a terror to yourself and a desolation to all around.”
“Oh! I will fly from here,” said Flora. “The hope of escape from so
terrific and dreadful a doom shall urge me onward; if flight can save
me—flight from Bannerworth Hall, I will pause not until continents and
oceans divide us.”
“It is well. I’m able now thus calmly to reason with you. A few short
months more and I shall feel the languor of death creeping over me,
and then will come that mad excitement of the brain, which, were you
hidden behind triple doors of steel, would tempt me again to seek your
chamber—again to seize you in my full embrace—again to draw from your
veins the means of prolonged life—again to convulse your very soul with
terror.”
“I need no incentives,” said Flora, with a shudder, “in the shape of
descriptions of the past, to urge me on.”
“You will fly from Bannerworth Hall?”
“Yes, yes!” said Flora, “it shall be so; its very chambers now are
hideous with the recollection of scenes enacted in them. I will urge
my brothers, my mother, all to leave, and in some distant clime we
will find security and shelter. There even we will learn to think of
you with more of sorrow than of anger—more pity than reproach—more
curiosity than loathing.”
“Be it so,” said the vampyre; and he clasped his hands, as if with
a thankfulness that he had done so much towards restoring peace at
least to one, who, in consequence of his acts, had felt such exquisite
despair. “Be it so; and even I will hope that the feelings which have
induced so desolated and so isolated a being as myself to endeavour to
bring peace to one human heart, will plead for me, trumpet-tongued, to
Heaven!”
“It will—it will,” said Flora.
“Do you think so?”
“I do; and I will pray that the thought may turn to certainty in such a
cause.”
The vampyre appeared to be much affected; and then he added,—
“Flora, you know that this spot has been the scene of a catastrophe
fearful to look back upon, in the annals of your family?”
“It has,” said Flora. “I know to what you allude; ’tis a matter of
common knowledge to all—a sad theme to me, and one I would not court.”
“Nor would I oppress you with it. Your father, here, on this very
spot, committed that desperate act which brought him uncalled for to
the judgment seat of God. I have a strange, wild curiosity upon such
subjects. Will you, in return for the good that I have tried to do you,
gratify it?”
“I know not what you mean,” said Flora.
“To be more explicit, then, do you remember the day on which your
father breathed his last?”
“Too well—too well.”
“Did you see him or converse with him shortly before that desperate act
was committed?”
“No; he shut himself up for some time in a solitary chamber.”
“Ha! what chamber?”
“The one in which I slept myself on the night——”
“Yes, yes; the one with the portrait—that speaking portrait—the eyes of
which seem to challenge an intruder as he enters the apartment.”
“The same.”
“For hours shut up there!” added Varney, musingly; “and from thence he
wandered to the garden, where, in this summer-house, he breathed his
last?”
“It was so.”
“Then, Flora, ere I bid you adieu——”
These words were scarcely uttered, when there was a quick, hasty
footstep, and Henry Bannerworth appeared behind Varney, in the very
entrance of the summer-house.
“Now,” he cried, “for revenge! Now, foul being, blot upon the earth’s
surface, horrible imitation of humanity, if mortal arm can do aught
against you, you shall die!”
A shriek came from the lips of Flora, and flinging herself past Varney,
who stepped aside, she clung to her brother, who made an unavailing
pass with his sword at the vampyre. It was a critical moment; and had
the presence of mind of Varney deserted him in the least, unarmed as
he was, he must have fallen beneath the weapon of Henry. To spring,
however, up the seat which Flora had vacated, and to dash out some of
the flimsy and rotten wood-work at the back of the summer-house by the
propulsive power of his whole frame, was the work of a moment; and
before Henry could free himself from the clinging embrace of Flora,
Varney, the vampyre, was gone, and there was no greater chance of his
capture than on a former occasion, when he was pursued in vain from the
Hall to the wood, in the intricacies of which he was so entirely lost.
CHAPTER XXXV.
THE EXPLANATION.—MARCHDALE’S ADVICE.—THE PROJECTED REMOVAL, AND THE
ADMIRAL’S ANGER.
This extremely sudden movement on the part of Varney was certainly
as unexpected as it was decisive. Henry had imagined, that by taking
possession of the only entrance to the summer-house, he must come
into personal conflict with the being who had worked so much evil for
him and his; and that he should so suddenly have created for himself
another mode of exit, certainly never occurred to him.
“For Heaven’s sake, Flora,” he said, “unhand me; this is a time for
action.”
“But, Henry, Henry, hear me.”
“Presently, presently, dear Flora; I will yet make another effort to
arrest the headlong flight of Varney.”
He shook her off, perhaps with not more roughness than was necessary
to induce her to forego her grasp of him, but in a manner that
fully showed he intended to be free; and then he sprang through the
same aperture whence Varney had disappeared, just as George and Mr.
Marchdale arrived at the door of the summer-house.
It was nearly morning, so that the fields were brightening up with the
faint radiance of the coming day; and when Henry reached a point which
he knew commanded an extensive view, he paused, and ran his eye eagerly
along the landscape, with a hope of discovering some trace of the
fugitive.
Such, however, was not the case; he saw nothing, heard nothing of Sir
Francis Varney; and then he turned, and called loudly to George to
join him, and was immediately replied to by his brother’s presence,
accompanied by Marchdale.
Before, however, they could exchange a word, a rattling discharge
of fire-arms took place from one of the windows, and they heard the
admiral, in a loud voice, shouting,—
“Broadside to broadside! Give it them again, Jack! Hit them between
wind and water!”
Then there was another rattling discharge, and Henry exclaimed,—
“What is the meaning of that firing?”
“It comes from the admiral’s room,” said Marchdale. “On my life, I
think the old man must be mad. He has some six or eight pistols ranged
in a row along the window-sill, and all loaded, so that by the aid
of a match they can be pretty well discharged as a volley, which he
considers the only proper means of firing upon the vampyre.”
“It is so,” replied George; “and, no doubt, hearing an alarm, he has
commenced operations by firing into the enemy.”
“Well, well,” said Henry; “he must have his way. I have pursued Varney
thus far, and that he has again retreated to the wood, I cannot doubt.
Between this and the full light of day, let us at least make an effort
to discover his place of retreat. We know the locality as well as he
can possibly, and I propose now that we commence an active search.”
“Come on, then,” said Marchdale. “We are all armed; and I, for one,
shall feel no hesitation in taking the life, if it be possible to do
so, of that strange being.”
“Of that possibility you doubt?” said George, as they hurried on across
the meadows.
“Indeed I do, and with reason too. I’m certain that when I fired at
him before I hit him; and besides, Flora must have shot him upon the
occasion when we were absent, and she used your pistols Henry, to
defend herself and her mother.”
“It would seem so,” said Henry; “and disregarding all present
circumstances, if I do meet him, I will put to the proof whether he be
mortal or not.”
The distance was not great, and they soon reached the margin of the
wood; they then separated agreeing to meet within it, at a well-spring,
familiar to them all; previous to which each was to make his best
endeavour to discover if any one was hidden among the bush-wood or in
the hollows of the ancient trees they should encounter on their line of
march.
The fact was, that Henry finding that he was likely to pass an
exceedingly disturbed, restless night, through agitation of spirits,
had, after tossing to and fro on his couch for many hours, wisely at
length risen, and determined to walk abroad in the gardens belonging to
the mansion, in preference to continuing in such a state of fever and
anxiety, as he was in, in his own chamber.
Since the vampyre’s dreadful visit, it had been the custom of both the
brothers, occasionally, to tap at the chamber door of Flora, who, at
her own request, now that she had changed her room, and dispensed with
any one sitting up with her, wished occasionally to be communicated
with by some member of the family.
Henry, then, after rapidly dressing, as he passed the door of her
bedroom, was about to tap at it, when to his surprise he found it open,
and upon hastily entering it he observed that the bed was empty, and a
hasty glance round the apartment convinced him that Flora was not there.
Alarm took possession of him, and hastily arming himself, he roused
Marchdale and George, but without waiting for them to be ready to
accompany him, he sought the garden, to search it thoroughly in case
she should be anywhere there concealed.
Thus it was he had come upon the conference so strangely and so
unexpectedly held between Varney and Flora in the summer-house. With
what occurred upon that discovery the readers are acquainted.
Flora had promised George that she would return immediately to the
house, but when, in compliance with the call of Henry, George and
Marchdale had left her alone, she felt so agitated and faint that she
began to cling to the trellis work of the little building for a few
moments before she could gather strength to reach the mansion.
Two or three minutes might thus have elapsed, and Flora was in such a
state of mental bewilderment with all that had occurred, that she could
scarce believe it real, when suddenly a slight sound attracted her
attention, and through the gap which had been made in the wall of the
summer-house, with an appearance of perfect composure, again appeared
Sir Francis Varney.
“Flora,” he said, quietly resuming the discourse which had been broken
off, “I am quite convinced now that you will be much the happier for
the interview.”
“Gracious Heaven!” said Flora, “whence have you come from?”
“I have never left,” said Varney.
“But I saw you fly from this spot.”
“You did; but it was only to another immediately outside the summer
house. I had no idea of breaking off our conference so abruptly.”
“Have you anything to add to what you have already stated?”
“Absolutely nothing, unless you have a question to propose to me—I
should have thought you had, Flora. Is there no other circumstance
weighing heavily upon your mind, as well as the dreadful visitation I
have subjected you to?”
“Yes,” said Flora. “What has become of Charles Holland?”
“Listen. Do not discard all hope; when you are far from here you will
meet with him again.”
“But he has left me.”
“And yet he will be able, when you again encounter him, so far to
extenuate his seeming perfidy, that you shall hold him as untouched in
honour as when first he whispered to you that he loved you.”
“Oh, joy! joy!” said Flora; “by that assurance you have robbed
misfortune of its sting, and richly compensated me for all that I have
suffered.”
“Adieu!” said the vampyre. “I shall now proceed to my own home by a
different route to that taken by those who would kill me.”
“But after this,” said Flora, “there shall be no danger; you shall
be held harmless, and our departure from Bannerworth Hall shall be
so quick, that you will soon be released from all apprehension of
vengeance from my brother, and I shall taste again of that happiness
which I thought had fled from me for ever.”
“Farewell,” said the vampire; and folding his cloak closely around
him, he strode from the summer-house, soon disappearing from her sight
behind the shrubs and ample vegetation with which that garden abounded.
Flora sunk upon her knees, and uttered a brief, but heartfelt
thanksgiving to Heaven for this happy change in her destiny. The hue of
health faintly again visited her cheeks, and as she now, with a feeling
of more energy and strength than she had been capable of exerting for
many days, walked towards the house, she felt all that delightful
sensation which the mind experiences when it is shaking off the
trammels of some serious evil which it delights now to find that the
imagination has attired in far worse colours than the facts deserved.
It is scarcely necessary, after this, to say that the search in the
wood for Sir Francis Varney was an unproductive one, and that the
morning dawned upon the labours of the brother and of Mr. Marchdale,
without their having discovered the least indication of the presence of
Varney. Again puzzled and confounded, they stood on the margin of the
wood, and looked sadly towards the brightening windows of Bannerworth
Hall, which were now reflecting with a golden radiance the slant rays
of the morning sun.
“Foiled again,” remarked Henry, with a gesture of impatience; “foiled
again, and as completely as before. I declare that I will fight this
man, let our friend the admiral say what he will against such a measure
I will meet him in mortal combat; he shall consummate his triumph over
our whole family by my death, or I will rid the world and ourselves of
so frightful a character.”
“Let us hope,” said Marchdale, “that some other course may be adopted,
which shall put an end to these proceedings.”
“That,” exclaimed Henry, “is to hope against all probability; what
other course can be pursued? Be this Varney man or devil, he has
evidently marked us for his prey.”
“Indeed, it would seem so,” remarked George; “but yet he shall find
that we will not fall so easily; he shall discover that if poor Flora’s
gentle spirit has been crushed by these frightful circumstances, we are
of a sterner mould.”
“He shall,” said Henry; “I for one will dedicate my life to this
matter. I will know no more rest than is necessary to recruit my frame,
until I have succeeded in overcoming this monster; I will seek no
pleasure here, and will banish from my mind all else that may interfere
with that one fixed pursuit. He or I must fall.”
“Well spoken,” said Marchdale; “and yet I hope that circumstances may
occur to prevent such a necessity of action, and that probably you will
yet see that it will be wise and prudent to adopt a milder and a safer
course.”
“No, Marchdale, you cannot feel as we feel. You look on more as a
spectator, sympathising with the afflictions of either, than feeling
the full sting of those afflictions yourself.”
“Do I not feel acutely for you? I’m a lonely man in the world, and
I have taught myself now to centre my affections in your family; my
recollections of early years assist me in so doing. Believe me, both
of you, that I am no idle spectator of your griefs, but that I share
them fully. If I advise you to be peaceful, and to endeavour by the
gentlest means possible to accomplish your aims, it is not that I would
counsel you cowardice; but having seen so much more of the world than
either of you have had time or opportunity of seeing, I do not look so
enthusiastically upon matters, but, with a cooler, calmer judgment, I
do not say a better, I proffer to you my counsel.”
“We thank you,” said Henry; “but this is a matter in which action seems
specially called for. It is not to be borne that a whole family is to
be oppressed by such a fiend in human shape as that Varney.”
“Let me,” said Marchdale, “counsel you to submit to Flora’s decision
in this business; let her wishes constitute the rules of action. She
is the greatest sufferer, and the one most deeply interested in the
termination of this fearful business. Moreover, she has judgment and
decision of character—she will advise you rightly, be assured.”
“That she would advise us honourably,” said Henry, “and that we
should feel every disposition in the world to defer to her wishes our
proposition, is not to be doubted; but little shall be done without
her counsel and sanction. Let us now proceed homeward, for I am most
anxious to ascertain how it came about that she and Sir Francis Varney
were together in that summer-house at so strange an hour.”
They all three walked together towards the house, conversing in a
similar strain as they went.
CHAPTER XXXVI.
THE CONSULTATION.—THE DUEL AND ITS RESULTS.
Independent of this interview which Flora had had with the much dreaded
Sir Francis Varney, the circumstances in which she and all who were
dear to her, happened at that moment to be placed, certainly required
an amount of consideration, which could not be too soon bestowed.
By a combination of disagreeables, everything that could possibly occur
to disturb the peace of the family seemed to have taken place at once;
like Macbeth’s, their troubles had truly come in battalions, and now
that the serenity of their domestic position was destroyed, minor evils
and annoyances which that very serenity had enabled them to hold at
arm’s-length became gigantic, and added much to their distress.
The small income, which, when all was happiness, health and peace, was
made to constitute a comfortable household, was now totally inadequate
to do so—the power to economise and to make the most of a little, had
flown along with that contentedness of spirit which the harmony of
circumstances alone could produce.
It was not to be supposed that poor Mrs. Bannerworth could now, as she
had formerly done, when her mind was free from anxiety, attend to those
domestic matters which make up the comforts of a family—distracted at
the situation of her daughter, and bewildered by the rapid succession
of troublesome events which so short a period of time had given birth
to, she fell into an inert state of mind as different as anything could
possibly be, from her former active existence.
It has likewise been seen how the very domestics fled from Bannerworth
Hall in dismay, rather than remain beneath the same roof with a family
believed to be subject to the visitations of so awful a being as a
vampyre.
Among the class who occupy positions of servitude, certainly there
might have been found some, who, with feelings and understandings above
such considerations, would have clung sympathetically to that family
in distress, which they had known under a happier aspect; but it had
not been the good fortune of the Bannerworths to have such as these
about them; hence selfishness had its way, and they were deserted. It
was not likely, then, that strangers would willingly accept service in
a family so situated, without some powerful impulse in the shape of a
higher pecuniary consideration, as was completely out of the power of
the Bannerworths to offer.
Thus was it, then, that most cruelly, at the very time that they had
most need of assistance and of sympathy, this unfortunate family
almost became isolated from their kind; and, apart from every other
consideration, it would have been almost impossible for them to
continue inhabitants of the Hall, with anything like comfort, or
advantage.
And then, although the disappearance of Charles Holland no longer
awakened those feelings of indignation at his supposed perfidy which
were first produced by that event; still, view it in which way they
might, it was a severe blow of fate, and after it, they one and all
found themselves still less able to contend against the sea of troubles
that surrounded them.
The reader, too, will not have failed to remark that there was about
the whole of the family that pride of independence which induced them
to shrink from living upon extraneous aid; and hence, although they
felt and felt truly, that when Admiral Bell, in his frank manner,
offered them pecuniary assistance, that it was no idle compliment, yet
with a sensitiveness such as they might well be expected to feel, they
held back, and asked each other what prospect there was of emerging
from such a state of things, and if it were justifiable to commence a
life of dependence, the end of which was not evident or tangible.
Notwithstanding, too, the noble confidence of Flora in her lover, and
notwithstanding that confidence had been echoed by her brothers, there
would at times obtrude into the minds of the latter, a feeling of the
possibility, that after all they might be mistaken; and Charles Holland
might, from some sudden impulse, fancying his future happiness was all
at stake, have withdrawn himself from the Hall, and really written the
letters attributed to him.
We say this only obtruded itself occasionally, for all their real
feelings and aspirations were the other way, although Mr. Marchdale,
they could perceive, had his doubts, and they could not but confess
that he was more likely to view the matter calmly and dispassionately
than they.
In fact, the very hesitation with which he spoke upon the subject,
convinced them of his doubts, for they attributed that hesitation to
a fear of giving them pain, or of wounding the prejudices of Admiral
Bell, with whom he had already had words so nearly approaching to a
quarrel.
Henry’s visit to Mr. Chillingworth was not likely to be productive of
any results beyond those of a conjectural character. All that that
gentleman could do was to express a willingness to be directed by them
in any way, rather than suggest any course of conduct himself upon
circumstances which he could not be expected to judge of as they who
were on the spot, and had witnessed their actual occurrence.
And now we will suppose that the reader is enabled with us to look
into one of the principal rooms of Bannerworth Hall. It is evening,
and some candles are shedding a sickly light on the ample proportions
of the once handsome apartment. At solemn consultation the whole of
the family are assembled. As well as the admiral, Mr. Chillingworth,
and Marchdale, Jack Pringle, too, walked in, by the sufferance of his
master, as if he considered he had a perfect right to do so.
The occasion of the meeting had been a communication which Flora had
made concerning her most singular and deeply interesting interview with
the vampyre. The details of this interview had produced a deep effect
upon the whole of the family.
Flora was there, and she looked better, calmer, and more collected than
she had done for some days past.
No doubt the interview she had had with Varney in the summer-house in
the garden had dispelled a host of imaginary terrors with which she had
surrounded him, although it had confirmed her fully that he and he only
was the dreadful being who had caused her so much misery.
That interview had tended to show her that about him there was yet
something human, and that there was not a danger of her being hunted
down from place to place by so horrible an existence.
Such a feeling as this was, of course, a source of deep consolation;
and with a firmer voice, and more of her old spirit of cheerfulness
about her than she had lately exhibited, she again detailed the
particulars of the interview to all who had assembled, concluding by
saying,—
“And this has given me hope of happier days. If it be a delusion, it
is a happy one; and now that but a frightful veil of mystery still
hangs over the fate of Charles Holland, how gladly would I bid adieu to
this place, and all that has made it terrible. I could almost pity Sir
Francis Varney, rather than condemn him.”
“That may be true,” said Henry, “to a certain extent, sister; but we
never can forget the amount of misery he has brought upon us. It is no
slight thing to be forced from our old and much-loved home, even if
such proceeding does succeed in freeing us from his persecutions.”
“But, my young friend,” said Marchdale, “you must recollect, that
through life it is continually the lot of humanity to be endeavouring
to fly from great evils to those which do not present themselves to
the mind in so bad an aspect. It is something, surely, to alleviate
affliction, if we cannot entirely remove it.”
“That is true,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “to a considerable extent, but
then it takes too much for granted to please me.”
“How so, sir?”
“Why, certainly, to remove from Bannerworth Hall is a much less evil
than to remain at Bannerworth Hall, and be haunted by a vampyre; but
then that proposition takes for granted that vampyre business, which
I will never grant. I repeat, again and again, it is contrary to all
experience, to philosophy, and to all the laws of ordinary nature.”
“Facts are stubborn things,” said Marchdale.
“Apparently,” remarked Mr. Chillingworth.
“Well, sir; and here we have the fact of a vampyre.”
“The presumed fact. One swallow don’t make a summer, Mr. Marchdale.”
“This is waste of time,” said Henry—“of course, the amount of evidence
that will suffice to bring conviction to one man’s mind will fail in
doing so to another. The question is, what are we to do?”
All eyes were turned upon Flora, as if this question was more
particularly addressed to her, and it behoved her, above all others, to
answer it. She did so; and in a firm, clear voice, she said,—
“I will discover the fate of Charles Holland, and then leave the Hall.”
“The fate of Charles Holland!” said Marchdale. “Why, really, unless
that young gentleman chooses to be communicative himself upon so
interesting a subject, we may be a long while discovering his fate. I
know that it is not a romantic view to take of the question, to suppose
simply that he wrote the three letters found upon his dressing-table,
and then decamped; but to my mind, it savours most wonderfully of
matter-of-fact. I now speak more freely than I have otherwise done, for
I am now upon the eve of my departure. I have no wish to remain here,
and breed dissension in any family, or to run a tilt against anybody’s
prejudices.” Here he looked at Admiral Bell. “I leave this house
to-night.”
“You’re a d—d lubberly thief,” said the admiral; “the sooner you leave
it the better. Why, you bad-looking son of a gun, what do you mean? I
thought we’d had enough of that.”
“I fully expected this abuse,” said Marchdale.
“Did you expect that?” said the admiral, as he snatched up an
inkstand, and threw at Marchdale, hitting him a hard knock on the
chin, and bespattering its contents on his breast. “Now I’ll give you
satisfaction, you lubber. D—me, if you ain’t a second Jones, and enough
to sink the ship. Shiver my timbers if I sha’n’t say something strong
presently.”
“I really,” said Henry, “must protest, Admiral Bell, against this
conduct.”
“Protest and be d—d.”
“Mr. Marchdale may be right, sir, or he may be wrong, it’s a matter of
opinion.”
“Oh, never mind,” said Marchdale; “I look upon this old nautical
ruffian as something between a fool and a madman. If he were a younger
man I should chastise him upon the spot; but as it is I live in hopes
yet of getting him into some comfortable lunatic asylum.”
“Me into an asylum!” shouted the admiral. “Jack, did you hear that?”
“Ay, ay, sir.”
“Farewell all of you,” said Marchdale; “my best wishes be with this
family. I cannot remain under this roof to be so insulted.”
“A good riddance,” cried the admiral. “I’d rather sail round the world
with a shipload of vampyres than with such a humbugging son of a gun as
you are. D——e, you’re worse than a lawyer.”
“Nay, nay,” cried they, “Mr. Marchdale, stay.”
“Stay, stay,” cried George, and Mrs. Bannerworth, likewise, said stay;
but at the moment Flora stepped forward, and in a clear voice she said,—
“No, let him go, he doubts Charles Holland; let all go who doubt
Charles Holland. Mr. Marchdale, Heaven forgive you this injustice you
are doing. We may never meet again. Farewell, sir!”
These words were spoken in so decided a tone, that no one contradicted
them. Marchdale cast a strange kind of look round upon the family
circle, and in another instant he was gone.
“Huzza!” shouted Jack Pringle; “that’s one good job.”
Henry looked rather resentful, which the admiral could not but observe,
and so, less with the devil-may-care manner in which he usually spoke,
the old man addressed him.
“Hark ye, Mr. Henry Bannerworth, you ain’t best pleased with me, and in
that case I don’t know that I shall stay to trouble you any longer, as
for your friend who has just left you, sooner or later you’ll find him
out—I tell you there’s no good in that fellow. Do you think I’ve been
cruizing about for a matter of sixty years, and don’t know an honest
man when I see him. But never mind, I’m going on a voyage of discovery
for my nephew, and you can do as you like.”
“Heaven only knows, Admiral Bell,” said Henry, “who is right and who is
wrong. I do much regret that you have quarrelled with Mr. Marchdale;
but what is done can’t be undone.”
“Do not leave us,” said Flora; “let me beg of you, Admiral Bell, not to
leave us; for my sake remain here, for to you I can speak freely and
with confidence, of Charles, when probably I can do so to no one else.
You knew him well and have a confidence in him, which no one else can
aspire to. I pray you, therefore, to stay with us.”
“Only on one condition,” said the admiral.
“Name it—name it!
“You think of letting the Hall?”
“Yes, yes.”
“Let me have it, then, and let me pay a few years in advance. If you
don’t, I’m d—d if I stay another night in the place. You must give me
immediate possession, too, and stay here as my guests until you suit
yourselves elsewhere. Those are my terms and conditions. Say yes, and
all’s right; say no, and I’m off like a round shot from a carronade.
D—me, that’s the thing, Jack, isn’t it?”
“Ay, ay, sir.”
There was a silence of some few moments after this extraordinary offer
had been made, and then they spoke, saying,—
“Admiral Bell, your generous offer, and the feelings which dictated it,
are by far too transparent for us to affect not to understand them.
Your actions, Admiral——”
“Oh, bother my actions! what are they to you? Come, now, I consider
myself master of the house, d—n you! I invite you all to dinner, or
supper, or to whatever meal comes next. Mrs. Bannerworth, will you
oblige me, as I’m an old fool in family affairs, by buying what’s
wanted for me and my guests? There’s the money, ma’am. Come along,
Jack, we’ll take a look over our new house. What do you think of it?”
“Wants some sheathing, sir, here and there.”
“Very like; but, however, it will do well enough for us; we’re in port,
you know. Come along.”
“Ay, ay, sir.”
And off went the admiral and Jack, after leaving a twenty pound note in
Mrs. Bannerworth’s lap.
CHAPTER XXXVII.
SIR FRANCIS VARNEY’S SEPARATE OPPONENTS.—THE INTERPOSITION OF FLORA.
The old admiral so completely overcame the family of the Bannerworths
by his generosity and evident single-mindedness of his behaviour, that
although not one, except Flora, approved of his conduct towards Mr.
Marchdale, yet they could not help liking him; and had they been placed
in a position to choose which of the two they would have had remain
with them, the admiral or Marchdale, there can be no question they
would have made choice of the former.
Still, however, it was not pleasant to find a man like Marchdale
virtually driven from the house, because he presumed to differ in
opinion upon a very doubtful matter with another of its inmates. But as
it was the nature of the Bannerworth family always to incline to the
most generous view of subjects, the frank, hearty confidence of the
old admiral in Charles Holland pleased them better than the calm and
serious doubting of Marchdale.
His ruse of hiring the house of them, and paying the rent in advance,
for the purpose of placing ample funds in their hands for any
contingency, was not the less amiable because it was so easily seen
through; and they could not make up their minds to hurt the feelings of
the old man by the rejection of his generous offer.
When he had left, this subject was canvassed among them, and it was
agreed that he should have his own way in the matter for the present,
although they hoped to hear something from Marchdale, which should make
his departure appear less abrupt and uncomfortable to the whole of the
family.
During the course of this conversation, it was made known to Flora with
more distinctness than under any other circumstances it would have
been, that George Holland had been on the eve of fighting a duel with
Sir Francis Varney, previous to his mysterious disappearance.
When she became fully aware of this fact, to her mind it seemed
materially to add to the suspicions previously to then entertained,
that foul means had been used in order to put Charles out of the way.
“Who knows,” she said, “that this Varney may not shrink with the
greatest terror from a conflict with any human being, and feeling
one was inevitable with Charles Holland, unless interrupted by some
vigorous act of his own, he or some myrmidons of his may have taken
Charles’s life!”
“I do not think, Flora,” said Henry, “that he would have ventured upon
so desperate an act; I cannot well believe such a thing possible. But
fear not; he will find, if he have really committed any such atrocity,
that it will not save him.”
These words of Henry, though it made no impression at the time upon
Flora, beyond what they carried upon their surface, they really,
however, as concerned Henry himself, implied a settled resolution,
which he immediately set about reducing to practice.
When the conference broke up, night, as it still was, he, without
saying anything to any one, took his hat and cloak, and left the
Hall, proceeding by the nearest practicable route to the residence of
Sir Francis Varney, where he arrived without any interruption of any
character.
Varney was at first denied to him, but before he could leave the house,
a servant came down the great staircase, to say it was a mistake; and
that Sir Francis was at home, and would be happy to see him.
He was ushered into the same apartment where Sir Francis Varney
had before received his visitors; and there sat the now declared
vampyre, looking pale and ghastly by the dim light which burned in the
apartment, and, indeed, more like some spectre of the tomb, than one of
the great family of man.
“Be seated, sir,” said Varney; “although my eyes have seldom the
pleasure of beholding you within these walls, be assured you are a
honoured guest.”
“Sir Francis Varney,” said Henry, “I came not here to bandy compliments
with you; I have none to pay to you, nor do I wish to hear any of them
from your lips.”
“An excellent sentiment, young man,” said Varney, “and well delivered.
May I presume, then, without infringing too far upon your extreme
courtesy, to inquire, to what circumstances I am indebted for your
visit?”
“To one, Sir Francis, that I believe you are better acquainted with
than you will have the candour to admit.”
“Indeed, sir,” said Varney, coldly; “you measure my candour, probably,
by a standard of your own; in which case I fear, I may be no gainer;
and yet that may be of itself a circumstance that should afford little
food for surprise, but proceed, sir—since we have so few compliments to
stand between us and our purpose, we shall in all due time arrive at
it.”
“Yes, in due time, Sir Francis Varney, and that due time has arrived.
Know you anything of my friend, Mr. Charles Holland?” said Henry, in
marked accents; and he gazed on Sir Francis Varney with earnestness,
that seemed to say not even a look should escape his observation.
Varney, however, returned the gaze as steadily, but coldly, as he
replied in his measured accents,—
“I have heard of the young gentleman.”
“And seen him?”
“And seen him too, as you, Mr. Bannerworth, must be well aware. Surely
you have not come all this way, merely to make such an inquiry; but,
sir, you are welcome to the answer.”
Henry had something of a struggle to keep down the rising anger, at
these cool taunts of Varney; but he succeeded—and then he said,—
“I suspect Charles Holland, Sir Francis Varney, has met with unfair
treatment, and that he has been unfairly dealt with, for an unworthy
purpose.”
“Undoubtedly,” said Varney, “if the gentleman you allude to, has been
unfairly dealt with, it was for a foul purpose; for no good or generous
object, my young sir, could be so obtained—you acknowledge so much, I
doubt not?”
“I do, Sir Francis Varney; and hence the purpose of my visit here—for
this reason I apply to you——”
“A singular object, supported by a singular reason. I cannot see the
connection, young sir; pray proceed to enlighten me upon this matter,
and when you have done that, may I presume upon your consideration, to
inquire in what way I can be of any service to you?”
“Sir Francis,” said Henry, his anger raising his tones—“this will not
serve you—I have come to exact an account of how you have disposed of
my friend; and I will have it.”
“Gently, my good sir; you are aware I know nothing of your friend; his
motions are his own; and as to what I have done with him; my only
answer is, that he would permit me to do nothing with him, had I been
so inclined to have taken the liberty.”
“You are suspected, Sir Francis Varney, of having made an attempt upon
the life or liberty of Charles Holland; you, in fact, are suspected of
being his murderer—and, so help me Heaven! if I have not justice, I
will have vengeance!”
“Young sir, your words are of grave import, and ought to be coolly
considered before they are uttered. With regard to justice and
vengeance, Mr. Bannerworth, you may have both; but I tell you, of
Charles Holland, or what has become of him, I know nothing. But
wherefore do you come to so unlikely a quarter to learn something of an
individual of whom I know nothing?”
“Because Charles Holland was to have fought a duel with you; but before
that had time to take place, he has suddenly become missing. I suspect
that you are the author of his disappearance, because you fear an
encounter with a mortal man.”
“Mr. Bannerworth, permit me to say, in my own defence, that I do not
fear any man, however foolish he may be; and wisdom is not an attribute
I find, from experience in all men, of your friend. However, you must
be dreaming, sir—a kind of vivid insanity has taken possession of your
mind, which distorts——”
“Sir Francis Varney!” exclaimed Henry, now perfectly uncontrollable.
“Sir,” said Varney, as he filled up the pause, “proceed; I am all
attention. You do me honour.”
“If,” resumed Henry, “such was your object in putting Mr. Holland
aside, by becoming personally or by proxy an assassin, you are mistaken
in supposing you have accomplished your object.”
“Go on, sir,” said Sir Francis Varney, in a bland and sweet tone; “I am
all attention; pray proceed.”
“You have failed; for I now here, on this spot, defy you to mortal
combat. Coward, assassin as you are, I challenge you to fight.”
“You don’t mean on the carpet here?” said Varney, deliberately.
“No, sir; but beneath the canopy of heaven, in the light of the day.
And then, Sir Francis, we shall see who will shrink from the conflict.”
“It is remarkably good, Mr. Bannerworth, and, begging your pardon, for
I do not wish to give any offence, my honoured sir, it would rehearse
before an audience; in short, sir, it is highly dramatic.”
“You shrink from the combat, do you? Now, indeed, I know you.”
“Young man—young man,” said Sir Francis, calmly, and shaking his head
very deliberately, and the shadows passed across his pale face, “you
know me not, if you think Sir Francis Varney shrinks from any man, much
less one like yourself.”
“You are a coward, and worse, if you refuse my challenge.”
“I do not refuse it; I accept it,” said Varney, calmly, and in a
dignified manner; and then, with a sneer, he added,—“You are well
acquainted with the mode in which gentlemen generally manage these
matters, Mr. Bannerworth, and perhaps I am somewhat confined in my
knowledge in the ways of the world, because you are your own principal
and second. In all my experience, I never met with a similar case.”
“The circumstances under which it is given are as unexampled, and will
excuse the mode of the challenge,” said Henry, with much warmth.
“Singular coincidence—the challenge and mode of it is most singular!
They are well matched in that respect. Singular, did I say? The more
I think of it, Mr. Bannerworth, the more I am inclined to think this
positively odd.”
“Early to-morrow, Sir Francis, you shall hear from me.”
“In that case, you will not arrange preliminaries now? Well, well; it
is very unusual for the principals themselves to do so; and yet, excuse
my freedom, I presumed, as you had so far deserted the beaten track,
that I had no idea how far you might be disposed to lead the same
route.”
“I have said all I intended to say, Sir Francis Varney; we shall see
each other again.”
“I may not detain you, I presume, to taste aught in the way of
refreshment?”
Henry made no reply, but turned towards the door, without even making
an attempt to return the grave and formal bow that Sir Francis Varney
made as he saw him about to quit the apartment; for Henry saw that his
pale features were lighted up with a sarcastic smile, most disagreeable
to look upon as well as irritating to Henry Bannerworth.
He now quitted Sir Francis Varney’s abode, being let out by a servant
who had been rung for for that purpose by his master.
Henry walked homeward, satisfied that he had now done all that he could
under the circumstances.
“I will send Chillingworth to him in the morning, and then I shall see
what all this will end in. He must meet me, and then Charles Holland,
if not discovered, shall be, at least, revenged.”
There was another person in Bannerworth Hall who had formed a similar
resolution. That person was a very different sort of person to Henry
Bannerworth, though quite as estimable in his way.
This was no other than the old admiral. It was singular that two such
very different persons should deem the same steps necessary, and
both keep the secret from each other; but so it was, and, after some
internal swearing, he determined upon challenging Varney in person.
“I’d send Jack Pringle, but the swab would settle the matter as
shortly as if a youngster was making an entry in a log, and heard the
boatswain’s whistle summoning the hands to a mess, and feared he would
lose his grog.
“D—n my quarters! but Sir Francis Varney, as he styles himself, sha’n’t
make any way against old Admiral Bell. He’s as tough as a hawser, and
just the sort of blade for a vampyre to come athwart. I’ll pitch him
end-long, and make a plank of him afore long. Cus my windpipe! what a
long, lanky swab he is, with teeth fit to unpick a splice; but let me
alone, I’ll see if I can’t make a hull of his carcass, vampyre or no
vampyre.
“My nevy, Charles Holland, can’t be allowed to cut away without
nobody’s leave or licence. No, no; I’ll not stand that anyhow. ‘Never
desert a messmate in the time of need,’ is the first maxim of a seaman,
and I ain’t the one as ’ll do so.”
Thus self-communing, the old admiral marched along until he came to Sir
Francis Varney’s house, at the gate of which he gave the bell what he
called a long pull, a strong pull, and a pull altogether, that set it
ringing with a fury, the like of which had never certainly been heard
by the household.
A minute or two scarcely elapsed before the domestics hurried to answer
so urgent a summons; and when the gate was opened, the servant who
answered it inquired his business.
“What’s that to you, snob? Is your master, Sir Francis Varney, in?
because, if he be, let him know old Admiral Bell wants to speak to him.
D’ye hear?”
“Yes, sir,” replied the servant, who had paused a few moments to
examine the individual who gave this odd kind of address.
In another minute word was brought to him that Sir Francis Varney would
be very happy to see Admiral Bell.
“Ay, ay,” he muttered; “just as the devil likes to meet with holy
water, or as I like any water save salt water.”
He was speedily introduced to Sir Francis Varney, who was seated in the
same posture as he had been left by Henry Bannerworth not many minutes
before.
“Admiral Bell,” said Sir Francis, rising, and bowing to that individual
in the most polite, calm, and dignified manner imaginable, “permit me
to express the honour I feel at this unexpected visit.”
“None of your gammon.”
“Will you be seated. Allow me to offer you such refreshments as this
poor house affords.”
“D—n all this! You know, Sir Francis, I don’t want none o’ this
palaver. It’s for all the world like a Frenchman, when you are going to
give him a broadside; he makes grimaces, throws dust in your eyes, and
tries to stab you in the back. Oh, no! none of that for me.”
“I should say not, Admiral Bell. I should not like it myself, and I
dare say you are a man of too much experience not to perceive when you
are or are not imposed upon.”
“Well, what is that to you? D—n me, I didn’t come here to talk to you
about myself.”
“Then may I presume upon your courtesy so far as to beg that you will
enlighten me upon the object of your visit!”
“Yes; in pretty quick time. Just tell me where you have stowed away my
nephew, Charles Holland?”
“Really, I——”
“Hold your slack, will you, and hear me out; if he’s living, let him
out, and I’ll say no more about it; that’s liberal, you know; it ain’t
terms everybody would offer you.”
“I must, in truth, admit they are not; and, moreover, they quite
surprise even me, and I have learned not to be surprised at almost
anything.”
“Well, will you give him up alive? but, hark ye, you mustn’t have made
very queer fish of him, do ye see?”
“I hear you,” said Sir Francis, with a bland smile, passing one hand
gently over the other, and showing his front teeth in a peculiar
manner; “but I really cannot comprehend all this; but I may say,
generally, that Mr. Holland is no acquaintance of mine, and I have no
sort of knowledge where he may be.”
“That won’t do for me,” said the admiral, positively, shaking his head.
“I am particularly sorry, Admiral Bell, that it will not, seeing that I
have nothing else to say.”
“I see how it is; you’ve put him out of the way, and I’m d—d if you
shan’t bring him to life, whole and sound, or I’ll know the reason why.”
“With that I have already furnished you, Admiral Bell,” quietly
rejoined Varney; “anything more on that head is out of my power,
though my willingness to oblige a person of such consideration as
yourself, is very great; but, permit me to add, this is a very strange
and odd communication from one gentleman to another. You have lost a
relative, who has, very probably, taken some offence, or some notion
into his head, of which nobody but himself knows anything, and you come
to one yet more unlikely to know anything of him, than even yourself.”
“Gammon again, now, Sir Francis Varney, or Blarney.”
“Varney, if you please, Admiral Bell; I was christened Varney.”
“Christened, eh?”
“Yes, christened—were you not christened? If not, I dare say you
understand the ceremony well enough.”
“I should think I did; but, as for christening, a——”
“Go on, sir.”
“A vampyre! why I should as soon think of reading the burial service of
a pig.”
“Very possible; but what has all this to do with your visit to me?”
“This much, you lubber. Now, d—n my carcass from head to stern, if I
don’t call you out.”
“Well, Admiral Bell,” said Varney, mildly, “in that case, I suppose I
must come out; but why do you insist that I have any knowledge of your
nephew, Mr. Charles Holland?”
“You were to have fought a duel with him, and now he’s gone.”
“I am here,” said Varney.
“Ay,” said the admiral, “that’s as plain as a purser’s shirt upon a
handspike; but that’s the very reason why my nevey ain’t here, and
that’s all about it.”
“And that’s marvellous little, so far as the sense is concerned,” said
Varney, without the movement of a muscle.
“It is said that people of your class don’t like fighting mortal men;
now you have disposed of him, lest he should dispose of you.”
“That is explicit, but it is to no purpose, since the gentleman in
question hasn’t placed himself at my disposal.”
“Then, d——e, I will; fish, flesh, or fowl, I don’t care; all’s one to
Admiral Bell. Come fair or fowl, I’m a tar for all men; a seaman ever
ready to face a foe, so here goes, you lubberly moon manufactured calf.”
“I hear, admiral, but it is scarcely civil, to say the least of it;
however, as you are somewhat eccentric, and do not, I dare say, mean
all your words imply, I am quite willing to make every allowance.”
“I don’t want any allowance; d—n you and your allowance, too; nothing
but allowance of grog, and a pretty good allowance, too, will do for
me, and I tell you, Sir Francis Varney,” said the admiral, with much
wrath, “that you are a d—d lubberly hound, and I’ll fight you; yes, I’m
ready to hammer away, or with anything from a pop-gun to a ship’s gun;
you don’t come over me with your gammon, I tell you. You’ve murdered
Charles Holland because you couldn’t face him—that’s the truth of it.”
“With the other part of your speech, Admiral Bell, allow me to say, you
have mixed up a serious accusation—one I cannot permit to pass lightly.”
“Will you or not fight?”
“Oh, yes; I shall be happy to serve you any way that I can. I hope this
will be an answer to your accusation, also.”
“That’s settled, then.”
“Why, I am not captious, Admiral Bell, but it is not generally usual
for the principals to settle the preliminaries themselves; doubtless
you, in your career of fame and glory, know something of the manner in
which gentlemen demean themselves on these occasions.”
“Oh, d—n you! Yes, I’ll send some one to do all this. Yes, yes, Jack
Pringle will be the man, though Jack ain’t a holiday, shore-going,
smooth-spoken swab, but as good a seaman as ever trod deck or handled a
boarding-pike.”
“Any friend of yours,” said Varney, blandly, “will be received and
treated as such upon an errand of such consequence; and now our
conference has, I presume, concluded.”
“Yes, yes, I’ve done—d—e, no—yes—no. I will keel haul you but I’ll know
something of my neavy, Charles Holland.”
“Good day, Admiral Bell.” As Varney spoke, he placed his hand upon
the bell which he had near him, to summon an attendant to conduct the
admiral out. The latter, who had said a vast deal more than he ever
intended, left the room in a great rage, protesting to himself that he
would amply avenge his nephew, Charles Holland.
He proceeded homeward, considerably vexed and annoyed that he had been
treated with so much calmness, and all knowledge of his nephew denied.
When he got back, he quarrelled heartily with Jack Pringle—made it
up—drank grog—quarrelled—made it up, and finished with grog again—until
he went to bed swearing he should like to fire a broadside at the whole
of the French army, and annihilate it at once.
With this wish, he fell asleep.
Early next morning, Henry Bannerworth sought Mr. Chillingworth, and
having found him, he said in a serious tone,—
“Mr. Chillingworth, I have rather a serious favour to ask you, and one
which you may hesitate in granting.”
“It must be very serious indeed,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “that I
should hesitate to grant it to you; but pray inform me what it is that
you deem so serious?”
“Sir Francis Varney and I must have a meeting,” said Henry.
“Have you really determined upon such a course?” said Mr.
Chillingworth; “you know the character of your adversary?”
“That is all settled,—I have given a challenge, and he has accepted it;
so all other considerations verge themselves into one—and that is the
when, where, and how.”
“I see,” said Mr. Chillingworth. “Well, since it cannot be helped on
your part, I will do what is requisite for you—do you wish anything to
be done or insisted on in particular in this affair.”
“Nothing with regard to Sir Francis Varney that I may not leave to
your discretion. I feel convinced that he is the assassin of Charles
Holland, whom he feared to fight in duel.”
“Then there remains but little else to do, but to arrange
preliminaries, I believe. Are you prepared on every other point?”
“I am—you will see that I am the challenger, and that he must now
fight. What accident may turn up to save him, I fear not, but sure I
am, that he will endeavour to take every advantage that may arise, and
so escape the encounter.”
“And what do you imagine he will do now he has accepted your
challenge?” said Mr. Chillingworth; “one would imagine he could not
very well escape.”
“No—but he accepted the challenge which Charles Holland sent him—a duel
was inevitable, and it seems to me to be a necessary consequence that
he disappeared from amongst us, for Mr. Holland would never have shrunk
from the encounter.”
“There can be no sort of suspicion about that,” remarked Chillingworth;
“but allow me to advise you that you take care of yourself, and keep a
watchful eye upon every one—do not be seen out alone.”
“I fear not.”
“Nay, the gentleman who has disappeared was, I am sure, fearless
enough; but yet that has not saved him. I would not advise you to be
fearful, only watchful; you have now an event awaiting upon you, which
it is well you should go through with, unless circumstances should
so turn out, that it is needless; therefore I say, when you have the
suspicions you do entertain of this man’s conduct, beware, be cautious,
and vigilant.”
“I will do so—in the mean time, I trust myself confidently in your
hands—you know all that is necessary.”
“This affair is quite a secret from all of the family?”
“Most certainly so, and will remain so—I shall be at the Hall.”
“And there I will see you—but be careful not to be drawn into any
adventure of any kind—it is best to be on the safe side under all
circumstances.”
“I will be especially careful, be assured, but farewell; see Sir
Francis Varney as early as you can, and let the meeting be as early as
you can, and thus diminish the chance of accident.”
“That I will attend to. Farewell for the present.”
Mr. Chillingworth immediately set about the conducting of the affair
thus confided to him; and that no time might be lost, he determined to
set out at once for Sir Francis Varney’s residence.
“Things with regard to this family seem to have gone on wild of late,”
thought Mr. Chillingworth; “this may bring affairs to a conclusion,
though I had much rather they had come to some other. My life for it,
there is a juggle or a mystery somewhere; I will do this, and then
we shall see what will come of it; if this Sir Francis Varney meets
him—and at this moment I can see no reason why he should not do so—it
will tend much to deprive him of the mystery about him; but if, on
the other hand, he refuse—but then that’s all improbable, because he
has agreed to do so. I fear, however, that such a man as Varney is a
dreadful enemy to encounter—he is cool and unruffled—and that gives
him all the advantage in such affairs; but Henry’s nerves are not bad,
though shaken by these untowards events; but time will show—I would it
were all over.”
With these thoughts and feelings strangely intermixed, Mr.
Chillingworth set forward for Sir Francis Varney’s house.
• • • • •
Admiral Bell slept soundly enough, though, towards morning, he fell
into a strange dream, and thought he was yard arm and yard arm with a
strange fish—something of the mermaid species.
“Well,” exclaimed the admiral, after a customary benediction, of his
eyes and limbs, “what’s to come next? may I be spliced to a shark if I
understand what this is all about. I had some grog last night, but then
grog, d’y’see, is—is—a seaman’s native element, as the newspapers say,
though I never read ’em now, it’s such a plague.”
He lay quiet for a short time, considering in his own mind what was
best to be done, and what was the proper course to pursue, and why he
should dream.
“Hilloa, hilloa, hil—loa! Jack a-hoy! a-hoy!” shouted the admiral, as
a sudden recollection of his challenge came across his memory; “Jack
Pringle a-hoy? d—n you, where are you?—you’re never at hand when you
are wanted. Oh, you lubber,—a-hoy!”
“A-hoy!” shouted a voice, as the door opened, and Jack thrust his head
in; “what cheer, messmate? what ship is this?”
“Oh, you lubberly——”
The door was shut in a minute, and Jack Pringle disappeared.
“Hilloa, Jack Pringle, you don’t mean to say you’ll desert your
colours, do you, you dumb dog?”
“Who says I’ll desert the ship as she’s sea-worthy!”
“Then why do you go away?”
“Because I won’t be called lubberly. I’m as good a man as ever swabbed
a deck, and don’t care who says to the contrary. I’ll stick to the
ship as long as she’s sea-worthy,” said Jack.
“Well, come here, and just listen to the log, and be d——d to you.”
“What’s the orders now, admiral?” said Jack, “though, as we are paid
off——”
“There, take that, will you?” said Admiral Bell, as he flung a pillow
at Jack, being the only thing in the shape of a missile within reach.
Jack ducked, and the pillow produced a clatter in the washhand-stand
among the crockery, as Jack said,—
“There’s a mutiny in the ship, and hark how the cargo clatters; will
you have it back again?”
“Come, will you? I’ve been dreaming, Jack.”
“Dreaming! what’s that?”
“Thinking of something when you are asleep, you swab.”
“Ha, ha, ha!” laughed Jack; “never did such a thing in my life—ha, ha,
ha! what’s the matter now?”
“I’ll tell you what’s the matter. Jack Pringle, you are becoming
mutinous, and I won’t have it; if you don’t hold your jaw and draw in
your slacks, I’ll have another second.”
“Another second! what’s in the wind, now?” said Jack. “Is this the
dream?”
“If ever I dream when I’m alongside a strange craft, then it is a
dream; but old Admiral Bell ain’t the man to sleep when there’s any
work to be done.”
“That’s uncommon true,” said Jack, turning a quid.
“Well, then, I’m going to fight.”
“Fight!” exclaimed Jack. “Avast, there, I don’t see where’s the
enemy—none o’ that gammon; Jack Pringle can fight, too, and will lay
alongside his admiral, but he don’t see the enemy anywhere.”
“You don’t understand these things, so I’ll tell you. I have had a bit
of talk with Sir Francis Varney, and I am going to fight him.”
“What the _wamphigher?_” remarked Jack, parenthetically.
“Yes.”
“Well, then,” resumed Jack, “then we shall see another blaze, at least
afore we die; but he’s an odd fish—one of Davy Jones’s sort.”
“I don’t care about that; he may be anything he likes; but Admiral Bell
ain’t a-going to have his nephew burned and eaten, and sucked like I
don’t know what, by a vampyre, or by any other confounded land-shark.”
“In course,” said Jack, “we ain’t a-going to put up with nothing of
that sort, and if so be as how he has put him out of the way, why it’s
our duty to send him after him, and square the board.”
“That’s the thing, Jack; now you know you must go to Sir Francis Varney
and tell him you come from me.”
“I don’t care if I goes on my own account,” said Jack.
“That won’t do; I’ve challenged him and I must fight him.”
“In course you will,” returned Jack, “and, if he blows you away, why
I’ll take your place, and have a blaze myself.”
The admiral gave a look at Jack of great admiration, and then said,—
“You are a d—d good seaman, Jack, but he’s a knight, and might say no
to that, but do you go to him, and tell him that you come from me to
settle the when and the where this duel is to be fought.”
“Single fight?” said Jack.
“Yes; consent to any thing that is fair,” said the admiral, “but let it
be as soon as you can. Now, do you understand what I have said?”
“Yes, to be sure; I ain’t lived all these years without knowing your
lingo.”
“Then go at once; and don’t let the honour of Admiral Bell and old
England suffer, Jack. I’m his man, you know, at any price.”
“Never fear,” said Jack; “you shall fight him, at any rate. I’ll go and
see he don’t back out, the warmint.”
“Then go along, Jack; and mind don’t you go blazing away like a fire
ship, and letting everybody know what’s going on, or it’ll be stopped.”
“I’ll not spoil sport,” said Jack, as he left the room, to go at once
to Sir Francis Varney, charged with the conducting of the important
cartel of the admiral. Jack made the best of his way with becoming
gravity and expedition until he reached the gate of the admiral’s enemy.
Jack rang loudly at the gate; there seemed, if one might judge by his
countenance, a something on his mind, that Jack was almost another man.
The gate was opened by the servant, who inquired what he wanted there.
“The wamphigher.”
“Who?”
“The wamphigher.”
The servant frowned, and was about to say something uncivil to Jack,
who winked at him very hard, and then said,—
“Oh, may be you don’t know him, or won’t know him by that name; I wants
to see Sir Francis Varney.”
“He’s at home,” said the servant; “who are you?”
“Show me up, then. I’m Jack Pringle, and I’m come from Admiral Bell;
I’m the admiral’s friend, you see, so none of your black looks.”
The servant seemed amazed, as well as rather daunted, at Jack’s
address; he showed him, however, into the hall, where Mr. Chillingworth
had just that moment arrived, and was waiting for an interview with
Varney.
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
MARCHDALE’S OFFER.—THE CONSULTATION AT BANNERWORTH HALL.—THE MORNING
OF THE DUEL.
Mr. Chillingworth was much annoyed to see Jack Pringle in the hall,
and Jack was somewhat surprised at seeing Mr. Chillingworth there at
that time in the rooming; they had but little time to indulge in their
mutual astonishment, for a servant came to announce that Sir Francis
Varney would see them both.
Without saying anything to the servant or each other, they ascended the
staircase, and were shown into the apartment where Sir Francis Varney
received them.
“Gentlemen,” said Sir Francis, in his usual bland tone, “you are
welcome.”
“Sir Francis,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “I have come upon matters of
some importance; may I crave a separate audience?”
“And I too,” said Jack Pringle; “I come as the friend of Admiral Bell,
I want a private audience; but, stay, I don’t care a rope’s end who
knows who I am, or what I come about; say you are ready to name time
and place, and I’m as dumb as a figure-head; that is saying something,
at all events; and now I’m done.”
“Why, gentlemen,” said Sir Francis, with a quiet smile, “as you have
both come upon the same errand, and as there may arise a controversy
upon the point of precedence, you had better be both present, as I must
arrange this matter myself upon due inquiry.”
“I do not exactly understand this,” said Mr. Chillingworth; “do you,
Mr. Pringle? perhaps you can enlighten me?”
“If,” said Jack, “as how you came here upon the same errand as I, and I
as you, why we both come about fighting Sir Francis Varney.”
“Yes,” said Sir Francis; “what Mr. Pringle says, is, I believe correct
to a letter. I have a challenge from both your principals, and am
ready to give you both the satisfaction you desire, provided the first
encounter will permit me the honour of joining in the second. You, Mr.
Pringle, are aware of the chances of war?”
“I should say so,” said Jack, with a wink and a nod of a familiar
character. “I’ve seen a few of them.”
“Will you proceed to make the necessary agreement between you both,
gentlemen? My affection for the one equals fully the good will I bear
the other, and I cannot give a preference in so delicate a matter;
proceed gentlemen.”
Mr. Chillingworth looked at Jack, and Jack Pringle looked at Mr.
Chillingworth, and then the former said,—
“Well, the admiral means fighting, and I am come to settle
the necessaries; pray let me know what are your terms, Mr.
What-d’ye-call’em.”
“I am agreeable to anything that is at all reasonable—pistols, I
presume?”
“Sir Francis Varney,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “I cannot consent to
carry on this office, unless you can appoint a friend who will settle
these matters with us—myself, at least.”
“And I too,” said Jack Pringle; “we don’t want to bear down an enemy.
Admiral Bell ain’t the man to do that, and if he were, I’m not the man
to back him in doing what isn’t fair or right; but he won’t do it.”
“But, gentlemen, this must not be; Mr. Henry Bannerworth must not be
disappointed, and Admiral Bell must not be disappointed. Moreover, I
have accepted the two cartels, and I am ready and willing to fight;—one
at a time, I presume?”
“Sir Francis, after what you have said, I must take upon myself, on the
part of Mr. Henry Bannerworth, to decline meeting you, if you cannot
name a friend with whom I can arrange this affair.”
“Ah!” said Jack Pringle, “that’s right enough. I recollect very well
when Jack Mizen fought Tom Foremast, they had their seconds. Admiral
Bell can’t do anything in the dark. No, no, d—e! all must be above
board.”
“Gentlemen,” said Sir Francis Varney, “you see the dilemma I am in.
Your principals have both challenged me. I am ready to fight any one,
or both of them, as the case may be. Distinctly understand that;
because it is a notion of theirs that I will not do so, or that I
shrink from them; but I am a stranger in this neighbourhood, and have
no one whom I could call upon to relinquish so much, as they run the
risk of doing by attending me to the field.”
“Then your acquaintances are no friends, d—e!” said Jack Pringle,
spitting through his teeth into the bars of a beautifully polished
grate. “I’d stick to anybody—the devil himself, leave alone a
vampyre—if so be as how I had been his friends and drunk grog from the
same can. They are a set of lubbers.”
“I have not been here long enough to form any such friendships, Mr.
Chillingworth; but can confidently rely upon your honour and that of
your principal, and will freely and fairly meet him.”
“But, Sir Francis, you forget the fact, in transacting, myself for Mr.
Bannerworth, and this person for Admiral Bell, we do much, and have our
own characters at stake; nay more, our lives and fortunes. These may
be small; but they are everything to us. Allow me to say, on my own
behalf, that I will not permit my principal to meet you unless you can
name a second, as is usual with gentlemen on such occasions.”
“I regret, while I declare to you my entire willingness to meet you,
that I cannot comply through utter inability to do so, with your
request. Let this go forth to the world as I have stated it, and
let it be an answer to any aspersions that may be uttered as to my
unwillingness to fight.”
There was a pause of some moments. Mr. Chillingworth was resolved that,
come of it what would, he would not permit Henry to fight, unless Sir
Francis Varney himself should appoint a friend, and then they could
meet upon equal terms.
Jack Pringle whistled, and spit, and chewed and turned his quid—hitched
up his trousers, and looked wistfully from one to the other, as he
said,—
“So then it’s likely to be no fight at all, Sir Francis what’s-o’-name?”
“It seems like it, Mr. Pringle,” replied Varney, with a meaning smile;
“unless you can be more complaisant towards myself, and kind towards
the admiral.”
“Why, not exactly that,” said Jack; “it’s a pity to stop a good play in
the beginning, just because some little thing is wrong in the tackling.”
“Perhaps your skill and genius may enable us to find some medium course
that we may pursue with pleasure and profit. What say you, Mr. Pringle?”
“All I know about genius, as you call it is the Flying Dutchman, or
some such odd out o’ the way fish. But, as I said, I am not one to
spoil sport, nor more is the admiral. Oh, no, we is all true men and
good.”
“I believe it,” said Varney, bowing politely.
“You needn’t keep your figure-head on the move; I can see you just as
well. Howsoever, as I was saying, I don’t like to spoil sport, and
sooner than both parties should be disappointed, my principal shall
become your second, Sir Francis.”
“What, Admiral Bell!” exclaimed Varney, lifting his eyebrows with
surprise.
“What, Charles Holland’s uncle!” exclaimed Mr. Chillingworth, in
accents of amazement.
“And why not?” said Jack, with great gravity. “I will pledge my
word—Jack Pringle’s word—that Admiral Bell shall be second to Sir
Francis Varney, during his scrimmage with Mr. Henry Bannerworth.
That will let the matter go on; there can be no back-out then, eh?”
continued Jack Pringle, with a knowing nod at Chillingworth as he spoke.
“That will, I hope, remove your scruples, Mr. Chillingworth,” said
Varney, with a courteous smile.
“But will Admiral Bell do this?”
“His second says so, and has, I daresay, influence enough with him to
induce that person to act in conformity with his promise.”
“In course he will. Do you think he would be the man to hang back? Oh,
no; he would be the last to leave Jack Pringle in the lurch—no. Depend
upon it, Sir Francis, he’ll be as sure to do what I say, as I have said
it.”
“After that assurance, I cannot doubt it,” said Sir Francis Varney;
“this act of kindness will, indeed, lay me under a deep and lasting
obligation to Admiral Bell, which I fear I shall never be able to pay.”
“You need not trouble yourself about that,” said Jack Pringle; “the
admiral will credit all, and you can pay off old scores when his turn
comes in the field.”
“I will not forget,” said Varney; “he deserves every consideration;
but now, Mr. Chillingworth, I presume that we may come to some
understanding respecting this meeting, which you were so kind as to do
me the honour of seeking.”
“I cannot object to its taking place. I shall be most happy to meet
your second in the field, and will arrange with him.”
“I imagine that, under the circumstances, that it will be barely
necessary to go to that length of ceremony. Future interviews can be
arranged later; name the time and place, and after that we can settle
all the rest on the ground.”
“Yes,” said Jack; “it will be time enough, surely, to see the admiral
when we are upon the ground. I’ll warrant the old buffer is a true
brick as ever was; there’s no flinching about him.”
“I am satisfied,” said Varney.
“And I also,” said Chillingworth; “but, understand, Sir Francis, any
default for seconds makes the meeting a blank.”
“I will not doubt Mr. Pringle’s honour so much as to believe it
possible.”
“I’m d—d,” said Jack, “if you ain’t a trump-card, and no mistake; it’s
a great pity as you is a wamphigher.”
“The time, Mr. Chillingworth?”
“To-morrow, at seven o’clock,” replied that gentleman.
“The place, sir?”
“The best place that I can think of is a level meadow half-way between
here and Bannerworth Hall; but that is your privilege, Sir Francis
Varney.”
“I waive it, and am much obliged to you for the choice of the spot; it
seems of the best character imaginable. I will be punctual.”
“I think we have nothing further to arrange now,” said Mr.
Chillingworth. “You will meet with Admiral Bell.”
“Certainly. I believe there is nothing more to be done; this affair is
very satisfactorily arranged, and much better than I anticipated.”
“Good morning, Sir Francis,” said Mr. Chillingworth. “Good morning.”
“Adieu,” said Sir Francis, with a courteous salutation. “Good day,
Mr. Pringle, and commend me to the admiral, whose services will be of
infinite value to me.”
“Don’t mention it,” said Jack; “the admiral’s the man as’d lend any
body a helping hand in case of distress like the present; and I’ll
pledge my word—Jack Pringle’s too, as that he’ll do what’s right, and
give up his turn to Mr. Henry Bannerworth; cause you see he can have
his turn arterwards, you know—it’s only waiting awhile.”
“That’s all,” said Sir Francis.
Jack Pringle made a sea bow and took his leave, as he followed Mr.
Chillingworth, and they both left the house together, to return to
Bannerworth Hall.
“Well,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “I am glad that Sir Francis Varney
has got over the difficulty of having no seconds; for it would not be
proper or safe to meet a man without a friend for him.”
“It ain’t the right thing,” said Jack hitching up his trousers; “but I
was afeard as how he would back out, and that would be just the wrong
thing for the admiral; he’d go raving mad.”
They had got but very few paces from Sir Francis Varney’s house, when
they were joined by Marchdale.
“Ah,” he said, as he came up, “I see you have been to Sir Francis
Varney’s, if I may judge from the direction whence you’re coming, and
your proximity.”
“Yes, we have,” said Mr. Chillingworth. “I thought you had left these
parts?”
“I had intended to do so,” replied Marchdale; “but second thoughts are
sometimes best, you know.”
“Certainly.”
“I have so much friendship for the family at the hall, that
notwithstanding I am compelled to be absent from the mansion itself,
yet I cannot quit the neighbourhood while there are circumstances of
such a character hanging about them. I will remain, and see if there be
not something arising, in which I may be useful to them in some matter.”
“It is very disinterested of you; you will remain here for some time, I
suppose?”
“Yes, undoubtedly; unless, as I do not anticipate, I should see any
occasion to quit my present quarters.”
“I tell you what it is,” said Jack Pringle; “if you had been here
half-an-hour earlier you could have seconded the wamphigher.”
“Seconded!”
“Yes, we’re here to challenge.”
“A double challenge?”
“Yes; but in confiding this matter to you, Mr. Marchdale, you will make
no use of it to the exploding of this affair. By so doing you will
seriously damage the honour of Mr. Henry Bannerworth.”
“I will not, you may rely upon it; but Mr. Chillingworth, do I not see
you in the character of a second?”
“You do, sir.”
“To Mr. Henry?”
“The same, sir.”
“Have you reflected upon the probable consequences of such an act,
should any serious mischief occur?”
“What I have undertaken, Mr. Marchdale, I will go through with;
the consequences I have duly considered, and yet you see me in the
character of Mr. Henry Bannerworth’s friend.”
“I am happy to see you as such, and I do not think Henry could find a
worthier. But this is beside the question. What induced me to make the
remark was this,—had I been at the hall, you will admit that Henry
Bannerworth would have chosen myself, without any disparagement to you,
Mr. Chillingworth.”
“Well sir, what then?”
“Why I am a single man, I can live, reside and go any where; one
country will suit me as well as another. I shall suffer no loss, but as
for you, you will be ruined in every particular; for if you go in the
character of a second, you will not be excused; for all the penalties
incurred your profession of a surgeon will not excuse you.”
“I see all that, sir.”
“What I propose is, that you should accompany the parties to the field,
but in your own proper character of surgeon, and permit me to take that
of second to Mr. Bannerworth.”
“This cannot be done, unless by Mr. Henry Bannerworth’s consent,” said
Mr. Chillingworth.
“Then I will accompany you to Bannerworth Hall, and see Mr. Henry, whom
I will request to permit me to do what I have mentioned to you.”
Mr. Chillingworth could not but admit the reasonableness of this
proposal, and it was agreed they should return to Bannerworth Hall in
company.
Here they arrived in a very short time after, and entered together.
“And now,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “I will go and bring our two
principals, who will be as much astonished to find themselves engaged
in the same quarrel, as I was to find myself sent on a similar errand
to Sir Francis with our friend Mr. John Pringle.”
“Oh, not John—Jack Pringle, you mean,” said that individual.
Chillingworth now went in search of Henry, and sent him to the
apartment where Mr. Marchdale was with Jack Pringle, and then he found
the admiral waiting the return of Jack with impatience.
“Admiral!” he said, “I perceive you are unwell this morning.”
“Unwell be d—d,” said the admiral, starting up with surprise. “Who ever
heard that old Admiral Bell looked ill just afore he was going into
action? I say it’s a scandalous lie.”
“Admiral, admiral, I didn’t say you were ill; only you looked ill—a—a
little nervous, or so. Rather pale, eh? Is it not so?”
“Confound you, do you think I want to be physicked? I tell you, I have
not a little but a great inclination to give you a good keelhauling. I
don’t want a doctor just yet.”
“But it may not be so long, you know, admiral; but there is Jack
Pringle a-waiting you below. Will you go to him? There is a particular
reason; he has something to communicate from Sir Francis Varney, I
believe.”
The admiral gave a look of some amazement at Mr. Chillingworth, and
then he said, muttering to himself,—
“If Jack Pringle should have betrayed me—but, no; he could not do that,
he is too true. I’m sure of Jack; and how did that son of a gallipot
hint about the odd fish I sent Jack to?”
Filled with a dubious kind of belief which he had about something he
had heard of Jack Pringle, he entered the room, where he met Marchdale,
Jack Pringle, and Henry Bannerworth. Immediately afterwards, Mr.
Chillingworth entered the apartment.
“I have,” said he, “been to Sir Francis Varney, and there had an
interview with him, and with Mr. Pringle; when I found we were both
intent upon the same object, namely, an encounter with the knight by
our principals.”
“Eh?” said the admiral.
“What!” exclaimed Henry; “had he challenged you, admiral?”
“Challenged me!” exclaimed Admiral Bell, with a round oath.
“I—however—since it comes to this, I must admit I challenged him.”
“That’s what I did,” said Henry Bannerworth, after a moment’s thought;
“and I perceive we have both fallen into the same line of conduct.”
“That is the fact,” said Mr. Chillingworth. “Both Mr. Pringle and I
went there to settle the preliminaries, and we found an insurmountable
bar to any meeting taking place at all.”
“He wouldn’t fight, then?” exclaimed Henry. “I see it all now.”
“Not fight!” said Admiral Bell, with a sort of melancholy
disappointment. “D—n the cowardly rascal! Tell me, Jack Pringle, what
did the long horse-marine-looking slab say to it? He told me he would
fight. Why he ought to be made to stand sentry over the wind.”
“You challenged him in person, too, I suppose?” said Henry.
“Yes, confound him! I went there last night.”
“And I too.”
“It seems to me,” said Marchdale, “that this affair has been not
indiscretely conducted; but somewhat unusually and strangely, to say
the least of it.”
“You see,” said Chillingworth, “Sir Francis was willing to fight both
Henry and the admiral, as he told us.”
“Yes,” said Jack; “he told us he would fight us both, if so be as his
light was not doused in the first brush.”
“That was all that was wanted,” said the admiral.
“We could expect no more.”
“But then he desired to meet you without any second; but, of course, I
would not accede to this proposal. The responsibility was too great and
too unequally borne by the parties engaged in the rencontre.”
“Decidedly,” said Henry; “but it is unfortunate—very unfortunate.”
“Very,” said the admiral—“very. What a rascally thing it is there ain’t
another rogue in the country to keep him in countenance.”
“I thought it was a pity to spoil sport,” said Jack Pringle. “It was a
pity a good intention should be spoiled, and I promised the wamphigher
that if as how he would fight, you should second him, and you’d meet
him to do so.”
“Eh! who? I!” exclaimed the admiral in some perplexity.
“Yes; that is the truth,” said Mr. Chillingworth. “Mr. Pringle said you
would do so, and he then and there pledged his word that you should
meet him on the ground and second him.”
“Yes,” said Jack “You must do it. I knew you would not spoil sport, and
that there had better be a fight than no fight. I believe you’d sooner
see a scrimmage than none, and so it’s all arranged.”
“Very well,” said the admiral, “I only wish Mr. Henry Bannerworth had
been his second; I think I was entitled to the first meeting.”
“No,” said Jack, “you warn’t, for Mr. Chillingworth was there first;
first come first served, you know.”
“Well, well, I mustn’t grumble at another man’s luck; mine’ll come in
turn; but it had better be so than a disappointment altogether; I’ll be
second to this Sir Francis Varney; he shall have fair play, as I’m an
admiral; but, d—e he shall fight—yes, yes, he shall fight.”
“And to this conclusion I would come,” said Henry, “I wish him to
fight; now I will take care that he shall not have any opportunity of
putting me on one side quietly.”
“There is one thing,” observed Marchdale, “that I wished to propose.
After what has passed, I should not have returned, had I not some
presentiment that something was going forward in which I could be
useful to my friend.”
“Oh!” said the admiral, with a huge twist of his countenance.
“What I was about to say was this,—Mr. Chillingworth has much to lose
as he is situated, and I nothing as I am placed. I am chained down to
no spot of earth. I am above following a profession—my means, I mean,
place me above the necessity. Now, Henry, allow me to be your second
in this affair; allow Mr. Chillingworth to attend in his professional
capacity; he may be of service—of great service to one of the
principals; whereas, if he go in any other capacity, he will inevitably
have his own safety to consult.”
“That is most unquestionably true,” said Henry, “and, to my mind, the
best plan that can be proposed. What say you, Admiral Bell, will you
act with Mr. Marchdale in this affair?”
“Oh, I!—Yes—certainly—I don’t care. Mr. Marchdale is Mr. Marchdale, I
believe, and that’s all I care about. If we quarrel to-day, and have
anything to do to-morrow, in course, to-morrow I can put off my quarrel
for next day; it will keep,—that’s all I have to say at present.”
“Then this is a final arrangement?” said Mr. Chillingworth.
“It is.”
“But, Mr. Bannerworth, in resigning my character of second to Mr.
Marchdale, I only do so because it appears and seems to be the opinion
of all present that I can be much better employed in another capacity.”
“Certainly, Mr. Chillingworth; and I cannot but feel that I am under
the same obligations to you for the readiness and zeal with which you
have acted.”
“I have done what I have done,” said Chillingworth, “because I believed
it was my duty to do so.”
“Mr. Chillingworth has undoubtedly acted most friendly and efficiently
in this affair,” said Marchdale; “and he does not relinquish the part
for the purpose of escaping a friendly deed, but to perform one in
which he may act in a capacity that no one else can.”
“That is true,” said the admiral.
“And now,” said Chillingworth, “you are to meet to-morrow morning in
the meadow at the bottom of the valley, half way between here and Sir
Francis Varney’s house, at seven o’clock in the morning.”
More conversation passed among them, and it was agreed that they should
meet early the next morning, and that, of course, the affair should be
kept a secret.
Marchdale for that night should remain in the house, and the admiral
should appear as if little or nothing was the matter; and he and Jack
Pringle retired, to talk over in private all the arrangements.
Henry Bannerworth and Marchdale also retired, and Mr. Chillingworth,
after a time, retired, promising to be with them in time for the
meeting next morning.
Much of that day was spent by Henry Bannerworth in his own apartment,
in writing documents and letters of one kind and another; but at night
he had not finished, for he had been compelled to be about, and in
Flora’s presence, to prevent anything from being suspected.
Marchdale was much with him, and in secret examined the arms,
ammunition, and bullets, and saw all was right for the next morning;
and when he had done, he said,—
“Now, Henry, you must permit me to insist that you take some hours’
repose, else you will scarcely be as you ought to be.”
“Very good,” said Henry. “I have just finished, and can take your
advice.”
After many thoughts and reflections, Henry Bannerworth fell into a deep
sleep, and slept several hours in calmness and quietude, and at an
early hour he awoke, and saw Marchdale sitting by him.
“Is it time, Marchdale? I have not overslept myself, have I?”
“No; time enough—time enough,” said Marchdale. “I should have let you
sleep longer, but I should have awakened you in good time.”
It was now the grey light of morning, and Henry arose and began to
prepare for the encounter. Marchdale stole to Admiral Bell’s chamber,
but he and Jack Pringle were ready.
Few words were spoken, and those few were in a whisper, and the whole
party left the Hall in as noiseless a manner as possible. It was a mild
morning, and yet it was cold at that time of the morning, just as day
is beginning to dawn in the east. There was, however, ample time to
reach the rendezvous.
It was a curious party that which was now proceeding towards the spot
appointed for the duel, the result of which might have so important an
effect on the interests of those who were to be engaged in it.
It would be difficult for us to analyse the different and conflicting
emotions that filled the breasts of the various individuals composing
that party—the hopes and fears—the doubts and surmises that were given
utterance to; though we are compelled to acknowledge that though to
Henry, the character of the man he was going to meet in mortal fight
was of a most ambiguous and undefined nature, and though no one could
imagine the means he might be endowed with for protection against the
arms of man—Henry, as we said, strode firmly forward with unflinching
resolution. His heart was set on recovering the happiness of his
sister, and he would not falter.
So far, then, we may consider that at length proceedings of a hostile
character were so far clearly and fairly arranged between Henry
Bannerworth and that most mysterious being who certainly, from some
cause or another, had betrayed no inclination to meet an opponent in
that manner which is sanctioned, bad as it is, by the usages of society.
But whether his motive was one of cowardice or mercy, remained yet
to be seen. It might be that he feared himself receiving some mortal
injury, which would at once put a stop to that preternatural career
of existence which he affected to shudder at, and yet evidently took
considerable pains to prolong.
Upon the other hand, it is just possible that some consciousness of
invulnerability on his own part, or of great power to injure his
antagonist, might be the cause why he had held back so long from
fighting the duel, and placed so many obstacles in the way of the usual
necessary arrangements incidental to such occasions.
Now, however, there would seem to be no possible means of escape. Sir
Francis Varney must fight or fly, for he was surrounded by too many
opponents.
To be sure he might have appealed to the civil authorities to protect
him, and to sanction him in his refusal to commit what undoubtedly is
a legal offence; but then there cannot be a question that the whole of
the circumstances would come out, and meet the public eye—the result
of which would be, his acquisition of a reputation as unenviable as it
would be universal.
It had so happened, that the peculiar position of the Bannerworth
family kept their acquaintance within extremely narrow limits, and
greatly indisposed them to set themselves up as marks for peculiar
observation.
Once holding, as they had, a proud position in the county, and being
looked upon quite as magnates of the land, they did not now court the
prying eye of curiosity to look upon their poverty; but rather with
a gloomy melancholy they lived apart, and repelled the advances of
society by a cold reserve, which few could break through.
Had this family suffered in any noble cause, or had the misfortunes
which had come over them, and robbed their ancestral house of its
lustre, been an unavoidable dispensation of providence, they would
have borne the hard position with a different aspect; but it must be
remembered, that to the faults, the vices, and the criminality of some
of their race, was to be attributed their present depressed state.
It has been seen during the progress of our tale, that its action has
been tolerably confined to Bannerworth Hall, its adjacent meadows,
and the seat of Sir Francis Varney; the only person at any distance,
knowing anything of the circumstances, or feeling any interest in them,
being Mr. Chillingworth, the surgeon, who, from personal feeling, as
well as from professional habit, was not likely to make a family’s
affairs a subject of gossip.
A change, however, was at hand—a change of a most startling and
alarming character to Varney—one which he might expect, yet not be well
prepared for.
This period of serenity was to pass away, and he was to become most
alarmingly popular. We will not, however, anticipate, but proceed at
once to detail as briefly as may be the hostile meeting.
It would appear that Varney, now that he had once consented to the
definitive arrangements of a duel, shrunk not in any way from carrying
them out, nor in the slightest attempted to retard arrangements which
might be fatal to himself.
The early morning was one of those cloudy ones so frequently occurring
in our fickle climate, when the cleverest weather prophet would find it
difficult to predict what the next hour might produce.
There was a kind of dim gloominess over all objects; and as there were
no bright lights, there were no deep shadows—the consequence of which
was a sureness of effect over the landscape, that robbed it of many of
its usual beauties.
Such was the state of things when Marchdale accompanied Henry and
Admiral Bell from Bannerworth Hall across the garden in the direction
of the hilly wood, close to which was the spot intended for the scene
of encounter.
Jack Pringle came on at a lazy pace behind with his hands in his
pockets, and looking as unconcerned as if he had just come out for a
morning’s stroll, and scarcely knew whether he saw what was going on or
not.
The curious contortion into which he twisted his countenance, and the
different odd-looking lumps that appeared in it from time to time,
may be accounted for by a quid of unusual size, which he seemed to
be masticating with a relish quite horrifying to one unused to so
barbarous a luxury.
The admiral had strictly enjoined him not to interfere on pain of
being considered a lubber and no seaman for the remainder of his
existence—threatened penalties which, of course, had their own weight
with Jack, and accordingly he came just to see the row in as quiet a
way as possible, perhaps not without a hope, that something might turn
up in the shape of a _causus belli_, that might justify him in adopting
a threatening attitude towards somebody.
“Now, Master Henry,” said the admiral, “none of your palaver to me as
we go along, recollect I don’t belong to your party, you know. I’ve
stood friend to two or three fellows in my time; but if anybody had
said to me, ‘Admiral Bell, the next time you go out on a quiet little
shooting party, it will be as second to a vampyre,’ I’d have said
‘you’re a liar’ Howsomever, d—me, here you goes, and what I mean to
say is this, Mr Henry, that I’d second even a Frenchman rather than he
shouldn’t fight when he’s asked.”
“That’s liberal of you,” said Henry, “at all events.”
“I believe you it is,” said the admiral, “so mind if you don’t hit him,
I’m not a-going to tell you how—all you’ve got to do is, to fire low;
but that’s no business of mine. Shiver my timbers, I oughtn’t to tell
you, but d—n you, hit him if you can.”
“Admiral,” said Henry, “I can hardly think you are even preserving a
neutrality in the matter, putting aside my own partisanship as regards
your own man.”
“Oh! hang him. I’m not going to let him creep out of the thing on such
a shabby pretence, I can tell you. I rather think I ought to have gone
to his house this morning; only, as I said I never would cross his
threshold again, I won’t.”
“I wonder if he’ll come,” said Mr. Marchdale to Henry. “After all, you
know he may take to flight, and shun an encounter which, it is evident,
he has entered into but tardily.”
“I hope not,” said Henry, “and yet I must own that your supposition has
several times crossed my mind. If, however, he do not meet me, he never
can appear at all in the country, and we should, at least, be rid of
him, and all his troublesome importunities concerning the Hall. I would
not allow that man, on any account, to cross the threshold of my house,
as its tenant or its owner.”
“Why, it ain’t usual,” said the admiral, “to let ones house to two
people at once, unless you seem quite to forget that I’ve taken yours.
I may as well remind you of it.”
“Hurra!” said Jack Pringle, at this moment.
“What’s the matter with you? Who told you to hurra?”
“Enemy in the offing,” said Jack, “three or four pints to the sou-west.”
“So he is, by Jove! dodging about among the trees. Come, now, this
vampyre’s a decenter fellow than I thought him. He means, after all, to
let us have a pop at him.”
They had now reached so close to the spot, that Sir Francis Varney,
who, to all appearance, had been waiting, emerged from among the trees,
rolled up in his dismal-looking cloak, and, if possible, looking longer
and thinner than ever he had looked before.
His face wore a singular cadaverous-looking aspect. His very lips were
white and there was a curious, pinkish-looking circle round each of
his eyes, that imparted to his whole countenance a most uninviting
appearance. He turned his eyes from one to the other of those who were
advancing towards him, until he saw the admiral, upon which he gave
such a grim and horrible smile, that the old man exclaimed,—
“I say, Jack, you lubber, there’s a face for a figure-head.”
“Ay, ay, sir.”
“Did you ever see such a d—d grin as that in your life, in any
latitude?”
“Ay, ay, sir.”
“You did you swab.”
“I should think so.”
“It’s a lie, and you know it.”
“Very good,” said Jack, “don’t you recollect when that ere iron bullet
walked over your head, leaving a nice little nick, all the way off
Bergen-ap-Zoom, that was the time—blessed if you didn’t give just such
a grin as that.”
“I didn’t, you rascal.”
“And I say you did.”
“Mutiny, by God!”
“Go to blazes!”
How far this contention might have gone, having now reached its
culminating point, had the admiral and Jack been alone, it is hard to
say; but as it was, Henry and Marchdale interfered, and so the quarrel
was patched up for the moment, in order to give place to more important
affairs.
Varney seemed to think, that after the smiling welcome he had given to
his second, he had done quite enough; for there he stood, tall, and
gaunt, and motionless, if we may except an occasional singular movement
of the mouth, and a clap together of his teeth, at times, which was
enough to make anybody jump to hear.
“For Heaven’s sake,” said Marchdale, “do not let us trifle at such a
moment as this. Mr. Pringle, you really had no business here.”
“Mr. who?” said Jack.
“Pringle, I believe, is your name?” returned Marchdale.
“It were; but blowed if ever I was called mister before.”
The admiral walked up to Sir Francis Varney, and gave him a nod that
looked much more like one of defiance than of salutation, to which the
vampyre replied by a low, courtly bow.
“Oh, bother!” muttered the old admiral. “If I was to double up my
backbone like that, I should never get it down straight again. Well,
all’s right; you’ve come; that’s all you could do, I suppose.”
“I am here,” said Varney, “and therefore it becomes a work of
supererogation to remark that I’ve come.”
“Oh! does it? I never bolted a dictionary, and, therefore, I don’t know
exactly what you mean.”
“Step aside with me a moment, Admiral Bell, and I will tell you what
you are to do with me after I am shot, if such should be my fate.”
“Do with you! D—d if I’ll do anything with you.”
“I don’t expect you will regret me; you will eat.”
“Eat!”
“Yes, and drink as usual, no doubt, notwithstanding being witness to
the decease of a fellow-creature.”
“Belay there; don’t call yourself a fellow-creature of mine; I ain’t a
vampyre.”
“But there’s no knowing what you may be; and now listen to my
instructions; for as you’re my second, you cannot very well refuse to
me a few friendly offices. Rain is falling. Step beneath this ancient
tree, and I will talk to you.”
CHAPTER XXXIX.
THE STORM AND THE FIGHT.-THE ADMIRAL’S REPUDIATION OF HIS PRINCIPAL.
“Well,” said the admiral, when they were fairly under the tree,
upon the leaves of which the pattering rain might be heard falling:
“well—what is it?”
“If your young friend, Mr. Bannerworth, should chance to send a
pistol-bullet through any portion of my anatomy, prejudicial to the
prolongation of my existence, you will be so good as not to interfere
with anything I may have about me, or to make any disturbance whatever.”
“You may depend I sha’n’t.”
“Just take the matter perfectly easy—as a thing of course.”
“Oh! I mean d—d easy.”
“Ha! what a delightful thing is friendship! There is a little knoll
or mound of earth midway between here and the Hall. Do you happen to
know it? There is one solitary tree growing near its summit—an oriental
looking tree, of the fir tribe, which, fan-like, spreads its deep green
leaves; across the azure sky.”
“Oh! bother it; it’s a d—d old tree, growing upon a little bit of a
hill, I suppose you mean?”
“Precisely; only much more poetically expressed. The moon rises at a
quarter past four to-night, or rather to-morrow, morning.”
“Does it?”
“Yes; and if I should happen to be killed, you will have me removed
gently to this mound of earth, and there laid beneath this tree, with
my face upwards; and take care that it is done before the moon rises.
You can watch that no one interferes.”
“A likely job. What the deuce do you take me for? I tell you what it
is, Mr. Vampyre, or Varney, or whatever’s your name, if you should
chance to be hit, wherever you chance to fall, there you’ll lie.”
“How very unkind.”
“Uncommon, ain’t it?”
“Well, well, since that is your determination, I must take care of
myself in another way. I can do so, and I will.”
“Take care of yourself how you like, for all I care; I’ve come here to
second you, and to see that, on the honour of a seaman, if you are put
out of the world, it’s done in a proper manner, that’s all I have to do
with you—now you know.”
Sir Francis Varney looked after him with a strange kind of smile, as he
walked away to make the necessary preparation with Marchdale for the
immediate commencement of the contest.
These were simple and brief. It was agreed that twelve paces should be
measured out, six each way, from a fixed point; one six to be paced by
the admiral, and the other by Marchdale; then they were to draw lots,
to see at which end of this imaginary line Varney was to be placed;
after this the signal for firing was to be one, two, three—fire!
A few minutes sufficed to complete these arrangements; the ground was
measured in the manner we have stated, and the combatants placed in
their respective positions, Sir Francis Varney occupying the same spot
where he had at first stood, namely, that nearest to the little wood,
and to his own residence.
It is impossible that under such circumstances the bravest and the
calmest of mankind could fail to feel some slight degree of tremour or
uneasiness; and, although we can fairly claim for Henry Bannerworth
that he was as truly courageous as any right feeling Christian man
could wish to be, yet when it was possible that he stood within, as it
were, a hair’s breadth of eternity, a strange world of sensation and
emotions found a home in his heart, and he could not look altogether
undaunted on that future which might, for all he knew to the contrary,
be so close at hand, as far as he was concerned.
It was not that he feared death, but that he looked with a decent
gravity upon so grave a change as that from this world to the next, and
hence was it that his face was pale, and that he looked all the emotion
which he really felt.
This was the aspect and the bearing of a brave but not a reckless
man; while Sir Francis Varney, on the other hand, seemed, now that
he had fairly engaged in the duel, to look upon it and its attendant
circumstances with a kind of smirking satisfaction, as if he were far
more amused than personally interested.
This was certainly the more extraordinary after the manner in which
he had tried to evade the fight, and, at all events, was quite a
sufficient proof that cowardice had not been his actuating motive in so
doing.
The admiral, who stood on a level with him, could not see the sort of
expression he wore, or, probably, he would have been far from well
pleased; but the others did, and they found something inexpressibly
disagreeable in the smirking kind of satisfaction with which the
vampyre seemed to regard now the proceedings.
“Confound him,” whispered Marchdale to Henry, “one would think he was
quite delighted, instead, as we had imagined him, not well pleased, at
these proceedings; look how he grins.”
“It is no matter,” said Henry; “let him wear what aspect he may, it
is the same to me; and, as Heaven is my judge, I here declare, if I
did not think myself justified in so doing, I would not raise my hand
against this man.”
“There can be no shadow of a doubt regarding your justification. Have
at him, and Heaven protect you.”
“Amen!”
The admiral was to give the word to fire, and now he and Marchdale
having stepped sufficiently on one side to be out of all possible
danger from any stray shot, he commenced repeating the signal,—
“Are you ready, gentlemen?—once.”
They looked sternly at each other, and each grasped his pistol.
“Twice!”
Sir Francis Varney smiled and looked around him, as if the affair were
one of the most common-place description.
“Thrice!”
Varney seemed to be studying the sky rather than attending to the duel.
“Fire!” said the admiral, and one report only struck upon the ear. It
was that from Henry’s pistol.
All eyes were turned upon Sir Francis Varney, who had evidently
reserved his fire, for what purpose could not be devised, except a
murderous one, the taking of a more steady aim at Henry.
Sir Francis, however, seemed in no hurry, but smiled significantly, and
gradually raised the point of his weapon.
“Did you hear the word, Sir Francis? I gave it loud enough, I am sure.
I never spoke plainer in my life; did I ever, Jack?”
“Yes, often,” said Jack Pringle; “what’s the use of your asking such
yarns as them? you know you have done so often enough when you wanted
grog.”
“You d—d rascal, I’ll—I’ll have your back scored, I will.”
“So you will, when you are afloat again, which you never will be—you’re
paid off, that’s certain.”
“You lubberly lout, you ain’t a seaman; a seaman would never mutiny
against his admiral; howsomever, do you hear, Sir Francis, I’ll give
the matter up, if you don’t pay some attention to me.”
Henry looked steadily at Varney, expecting every moment to feel his
bullet. Mr. Marchdale hastily exclaimed that this was not according to
usage.
Sir Francis Varney took no notice, but went on elevating his weapon;
when it was perpendicular to the earth he fired in the air.
[Illustration: The duel between Varney and Henry Bannerworth.]
“I had not anticipated this,” said Marchdale, as he walked to Henry. “I
thought he was taking a more deadly aim.”
“And I,” said Henry.
“Ay, you have escaped, Henry; let me congratulate you.”
“Not so fast; we may fire again.”
“I can afford to do that,” he said, with a smile.
“You should have fired, sir, according to custom,” said the admiral;
“this is not the proper thing.”
“What, fire at your friend?”
“Oh, that’s all very well! You are my friend for a time, vampyre as you
are, and I intend you shall fire.”
“If Mr. Henry Bannerworth demands another fire, I have no objection to
it, and will fire at him; but as it is I shall not do so, indeed, it
would be quite useless for him to do so—to point mortal weapons at me
is mere child’s play, they will not hurt me.”
“The devil they won’t,” said the admiral.
“Why, look you here,” said Sir Francis Varney, stepping forward and
placing his hand to his neckerchief; “look you here; if Mr. Henry
Bannerworth should demand another fire, he may do so with the same
bullet.”
“The same bullet!” said Marchdale, stepping forward—“the same bullet!
How is this?”
“My eyes,” said Jack; “who’d a thought it; there’s a go! Wouldn’t he do
for a dummy—to lead a forlorn hope, or to put among the boarders?”
“Here,” said Sir Francis, handing a bullet to Henry Bannerworth—“here
is the bullet you shot at me.”
Henry looked at it—it was blackened by powder; and then Marchdale
seized it and tried it in the pistol, but found the bullet fitted
Henry’s weapon.
“By heavens, it is so!” he exclaimed, stepping back and looking at
Varney from top to toe in horror and amazement.
“D——e,” said the admiral, “if I understand this. Why Jack Pringle, you
dog, here’s a strange fish.”
“On, no! there’s plenty on ’um in some countries.”
“Will you insist upon another fire, or may I consider you satisfied?”
“I shall object,” said Marchdale. “Henry, this affair must go no
further; it would be madness—worse than madness, to fight upon such
terms.”
“So say I,” said the admiral. “I will not have anything to do with
you, Sir Francis. I’ll not be your second any longer. I didn’t bargain
for such a game as this. You might as well fight with the man in brass
armour, at the Lord Mayor’s show, or the champion at a coronation.”
“Oh!” said Jack Pringle; “a man may as well fire at the back of a
halligator as a wamphigher.”
“This must be considered as having been concluded,” said Mr. Marchdale.
“No!” said Henry.
“And wherefore not?”
“Because I have not received his fire.”
“Heaven forbid you should.”
“I may not with honour quit the ground without another fire.”
“Under ordinary circumstances there might be some shadow of an excuse
for your demand; but as it is there is none. You have neither honour
nor credit to gain by such an encounter, and, certainly, you can gain
no object.”
“How are we to decide this affair? Am I considered absolved from the
accusation under which I lay, of cowardice?” inquired Sir Francis
Varney, with a cold smile.
“Why, as for that,” said the admiral, “I should as soon expect credit
for fighting behind a wall, as with a man that I couldn’t hit any more
than the moon.”
“Henry; let me implore you to quit this scene; it can do no good.”
At this moment, a noise, as of human voices, was heard at a distance;
this caused a momentary pause, and, the whole party stood still and
listened.
The murmurs and shouts that now arose in the distance were indistinct
and confused.
“What can all this mean?” said Marchdale; “there is something
very strange about it. I cannot imagine a cause for so unusual an
occurrence.”
“Nor I,” said Sir Francis Varney, looking suspiciously at Henry
Bannerworth.
“Upon my honour I know neither what is the cause nor the nature of the
sounds themselves.”
“Then we can easily see what is the matter from yonder hillock,” said
the admiral; “and there’s Jack Pringle, he’s up there already. What’s
he telegraphing about in that manner, I wonder?”
The fact was, Jack Pringle, hearing the riot, had thought that if he
got to the neighbouring eminence he might possibly ascertain what it
was that was the cause of what he termed the “row,” and had succeeded
in some degree.
There were a number of people of all kinds coming out from the village,
apparently armed, and shouting. Jack Pringle hitched up his trousers
and swore, then took off his hat and began to shout to the admiral, as
he said,—
“D——e, they are too late to spoil the sport. Hilloa! hurrah!”
“What’s all that about, Jack?” inquired the admiral, as he came puffing
along. “What’s the squall about?”
“Only a few horse-marines and bumboat-women, that have been startled
like a company of penguins.”
“Oh! my eyes! wouldn’t a whole broadside set ’em flying, Jack?”
“Ay; just as them Frenchmen that you murdered on board the Big
Thunderer, as you called it.”
“I murder them, you rascal?”
“Yes; there was about five hundred of them killed.”
“They were only shot.”
“They were killed, only your conscience tells you it’s uncomfortable.”
“You rascal—you villain! You ought to be keel-hauled and well payed.”
“Ay; you’re payed, and paid off as an old hulk.”
“D——e—you—you—oh! I wish I had you on board ship, I’d make your
lubberly carcass like a union jack, full of red and blue stripes.”
“Oh! it’s all very well; but if you don’t take to your heels, you’ll
have all the old women in the village a whacking on you, that’s all I
have to say about it. You’d better port your helm and about ship, or
you’ll be keel-hauled.”
“D—n your——”
“What’s the matter?” inquired Marchdale, as he arrived.
“What’s the cause of all the noise we have heard?” said Sir Francis;
“has some village festival spontaneously burst forth among the rustics
of this place?”
“I cannot tell the cause of it,” said Henry Bannerworth; “but they seem
to me to be coming towards this place.”
“Indeed!”
“I think so too,” said Marchdale.
“With what object?” inquired Sir Francis Varney.
“No peaceable one,” observed Henry; “for, as far I can observe, they
struck across the country, as though they would enclose something, or
intercept somebody.”
“Indeed! but why come here?”
“If I knew that I could have at once told the cause.”
“And they appear armed with a variety of odd weapons,” observed Sir
Francis; “they mean an attack upon some one. Who is that man with them?
he seems to be deprecating their coming.”
[Illustration: Mr. Chillingworth tries to appease the fury of the mob.]
“That appears to be Mr. Chillingworth,” said Henry; “I think that is
he.”
“Yes,” observed the admiral; “I think I know the build of that craft;
he’s been in our society before. I always know a ship as soon as I see
it.”
“Does you, though?” said Jack.
“Yea; what do you mean, eh? let me hear what you’ve got to say against
your captain and your admiral, you mutinous dog; you tell me, I say.”
“So I will; you thought you were fighting a big ship in a fog, and
fired a dozen broadsides or so, and it was only the Flying Dutchman, or
the devil.”
“You infernal dog——”
“Well, you know it was; it might a been our own shadow for all I can
tell. Indeed, I think it was.”
“You think!”
“Yes.”
“That’s mutiny; I’ll have no more to do with you, Jack Pringle; you’re
no seaman, and have no respect for your officer. Now sheer off, or I’ll
cut your yards.”
“Why, as for my yards, I’ll square ’em presently if I like, you old
swab; but as for leaving you, very well; you have said so, and you
shall be accommodated, d—e; however, it was not so when your nob was
nearly rove through with a boarding pike; it wasn’t ‘I’ll have no more
to do with Jack Pringle’ then, it was more t’other.”
“Well, then, why be so mutinous?”
“Because you aggrawates me.”
The cries of the mob became more distinct as they drew nearer to the
party, who began to evince some uneasiness as to their object.
“Surely,” said Marchdale, “Mr. Chillingworth has not named anything
respecting the duel that has taken place.”
“No, no.”
“But he was to have been here this morning,” said the admiral. “I
understood he was to be here in his own character of a surgeon, and yet
I have not seen him; have any of you?”
“No,” said Henry.
“Then here he comes in the character of conservator of the public
peace,” said Varney, coldly; “however, I believe that his errand will
be useless since the affair is, I presume, concluded.”
“Down with the vampyre!”
“Eh!” said the admiral, “eh, what’s that, eh? What did they say?”
“If you’ll listen they’ll tell you soon enough, I’ll warrant.”
“May be they will, and yet I’d like to know now.”
Sir Francis Varney looked significantly at Marchdale, and then waited
with downcast eyes for the repetition of the words.
“Down with the vampyre!” resounded on all sides from the people who
came rapidly towards them, and converging towards a centre. “Burn,
destroy, and kill the vampyre! No vampyre; burn him out; down with him;
kill him!”
Then came Mr. Chillingworth’s voice, who, with much earnestness,
endeavoured to exhort them to moderation, and to refrain from violence.
Sir Francis Varney became very pale and agitated; he immediately
turned, and without taking the least notice, he made for the wood,
which lay between him and his own house, leaving the people in the
greatest agitation.
Mr. Marchdale was not unmoved at this occurrence, but stood his ground
with Henry Bannerworth, the admiral, and Jack Pringle, until the mob
came very near to them, shouting, and uttering cries of vengeance, and
death of all imaginable kinds that it was possible to conceive, against
the unpopular vampyre.
Pending the arrival of these infuriated persons, we will, in a few
words, state how it was that so suddenly a set of circumstances arose
productive of an amount of personal danger to Varney, such as, up to
that time, had seemed not at all likely to occur.
We have before stated there was but one person out of the family of
the Bannerworths who was able to say anything of a positive character
concerning the singular and inexplicable proceedings at the Hall; and
that that person was Mr. Chillingworth, an individual not at all likely
to become garrulous upon the subject.
But, alas! the best of men have their weaknesses, and we much regret
to say that Mr. Chillingworth so far in this instance forgot that
admirable discretion which commonly belonged to him, as to be the cause
of the popular tumult which had now readied such a height.
In a moment of thoughtlessness and confidence, he told his wife. Yes,
this really clever man, from whom one would not have expected such a
piece of horrible indiscretion, actually told his wife all about the
vampyre. But such is human nature; combined with an amount of firmness
and reasoning power, that one would have thought to be invulnerable
safeguards, we find some weakness which astonishes all calculation.
Such was this of Mr. Chillingworth’s. It is true, he cautioned the
lady to be secret, and pointed to her the danger of making Varney the
vampyre a theme for gossip; but he might as well have whispered to a
hurricane to be so good as not to go on blowing so, as request Mrs.
Chillingworth to keep a secret.
Of course she burst into the usual fervent declarations of “Who was
she to tell? Was she a person who went about telling things? When did
she see anybody? Not she, once in a blue moon;” and then, when Mr.
Chillingworth went out, like the King of Otaheite, she invited the
neighbours round about to come to take some tea.
Under solemn promises of secrecy, sixteen ladies that evening were made
acquainted with the full and interesting particulars of the attack of
the vampyre on Flora Bannerworth, and all the evidence inculpating Sir
Francis Varney as the bloodthirsty individual.
When the mind comes to consider that these sixteen ladies multiplied
their information by about four-and-twenty each, we become quite lost
in a sea of arithmetic, and feel compelled to sum up the whole by a
candid assumption that in four-and-twenty hours not an individual in
the whole town was ignorant of the circumstances.
On the morning before the projected duel, there was an unusual
commotion in the streets. People were conversing together in little
knots, and using rather violent gesticulations. Poor Mr. Chillingworth!
he alone was ignorant of the causes of the popular commotion, and so he
went to bed wondering that an unusual bustle pervaded the little market
town, but not at all guessing its origin.
Somehow or another, however, the populace, who had determined to
make a demonstration on the following morning against the vampyre,
thought it highly necessary first to pay some sort of compliment to
Mr. Chillingworth, and, accordingly, at an early hour, a great mob
assembled outside his house, and gave three terrific applauding shouts,
which roused him most unpleasantly from his sleep; and induced the
greatest astonishment at the cause of such a tumult.
Oh, that artful Mrs. Chillingworth! too well she knew what was the
matter; yet she pretended to be so oblivious upon the subject.
“Good God!” cried Mr. Chillingworth, as he started up in bed, “what’s
all that?”
“All what?” said his wife.
“All what! Do you mean to say you heard nothing?”
“Well, I think I did hear a little sort of something.”
“A little sort of something? It shook the house.”
“Well, well; never mind. Go to sleep again; it’s no business of ours.”
“Yes; but it may be, though. It’s all very well to say ‘go to sleep.’
That happens to be a thing I can’t do. There’s something amiss.”
“Well, what’s that to you?”
“Perhaps nothing; but, perhaps, everything.”
Mr. Chillingworth sprang from his bed, and began dressing, a process
which he executed with considerable rapidity, and in which he was much
accelerated by two or three supplementary shouts from the people below.
Then, in a temporary lull, a loud voice shouted,—
“Down with the vampyre—down with the vampyre!”
The truth in an instant burst over the mind of Mr. Chillingworth; and,
turning to his wife, he exclaimed,—
“I understand it now. You’ve been gossipping about Sir Francis Varney,
and have caused all this tumult.”
“I gossip! Well, I never! Lay it on me; it’s sure to be my fault. I
might have known that beforehand. I always am.”
“But you must have spoken of it.”
“Who have I got to speak to about it?”
“Did you, or did you not?”
“Who should I tell?”
Mr. Chillingworth was dressed, and he hastened down and entered the
street with great desperation. He had a hope that he might be enabled
to disperse the crowd, and yet be in time to keep his appointment at
the duel.
His appearance was hailed with another shout, for it was considered, of
course, that he had come to join in the attack upon Sir Francis Varney.
He found assembled a much more considerable mob than he had imagined,
and to his alarm he found many armed with all sorts of weapons of
offence.
“Hurrah!” cried a great lumpy-looking fellow, who seemed half mad with
the prospect of a disturbance. “Hurrah! here’s the doctor, he’ll tell
us all about it as we go along. Come on.”
“For Heaven’s sake,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “stop! What are you about
to do all of you?”
“Burn the vampyre—burn the vampyre!”
“Hold—hold! this is folly. Let me implore you all to return to your
homes, or you will get into serious trouble on this subject.”
This was a piece of advice not at all likely to be adopted; and when
the mob found that Mr. Chillingworth was not disposed to encourage and
countenance it in its violence, it gave another loud shout of defiance,
and moved off through the long straggling streets of the town in a
direction towards Sir Francis Varney’s house.
It is true that what were called the authorities of the town had
become alarmed, and were stirring, but they found themselves in such
a frightful minority, that it became out of the question for them
to interfere with any effect to stop the lawless proceedings of the
rioters, so that the infuriated populace had it all their own way, and
in a straggling, disorderly-looking kind of procession they moved off,
vowing vengeance as they went against Varney the vampyre.
Hopeless as Mr. Chillingworth thought it was to interfere with any
degree of effect in the proceedings of the mob, he still could not
reconcile it to himself to be absent from a scene which he now felt
certain had been produced by his own imprudence, so he went on with
the crowd, endeavouring, as he did so, by every argument that could be
suggested to him to induce them to abstain from the acts of violence
they contemplated. He had a hope, too, that when they reached Sir
Francis Varney’s, finding him not within, as probably would be the
case, as by that time he would have started to meet Henry Bannerworth
on the ground, to fight the duel, he might induce the mob to return and
forego their meditated violence.
And thus was it that, urged on by a multitude of persons, the unhappy
surgeon was expiating, both in mind and person, the serious mistakes he
had committed in trusting a secret to his wife.
Let it not be supposed that we for one moment wish to lay down a
general principle as regards the confiding secrets to ladies, because
from the beginning of the world it has become notorious how well they
keep them, and with what admirable discretion, tact, and forethought
this fairest portion of humanity conduct themselves.
We know how few Mrs. Chillingworths there are in the world, and have
but to regret that our friend the doctor should, in his matrimonial
adventure, have met with such a specimen.
CHAPTER XL.
THE POPULAR RIOT.—SIR FRANCIS VARNEY’S DANGER.—THE SUGGESTION AND ITS
RESULTS.
Such, then, were the circumstances which at once altered the whole
aspect of the affairs, and, from private and domestic causes of very
deep annoyance, led to public results of a character which seemed
likely to involve the whole country-side in the greatest possible
confusion.
But while we blame Mr. Chillingworth for being so indiscreet as to
communicate the secret of such a person as Varney the vampyre to his
wife, we trust in a short time to be enabled to show that he made as
much reparation as it was possible to make for the mischief he had
unintentionally committed. And now as he struggled onward—apparently
onward—first and foremost among the rioters, he was really doing all in
his power to quell that tumult which superstition and dread had raised.
Human nature truly delights in the marvellous, and in proportion
as a knowledge of the natural phenomena of nature is restricted,
and unbridled imagination allowed to give the rein to fathomless
conjecture, we shall find an eagerness likewise to believe the
marvellous to be the truth.
That dim and uncertain condition concerning vampyres, originating
probably as it had done in Germany, had spread itself slowly, but
insidiously, throughout the whole of the civilized world.
In no country and in no clime is there not something which bears a kind
of family relationship to the veritable vampyre of which Sir Francis
Varney appeared to be so choice a specimen.
The _ghoul_ of eastern nations is but the same being, altered to suit
habits and localities; and the _sema_ of the Scandinavians is but the
vampyre of a more primitive race, and a personification of that morbid
imagination which has once fancied the probability of the dead walking
again among the living, with all the frightful insignia of corruption
and the grave about them.
Although not popular in England, still there had been tales told of
such midnight visitants, so that Mrs. Chillingworth, when she had
imparted the information which she had obtained, had already some rough
material to work upon in the minds of her auditors, and therefore there
was no great difficulty in very soon establishing the fact.
Under such circumstances, ignorant people always do what they have
heard has been done by some one else before them and in an incredibly
short space of time the propriety of catching Sir Francis Varney,
depriving him of his vampyre-like existence, and driving a stake
through his body, became not at all a questionable proposition.
Alas, poor Mr. Chillingworth! as well might he have attempted King
Canute’s task of stemming the waves of the ocean as that of attempting
to stop the crowd from proceeding to Sir Francis Varney’s house.
His very presence was a sort of confirmation of the whole affair. In
vain he gesticulated, in vain he begged and prayed that they would go
back, and in vain he declared that full and ample justice should be
done upon the vampyre, provided popular clamour spared him, and he was
left to more deliberate judgment.
Those who were foremost in the throng paid no attention to these
remonstrances, while those who were more distant heard them not, and,
for all they knew, he might be urging the crowd on to violence, instead
of deprecating it.
Thus, then, this disorderly rabble rout soon reached the house of Sir
Francis Varney, and loudly demanded of his terrified servants where he
was to be found.
The knocking at the Hall door was prodigious, and, with a laudable
desire, doubtless, of saving time, the moment one was done amusing
himself with the ponderous knocker, another seized it; so that until
the door was flung open by some of the bewildered and terrified men,
there was no cessation whatever of the furious demands for admittance.
“Varney the vampyre—Varney the vampyre!” cried a hundred voices. “Death
to the vampyre! Where is he? Bring him out. Varney the vampyre!”
The servants were too terrified to speak for some moments, as they saw
such a tumultuous assemblage seeking their master, while so singular
a name was applied to him. At length, one more bold than the rest
contrived to stammer out,—
“My good people, Sir Francis Varney is not at home. He took an early
breakfast, and has been out nearly an hour.”
The mob paused a moment in indecision, and then one of the foremost
cried,—
“Who’d suppose they’d own he was at home? He’s hiding somewhere of
course; let’s pull him out.”
“Ah, pull him out—pull him out!” cried many voices. A rush was made
into the house, and in a very few minutes its chambers were ransacked,
and all its hidden places carefully searched, with the hope of
discovering the hidden form of Sir Francis Varney.
The servants felt that, with their inefficient strength, to oppose the
proceedings of an assemblage which seemed to be unchecked by all sort
of law or reason, would be madness; they therefore only looked on, with
wonder and dismay, satisfied certainly in their own minds that Sir
Francis would not be found, and indulging in much conjecture as to what
would be the result of such violent and unexpected proceedings.
Mr. Chillingworth hoped that time was being gained, and that some sort
of indication of what was going on would reach the unhappy object of
popular detestation sufficiently early to enable him to provide for his
own safety.
He knew he was breaking his own engagement to be present at the duel
between Henry Bannerworth and Sir Francis Varney, and, as that thought
recurred to him, he dreaded that his professional services might be
required on one side or the other; for he knew, or fancied he knew,
that mutual hatred dictated the contest; and he thought that if ever
a duel had taken place which was likely to be attended with some
disastrous result, that was surely the one.
But how could he leave, watched and surrounded as he was by an
infuriated multitude—how could he hope but that his footsteps would be
dogged, or that the slightest attempt of his to convey a warning to Sir
Francis Varney, would not be the means of bringing down upon his head
the very danger he sought to shield him from.
In this state of uncertainty, then, did our medical man remain, a prey
to the bitterest reflections, and full of the direst apprehensions,
without having the slightest power of himself to alter so disastrous a
train of circumstances.
Dissatisfied with their non-success, the crowd twice searched the house
of Sir Francis Varney, from the attics to the basement; and then, and
not till then, did they begin reluctantly to believe that the servants
must have spoken the truth.
“He’s in the town somewhere,” cried one. “Let’s go back to the town.”
It is strange how suddenly any mob will obey any impulse, and this
perfectly groundless supposition was sufficient to turn their steps
back again in the direction whence they came, and they had actually,
in a straggling sort of column, reached halfway towards the town, when
they encountered a boy, whose professional pursuit consisted in tending
sheep very early of a morning, and who at once informed them that he
had seen Sir Francis Varney in the wood, half way between Bannerworth
Hall and his own home.
This event at once turned the whole tide again, and with renewed
clamours, carrying Mr. Chillingworth along with them, they now rapidly
neared the real spot, where, probably, had they turned a little
earlier, they would have viewed the object of their suspicion and
hatred.
But, as we have already recorded, the advancing throng was seen by the
parties on the ground, where the duel could scarcely have been said
to have been fought; and then had Sir Francis Varney dashed into the
wood, which was so opportunely at hand to afford him a shelter from his
enemies, and from the intricacies of which—well acquainted with them as
he doubtless was,—he had every chance of eluding their pursuit.
The whole affair was a great surprise to Henry and his friends, when
they saw such a string of people advancing, with such shouts and
imprecations; they could not, for the life of them, imagine what could
have excited such a turn out among the ordinarily industrious and
quiet inhabitants of a town, remarkable rather for the quietude and
steadiness of its population, than for any violent outbreaks of popular
feeling.
“What can Mr. Chillingworth be about,” said Henry, “to bring such a mob
here? has he taken leave of his senses?”
“Nay,” said Marchdale; “look again; he seems to be trying to keep them
back, although ineffectually, for they will not be stayed.”
“D——e,” said the admiral, “here’s a gang of pirates; we shall be
boarded and carried before we know where we are, Jack.”
“Ay ay, sir,” said Jack.
“And is that all you’ve got to say, you lubber, when you see your
admiral in danger? You’d better go and make terms with the enemy at
once.”
“Really, this is serious,” said Henry; “they shout for Varney. Can Mr.
Chillingworth have been so mad as to adopt this means of stopping the
duel?”
“Impossible,” said Marchdale; “if that had been his intention, he could
have done so quietly, through the medium of the civil authorities.”
“Hang me!” exclaimed the admiral, “if there are any civil authorities;
they talk of smashing somebody. What do they say, Jack? I don’t hear
quite so well as I used.”
“You always was a little deaf,” said Jack.
“What?”
“A little deaf, I say.”
“Why, you lubberly lying swab, how dare you say so?”
“Because you was.”
“You slave-going scoundrel!”
“For Heaven’s sake, do not quarrel at such a time as this!” said Henry;
“we shall be surrounded in a moment. Come, Mr. Marchdale, let you and I
visit these people, and ascertain what it is that has so much excited
their indignation.”
“Agreed,” said Marchdale; and they both stepped forward at a rapid
pace, to meet the advancing throng.
The crowd which had now approached to within a short distance of
the expectant little party, was of a most motley description, and
its appearance, under many circumstances, would cause considerable
risibility. Men and women were mixed indiscriminately together, and in
the shouting, the latter, if such a thing were possible, exceeded the
former, both in discordance and energy.
Every individual composing that mob carried some weapon calculated for
defence, such as flails, scythes, sickles, bludgeons, &c., and this
mode of arming caused them to wear a most formidable appearance; while
the passion that superstition had called up was strongly depicted in
their inflamed features. Their fury, too, had been excited by their
disappointment, and it was with concentrated rage that they now pressed
onward.
The calm and steady advance of Henry and Mr. Marchdale to meet the
advancing throng, seemed to have the effect of retarding their progress
a little, and they came to a parley at a hedge, which separated them
from the meadow in which the duel had been fought.
“You seem to be advancing towards us,” said Henry. “Do you seek me or
any of my friends; and if so, upon what errand? Mr. Chillingworth, for
Heaven’s sake, explain what is the cause of all this tumult. You seem
to be at the head of it.”
“Seem to be,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “without being so. You are not
sought, nor any of your friends?”
“Who, then?”
“Sir Francis Varney,” was the immediate reply.
“Indeed! and what has he done to excite popular indignation? Of private
wrong I can accuse him; but I desire no crowd to take up my cause, or
to avenge my quarrels.”
“Mr. Bannerworth, it has become known, through my indiscretion, that
Sir Francis Varney is suspected of being a vampyre.”
“Is this so?”
“Hurrah!” shouted the mob. “Down with the vampyre! hurrah! where is he?
Down with him!”
“Drive a stake through him,” said a woman; “it’s the only way, and the
humanestest. You’ve only to take a hedge stake, and sharpen it a bit at
one end, and char it a little in the fire so as there mayt’n’t be no
splinters to hurt, and then poke it through his stomach.”
The mob gave a great shout at this humane piece of advice, and it was
some time before Henry could make himself heard at all, even to those
who were nearest to him.
When he did succeed in so doing, he cried, with a loud voice,—
“Hear me, all of you. It is quite needless for me to inquire how
you became possessed of the information that a dreadful suspicion
hangs over the person of Sir Francis Varney; but if, in consequence
of hearing such news, you fancy this public demonstration will be
agreeable to me, or likely to relieve those who are nearest or dearest
to me from the state of misery and apprehension into which they have
fallen, you are much mistaken.”
“Hear him, hear him!” cried Mr. Marchdale; “he speaks both wisdom and
truth.”
“If anything,” pursued Henry, “could add to the annoyance of vexation
and misery we have suffered, it would assuredly be the being made
subjects of every-day gossip, and every-day clamour.”
“You hear him?” said Mr. Marchdale.
“Yes, we does,” said a man; “but we comes out to catch a vampyre, for
all that.”
“Oh, to be sure,” said the humane woman; “nobody’s feelings is nothing
to us. Are we to be woke up in the night with vampyres sucking our
bloods while we’ve got a stake in the country?”
“Hurrah!” shouted everybody. “Down with the vampyre! where is he?”
“You are wrong. I assure you, you are all wrong,” said Mr.
Chillingworth, imploringly; “there is no vampyre here, you see. Sir
Francis Varney has not only escaped, but he will take the law of all of
you.”
This was an argument which appeared to stagger a few, but the bolder
spirits pushed them on, and a suggestion to search the wood having been
made by some one who was more cunning than his neighbours, that measure
was at once proceeded with, and executed in a systematic manner, which
made those who knew it to be the hiding-place of Sir Francis Varney
tremble for his safety.
It was with a strange mixture of feeling that Henry Bannerworth waited
the result of the search for the man who but a few minutes before had
been opposed to him in a contest of life or death.
The destruction of Sir Francis Varney would certainly have been an
effectual means of preventing him from continuing to be the incubus he
then was upon the Bannerworth family; and yet the generous nature of
Henry shrank with horror from seeing even such a creature as Varney
sacrificed at the shrine of popular resentment, and murdered by an
infuriated populace.
He felt as great an interest in the escape of the vampyre as if some
great advantage to himself had been contingent upon such an event; and,
although he spoke not a word, while the echoes of the little wood were
all awakened by the clamorous manner in which the mob searched for
their victim, his feelings could be well read upon his countenance.
The admiral, too, without possessing probably the fine feelings of
Henry Bannerworth, took an unusually sympathetic interest in the fate
of the vampyre; and, after placing himself in various attitudes of
intense excitement, he exclaimed,—
“D—n it, Jack, I do hope, after all, the vampyre will get the better
of them. It’s like a whole flotilla attacking one vessel—a lubberly
proceeding at the best, and I’ll be hanged if I like it. I should like
to pour in a broadside into those fellows, just to let them see it
wasn’t a proper English mode of fighting. Shouldn’t you, Jack?”
“Ay, ay, sir, I should.”
“Shiver me, if I see an opportunity, if I don’t let some of those
rascals know what’s what.”
Scarcely had these words escaped the lips of the old admiral than there
arose a loud shout from the interior of the wood. It was a shout of
success, and seemed at the very least to herald the capture of the
unfortunate Varney.
“By Heaven!” exclaimed Henry, “they have him.”
“God forbid!” said Mr. Marchdale; “this grows too serious.”
“Bear a hand, Jack,” said the admiral; “we’ll have a fight for it yet;
they sha’n’t murder even a vampyre in cold blood. Load the pistols and
send a flying shot or two among the rascals, the moment they appear.”
“No, no,” said Henry; “no more violence, at least there has been
enough—there has been enough.”
Even as he spoke there came rushing from among the trees, at the corner
of the wood, the figure of a man. There needed but one glance to assure
them who it was. Sir Francis Varney had been seen, and was flying
before those implacable foes who had sought his life.
He had divested himself of his huge cloak, as well as of his low
slouched hat, and, with a speed which nothing but the most absolute
desperation could have enabled him to exert, he rushed onward, beating
down before him every obstacle, and bounding over the meadows at a rate
that, if he could have continued it for any length of time, would have
set pursuit at defiance.
“Bravo!” shouted the admiral, “a stern chase is a long chase, and I
wish them joy of it—d——e, Jack, did you ever see anybody get along like
that?”
“Ay, ay, sir.”
“You never did, you scoundrel.”
“Yes, I did.”
“When and where?”
“When you ran away off the sound.”
The admiral turned nearly blue with anger, but Jack looked perfectly
imperturbable, as he added,—
“You know you ran away after the French frigates who wouldn’t stay to
fight you.”
“Ah! that indeed. There he goes, putting on every stitch of canvass,
I’ll be bound.”
“And there they come,” said Jack, as he pointed to the corner of the
wood, and some of the more active of the vampyre’s pursuers showed
themselves.
It would appear as if the vampyre had been started from some
hiding-place in the interior of the wood, and had then thought it
expedient altogether to leave that retreat, and make his way to some
more secure one across the open country, where there would be more
obstacles to his discovery than perseverance could overcome. Probably,
then, among the brushwood and trees, for a few moments he had been
again lost sight of, until those who were closest upon his track had
emerged from among the dense foliage, and saw him scouring across
the country at such headlong speed. These were but few, and in their
extreme anxiety themselves to capture Varney, whose precipate and
terrified flight brought a firm conviction to their minds of his being
a vampyre, they did not stop to get much of a reinforcement, but
plunged on like greyhounds in his track.
“Jack,” said the admiral, “this won’t do. Look at that great lubberly
fellow with the queer smock-frock.”
“Never saw such a figure-head in my life,” said Jack.
“Stop him.”
“Ay, ay, sir.”
The man was coming on at a prodigious rate, and Jack, with all the
deliberation in the world, advanced to meet him; and when they got
sufficiently close together, that in a few moments they must encounter
each other, Jack made himself into as small a bundle as possible, and
presented his shoulder to the advancing countryman in such a way, that
he flew off it at a tangent, as if he had run against a brick wall,
and after rolling head over heels for some distance, safely deposited
himself in a ditch, where he disappeared completely for a few moments
from all human observation.
“Don’t say I hit you,” said Jack. “Curse yer, what did yer run against
me for? Sarves you right. Lubbers as don’t know how to steer, in course
runs agin things.”
“Bravo,” said the admiral; “there’s another of them.”
The pursuers of Varney the vampyre, however, now came too thick and
fast to be so easily disposed of, and as soon as his figure could be
seen coursing over the meadows, and springing over road and ditch with
an agility almost frightful to look upon, the whole rabble rout was in
pursuit of him.
By this time, the man who had fallen into the ditch had succeeded in
making his appearance in the visible world again, and as he crawled up
the bank, looking a thing of mire and mud, Jack walked up to him with
all the carelessness in the world, and said to him,—
“Any luck, old chap?”
“Oh, murder!” said the man, “what do you mean? who are you? where am I?
what’s the matter? Old Muster Fowler, the fat crowner, will set upon me
now.”
“Have you caught anything?” said Jack.
“Caught anything?”
“Yes; you’ve been in for eels, haven’t you?”
“D—n!”
“Well, it is odd to me, as some people can’t go a fishing without
getting out of temper. Have it your own way; I won’t interfere with
you;” and away Jack walked.
The man cleared the mud out of his eyes, as well as he could, and
looked after him with a powerful suspicion that in Jack he saw the
very cause of his mortal mishap; but, somehow or other, his immersion
in the not over limpid stream had wonderfully cooled his courage, and
casting one despairing look upon his begrimed apparel, and another at
the last of the stragglers who were pursuing Sir Francis Varney across
the fields, he thought it prudent to get home as fast he could, and get
rid of the disagreeable results of an adventure which had turned out
for him anything but auspicious or pleasant.
Mr. Chillingworth, as though by a sort of impulse to be present in case
Sir Francis Varney should really be run down, and with a hope of saving
him from personal violence, had followed the foremost of the rioters
in the wood, found it now quite impossible for him to carry on such a
chase as that which was being undertaken across the fields after Sir
Francis Varney.
His person was unfortunately but ill qualified for the continuance of
such a pursuit, and, although with the greatest reluctance, he at last
felt himself compelled to give it up.
In making his way through the intricacies of the wood, he had been
seriously incommoded by the thick undergrowth, and he had accidentally
encountered several miry pools, with which he had involuntarily made a
closer acquaintance than was at all conducive either to his personal
appearance or comfort. The doctor’s temper, though, generally speaking,
one of the most even, was at last affected by his mishaps, and he could
not restrain from an execration upon his want of prudence in letting
his wife have a knowledge of a secret that was not his own, and the
producing an unlooked for circumstance, the termination of which might
be of a most disastrous nature.
Tired, therefore, and nearly exhausted by the exertions he had already
taken, he emerged now alone from the wood, and near the spot where
stood Henry Bannerworth and his friends in consultation.
The jaded look of the surgeon was quite sufficient indication of the
trouble and turmoil he had gone through, and some expressions of
sympathy for his condition were dropped by Henry, to whom he replied,—
“Nay, my young friend, I deserve it all. I have nothing but my own
indiscretion to thank for all the turmoil and tumult that has arisen
this morning.”
“But to what possible cause can we attribute such an outrage?”
“Reproach me as much as you will, I deserve it. A man may prate of his
own secrets if he like, but he should be careful of those of other
people. I trusted yours to another, and am properly punished.”
“Enough,” said Henry; “we’ll say no more of that, Mr. Chillingworth.
What is done cannot be undone, and we had better spend our time
in reflection of how to make the best of what is, than in useless
lamentation over its causes. What is to be done?”
“Nay, I know not. Have you fought the duel?”
“Yes; and, as you perceive, harmlessly.”
“Thank Heaven for that.”
“Nay, I had my fire, which Sir Francis Varney refused to return; so the
affair had just ended, when the sound of approaching tumult came upon
our ears.”
“What a strange mixture,” exclaimed Marchdale, “of feelings and
passions this Varney appears to be. At one moment acting with the
apparent greatest malignity; and another, seeming to have awakened
in his mind a romantic generosity which knows no bounds. I cannot
understand him.”
“Nor I, indeed,” said Henry; “but yet I somehow tremble for his fate,
and I seem to feel that something ought to be done to save him from the
fearful consequences of popular feeling. Let us hasten to the town,
and procure what assistance we may; but a few persons, well organised
and properly armed, will achieve wonders against a desultory and
ill-appointed multitude. There may be a chance of saving him, yet, from
the imminent danger which surrounds him.”
“That’s proper,” cried the admiral. “I don’t like to see anybody run
down. A fair fight’s another thing. Yard arm and yard arm—stink pots
and pipkins—broadside to broadside—and throw in your bodies, if you
like, on the lee quarter; but don’t do anything shabby. What do you
think of it, Jack?”
“Why, I means to say as how if Varney only keeps on sail as he’s been
doing, that the devil himself wouldn’t catch him in a gale.”
“And yet,” said Henry, “it is our duty to do the best we can. Let us
at once to the town, and summons all the assistance in our power. Come
on—come on!”
His friends needed no further urging, but, at a brisk pace, they all
proceeded by the nearest footpaths towards the town.
It puzzled his pursuers to think in what possible direction Sir
Francis Varney expected to find sustenance or succour, when they
saw how curiously he took his flight across the meadows. Instead of
endeavouring, by any circuitous path, to seek the shelter of his own
house, or to throw himself upon the care of the authorities of the
town, who must, to the extent of their power, have protected him, he
struck across the fields, apparently without aim or purpose, seemingly
intent upon nothing but to distance his pursuers in a long chase, which
might possibly tire them, or it might not, according to their or his
powers of endurance.
We say this seemed to be the case, but it was not so in reality. Sir
Francis Varney had a deeper purpose, and it was scarcely to be supposed
that a man of his subtle genius, and, apparently, far-seeing and
reflecting intellect, could have so far overlooked the many dangers of
his position as not to be fully prepared for some such contingency as
that which had just now occurred.
Holding, as he did, so strange a place in society—living among men,
and yet possessing so few attributes in common with humanity—he must
all along have felt the possibility of drawing upon himself popular
violence.
He could not wholly rely upon the secrecy of the Bannerworth family,
much as they might well be supposed to shrink from giving publicity to
circumstances of so fearfully strange and perilous a nature as those
which had occurred amongst them. The merest accident might, at any
moment, make him the town’s talk. The overhearing of a few chance words
by some gossiping domestic—some ebullition of anger or annoyance by
some member of the family—or a communication from some friend who had
been treated with confidence—might, at any time, awaken around him some
such a storm as that which now raged at his heels.
Varney the vampire must have calculated this. He must have felt the
possibility of such a state of things; and, as a matter of course,
politicly provided himself with some place of refuge.
After about twenty minutes of hard chasing across the fields, there
could be no doubt of his intentions. He had such a place of refuge;
and, strange a one as it might appear, he sped towards it in as direct
a line as ever a well-sped arrow flew towards its mark.
That place of refuge, to the surprise of every one, appeared to be the
ancient ruin, of which we have before spoken, and which was so well
known to every inhabitant of the county.
Truly, it seemed like some act of mere desperation for Sir Francis
Varney to hope there to hide himself. There remained within, of what
had once been a stately pile, but a few grey crumbling walls, which
the hunted hare would have passed unheeded, knowing that not for one
instant could he have baffled his pursuers by seeking so inefficient a
refuge.
And those who followed hard and fast upon the track of Sir Francis
Varney felt so sure of their game, when they saw whither he was
speeding, that they relaxed in their haste considerably, calling loudly
to each other that the vampire was caught at last, for he could be
easily surrounded among the old ruins, and dragged from amongst its
moss-grown walls.
In another moment, with a wild dash and a cry of exultation, he sprang
out of sight, behind an angle, formed by what had been at one time one
of the principal supports of the ancient structure.
Then, as if there was still something so dangerous about him, that
only by a great number of hands could he be hoped to be secured, the
infuriated peasantry gathered in a dense circle around what they
considered his temporary place of refuge, and as the sun, which had now
climbed above the tree tops, and dispersed, in a great measure, many of
the heavy clouds of morning, shone down upon the excited group, they
might have been supposed there assembled to perform some superstitious
rite, which time had hallowed as an association of the crumbling ruin
around which they stood.
By the time the whole of the stragglers, who had persisted in the
chase, had come up, there might have been about fifty or sixty
resolute men, each intent upon securing the person of one whom they
felt, while in existence, would continue to be a terror to all the
weaker and dearer portions of their domestic circles.
There was a pause of several minutes. Those who had come the fleetest
were gathering breath, and those who had come up last were looking
to their more forward companions for some information as to what had
occurred before their arrival.
All was profoundly still within the ruin, and then suddenly, as if by
common consent, there arose from every throat a loud shout of “Down
with the vampyre! down with the vampyre!”
The echoes of that shout died away, and then all was still as before,
while a superstitious feeling crept over even the boldest. It would
almost seem as if they had expected some kind of response from Sir
Francis Varney to the shout of defiance with which they had just
greeted him; but the very calmness, repose, and absolute quiet of the
ruin, and all about it, alarmed them, and they looked the one at the
other as if the adventure after all were not one of the pleasantest
description, and might not fall out so happily as they had expected.
Yet what danger could there be? there were they, more than half a
hundred stout, strong men, to cope with one; they felt convinced that
he was completely in their power; they knew the ruins could not hide
him, and that five minutes time given to the task, would suffice to
explore every nook and corner of them.
And yet they hesitated, while an unknown terror shook their nerves,
and seemingly from the very fact that they had run down their game
successfully, they dreaded to secure the trophy of the chase.
One bold spirit was wanting; and, if it was not a bold one that spoke
at length, he might be complimented as being comparatively such. It
was one who had not been foremost in the chase, perchance from want of
physical power, who now stood forward, and exclaimed,—
“What are you waiting for, now? You can have him when you like. If you
want your wives and children to sleep quietly in their beds, you will
secure the vampyre. Come on—we all know he’s here—why do you hesitate?
Do you expect me to go alone and drag him out by the ears?”
Any voice would have sufficed to break the spell which bound them. This
did so; and, with one accord, and yells of imprecation, they rushed
forward and plunged among the old walls of the ruin.
Less time than we have before remarked would have enabled any one to
explore the tottering fabric sufficient to bring a conviction to their
minds that, after all, there might have been some mistake about the
matter, and Sir Francis Varney was not quite caught yet.
It was astonishing how the fact of not finding him in a moment, again
roused all their angry feelings against him, and dispelled every
feeling of superstitious awe with which he had been surrounded; rage
gave place to the sort of shuddering horror with which they had before
contemplated his immediate destruction, when they had believed him to
be virtually within their very grasp.
Over and over again the ruins were searched—hastily and impatiently by
some, carefully and deliberately by others, until there could be no
doubt upon the mind of every one individual, that somehow or somewhere
within the shadow of those walls, Sir Francis Varney had disappeared
most mysteriously.
Then it would have been a strange sight for any indifferent spectator
to have seen how they shrunk, one by one, out of the shadow of those
ruins; each seeming to be afraid that the vampyre, in some mysterious
manner, would catch him if he happened to be the last within their
sombre influence; and, when they had all collected in the bright,
open space, some little distance beyond, they looked at each other
and at the ruins, with dubious expressions of countenance, each, no
doubt, wishing that each would suggest something of a consolatory or
practicable character.
“What’s to be done, now?” said one.
“Ah! that’s it,” said another, sententiously. “I’ll be hanged if I
know.”
“He’s given us the slip,” remarked a third.
“But he can’t have given us the slip,” said one man, who was
particularly famous for a dogmatical spirit of argumentation; “how is
it possible? he must be here, and I say he is here.”
“Find him, then,” cried several at once.
“Oh! that’s nothing to do with the argument; he’s here, whether we find
him or not.”
One very cunning fellow laid his finger on his nose, and beckoned to
a comrade to retire some paces, where he delivered himself of the
following very oracular sentiment:—
“My good friend, you must know Sir Francis Varney is here or he isn’t.”
“Agreed, agreed.”
“Well, if he isn’t here it’s no use troubling our heads any more about
him; but, otherwise, it’s quite another thing, and, upon the whole, I
must say, that I rather think he is.”
All looked at him, for it was evident he was big with some suggestion.
After a pause, he resumed,—
“Now, my good friends, I propose that we all appear to give it up, and
to go away; but that some one of us shall remain and hide among the
ruins for some time, to watch, in case the vampyre makes his appearance
from some hole or corner that we haven’t found out.”
“Oh, capital!” said everybody.
“Then you all agree to that?”
“Yes, yes.”
“Very good; that’s the only way to nick him. Now, we’ll pretend to give
it up; let’s all of us talk loud about going home.”
They did all talk loud about going home; they swore that it was not
worth the trouble of catching him, that they gave it up as a bad job;
that he might go to the deuce in any way he liked, for all they cared;
and then they all walked off in a body, when, the man who had made the
suggestion, suddenly cried,—
“Hilloa! hilloa!—stop! stop! you know one of us is to wait?”
“Oh, ay; yes, yes, yes!” said everybody, and still they moved on.
“But really, you know, what’s the use of this? who’s to wait?”
That was, indeed, a knotty question, which induced a serious
consultation, ending in their all, with one accord, pitching upon the
author of the suggestion, as by far the best person to hide in the
ruins and catch the vampyre.
They then all set off at full speed; but the cunning fellow, who
certainly had not the slightest idea of so practically carrying out his
own suggestion, scampered off after them with a speed that soon brought
him in the midst of the throng again, and so, with fear in their looks,
and all the evidences of fatigue about them, they reached the town to
spread fresh and more exaggerated accounts of the mysterious conduct of
Varney the vampyre.
CHAPTER XLIV.
VARNEY’S DANGER, AND HIS RESCUE.—THE PRISONER AGAIN, AND THE
SUBTERRANEAN VAULT.
We have before slightly mentioned to the reader, and not unadvisedly,
the existence of a certain prisoner, confined in a gloomy dungeon, into
whose sad and blackened recesses but few and faint glimmering rays
of light ever penetrated; for, by a diabolical ingenuity, the narrow
loophole which served for a window to that subterraneous abode was so
constructed, that, let the sun be at what point it might, during its
diurnal course, but a few reflected beams of light could ever find
their way into that abode of sorrow.
The prisoner—the same prisoner of whom we before spoke—is there.
Despair is in his looks, and his temples are still bound with those
cloths, which seemed now for many days to have been sopped in blood,
which has become encrusted in their folds.
He still lives, apparently incapable of movement. How he has lived
so long seems to be a mystery, for one would think him scarcely in
a state, even were nourishment placed to his lips, to enable him to
swallow it.
It may be, however, that the mind has as much to do with that apparent
absolute prostration of all sort of physical energy as those bodily
wounds which he has received at the hands of the enemies who have
reduced him to his present painful and hopeless situation.
Occasionally a low groan burst from his lips; it seems to come from the
very bottom of his heart, and it sounds as if it would carry with it
every remnant of vitality that was yet remaining to him.
Then he moves restlessly, and repeats in hurried accents the names
of some who are dear to him, and far away—some who may, perchance,
be mourning him, but who know not, guess not, aught of his present
sufferings.
As he thus moves, the rustle of a chain among the straw on which he
lies gives an indication, that even in that dungeon it has not been
considered prudent to leave him master of his own actions, lest, by too
vigorous an effort, he might escape from the thraldom in which he is
held.
The sound reaches his own ears, and for a few moments, in the deep
impatience of his wounded spirit, he heaps malediction on the heads of
those who have reduced him to his present state.
But soon a better nature seems to come over him, and gentler words fall
from his lips. He preaches patience to himself—he talks not of revenge,
but of justice, and in accents of more hopefulness than he had before
spoken, he calls upon Heaven to succour him in his deep distress.
Then all is still, and the prisoner appears to have resigned himself
once more to the calmness of expectation or of despair; but hark!
his sense of hearing, rendered doubly acute by lying so long alone
in nearly darkness, and in positive silence, detects sounds which,
to ordinary mortal powers of perception, would have been by far too
indistinct to produce any tangible effect upon the senses.
It is the sound of feet—on, on they come; far overhead he hears them;
they beat the green earth—that sweet, verdant sod, which he may never
see again—with an impatient tread. Nearer and nearer still; and now
they pause; he listens with all the intensity of one who listens for
existence; some one comes; there is a lumbering noise—a hasty footstep;
he hears some one labouring for breath—panting like a hunted hare; his
dungeon door is opened, and there totters in a man, tall and gaunt;
he reels like one intoxicated; fatigue has done more than the work of
inebriation; he cannot save himself, and he sinks exhausted by the side
of that lonely prisoner.
The captive raises himself as far as his chains will allow him; he
clutches the throat of his enervated visitor.
“Villain, monster, vampyre!” he shrieks, “I have thee now;” and locked
in a deadly embrace, they roll upon the damp earth, struggling for life
together.
[Illustration: The struggle between Varney and Charles Holland.]
• • • • •
It is mid-day at Bannerworth Hall, and Flora is looking from the
casement anxiously expecting the arrival of her brothers. She had
seen, from some of the topmost windows of the Hall, that the whole
neighbourhood had been in a state of commotion, but little did she
guess the cause of so much tumult, or that it in any way concerned her.
She had seen the peasantry forsaking their work in the fields and the
gardens, and apparently intent upon some object of absorbing interest;
but she feared to leave the house, for she had promised Henry that she
would not do so, lest the former pacific conduct of the vampyre should
have been but a new snare, for the purpose of drawing her so far from
her home as to lead her into some danger when she should be far from
assistance.
And yet more than once was she tempted to forget her promise, and
to seek the open country, for fear that those she loved should be
encountering some danger for her sake, which she would willingly either
share with them or spare them.
The solicitation, however, of her brother kept her comparatively quiet;
and, moreover, since her last interview with Varney, in which, at all
events, he had shown some feeling for the melancholy situation to
which, he had reduced her, she had been more able to reason calmly, and
to meet the suggestions of passion and of impulse with a sober judgment.
About midday, then, she saw the domestic party returning—that party,
which now consisted of her two brothers, the admiral, Jack Pringle, and
Mr. Chillingworth. As for Mr. Marchdale, he had given them a polite
adieu on the confines of the grounds of Bannerworth Hall, stating, that
although he had felt it to be his duty to come forward and second Henry
Bannerworth in the duel with the vampyre, yet that circumstance by no
means obliterated from his memory the insults he had received from
Admiral Bell, and, therefore, he declined going to Bannerworth Hall,
and bade them a very good morning.
To all this, Admiral Bell replied that he might go and be d——d, if he
liked, and that he considered him a swab and a humbug, and appealed to
Jack Pringle whether he, Jack, ever saw such a sanctified looking prig
in his life.
“Ay, ay,” says Jack.
This answer, of course, produced the usual contention, which lasted
them until they got fairly in the house, where they swore at each other
to an extent that was enough to make any one’s hair stand on end, until
Henry and Mr. Chillingworth interfered, and really begged that they
would postpone the discussion until some more fitting opportunity.
The whole of the circumstances were then related to Flora; who, while
she blamed her brother much for fighting the duel with the vampyre,
found in the conduct of that mysterious individual, as regarded the
encounter, yet another reason for believing him to be strictly sincere
in his desire to save her from the consequences of his future visits.
Her desire to leave Bannerworth Hall consequently became more and more
intense, and as the admiral really now considered himself the master
of the house, they offered no amount of opposition to the subject, but
merely said,—
“My dear Flora, Admiral Bell shall decide in all these matters, now. We
know that he is our sincere friend; and that whatever he says we ought
to do, will be dictated by the best possible feelings towards us.”
“Then I appeal to you, sir,” said Flora, turning to the admiral.
“Very good,” replied the old man; “then I say——”
“Nay, admiral,” interrupted Mr. Chillingworth; “you promised me, but a
short time since, that you would come to no decision whatever upon this
question, until you had heard some particulars which I have to relate
to you, which, in my humble opinion, will sway your judgment.”
“And so I did,” cried the admiral; “but I had forgotten all about it.
Flora, my dear, I’ll be with you in an hour or two. My friend, the
doctor, here, has got some sow by the ear, and fancies it’s the right
one; however, I’ll hear what he has got to say, first, before we come
to a conclusion. So, come along, Mr. Chillingworth, and let’s have it
out at once.”
“Flora,” said Henry, when the admiral had left the room, “I can see
that you wish to leave the Hall.”
[Illustration: Flora and Henry decide upon leaving Bannerworth Hall.]
“I do, brother; but not to go far—I wish rather to hide from Varney
than to make myself inaccessible by distance.”
“You still cling to this neighbourhood?”
“I do, I do; and you know with what hope I cling to it.”
“Perfectly; you still think it possible that Charles Holland may be
united to you.”
“I do, I do.”
“You believe his faith.”
“Oh, yes; as I believe in Heaven’s mercy.”
“And I, Flora; I would not doubt him now for worlds; something even now
seems to whisper to me that a brighter sun of happiness will yet dawn
upon us, and that, when the mists which at present enshroud ourselves
and our fortunes pass away, they will disclose a landscape full of
beauty, the future of which shall know no pangs.”
“Yes, brother,” exclaimed Flora, enthusiastically; “this, after all,
may be but some trial, grievous while it lasts, but yet tending
eventually only to make the future look more bright and beautiful.
Heaven may yet have in store for us all some great happiness, which
shall spring clearly and decidedly from out these misfortunes.”
“Be it so, and may we ever thus banish despair by such hopeful
propositions. Lean on my arm, Flora; you are safe with me. Come,
dearest, and taste the sweetness of the morning air.”
There was, indeed now, a hopefulness about the manner in which Henry
Bannerworth spoke, such as Flora had not for some weary months had the
pleasure of listening to, and she eagerly rose to accompany him into
the garden, which was glowing with all the beauty of sunshine, for the
day had turned out to be much finer than the early morning had at all
promised it would be.
“Flora,” he said, when they had taken some turns to and fro in the
garden, “notwithstanding all that has happened, there is no convincing
Mr. Chillingworth that Sir Francis Varney is really what to us he
appears.”
“Indeed!”
“It is so. In the face of all evidence, he neither will believe in
vampyres at all, nor that Varney is anything but some mortal man, like
ourselves, in his thoughts, talents, feelings, and modes of life; and
with no more power to do any one an injury than we have.”
“Oh, would that I could think so!”
“And I; but, unhappily, we have by far too many, and too conclusive
evidences to the contrary.”
“We have, indeed, brother.”
“And though, while we respect that strength of mind in our friend which
will not allow him, even almost at the last extremity, to yield to what
appear to be stern facts, we may not ourselves be so obdurate, but may
feel that we know enough to be convinced.”
“You have no doubt, brother?”
“Most reluctantly, I must confess, that I feel compelled to consider
Varney as something more than mortal.”
“He must be so.”
“And now, sister, before we leave the place which has been a home to
us from earliest life, let us for a few moments consider if there be
any possible excuse for the notion of Mr. Chillingworth, to the effect
that Sir Francis Varney wants possession of the house for some purpose
still more inimical to our peace and prosperity than any he has yet
attempted.”
“Has he such an opinion?”
“He has.”
“’Tis very strange.”
“Yes, Flora; he seems to gather from all the circumstances, nothing but
an overwhelming desire on the part of Sir Francis Varney to become the
tenant of Bannerworth Hall.”
“He certainly wishes to possess it.”
“Yes; but can you, sister, in the exercise of any possible amount of
fancy, imagine any motive for such an anxiety beyond what he alleges?”
“Which is merely that he is fond of old houses.”
“Precisely so. That is the reason, and the only one, that can be got
from him. Heaven only knows if it be the true one.”
“It may be, brother.”
“As you say, it may; but there’s a doubt, nevertheless, Flora. I much
rejoice that you have had an interview with this mysterious being, for
you have certainly, since that time, been happier and more composed
than I ever hoped to see you again.”
“I have indeed.”
“It is sufficiently perceivable.”
“Somehow, brother, since that interview, I have not had the same sort
of dread of Sir Francis Varney which before made the very sound of his
name a note of terror to me. His words, and all he said to me during
that interview which took place so strangely between us, indeed how I
know not, tended altogether rather to make him, to a certain extent, an
object of my sympathies rather than my abhorrence.”
“That is very strange.”
“I own that it is strange, Henry; but when we come for but a brief
moment to reflect upon the circumstances which have occurred, we shall,
I think, be able to find some cause even to pity Varney the vampyre.”
“How?”
“Thus, brother. It is said—and well may I who have been subject to an
attack of such a nature, tremble to repeat the saying—that those who
have been once subject to the visitations of a vampyre, are themselves
in a way to become one of the dreadful and maddening fraternity.”
“I have heard so much, sister,” replied Henry.
“Yes; and therefore who knows but that Sir Francis Varney may, at one
time, have been as innocent as we are ourselves of the terrible and
fiendish propensity which now makes him a terror and a reproach to all
who know him, or are in any way obnoxious to his attacks.”
“That is true.”
“There may have been a time—who shall say there was not?—when he, like
me, would have shrunk, with a dread as great as any one could have
experienced, from the contamination of the touch even of a vampyre.”
“I cannot, sister, deny the soundness of your reasoning,” said Henry,
with a sigh; “but I still do not see anything, even from a full
conviction that Varney is unfortunate, which should induce us to
tolerate him.”
“Nay, brother, I said not tolerate. What I mean is, that even with the
horror and dread we must naturally feel at such a being, we may afford
to mingle some amount of pity, which shall make us rather seek to shun
him, than to cross his path with a resolution of doing him an injury.”
“I perceive well, sister, what you mean. Rather than remain here, and
make an attempt to defy Sir Francis Varney, you would fly from him, and
leave him undisputed master of the field.”
“I would—I would.”
“Heaven forbid that I or any one should thwart you. You know well,
Flora, how dear you are to me; you know well that your happiness has
ever been to us all a matter which has assumed the most important of
shapes, as regarded our general domestic policy. It is not, therefore,
likely now, dear sister, that we should thwart you in your wish to
remove from here.”
“I know, Henry, all you would say,” remarked Flora, as a tear started
to her eyes. “I know well all you think, and, in your love for me, I
likewise know well I rely for ever. You are attached to this place, as,
indeed, we all are, by a thousand happy and pleasant associations; but
listen to me further, Henry, I do not wish to wander far.”
“Not far, Flora?”
“No. Do I not still cling to a hope that Charles may yet appear? and if
he do so, it will assuredly be in this neighbourhood, which he knows is
native and most dear to us all.”
“True.”
“Then do I wish to make some sort of parade, in the way of publicity,
of our leaving the Hall.”
“Yes, yes.”
“And yet not go far. In the neighbouring town, for example, surely
we might find some means of living entirely free from remark or
observation as to who or what we were.”
“That, sister, I doubt. If you seek for that species of solitude which
you contemplate, it is only to be found in a desert.”
“A desert?”
“Yes; or in a large city.”
“Indeed!”
“Ay, Flora; you may well believe me, that it is so. In a small
community you can have no possible chance of evading an amount of
scrutiny which would very soon pierce through any disguise you could by
any possibility assume.”
“Then there is no resource. We must go far.”
“Nay, I will consider for you, Flora; and although, as a general
principle, what I have said I know to be true, yet some more special
circumstance may arise that may point a course that, while it
enables us, for Charles Holland’s sake, to remain in this immediate
neighbourhood, yet will procure to us all the secrecy we may desire.”
“Dear—dear brother,” said Flora, as she flung herself upon Henry’s
neck, “you speak cheeringly to me, and, what is more, you believe in
Charles’s faithfulness and truth.”
“As Heaven is my judge, I do.”
“A thousand, thousand thanks for such an assurance. I know him too
well to doubt, for one moment, his faith. Oh, brother! could he—could
Charles Holland, the soul of honour, the abode of every noble impulse
that can adorn humanity—could he have written those letters? No, no!
perish the thought!”
“It has perished.”
“Thank God!”
“I only, upon reflection, wonder how, misled for the moment by the
concurrence of a number of circumstances, I could ever have suspected
him.”
“It is like your generous nature, brother, to say so; but you know as
well as I, that there has been one here who has, far from feeling any
sort of anxiety to think as well as possible of poor Charles Holland,
has done all that in him lay to take the worst view of his mysterious
disappearance, and induce us to do the like.”
“You allude to Mr. Marchdale?”
“I do.”
“Well, Flora, at the same time that I must admit you have cause for
speaking of Mr. Marchdale as you do, yet when we come to consider all
things, there may be found for him excuses.”
“May there?”
“Yes, Flora; he is a man, as he himself says, past the meridian of
life, and the world is a sad as well as a bad teacher, for it soon—too
soon, alas! deprives us of our trusting confidence in human nature.”
“It may be so; but yet, he, knowing as he did so very little of Charles
Holland, judged him hastily and harshly.”
“You rather ought to say, Flora, that he did not judge him generously.”
“Well, be it so.”
“And you must recollect, when you say so, that Marchdale did not love
Charles Holland.”
“Nay, now,” said Flora, while there flashed across her cheek, for a
moment, a heightened colour, “you are commencing to jest with me, and,
therefore, we will say no more. You know, dear Henry, all my hopes, my
wishes, and my feelings, and I shall therefore leave my future destiny
in your hands, to dispose of as you please. Look yonder!”
“Where?”
“There. Do you not see the admiral and Mr. Chillingworth walking among
the trees?”
“Yes, yes; I do now.”
“How very serious and intent they are upon the subject of their
discourse. They seem quite lost to all surrounding objects. I could not
have imagined any subject that would so completely have absorbed the
attention of Admiral Bell.”
“Mr. Chillingworth had something to relate to him or to propose, of
a nature which, perchance, has had the effect of enchaining all his
attention—he called him from the room.”
“Yes; I saw that he did. But see, they come towards us, and now we
shall, probably, hear what is the subject-matter of their discourse and
consultation.”
“We shall.”
Admiral Bell had evidently seen Henry and his sister, for now,
suddenly, as if not from having for the first moment observed them,
and, in consequence, broken off their private discourse, but as if they
arrived at some point in it which enabled them to come to a conclusion
to be communicative, the admiral came towards the brother and sister.
“Well,” said the bluff old admiral, when they were sufficiently near
to exchange words, “well, Miss Flora, you are looking a thousand times
better than you were.”
“I thank you, admiral, I am much better.”
“Oh, to be sure you are; and you will be much better still, and no sort
of mistake. Now, here’s the doctor and I have both been agreeing upon
what is best for you.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes, to be sure. Have we not, doctor?”
“We have, admiral.”
“Good; and what, now, Miss Flora, do you suppose it is?”
“I really cannot say.”
“Why, it’s change of air, to be sure. You must get away from here as
quickly as you can, or there will be no peace for you.”
“Yes,” added Mr. Chillingworth, advancing; “I am quite convinced that
change of scene and change of place, and habits, and people, will tend
more to your complete recovery than any other circumstances. In the
most ordinary cases of indisposition we always find that the invalid
recovers much sooner away from the scene of his indisposition, than by
remaining in it, even though its general salubrity be much greater than
the place to which he may be removed.”
“Good,” said the admiral.
“Then we are to understand,” said Henry, with a smile, “that we are no
longer to be your guests, Admiral Bell?”
“Belay there!” cried the admiral; “who told you to understand any such
thing, I should like to know?”
“Well, but we shall look upon this house as yours, now; and, that being
the case, if we remove from it, of course we cease to be your guests
any longer.”
“That’s all you know about it. Now, hark ye. You don’t command the
fleet, so don’t pretend to know what the admiral is going to do. I have
made money by knocking about some of the enemies of old England, and
that’s the most gratifying manner in the world of making money, so far
as I am concerned.”
“It is an honourable mode.”
“Of course it is. Well, I am going to—what the deuce do you call it?”
“What?”
“That’s just what I want to know. Oh, I have it now. I am going to what
the lawyers call invest it.”
“A prudent step, admiral, and one which it is to be hoped, before now,
has occurred to you.”
“Perhaps it has and perhaps it hasn’t; however, that’s my business, and
no one’s else’s. I am going to invest my spare cash in taking houses;
so, as I don’t care a straw where the houses may be situated, you can
look out for one somewhere that will suit you, and I’ll take it; so,
after all, you will be my guests there just the same as you are here.”
“Admiral,” said Henry, “it would be imposing upon a generosity as
rare as it is noble, were we to allow you to do so much for us as you
contemplate.”
“Very good.”
“We cannot—we dare not.”
“But I say you shall. So you have had your say, and I’ve had mine,
after which, if you please, Master Henry Bannerworth, I shall take upon
myself to consider the affair as altogether settled. You can commence
operations as soon as you like. I know that Miss Flora, here—bless her
sweet eyes—don’t want to stay at Bannerworth Hall any longer than she
can help it.”
“Indeed I was urging upon Henry to remove,” said Flora; “but yet I
cannot help feeling with him, admiral, that we are imposing upon your
goodness.”
“Go on imposing, then.”
“But——”
“Psha! Can’t a man be imposed upon if he likes? D—n it, that’s a poor
privilege for an Englishman to be forced to make a row about. I tell
you I like it. I will be imposed upon, so there’s an end of that; and
now let’s come in and see what Mrs. Bannerworth has got ready for
luncheon.”
• • • • •
It can hardly be supposed that such a popular ferment as had been
created in the country town, by the singular reports concerning Varney
the Vampyre, should readily, and without abundant satisfaction, subside.
An idea like that which had lent so powerful an impulse to the popular
mind, was one far easier to set going than to deprecate or extinguish.
The very circumstances which had occurred to foil the excited mob in
their pursuit of Sir Francis Varney, were of a nature to increase the
popular superstition concerning him, and to make him and his acts
appear in still more dreadful colours.
Mobs do not reason very closely and clearly; but the very fact of the
frantic flight of Sir Francis Varney from the projected attack of the
infuriated multitude, was seized hold of as proof positive of the
reality of his vampyre-like existence.
Then, again, had he not disappeared in the most mysterious manner?
Had he not sought refuge where no human being would think of seeking
refuge, namely, in that old, dilapidated ruin, where, when his pursuers
were so close upon his track, he had succeeded in eluding their grasp
with a facility which looked as if he had vanished into thin air, or
as if the very earth had opened to receive him bodily within its cold
embraces?
It is not to be wondered at, that the few who fled so precipitately
from the ruin, lost nothing of the wonderful story they had to tell, in
the carrying it from that place to the town. When they reached their
neighbours, they not only told what had really occurred, but they
added to it all their own surmises, and the fanciful creation of all
their own fears, so that before mid-day, and about the time when Henry
Bannerworth was conversing so quietly in the gardens of the Hall with
his beautiful sister, there was an amount of popular ferment in the
town, of which they had no conception.
All business was suspended, and many persons, now that once the idea
had been started concerning the possibility that a vampyre might have
been visiting some of the houses in the place, told how, in the dead
of the night, they had heard strange noises. How children had shrieked
from no apparent cause—doors opened and shut without human agency; and
windows rattled that never had been known to rattle before.
Some, too, went so far as to declare that they had been awakened out
of their sleep by noises incidental to an effort made to enter their
chambers; and others had seen dusky forms of gigantic proportions
outside their windows, tampering with their fastenings, and only
disappearing when the light of day mocked all attempts at concealment.
These tales flew from mouth to mouth, and all listened to them with
such an eager interest, that none thought it worth while to challenge
their inconsistencies, or to express a doubt of their truth, because
they had not been mentioned before.
The only individual, and he was a remarkably clever man, who made the
slightest remark upon the subject of a practical character, hazarded a
suggestion that made confusion worse confounded.
He knew something of vampyres. He had travelled abroad, and had
heard of them in Germany, as well as in the east, and, to a crowd of
wondering and aghast listeners, he said,—
“You may depend upon it, my friends, this has been going on for some
time; there have been several mysterious and sudden deaths in the town
lately; people have wasted away and died nobody knew how or wherefore.”
“Yes—yes,” said everybody.
“There was Miles, the butcher; you know how fat he was, and then how
fat he wasn’t.”
A general assent was given to the proposition; and then, elevating one
arm in an oratorical manner, the clever fellow continued,—
“I have not a doubt that Miles, the butcher, and every one else who
has died suddenly lately, have been victims of the vampyre; and what’s
more, they’ll all be vampyres, and come and suck other people’s blood,
till at last the whole town will be a town of vampyres.”
“But what’s to be done?” cried one, who trembled so excessively that he
could scarcely stand under his apprehension.
“There is but one plan—Sir Francis Varney must be found, and put out
of the world in such a manner that he can’t come back to it again; and
all those who are dead that we have any suspicion of, should be taken
up out of their graves and looked at, to see if they’re rotting or not;
if they are it’s all right; but, if they look fresh and much, as usual,
you may depend they’re vampyres, and no mistake.”
This was a terrific suggestion thrown amongst a mob. To have caught Sir
Francis Varney and immolated him at the shrine of popular fury, they
would not have shrunk from; but a desecration of the graves of those
whom they had known in life was a matter which, however much it had to
recommend it, even the boldest stood aghast at, and felt some qualms of
irresolution.
There are many ideas, however, which, like the first plunge into a cold
bath, are rather uncomfortable for the moment; but which, in a little
time, we become so familiarized with, that they become stripped of
their disagreeable concomitants, and appear quite pleasing and natural.
So it was with this notion of exhuming the dead bodies of those
townspeople who had recently died from what was called a decay of
nature, and such other failures of vitality as bore not the tangible
name of any understood disease.
From mouth to mouth the awful suggestion spread like wildfire, until at
last it grew into such a shape that it almost seemed to become a duty,
at all events, to have up Miles the butcher, and see how he looked.
There is, too, about human nature a natural craving curiosity
concerning everything connected with the dead. There is not a man of
education or of intellectual endowment who would not travel many miles
to look upon the exhumation of the remains of some one famous in his
time, whether for his vices, his virtues, his knowledge, his talents,
or his heroism; and, if this feeling exist in the minds of the educated
and refined in a sublimated shape, which lends to it grace and dignity,
we may look for it among the vulgar and the ignorant, taking only a
grosser and meaner form, in accordance with their habits of thought.
The rude materials, of which the highest and noblest feelings of
educated minds are formed, will be found amongst the most grovelling
and base; and so this vulgar curiosity, which, combined with other
feelings, prompted an ignorant and illiterate mob to exhume Miles, the
once fat butcher, in a different form tempted the philosophic Hamlet to
moralise upon the skull of Yorick.
And it was wonderful to see how, when these people had made up their
minds to carry out the singularly interesting, but, at the same,
fearful, suggestion, they assumed to themselves a great virtue in so
doing—told each other what an absolute necessity there was, for the
public good, that it should be done; and then, with loud shouts and
cries concerning the vampyre, they proceeded in a body to the village
churchyard, where had been lain, with a hope of reposing in peace, the
bones of their ancestors.
A species of savage ferocity now appeared to have seized upon the
crowd, and the people, in making up their minds to do something which
was strikingly at variance with all their preconceived notions of right
and wrong, appeared to feel that it was necessary, in order that they
might be consistent, to cast off many of the decencies of life, and to
become riotous and reckless.
As they proceeded towards the graveyard, they amused themselves by
breaking the windows of the tax-gatherers, and doing what passing
mischief they could to the habitations of all who held any official
situation or authority.
This was something like a proclamation of war against those who might
think it their duty to interfere with the lawless proceedings of an
ignorant multitude. A public-house or two, likewise, _en route_, was
sacked of some of its inebriating contents, so that, what with the
madness of intoxication, and the general excitement consequent upon the
very nature of the business which took them to the churchyard, a more
wild and infuriated multitude than that which paused at two iron gates
which led into the sanctuary of that church could not be imagined.
Those who have never seen a mob placed in such a situation as to have
cast off all moral restraint whatever, at the same time that it feels
there is no physical power to cope with it, can form no notion of the
mass of terrible passions which lie slumbering under what, in ordinary
cases, have appeared harmless bosoms, but which now run riot, and
overcame every principle of restraint. It is a melancholy fact, but,
nevertheless, a fact, despite its melancholy, that, even in a civilised
country like this, with a generally well-educated population, nothing
but a well-organised physical force keeps down, from the commission of
the most outrageous offences, hundreds and thousands of persons.
We have said that the mob paused at the iron gates of the churchyard,
but it was more a pause of surprise than one of vacillation, because
they saw that those iron gates were closed, which had not been the case
within the memory of the oldest among them.
At the first building of the church, and the enclosure of its
graveyard, two pairs of these massive gates had been presented by some
munificent patron; but, after a time, they hung idly upon their hinges,
ornamental certainly, but useless, while a couple of turnstiles,
to keep cattle from straying within the sacred precincts, did duty
instead, and established, without trouble, the regular thoroughfare,
which long habit had dictated as necessary, through the place of
sepulture.
But now those gates were closed, and for once were doing duty. Heaven
only knows how they had been moved upon their rusty and time-worn
hinges. The mob, however, was checked for the moment, and it was clear
that the ecclesiastical authorities were resolved to attempt something
to prevent the desecration of the tombs.
Those gates were sufficiently strong to resist the first vigorous shake
which was given to them by some of the foremost among the crowd, and
then one fellow started the idea that they might be opened from the
inside, and volunteered to clamber over the wall to do so.
Hoisted up upon the shoulders of several, he grasped the top of the
wall, and raised his head above its level, and then something of a
mysterious nature rose up from the inside, and dealt him such a whack
between the eyes, that down he went sprawling among his coadjutors.
Now, nobody had seen how this injury had been inflicted, and the policy
of those in the garrison should have been certainly to keep up the
mystery, and leave the invaders in ignorance of what sort of person it
was that had so foiled them. Man, however, is prone to indulge in vain
glorification, and the secret was exploded by the triumphant waving of
the long staff of the beadle, with the gilt knob at the end of it, just
over the parapet of the wall, in token of victory.
[Illustration: The beadle gallantly defends the churchyard from the
mob.]
“It’s Waggles! it’s Waggles!” cried everybody “it’s Waggles, the
beadle!”
“Yes,” said a voice from within, “it’s Waggles, the beadle; and he
thinks as he had yer there rather; try it again. The church isn’t in
danger; oh, no. What do you think of this?”
The staff was flourished more vigorously than ever, and in the secure
position that Waggles occupied it seemed not only impossible to attack
him, but that he possessed wonderful powers of resistance, for the
staff was long and the knob was heavy.
It was a boy who hit upon the ingenious expedient of throwing up a
great stone, so that it just fell inside the wall, and hit Waggles a
great blow on the head.
The staff was flourished more vigorously than ever, and the mob, in the
ecstasy at the fun which was going on, almost forgot the errand which
had brought them.
Perhaps after all the affair might have passed off jestingly, had not
there been some really mischievous persons among the throng who were
determined that such should not be the case, and they incited the
multitude to commence an attack upon the gates, which in a few moments
must have produced their entire demolition.
Suddenly, however, the boldest drew back, and there was a pause, as the
well-known form of the clergyman appeared advancing from the church
door, attired in full canonicals.
“There’s Mr. Leigh,” said several; “how unlucky he should be here.”
“What is this?” said the clergyman, approaching the gates. “Can I
believe my eyes when I see before me those who compose the worshippers
at this church armed, and attempting to enter for the purpose of
violence to this sacred place! Oh! let me beseech you, lose not a
moment, but return to your homes, and repent of that which you have
already done. It is not yet too late; listen, I pray you, to the voice
of one with whom you have so often joined in prayer to the throne of
the Almighty, who is now looking upon your actions.”
This appeal was heard respectfully, but it was evidently very far from
suiting the feelings and the wishes of those to whom it was addressed;
the presence of the clergyman was evidently an unexpected circumstance,
and the more especially too as he appeared in that costume which they
had been accustomed to regard with a reverence almost amounting to
veneration. He saw the favourable effect he had produced, and anxious
to follow it up, he added,—
“Let this little ebullition of feeling pass away, my friends; and,
believe me, when I assure you upon my sacred word, that whatever ground
there may be for complaint or subject for inquiry, shall be fully and
fairly met; and that the greatest exertions shall be made to restore
peace and tranquillity to all of you.”
“It’s all about the vampyre!” cried one fellow—“Mr. Leigh, how should
you like a vampyre in the pulpit?”
“Hush, hush! can it be possible that you know so little of the works of
that great Being whom you all pretend to adore, as to believe that he
would create any class of beings of a nature such as those you ascribe
to that terrific word? Oh, let me pray of you to get rid of these
superstitions—alike disgraceful to yourselves and afflicting to me.”
The clergyman had the satisfaction of seeing the crowd rapidly thinning
from before the gates, and he believed his exhortations were having all
the effect he wished. It was not until he heard a loud shout behind
him, and, upon hastily turning, saw that the churchyard had been scaled
at another place by some fifty or sixty persons, that his heart sunk
within him, and he began to feel that what he had dreaded would surely
come to pass.
Even then he might have done something in the way of pacific exertion,
but for the interference of Waggles, the beadle, who spoilt everything.
CHAPTER XLV.
THE OPEN GRAVES.—THE DEAD BODIES.—A SCENE OF TERROR.
We have said Waggles spoilt everything, and so he did, for before
Mr. Leigh could utter a word more, or advance two steps towards the
rioters, Waggles charged them staff in hand, and there soon ensued a
riot of a most formidable description.
A kind of desperation seemed to have seized the beadle, and certainly,
by his sudden and unexpected attack, he achieved wonders. When,
however, a dozen hands got hold of the staff, and it was wrenched from
him, and he was knocked down, and half-a-dozen people rolled over him,
Waggles was not near the man he had been, and he would have been very
well content to have lain quiet where he was; this, however, he was
not permitted to do, for two or three, who had felt what a weighty
instrument of warfare the parochial staff was, lifted him bodily from
the ground, and canted him over the wall, without much regard to
whether he fell on a hard or a soft place on the other side.
This feat accomplished, no further attention was paid to Mr. Leigh,
who, finding that his exhortations were quite unheeded, retired into
the church with an appearance of deep affliction about him, and locked
himself in the vestry.
The crowd now had entire possession—without even the sort of control
that an exhortation assumed over them—of the burying-ground, and soon
in a dense mass were these desperate and excited people collected round
the well-known spot where lay the mortal remains of Miles, the butcher.
“Silence!” cried a loud voice, and every one obeyed the mandate,
looking towards the speaker, who was a tall, gaunt-looking man, attired
in a suit of faded black, and who now pressed forward to the front of
the throng.
“Oh!” cried one, “it’s Fletcher, the ranter. What does he do here?”
“Hear him! hear him!” cried others; “he won’t stop us.”
“Yes, hear him,” cried the tall man, waving his arms about like the
sails of a windmill. “Yes, hear him. Sons of darkness, you’re all
vampyres, and are continually sucking the life-blood from each other.
No wonder that the evil one has power over you all. You’re as men who
walk in the darkness when the sunlight invites you, and you listen to
the words of humanity when those of a diviner origin are offered to
your acceptance. But there shall be miracles in the land, and even in
this place, set apart with a pretended piety that is in itself most
damnable, you shall find an evidence of the true light; and the proof
that those who will follow me the true path to glory shall be found
here within this grave. Dig up Miles, the butcher!”
“Hear, hear, hear, hurra!” said every body. “Mr. Fletcher’s not such a
fool, after all. He means well.”
“Yes, you sinners,” said the ranter, “and if you find Miles, the
butcher, decaying—even as men are expected to decay whose mortal
tabernacles are placed within the bowels of the earth—you shall gather
from that a great omen, and a sign that if you follow me you seek the
Lord; but if you find him looking fresh and healthy, as if the warm
blood was still within his veins, you shall take that likewise as a
signification that what I say to you shall be as the Gospel, and that
by coming to the chapel of the Little Boozlehum, ye shall achieve a
great salvation.”
“Very good,” said a brawny fellow, advancing with a spade in his hand;
“you get out of the way, and I’ll soon have him up. Here goes, like
blue blazes!”
The first shovelful of earth he took up, he cast over his head into the
air, so that it fell in a shower among the mob, which of course raised
a shout of indignation; and, as he continued so to dispose of the
superfluous earth, a general row seemed likely to ensue. Mr. Fletcher
opened his mouth to make a remark, and, as that feature of his face
was rather a capacious one, a descending lump of mould, of a clayey
consistency, fell into it, and got so wedged among his teeth, that in
the process of extracting it he nearly brought some of those essential
portions of his anatomy with it.
This was a state of things that could not last long, and he who had
been so liberal with his spadesful of mould was speedily disarmed,
and yet he was a popular favourite, and had done the thing so
good-humouredly, that nobody touched him. Six or eight others, who had
brought spades and pickaxes, now pushed forward to the work, and in an
incredibly short space of time the grave of Miles, the butcher, seemed
to be very nearly excavated.
Work of any kind or nature whatever, is speedily executed when done
with a wish to get through it; and never, perhaps, within the memory
of man, was a grave opened in that churchyard with such a wonderful
celerity. The excitement of the crowd grew intense—every available spot
from which a view of the grave could be got, was occupied; for the last
few minutes scarcely a remark had been uttered, and when, at last,
the spade of one of those who were digging struck upon something that
sounded like wood, you might have heard a pin drop, and each one there
present drew his breath more shortly than before.
“There he is,” said the man, whose spade struck upon the coffin.
Those few words broke the spell, and there was a general murmur, while
every individual present seemed to shift his position in his anxiety to
obtain a better view of what was about to ensue.
The coffin now having been once found, there seemed to be an increased
impetus given to the work; the earth was thrown out with a rapidity
that seemed almost the quick result of the working of some machine; and
those closest to the grave’s brink crouched down, and, intent as they
were upon the progress of events, heeded not the damp earth that fell
upon them, nor the frail brittle and humid remains of humanity that
occasionally rolled to their feet.
It was, indeed, a scene of intense excitement—a scene which only wanted
a few prominent features in its foreground of a more intellectual and
higher cast than composed the mob, to make it a fit theme for a painter
of the highest talent.
And now the last few shovelfuls of earth that hid the top of the coffin
were cast from the grave, and that narrow house which contained the
mortal remains of him who was so well known, while in life, to almost
every one then present, was brought to the gaze of eyes which never had
seemed likely to have looked upon him again.
The cry was now for ropes, with which to raise the cumbrous mass; but
these were not to be had, no one thought of providing himself with such
appliances, so that by main strength, only, could the coffin be raised
to the brink.
The difficulty of doing this was immense, for there was nothing
tangible to stand upon; and even when the mould from the sides was
sufficiently cleared away, that the handles of the coffin could be laid
hold of, they came away immediately in the grasp of those who did so.
But the more trouble that presented itself to the accomplishment of the
designs of the mob, the more intent that body seemed upon carrying out
to the full extent their original designs.
Finding it quite impossible by bodily strength to raise the coffin of
the butcher from the position in which it had got imbedded by excessive
rains, a boy was hastily despatched to the village for ropes, and never
did boy run with such speed before, for all his own curiosity was
excited in the issue of an adventure, that to his young imagination was
appallingly interesting.
As impatient as mobs usually are, they had not time, in this case, for
the exercise of that quality of mind before the boy came back with the
necessary means of exerting quite a different species of power against
the butcher’s coffin.
Strong ropes were slid under the inert mass, and twenty hands at once
plied the task of raising that receptacle of the dead from what had
been presumed to be its last resting-place. The ropes strained and
creaked, and many thought that they would burst asunder sooner than
raise the heavy coffin of the defunct butcher.
It is singular what reasons people find for backing their opinion.
“You may depend he’s a vampyre,” said one, “or it wouldn’t be so
difficult to get him out of the grave.”
“Oh, there can be no mistake about that,” said one; “when did a natural
Christian’s coffin stick in the mud in that way?”
“Ah, to be sure,” said another; “I knew no good would come of his
goings on; he never was a decent sort of man like his neighbours, and
many queer things have been said of him that I have no doubt are true
enough, if we did but know the rights of them.”
“Ah, but,” said a young lad, thrusting his head between the two who
were talking, “if he is a vampyre, how does he get out of his coffin of
a night with all that weight of mould a top of him?”
One of the men considered for a moment, and then finding no rational
answer occur to him, he gave the boy a box on the ear, saying,—
“I should like to know what business that is of yours? Boys,
now-a-days, ain’t like the boys in my time; they think nothing now of
putting their spokes in grown-up people’s wheels, just as if their
opinions were of any consequence.”
Now, by a vigorous effort, those who were tugging at the ropes
succeeded in moving the coffin a little, and that first step was all
the difficulty, for it was loosened from the adhesive soil in which it
lay, and now came up with considerable facility.
[Illustration: The exhumation of the body of the butcher.]
There was a half shout of satisfaction at this result, while some of
the congregation turned pale, and trembled at the prospect of the sight
which was about to present itself; the coffin was dragged from the
grave’s brink fairly among the long rank grass that flourished in the
churchyard, and then they all looked at it for a time, and the men who
had been most earnest in raising it wiped the perspiration from their
brows, and seemed to shrink from the task of opening that receptacle of
the dead now that it was fairly in their power so to do.
Each man looked anxiously in his neighbour’s face, and several audibly
wondered why somebody else didn’t open the coffin.
“There’s no harm in it,” said one; “if he’s a vampyre, we ought to know
it; and, if he ain’t, we can’t do any hurt to a dead man.”
“Oughtn’t we to have the service for the dead?” said one.
“Yes,” said the impertinent boy who had before received the knock on
the head, “I think we ought to have that read backwards.”
This ingenious idea was recompensed by a great many kicks and cuffs,
which ought to have been sufficient to have warned him of the great
danger of being a little before his age in wit.
“Where’s the use of shirking the job?” cried he who had been so active
in shoveling the mud upon the multitude; “why, you cowardly sneaking
set of humbugs, you’re half afraid, now.”
“Afraid—afraid!” cried everybody; “who’s afraid?”
“Ah, who’s afraid?” said a little man, advancing, and assuming an
heroic attitude; “I always notice, if anybody’s afraid, it’s some big
fellow, with more bones than brains.”
At this moment, the man to whom this reproach was more particularly
levelled, raised a horrible shout of terror, and cried out, in frantic
accents,—
“He’s a-coming—he’s a-coming!”
The little man fell at once into the grave, while the mob, with one
accord, turned tail, and fled in all directions, leaving him alone with
the coffin. Such a fighting, and kicking, and scrambling ensued to get
over the wall of the grave-yard, that this great fellow, who had caused
all the mischief, burst into such peals of laughter that the majority
of the people became aware that it was a joke, and came creeping back,
looking as sheepish as possible.
Some got up very faint sorts of laugh, and said “very good,” and swore
they saw what big Dick meant from the first, and only ran to make the
others run.
“Very good,” said Dick, “I’m glad you enjoyed it, that’s all. My eye,
what a scampering there was among you. Where’s my little friend, who
was so infernally cunning about bones and brains?”
With some difficulty the little man was extricated from the grave, and
then, oh, for the consistency of a mob! they all laughed at him; those
very people who, heedless of all the amenities of existence, had been
trampling upon each other, and roaring with terror, actually had the
impudence to laugh at him, and call him a cowardly little rascal, and
say it served him right.
But such is popularity!
“Well, if nobody won’t open the coffin,” said big Dick, “I will, so
here goes. I knowed the old fellow when he was alive, and many a time
he’s d—d me and I’ve d—d him, so I ain’t a-going to be afraid of him
now he’s dead. We was very intimate, you see, ’cos we was the two
heaviest men in the parish; there’s a reason for everything.”
“Ah, Dick’s the fellow to do it,” cried a number of persons; “there’s
nobody like Dick for opening a coffin; he’s the man as don’t care for
nothing.”
“Ah, you snivelling curs,” said Dick, “I hate you. If it warn’t for my
own satisfaction, and all for to prove that my old friend, the butcher,
as weighed seventeen stone, and stood six feet two and-a-half on his
own sole, I’d see you all jolly well——”
“D——d first,” said the boy; “open the lid, Dick, let’s have a look.”
“Ah, you’re a rum un,” said Dick, “arter my own heart. I sometimes
thinks as you must be a nevy, or some sort of relation of mine.
Howsomdever, here goes. Who’d a thought that I should ever had a look
at old fat and thunder again?—that’s what I used to call him; and then
he used to request me to go down below, where I needn’t turn round to
light my blessed pipe.”
“Hell—we know,” said the boy; “why don’t you open the lid, Dick?”
“I’m a going,” said Dick; “kim up.”
He introduced the corner of a shovel between the lid and the coffin,
and giving it a sudden wrench, he loosened it all down one side.
A shudder pervaded the multitude, and, popularly speaking, you might
have heard a pin drop in that crowded churchyard at that eventful
moment.
Dick then proceeded to the other side, and executed the same manœuvre.
“Now for it,” he said; “we shall see him in a moment, and we’ll think
we seed him still.”
“What a lark!” said the boy.
“You hold yer jaw, will yer? Who axed you for a remark, blow yer? What
do you mean by squatting down there, like a cock-sparrow, with a pain
in his tail, hanging yer head, too, right over the coffin? Did you
never hear of what they call a fluvifium coming from the dead, yer
ignorant beast, as is enough to send nobody to blazes in a minute? Get
out of the way of the cold meat, will yer?”
“A what, do you say, Dick?”
“Request information from the extreme point of my elbow.”
Dick threw down the spade, and laying hold of the coffin-lid with both
hands, he lifted it off, and flung it on one side.
There was a visible movement and an exclamation among the multitude.
Some were pushed down, in the eager desire of those behind to obtain a
sight of the ghastly remains of the butcher; those at a distance were
frantic, and the excitement was momentarily increasing.
They might all have spared themselves the trouble, for the coffin was
empty—here was no dead butcher, nor any evidence of one ever having
been there, not even the grave-clothes; the only thing at all in the
receptacle of the dead was a brick.
Dick’s astonishment was so intense that his eyes and mouth kept opening
together to such an extent, that it seemed doubtful when they would
reach their extreme point of elongation. He then took up the brick and
looked at it curiously, and turned it over and over, examined the ends
and the sides with a critical eye, and at length he said,—
“Well, I’m blowed, here’s a transmogrification; he’s consolidified
himself into a blessed brick—my eye, here’s a curiosity.”
“But you don’t mean to say that’s the butcher, Dick?” said the boy.
Dick reached over, and gave him a tap on the head with the brick.
“There!” he said, “that’s what I calls occular demonstration. Do you
believe it now, you blessed infidel? What’s more natural? He was an
out-and-out brick while he was alive; and he’s turned to a brick now
he’s dead.”
“Give it to me, Dick,” said the boy; “I should like to have that brick,
just for the fun of the thing.”
“I’ll see you turned into a pantile first. I sha’n’t part with this
here, it looks so blessed sensible; it’s a gaining on me every minute
as a most remarkable likeness, d——d if it ain’t.”
By this time the bewilderment of the mob had subsided; now that
there was no dead butcher to look upon, they fancied themselves most
grievously injured; and, somehow or other, Dick, notwithstanding
all his exertions in their service, was looked upon in the light of
a showman, who had promised some startling exhibition and then had
disappointed his auditors.
The first intimation he had of popular vengeance was a stone thrown at
him, but Dick’s eye happened to be upon the fellow who threw it, and
collaring him in a moment, he dealt him a cuff on the side of the head,
which confused his faculties for a week.
“Hark ye,” he then cried, with a loud voice, “don’t interfere with me;
you know it won’t go down. There’s something wrong here; and, as one
of yourselves, I’m as much interested in finding out what it is as any
of you can possibly be. There seems to be some truth in this vampyre
business; our old friend, the butcher, you see, is not in his grave;
where is he then?”
The mob looked at each other, and none attempted to answer the question.
“Why, of course, he’s a vampyre,” said Dick, “and you may all of you
expect to see him, in turn, come into your bed-room windows with a
burst, and lay hold of you like a million and a half of leeches rolled
into one.”
There was a general expression of horror, and then Dick continued,—
“You’d better all of you go home; I shall have no hand in pulling up
any more of the coffins—this is a dose for me. Of course you can do
what you like.”
“Pull them all up!” cried a voice; “pull them all up! Let’s see how
many vampyres there are in the churchyard.”
“Well, it’s no business of mine,” said Dick; “but I wouldn’t, if I was
you.”
“You may depend,” said one, “that Dick knows something about it, or he
wouldn’t take it so easy.”
“Ah! down with him,” said the man who had received the box on the ears;
“he’s perhaps a vampyre himself.”
The mob made a demonstration towards him, but Dick stood his ground,
and they paused again.
“Now, you’re a cowardly set,” he said; “cause you’re disappointed, you
want to come upon me. Now, I’ll just show what a little thing will
frighten you all again, and I warn beforehand it will, so you sha’n’t
say you didn’t know it, and were taken by surprise.”
The mob looked at him, wondering what he was going to do.
“Once! twice! thrice!” he said, and then he flung the brick up into the
air an immense height, and shouted “heads,” in a loud tone.
A general dispersion of the crowd ensued, and the brick fell in the
centre of a very large circle indeed.
“There you are again,” said Dick; “why, what a nice set you are!”
“What fun!” said the boy. “It’s a famous coffin, this, Dick,” and he
laid himself down in the butcher’s last resting-place. “I never was in
a coffin before—it’s snug enough.”
“Ah, you’re a rum ’un,” said Dick; “you’re such a inquiring genius, you
is; you’ll get your head into some hole one day, and not be able to get
it out again, and then I shall see you a kicking. Hush! lay still—don’t
say anything.”
“Good again,” said the boy; “what shall I do?”
“Give a sort of a howl and a squeak, when they’ve all come back again.”
“Won’t I!” said the boy; “pop on the lid.”
“There you are,” said Dick; “d—d if I don’t adopt you, and bring you up
to the science of nothing.”
“Now, listen to me, good people all,” added Dick; “I have really got
something to say to you.”
At this intimation the people slowly gathered again round the grave.
“Listen,” said Dick, solemnly; “it strikes me there’s some tremendous
do going on.”
“Yes, there is,” said several who were foremost.
“It won’t be long before you’ll all of you be most d—nably astonished;
but let me beg of all you not to accuse me of having anything to do
with it, provided I tell you all I know.”
“No, Dick; we won’t—we won’t—we won’t.”
“Good; then, listen. I don’t know anything, but I’ll tell you what
I think, and that’s as good; I don’t think that this brick is the
butcher; but I think, that when you least expect it——hush! come a
little closer.”
“Yes, yes; we are closer.”
“Well, then, I say, when you all least expect it, and when you ain’t
dreaming of such a thing, you’ll hear something of my fat friend as is
dead and gone, that will astonish you all.”
Dick paused, and he gave the coffin a slight kick, as intimation to
the boy that he might as well be doing his part in the drama, upon
which that ingenious young gentleman set up such a howl, that even
Dick jumped, so unearthly did it sound within the confines of that
receptacle of the dead.
But if the effect upon him was great, what must it have been upon
those whom it took completely unawares? For a moment or two they
seemed completely paralysed, and then they frightened the boy, for the
shout of terror that rose from so many throats at once was positively
alarming.
This jest of Dick’s was final, for, before three minutes had elapsed,
the churchyard was clear of all human occupants save himself and the
boy, who had played his part so well in the coffin.
“Get out,” said Dick, “it’s all right—we’ve done ’em at last; and now
you may depend upon it they won’t be in a hurry to come here again. You
keep your own counsel, or else somebody will serve you out for this. I
don’t think you’re altogether averse to a bit of fun, and if you keep
yourself quiet, you’ll have the satisfaction of hearing what’s said
about this affair in every pot-house in the village, and no mistake.”
CHAPTER XLVI.
THE PREPARATIONS FOR LEAVING BANNERWORTH HALL, AND THE MYSTERIOUS
CONDUCT OF THE ADMIRAL AND MR. CHILLINGWORTH.
It seemed now, that, by the concurrence of all parties, Bannerworth
Hall was to be abandoned; and, notwithstanding Henry was loth—as he
had, indeed, from the first shown himself—to leave the ancient abode of
his race, yet, as not only Flora, but the admiral and his friend Mr.
Chillingworth seemed to be of opinion that it would be a prudent course
to adopt, he felt that it would not become him to oppose the measure.
He, however, now made his consent to depend wholly upon the full and
free acquiescence of every member of the family.
“If,” he said, “there be any among us who will say to me ‘Continue to
keep open the house in which we have passed so many happy hours, and
let the ancient home of our race still afford a shelter to us,’ I shall
feel myself bound to do so; but if both my mother and my brother agree
to a departure from it, and that its hearth shall be left cold and
desolate, be it so. I will not stand in the way of any unanimous wish
or arrangement.”
“We may consider that, then, as settled,” said the admiral, “for I have
spoken to your brother, and he is of our opinion. Therefore, my boy, we
may all be off as soon as we can conveniently get under weigh.”
“But my mother?
“Oh, there, I don’t know. You must speak to her yourself. I never, if I
can help it, interfere with the women folks.”
“If she consent, then I am willing.”
“Will you ask her?”
“I will not ask her to leave, because I know, then, what answer she
would at once give; but she shall hear the proposition, and I will
leave her to decide upon it, unbiased in her judgment by any stated
opinion of mine upon the matter.”
“Good. That’ll do; and the proper way to put it, too. There’s no
mistake about that, I can tell you.”
Henry, although he went through the ceremony of consulting his mother,
had no sort of doubt before he did so that she was sufficiently aware
of the feelings and wishes of Flora to be prepared to yield a ready
assent to the proposition of leaving the Hall.
Moreover, Mr. Marchdale had, from the first, been an advocate of such
a course of proceeding, and Henry well knew how strong an influence
he had over Mrs. Bannerworth’s mind, in consequence of the respect in
which she held him as an old and valued friend.
He was, therefore, prepared for what his mother said, which was,—
“My dear Henry, you know that the wishes of my children, since they
have been grown up and capable of coming to a judgment for themselves,
have ever been laws to me. If you, among you all, agree to leave this
place, do so.”
“But will you leave it freely, mother?”
“Most freely I go with you all; what is it that has made this house
and all its appurtenances pleasant in my eyes, but the presence in it
of those who are so dear to me? If you all leave it, you take with you
the only charms it ever possessed; so it becomes in itself as nothing.
I am quite ready to accompany you all anywhere, so that we do but keep
together.”
“Then, mother, we may consider that as settled.”
“As you please.”
“It is scarcely as I please. I must confess that I would fain
have clung with a kind of superstitious reverence to this ancient
abiding-place of my race, but it may not be so. Those, perchance,
who are more practically able to come to correct conclusions, in
consequence of their feelings not being sufficiently interested to lead
them astray, have decided otherwise; and, therefore, I am content to
leave.”
“Do not grieve at it, Henry. There has hung a cloud of misfortune over
us all since the garden of this house became the scene of an event
which we can none of us remember but with terror and shuddering.”
“Two generations of our family must live and die before the remembrance
of that circumstance can be obliterated. But we will think of it no
more.”
There can no doubt but that the dreadful circumstance to which both
Mrs. Bannerworth and Henry alluded, was the suicide of the father of
the family in the gardens which before has been hinted at in the course
of this narration, as being a circumstance which had created a great
sensation at the time, and cast a great gloom for many months over the
family.
The reader will, doubtless, too, recollect that, at his last moments,
this unhappy individual was said to have uttered some incoherent words
about some hidden money, and that the rapid hand of death alone seemed
to prevent him from being explicit upon that subject, and left it
merely a matter of conjecture.
As years had rolled on, this affair, even as a subject of speculation,
had ceased to occupy the minds of any of the Bannerworth family, and
several of their friends, among whom was Mr. Marchdale, were decidedly
of opinion that the apparently pointed and mysterious words uttered,
were but the disordered wanderings of an intellect already hovering on
the confines of eternity.
Indeed, far from any money, of any amount, being a disturbance to the
last moments of the dissolute man, whose vices and extravagances had
brought his family to such ruin, it was pretty generally believed that
he had committed suicide simply from a conviction of the impossibility
of raising any more supplies of cash, to enable him to carry on the
career which he had pursued for so long.
But to resume.
Henry at once communicated to the admiral what his mother had said,
and then the whole question regarding the removal being settled in the
affirmative, nothing remained to be done but to set about it as quickly
as possible.
The Bannerworths lived sufficiently distant from the town to be out
of earshot of the disturbances which were then taking place; and so
completely isolated were they from all sort of society, that they had
no notion of the popular disturbance which Varney the vampyre had
given rise to.
It was not until the following morning that Mr. Chillingworth, who
had been home in the meantime, brought word of what had taken place,
and that great commotion was still in the town, and that the civil
authorities, finding themselves by far too weak to contend against the
popular will, had sent for assistance to a garrison town, some twenty
miles distant.
It was a great grief to the Bannerworth family to hear these tidings,
not that they were in any way, except as victims, accessory to creating
the disturbance about the vampyre, but it seemed to promise a kind of
notoriety which they might well shrink from, and which they were just
the people to view with dislike.
View the matter how we like, however, it is not to be considered as
at all probable that the Bannerworth family would remain long in
ignorance of what a great sensation they had created unwittingly in the
neighbourhood.
The very reasons which had induced their servants to leave their
establishment, and prefer throwing themselves completely out of place,
rather than remain in so ill-omened a house, were sure to be bruited
abroad far and wide.
And that, perhaps, when they came to consider of it, would suffice to
form another good and substantial reason for leaving the Hall, and
seeking a refuge in obscurity from the extremely troublesome sort of
popularity incidental to their peculiar situation.
Mr. Chillingworth felt uncommonly chary of telling them all that had
taken place; although he was well aware that the proceedings of the
riotous mob had not terminated with the little disappointment at the
old ruin, to which they had so effectually chased Varney the vampyre,
but to lose him so singularly when he got there.
No doubt he possessed the admiral with the uproar that was going on in
the town, for the latter did hint a little of it to Henry Bannerworth.
“Hilloa!” he said to Henry, as he saw him walking in the garden; “it
strikes me if you and your ship’s crew continue in these latitudes,
you’ll get as notorious as the Flying Dutchman in the southern ocean.”
“How do you mean?” said Henry.
“Why, it’s a sure going proverb to say, that a nod’s as good as a wink;
but, the fact is, it’s getting rather too well known to be pleasant,
that a vampyre has struck up rather a close acquaintance with your
family. I understand there’s a precious row in the town.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes; bother the particulars, for I don’t know them; but, hark ye, by
to-morrow I’ll have found a place for you to go to, so pack up the
sticks, get all your stores ready to clear out, and make yourself
scarce from this place.”
“I understand you,” said Henry; “We have become the subject of popular
rumour; I’ve only to beg of you, admiral, that you’ll say nothing of
this to Flora; she has already suffered enough, Heaven knows; do not
let her have the additional infliction of thinking that her name is
made familiar in every pothouse in the town.”
“Leave me alone for that,” said the admiral. “Do you think I’m an ass?”
“Ay, ay,” said Jack Pringle, who came in at that moment, and thought
the question was addressed to him.
“Who spoke to you, you bad-looking horse-marine?”
“Me a horse-marine! didn’t you ask a plain question of a fellow, and
get a plain answer?”
“Why, you son of a bad looking gun, what do you mean by that? I tell
you what it is, Jack; I’ve let you come sneaking too often on the
quarter-deck, and now you come poking your fun at your officers, you
rascal!”
“I poking fun!” said Jack; “couldn’t think of such a thing. I should
just as soon think of you making a joke as me.”
“Now, I tell you what it is, I shall just strike you off the ship’s
books, and you shall just go and cruise by yourself; I’ve done with
you.”
“Go and tell that to the marines, if you like,” said Jack. “I ain’t
done with you yet, for a jolly long watch. Why, what do you suppose
would become of you, you great babby, without me? Ain’t I always a
conveying you from place to place, and steering you through all sorts
of difficulties?”
“D——n your impudence!”
“Well, then, d——n yours.”
“Shiver my timbers!”
“Ay, you may do what you like with your own timbers.”
“And you won’t leave me?”
“Sartingly not.”
“Come here, then?”
Jack might have expected a gratuity, for he advanced with alacrity.
“There,” said the admiral, as he laid his stick across his shoulders;
“that’s your last month’s wages; don’t spend it all at once.”
“Well, I’m d—d!” said Jack; “who’d have thought of that?—he’s a turning
rumgumtious, and no mistake. Howsomdever, I must turn it over in my
mind, and be even with him, somehow—I owes him one for that. I say,
admiral.”
“What now, you lubber?”
“Nothing; turn that over in your mind;” and away Jack walked, not quite
satisfied, but feeling, at least, that he had made a demonstration of
attack.
As for the admiral, he considered that the thump he had given Jack
with the stick, and it was no gentle one, was a decided balancing of
accounts up to that period, and as he remained likewise master of the
field, he was upon the whole very well satisfied.
These last few words which had been spoken to Henry by Admiral Bell,
more than any others, induced him to hasten his departure from
Bannerworth Hall; he had walked away when the altercation between
Jack Pringle and the admiral began, for he had seen sufficient of
those wordy conflicts between those originals to be quite satisfied
that neither of them meant what he said of a discouraging character
towards the other, and that far from there being any unfriendly feeling
contingent upon those little affairs, they were only a species of
friendly sparring, which both parties enjoyed extremely.
He went direct to Flora, and he said to her,—
“Since we are all agreed upon the necessity, or, at all events, upon
the expediency of a departure from the Hall, I think, sister, the
sooner we carry out that determination the better and the pleasanter
for us all it will be. Do you think you could remove so hastily as
to-morrow?”
“To-morrow! That is soon indeed.”
“I grant you that it is so; but Admiral Bell assures me that he will
have everything in readiness, and a place provided for us to go to by
then.”
“Would it be possible to remove from a house like this so very quickly?”
“Yes, sister. If you look around you, you will see that a great portion
of the comforts you enjoy in this mansion belong to it as a part of
its very structure, and are not removable at pleasure; what we really
have to take away is very little. The urgent want of money during our
father’s lifetime induced him, as you may recollect even, at various
times to part with much that was ornamental, as well as useful, which
was in the Hall. You will recollect that we seldom returned from those
little continental tours which to us were so delightful, without
finding some old familiar objects gone, which, upon inquiry, we found
had been turned into money, to meet some more than usually pressing
demand.”
“That is true, brother; I recollect well.”
“So that, upon the whole, sister, there is little to remove.”
“Well, well, be it so. I will prepare our mother for this sudden
step. Believe me, my heart goes with it; and as a force of vengeful
circumstances have induced us to remove from this home, which was once
so full of pleasant recollections, it is certainly better, as you say,
that the act should be at once consummated, than left hanging in terror
over our minds.”
“Then I’ll consider that as settled,” said Henry.
CHAPTER XLVII.
THE REMOVAL FROM THE HALL.—THE NIGHT WATCH, AND THE ALARM.
Mrs. Bannerworth’s consent having been already given to the removal,
she said at once, when appealed to, that she was quite ready to go at
any time her children thought expedient.
Upon this, Henry sought the admiral, and told him as much, at the same
time adding,—
“My sister feared that we should have considerable trouble in the
removal, but I have convinced her that such will not be the case, as we
are by no means overburdened with cumbrous property.”
“Cumbrous property,” said the admiral, “why, what do you mean? I beg
leave to say, that when I took the house, I took the table and chairs
with it. D—n it, what good do you suppose an empty house is to me?”
“The tables and chairs!”
“Yes. I took the house just as it stands. Don’t try and bamboozle
me out of it. I tell you, you’ve nothing to move but yourselves and
immediate personal effects.”
“I was not aware, admiral, that that was your plan.”
“Well, then, now you are, listen to me. I’ve circumvented the enemy too
often not to know how to get up a plot. Jack and I have managed it all.
To-morrow evening, after dark, and before the moon’s got high enough to
throw any light, you and your brother, and Miss Flora and your mother,
will come out of the house, and Jack and I will lead you where you’re
to go to. There’s plenty of furniture where you’re a-going, and so you
will get off free, without anybody knowing anything about it.”
“Well, admiral, I’ve said it before, and it is the unanimous opinion of
us all, that everything should be left to you. You have proved yourself
too good a friend to us for us to hesitate at all in obeying your
commands. Arrange everything, I pray you, according to your wishes and
feelings, and you will find there shall be no cavilling on our parts.”
“That’s right; there’s nothing like giving a command to some one
person. There’s no good done without. Now I’ll manage it all. Mind you,
seven o’clock to-morrow evening everything is to be ready, and you will
all be prepared to leave the Hall.”
“It shall be so.”
“Who’s that giving such a thundering ring at the gate?”
“Nay, I know not. We have few visitors and no servants, so I must e’en
be my own gate porter.”
Henry walked to the gate, and having opened it, a servant in a handsome
livery stepped a pace or two into the garden.
“Well,” said Henry.
“Is Mr. Henry Bannerworth within, or Admiral Bell?”
“Both,” cried the admiral. “I’m Admiral Bell, and this is Mr. Henry
Bannerworth. What do you want with us, you d—d gingerbread-looking
flunkey?”
“Sir, my master desires his compliments—his very best compliments—and
he wants to know how you are after your flurry.”
“What?”
“After your—a—a—flurry and excitement.”
“Who is your master?” said Henry.
“Sir Francis Varney.”
“The devil!” said the admiral; “if that don’t beat all the impudence I
ever came near. Our flurry! Ah! I like that fellow. Just go and tell
him——”
“No, no,” said Henry, interposing, “send back no message. Say to your
master, fellow, that Mr. Henry Bannerworth feels that not only has he
no claim to Sir Francis Varney’s courtesy, but that he would rather be
without it.”
“Oh, ha!” said the footman, adjusting his collar; “very good. This
seems a d—d, old-fashioned, outlandish place of yours. Any ale?”
“Now, shiver my hulks!” said the admiral.
“Hush! hush!” said Henry; “who knows but there may be a design in this?
We have no ale.”
“Oh, ah! dem!—dry as dust, by God! What does the old commodore say? Any
message, my ancient Greek?”
“No, thank you,” said the admiral; “bless you, nothing. What did you
give for that waistcoat, d—n you? Ha! ha! you’re a clever fellow.”
“Ah! the old gentleman’s ill. However, I’ll take back his compliments,
and that he’s much obliged at Sir Francis’s condescension. At the same
time, I suppose may place in my eye what I may get out of either of
you, without hindering me seeing my way back. Ha! ha! Adieu—adieu.”
“Bravo!” said the admiral; “that’s it—go it—now for it. D—n it, it is a
_do!_”
The admiral’s calmness during the latter part of the dialogue arose
from the fact that over the flunkey’s shoulder, and at some little
distance off, he saw Jack Pringle taking off his jacket, and rolling
up his sleeves in that deliberate sort of way that seemed to imply a
determination of setting about some species of work that combined the
pleasant with the useful.
Jack executed many nods to and winks at the livery-servant, and jerked
his thumb likewise in the direction of a pump near at hand, in a manner
that spoke as plainly as possible, that John was to be pumped upon.
And now the conference was ended, and Sir Francis’s messenger turned to
go; but Jack Pringle bothered him completely, for he danced round him
in such a singular manner, that, turn which way he would, there stood
Jack Pringle, in some grotesque attitude, intercepting him; and so he
edged him on, till he got him to the pump.
“Jack,” said the admiral.
“Ay, ay, sir.”
“Don’t pump on that fellow now.”
“Ay, ay, sir; give us a hand.”
Jack laid hold of him by the two ears, and holding him under the pump,
kicked his shins until he completely gathered himself beneath the
spout. It was in vain that he shouted “Murder! help! fire! thieves!”
Jack was inexorable, and the admiral pumped.
[Illustration: Jack holds the messenger under the pump.]
Jack turned the fellow’s head about in a very scientific manner, so as
to give him a fair dose of hydropathic treatment, and in a few minutes,
never was human being more thoroughly saturated with moisture than was
Sir Francis Varney’s servant. He had left off hallooing for aid, for
he found that whenever he did so, Jack held his mouth under the spout,
which was decidedly unpleasant; so, with a patience that looked like
heroic fortitude, he was compelled to wait until the admiral was tired
of pumping.
“Very good,” at length he said. “Now, Jack, for fear this fellow
catches cold, be so good as to get a horsewhip, and see him off the
premises with it.”
“Ay, ay, sir,” said Jack. “And I say, old fellow, you can take back all
our blessed compliments now, and say you’ve been flurried a little
yourself; and if so be as you came here as dry as dust, d—e, you go
back as wet as a mop. Won’t it do to kick him out, sir?”
“Very well—as you please, Jack.”
“Then here goes;” and Jack proceeded to kick the shivering animal from
the garden with a vehemence that soon convinced him of the necessity of
getting out of it as quickly as possible.
How it was that Sir Francis Varney, after the fearful race he had had,
got home again across the fields, free from all danger, and back to his
own house, from whence he sent so cool and insolent a message, they
could not conceive.
But such must certainly be the fact; somehow or another, he had
escaped all danger, and, with a calm insolence peculiar to the man,
he had no doubt adopted the present mode of signifying as much to the
Bannerworths.
The insolence of his servant was, no doubt, a matter of pre-arrangement
with that individual, however he might have set about it _con amore_.
As for the termination of the adventure, that, of course, had not
been at all calculated upon; but, like most tools of other people’s
insolence or ambition, the insolence of the underling had received both
his own punishment and his master’s.
We know quite enough of Sir Francis Varney to feel assured that he
would rather consider it as a good jest than otherwise of his footman,
so that with the suffering he endured at the Bannerworths’, and the
want of sympathy he was likely to find at home, that individual had
certainly nothing to congratulate himself upon but the melancholy
reminiscence of his own cleverness.
But were the mob satisfied with what had occurred in the churchyard?
They were not, and that night was to witness the perpetration of
a melancholy outrage, such as the history of the time presents no
parallel to.
The finding of a brick in the coffin of the butcher, instead of
the body of that individual, soon spread as a piece of startling
intelligence all over the place; and the obvious deduction that was
drawn from the circumstance, seemed to be that the deceased butcher was
unquestionably a vampyre, and out upon some expedition at the time when
his coffin was searched.
How he had originally got out of that receptacle for the dead was
certainly a mystery; but the story was none the worse for that. Indeed,
an ingenious individual found a solution for that part of the business,
for, as he said, nothing was more natural, when anybody died who was
capable of becoming a vampyre, than for other vampyres who knew it to
dig him up, and lay him out in the cold beams of the moonlight, until
he acquired the same sort of vitality they themselves possessed, and
joined their horrible fraternity.
In lieu of a better explanation—and, after all, it was no bad one—this
theory was generally received, and, with a shuddering horror, people
asked themselves, if the whole of the churchyard were excavated, how
many coffins would be found tenantless by the dead which had been
supposed, by simple-minded people, to inhabit them.
The presence, however, of a body of dragoons, towards evening,
effectually prevented any renewed attack upon the sacred precincts of
the churchyard, and it was a strange and startling thing to see that
country town under military surveillance, and sentinels posted at its
principal buildings.
This measure smothered the vengeance of the crowd, and insured, for a
time, the safety of Sir Francis Varney; for no considerable body of
persons could assemble for the purpose of attacking his house again,
without being followed; so such a step was not attempted.
It had so happened, however, that on that very day, the funeral of a
young man was to have taken place, who had put up for a time at that
same inn where Admiral Bell was first introduced to the reader. He had
become seriously ill, and, after a few days of indisposition, which had
puzzled the country practitioners, breathed his last.
He was to have been buried in the village churchyard on the very day
of the riot and confusion incidental to the exhumation of the coffin
of the butcher, and probably from that circumstance we may deduce the
presence of the clergyman in canonicals at the period of the riot.
When it was found that so disorderly a mob possessed the churchyard,
the idea of burying the stranger on that day was abandoned; but still
all would have gone on quietly as regarded him, had it not been for the
folly of one of the chamber-maids at the tavern.
This woman, with all the love of gossip incidental to her class, had,
from the first, entered so fully into all the particulars concerning
vampyres, that she fairly might be considered to be a little deranged
on that head. Her imagination had been so worked upon, that she was
in an unfit state to think of anything else, and if ever upon anybody
a stern and revolting superstition was calculated to produce direful
effects, it was upon this woman.
The town was tolerably quiet; the presence of the soldiery had
frightened some and amused others, and no doubt the night would have
passed off serenely, had she not suddenly rushed into the street, and,
with bewildered accents and frantic gestures shouted,—
“A vampyre—a vampyre—a vampyre!”
These words soon collected a crowd around her, and then, with screaming
accents, which would have been quite enough to convince any reflecting
person that she had actually gone distracted upon that point, she
cried,—
“Come into the house—come into the house! Look upon the dead body,
that should have been in its grave; it’s fresher now than it was the
day on which it died, and there’s a colour in its cheeks! A vampyre—a
vampyre—a vampyre! Heaven save us from a vampyre!”
The strange, infuriated, maniacal manner in which these words were
uttered, produced an astonishingly exciting effect among the mob.
Several women screamed, and some few fainted. The torch was laid again
to the altar of popular feeling, and the fierce flame of superstition
burnt brightly and fiercely.
Some twenty or thirty persons, with shouts and exclamations, rushed
into the inn, while the woman who had created the disturbance still
continued to rave, tearing her hair, and shrieking at intervals, until
she fell exhausted upon the pavement.
Soon, from a hundred throats, rose the dreadful cry of “A vampyre—a
vampyre!” The alarm was given throughout the whole town; the bugles of
the military sounded; there was a clash of arms—the shrieks of women;
altogether, the premonitory symptoms of such a riot as was not likely
to be quelled without bloodshed and considerable disaster. It is truly
astonishing the effect which one weak or vicious-minded person can
produce upon a multitude.
Here was a woman whose opinion would have been accounted valueless upon
the most common-place subject, and whose word would not have passed for
twopence, setting a whole town by the ears by force of nothing but her
sheer brutal ignorance.
It is a notorious physiological fact, that after four or five days,
or even a week, the bodies of many persons assume an appearance of
freshness, such as might have been looked for in vain immediately after
death.
It is one of the most insidious processes of that decay which appears
to regret with its
“——————— offensive fingers,
To mar the lines where beauty lingers.”
But what did the chamber-maid know of physiology? Probably, she would
have asked if it was anything good to eat; and so, of course, having
her head full of vampyres, she must needs produce so lamentable a scene
of confusion, the results of which we almost sicken at detailing.
CHAPTER XLVIII.
THE STAKE AND THE DEAD BODY.
The mob seemed from the first to have an impression that, as regarded
the military force, no very serious results would arise from that
quarter, for it was not to be supposed that, on an occasion which could
not possibly arouse any ill blood on the part of the soldiery, or on
which they could have the least personal feeling, they would like to
get a bad name, which would stick to them for years to come.
It was no political riot, on which men might be supposed, in
consequence of differing in opinion, to have their passions inflamed;
so that, although the call of the civil authorities for military aid
had been acceded to, yet it was hoped, and, indeed, almost understood
by the officers, that their operations would lie confined more to a
demonstration of power, than anything else.
Besides, some of the men had got talking to the townspeople, and had
heard all about the vampyre story, and not being of the most refined or
educated class themselves, they felt rather interested than otherwise
in the affair.
Under these circumstances, then, we are inclined to think, that the
disorderly mob of that inn had not so wholesome a fear as it was most
certainly intended they should have of the red coats. Then, again, they
were not attacking the churchyard, which, in the first case, was the
main point in dispute, and about which the authorities had felt so very
sore, inasmuch as they felt that, if once the common people found out
that the sanctity of such places could be outraged with impunity, they
would lose their reverence for the church; that is to say, for the host
of persons who live well and get fat in this country by the trade of
religion.
Consequently, this churchyard was the main point of defence, and it
was zealously looked to when it need not have been done so, while the
public-house where there really reigned mischief was half unguarded.
There are always in all communities, whether large or small, a number
of persons who really have, or fancy they have, something to gain by
disturbance. These people, of course, care not for what pretext the
public peace is violated; so long as there is a row, and something like
an excuse for running into other people’s houses, they are satisfied.
To get into a public-house under such circumstances is an unexpected
treat; and thus, when the mob rushed into the inn with such symptoms
of fury and excitement, there went with the leaders of the disturbance
a number of persons who never thought of getting further than the bar,
where they attacked the spirit-taps with an alacrity which showed how
great was their love for ardent compounds.
Leaving these persons behind, however, we will follow those who, with a
real superstition, and a furious interest in the affair of the vampyre,
made their way towards the upper chamber, determining to satisfy
themselves if there were truth in the statement so alarmingly made by
the woman who had created such an emotion.
It is astonishing what people will do in crowds, in comparison with the
acts that they would be able to commit individually. There is usually
a calmness, a sanctity, a sublimity about death, which irresistibly
induces a respect for its presence, alike from the educated or from the
illiterate; and let the object of the fell-destroyer’s presence be whom
it may, the very consciousness that death has claimed it for its own,
invests it with a halo of respect, that, in life, the individual could
never aspire to probably.
Let us precede these furious rioters for a few moments, and look upon
the chamber of the dead—that chamber, which for a whole week, had been
looked upon with a kind of shuddering terror—that chamber which had
been darkened by having its sources of light closed, as if it were a
kind of disrespect to the dead to allow the pleasant sunshine to fall
upon the faded form.
And every inhabitant of that house, upon ascending and descending its
intricate and ancient staircases, had walked with a quiet and subdued
step past that one particular door.
Even the tones of voice in which they spoke to each other, while they
knew that that sad remnant of mortality was in the house, was quiet and
subdued, as if the repose of death was but a mortal sleep, and could be
broken by rude sounds.
Ay, even some of these very persons, who now with loud and boisterous
clamour, had rushed into the place, had visited the house and talked
in whispers; but then they were alone, and men will do in throngs
acts which, individually, they would shrink from with compunction or
cowardice, call it which we will.
The chamber of death is upon the second story of the house. It is a
back room, the windows of which command a view of that half garden,
half farm-yard, which we find generally belonging to country inns.
But now the shutters were closed, with the exception of one small
opening, that, in daylight, would have admitted a straggling ray of
light to fall upon the corpse. Now, however, that the sombre shades of
evening had wrapped everything in gloom, the room appeared in total
darkness, so that the most of those adventurers who had ventured into
the place shrunk back until lights were procured from the lower part of
the house, with which to enter the room.
A dim oil lamp in a niche sufficiently lighted the staircase, and, by
the friendly aid of its glimmering beams, they had found their way up
to the landing tolerably well, and had not thought of the necessity of
having lights with which to enter the apartments, until they found them
in utter darkness.
These requisites, however, were speedily procured from the kitchen of
the inn. Indeed, anything that was wanted was laid hold of without the
least word of remark to the people of the place, as if might, from that
evening forthwith, was understood to constitute right, in that town.
Up to this point no one had taken a very prominent part in the attack
upon the inn, if attack it could be called; but now the man whom
chance, or his own nimbleness, made the first of the throng, assumed to
himself a sort of control over his companions and, turning to them, he
said,—
“Hark ye, my friends; we’ll do everything quietly and properly; so I
think we’d better three or four of us go in at once, arm-in-arm.”
“Psha!” cried one who had just arrived with a light; “it’s your
cowardice that speaks. I’ll go in first; let those follow me who like,
and those who are afraid may remain where they are.”
He at once dashed into the room, and this immediately broke the spell
of fear which was beginning to creep over the others in consequence of
the timid suggestion of the man who, up to that moment, had been first
and foremost in the enterprise.
In an instant the chamber was half filled with persons, four or five of
whom carried lights; so that, as it was not of very large dimensions,
it was sufficiently illuminated for every object in it to be clearly
visible.
There was the bed, smooth and unruffled, as if waiting for some
expected guest; while close by its side a coffin, supported upon
tressles, over which a sheet was partially thrown, contained the sad
remains of him who little expected in life that, after death, he should
be stigmatised as an example of one of the ghastliest superstitions
that ever found a home in the human imagination.
It was evident that some one had been in the room; and that this was
the woman whose excited fancy had led her to look upon the face of the
corpse there could be no doubt, for the sheet was drawn aside just
sufficiently to discover the countenance.
The fact was that the stranger was unknown at the inn, or probably ere
this the coffin lid would have been screwed on; but it was hoped, up to
the last moment, as advertisements had been put into the county papers,
that some one would come forward to identify and claim him.
Such, however, had not been the case, and so his funeral had been
determined upon.
The presence of so many persons at once effectually prevented any
individual from exhibiting, even if he felt, any superstitious fears
about approaching the coffin; and so, with one accord, they surrounded
it, and looked upon the face of the dead.
There was nothing repulsive in that countenance. The fact was that
decomposition had sufficiently advanced to induce a relaxation of
the muscles, and a softening of the fibres, so that an appearance of
calmness and repose had crept over the face which it did not wear
immediately after death.
It happened, too, that the face was full of flesh; for the death had
been sudden, and there had not been that wasting away of the muscles
and integuments which makes the skin cling, as it were, to the bone,
when the ravages of long disease have exhausted the physical frame.
There was, unquestionably, a plumpness, a freshness, and a sort of
vitality about the countenance that was remarkable.
For a few moments there was a death-like stillness in the apartment,
and then one voice broke the silence by exclaiming,—
“He’s a vampyre, and has come here to die. Well he knows he’d be taken
up by Sir Francis Varney, and become one of the crew.”
“Yes, yes,” cried several voices at once; “a vampyre! a vampyre!”
“Hold a moment,” cried one; “let us find somebody in the house who
has seen him some days ago, and then we can ascertain if there’s any
difference in his looks.”
This suggestion was agreed to, and a couple of stout men ran down
stairs, and returned in a few moments with a trembling waiter, whom
they had caught in the passage, and forced to accompany them.
This man seemed to think that he was to be made a dreadful example of
in some sort of way; and, as he was dragged into the room, he trembled,
and looked as pale as death.
“What have I done, gentlemen?” he said; “I ain’t a vampyre. Don’t be
driving a stake through me. I assure you, gentlemen, I’m only a waiter,
and have been for a matter of five-and-twenty years.”
“You’ll be done no harm to,” said one of his captors; “you’ve only got
to answer a question that will be put to you.”
“Oh, well, certainly, gentlemen; anything you please. Coming—coming, as
I always say; give your orders, the waiter’s in the room.”
“Look upon the face of that corpse.”
“Certainly, certainly—directly.”
“Have you ever seen it before?”
“Seen it before! Lord bless you! yes, a dozen of times. I seed him
afore he died, and I seed him arter; and when the undertaker’s men
came, I came up with them and I seed ’em put him in his coffin. You see
I kept an eye on ’em, gentlemen, ’cos knows well enough what they is. A
cousin of mine was in the trade, and he assures me as one of ’em always
brings a tooth-drawing concern in his pocket, and looks in the mouth of
the blessed corpse to see if there’s a blessed tooth worth pulling out.”
“Hold your tongue,” said one; “we want none of your nonsense. Do you
see any difference now in the face of the corpse to what it was some
days since?”
“Well, I don’t know; somehow, it don’t look so rum.”
“Does it look fresher?”
“Well, somehow or another, now you mention it, it’s very odd, but it
does.”
“Enough,” cried the man who had questioned him, with considerable
excitement of manner. “Neighbours, are we to have our wives and our
children scared to death by vampyres?”
“No—no!” cried everybody.
“Is not this, then, one of that dreadful order of beings?”
“Yes—yes; what’s to be done?”
“Drive a stake through the body, and so prevent the possibility of
anything in the shape of a restoration.”
This was a terrific proposition; and even those who felt most strongly
upon the subject, and had their fears most awakened, shrank from
carrying it into effect. Others, again, applauded it, although they
determined, in their own minds, to keep far enough off from the
execution of the job, which they hoped would devolve upon others, so
that they might have all the security of feeling that such a process
had been gone through with the supposed vampyre, without being in any
way committed by the dreadful act.
Nothing was easier than to procure a stake from the garden in the rear
of the premises; but it was one thing to have the means at hand of
carrying into effect so dreadful a proposition, and another actually to
do it.
For the credit of human nature, we regret that even then, when
civilisation and popular education had by no means made such rapid
strides as in our times they have, such a proposition should be
entertained for a moment; but so it was; and just as an alarm was
given that a party of the soldiers had reached the inn, and had taken
possession of the doorway with a determination to arrest the rioters, a
strong hedge-stake had been procured, and everything was in readiness
for the perpetration of the horrible deed.
Even then those in the room, for they were tolerably sober, would
have revolted, probably, from the execution of so fearful an act; but
the entrance of a party of the military into the lower portion of the
tavern, induced those who had been making free with the strong liquors
below, to make a rush up-stairs to their companions with the hope of
escaping detection of the petty larceny, if they got into trouble on
account of the riot.
These persons, infuriated by drink, were capable of anything, and
to them, accordingly, the more sober parties gladly surrendered the
disagreeable job of rendering the supposed vampyre perfectly innoxious,
by driving a hedge-stake through his body—a proceeding which, it was
currently believed, inflicted so much physical injury to the frame, as
to render his resuscitation out of the question.
The cries of alarm from below, joined now to the shouts of those mad
rioters, produced a scene of dreadful confusion.
We cannot, for we revolt at the office, describe particularly the
dreadful outrage which was committed upon the corpse; suffice it that
two or three, maddened by drink, and incited by the others, plunged
the hedge-stake through the body, and there left it, a sickening and
horrible spectacle to any one who might cast his eyes upon it.
With such violence had the frightful and inhuman deed been committed,
that the bottom of the coffin was perforated by the stake, so that the
corpse was actually nailed to its last earthly tenement.
Some asserted, that at that moment an audible groan came from the dead
man, and that this arose from the extinguishment of that remnant of
life which remained in him, on account of his being a vampyre, and
which would have been brought into full existence, if the body had been
placed in the rays of the moon, when at its full, according to the
popular superstition upon that subject.
Others, again, were quite ready to swear, that at the moment the stake
was used there was a visible convulsion of all the limbs, and that
the countenance, before so placid and so calm, became immediately
distorted, as if with agony.
But we have done with these horrible surmises; the dreadful deed has
been committed, and wild, ungovernable superstition has had, for a
time, its sway over the ignorant and debased.
CHAPTER XLIX.
THE MOB’S ARRIVAL AT SIR FRANCIS VARNEY’S.—THE ATTEMPT TO GAIN
ADMISSION.
The soldiery had been sent for from their principal station near the
churchyard, and had advanced with some degree of reluctance to quell
what they considered as nothing better nor worse than a drunken brawl
at a public-house, which they really considered they ought not to be
called to interfere with.
When, however, the party reached the spot, and heard what a confusion
there was, and saw in what numbers the rioters were assembling, it
became evident to them that the case was of a more serious complexion
than they had at first imagined, and consequently they felt that
their professional dignity was not so much compromised with their
interference with the lawless proceedings.
Some of the constabulary of the town were there, and to them the
soldiers promised they would hand what prisoners they took, at the
same time that they made a distinct condition that they were not to
be troubled with their custody, nor in any way further annoyed in the
business beyond taking care that they did not absolutely escape, after
being once secured.
This was all that the civil authorities of the town required, and,
in fact, they hoped that, after making prisoners of a few of the
ringleaders of the riotous proceedings, the rest would disperse, and
prevent the necessity of capturing them.
Be it known, however, that both military and civil authorities were
completely ignorant of the dreadful outrage against all common decency,
which had been committed within the public-house.
The door was well guarded, and the question now was how the rioters
were to be made to come down stairs, and be captured; and this was
likely to remain a question, so long as no means were adopted to make
them descend. So that, after a time, it was agreed that a couple of
troopers should march up stairs with a constable, to enable him to
secure any one who seemed a principal in the riot.
But this only had the effect of driving those who were in the
second-floor, and saw the approach of the two soldiers, whom they
thought were backed by the whole of their comrades, up a narrow
staircase, to a third-floor, rather consisting of lofts than of actual
rooms; but still, for the time, it was a refuge; and owing to the
extreme narrowness of the approach to it, which consisted of nearly a
perpendicular staircase, with any degree of tact or method, it might
have been admirably defended.
In the hurry and scramble, all the lights were left behind; and when
the two soldiers and constables entered the room where the corpse had
lain, they became, for the first time, aware of what a horrible purpose
had been carried out by the infuriated mob.
[Illustration: The discovery of the desecrated corpse.]
The sight was one of perfect horror, and hardened to scenes which might
strike other people as being somewhat of the terrific as these soldiers
might be supposed to be by their very profession, they actually
sickened at the sight which the mutilated corpse presented, and turned
aside with horror.
These feelings soon gave way to anger and animosity against the crowd
who could be guilty of such an atrocious outrage; and, for the first
time, a strong and interested vengeance against the mob pervaded the
breasts of those who were brought to act against it.
One of the soldiers ran down stairs to the door, and reported the scene
which was to be seen above. A determination was instantly come to,
to capture as many as possible of those who had been concerned in so
diabolical an outrage, and leaving a guard of five men at the door, the
remainder of the party ascended the staircase, determined upon storming
the last refuge of the rioters, and dragging them to justice.
The report, however, of these proceedings that were taking place at the
inn, spread quickly over the whole town; and soon as large a mob of the
disorderly and the idle as the place could at all afford was assembled
outside the inn.
This mob appeared, for a time, inertly to watch the proceedings. It
seemed rather a hazardous thing to interfere with the soldiers, whose
carbines look formidable and troublesome weapons.
With true mob courage, therefore, they left the minority of their
comrades, who were within the house, to their fate; and after a
whispered conference from one to the other, they suddenly turned in a
body, and began to make for the outskirts of the town.
They then separated, as if by common consent, and straggled out into
the open country by twos and threes, consolidating again into a mass
when they had got some distance off, and clear of any exertions that
could be made by the soldiery to stay them.
The cry then rose of “Down with Sir Francis Varney—slay him—burn his
house—death to all vampyres!” and, at a rapid pace, they proceeded in
the direction of his mansion.
We will leave this mob, however, for the present, and turn our
attention to those who are at the inn, and are certainly in a position
of some jeopardy. Their numbers were not great, and they were unarmed;
certainly, their best chance would have been to have surrendered at
discretion; but that was a measure which, if the sober ones had felt
inclined to, those who were infuriated and half maddened with drink
would not have acceded to on any account.
A furious resistance was, therefore, fairly to be expected; and what
means the soldiery were likely to use for the purpose of storming this
last retreat was a matter of rather anxious conjecture.
In the case of a regular enemy, there would not, perhaps, have been
much difficulty; but here the capture of certain persons, and not their
destruction, was the object; and how that was to be accomplished by
fair means, certainly was a question which nobody felt very competent
to solve.
Determination, however, will do wonders; and although the rioters
numbered over forty, notwithstanding all their desertions, and not
above seventeen or eighteen soldiers marched into the inn, we shall
perceive that they succeeded in accomplishing their object without any
manœuvring at all.
The space in which the rioters were confined was low, narrow, and
inconvenient, as well as dark, for the lights on the staircase cast up
that height but very insufficient rays.
Weapons of defence they found but very few, and yet there were some
which, to do them but common credit, they used as effectually as
possible.
These attics, or lofts, were used as lumber-rooms, and had been so for
years, so that there was a collection of old boxes, broken pieces of
furniture, and other matters, which will, in defiance of everything and
everybody, collect in a house.
These were formidable means of defence, if not of offence, down a very
narrow staircase, had they been used with judgment.
Some of the rioters, who were only just drunk enough to be fool-hardy,
collected a few of these articles at the top of the staircase, and
swore they would smash anybody who should attempt to come up to them, a
threat easier uttered than executed.
And besides, after all, if their position had been ever so impregnable,
they must come down eventually, or be starved out.
But the soldiers were not at liberty to adopt so slow a process of
overcoming their enemy, and up the second-floor staircase they went,
with a determination of making short work of the business.
They paused a moment, by word of command, on the landing, and then,
after this slight pause, the word was given to advance.
Now when men will advance, in spite of anything and everything, it is
no easy matter to stop them, and he who was foremost among the military
would as soon thought of hesitating to ascend the narrow staircase
before him, when ordered so to do, as paying the national debt. On he
went, and down came a great chest, which, falling against his feet,
knocked him down as he attempted to scramble over it.
“Fire,” said the officer; and it appeared that he had made some
arrangements as to how the order was to be obeyed, for the second man
fired his carbine, and then scrambled over his prostrate comrade; after
which he stooped, and the third fired his carbine likewise, and then
hurried forward in the same manner.
At the first sound of the fire arms the rioters were taken completely
by surprise; they had not had the least notion of affairs getting
to such a length. The smell of the powder, the loud report, and the
sensation of positive danger that accompanied these phenomena, alarmed
them most terrifically; so that, in point of fact, with the exception
of the empty chest that was thrown down in the way of the first
soldier, no further idea of defence seemed in any way to find a place
in the hearts of the besieged.
They scrambled one over the other in their eagerness to get as far
as possible from immediate danger, which, of course, they conceived
existed in the most imminent degree the nearest to the door.
Such was the state of terror into which they were thrown, that each
one at the moment believed himself shot, and the soldiers had overcome
all the real difficulties in getting possession of what might thus
be called the citadel of the inn, before those men who had been so
valorous a short time since recovered from the tremendous fright into
which they had been thrown.
We need hardly say that the carbines were loaded, but with blank
cartridges, for there was neither a disposition nor a necessity for
taking the lives of these misguided people.
It was the suddenness and the steadiness of the attack that had done
all the mischief to their cause; and now, ere they recovered from the
surprise of having their position so completely taken by storm, they
were handed down stairs, one by one, from soldier to soldier, and into
the custody of the civil authorities.
In order to secure the safe keeping of large a body of prisoners,
the constables, who were in a great minority, placed handcuffs upon
some of the most capable of resistance; so what with those who were
thus secured, and those who were terrified into submission, there was
not a man of all the lot who had taken refuge in the attics of the
public-house but was a prisoner.
At the sound of fire-arms, the women who were outside the inn had, of
course, raised a most prodigious clamour.
They believed directly that every bullet must have done some most
serious mischief to the townspeople, and it was only upon one of the
soldiers, a non-commissioned officer, who was below, assuring them of
the innoxious nature of the proceeding which restored anything like
equanimity.
“Silence!” he cried; “what are you howling about? Do you fancy that
we’ve nothing better to do than to shoot a parcel of fellows that
are not worth the bullets that would be lodged in their confounded
carcases?”
“But we heard the gun,” said a woman.
“Of course you did; it’s the powder that makes the noise, not the
bullet. You’ll see them all brought out safe wind and limb.”
This assurance satisfied the women to a certain extent, and such had
been their fear that they should have had to look upon the spectacle
of death, or of grievous wounds, that they were comparatively quite
satisfied when they saw husbands, fathers, and brothers, only in the
custody of the town officers.
And very sheepish some of the fellows looked, when they were handed
down and handcuffed, and the more especially when they had been routed
only by a few blank cartridges—that sixpennyworth of powder had
defeated them.
They were marched off to the town gaol, guarded by the military, who
now probably fancied that their night’s work was over, and that the
most turbulent and troublesome spirits in the town had been secured.
Such, however, was not the case, for no sooner had comparative order
been restored, than common observation pointed to a dull red glare in
the southern sky.
In a few more minutes there came in stragglers from the open country,
shouting “Fire! fire!” with all their might.
CHAPTER L.
THE MOB’S ARRIVAL AT SIR FRANCIS VARNEY’S.—THE ATTEMPT TO GAIN
ADMISSION.
All eyes were directed towards that southern sky which each moment was
becoming more and more illuminated by the lurid appearance bespeaking a
conflagration, which, if it was not extensive, at all events was raging
fiercely.
There came, too upon the wind, which set from that direction, strange
sounds, resembling shouts of triumph, combined occasionally with
sharper cries, indicative of alarm.
With so much system and so quietly had this attack been made upon the
house of Sir Francis Varney—for the consequences of it now exhibited
themselves most unequivocally—that no one who had not actually
accompanied the expedition was in the least aware that it had been at
all undertaken, or that anything of the kind was on the tapis.
Now, however, it could be no longer kept a secret, and as the
infuriated mob, who had sought this flagrant means of giving vent to
their anger, saw the flames from the blazing house rising high in
the heavens, they felt convinced that further secrecy was out of the
question.
Accordingly, in such cries and shouts as—but for caution’s sake—they
would have indulged in from the very first, they now gave utterance to
their feelings as regarded the man whose destruction was aimed at.
“Death to the vampyre!—death to the vampyre!” was the principal shout,
and it was uttered in tones which sounded like those of rage and
disappointment.
But it is necessary, now that we have disposed of the smaller number of
rioters who committed so serious an outrage at the inn, that we should,
with some degree of method, follow the proceedings of the larger
number, who went from the town towards Sir Francis Varney’s.
These persons either had information of a very positive nature, or a
very strong suspicion that, notwithstanding the mysterious and most
unaccountable disappearance of the vampyre in the old ruin, he would
now be found, as usual, at his own residence.
Perhaps one of his own servants may have thus played the traitor to
him; but however it was, there certainly was an air of confidence about
some of the leaders of the tumultuous assemblage that induced a general
belief that this time, at least, the vampyre would not escape popular
vengeance for being what he was.
We have before noticed that these people went out of the town at
different points, and did not assemble into one mass until they were at
a sufficient distance off to be free from all fear of observation.
Then some of the less observant and cautious of them began to indulge
in shouts of rage and defiance; but those who placed themselves
foremost succeeded in procuring a halt, and one said,—
“Good friends all, if we make any noise, it can only have one effect,
and that is, to warn Sir Francis Varney, and enable him to escape. If,
therefore, we cannot go on quietly, I propose that we return to our
homes, for we shall accomplish nothing.”
This advice was sufficiently and evidently reasonable to meet with no
dissension; a death-like stillness ensued, only broken by some two or
three voices saying, in subdued tones,—
“That’s right—that’s right. Nobody speak.”
“Come on, then,” said he who had given such judicious counsel; and the
dark mass of men moved towards Sir Francis Varney’s house, as quietly
as it was possible for such an assemblage to proceed.
Indeed, saving the sound of the footsteps, nothing could be heard of
them at all; and that regular tramp, tramp, would have puzzled any one
listening to it from any distance to know in which direction it was
proceeding.
In this way they went on until Sir Francis Varney’s house was reached,
and then a whispered word to halt was given, and all eyes were bent
upon the building.
From but one window out of the numerous ones with which the front of
the mansion was studded did there shine the least light, and from that
there came rather an uncommonly bright reflection, probably arising
from a reading lamp placed close to the window.
A general impression, they knew not why exactly, seemed to pervade
everybody, that in the room from whence streamed that bright light was
Sir Francis Varney.
“The vampyre’s room!” said several. “The vampyre’s room! That is it!”
“Yes,” said he who had a kind of moral control over his comrades; “I
have no doubt but he is there.”
“What’s to be done?” asked several.
“Make no noise whatever, but stand aside, so as not to be seen from the
door when it is opened.”
“Yes, yes.”
“I will knock for admittance, and, the moment it is answered, I will
place this stick in such a manner within, that the door cannot be
closed again. Upon my saying ‘Advance,’ you will make a rush forward,
and we shall have possession immediately of the house.”
All this was agreed to. The mob slunk close to the walls of the house,
and out of immediate observation from the hall door, or from any of the
windows, and then the leader advanced, and knocked loudly for admission.
The silence was now of the most complete character that could be
imagined. Those who came there so bent upon vengeance were thoroughly
convinced of the necessity of extreme caution, to save themselves even
yet from being completely foiled.
They had abundant faith, from experience, of the resources in the way
of escape of Sir Francis Varney, and not one among them was there
who considered that there was any chance of capturing him, except by
surprise, and when once they got hold of him, they determined he should
not easily slip through their fingers.
The knock for admission produced no effect; and, after waiting three or
four minutes, it was very provoking to find such a wonderful amount of
caution and cunning completely thrown away.
“Try again,” whispered one.
“Well, have patience; I am going to try again.”
The man had the ponderous old-fashioned knocker in his hand, and was
about to make another appeal to Sir Francis Varney’s door, when a
strange voice said,—
“Perhaps you may as well say at once what you want, instead of knocking
there to no purpose.”
He gave a start, for the voice seemed to come from the very door itself.
Yet it sounded decidedly human; and, upon a closer inspection, it was
seen that a little wicket-gate, not larger than a man’s face, had been
opened from within.
This was terribly provoking. Here was an extent of caution on the part
of the garrison quite unexpected. What was to be done?
“Well?” said the man who appeared at the little opening.
“Oh,” said he who had knocked; “I——”
“Well?”
“I—that is to say—ahem! Is Sir Francis Varney within?”
“Well?”
“I say, is Sir Francis Varney within?”
“Well; you have said it!”
“Ah, but you have not answered it.”
“No.”
“Well, is he at home?”
“I decline saying; so you had better, all of you, go back to the town
again, for we are well provided with all material to resist any attack
you may be fools enough to make.”
As he spoke, the servant shut the little square door with a bang that
made his questioner jump again. Here was a dilemma!
CHAPTER LI.
THE ATTACK UPON THE VAMPYRE’S HOUSE.—THE FURY OF THE ATTACK.—THE
FORCING OF THE DOORS, AND THE STRUGGLE.
A council of war was now called among the belligerents, who were
somewhat taken aback by the steady refusal of the servant to admit
them, and their apparent determination to resist all endeavours on the
part of the mob to get into and obtain possession of the house. It
argued that they were prepared to resist all attempts, and it would
cost some few lives to get into the vampyre’s house. This passed
through the minds of many as they retired behind the angle of the wall
where the council was to be held.
Here they looked in each others’ face, as if to gather from that the
general tone of the feelings of their companions; but here they saw
nothing that intimated the least idea of going back as they came.
“It’s all very well, mates, to take care of ourselves, you know,” began
one tall, brawny fellow; “but, if we bean’t to be sucked to death by a
vampyre, why we must have the life out of him.”
“Ay, so we must.”
“Jack Hodge is right; we must kill him, and there’s no sin in it, for
he has no right to it; he’s robbed some poor fellow of his life to
prolong his own.”
“Ay, ay, that’s the way he does; bring him out, I say, then see what we
will do with him.”
“Yes, catch him first,” said one, “and then we can dispose of him
afterwards. I say, neighbours, don’t you think it would be as well to
catch him first?”
“Haven’t we come on purpose?”
“Yes, but do it.”
“Ain’t we trying it?”
“You will presently, when we come to get into the house.”
“Well, what’s to be done?” said one; “here we are in a fix, I think,
and I can’t see our way out very clearly.”
“I wish we could get in.”
“But how is a question I don’t very well see,” said a large specimen of
humanity.
“The best thing that can be done will be to go round and look over the
whole house, and then we may come upon some part where it is far easier
to get in at than by the front door.”
“But it won’t do for us all to go round that way,” said one; “a small
party only should go, else they will have all their people stationed
at one point, and if we can divide them, we shall beat them because
they have not enough to defend more than one point at a time; now we
are numerous enough to make several attacks.”
“Oh! that’s the way to bother them all round; they’ll give in, and then
the place is our own.”
“No, no,” said the big countryman, “I like to make a good rush and
drive all afore us; you know what ye have to do then, and you do it, ye
know.”
“If you can.”
“Ay, to be sure, if we can, as you say; but can’t we? that’s what I
want to know.”
“To be sure we can.”
“Then we’ll do it, mate—that’s my mind; we’ll do it. Come on, and let’s
have another look at the street-door.”
The big countryman left the main body, and resolutely walked up to the
main avenue, and approached the door, accompanied by about a dozen or
less of the mob. When they came to the door, they commenced knocking
and kicking most violently, and assailing it with all kinds of things
they could lay their hands upon.
They continued at this violent exercise for some time—perhaps for five
minutes, when the little square hole in the door was again opened, and
a voice was heard to say,—
“You had better cease that kind of annoyance.”
“We want to get in.”
“It will cost you more lives to do so than you can afford to spare. We
are well armed, and are prepared to resist any effort you can make.”
“Oh! it’s all very well; but, an you won’t open, why we’ll make you;
that’s all about it.”
This was said as the big countryman and his companions were leaving the
avenue towards the rest of the body.
“Then, take this, as an earnest of what is to follow,” said the man,
and he discharged the contents of a blunderbuss through the small
opening, and its report sounded to the rest of the mob like the report
of a field-piece.
Fortunately for the party retiring the man couldn’t take any aim, else
it is questionable how many of the party would have got off unwounded.
As it was, several of them found stray slugs were lodged in various
parts of their persons, and accelerated their retreat from the house of
the vampyre.
“What luck?” inquired one of the mob to the others, as they came back;
“I’m afraid you had all the honour.”
“Ay, ay, we have, and all the lead too,” replied a man, as he placed
his hand upon a sore part of his person, which bled in consequence of a
wound.
“Well, what’s to be done?”
“Danged if I know,” said one.
“Give it up,” said another.
“No, no; have him out. I’ll never give in while I can use a stick. They
are in earnest, and so are we. Don’t let us be frightened because they
have a gun or two—they can’t have many; and besides, if they have, we
are too many for them. Besides, we shall all die in our beds.”
“Hurrah! down with the vampyre!”
“So say I, lads. I don’t want to be sucked to death when I’m a-bed.
Better die like a man than such a dog’s death as that, and you have no
revenge then.”
“No, no; he has the better of us then. We’ll have him out—we’ll burn
him—that’s the way we’ll do it.”
“Ay, so we will; only let us get in.”
At that moment a chosen party returned who had been round the house to
make a reconnaissance.
“Well, well,” inquired the mob, “what can be done now—where can we get
in?”
“In several places.”
“All right; come along then; the place is our own.”
“Stop a minute; they are armed at all points, and we must make an
attack on all points, else we may fail. A party must go round to the
front-door, and attempt to beat it in; there are plenty of poles and
things that could be used for such a purpose.”
“There is, besides, a garden-door, that opens into the house—a kind
of parlour; a kitchen-door; a window in the flower-garden, and an
entrance into a store-room; this place appears strong, and is therefore
unguarded.”
“The very point to make an attack.”
“Not quite.”
“Why not?”
“Because it can easily be defended, and rendered useless to us. We must
make an attack upon all places but that, and, while they are being at
those points, we can then enter at that place, and then you will find
them desert the other places when they see us inside.”
“Hurrah! down with the vampyre!” said the mob, as they listened to this
advice, and appreciated the plan.
“Down with the vampyre!”
“Now, then, lads, divide, and make the attack; never mind their guns,
they have but very few, and if you rush in upon them, you will soon
have the guns yourselves.”
“Hurrah! hurrah!” shouted the mob.
The mob now moved away in different bodies, each strong enough to carry
the house. They seized upon a variety of poles and stones, and then
made for the various doors and windows that were pointed out by those
who had made the discovery. Each one of those who had formed the party
of observation, formed a leader to the others, and at once proceeded to
the post assigned him.
The attack was so sudden and so simultaneous that the servants were
unprepared; and though they ran to the doors, and fired away, still
they did but little good, for the doors were soon forced open by the
enraged rioters, who proceeded in a much more systematic operation,
using long heavy pieces of timber which were carried on the shoulders
of several men, and driven with the force of battering-rams—which, in
fact, they were—against the door.
Bang went the battering-ram, crash went the door, and the whole party
rushed headlong in, carried forward by their own momentum and fell
prostrate, engine and all, into the passage.
“Now, then, we have them,” exclaimed the servants, who began to
belabour the whole party with blows, with every weapon they could
secure.
Loudly did the fallen men shout for assistance, and but for their
fellows who came rushing in behind, they would have had but a sorry
time of it.
“Hurrah!” shouted the mob; “the house is our own.”
“Not yet,” shouted the servants.
“We’ll try,” said the mob; and they rushed forward to drive the
servants back, but they met with a stout resistance, and as some of
them had choppers and swords, there were a few wounds given, and
presently bang went the blunderbuss.
Two or three of the mob reeled and fell.
This produced a momentary panic, and the servants then had the whole
of the victory to themselves, and were about to charge, and clear the
passage of their enemies, when a shout behind attracted their attention.
That shout was caused by an entrance being gained in another quarter,
whence the servants were flying, and all was disorder.
“Hurrah! hurrah!” shouted the mob.
The servants retreated to the stairs, and here united, they made a
stand, and resolved to resist the whole force of the rioters, and they
succeeded in doing so, too, for some minutes. Blows were given and
taken of a desperate character.
Somehow, there were no deadly blows received by the servants; they were
being forced and beaten, but they lost no life; this may be accounted
for by the fact that the mob used no more deadly weapons than sticks.
The servants of Sir Francis Varney, on the contrary, were mostly armed
with deadly weapons, which, however, they did not use unnecessarily.
They stood upon the hall steps—the grand staircase, with long poles
or sticks, about the size of quarter-staves, and with these they
belaboured those below most unmercifully.
Certainly, the mob were by no means cowards, for the struggle to close
with their enemies was as great as ever, and as firm as could well be.
Indeed, they rushed on with a desperation truly characteristic of John
Bull, and defied the heaviest blows; for as fast as one was stricken
down another occupied his place, and they insensibly pressed their
close and compact front upon the servants, who were becoming fatigued
and harassed.
“Fire, again,” exclaimed a voice from among the servants.
The mob made no retrograde movement, but still continued to press
onwards, and in another moment a loud report rang through the house,
and a smoke hung over the heads of the mob.
[Illustration: The conflict between the mob and Varney’s servants.]
A long groan or two escaped some of the men who had been wounded, and a
still louder from those who had not been wounded, and a cry arose of,—
“Down with the vampyre—pull down—destroy and burn the whole place—down
with them all.”
A rush succeeded, and a few more discharges took place, when a shout
above attracted the attention of both parties engaged in this fierce
struggle. They paused by mutual consent, to look and see what was the
cause of that shout.
CHAPTER LII.
THE INTERVIEW BETWEEN THE MOB AND SIR FRANCIS VARNEY.—THE MYSTERIOUS
DISAPPEARANCE.—THE WINE CELLARS.
The shout that had so discomposed the parties who were thus engaged in
a terrific struggle came from a party above.
“Hurrah! hurrah!” they shouted a number of times, in a wild strain of
delight. “Hurrah! hurrah! hurrah!”
The fact was, a party of the mob had clambered up a verandah, and
entered some of the rooms upstairs, whence they emerged just above the
landing near the spot where the servants were resisting in a mass the
efforts of the mob.
“Hurrah!” shouted the mob below.
“Hurrah!” shouted the mob above.
There was a momentary pause, and the servants divided themselves into
two bodies, and one turned to face those above, and the other those who
were below.
A simultaneous shout was given by both parties of the mob, and a sudden
rush was made by both bodies, and the servants of Sir Francis Varney
were broken in an instant. They were instantly separated, and knocked
about a good bit, but they were left to shift for themselves, the mob
had a more important object in view.
“Down with the vampyre!” they shouted.
“Down with the vampyre!” shouted they, and they rushed helter skelter
through the rooms, until they came to one where the door was partially
open, and they could see some person very leisurely seated.
“Here he is,” they cried.
“Who? who?”
“The vampire.”
“Down with him! kill him! burn him!”
“Hurrah! down with the vampire!”
These sounds were shouted out by a score of voices, and they rushed
headlong into the room.
But here their violence and headlong precipitancy were suddenly
restrained by the imposing and quiet appearance of the individual who
was there seated.
The mob entered the room, and there was a sight, that if it did not
astonish them, at least, it caused them to pause before the individual
who was seated there.
The room was well filled with furniture, and there was a curtain drawn
across the room, and about the middle of it there was a table, behind
which sat Sir Francis Varney himself, looking all smiles and courtesy.
[Illustration: Varney, seated, greets the mob with a smile]
“Well, dang my smock-frock!” said one, “who’d ha’ thought of this? He
don’t seem to care much about it.”
“Well, I’m d——d!” said another; “he seems pretty easy, at all events.
What is he going to do?”
“Gentlemen,” said Sir Francis Varney, rising, with the blandest smiles,
“pray, gentlemen, permit me to inquire the cause of this condescension
on your part. The visit is kind.”
The mob looked at Sir Francis, and then at each other, and then at Sir
Francis again; but nobody spoke. They were awed by this gentlemanly and
collected behaviour.
“If you honour me with this visit from pure affection and neighbourly
good-will, I thank you.”
“Down with the vampyre!” said one, who was concealed behind the rest,
and not so much overawed, as he had not seen Sir Francis.
Sir Francis Varney rose to his full height; a light gleamed across his
features; they were strongly defined then. His long front teeth, too,
showed most strongly when he smiled, as he did now, and said, in a
bland voice,—
“Gentlemen, I am at your service. Permit me to say you are welcome
to all I can do for you. I fear the interview will be somewhat
inconvenient and unpleasant to you. As for myself, I am entirely at
your service.”
As Sir Francis spoke, he bowed, and folded his hands together, and
stepped forwards; but, instead of coming onwards to them, he walked
behind the curtain, and was immediately hid from their view.
“Down with the vampyre!” shouted one.
“Down with the vampyre!” rang through the apartment; and the mob now,
not awed by the coolness and courtesy of Sir Francis, rushed forward,
and, overturning the table, tore down the curtain to the floor; but, to
their amazement, there was no Sir Francis Varney present.
“Where is he?”
“Where is the vampyre?”
“Where has he gone?”
These were cries that escaped every one’s lips; and yet no one could
give an answer to them.
There Sir Francis Varney was not. They were completely thunderstricken.
They could not find out where he had gone to. There was no possible
means of escape, that they could perceive. There was not an odd corner,
or even anything that could, by any possibility, give even a suspicion
that even a temporary concealment could take place.
They looked over every inch of flooring and of wainscoting; not the
remotest trace could be discovered.
“Where is he?”
“I don’t know,” said one—“I can’t see where he could have gone. There
ain’t a hole as big as a keyhole.”
“My eye!” said one; “I shouldn’t be at all surprised, if he were to
blow up the whole house.”
“You don’t say so!”
“I never heard as how vampyres could do so much as that. They ain’t the
sort of people,” said another.
“But if they can do one thing, they can do another.”
“That’s very true.”
“And what’s more, I never heard as how a vampyre could make himself
into nothing before; yet he has done so.”
“He may be in this room now.”
“He may.”
“My eyes! what precious long teeth he had!”
“Yes; and had he fixed one on ’em in to your arm, he would have drawn
every drop of blood out of your body; you may depend upon that,” said
an old man.
“He was very tall.”
“Yes; too tall to be any good.”
“I shouldn’t like him to have laid hold of me, though, tall as he is;
and then he would have lifted me up high enough to break my neck, when
he let me fall.”
The mob routed about the room, tore everything out of its place, and as
the object of their search seemed to be far enough beyond their reach,
their courage rose in proportion, and they shouted and screamed with
a proportionate increase of noise and bustle; and at length they ran
about mad with rage and vexation, doing all the mischief that was in
their power to inflict.
Then they became mischievous, and tore the furniture from its place,
and broke it in pieces, and then amused themselves with breaking it up,
throwing pieces at the pier-glasses, in which they made dreadful holes;
and when that was gone, they broke up the frames.
Every hole and corner of the house was searched, but there was no Sir
Francis Varney to be found.
“The cellars, the cellars!” shouted a voice.
“The cellars, the cellars!” re-echoed nearly every pair of lips in the
whole place; in another moment, there was crushing and crowding to get
down into the cellars.
“Hurray!” said one, as he knocked off the neck of the bottle that first
came to hand.
“Here’s luck to vampyre-hunting! Success to our chase!”
“So say I, neighbour; but is that your manners to drink before your
betters?”
So saying, the speaker knocked the other’s elbow, while he was in the
act of lifting the wine to his mouth; and thus he upset it over his
face and eyes.
“D—n it!” cried the man; “how it makes my eyes smart! Dang thee! if I
could see, I’d ring thy neck!”
“Success to vampyre-hunting!” said one.
“May we be lucky yet!” said another.
“I wouldn’t be luckier than this,” said another, as he, too, emptied a
bottle. “We couldn’t desire better entertainment, where the reckoning
is all paid.”
“Excellent!”
“Very good!”
“Capital wine this!”
“I say, Huggins!”
“Well,” said Huggins.
“What are you drinking?”
“Wine.”
“What wine?”
“Danged if I know,” was the reply. “It’s wine, I suppose; for I know it
ain’t beer nor spirits; so it must be wine.”
“Are you sure it ain’t bottled men’s blood?”
“Eh?”
“Bottled blood, man! Who knows what a vampyre drinks? It may be his
wine. He may feast upon that before he goes to bed of a night, drink
anybody’s health, and make himself cheerful on bottled blood!”
“Oh, danged! I’m so sick; I wish I hadn’t taken the stuff. It may be as
you say, neighbour, and then we be cannibals.”
“Or vampyres.”
“There’s a pretty thing to think of.”
By this time some were drunk, some were partially so, and the remainder
were crowding into the cellars to get their share of the wine.
The servants had now slunk away; they were no longer noticed by the
rioters, who, having nobody to oppose them, no longer thought of
anything, save the searching after the vampyre, and the destruction of
the property. Several hours had been spent in this manner, and yet they
could not find the object of their search.
There was not a room, or cupboard, or a cellar, that was capable of
containing a cat, that they did not search, besides a part of the
rioters keeping a very strict watch on the outside of the house and
all about the grounds, to prevent the possibility of the escape of the
vampyre.
There was a general cessation of active hostilities at that moment; a
reaction after the violent excitement and exertion they had made to get
in. Then the escape of their victim, and the mysterious manner in which
he got away, was also a cause of the reaction, and the rioters looked
in each others’ countenances inquiringly.
Above all, the discovery of the wine-cellar tended to withdraw them
from violent measures; but this could not last long, there must be an
end to such a scene, for there never was a large body of men assembled
for an evil purpose, who ever were, for any length of time, peaceable.
To prevent the more alarming effects of drunkenness, some few of the
rioters, after having taken some small portion of the wine, became,
from the peculiar flavour it possessed, imbued with the idea that it
was really blood, and forthwith commenced an instant attack upon the
wine and liquors, and they were soon mingling in one stream throughout
the cellars.
This destruction was loudly declaimed against by a large portion of
the rioters, who were drinking; but before they could make any efforts
to save the liquor, the work of destruction had not only been begun,
but was ended, and the consequence was, the cellars were very soon
evacuated by the mob.
CHAPTER LIII.
THE DESTRUCTION OF SIR FRANCIS VARNEY’S HOUSE BY FIRE.—THE ARRIVAL OF
THE MILITARY, AND A SECOND MOB.
Thus many moments had not elapsed ere the feelings of the rioters
became directed into a different channel from that in which it had so
lately flowed. When urged about the house and grounds for the vampyre,
they became impatient and angry at not finding him. Many believed that
he was yet about the house, while many were of opinion that he had
flown away by some mysterious means only possessed by vampyres and such
like people.
“Fire the house, and burn him out,” said one.
“Fire the house!”
“Burn the den!” now arose in shouts from all present, and then the
mob were again animated by the love of mischief that seemed to be the
strongest feelings that animated them.
“Burn him out—burn him out!” were the only words that could be heard
from any of the mob. The words ran through the house like wild-fire,
nobody thought of anything else, and all were seen running about in
confusion.
There was no want of good will on the part of the mob to the
undertaking; far from it, and they proceeded in the work _con amore_.
They worked together with right good will, and the result was soon seen
by the heaps of combustible materials that were collected in a short
time from all parts of the house.
All the old dry wood furniture that could be found was piled up in
a heap, and to these were added a number of faggots, and also some
shavings that were found in the cellar.
“All right!” exclaimed one man, in exultation.
“Yes,” replied a second; “all right—all right! Set light to it, and he
will be smoked out if not burned.”
“Let us be sure that all are out of the house,” suggested one of the
bystanders.
“Ay, ay,” shouted several; “give them all a chance. Search through the
house and give them a warning.”
“Very well; give me the light, and then when I come back I will set
light to the fire at once, and then I shall know all is empty, and so
will you too.”
This was at once agreed to by all, with acclamations, and the light
being handed to the man, he ascended the stairs, crying out in a loud
voice,—
“Come out—come out! the house is on fire!”
“Fire! fire! fire!” shouted the mob as a chorus, every now and then at
intervals.
In about ten minutes more, there came a cry of “all right; the house is
empty,” from up the stairs, and the man descended in haste to the hall.
“Make haste, lads, and fire away, for I see the red coats are leaving
the town.”
“Hurra! hurra!” shouted the infuriated mob. “Fire—fire—fire the house!
Burn out the vampyre! Burn down the house—burn him out, and see if he
can stand fire.”
Amidst all this tumult there came a sudden blaze upon all around, for
the pile had been fired.
“Hurra!” shouted the mob—“hurra!” and they danced like maniacs round
the fire; looking, in fact, like so many wild Indians, dancing round
their roasting victims, or some demons at an infernal feast.
The torch had been put to twenty different places, and the flames
united into one, and suddenly shot up with a velocity, and roared with
a sound that caused many who were present to make a precipitate retreat
from the hall.
This soon became a necessary measure of self-preservation, and it
required no urging to induce them to quit a place that was burning
rapidly and even furiously.
“Get the poles and firewood—get faggots,” shouted some of the mob,
and, lo, it was done almost by magic. They brought the faggots and
wood piled up for winter use, and laid them near all the doors, and
especially the main entrance. Nay, every gate or door belonging to the
outhouses was brought forward and placed upon the fire, which now began
to reach the upper stories.
“Hurra—fire! Hurra—fire!”
And a loud shout of triumph came from the mob as they viewed the
progress of the flames, as they came roaring and tearing through the
house doors and the windows.
Each new victory of the element was a signal to the mob for a cheer;
and a hearty cheer, too, came from them.
“Where is the vampyre now?” exclaimed one.
“Ha! where is he?” said another.
“If he be there,” said the man, pointing to the flames, “I reckon he’s
got a warm berth of it, and, at the same time, very little water to
boil in his kettle.”
“Ha, ha! what a funny old man is Bob Mason; he’s always poking fun;
he’d joke if his wife were dying.”
“There is many a true word spoken in jest,” suggested another; “and, to
my mind, Bob Mason wouldn’t be very much grieved if his wife were to
die.”
“Die?” said Bob; “she and I have lived and quarrelled daily a matter of
five-and-thirty years, and, if that ain’t enough to make a man sick of
being married, and of his wife, hang me, that’s all. I say I am tired.”
This was said with much apparent sincerity, and several laughed at the
old man’s heartiness.
“It’s all very well,” said the old man; “it’s all very well to laugh
about matters you don’t understand, but I know it isn’t a joke—not a
bit on it. I tells you what it is, neighbour, I never made but one
grand mistake in all my life.”
“And what was that?”
“To tie myself to a woman.”
“Why, you’d get married to-morrow if your wife were to die to-day,”
said one.
“If I did, I hope I may marry a vampyre. I should have something then
to think about. I should know what’s o’clock. But, as for my old woman,
lord, lord, I wish Sir Francis Varney had had her for life. I’ll
warrant when the next natural term of his existence came round again,
he wouldn’t be in no hurry to renew it; if he did, I should say that
vampyres had the happy lot of managing women, which I haven’t got.”
“No, nor anybody else.”
A loud shout now attracted their attention, and, upon looking in the
quarter whence it came, they descried a large body of people coming
towards them; from one end of the mob could be seen a long string of
red coats.
“The red coats!” shouted one.
“The military!” shouted another.
It was plain the military who had been placed in the town to quell
disturbances, had been made acquainted with the proceedings at Sir
Francis Varney’s house, and were now marching to relieve the place, and
to save the property.
They were, as we have stated, accompanied by a vast concourse of
people, who came out to see what they were going to see, and seeing the
flames at Sir Francis Varney’s house, they determined to come all the
way, and be present.
The military, seeing the disturbance in the distance, and the flames
issuing from the windows, made the best of their way towards the scene
of tumult with what speed they could make.
“Here they come,” said one.
“Yes, just in time to see what is done.”
“Yes, they can go back and say we have burned the vampyre’s house
down—hurra!”
“Hurra!” shouted the mob, in prolonged accents, and it reached the ears
of the military.
The officer urged the men onwards, and they responded to his words, by
exerting themselves to step out a little faster.
“Oh, they should have been here before this; it’s no use, now, they are
too late.”
“Yes, they are too late.”
“I wonder if the vampyre can breathe through the smoke, and live in
fire,” said one.
“I should think he must be able to do so, if he can stand shooting, as
we know he can—you can’t kill a vampyre; but yet he must be consumed,
if the fire actually touches him, but not unless he can bear almost
anything.”
“So he can.”
“Hurra!” shouted the mob, as a tall flame shot through the top windows
of the house.
The fire had got the ascendant now, and no hopes could be entertained,
however extravagant, of saving the smallest article that had been left
in the mansion.
“Hurra!” shouted the mob with the military, who came up with them.
“Hurra!” shouted the others in reply.
“Quick march!” said the officer; and then, in a loud, commanding tone,
he shouted, “Clear the way, there! clear the way.”
“Ay, there’s room enough for you,” said old Mason; “what are you making
so much noise about?”
There was a general laugh at the officer, who took no notice of the
words, but ordered his men up before the burning pile, which was now an
immense mass of flame.
The mob who had accompanied the military now mingled with the mob that
had set the house of Sir Francis Varney on fire ere the military had
come up with them.
“Halt!” cried out the officer; and the men, obedient to the word of
command, halted, and drew up in a double line before the house.
There were then some words of command issued, and some more given to
some of the subalterns, and a party of men, under the command of a
sergeant, was sent off from the main body, to make a circuit of the
house and grounds.
The officer gazed for some moments upon the burning pile without
speaking; and then, turning to the next in command, he said in low
tones, as he looked upon the mob,—
“We have come too late.”
“Yes, much.”
“The house is now nearly gutted.”
“It is.”
“And those who came crowding along with us are inextricably mingled
with the others who have been the cause of all this mischief; there’s
no distinguishing them one from another.”
“And if you did, you could not say who had done it, and who had not;
you could prove nothing.”
“Exactly.”
“I shall not attempt to take prisoners, unless any act is perpetrated
beyond what has been done.”
“It is a singular affair.”
“Very.”
“This Sir Francis Varney is represented to be a courteous, gentlemanly
man,” said the officer.
“No doubt about it, but he’s beset by a parcel of people who do not
mind cutting a throat if they can get an opportunity of doing so.”
“And I expect they will.”
“Yes, when there is a popular excitement against any man, he had better
leave this part at once and altogether. It is dangerous to tamper with
popular prejudices; no man who has any value for his life ought to do
so. It is a sheer act of suicide.”
CHAPTER LIV.
THE BURNING OF VARNEY’S HOUSE.—A NIGHT SCENE.—POPULAR SUPERSTITION.
The officer ceased to speak, and then the party whom he had sent round
the house and grounds returned, and gained the main body orderly
enough, and the sergeant went forward to make his report to his
superior officer.
After the usual salutation, he waited for the inquiry to be put to him
as to what he had seen.
“Well, Scott, what have you done?”
“I went round the premises, sir, according to your instructions, but
saw no one either in the vicinity of the house, or in the grounds
around it.”
“No strangers, eh?”
“No, sir, none.”
“You saw nothing at all likely to lead to any knowledge as to who it
was that has caused this catastrophe?”
“No, sir.”
“Have you learnt anything among the people who are the perpetrators of
this fire?”
“No, sir.”
“Well, then, that will do, unless there is anything else that you can
think of.”
“Nothing further, sir, unless it is that I heard some of them say that
Sir Francis Varney has perished in the flames.”
“Good heavens!”
“So I heard, sir.”
“That must be impossible, and yet why should it be so? Go back, Scott,
and bring me some person who can give me some information upon this
point.”
The sergeant departed toward the people, who looked at him without any
distrust, for he came single-handed, though they thought he came with
the intention of learning what they knew of each other, and so stroll
about with the intention of getting up accusations against them. But
this was not the case; the officer didn’t like the work well enough;
he’d rather have been elsewhere.
At length the sergeant came to one man, whom he accosted, and said to
him,—
“Do you know anything of yonder fire?”
“Yes; I do know it is a fire.”
“Yes, and so do I.”
“My friend,” said the sergeant, “when a soldier asks a question he does
not expect an uncivil answer.”
“But a soldier may ask a question that may have an uncivil end to it.”
“He may; but it is easy to say so.”
“I do say so, then, now.”
“Then I’ll not trouble you any more.”
The sergeant moved on a pace or two more, and then, turning to the
mob, he said,—
“Is there any one among you who can tell me anything concerning the
fate of Sir Francis Varney?”
“Burnt!”
“Did you see him burnt?”
“No; but I saw him.”
“In the flames?”
“No; before the house was on fire.”
“In the house?”
“Yes; and he has not been seen to leave it since, and we conclude he
must have been burned.”
“Will you come and say as much to my commanding officer? It is all I
want.”
“Shall I be detained?”
“No.”
“Then I will go,” said the man, and he hobbled out of the crowd towards
the sergeant. “I will go and see the officer, and tell him what I know,
and that is very little, and can prejudice no one.”
“Hurrah!” said the crowd, when they heard this latter assertion; for,
at first, they began to be in some alarm lest there should be something
wrong about this, and some of them get identified as being active in
the fray.
The sergeant led the man back to the spot, where the officer stood a
little way in advance of his men.
“Well, Scott,” he said, “what have we here?”
“A man who has volunteered a statement, sir.”
“Oh! Well, my man, can you say anything concerning all this disturbance
that we have here?”
“No, sir.”
“Then what did you come here for?”
“I understood the sergeant to want some one who could speak of Sir
Francis Varney.”
“Well?”
“I saw him.”
“Where?”
“In the house.”
“Exactly; but have you not seen him out of it?”
“Not since; nor any one else, I believe.”
“Where was he?”
“Upstairs, where he suddenly disappeared, and nobody can tell where he
may have gone to. But he has not been seen out of the house since, and
they say he could not have gone bodily out if they had not seen him.”
“He must have been burnt,” said the officer, musingly; “he could not
escape, one would imagine, without being seen by some one out of such a
mob.”
“Oh, dear no, for I am told they placed a watch at every hole, window,
or door however high, and they saw nothing of him—not even fly out!”
“Fly out! I’m speaking of a man!”
“And I of a vampire!” said the man carelessly.
“A vampyre! Pooh, pooh!”
“Oh no! Sir Francis Varney is a vampyre! There can be no sort of doubt
about it. You have only to look at him, and you will soon be satisfied
of that. See his great sharp teeth in front, and ask yourself what they
are for, and you will soon find the answer. They are to make holes with
in the bodies of his victims, through which he can suck their blood!”
The officer looked at the man in astonishment for a few moments, as if
he doubted his own ears, and then he said,—
“Are you serious?”
“I am ready to swear to it.”
“Well, I have heard a great deal about popular superstition, and
thought I had seen something of it; but this is decidedly the worst
case that ever I saw or heard of. You had better go home, my man, than,
by your presence, countenance such a gross absurdity.”
“For all that,” said the man, “Sir Francis Varney is a vampyre—a
blood-sucker—a human blood-sucker!”
“Get away with you,” said the officer, “and do not repeat such folly
before any one.”
The man almost jumped when he heard the tone in which this was spoken,
for the officer was both angry and contemptuous, when he heard the
words of the man.
“These people,” he added, turning to the sergeant, “are ignorant in
the extreme. One would think we had got into the country of vampires,
instead of a civilised community.”
The day was going down now; the last rays of the setting sun glimmered
upwards, and still shone upon the tree-tops. The darkness of night was
still fast closing around them. The mob stood a motley mass of human
beings, wedged together, dark and sombre, gazing upon the mischief
that had been done—the work of their hands. The military stood at ease
before the burning pile, and by their order and regularity, presented a
contrast to the mob, as strongly by their bright gleaming arms, as by
their dress and order.
The flames now enveloped the whole mansion. There was not a window or
a door from which the fiery element did not burst forth in clouds, and
forked flames came rushing forth with a velocity truly wonderful.
The red glare of the flames fell upon all objects around for some
distance—the more especially so, as the sun had sunk, and a bank of
clouds rose from beneath the horizon and excluded all his rays; there
was no twilight, and there was, as yet, no moon.
The country side was enveloped in darkness, and the burning house could
be seen for miles around, and formed a rallying-point to all men’s eyes.
The engines that were within reach came tearing across the country, and
came to the fire; but they were of no avail. There was no supply of
water, save from the ornamental ponds. These they could only get at by
means that were tedious and unsatisfactory, considering the emergency
of the case.
The house was a lone one, and it was being entirely consumed before
they arrived, and therefore there was not the remotest chance of saving
the least article. Had they ever such a supply of water, nothing could
have been effected by it.
Thus the men stood idly by, passing their remarks upon the fire and the
mob.
Those who stood around, and within the influence of the red glare
of the flames, looked like so many demons in the infernal regions,
watching the progress of lighting the fire, which we are told by good
Christians is the doom of the unfortunate in spirit, and the woefully
unlucky in circumstances.
It was a strange sight that; and there were many persons who would,
without doubt, have rather been snug by their own fire-side than they
would have remained there; but it happened that no one felt inclined
to express his inclination to his neighbour, and, consequently, no one
said anything on the subject.
None would venture to go alone across the fields, where the spirit of
the vampyre might, for all they knew to the contrary, be waiting to
pounce upon them, and worry them.
No, no; no man would have quitted that mob to go back alone to the
village; they would sooner have stood there all night through. That was
an alternative that none of the number would very willingly accept.
The hours passed away, and the house that had been that morning a noble
and well-furnished mansion, was now a smouldering heap of ruins. The
flames had become somewhat subdued, and there was now more smoke than
flames.
The fire had exhausted itself. There was now no more material that
could serve it for fuel, and the flames began to become gradually
enough subdued.
Suddenly there was a rush, and then a bright flame shot upward for an
instant, so bright and so strong, that it threw a flash of light over
the country for miles; but it was only momentary, and it subsided.
The roof, which had been built strong enough to resist almost anything,
after being burning for a considerable time, suddenly gave way, and
came in with a tremendous crash, and then all was for a moment darkness.
After this the fire might be said to be subdued, it having burned
itself out; and the flames that could now be seen were but the result
of so much charred wood, that would probably smoulder away for a day or
two, if left to itself to do so. A dense mass of smoke arose from the
ruins, and blackened the atmosphere around, and told the spectators the
work was done.
CHAPTER LV.
THE RETURN OF THE MOB AND MILITARY TO THE TOWN.—THE MADNESS OF THE
MOB.—THE GROCER’S REVENGE.
On the termination of the conflagration, or, rather, the fall of the
roof, with the loss of grandeur in the spectacle, men’s minds began to
be free from the excitement that chained them to the spot, watching the
progress of that element which has been truly described as a very good
servant, but a very bad master; and of the truth of this every one must
be well satisfied.
There was now remaining little more than the livid glare of the hot and
burning embers; and this did not extend far, for the walls were too
strongly built to fall in from their own weight; they were strong and
stout, and intercepted the little light the ashes would have given out.
The mob now began to feel fatigued and chilly. It had been standing and
walking about many hours, and the approach of exhaustion could not
be put off much longer, especially as there was no longer any great
excitement to carry it off.
The officer, seeing that nothing was to be done, collected his men
together, and they were soon seen in motion. He had been ordered to
stop any tumult that he might have seen, and to save any property. But
there was nothing to do now; all the property that could have been
saved was now destroyed, and the mob were beginning to disperse, and
creep towards their own houses.
The order was then given for the men to take close order, and keep
together, and the word to march was given, which the men obeyed with
alacrity, for they had no good-will in stopping there the whole of the
night.
The return to the village of both the mob and the military was not
without its vicissitudes; accidents of all kinds were rife amongst
them; the military, however, taking the open paths, soon diminished
the distance, and that, too, with little or no accidents, save such as
might have been expected from the state of the fields, after they had
been so much trodden down of late.
Not so the townspeople or the peasantry; for, by way of keeping up
their spirits, and amusing themselves on their way home, they commenced
larking, as they called it, which often meant the execution of
practical jokes, and these sometimes were of a serious nature.
The night was dark at that hour, especially so when there was a number
of persons traversing about, so that little or nothing could be seen.
The mistakes and blunders that were made were numerous. In one place
there were a number of people penetrating a path that led only to a
hedge and deep ditch; indeed it was a brook very deep and muddy.
Here they came to a stop and endeavoured to ascertain its width, but
the little reflected light they had was deceptive, and it did not
appear so broad as it was.
“Oh, I can jump it,” exclaimed one.
“And so can I,” said another. “I have done so before, and why should I
not do so now.”
This was unanswerable, and as there were many present, at least a dozen
were eager to jump.
“If thee can do it, I know I can,” said a brawny countryman; “so I’ll
do it at once.
“The sooner the better,” shouted some one behind, “or you’ll have no
room for a run, here’s a lot of ’em coming up; push over as quickly as
you can.”
Thus urged, the jumpers at once made a rush to the edge of the ditch,
and many jumped, and many more, from the prevailing darkness, did not
see exactly where the ditch was, and taking one or two steps too many,
found themselves up above the waist in muddy water.
Nor were those who jumped much better off, for nearly all jumped short
or fell backwards into the stream, and were dragged out in a terrible
state.
“Oh, lord! oh, lord!” exclaimed one poor fellow, dripping wet and
shivering with cold, “I shall die! oh, the rheumatiz, there’ll be a
pretty winter for me: I’m half dead.”
“Hold your noise,” said another, “and help me to get the mud out of my
eye; I can’t see.”
“Never mind,” added a third, “considering how you jump, I don’t think
you want to see.”
“This comes a hunting vampyres.”
“Oh, it’s all a judgment; who knows but he may be in the air; it is
nothing to laugh at as I shouldn’t be surprised if he were; only think
how precious pleasant.”
“However pleasant it may be to you,” remarked one, “it’s profitable to
a good many.”
“How so?”
“Why, see the numbers of things that will be spoiled, coats torn, hats
crushed, heads broken, and shoes burst. Oh, it’s an ill-wind that blows
nobody any good.”
“So it is, but you may benefit anybody you like, so you don’t do it at
my expence.”
In one part of a field where there were some stiles and gates, a
big countryman caught a fat shopkeeper with the arms of the stile a
terrible poke in the stomach; while the breath was knocked out of the
poor man’s stomach, and he was gasping with agony, the fellow set to
laughing, and said to his companions, who were of the same class—
“I say, Jim, look at the grocer, he hasn’t got any wind to spare, I’d
run him for a wager, see how he gapes like a fish out of water.”
The poor shopkeeper felt indeed like a fish out of water, and as he
afterwards declared he felt just as if he had had a red hot clock
weight thrust into the midst of his stomach and there left to cool.
However, the grocer would be revenged upon his tormentor, who had now
lost sight of him, but the fat man, after a time, recovering his wind,
and the pain in his stomach becoming less intense, he gathered himself
up.
“My name ain’t Jones,” he muttered, “if I don’t be one to his one for
that; I’ll do something that shall make him remember what it is to
insult a respectable tradesman. I’ll never forgive such an insult. It
is dark, and that’s why it is he has dared to do this.”
Filled with dire thoughts and a spirit of revenge, he looked from side
to side to see with what he could effect his object, but could espy
nothing.
“It’s shameful,” he muttered; “what would I give for a little retort.
I’d plaster his ugly countenance.”
As he spoke, he placed his hands on some pales to rest himself, when
he found that they stuck to them, the pales had that day been newly
pitched.
A bright idea now struck him.
“If I could only get a handful of this stuff,” he thought, “I should be
able to serve him out for serving me out. I will, cost what it may; I’m
resolved upon that. I’ll not have my wind knocked out, and my inside
set on fire for nothing. No, no; I’ll be revenged on him.”
With this view he felt over the pales, and found that he could scrape
off a little only, but not with his hands; indeed, it only plastered
them; he, therefore, marched about for something to scrape it off with.
“Ah; I have a knife, a large pocket knife, that will do, that is the
sort of thing I want.”
He immediately commenced feeling for it, but had scarcely got his
hand into his pocket when he found there would be a great difficulty
in either pushing it in further or withdrawing it altogether, for the
pitch made it difficult to do either, and his pocket stuck to his hands
like a glove.
“D—n it,” said the grocer, “who would have thought of that? here’s a
pretty go, curse that fellow, he is the cause of all this; I’ll be
revenged upon him, if it’s a year hence.”
The enraged grocer drew his hand out, but was unable to effect his
object in withdrawing the knife also; but he saw something shining, he
stooped to pick it up, exclaiming as he did so, in a gratified tone of
voice,
“Ah, here’s something that will do better.”
As he made a grasp at it, he found he had inserted his hand into
something soft.
“God bless me! what now?”
He pulled his hand hastily away, and found that it stuck slightly, and
then he saw what it was.
“Ay, ay, the very thing. Surely it must have been placed here on
purpose by the people.”
The fact was, he had placed his hand into a pot of pitch that had been
left by the people who had been at work at pitching the pales, but had
been attracted by the fire at Sir Francis Varney’s, and to see which
they had left their work, and the pitch was left on a smouldering peat
fire, so that when Mr. Jones, the grocer, accidentally put his hand
into it he found it just warm.
When he made this discovery he dabbed his hand again into the
pitch-pot, exclaiming,—
“In for a penny, in for a pound.”
And he endeavoured to secure as large a handful of the slippery and
sticky stuff as he could, and this done he set off to come up with the
big countryman who had done him so much indignity and made his stomach
uncomfortable.
He soon came up with him, for the man had stopped rather behind, and
was larking, as it is called, with some men, to whom he was a companion.
He had slipped down a bank, and was partially sitting down on the soft
mud. In his bustle, the little grocer came down with a slide, close to
the big countryman.
“Ah—ah! my little grocer,” said the countryman, holding out his hand to
catch him, and drawing him towards himself. “You will come and sit down
by the side of your old friend.”
As he spoke, he endeavoured to pull Mr. Jones down, too; but that
individual only replied by fetching the countryman a swinging smack
across the face with the handful of pitch.
“There, take that; and now we are quits; we shall be old friends after
this, eh? Are you satisfied? You’ll remember me, I’ll warrant.”
As the grocer spoke, he rubbed his hands over the face of the fallen
man, and then rushed from the spot with all the haste he could make.
The countryman sat a moment or two confounded, cursing, and swearing,
and spluttering, vowing vengeance, believing that it was mud only that
had been plastered over his face; but when he put his hands up, and
found out what it was, he roared and bellowed like a town-bull.
He cried out to his companions that his eyes were pitched; but they
only laughed at him, thinking he was having some foolish lark with them.
It was next day before he got home, for he wandered about all night:
and it took him a week to wash the pitch off by means of grease; and
ever afterwards he recollected the pitching of his face; nor did he
ever forget the grocer.
Thus it was the whole party returned a long while after dark across the
fields, with all the various accidents that were likely to befall such
an assemblage of people.
The vampyre hunting cost many of them dear, for clothes were injured
on all sides, hats lost, and shoes missing in a manner that put some
of the rioters to much inconvenience. Soon afterwards, the military
retired to their quarters; and the townspeople at length became
tranquil and nothing more was heard or done that night.
CHAPTER LVI.
THE DEPARTURE OF THE BANNERWORTHS FROM THE HALL.—THE NEW ABODE.—JACK
PRINGLE, PILOT.
During that very evening, on which the house of Sir Francis Varney was
fired by the mob, another scene, and one of different character, was
enacted at Bannerworth Hall, where the owners of that ancient place
were departing from it.
It was towards the latter part of the day, that Flora Bannerworth,
Mrs. Bannerworth, and Henry Bannerworth, were preparing themselves to
depart from the house of their ancestors. The intended proprietor was,
as we have already been made acquainted with, the old admiral, who had
taken the place somewhat mysteriously, considering the way in which he
usually did business.
The admiral was walking up and down the lawn before the house, and
looking up at the windows every now and then; and turning to Jack
Pringle, he said,—
“Jack, you dog.”
“Ay—ay, sir.”
“Mind you convoy these women into the right port; do you hear? and no
mistaking the bearings; do you hear?”
“Ay, ay, sir.”
“These crafts want care; and you are pilot, commander, and all; so mind
and keep your weather eye open.”
“Ay, ay, sir. I knows the craft well enough, and I knows the roads,
too; there’ll be no end of foundering against the breakers to find
where they lie.”
“No, no, Jack; you needn’t do that; but mind your bearings. Jack, mind
your bearings.”
“Never fear; I know ’em, well enough; my eyes ain’t laid up in ordinary
yet.”
“Eh? What do you mean by that, you dog, eh?”
“Nothing; only I can see without helps to read, or glasses either; so I
know one place from another.”
There was now some one moving within; and the admiral, followed by Jack
Pringle, entered the Hall. Henry Bannerworth was there. They were all
ready to go when the coach came for them, which the admiral had ordered
for them.
“Jack, you lubber; where are you?”
“Ay, ay, sir, here am I.”
“Go, and station yourself up in some place where you can keep a good
look-out for the coach, and come and report when you see it.”
“Ay—ay, sir,” said Jack, and away he went from the room, and stationed
himself up in one of the trees, that commanded a good view of the main
road for some distance.
“Admiral Bell,” said Henry, “here we are, trusting implicitly to you;
and in doing so, I am sure I am doing right.”
“You will see that,” said the admiral. “All’s fair and honest as yet;
and what is to come, will speak for itself.”
“I hope you won’t suffer from any of these nocturnal visits,” said
Henry.
“I don’t much care about them; but old Admiral Bell don’t strike his
colours to an enemy, however ugly he may look. No, no; it must be a
better craft than his own that’ll take him; and one who won’t run away,
but that will grapple yard-arm and yard-arm, you know.”
“Why, admiral, you must have seen many dangers in your time, and be
used to all kinds of disturbances and conflicts. You have had a life of
experience.”
“Yes; and experience has come pretty thick sometimes, I can tell you,
when it comes in the shape of Frenchmen’s broadsides.”
“I dare say, then, it must be rather awkward.”
“Death by the law,” said the admiral, “to stop one of them with your
head, I assure you. I dare not make the attempt myself, though I have
often seen it done.”
“I dare say; but here are Flora and my mother.”
As he spoke, Flora and her mother entered the apartment.
“Well, admiral, we are all ready; and, though I may feel somewhat sorry
at leaving the old Hall, yet it arises from attachment to the place,
and not any disinclination to be beyond the reach of these dreadful
alarms.”
“And I, too, shall be by no means sorry,” said Flora; “I am sure it is
some gratification to know we leave a friend here, rather than some
others, who would have had the place, if they could have got it, by any
means.”
“Ah, that’s true enough, Miss Flora,” said the admiral; “but we’ll
run the enemy down yet, depend upon it. But once away, you will be
free from these terrors; and now, as you have promised, do not let
yourselves be seen any where at all.”
“You have our promises, admiral; and they shall be religiously kept, I
can assure you.”
“Boat, ahoy—ahoy!” shouted Jack.
“What boat?” said the admiral, surprised; and then he muttered,
“Confound you for a lubber! Didn’t I tell you to mind your bearings,
you dog-fish you?”
“Ay, ay, sir—and so I did.”
“You did.”
“Yes, here they are. Squint over the larboard bulk-heads, as they call
walls, and then atween the two trees on the starboard side of the
course, then straight ahead for a few hundred fathoms, when you come to
a funnel as is smoking like the crater of Mount Vesuvius, and then in a
line with that on the top of the hill, comes our boat.”
“Well,” said the admiral, “that’ll do. Now go open the gates, and keep
a bright look out, and if you see anybody near your watch, why douse
their glim.”
“Ay—ay, sir,” said Jack, and he disappeared.
“Rather a lucid description,” said Henry, as he thought of Jack’s
report to the admiral.
“Oh, it’s a seaman’s report. I know what he means; it’s quicker and
plainer than the land lingo, to my ears, and Jack can’t talk any other,
you see.”
By this time the coach came into the yard, and the whole party
descended into the court-yard, where they came to take leave of the old
place.
“Farewell, admiral.”
“Good bye,” said the admiral. “I hope the place you are going to will
be such as please you—I hope it will.”
“I am sure we shall endeavour to be pleased with it, and I am pretty
sure we shall.”
“Good bye.”
“Farewell, Admiral Bell,” said Henry.
“You remember your promises?”
“I do. Good bye, Mr. Chillingworth.”
“Good bye,” said Mr. Chillingworth, who came up to bid them farewell;
“a pleasant journey, and may you all be the happier for it.”
“You do not come with us?”
“No; I have some business of importance to attend to, else I should
have the greatest pleasure in doing so. But good bye; we shall not be
long apart, I dare say.”
“I hope not,” said Henry.
The door of the carriage was shut by the admiral, who looked round,
saying,—
“Jack—Jack Pringle, where are you, you dog?”
“Here am I,” said Jack.
“Where have you been to?”
“Only been for pigtail,” said Jack. “I forgot it, and couldn’t set sail
without it.”
“You dog you; didn’t I tell you to mind your bearings?”
“So I will,” said Jack, “fore and aft—fore and aft, admiral.”
“You had better,” said the admiral, who, however, relaxed into a broad
grin, which he concealed from Jack Pringle.
Jack mounted the coach-box, and away it went, just as it was getting
dark. The old admiral had locked up all the rooms in the presence
of Henry Bannerworth; and when the coach had gone out of sight, Mr.
Chillingworth came back to the Hall, where he joined the admiral.
“Well,” he said, “they are gone, Admiral Bell, and we are alone; we
have a clear stage and no favour.”
“The two things of all others I most desire. Now, they will be
strangers where they are going to, and that will be something gained.
I will endeavour to do some thing if I get yard-arm and yard-arm with
these pirates. I’ll make ’em feel the weight of true metal; I’ll board
’em—d——e, I’ll do everything.”
“Everything that can be done.”
“Ay—ay.”
• • • • •
The coach in which the family of the Bannerworths were carried away
continued its course without any let or hindrance, and they met no one
on their road during the whole drive. The fact was, nearly everybody
was at the conflagration at Sir Francis Varney’s house.
Flora knew not which way they were going, and, after a time, all trace
of the road was lost. Darkness set in, and they all sat in silence in
the coach.
At length, after some time had been spent thus, Flora Bannerworth
turned to Jack Pringle, and said,—
“Are we near, or have we much further to go?”
“Not very much, ma’am,” said Jack. “All’s right, however—ship in the
direct course, and no breakers ahead—no lookout necessary; however
there’s a land-lubber aloft to keep a look out.”
As this was not very intelligible, and Jack seemed to have his own
reasons for silence, they asked him no further questions; but in about
three-quarters of an hour, during which time the coach had been driving
through the trees, they came to a standstill by a sudden pull of the
check-string from Jack, who said,—
“Hilloa!—take in sails, and drop anchor.”
“Is this the place?”
“Yes, here we are,” said Jack; “we’re in port now, at all events;” and
he began to sing,—
“The trials and the dangers of the voyage is past,”
when the coach door opened, and they all got out and looked about them
where they were.
“Up the garden if you please, ma’am—as quick as you can; the night air
is very cold.”
Flora and her mother and brother took the hint, which was meant by Jack
to mean that they were not to be seen outside. They at once entered
a pretty garden, and then they came to a very neat and picturesque
cottage. They had no time to look up at it, as the door was immediately
opened by an elderly female, who was intended to wait upon them.
Soon after, Jack Pringle and the coachman entered the passage with the
small amount of luggage which they had brought with them. This was
deposited in the passage, and then Jack went out again, and, after a
few minutes, there was the sound of wheels, which intimated that the
coach had driven off.
Jack, however, returned in a few minutes afterwards, having secured
the wicket-gate at the end of the garden, and then entered the house,
shutting the door carefully after him.
Flora and her mother looked over the apartments in which they were
shown with some surprise. It was, in everything, such as they could
wish; indeed, though it could not be termed handsomely or extravagantly
furnished, or that the things were new, yet, there was all that
convenience and comfort could require, and some little of the luxuries.
“Well,” said Flora, “this is very thoughtful of the admiral. The place
will really be charming, and the garden, too, delightful.”
“Mustn’t be made use of just now,” said Jack, “if you please, ma’am;
them’s the orders at present.”
“Very well,” said Flora, smiling. “I suppose, Mr. Pringle, we must obey
them.”
“Jack Pringle, if you please,” said Jack. “My commands only temporary.
I ain’t got a commission.”
CHAPTER LVII.
THE LONELY WATCH, AND THE ADVENTURE IN THE DESERTED HOUSE.
It is now quite night, and so peculiar and solemn a stillness reigns in
and about Bannerworth Hall and its surrounding grounds, that one might
have supposed it a place of the dead, deserted completely after sunset
by all who would still hold kindred with the living. There was not a
breath of air stirring, and this circumstance added greatly to the
impression of profound repose which the whole scene exhibited.
The wind during the day had been rather of a squally character, but
towards nightfall, as is often usual after a day of such a character,
it had completely lulled, and the serenity of the scene was unbroken
even by the faintest sigh from a wandering zephyr.
The moon rose late at that period, and as is always the case at that
interval between sunset and the rising of that luminary which makes the
night so beautiful, the darkness was of the most profound character.
It was one of those nights to produce melancholy reflections—a night on
which a man would be apt to review his past life, and to look into the
hidden recesses of his soul to see if conscience could make a coward of
him in the loneliness and stillness that breathed around.
It was one of those nights in which wanderers in the solitude of nature
feel that the eye of Heaven is upon them, and on which there seems to
be a more visible connection between the world and its great Creator
than upon ordinary occasions.
The solemn and melancholy appear places once instinct with life, when
deserted by those familiar forms and faces that have long inhabited
them. There is no desert, no uninhabited isle in the far ocean, no
wild, barren, pathless tract of unmitigated sterility, which could for
one moment compare in point of loneliness and desolation to a deserted
city.
Strip London, mighty and majestic as it is, of the busy swarm of
humanity that throng its streets, its suburbs, its temples, its public
edifices, and its private dwellings, and how awful would be the walk of
one solitary man throughout its noiseless thoroughfares.
If madness seized not upon him ere he had been long the sole survivor
of a race, it would need be cast in no common mould.
And to descend from great things to smaller—from the huge leviathan
city to one mansion far removed from the noise and bustle of
conventional life, we may imagine the sort of desolation that reigned
through Bannerworth Hall, when, for the first time, after nearly
a hundred and fifty years of occupation, it was deserted by the
representatives of that family, so many members of which had lived and
died beneath its roof. The house, and everything within, without, and
around it, seemed actually to sympathize with its own desolation and
desertion.
It seemed as if twenty years of continued occupation could not have
produced such an effect upon the ancient edifice as had those few hours
of neglect and desertion.
And yet it was not as if it had been stripped of those time-worn and
ancient relics of ornament and furnishing that so long had appertained
to it. No, nothing but the absence of those forms which had been
accustomed quietly to move from room to room, and to be met here
upon a staircase, there upon a corridor, and even in some of the
ancient panelled apartments, which give it an air of dreary repose and
listlessness.
The shutters, too, were all closed, and that circumstance contributed
largely to the production of that gloomy effect which otherwise could
not have ensued.
In fact, what could be done without attracting very special observation
was done to prove to any casual observer that the house was untenanted.
But such was not really the case. In that very room where the much
dreaded Varney the vampyre had made one of his dreaded appearances to
Flora Bannerworth and her mother, sat two men.
It was from that apartment that Flora had discharged the pistol, which
had been left to her by her brother, and the shot from which it was
believed by the whole family had most certainly taken effect upon the
person of the vampyre.
It was a room peculiarly accessible from the gardens, for it had
long French windows opening to the very ground, and but a stone step
intervened between the flooring of the apartment and a broad gravel
walk which wound round that entire portion of the house.
It was in this room, then, that two men sat in silence, and nearly in
darkness.
Before them, and on a table, were several articles of refreshment, as
well of defence and offence, according as their intentions might be.
There were a bottle and three glasses, and lying near the elbow of one
of the men was a large pair of pistols, such as might have adorned the
belt of some desperate character, who wished to instil an opinion of
his prowess into his foes by the magnitude of his weapons.
Close at hand, by the same party, lay some more modern fire-arms, as
well as a long dirk, with a silver mounted handle.
The light they had consisted of a large lantern, so constructed with a
slide, that it could be completely obscured at a moment’s notice; but
now as it was placed, the rays that were allowed to come from it were
directed as much from the window of the apartment, as possible, and
fell upon the faces of the two men, revealing them to be Admiral Bell
and Dr. Chillingworth.
It might have been the effect of the particular light in which he sat,
but the doctor looked extremely pale, and did not appear at all at his
ease.
The admiral, on the contrary, appeared in as placable a state of mind
as possible and had his arms folded across his breast, and his head
shrunk down between his shoulders, as if he had made up his mind to
something that was to last a long time, and, therefore he was making
the best of it.
“I do hope,” said Mr. Chillingworth, after a long pause, “that our
efforts will be crowned with success—you know, my dear sir, that I have
always been of your opinion, that there was a great deal more in this
matter than met the eye.”
“To be sure,” said the admiral, “and as to our efforts being crowned
with success, why, I’ll give you a toast, doctor, ‘may the morning’s
reflection provide for the evening’s amusement.’”
“Ha! ha!” said Chillingworth, faintly; “I’d rather not drink any more,
and you seem, admiral, to have transposed the toast in some way. I
believe it runs, ‘may the evening’s amusement bear the morning’s
reflection.’”
“Transpose the devil!” said the admiral; “what do I care how it runs?
I gave you my toast, and as to that you mention, it’s another one
altogether, and a sneaking, shore-going one too; but why don’t you
drink?”
“Why, my dear sir, medically speaking, I am strongly of opinion that,
when the human stomach is made to contain a large quantity of alcohol,
it produces bad effects upon the system. Now, I’ve certainly taken one
glass of this infernally strong Hollands, and it is now lying in my
stomach like the red-hot heater of a tea-urn.”
“Is it? put it out with another, then.”
“Ay, I’m afraid that would not answer, but do you really think,
admiral, that we shall effect anything by waiting here, and keeping
watch and ward, not under the most comfortable circumstances, this
first night of the Hall being empty.”
“Well, I don’t know that we shall,” said the admiral; “but when you
really want to steal a march upon the enemy, there is nothing like
beginning betimes. We are both of opinion that Varney’s great object
throughout has been, by some means or another, to get possession of the
house.”
“Yes; true, true.”
“We know that he has been unceasing in his endeavours to get the
Bannerworth family out of it; that he has offered them their own price
to become its tenant, and that the whole gist of his quiet and placid
interview with Flora in the garden, was to supply her with a new set of
reasons for urging her mother and brother to leave Bannerworth Hall,
because the old ones were certainly not found sufficient.”
“True, true, most true,” said Mr. Chillingworth, emphatically. “You
know, sir, that from the first time you broached that view of the
subject to me, how entirely I coincided with you.”
“Of course you did, for you are a honest fellow, and a right-thinking
fellow, though you are a doctor, and I don’t know that I like doctors
much better than I like lawyers—they’re only humbugs in a different
sort of way. But I wish to be liberal; there is such a thing as an
honest lawyer, and, d——e, you’re an honest doctor!”
“Of course I’m much obliged, admiral, for your good opinion. I only
wish it had struck me to bring something of a solid nature in the shape
of food, to sustain the waste of the animal economy during the hours we
shall have to wait here.”
“Don’t trouble yourself about that,” said the admiral. “Do you think
I’m a donkey, and would set out on a cruise without victualling my
ship? I should think not. Jack Pringle will be here soon, and he has my
orders to bring in something to eat.”
“Well,” said the doctor, “that’s very provident of you, admiral, and I
feel personally obliged; but tell me, how do you intend to conduct the
watch?”
“What do you mean?”
“Why, I mean, if we sit here with the window fastened so as to prevent
our light from being seen, and the door closed, how are we by any
possibility to know if the house is attacked or not?”
“Hark’ee, my friend,” said the admiral; “I’ve left a weak point for the
enemy.”
“A what, admiral?”
“A weak point. I’ve taken good care to secure everything but one of
the windows on the ground floor, and that I’ve left open, or so nearly
open, that it will look like the most natural place in the world to get
in at. Now, just inside that window, I’ve placed a lot of the family
crockery. I’ll warrant, if anybody so much as puts his foot in, you’ll
hear the smash;—and, d—e, there it is!”
There was a loud crash at this moment, followed by a succession of
similar sounds, but of a lesser degree; and both the admiral and Mr.
Chillingworth sprung to their feet.
“Come on,” cried the former; “here’ll be a precious row—take the
lantern.”
Mr. Chillingworth did so, but he did not seem possessed of a great deal
of presence of mind; for, before they got out of the room, he twice
accidentally put on the dark slide, and produced a total darkness.
“D——n!” said the admiral; “don’t make it wink and wink in that way;
hold it up, and run after me as hard as you can.”
“I’m coming, I’m coming,” said Mr. Chillingworth.
It was one of the windows of a long room, containing five, fronting
the garden, which the admiral had left purposely unguarded; and it was
not far from the apartment in which they had been sitting, so that,
probably, not half a minute’s time elapsed between the moment of the
first alarm, and their reaching the spot from whence it was presumed to
arise.
The admiral had armed himself with one of the huge pistols, and he
dashed forward, with all the vehemence of his character, towards the
window, where he knew he had placed the family crockery, and where he
fully expected to meet the reward of his exertion by discovering some
one lying amid its fragments.
In this, however, he was disappointed; for, although there was
evidently a great smash amongst the plates and dishes, the window
remained closed, and there was no indication whatever of the presence
of any one.
“Well, that’s odd,” said the admiral; “I balanced them up amazingly
careful, and two of ’em edgeways—d——e, a fly would have knocked them
down.”
“Mew,” said, a great cat, emerging from under a chair.
“Curse you, there you are,” said the admiral. “Put out the light, put
out the light; here we’re illuminating the whole house for nothing.”
With, a click went the darkening slide over the lantern, and all was
obscurity.
At that instant a shrill, clear whistle came from the garden.
CHAPTER LVIII.
THE ARRIVAL OF JACK PRINGLE.—MIDNIGHT AND THE
VAMPYRE.—THE MYSTERIOUS HAT.
“Bless me! what is that?” said Mr. Chillingworth; “what a very singular
sound.”
“Hold your noise,” said the admiral; “did you never hear that before?”
“No; how should I?”
“Lor, bless the ignorance of some people, that’s a boatswain’s call.”
“Oh, it is,” said Mr. Chillingworth; “is he going to call again?”
“D——e, I tell ye it’s a boatswain’s call.”
“Well, then, d——e, if it comes to that,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “what
does he call here for?”
The admiral disdained an answer; but demanding the lantern, he opened
it, so that there was a sufficient glimmering of light to guide him,
and then walked from the room towards the front door of the Hall.
He asked no questions before he opened it, because, no doubt, the
signal was preconcerted; and Jack Pringle, for it was he indeed who had
arrived, at once walked in, and the admiral barred the door with the
same precision with which it was before secured.
“Well, Jack,” he said, “did you see anybody?”
“Ay, ay, sir,” said Jack.
“Why, ye don’t mean that—where?”
“Where I bought the grub; a woman——”
“D——e, you’re a fool, Jack.”
“You’re another.”
“Hilloa, ye scoundrel, what d’ye mean by talking to me in that way? is
this your respect for your superiors?”
“Ship’s been paid off, long ago,” said Jack, “and I ain’t got no
superiors. I ain’t a marine or a Frenchman.”
“Why, you’re drunk.”
“I know it; put that in your eye.”
“There’s a scoundrel. Why, you know-nothing-lubber, didn’t I tell you
to be careful, and that everything depended upon secrecy and caution?
and didn’t I tell you, above all this, to avoid drink?”
“To be sure you did.”
“And yet you come here like a rum cask.”
“Yes; now you’ve had your say, what then?”
“You’d better leave him alone,” said Mr. Chillingworth; “it’s no use
arguing with a drunken man.”
“Harkye, admiral,” said Jack, steadying himself as well as he could.
“I’ve put up with you a precious long while, but I won’t no longer;
you’re so drunk, now, that you keeping bobbing up and down like the
mizen gaff in a storm—that’s my opinion—tol de rol.”
“Let him alone, let him alone,” urged Mr. Chillingworth.
“The villain,” said the admiral; “he’s enough to ruin everything; now,
who would have thought that? but it’s always been the way with him for
a matter of twenty years—he never had any judgment in his drink. When
it was all smooth sailing, and nothing to do, and the fellow might
have got an extra drop on board, which nobody would have cared for,
he’s as sober as a judge; but, whenever there’s anything to do, that
wants a little cleverness, confound him, he ships rum enough to float a
seventy-four.”
“Are you going to stand anything to drink,” said Jack, “my old buffer?
Do you recollect where you got your knob scuttled off Beyrout—how you
fell on your latter end and tried to recollect your church cateckis,
you old brute?—I’s ashamed of you. Do you recollect the brown girl you
bought for thirteen bob and a tanner, at the blessed Society Islands,
and sold her again for a dollar, to a nigger seven feet two, in his
natural pumps? you’re a nice article, you is, to talk of marines and
swabs, and shore-going lubbers, blow yer. Do you recollect the little
Frenchman that told ye he’d pull your blessed nose, and I advised you
to soap it? do you recollect Sall at Spithead, as you got in at a port
hole of the state cabin, all but her behind?”
“Death and the devil!” said the admiral, breaking from the grasp of Mr.
Chillingworth.
“Ay,” said Jack, “you’ll come to ’em both one of these days, old cock,
and no mistake.”
“I’ll have his life, I’ll have his life,” roared the admiral.
“Nay, nay, sir,” said Mr. Chillingworth, catching the admiral round the
waist. “My dear sir, recollect, now, if I may venture to advise you,
Admiral Bell, there’s a lot of that fiery hollands you know, in the
next room; set him down to that, and finish him off. I’ll warrant him,
he’ll be quiet enough.”
“What’s that you say?” cried Jack—“hollands!—who’s got any?—next to rum
and Elizabeth Baker, if I has an affection, it’s hollands.”
“Jack!” said the admiral.
“Ay, ay, sir!” said Jack, instinctively.
“Come this way.”
Jack staggered after him, and they all reached the room where the
admiral and Mr. Chillingworth had been sitting before the alarm.
“There!” said the admiral, putting the light upon the table, and
pointing to the bottle; “what do you think of that?”
“I never thinks under such circumstances,” said Jack. “Here’s to the
wooden walls of old England!”
He seized the bottle, and, putting its neck into his mouth, for a few
moments nothing was heard but a gurgling sound of the liquor passing
down his throat; his head went further and further back, until, at
last, over he went, chair and bottle and all, and lay in a helpless
state of intoxication on the floor.
“So far, so good,” said the admiral. “He’s out of the way, at all
events.”
“I’ll just loosen his neckcloth,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “and then
we’ll go and sit somewhere else; and I should recommend that, if
anywhere, we take up our station in that chamber, once Flora’s,
where the mysterious panelled portrait hangs, that bears so strong a
resemblance to Varney, the vampyre.”
“Hush!” said the admiral. “What’s that?”
They listened for a moment intently; and then, distinctly, upon the
gravel path outside the window, they heard a footstep, as if some
person were walking along, not altogether heedlessly, but yet without
any very great amount of caution or attention to the noise he might
make.
“Hist!” said the doctor. “Not a word. They come.”
“What do you say they for?” said the admiral.
“Because something seems to whisper me that Mr. Marchdale knows more
of Varney, the vampyre, than ever he has chosen to reveal. Put out the
light.”
“Yes, yes—that’ll do. The moon has risen; see how it streams through
the chinks of the shutters.”
“No, no—it’s not in that direction, or our light would have betrayed
us. Do you not see the beams come from that half glass-door leading to
the greenhouse?”
“Yes; and there’s the footstep again, or another.”
Tramp, tramp came a footfall again upon the gravel path, and, as
before, died away upon their listening ears.
“What do you say now,” said Mr. Chillingworth—“are there not two?”
“If they were a dozen,” said the admiral, “although we have lost one of
our force, I would tackle them. Let’s creep on through the rooms in the
direction the footsteps went.”
“My life on it,” said Mr. Chillingworth as they left the apartment,
“if this be Varney, he makes for that apartment where Flora slept, and
which he knows how to get admission to. I’ve studied the house well,
admiral, and to get to that window any one from here outside must take
a considerable round. Come on—we shall be beforehand.”
“A good idea—a good idea. Be it so.”
Just allowing themselves sufficient light to guide them on the way
from the lantern, they hurried on with as much precipitation as the
intricacies of the passage would allow, nor halted till they had
reached the chamber were hung the portrait which bore so striking and
remarkable a likeness to Varney, the vampyre.
They left the lamp outside the door, so that not even a straggling
beam from it could betray that there were persons on the watch; and
then, as quietly as foot could fall, they took up their station among
the hangings of the antique bedstead, which has been before alluded to
in this work as a remarkable piece of furniture appertaining to that
apartment.
“Do you think,” said the admiral, “we’ve distanced them?”
“Certainly we have. It’s unlucky that the blind of the window is down.”
“Is it? By Heaven, there’s a d—d strange-looking shadow creeping over
it.”
Mr. Chillingworth looked almost with suspended breath. Even he could
not altogether get rid of a tremulous feeling, as he saw that the
shadow of a human form, apparently of very large dimensions, was on
the outside, with the arms spread out, as if feeling for some means of
opening the window.
It would have been easy now to have fired one of the pistols direct
upon the figure; but, somehow or another, both the admiral and Mr.
Chillingworth shrank from that course, and they felt much rather
inclined to capture whoever might make his appearance, only using their
pistols as a last resource, than gratuitously and at once to resort to
violence.
“Who should you say that was?” whispered the admiral.
“Varney, the vampyre.”
“D—e, he’s ill-looking and big enough for anything—there’s a noise!”
There was a strange cracking sound at the window, as if a pane of glass
was being very stealthily and quietly broken; and then the blind was
agitated slightly, confusing much the shadow that was cast upon it, as
if the hand of some person was introduced for the purpose of effecting
a complete entrance into the apartment.
“He’s coming in,” whispered the admiral.
“Hush, for Heaven’s sake!” said Mr. Chillingworth; “you will alarm him,
and we shall lose the fruit of all the labour we have already bestowed
upon the matter; but did you not say something, admiral, about lying
under the window and catching him by the leg?”
“Why, yes; I did.”
“Go and do it, then; for, as sure as you are a living man, his leg will
be in in a minute.”
“Here goes,” said the admiral; “I never suggest anything which I’m
unwilling to do myself.”
Whoever it was that now was making such strenuous exertions to get into
the apartment seemed to find some difficulty as regarded the fastenings
of the window, and as this difficulty increased, the patience of the
party, as well as his caution deserted him, and the casement was
rattled with violence.
With a far greater amount of caution than any one from a knowledge
of his character would have given him credit for, the admiral crept
forward and laid himself exactly under the window.
The depth of wood-work from the floor to the lowest part of the
window-frame did not exceed above two feet; so that any one could
conveniently step in from the balcony outside on to the floor of the
apartment, which was just what he who was attempting to effect an
entrance was desirous of doing.
It was quite clear that, be he who he might, mortal or vampyre, he
had some acquaintance with the fastening of the window; for now he
succeeded in moving it, and the sash was thrown open.
The blind was still an obstacle; but a vigorous pull from the intruder
brought that down on the prostrate admiral; and then Mr. Chillingworth
saw, by the moonlight, a tall, gaunt figure standing in the balcony, as
if just hesitating for a moment whether to get head first or feet first
into the apartment.
Had he chosen the former alternative he would need, indeed, to have
been endowed with more than mortal powers of defence and offence to
escape capture, but his lucky star was in the ascendancy, and he put
his foot in first.
He turned his side to the apartment and, as he did so, the bright
moonlight fell upon his face, enabling Mr. Chillingworth to see,
without the shadow of a doubt, that it was, indeed, Varney, the
vampyre, who was thus stealthily making his entrance into Bannerworth
Hall, according to the calculation which had been made by the admiral
upon that subject. The doctor scarcely knew whether to be pleased or
not at this discovery; it was almost a terrifying one, sceptical as
he was upon the subject of vampyres, and he waited breathless for the
issue of the singular and perilous adventure.
No doubt Admiral Bell deeply congratulated himself upon the success
which was about to crown his stratagem for the capture of the intruder,
be he who he might, and he writhed with impatience for the foot to come
sufficiently near him to enable him to grasp it.
His patience was not severely tried, for in another moment it rested
upon his chest.
“Boarders a hoy!” shouted the admiral, and at once he laid hold of the
trespasser. “Yard-arm to yard-arm, I think I’ve got you now. Here’s a
prize, doctor! he shall go away without his leg if he goes away now.
Eh! what! the light—d—e, he has—Doctor, the light! the light! Why
what’s this?—Hilloa, there!”
Dr. Chillingworth sprang into the passage, and procured the light—in
another moment he was at the side of the admiral, and the lantern slide
being thrown back, he saw at once the dilemma into which his friend had
fallen.
There he lay upon his back, grasping, with the vehemence of an embrace
that had in it much of the ludicrous, a long boot, from which the
intruder had cleverly slipped his leg, leaving it as a poor trophy in
the hands of his enemies.
“Why you’ve only pulled his boot off,” said the doctor; “and now he’s
gone for good, for he knows what we’re about, and has slipped through
your fingers.”
Admiral Bell sat up and looked at the boot with a rueful countenance.
“Done again!” he said.
“Yes, you are done,” said the doctor; “why didn’t you lay hold of the
leg while you were about it, instead of the boot? Admiral, are these
your tactics?”
“Don’t be a fool,” said the admiral; “put out the light and give me
the pistols, or blaze away yourself into the garden; a chance shot may
do something. It’s no use running after him; a stern chase is a long
chase; but fire away.”
As if some parties below had heard him give the word, two loud reports
from the garden immediately ensued, and a crash of glass testified to
the fact that some deadly missile had entered the room.
“Murder!” said the doctor, and he fell flat upon his back. “I don’t
like this at all; it’s all in your line, admiral, but not in mine.”
“All’s right, my lad,” said the admiral; “now for it.”
He saw lying in the moonlight the pistols which he and the doctor had
brought into the room, and in another moment he, to use his own words,
returned the broadside of the enemy.
“D—n it!” he said, “this puts me in mind of old times. Blaze away, you
thieves, while I load; broadside to broadside. It’s your turn now; I
scorn to take an advantage. What the devil’s that?”
Something very large and very heavy came bang against the window,
sending it all into the room, and nearly smothering the admiral with
the fragments. Another shot was then fired, and in came something else,
which hit the wall on the opposite side of the room, rebounding from
thence on to the doctor, who gave a yell of despair.
After that all was still; the enemy seemed to be satisfied that they
had silenced the garrison. And it took the admiral a great deal of
kicking and plunging to rescue himself from some superincumbent mass
that was upon him, which seemed to him to be a considerable sized tree.
“Call this fair fighting,” he shouted—“getting a man’s legs and arms
tangled up like a piece of Indian matting in the branches of a tree?
Doctor, I say! hilloa! where are you?”
“I don’t know,” said the doctor; “but there’s somebody getting into the
balcony—now we shall be murdered in cold blood!”
“Where’s the pistols?”
“Fired off, of course; you did it yourself.”
Bang came something else into the room, which, from the sound it made,
closely resembled a brick, and after that somebody jumped clean into
the centre of the floor, and then, after rolling and writhing about in
a most singular manner, slowly got up, and with various preliminary
hiccups, said,—
“Come on, you lubbers, many of you as like. I’m the tar for all
weathers.”
“Why, d—e,” said the admiral, “it’s Jack Pringle.”
“Yes, it is,” said Jack, who was not sufficiently sober to recognise
the admiral’s voice. “I sees as how you’ve heard of me. Come on, all of
you.”
“Why, Jack, you scoundrel,” roared the admiral, “how came you here?
Don’t you know me? I’m your admiral, you horse-marine.”
“Eh?” said Jack. “Ay—ay, sir, how came you here?”
“How came you, you villain?”
“Boarded the enemy.”
“The enemy who you boarded was us; and hang me if I don’t think you
haven’t been pouring broadsides into us, while the enemy were scudding
before the wind in another direction.”
“Lor!” said Jack.
“Explain, you scoundrel, directly—explain.”
“Well, that’s only reasonable,” said Jack; and giving a heavier lurch
than usual, he sat down with a great bounce upon the floor. “You see
it’s just this here,—when I was a coming of course I heard, just as I
was a going, that ere as made me come all in consequence of somebody a
going, or for to come, you see, admiral.”
“Doctor,” cried the admiral, in a great rage, “just help me out of this
entanglement of branches, and I’ll rid the world from an encumbrance by
smashing that fellow.”
“Smash yourself!” said Jack. “You know you’re drunk.”
“My dear admiral,” said Mr. Chillingworth, laying hold of one of his
legs, and pulling it very hard, which brought his face into a lot of
brambles, “we’re making a mess of this business.”
“Murder!” shouted the admiral; “you are indeed. Is that what you call
pulling me out of it? You’ve stuck me fast.”
“I’ll manage it,” said Jack. “I’ve seed him in many a scrape, and I’ve
seed him out. You pull me, doctor, and I’ll pull him. Yo hoy!”
Jack laid hold of the admiral by the scuff of the neck, and the doctor
laid hold of Jack round the waist, the consequence of which was that
he was dragged out from the branches of the tree, which seemed to have
been thrown into the room, and down fell both Jack and the doctor.
At this instant there was a strange hissing sound heard below the
window; then there was a sudden, loud report, as if a hand-grenade had
gone off. A spectral sort of light gleamed into the room, and a tall,
gaunt-looking figure rose slowly up in the balcony.
“Beware of the dead!” said a voice. “Let the living contend with the
living, the dead with the dead. Beware!”
The figure disappeared, as did also the strange, spectral-looking
light. A death-like silence ensued, and the cold moonbeams streamed in
upon the floor of the apartment, as if nothing had occurred to disturb
the wrapped repose and serenity of the scene.
CHAPTER LIX.
THE WARNING.—THE NEW PLAN OF OPERATION.—THE INSULTING MESSAGE FROM
VARNEY.
So much of the night had been consumed in these operations, that by the
time they were over, and the three personages who lay upon the floor of
what might be called the haunted chamber of Bannerworth Hall, even had
they now been disposed to seek repose, would have had a short time to
do so before the daylight would have streamed in upon them, and roused
them to the bustle of waking existence.
It may be well believed what a vast amount of surprise came over the
three persons in that chamber at the last little circumstance that had
occurred in connection with the night’s proceedings.
There was nothing which had preceded that, that did not resemble a
genuine attack upon the premises; but about that last mysterious
appearance, with its curious light, there was quite enough to bother
the admiral and Jack Pringle to a considerable effect, whatever might
be the effect upon Mr. Chillingworth, whose profession better enabled
him to comprehend, chemically, what would produce effects that, no
doubt, astonished them amazingly.
What with his intoxication and the violent exercise he had taken, Jack
was again thoroughly prostrate; while the admiral could not have looked
more astonished had the evil one himself appeared in _propria persona_
and given him notice to quit the premises.
He was, however, the first to speak, and the words he spoke were
addressed to Jack, to whom he said,—
“Jack, you lubber, what do you think of all that?”
Jack, however, was too far gone even to say “Ay, ay, sir;” and Mr.
Chillingworth, slowly getting himself up to his feet, approached the
admiral.
“It’s hard to say so much, Admiral Bell,” he said, “but it strikes
me that whatever object this Sir Francis Varney, or Varney, the
vampyre, has in coming into Bannerworth Hall, it is, at all events, of
sufficient importance to induce him to go any length, and not to let
even a life to stand in the way of its accomplishment.”
“Well, it seems so,” said the admiral; “for I’ll be hanged if I can
make head or tail of the fellow.”
“If we value our personal safety, we shall hesitate to continue a
perilous adventure, which I think can end only in defeat, if not in
death.”
“But we don’t value our personal safety,” said the admiral. “We’ve got
into the adventure, and I don’t see why we shouldn’t carry it out. It
may be growing a little serious; but what of that? For the sake of that
young girl, Flora Bannerworth, as well as for the sake of my nephew,
Charles Holland, I will see the end of this affair, let it be what it
may; but mind you, Mr. Chillingworth, if one man chooses to go upon a
desperate service, that’s no reason why he should ask another to do so.”
“I understand you,” said Mr. Chillingworth; “but, having commenced
the adventure with you, I am not the man to desert you in it. We have
committed a great mistake.”
“A mistake! how?”
“Why, we ought to have watched outside the house, instead of within it.
There can be no doubt that if we had lain in wait in the garden, we
should have been in a better position to have accomplished our object.”
“Well, I don’t know, doctor, but it seems to me that if Jack Pringle
hadn’t made such a fool of himself, we should have managed very well:
and I don’t know now how he came to behave in the manner he did.”
“Nor I,” said Mr. Chillingworth. “But, at all events, so far as the
result goes, it is quite clear that any further watching, in this
house, for the appearance of Sir Francis Varney, will now be in vain.
He has nothing to do now but to keep quiet until we are tired out—a
fact, concerning which he can easily obtain information—and then he
immediately, without trouble, walks into the premises, to his own
satisfaction.”
“But what the deuce can he want upon the premises?”
“That question, admiral, induces me to think that we have made another
mistake. We ought not to have attempted to surprise Sir Francis Varney
in coming into Bannerworth Hall, but to catch him as he came out.”
“Well, there’s something in that,” said the admiral. “This is a pretty
night’s business, to be sure. However, it can’t be helped, it’s done,
and there’s an end on’t. And now, as the morning is near at hand, I
certainly must confess I should like to get some breakfast, although I
don’t like that we should all leave the house together.”
“Why,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “as we have now no secret to keep with
regard to our being here, because the principal person we wished to
keep it from is aware of it, I think we cannot do better than send at
once for Henry Bannerworth, tell him of the non-success of the effort
we have made in his behalf, and admit him at once into our consultation
of what is next to be done.”
“Agreed, agreed, I think that, without troubling him, we might have
captured this Varney; but that’s over now, and, as soon as Jack Pringle
chooses to wake up again, I’ll send him to the Bannerworths with a
message.”
“Ay, ay, sir,” said Jack, suddenly; “all’s right.”
“Why, you vagabond,” said the admiral, “I do believe you’ve been
shamming!”
“Shamming what?”
“Being drunk, to be sure.”
“Lor! couldn’t do it,” said Jack; “I’ll just tell you how it was. I
wakened up and found myself shut in somewhere; and, as I couldn’t get
out of the door, I thought I’d try the window, and there I did get out.
Well, perhaps I wasn’t quite the thing, but I sees two people in the
garden a looking up at this ere room; and, to be sure, I thought it was
you and the doctor. Well, it warn’t no business of mine to interfere,
so I seed one of you climb up the balcony, as I thought, and then,
after which, come down head over heels with such a run, that I thought
you must have broken your neck. Well, after that you fired a couple of
shots in, and then, after that, I made sure it was you, admiral.”
“And what made you make sure of that?”
“Why, because you scuttled away like an empty tar-barrel in full tide.”
“Confound you, you scoundrel!”
“Well, then, confound you, if it comes to that. I thought I was doing
you good sarvice, and that the enemy was here, when all the while it
turned out as you was and the enemy wasn’t, and the enemy was outside
and you wasn’t.”
“But who threw such a confounded lot of things into the room?”
“Why, I did, of course; I had but one pistol, and, when I fired that
off, I was forced to make up a broadside with what I could.”
“Was there ever such a stupid!” said the admiral; “doctor, doctor, you
talked of us making two mistakes; but you forgot a third and worse one
still, and that was the bringing such a lubberly son of a sea-cook into
the place as this fellow.”
“You’re another,” said Jack; “and you knows it.”
“Well, well,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “it’s no use continuing it,
admiral; Jack, in his way, did, I dare say, what he considered for the
best.”
“I wish he’d do, then, what he considers for the worst, next time.”
“Perhaps I may,” said Jack, “and then you will be served out above a
bit. What ’ud become of you, I wonder, if it wasn’t for me? I’m as good
as a mother to you, you knows that, you old babby.”
“Come, come, admiral,” said Mr. Chillingworth; “come down to the
garden-gate; it is now just upon daybreak, and the probability is that
we shall not be long there before we see some of the country people,
who will get us anything we require in the shape of refreshment; and
as for Jack, he seems quite sufficiently recovered now to go to the
Bannerworths’.”
“Oh! I can go,” said Jack; “as for that, the only thing as puts me out
of the way is the want of something to drink. My constitution won’t
stand what they call temperance living, or nothing with the chill off.”
“Go at once,” said the admiral, “and tell Mr. Henry Bannerworth that we
are here; but do not tell him before his sister or his mother. If you
meet anybody on the road, send them here with a cargo of victuals. It
strikes me that a good, comfortable breakfast wouldn’t be at all amiss,
doctor.”
“How rapidly the day dawns,” remarked Mr. Chillingworth, as he walked
into the balcony from whence Varney, the vampire, had attempted to make
good his entrance to the Hall.
Just as he spoke, and before Jack Pringle could get half way over to
the garden gate, there came a tremendous ring at the bell which was
suspended over it.
A view of that gate could not be commanded from the window of the
haunted apartment, so that they could not see who it was that demanded
admission.
As Jack Pringle was going down at any rate, they saw no necessity for
personal interference; and he proved that there was not, by presently
returning with a note which he said had been thrown over the gate by a
lad, who then scampered off with all the speed he could make.
The note, exteriorly, was well got up, and had all the appearance of
great care having been bestowed upon its folding and sealing.
It was duly addressed to “Admiral Bell, Bannerworth Hall,” and the word
“immediate” was written at one corner.
The admiral, after looking at it for some time with very great wonder,
came at last to the conclusion that probably to open it would be the
shortest way of arriving at a knowledge of who had sent it, and he
accordingly did so.
The note was as follows:—
“My dear sir,—Feeling assured that you cannot be surrounded
with those means and appliances for comfort in the Hall, in its
now deserted condition, which you have a right to expect, and
so eminently deserve, I flatter myself that I shall receive an
answer in the affirmative, when I request the favour of your
company to breakfast, as well as that of your learned friend.
Mr. Chillingworth.
“In consequence of a little accident which occurred last
evening to my own residence, I am, _ad interim_, until the
county build it up for me again, staying at a house called
Walmesley Lodge, where I shall expect you with all the
impatience of one soliciting an honour, and hoping that it
will be conferred upon him.
“I trust that any little difference of opinion on other
subjects will not interfere to prevent the harmony of our
morning’s meal together.
“Believe me to be, my dear sir, with the greatest possible
consideration, your very obedient, humble servant,
“+Francis Varney+.”
The admiral gasped again, and looked at Mr. Chillingworth, and then at
the note, and then at Mr. Chillingworth again, as if he was perfectly
bewildered.
“That’s about the coolest piece of business,” said Mr. Chillingworth,
“that ever I heard of.”
“Hang me,” said the admiral, “if I sha’n’t like the fellow at last. It
is cool, and I like it because it is cool. Where’s my hat? where’s my
stick?”
“What are you going to do?”
“Accept his invitation, to be sure, and breakfast with him; and, my
learned friend, as he calls you, I hope you’ll come likewise. I’ll
take the fellow at his word. By fair means, or by foul, I’ll know what
he wants here; and why he persecutes this family, for whom I have an
attachment; and what hand he has in the disappearance of my nephew,
Charles Holland; for, as sure as there’s a Heaven above us, he’s at the
bottom of that affair. Where is this Walmesley Lodge?”
“Just in the neighbourhood; but——”
“Come on, then; come on.”
“But, really, admiral, you don’t mean to say you’ll breakfast
with—with——”
“A vampyre? Yes, I would, and will, and mean to do so. Here, Jack, you
needn’t go to Mr. Bannerworth’s yet. Come, my learned friend, let’s
take Time by the forelock.”
CHAPTER LX.
THE INTERRUPTED BREAKFAST AT SIR FRANCIS VARNEY’S.
Notwithstanding all Mr. Chillingworth could say to the contrary, the
admiral really meant to breakfast with Sir Francis Varney.
The worthy doctor could not for some time believe but that the admiral
must be joking, when he talked in such a strain; but he was very soon
convinced to the contrary, by the latter actually walking out and once
more asking him, Mr. Chillingworth, if he meant to go with him, or not.
This was conclusive, so the doctor said,—
“Well, admiral, this appears to me rather a mad sort of freak; but, as
I have begun the adventure with you, I will conclude it with you.”
“That’s right,” said the admiral; “I’m not deceived in you, doctor;
so come along. Hang these vampyres, I don’t know how to tackle them,
myself. I think, after all, Sir Francis Varney is more in your line
than he is in mine.”
“How do you mean?”
“Why, couldn’t you persuade him he’s ill, and wants some physic? That
would soon settle him, you know.”
“Settle him!” said Mr. Chillingworth; “I beg to say, that if I did give
him any physic, the dose would be much to his advantage; but, however,
my opinion is, that this invitation to breakfast is, after all, a mere
piece of irony; and that, when we get to Walmesley Lodge, we shall not
see anything of him; on the contrary, we shall probably find it’s a
hoax.”
“I certainly shouldn’t like that, but still it’s worth the trying. The
fellow has really behaved himself in such an extraordinary manner,
that, if I can make terms with him I will; and there’s one thing, you
know, doctor, that I think we may say we have discovered.”
“And what may that be? Is it, not to make too sure of a vampyre, even
when you have him by the leg?”
“No, that ain’t it, though that’s a very good thing in its way; but
it is just this, that Sir Francis Varney, whoever he is and whatever
he is, is after Bannerworth Hall, and not the Bannerworth family. If
you recollect, Mr. Chillingworth, in our conversation, I have always
insisted upon that fact.”
“You have; and it seems to me to be completely verified by the
proceedings of the night. There, then, admiral, is the great
mystery—what can he want at Bannerworth Hall that makes him take such a
world of trouble, and run so many fearful risks in trying to get at it?”
“That is, indeed, the mystery; and if he really means this invitation
to breakfast, I shall ask him plumply, and tell him, at the same time,
that possibly his very best way to secure his object will be to be
candid, vampyre as he is.”
“But really, admiral, you do not still cling to that foolish
superstition of believing that Sir Francis Varney is in reality a
vampyre?”
“I don’t know, and I can’t say; if anybody was to give me a description
of a strange sort of fish that I had never seen, I wouldn’t take upon
myself to say there wasn’t such a thing; nor would you, doctor, if you
had really seen the many odd ones that I have encountered at various
times.”
“Well, well, admiral, I’m certainly not belonging to that school
of philosophy which declares the impossible to be what it don’t
understand; there may be vampyres, and there may be apparitions, for
all I know to the contrary; I only doubt these things, because I think,
if they were true, that, as a phenomena of nature, they would have been
by this time established by repeated instances without the possibility
of doubt or cavil.”
“Well, there’s something in that; but how far have we got to go now?”
“No further than to yon enclosure where you see those park-like looking
gates, and that cedar-tree stretching its dark-green foliage so far
into the road; that is Walmesley Lodge, whither you have been invited.”
“And you, my learned friend, recollect that you were invited too; so
that you are no intruder upon the hospitality of Varney the vampyre.”
“I say, admiral,” said Mr. Chillingworth, when they reached the gates,
“you know it is not quite the thing to call a man a vampyre at his own
breakfast-table, so just oblige me by promising not to make any such
remark to Sir Francis.”
“A likely thing!” said the admiral; “he knows I know what he is, and he
knows I’m a plain man and a blunt speaker; however, I’ll be civil to
him, and more than that I can’t promise. I must wring out of him, if I
can, what has become of Charles Holland, and what the deuce he really
wants himself.”
“Well, well; come to no collision with him, while we’re his guests.”
“Not if I can help it.”
The doctor rang at the gate bell of Walmesley Lodge, and was in a few
moments answered by a woman, who demanded their business.
“Is Sir Francis Varney here?” said the doctor.
“Oh, ah! yes,” she replied; “you see his house was burnt down, for
something or other—I’m sure I don’t know what—by some people—I’m sure I
don’t know who; so, as the lodge was to let, we have took him in till
he can suit himself.”
“Ah! that’s it, is it?” said the admiral—“tell him that Admiral Bell
and Dr. Chillingworth are here.”
“Very well,” said the woman; “you may walk in.”
“Thank ye; you’re vastly obliging, ma’am. Is there anything going on in
the breakfast line?”
“Well, yes; I am getting him some breakfast, but he didn’t say as he
expected company.”
The woman opened the garden gate, and they walked up a trimly laid out
garden to the lodge, which was a cottage-like structure in external
appearance, although within it boasted of all the comforts of a
tolerably extensive house.
She left them in a small room, leading from the hall, and was absent
about five minutes; then she returned, and, merely saying that Sir
Francis Varney presented his compliments, and desired them to walk up
stairs, she preceded them up a handsome flight which led to the first
floor of the lodge.
Up to this moment, Mr. Chillingworth had expected some excuse, for,
notwithstanding all he had heard and seen of Sir Francis Varney, he
could not believe that any amount of impudence would suffice to enable
him to receive people as his guests, with whom he must feel that he was
at such positive war.
It was a singular circumstance; and, perhaps, the only thing that
matched the cool impertinence of the invitation, was the acceptance of
it under the circumstances by the admiral.
Sir Francis Varney might have intended it as a jest; but if he did so,
in the first instance, it was evident he would not allow himself to be
beaten with his own weapons.
The room into which they were shown was a longish narrow one; a very
wide door gave them admission to it, at the end, nearest the staircase,
and at its other extremity there was a similar door opening into some
other apartments of the house.
Sir Francis Varney sat with his back towards this second door, and
a table, with some chairs and other articles of furniture, were so
arranged before him, that while they seemed but to be carelessly placed
in the position they occupied, they really formed a pretty good barrier
between him and his visitors.
The admiral, however, was too intent upon getting a sight of Varney, to
notice any preparation of this sort, and he advanced quickly into the
room.
And there, indeed, was the much dreaded, troublesome, persevering, and
singular looking being who had caused such a world of annoyance to the
family of the Bannerworths, as well as disturbing the peace of the
whole district, which had the misfortune to have him as an inhabitant.
If anything, he looked thinner, taller, and paler than usual, and there
seemed to be a slight nervousness of manner about him, as he slowly
inclined his head towards the admiral, which was not quite intelligible.
“Well,” said Admiral Bell, “you invited me to breakfast, and my learned
friend; here we are.”
“No two human beings,” said Varney, “could be more welcome to my
hospitality than yourself and Dr. Chillingworth. I pray you to be
seated. What a pleasant thing it is, after the toils and struggles of
this life, occasionally to sit down in the sweet companionship of such
dear friends.”
He made a hideous face as he spoke, and the admiral looked as if he
were half inclined to quarrel at that early stage of the proceedings.
“Dear friends!” he said; “well, well—it’s no use squabbling about a
word or two; but I tell you what it is, Mr. Varney, or Sir Francis
Varney, or whatever your d—d name is——”
“Hold, my dear sir,” said Varney—“after breakfast, if you please—after
breakfast.”
He rang a hand-bell as he spoke, and the woman who had charge of the
house brought in a tray tolerably covered with the materials for a
substantial morning’s meal. She placed it upon the table, and certainly
the various articles that smoked upon it did great credit to her
culinary powers.
“Deborah,” said Sir Varney, in a mild sort of tone, “keep on
continually bringing things to eat until this old brutal sea ruffian
has satiated his disgusting appetite.”
The admiral opened his eyes an enormous width, and, looking at Sir
Francis Varney, he placed his two fists upon the table, and drew a long
breath.
“Did you address those observations to me,” he said, at length, “you
blood-sucking vagabond?”
“Eh?” said Sir Francis Varney, looking over the admiral’s head, as if
he saw something interesting on the wall beyond.
“My dear admiral,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “come away.”
“I’ll see you d—d first!” said the admiral. “Now, Mr. Vampyre, no
shuffling; did you address those observations to me?”
“Deborah,” said Sir Francis Varney, in silvery tones, “you can remove
this tray and bring on the next.”
“Not if I know it,” said the admiral “I came to breakfast, and I’ll
have it; after breakfast I’ll pull your nose—ay, if you were fifty
vampyres, I’d do it.”
“Dr. Chillingworth,” said Varney, without paying the least attention
to what the admiral said, “you don’t eat, my dear sir; you must be
fatigued with your night’s exertions. A man of your age, you know,
cannot be supposed to roll and tumble about like a fool in a pantomime
with impunity. Only think what a calamity it would be if you were laid
up. Your patients would all get well, you know.”
“Sir Francis Varney,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “we’re your guests; we
come here at your invitation to partake of a meal. You have wantonly
attacked both of us. I need not say that by so doing you cast a far
greater slur upon your own taste and judgment than you can upon us.”
“Admirably spoken,” said Sir Francis Varney, giving his hands a clap
together that made the admiral jump again. “Now, old Bell, I’ll fight
you, if you think yourself aggrieved, while the doctor sees fair play.”
“Old who?” shouted the admiral.
“Bell, Bell—is not your name Bell?—a family cognomen, I presume, on
account of the infernal clack, clack, without any sense in it, that is
the characteristic of your race.”
“You’ll fight me?” said the admiral, jumping up.
“Yes; if you challenge me.”
“By Jove I do; of course.”
“Then I accept it; and the challenged party, you know well, or ought to
know, can make his own terms in the encounter.”
“Make what terms you please; I care not what they are. Only say you
will fight, and that’s sufficient.”
“It is well,” said Sir Francis Varney, in a solemn tone.
“Nay, nay,” interrupted Mr. Chillingworth; “this is boyish folly.”
“Hold your row,” said the admiral, “and let’s hear what he’s got to
say.”
“In this mansion,” said Sir Francis Varney—“for a mansion it is,
although under the unpretending name of a lodge—in this mansion there
is a large apartment which was originally fitted up by a scientific
proprietor of the place, for the purpose of microscopic and other
experiments, which required a darkness total and complete, such a
darkness as seems as if it could be felt—palpable, thick, and obscure
as the darkness of the tomb, and I know what that is.”
“The devil you do!” said this admiral “It’s damp, too, ain’t it?”
“The room?”
“No; the grave.”
“Oh! uncommonly, after autumnal rains. But to resume—this room is
large, lofty, and perfectly empty.”
“Well?”
“I propose that we procure two scythes.”
“Two what?”
“Scythes, with their long handles, and their convenient holding places.”
“Well, I’ll be hanged! What next do you propose?”
“You may be hanged. The next is, that with these scythes we be both of
us placed in the darkened room, and the door closed, and doubly locked
upon us for one hour, and that then and there we do our best each to
cut the other in two. If you succeed in dismembering me, you will have
won the day; but I hope, from my superior agility”—here Sir Francis
jumped upon his chair, and sat upon the back of it—“to get the better
of you. How do you like the plan I have proposed? Does it meet your
wishes?”
“Curse your impudence!” said the admiral, placing his elbows upon the
table and resting his chin in astonishment upon his two hands.
“Nay,” interrupted Sir Francis, “you challenged me; and, besides,
you’ll have an equal chance, you know that. If you succeed in striking
me first, down I go; whereas it I succeed in striking you first, down
you go.”
As he spoke, Sir Francis Varney stretched out his foot, and closed
a small bracket, which held out the flap of the table on which the
admiral was leaning, and, accordingly, down the admiral went, tea-tray
and all.
Mr. Chillingworth ran to help him up, and, when they both recovered
their feet, they found they were alone.
CHAPTER LXI.
THE MYSTERIOUS STRANGER.—THE PARTICULARS OF THE SUICIDE AT BANNERWORTH
HALL.
“Hilloa where the deuce is he?” said the admiral. “Was there ever such
a confounded take-in?”
“Well, I really don’t know,” said Mr. Chillingworth; “but it seems
to me that he must have gone out of that door that was behind him; I
begin, do you know, admiral, to wish——”
“What?”
“That we had never come here at all; and I think the sooner we get out
of it the better.”
“Yes; but I am not going to be hoaxed and humbugged in this way. I
will have satisfaction, but not with those confounded scythes and
things he talks about in the dark room. Give me broad daylight and no
favour; yardarm and yardarm; broadside and broadside; hand-grenades and
marling-spikes.”
“Well, but that’s what he won’t do. Now, admiral, listen to me.”
“Well, go on; what next?”
“Come away at once.”
“Oh, you said that before.”
“Yes; but I’m going to say something else. Look round you. Don’t you
think this a large, scientific-looking room?”
“What of that?”
“Why, what if suppose it was to become as dark as the grave, and Varney
was to enter with his scythe, that he talks of, and begin mowing about
our legs.”
“The devil! Come along!”
The door at which they entered was at this moment opened, and the old
woman made her appearance.
“Please, sir,” she said, “here’s a Mr. Mortimer,” in a loud voice. “Oh,
Sir Francis ain’t here! Where’s he gone, gentlemen?”
“To the devil!” said the admiral. “Who may Mr. Mortimer be?”
There walked past the woman a stout, portly-looking man, well dressed,
but with a very odd look upon his face, in consequence of an obliquity
of vision, which prevented the possibility of knowing which way he was
looking.
“I must see him,” he said; “I must see him.”
Mr. Chillingworth started back as if in amazement.
“Good God!” he cried, “you here!”
“Confusion!” said Mortimer; “are you Dr.—— Dr.——”
“Chillingworth.”
“The same. Hush! there is no occasion to betray—that is, to state my
secret.”
“And mine, too,” said Chillingworth. “But what brings you here?”
“I cannot and dare not tell you. Farewell!”
He turned abruptly, and was leaving the room; but he ran against some
one at the entrance, and in another moment Henry Bannerworth, heated
and almost breathless by evident haste, made his appearance.
“Hilloa! bravo!” cried the admiral; “the more the merrier! Here’s a
combined squadron! Why, how came you here, Mr. Henry Bannerworth?”
“Bannerworth!” said Mortimer; “is that young man’s name Bannerworth?”
“Yes,” said Henry. “Do you know me, sir?”
“No, no; only I—I—must be off. Does anybody know anything of Sir
Francis Varney?”
“We did know something of him,” said the admiral, “a little while ago;
but he’s taken himself off. Don’t you do so likewise. If you’ve got
anything to say, stop and say it, like an Englishman.”
“Stuff! stuff!” said Mortimer, impatiently. “What do you all want here?”
“Why, Sir Francis Varney,” said Henry,—“and I care not if the whole
world heard it—is the persecutor of my family.”
“How? in what way?”
“He has the reputation of a vampyre; he has hunted me and mine from
house and home.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes,” cried Dr. Chillingworth; “and, by some means or another, he
seems determined to get possession of Bannerworth Hall.”
“Well, gentlemen,” said Mortimer, “I promise you that I will inquire
into this. Mr. Chillingworth, I did not expect to meet you. Perhaps the
least we say to each other is, after all, the better.”
“Let me ask but one question,” said Dr. Chillingworth, imploringly.
“Ask it.”
“Did he live after——”
“Hush! he did.”
“You always told me to the contrary.”
“Yes; I had an object; the game is up. Farewell; and, gentlemen, as I
am making my exit, let me do so with a sentiment:—Society at large is
divided into two great classes.”
“And what may they be?” said the admiral.
“Those who have been hanged, and those who have not. Adieu!”
He turned and left the room; and Mr. Chillingworth sunk into a chair,
and said, in a low voice,—
“It’s uncommonly true; and I’ve found out an acquaintance among the
former.”
“D—n it! you seem all mad,” said the admiral. “I can’t make out what
you are about. How came you here, Mr. Henry Bannerworth?”
“By mere accident I heard,” said Henry, “that you were keeping watch
and ward in the Hall. Admiral, it was cruel, and not well done of you,
to attempt such an enterprise without acquainting me with it. Did you
suppose for a moment that I, who had the greatest interest in this
affair, would have shrunk from danger, if danger there be; or lacked
perseverance, if that quality were necessary in carrying out any plan
by which the safety and honour of my family might be preserved?”
“Nay, now, my young friend,” said Mr. Chillingworth.
“Nay, sir; but I take it ill that I should have been kept out of this
affair; and it should have been sedulously, as it were, kept a secret
from me.”
“Let him go on as he likes,” said the admiral; “boys will be boys.
After all, you know, doctor, it’s my affair, and not yours. Let him say
what he likes; where’s the odds? It’s of no consequence.”
“I do not expect. Admiral Bell,” said Henry, “that it is to you; but it
is to me.”
“Psha!”
“Respecting you, sir, as I do—”
“Gammon!”
“I must confess that I did expect—”
“What you didn’t get; therefore, there’s an end of that. Now, I tell
you what, Henry, Sir Francis Varney is within this house; at least, I
have reason to suppose so.”
“Then,” exclaimed Henry, impetuously, “I will wring from him answers to
various questions which concern my peace and happiness.”
“Please, gentlemen,” said the woman Deborah, making her appearance,
“Sir Francis Varney has gone out, and he says I’m to show you all the
door, as soon as it is convenient for you all to walk out of it.”
“I feel convinced,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “that it will be a useless
search now to attempt to find Sir Francis Varney here. Let me beg of
you all to come away; and believe me that I do not speak lightly, or
with a view to get you from here, when I say, that after I have heard
something from you, Henry, which I shall ask you to relate to me,
painful though it may be, I shall be able to suggest some explanation
of many things which appear at present obscure, and to put you in a
course of freeing you from the difficulties which surround you, which,
Heaven knows, I little expected I should have it in my power to propose
to any of you.”
“I will follow your advice, Mr. Chillingworth,” said Henry; “for I
have always found that it has been dictated by good feeling as well as
correct judgment. Admiral Bell, you will oblige me much by coming away
with me now and at once.”
“Well,” remarked the admiral, “if the doctor has really something to
say, it alters the appearance of things, and, of course, I have no
objection.”
Upon this, the whole three of them immediately left the place, and it
was evident that Mr. Chillingworth had something of an uncomfortable
character upon his mind. He was unusually silent and reserved, and,
when he did speak, he seemed rather inclined to turn the conversation
upon indifferent topics, than to add anything more to what he had said
upon the deeply interesting one which held so foremost a place in all
their minds.
“How is Flora, now,” he asked of Henry, “since her removal?”
“Anxious still,” said Henry; “but, I think, better.”
“That is well. I perceive that, naturally, we are all three walking
towards Bannerworth Hall, and, perhaps, it is as well that on that spot
I should ask of you, Henry, to indulge me with a confidence such as,
under ordinary circumstances, I should not at all feel myself justified
in requiring of you.”
“To what does it relate?” said Henry. “You may be assured, Mr.
Chillingworth, that I am not likely to refuse my confidence to you,
whom I have so much reason to respect as an attached friend of myself
and my family.”
“You will not object, likewise, I hope,” added Mr. Chillingworth, “to
extend that confidence to Admiral Bell; for, as you well know, a truer
and more warm-hearted man than he does not exist.”
“What do you expect for that, doctor?” said the admiral.
“There is nothing,” said Henry, “that I could relate at all, that I
should shrink from relating to Admiral Bell.”
“Well, my boy,” said the admiral, “and all I can reply to that is, you
are quite right; for there can be nothing that you need shrink from
telling me, so far as regards the fact of trusting me with it goes.”
“I am assured of that.”
“A British officer, once pledging his word, prefers death to breaking
it. Whatever you wish kept secret in the communication you make to me,
say so, and it will never pass my lips.”
“Why, sir, the fact is,” said Henry, “that what I am about to relate
to you consists not so much of secrets as of matters which would be
painful to my feelings to talk of more than may be absolutely required.”
“I understand you.”
“Let me, for a moment,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “put myself right. I
do not suspect, Mr. Henry Bannerworth, that you fancy I ask you to
make a recital of circumstances which must be painful to you, from any
idle motive. But let me declare that I have now a stronger impulse,
which induces me to wish to hear from your own lips those matters which
popular rumour may have greatly exaggerated or vitiated.”
“It is scarcely possible,” remarked Henry, sadly, “that popular rumour
should exaggerate the facts.”
“Indeed!”
“No. They are, unhappily, of themselves, in their bare truthfulness, so
full of all that can be grievous to those who are in any way connected
with them, that there needs no exaggeration to invest them with more
terror, or with more of that sadness which must ever belong to a
recollection of them in my mind.”
In suchlike discourse as this, the time was passed, until Henry
Bannerworth and his friends once more reached the Hall, from which he,
with his family, had so recently removed, in consequence of the fearful
persecution to which they had been subjected.
They passed again into the garden which they all knew so well, and then
Henry paused and looked around him with a deep sigh.
In answer to an inquiring glance from Mr. Chillingworth, he said,—
“Is it not strange, now, that I should have only been away from here a
space of time which may be counted by hours, and yet all seems changed.
I could almost fancy that years had elapsed since I had looked at it.”
“Oh,” remarked the doctor, “time is always by the imagination measured
by the number of events which are crowded into a given space of it,
and not by its actual duration. Come into the house; there you will
find all just as you left it, Henry, and you can tell us your story at
leisure.”
“The air,” said Henry, “about here is fresh and pleasant. Let us sit
down in the summer-house yonder, and there I will tell you all. It has
a local interest, too, connected with the tale.”
This was agreed to, and, in a few moments, the admiral, Mr.
Chillingworth, and Henry were seated in the same summer-house which had
witnessed the strange interview between Sir Francis Varney and Flora
Bannerworth, in which he had induced her to believe that he felt for
the distress he had occasioned her, and was strongly impressed with the
injustice of her sufferings.
Henry was silent for some few moments, and then he said, with a deep
sigh, as he looked mournfully around him,—
“It was on this spot that my father breathed his last, and hence have
I said that it has a local interest in the tale I have to tell, which
makes it the most fitting place in which to tell it.”
“Oh,” said the admiral, “he died here, did he?”
“Yes, where you are now sitting.”
“Very good, I have seen many a brave man die in my time, and I hope
to see a few more, although, I grant you, the death in the heat of
conflict, and fighting for our country, is a vastly different thing to
some shore-going mode of leaving the world.”
“Yes,” said Henry, as if pursuing his own meditations, rather than
listening to the admiral. “Yes, it was from this precise spot that my
father took his last look at the ancient house of his race. What we can
now see of it, he saw of it with his dying eyes, and many a time I have
sat here and fancied the world of terrible thoughts that must at such a
moment have come across his brain.”
“You might well do so,” said the doctor.
“You see,” added Henry, “that from here the fullest view you have of
any of the windows of the house is of that of Flora’s room, as we have
always called it, because for years she had had it as her chamber; and,
when all the vegetation of summer is in its prime, and the vine which
you perceive crawls over this summer-house is full of leaf and fruit,
the view is so much hindered that it is difficult, without making an
artificial gap in the clustering foliage, to see anything but the
window.”
“So I should imagine,” replied Mr. Chillingworth.
“You, doctor,” added Henry, “who know much of my family, need not be
told what sort of man my father was.”
“No, indeed.”
“But you, Admiral Bell, who do not know, must be told, and, however
grievous it may be to me to have to say so, I must inform you that he
was not a man who would have merited your esteem.”
“Well,” said the admiral, “you know, my boy, that can make no
difference as regards you in anybody’s mind, who has got the brains of
an owl. Every man’s credit, character, and honour, to my thinking, is
in his own most special keeping, and let your father be what he might,
or who he might, I do not see that any conduct of his ought to raise
upon your cheek the flush of shame, or cost you more uneasiness than
ordinary good feeling dictates to the errors and feelings of a fellow
creature.”
“If all the world,” said Henry, “would take such liberal and
comprehensive views as you do, admiral, it would be much happier than
it is; but such is not the case, and people are but too apt to blame
one person for the evil that another has done.”
“Ah, but,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “it so happens that those are the
people whose opinions are of the very least consequence.”
“There is some truth in that,” said Henry, sadly; “but, however, let
me proceed; since I have to tell the tale, I could wish it over. My
father, then, Admiral Bell, although a man not tainted in early life
with vices, became, by the force of bad associates, and a sort of want
of congeniality and sentiment that sprang up between him and my mother,
plunged into all the excesses of his age.”
“These excesses were all of that character which the most readily lay
hold strongly of an unreflecting mind, because they all presented
themselves in the garb of sociality.
The wine cup is drained in the name of good fellowship; money which is
wanted for legitimate purposes is squandered under the mask of a noble
and free generosity, and all that the small imaginations of a number of
persons of perverted intellects could enable them to do, has been done
from time to time, to impart a kind of lustre to intemperance and all
its dreadful and criminal consequences.
My father, having once got into the company of what he considered wits
and men of spirit, soon became thoroughly vitiated. He was almost
the only one of the set among whom he passed what he considered his
highly convivial existence, who was really worth anything, pecuniarily
speaking. There were some among them who might have been respectable
men, and perchance carved their way to fortune, as well as some others
who had started in life with good patrimonies; but he, my father, at
the time he became associated with them, was the only one, as I say,
who, to use a phrase I have heard myself from his lips concerning them,
had got a feather to fly with.
The consequence of this was, that his society, merely for the sake of
the animal gratification of drinking at his expense was courted, and
he was much flattered, all of which he laid to the score of his own
merits, which had been found out, and duly appreciated by these _bon
vivants_, while he considered that the grave admonitions of his real
friends proceeded from nothing in the world but downright envy and
malice.
Such a state of things as this could not last very long. The associates
of my father wanted money as well as wine, so they introduced him to
the gaming-table, and he became fascinated with the fearful vice to an
extent which predicted his own destruction and the ruin of every one
who was in any way dependent upon him.
He could not absolutely sell Bannerworth Hall, unless I had given my
consent, which I refused; but he accumulated debt upon debt, and from
time to time stripped the mansion of all its most costly contents.
With various mutations of fortune, he continued this horrible and
baneful career for a long time, until, at last, he found himself
utterly and irretrievably ruined, and he came home in an agony of
despair, being so weak, and utterly ruined in constitution, that he
kept his bed for many days.
It appeared, however, that something occurred at this juncture which
gave him actually, or all events awakened a hope that he should possess
some money, and be again in a position to try his fortune at the
gaming-table.
He rose, and, fortifying himself once more with the strong stimulant
of wine and spirits, he left his home, and was absent for about two
months.
What occurred to him during that time we none of us ever knew, but late
one night he came home, apparently much flurried in manner, and seeming
as if something had happened to drive him half mad.
He would not speak to any one, but he shut himself up the whole of the
night in the chamber where hangs the portrait that bears so strong
a resemblance to Sir Francis Varney, and there he remained till the
morning, when he emerged, and said briefly that he intended to leave
the country.
He was in a most fearful state of nervousness, and my mother tells me
that he shook like one in an ague, and started at every little sound
that occurred in the house, and glared about him so wildly that it was
horrible to see him, or to sit in the same apartment with him.
She says that the whole morning passed on in this way till a letter
came to him, the contents of which appeared to throw him into a perfect
convulsion of terror, and he retired again to the room with the
portrait, where he remained some hours, and then he emerged, looking
like a ghost, so dreadfully pale and haggard was he.
He walked into the garden here, and was seen to sit down in this
summer-house, and fix his eyes upon the window of that apartment.
Henry paused for a few moments, and then he added,—
You will excuse me from entering upon any details of what next ensued
in the melancholy history. My father here committed suicide. He was
found dying, and all the words he spoke were, “The money is hidden!”
Death claimed his victim, and, with a convulsive spasm, he resigned his
spirit, leaving what he had intended to say hidden in the oblivion of
the grave.
[Illustration: The suicide of Henry Bannerworth’s father.]
“That was an odd affair,” said the admiral.
“It was, indeed. We have all pondered deeply, and the result was,
that, upon the whole, we were inclined to come to an opinion that the
words he so uttered were but the result of the mental disturbance that
at such a moment might well be supposed to be ensuing in the mind,
and that they related really to no foregone fact any more than some
incoherent words uttered by a man in a dream might be supposed to do.”
“It may be so.”
“I do not mean,” remarked Mr. Chillingworth, “for one moment to attempt
to dispute, Henry, the rationality of such an opinion as you have just
given utterance to; but you forget that another circumstance occurred,
which gave a colour to the words used by your father.”
“Yes; I know to what you allude.”
“Be so good as to state it to the admiral.”
“I will. On the evening of that same day there came a man here, who, in
seeming ignorance of what had occurred, although by that time it was
well known to all the neighbourhood, asked to see my father.”
“Upon being told that he was dead, he started back, either with well
acted or with real surprise, and seemed to be immensely chagrined. He
then demanded to know if he had left any disposition of his property;
but he got no information, and departed muttering the most diabolical
oaths and curses that can be imagined. He mounted his horse, for he had
ridden to the Hall and his last words were, as I am told—”
“‘Where, in the name of all that’s damnable, can he have put the
money!’”
“And did you never find out who this man was?” asked the admiral.
“Never.”
“It is an odd affair.”
“It is,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “and full of mystery. The public mind
was much taken up at the time with some other matters, or it would
have made the death of Mr. Bannerworth the subject of more prolific
comment than it did. As it was, however, a great deal was said upon the
subject, and the whole county was in a state of commotion for weeks
afterwards.”
“Yes,” said Henry; “it so happened that about that very time a murder
was committed in the neighbourhood of London, which baffled all the
exertions of the authorities to discover the perpetrators of. It was
the murder of Lord Lorne.”
“Oh! I remember,” said the admiral; “the newspapers were full of it for
a long time.”
“They were; and so, as Mr. Chillingworth says, the more exciting
interest which that affair created drew off public attention, in a
great measure, from my father’s suicide, and we did not suffer so much
from public remark and from impertinent curiosity as might have been
expected.”
“And, in addition,” said Mr. Chillingworth, and he changed colour a
little as he spoke, “there was an execution shortly afterwards.”
“Yes,” said Henry, “there was.”
“The execution of a man named Angerstein,” added Mr. Chillingworth,
“for a highway robbery, attended with the most brutal violence.”
“True; all the affairs of that period of time are strongly impressed
upon my mind,” said Henry; “but you do not seem well, Mr.
Chillingworth.”
“Oh, yes; I am quite well—you are mistaken.”
Both the admiral and Henry looked scrutinizingly at the doctor, who
certainly appeared to them to be labouring under some great mental
excitement, which he found it almost beyond his power to repress.
“I tell you what it is, doctor,” said the admiral; “I don’t pretend,
and never did, to see further through a tar-barrel than my neighbours;
but I can see far enough to feel convinced that you have got something
on your mind, and that it somehow concerns this affair.”
“Is it so?” said Henry.
“I cannot if I would,” said Mr. Chillingworth; “and I may with truth
add, that I would not, if I could, hide from you that I have something
on my mind connected with this affair; but let me assure you it would
be premature of me to tell you of it.”
“Premature be d—d!” said the admiral; “out with it.”
“Nay, nay, dear sir; I am not now in a position to say what is passing
through my mind.”
“Alter your position, then, and be blowed!” cried Jack Pringle,
suddenly stepping forward, and giving the doctor such a push, that he
nearly went through one of the sides of the summer-house.
“Why, you scoundrel!” cried the admiral, “how came you here?”
“On my legs,” said Jack. “Do you think nobody wants to know nothing but
yourself? I’m as fond of a yarn as anybody.”
“But if you are,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “you had no occasion to come
against me as if you wanted to move a house.”
“You said as you wasn’t in a position to say something as I wanted to
hear, so I thought I’d alter it for you.”
“Is this fellow,” said the doctor, shaking his head, as he accosted the
admiral, “the most artful or stupid?”
“A little of both,” said Admiral Bell—“a little of both, doctor. He’s a
great fool and a great scamp.”
“The same to you,” said Jack; “you’re another. I shall hate you
presently, if you go on making yourself so ridiculous. Now, mind, I’ll
only give you a trial of another week or so, and if you don’t be more
purlite in your d——n language, I’ll leave you.”
Away strolled Jack, with his hands in his pockets, towards the house,
while the admiral was half choked with rage, and could only glare after
him, without the ability to say a word.
Under any other circumstances than the present one of trouble, and
difficulty; and deep anxiety, Henry Bannerworth must have laughed at
these singular little episodes between Jack and the admiral; but his
mind was now by far too much harassed to permit him to do so.
“Let him go, let him go, my dear sir,” said Mr. Chillingworth to the
admiral, who showed some signs of an intention to pursue Jack; “he no
doubt has been drinking again.”
“I’ll turn him off the first moment I catch him sober enough to
understand me,” said the admiral.
“Well, well; do as you please; but now let me ask a favour of both of
you.”
“What is it?”
“That you will leave Bannerworth Hall to me for a week.”
“What for?”
“I hope to make some discoveries connected with it which shall well
reward you for the trouble.”
“It’s no trouble,” said Henry; “and for myself, I have amply sufficient
faith, both in your judgment and in your friendship, doctor, to accede
to any request which you may make to me.”
“And I,” said the admiral. “Be it so—be it so. For one week, you say?”
“Yes—for one week. I hope, by the end of that time, to have achieved
something worth the telling you of; and I promise you that, if I am
at all disappointed in my expectation, that I will frankly and freely
communicate to you all I know and all I suspect.”
“Then that’s a bargain.”
“It is.”
“And what’s to be done at once?”
“Why, nothing, but to take the greatest possible care that Bannerworth
Hall is not left another hour without some one in it; and in order that
such should be the case, I have to request that you two will remain
here until I go to the town, and make preparations for taking quiet
possession of it myself, which I will do in the course of two hours, at
most.”
“Don’t be longer,” said the admiral, “for I am so desperately hungry,
that I shall certainly begin to eat somebody, if you are.”
“Depend upon me.”
“Very well,” said Henry; “you may depend we will wait here until you
come back.”
The doctor at once hurried from the garden, leaving Henry and the
admiral to amuse themselves as best they might, with conjectures as to
what he was really about, until his return.
CHAPTER LXII.
THE MYSTERIOUS MEETING IN THE RUIN AGAIN.—THE VAMPYRE’S ATTACK UPON
THE CONSTABLE.
It is now necessary that we return once more to that mysterious ruin,
in the intricacies of which Varney, when pursued by the mob, had
succeeded in finding a refuge which defied all the exertions which were
made for his discovery. Our readers must be well aware, that, connected
with that ruin, are some secrets of great importance to our story; and
we will now, at the solemn hour of midnight, take another glance at
what is doing within its recesses.
At that solemn hour it is not probable that any one would seek that
gloomy place from choice. Some lover of the picturesque certainly might
visit it; but such was not the inciting cause of the pilgrimage with
those who were soon to stand within its gloomy precincts.
Other motives dictated their presence in that spot—motives of rapine;
peradventure of murder itself.
As the neighbouring clocks sounded the hour of twelve, and the faint
strokes were borne gently on the wind to that isolated ruin, there
might have been seen a tall man standing by the porch of what had once
been a large doorway to some portion of the ruin.
His form was enveloped in a large cloak, which was of such ample
material that he seemed well able to wrap it several times around him,
and then leave a considerable portion of it floating idly in the gentle
wind.
He stood as still, as calm, and as motionless as a statue, for a
considerable time, before any degree of impatience began to show
itself. Then he took from his pocket a large antique watch, the white
face of which just enabled him to see what the time was, and, in a
voice which had in it some amount of petulance and anger, he said,—
“Not come yet, and nearly half an hour beyond the time! What can have
detained him? This is, indeed, trifling with the most important moments
of a man’s existence.”
Even as he spoke, he heard, from some distance off, the sound of a
short, quick footstep. He bent forwards to listen, and then, in a tone
of satisfaction, he said,—
“He comes—he comes!”
But he who thus waited for some confederate among these dim and old
grey ruins, advanced not a step to meet him. On the contrary, such
seemed the amount of cold-blooded caution which he possessed, that
the nearer the man—who was evidently advancing—got to the place, the
further back did he who had preceded him shrink into the shadow of the
dim and crumbling walls, which had, for some years now past, seemed to
bend to the passing blast, and to be on the point of yielding to the
destroying hand of time.
And yet, surely he needed not have been so cautious. Who was likely, at
such an hour as that, to come to the ruins, but one who sought it by
appointment?
And, moreover, the manner of the advancing man should have been quite
sufficient to convince him who waited, that so much caution was
unnecessary; but it was a part and parcel of his nature.
About three minutes more sufficed to bring the second man to the ruin,
and he, at once, and fearlessly, plunged into its recesses.
“Who comes?” said the first man, in a deep, hollow voice.
“He whom you expect,” was the reply.
“Good,” he said, and at once he now emerged from his hiding-place, and
they stood together in the nearly total darkness with which the place
was enshrouded; for the night was a cloudy one, and there appeared not
a star in the heavens, to shed its faint light upon the scene below.
For a few moments they were both silent, for he who had last arrived
had evidently made great exertions to reach the spot, and was breathing
laboriously, while he who was there first appeared, from some natural
taciturnity of character, to decline opening the conversation.
At length the second comer spoke, saying,—
“I have made some exertion to get here to my time, and yet I am beyond
it, as you are no doubt aware.”
“Yes, yes.”
“Well, such would not have been the case; but yet, I stayed to bring
you some news of importance.”
“Indeed!”
“It is so. This place, which we have, now for some time had as a quiet
and perfectly eligible one of meeting, is about to be invaded by one
of those restless, troublesome spirits, who are never happy but when
they are contriving something to the annoyance of others who do not
interfere with them.”
“Explain yourself more fully.”
“I will. At a tavern in the town, there has happened some strange
scenes of violence, in consequence of the general excitement into
which the common people have been thrown upon the dreadful subject of
vampyres.”
“Well.”
“The consequence is, that numerous arrests have taken place, and the
places of confinement for offenders against the laws are now full of
those whose heated and angry imaginations have induced them to take
violent steps to discover the reality or the falsehood of rumours which
so much affected them, their wives, and their families, that they
feared to lie down to their night’s repose.”
The other laughed a short, hollow, restless sort of laugh, which had
not one particle of real mirth in it.
“Go on—go on,” he said. “What did they do?”
“Immense excesses have been committed; but what made me, first of all,
stay beyond my time, was that I overheard a man declare his intentions
this night, from twelve till the morning, and for some nights to come,
to hold watch and ward for the vampyre.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes. He did but stay, at the earnest solicitation of his comrades, to
take yet another glass, ere he came upon his expedition.”
“He must be met. The idiot! what business is it of his?”
“There are always people who will make everything their business,
whether it be so or not.”
“There are. Let us retire further into the recesses of the ruin, and
there consider as well what is to be done regarding more important
affairs, as with this rash intruder here.”
They both walked for some twenty paces, or so, right into the ruin, and
then he who had been there first, said, suddenly, to his companion,—
“I am annoyed, although the feeling reaches no further than annoyance,
for I have a natural love of mischief, to think that my reputation has
spread so widely, and made so much noise.”
“Your reputation as a vampyre, Sir Francis Varney, you mean?”
“Yes; but there is no occasion for you to utter my name aloud, even
here where we are alone together.”
“It came out unawares.”
“Unawares! Can it be possible that you have so little command over
yourself as to allow a name to come from your lips unawares?”
“Sometimes.”
“I am surprised.”
“Well, it cannot be helped. What do you now propose to do?”
“Nay, you are my privy councillor. Have you no deep-laid, artful
project in hand? Can you not plan and arrange something which may yet
have the effect of accomplishing what at first seemed so very simple,
but which has, from one unfortunate circumstance and another, become
full of difficulty and pregnant with all sorts of dangers?”
“I must confess I have no plan.”
“I listen with astonishment.”
“Nay, now, you are jesting.”
“When did you ever hear of me jesting?”
“Not often, I admit. But you have a fertile genius, and I have always,
myself, found it easier to be the executive than to plan an elaborate
course of action for others.”
“Then you throw it all on me?”
“I throw a weight, naturally enough, upon the shoulders which I think
the best adapted to sustain it.”
“Be it so, then—be it so.”
“You are, I presume, from what you say, provided with a scheme of
action which shall present better hopes of success, at less risk, I
hope. Look what great danger we have already passed through.”
“Yes, we have.”
“I pray you avoid that in the next campaign.”
“It is not the danger that annoys and troubles me, but it is that,
notwithstanding it, the object is as far off as ever from being
attained.”
“And not only so, but, as is invariably the case under such
circumstances, we have made it more difficult of execution because we
have put those upon their guard thoroughly who are the most likely to
oppose us.”
“We have—we have.”
“And placed the probability of success afar off indeed.”
“And yet I have set my life upon the cast, and I will stand the hazard.
I tell you I will accomplish this object, or I will perish in the
attempt.”
“You are too enthusiastic.”
“Not at all. Nothing has been ever done, the execution of which was
difficult, without enthusiasm. I will do what I intend, or Bannerworth
Hall shall become a heap of ruins, where fire shall do its worst work
of devastation, and I will myself find a grave in the midst.”
“Well, I quarrel with no man for chalking out the course he intends to
pursue; but what do you mean to do with the prisoner below here?”
“Kill him.”
“What?”
“I say kill him. Do you not understand me?”
“I do, indeed.”
“When everything else is secured, and when the whole of that which I
so much court, and which I will have, is in my possession, I will take
his life, or you shall. Ay, you are just the man for such a deed. A
smooth-faced, specious sort of man are you, and you like not danger.
There will be none in taking the life of a man who is chained to the
floor of a dungeon.”
“I know not why,” said the other, “you take a pleasure on this
particular night, of all others, in saying all you can which you think
will be offensive to me.”
“Now, how you wrong me. This is the reward of confidence.”
“I don’t want such confidence.”
“Why, you surely don’t want me to flatter you.”
“No; but——”
“Psha! Hark you. That admiral is the great stumbling-block in my way. I
should ere this have had undisturbed possession of Bannerworth Hall but
for him. He must be got out of the way somehow.”
“A short time will tire him out of watching. He is one of those men of
impulse who soon become wearied of inaction.”
“Ay, and then the Bannerworths return to the Hall.”
“It may be so.”
“I am certain of it. We have been out-generalled in this matter,
although I grant we did all that men could do to give us success.”
“In what way would you get rid of this troublesome admiral?”
“I scarcely know. A letter from his nephew might, if well put together,
get him to London.”
“I doubt it. I hate him mortally. He has offended me more than once
most grievously.”
“I know it. He saw through you.”
“I do not give him so much credit. He is a suspicious man, and a vain
and a jealous one.”
“And yet he saw through you. Now, listen to me. You are completely at
fault, and have no plan of operations whatever in your mind. What I
want you to do is, to disappear from the neighbourhood for a time, and
so will I. As for our prisoner here below, I cannot see what else can
be done with him than—than——”
“Than what? Do you hesitate?”
“I do.”
“Then what is it you were about to say?”
“I cannot but feel that all we have done, hitherto, as regards
this young prisoner of ours, has failed. He has, with a determined
obstinacy, set at naught, as well you know, all threats.”
“He has.”
“He has refused to do one act which could in any way aid me in my
objects. In fact, from the first to the last, he has been nothing but
an expense and an encumbrance to us both.”
“All that is strictly true.”
“And yet, although you, as well as I, know of a marvellously ready way
of getting rid of such encumbrances, I must own, that I shrink with
more than a feeling of reluctance from the murder of the youth.”
“You contemplated it then?” asked the other.
“No; I cannot be said to have contemplated it. That is not the proper
sort of expression to use.”
“What is then?”
“To contemplate a deed seems to me to have some close connexion to the
wish to do it.”
“And you have no such wish?”
“I have no such wish, and what is more I will not do it.”
“Then that is sufficient; and the only question that remains for you
to consider is, what you will do. It is far easier in all enterprises
to decide upon what we will not do, than upon what we will. For my own
part I must say that I can perceive no mode of extricating ourselves
from this involvement with anything like safety.”
“Then it must be done with something like danger.”
“As you please.”
“You say so, and your words bear a clear enough signification; but from
your tone I can guess how much you are dissatisfied with the aspect of
affairs.”
“Dissatisfied!”
“Yes; I say, dissatisfied. Be frank, and own that which it is in vain
to conceal from me. I know you too well; arch hypocrite as you are, and
fully capable of easily deceiving many, you cannot deceive me.”
“I really cannot understand you.”
“Then I will take care that you shall.”
“How?”
“Listen. I will not have the life of Charles Holland taken.”
“Who wishes to take it?”
“You.”
“There, indeed, you wrong me. Unless you yourself thought that such an
act was imperatively called for by the state of affairs, do you think
that I would needlessly bring down upon my head the odium as well as
the danger of such a deed? No, no. Let him live, if you are willing; he
may live a thousand years for all I care.”
“’Tis well. I am, mark me, not only willing, but I am determined that
he shall live so far as we are concerned. I can respect the courage
that, even when he considered that his life was at stake, enabled him
to say no to a proposal which was cowardly and dishonourable, although
it went far to the defeat of my own plans and has involved me in much
trouble.”
“Hush! hush!”
“What is it?”
“I fancy I hear a footstep.”
“Indeed; that were a novelty in such a place as this.”
“And yet not more than I expected. Have you forgotten what I told you
when I reached here to-night after the appointed hour?”
“Truly; I had for the moment. Do you think then that the footstep which
now meets our ears, is that of the adventurer who boasted that he could
keep watch for the vampyre?”
“In faith do I. What is to be done with such a meddling fool?”
“He ought certainly to be taught not to be so fond of interfering with
other people’s affairs.”
“Certainly.”
“Perchance the lesson will not be wholly thrown away upon others. It
may be worth while to take some trouble with this poor valiant fellow,
and let him spread his news so as to stop any one else from being
equally venturous and troublesome.”
“A good thought.”
“Shall it be done?”
“Yes; if you will arrange that which shall accomplish such a result.”
“Be it so. The moon rises soon.”
“It does.”
“Ah, already I fancy I see a brightening of the air as if the mellow
radiance of the queen of night were already quietly diffusing itself
throughout the realms of space. Come further within the ruins.”
They both walked further among the crumbling walls and fragments of
columns with which the place abounded. As they did so they paused now
and then to listen, and more than once they both heard plainly the
sound of certain footsteps immediately outside the once handsome and
spacious building.
Varney, the vampyre, who had been holding this conversation with
no other than Marchdale, smiled as he, in a whispered voice, told
the latter what to do in order to frighten away from the place the
foolhardy man who thought that, by himself, he should be able to
accomplish anything against the vampyre.
It was, indeed, a hair-brained expedition, for whether Sir Francis
Varney was really so awful and preternatural a being as so many
concurrent circumstances would seem to proclaim, or not, he was not a
likely being to allow himself to be conquered by any one individual,
let his powers or his courage be what they might.
What induced this man to become so ventursome we shall now proceed to
relate, as well as what kind of reception he got in the old ruins,
which, since the mysterious disappearance of Sir Francis Varney within
their recesses, had possessed so increased a share of interest and
attracted so much popular attention and speculation.
CHAPTER LXIII.
THE GUESTS AT THE INN, AND THE STORY OF THE DEAD UNCLE.
As had been truly stated by Mr. Marchdale, who now stands out in his
true colours to the reader as the confidant and abettor of Sir Francis
Varney, there had assembled on that evening a curious and a gossipping
party at the inn where such dreadful and such riotous proceedings had
taken place, which, in their proper place, we have already duly and at
length recorded.
It was not very likely that, on that evening, or for many and many an
evening to come, the conversation in the parlour of the inn would be
upon any other subject than that of the vampyre.
Indeed, the strange, mysterious, and horrible circumstances which had
occurred, bade fair to be gossipping stock in trade for many a year.
Never before had a subject presenting so many curious features arisen.
Never, within the memory of that personage who is supposed to know
everything, had there occurred any circumstance in the county, or set
of circumstances, which afforded such abundant scope for conjecture and
speculation.
Everybody might have his individual opinion, and be just as likely to
be right as his neighbours; and the beauty of the affair was, that such
was the interest of the subject itself, that there was sure to be a
kind of reflected interest with every surmise that at all bore upon it.
On this particular night, when Marchdale was prowling about, gathering
what news he could, in order that he might carry it to the vampyre, a
more than usually strong muster of the gossips of the town took place.
Indeed, all of any note in the talking way were there, with the
exception of one, and he was in the county gaol, being one of the
prisoners apprehended by the military when they made the successful
attack upon the lumber-room of the inn, after the dreadful desecration
of the dead which had taken place.
The landlord of the inn was likely to make a good thing of it, for
talking makes people thirsty; and he began to consider that a vampyre
about once a-year would be no bad thing for the Blue Lion.
“It’s shocking,” said one of the guests; “it’s shocking to think of.
Only last night, I am quite sure I had such a fright that it added at
least ten years to my age.”
“A fright!” said several.
“I believe I speak English—I said a fright.”
“Well, but had it anything to do with the vampyre?”
“Everything.”
“Oh! do tell us; do tell us all about it. How was it? Did he come to
you? Go on. Well, well.”
The first speaker became immediately a very important personage in
the room; and, when he saw that, he became at once a very important
personage in his own eyes likewise; and, before he would speak another
word, he filled a fresh pipe, and ordered another mug of ale.
“It’s no use trying to hurry him,” said one.
“No,” he said, “it isn’t. I’ll tell you in good time what a dreadful
circumstance has made me sixty-three to-day, when I was only
fifty-three yesterday.”
“Was it very dreadful?”
“Rather. You wouldn’t have survived it at all.”
“Indeed!”
“No. Now listen. I went to bed at a quarter after eleven, as usual. I
didn’t notice anything particular in the room.”
“Did you peep under the bed?”
“No, I didn’t. Well, as I was a-saying, to bed I went, and I didn’t
fasten the door; because, being a very sound sleeper, in case there was
a fire, I shouldn’t hear a word of it if I did.”
“No,” said another. “I recollect once——”
“Be so good as allow me to finish what I know, before you begin to
recollect anything, if you please. As I was saying, I didn’t lock the
door, but I went to bed. Somehow or another, I did not feel at all
comfortable, and I tossed about, first on one side, and then on the
other; but it was all in vain; I only got, every moment, more and more
fidgetty.”
“And did you think of the vampyre?” said one of the listeners.
“I thought of nothing else till I heard my clock, which is on the
landing of the stairs above my bed-room, begin to strike twelve.”
“Ah! I like to hear a clock sound in the night,” said one; “it puts
one in mind of the rest of the world, and lets one know one isn’t all
alone.”
“Very good. The striking of the clock I should not at all have objected
to; but it was what followed that did the business.”
“What, what?”
“Fair and softly; fair and softly. Just hand me a light, Mr. Sprigs, if
you please. I’ll tell you all, gentlemen, in a moment or two.”
With the most provoking deliberation, the speaker re-lit his pipe,
which had gone out while he was talking, and then, after a few whiffs,
to assure himself that its contents had thoroughly ignited, he resumed,—
“No sooner had the last sound of it died away, than I heard something
on the stairs.”
“Yes, yes.”
“It was as if some man had given his foot a hard blow against one of
the stairs; and he would have needed to have had a heavy boot on to do
it. I started up in bed and listened, as you may well suppose, not in
the most tranquil state of mind, and then I heard an odd, gnawing sort
of noise, and then another dab upon one of the stairs.”
“How dreadful!”
“It was. What to do I knew not, or what to think, except that the
vampyre had, by some means, got in at the attic window, and was coming
down stairs to my room. That seemed the most likely. Then there was
another groan, and then another heavy step; and, as they were evidently
coming towards my door, I felt accordingly, and got out of bed, not
knowing hardly whether I was on my head or my heels, to try and lock my
door.”
“Ah, to be sure.”
“Yes; that was all very well, if I could have done it; but a man in
such a state of mind as I was in is not a very sharp hand at doing
anything. I shook from head to foot. The room was very dark, and I
couldn’t, for a moment or two, collect my senses sufficient really to
know which way the door lay.”
“What a situation!”
“It was. Dab, dab, dab, came these horrid footsteps, and there was I
groping about the room in an agony. I heard them coming nearer and
nearer to my door. Another moment, and they must have reached it, when
my hand struck against the lock.”
“What an escape!”
“No, it was not.”
“No?”
“No, indeed. The key was on the outside, and you may well guess I was
not over and above disposed to open the door to get at it.”
“No, no.”
“I felt regularly bewildered, I can tell you; it seemed to me as if the
very devil himself was coming down stairs hopping all the way upon one
leg.”
“How terrific!”
“I felt my senses almost leaving me; but I did what I could to hold the
door shut just as I heard the strange step come from the last stair
on to the landing. Then there was a horrid sound, and some one began
trying the lock of my door.”
“What a moment!”
“Yes, I can tell you it was a moment. Such a moment as I don’t wish
to go through again. I held the door as close as I could, and did not
speak. I tried to cry out help and murder, but I could not; my tongue
stuck to the roof of my mouth, and my strength was fast failing me.”
“Horrid, horrid!”
“Take a drop of ale.”
“Thank you. Well, I don’t think this went on above two or three
minutes, and all the while some one tried might and main to push open
the door. My strength left me all at once; I had only time to stagger
back a step or two, and then, as the door opened, I fainted away.”
“Well, well!”
“Ah, you wouldn’t have said well, if you had been there, I can tell
you.”
“No; but what become of you. What happened next? How did it end? What
was it?”
“Why, what exactly happened next after I fainted I cannot tell you; but
the first thing I saw when I recovered was a candle.”
“Yes, yes.”
“And then a crowd of people.”
“Ah, ah!”
“And then Dr. Webb.”
“Gracious!”
“And Mrs. Bulk, my housekeeper. I was in my own bed, and when I opened
my eyes I heard Dr. Webb say,—
“‘He will be better soon. Can no one form any idea of what it is all
about. Some sudden fright surely could alone have produced such an
effect.’”
“‘The Lord have mercy upon me!’ said I.
“Upon this everybody who had been called in got round the bed, and
wanted to know what had happened; but I said not a word of it; but
turning to Mrs. Bulk, I asked her how it was she found out I had
fainted.
“‘Why, sir,’ says she, ‘I was coming up to bed as softly as I could,
because I knew you had gone to rest some time before. The clock was
striking twelve, and as I went past it some of my clothes, I suppose,
caught the large weight, but it was knocked off, and down the stairs it
rolled, going with such a lump from one to the other, and I couldn’t
catch it because it rolled so fast, that I made sure you would be
awakened; so I came down to tell you what it was, and it was some time
before I could get your room door open, and when I did I found you out
of bed and insensible.’”
There was a general look of disappointment when this explanation was
given, and one said,—
“Then it was not the vampire?”
“Certainly not.”
“And, after all, only a clock weight.”
“That’s about it.”
“Why didn’t you tell us that at first?”
“Because that would have spoilt the story.”
There was a general murmur of discontent, and, after a few moments one
man said, with some vivacity,—
“Well, although our friend’s vampyre has turned out, after all, to be
nothing but a confounded clock-weight, there’s no disputing the fact
about Sir Francis Varney being a vampyre, and not a clock-weight.”
“Very true—very true.”
“And what’s to be done to rid the town of such a man?”
“Oh, don’t call him a man.”
“Well, a monster.”
“Ah, that’s more like. I tell you what, sir, if you had got a light,
when you first heard the noise in your room, and gone out to see what
it was, you would have spared yourself much fright.”
“Ah, no doubt; it’s always easy afterwards to say, if you had done
this, and if you had done the other, so and so would have been the
effect; but there is something about the hour of midnight that makes
men tremble.”
“Well,” said one, who had not yet spoken, “I don’t see why twelve at
night should be a whit more disagreeable than twelve at day.”
“Don’t you?”
“Not I.”
“Now, for instance, many a party of pleasure goes to that old ruin
where Sir Francis Varney so unaccountably disappeared in broad
daylight. But is there any one here who would go to it alone, and at
midnight?”
“Yes.”
“Who?”
“I would.”
“What! and after what has happened as regards the vampyre in connection
with it?”
“Yes, I would.”
“I’ll bet you twenty shillings you won’t.”
“And I—and I,” cried several.
“Well, gentlemen,” said the man, who certainly shewed no signs of fear,
“I will go, and not only will I go and take all your bets, but, if I
do meet the vampyre, then I’ll do my best to take him prisoner.”
“And when will you go?”
“To-night,” he cried, and he sprang to his feet; “hark ye all, I don’t
believe one word about vampyres. I’ll go at once; it’s getting late,
and let any one of you, in order that you may be convinced I have been
to the place, give me any article, which I will hide among the ruins;
and tell you where to find it to-morrow in broad daylight.”
“Well,” said one, “that’s fair, Tom Eccles. Here’s a handkerchief of
mine; I should know it again among a hundred others.”
“Agreed; I’ll leave it in the ruins.”
The wagers were fairly agreed upon; several handkerchiefs were handed
to Tom Eccles; and at eleven o’clock he fairly started, through the
murky darkness of the night, to the old ruin where Sir Francis Varney
and Marchdale were holding their most unholy conference.
It is one thing to talk and to accept wagers in the snug parlour of
an inn, and another to go alone across a tract of country wrapped in
the profound stillness of night to an ancient ruin which, in addition
to the natural gloom which might well be supposed to surround it, has
superadded associations which are anything but of a pleasant character.
Tom Eccles, as he was named, was one of those individuals who act
greatly from impulse. He was certainly not a coward, and, perhaps,
really as free from superstition as most persons, but he was human, and
consequently he had nerves, and he had likewise an imagination.
He went to his house first before he started on his errand to the
ruins. It was to get a horse-pistol which he had, and which he duly
loaded and placed in his pocket. Then he wrapped himself up in a
great-coat, and with the air of a man quite determined upon something
desperate he left the town.
The guests at the inn looked after him as he walked from the door of
that friendly establishment, and some of them, as they saw his resolved
aspect, began to quake for the amount of the wagers they had laid upon
his non-success.
However, it was resolved among them, that they would stay until
half-past twelve, in the expectation of his return, before they
separated.
To while away the time, he who had been so facetious about his story
of the clock-weight, volunteered to tell what happened to a friend of
his who went to take possession of some family property which he became
possessed of as heir-at-law to an uncle who had died without a will,
having an illegitimate family unprovided for in every shape.
“Ah! nobody cares for other people’s illegitimate children, and, if
their parents don’t provide for them, why, the workhouse is open for
them, just as if they were something different from other people.”
“So they are; if their parents don’t take care of them, and provide for
them, nobody else will, as you say, neighbour, except when they have a
Fitz put to their name, which tells you they are royal bastards, and of
course unlike anybody else’s.”
“But go on—let’s know all about it; we sha’n’t hear what he has got to
say at all, at this rate.”
“Well, as I was saying, or about to say, the nephew, as soon as he
heard his uncle was dead, comes and claps his seal upon everything in
the house.”
“But, could he do so?” inquired one of the guests.
“I don’t see what was to hinder him,” replied a third. “He could do so,
certainly.”
“But there was a son, and, as I take it, a son’s nearer than a nephew
any day.”
“But the son is illegitimate.”
“Legitimate, or illegitimate, a son’s a son; don’t bother me about
distinction of that sort; why, now, there was old Weatherbit——”
“Order, order.”
“Let’s hear the tale.”
“Very good, gentlemen, I’ll go on, if I ain’t to be interrupted; but
I’ll say this, that an illegitimate son is no son, in the eyes of the
law; or at most he’s an accident quite, and ain’t what he is, and so
can’t inherit.”
“Well, that’s what I call making matters plain,” said one of the
guests, who took his pipe from his mouth to make room for the remark;
“now that is what I likes.”
“Well, as I have proved then,” resumed the speaker, “the nephew was the
heir, and into the house he would come. A fine affair it was too—the
illegitimates looking the colour of sloes; but he knew the law, and
would have it put in force.”
“Law’s law, you know.”
“Uncommonly true that; and the nephew stuck to it like a cobbler to his
last—he said they should go out, and they did go out; and, say what
they would about their natural claims, he would not listen to them, but
bundled them out and out in a pretty short space of time.”
“It was trying to them, mind you, to leave the house they had been born
in with very different expectations to those which now appeared to be
their fate. Poor things, they looked ruefully enough, and well they
might, for there was a wide world for them, and no prospect of a warm
corner.
“Well, as I was saying, he had them all out and the house clear to
himself.
“Now,” said he, “I have an open field and no favour. I don’t care for
no——Eh! what?”
“There was a sudden knocking, he thought, the door, and went and opened
it, but nothing was to be seen.
“Oh! I see—somebody next door; and if it wasn’t, it don’t matter.
There’s nobody here. I’m alone, and there’s plenty of valuables in
the house. That is what I call very good company. I wouldn’t wish for
better.”
He turned about, looked over room after room, and satisfied himself
that he was alone—that the house was empty.
At every room he entered he paused to think over the value—what it was
worth, and that he was a very fortunate man in having dropped into such
a good thing.
“Ah! there’s the old boy’s secretary, too—his bureau—there’ll be
something in that that will amuse me mightily; but I don’t think I
shall sit up late. He was a rum old man, to say the least of it—a very
odd sort of man.”
With that he gave himself a shrug, as if some very uncomfortable
feeling had come over him.
“I’ll go to bed early, and get some sleep, and then in daylight I can
look after these papers. They won’t be less interesting in the morning
than they are now.”
There had been some rum stories about the old man, and now the nephew
seemed to think he might have let the family sleep on the premises for
that night; yes, at that moment he could have found it in his heart to
have paid for all the expense of their keep, had it been possible to
have had them back to remain the night.
But that wasn’t possible, for they would not have done it, but sooner
have remained in the streets all night than stay there all night,
like so many house-dogs, employed by one who stepped in between them
and their father’s goods, which were their inheritance, but for one
trifling circumstance—a mere ceremony.
The night came on, and he had lights. True it was he had not been down
stairs, only just to have a look. He could not tell what sort of a
place it was; there were a good many odd sort of passages, that seemed
to end nowhere, and others that did.
There were large doors; but they were all locked, and he had the keys;
so he didn’t mind, but secured all places that were not fastened.
He then went up stairs again, and sat down in the room where the bureau
was placed.
“I’ll be bound,” said one of the guests, “he was in a bit of a stew,
notwithstanding all his brag.”
“Oh! I don’t believe,” said another, “that anything done that is
dangerous, or supposed to be dangerous, by the bravest man, is any way
wholly without some uncomfortable feelings. They may not be strong
enough to prevent the thing proposed to be done from being done, but
they give a disagreeable sensation to the skin.”
“You have felt it, then?”
“Ha! ha! ha!”
“Why, at that time I slept in the churchyard for a wager, I must
say I felt cold all over, as if my skin was walking about me in an
uncomfortable manner.”
“But you won your wager?”
“I did.”
“And of course you slept there?”
“To be sure I did.”
“And met with nothing?”
“Nothing, save a few bumps against the gravestones.”
“Those were hard knocks, I should say.”
“They were, I assure you; but I lay there, and slept there, and won my
wager.”
“Would you do it again?”
“No.”
“And why not?”
“Because of the rheumatism.”
“You caught that?”
“I did; I would give ten times my wager to get rid of them. I have them
very badly.”
“Come, order, order—the tale; let’s hear the end of that, since it has
begun.”
“With all my heart. Come, neighbour.”
“Well, as I said, he was fidgetty; but yet he was not a man to be very
easily frightened or overcome, for he was stout and bold.
“When he shut himself up in the room, he took out a bottle of some good
wine, and helped himself to drink; it was good old wine, and he soon
felt himself warmed and, comforted. He could have faced the enemy.
“If one bottle produces such an effect,” he muttered, “what will two
do?”
This was a question that could only be solved by trying it, and this he
proceeded to do.
But first he drew a brace of long barrelled pistols from his coat
pocket, and taking a powder-flask and bullets from his pocket also, he
loaded them very carefully.
“There,” said he, “are my bull-dogs; and rare watch-dogs they are. They
never bark but they bite. Now, if anybody does come, it will be all up
with them. Tricks upon travellers ain’t a safe game when I have these;
and now for the other bottle.”
He drew the other bottle, and thought, if anything, it was better than
the first. He drank it rather quick, to be sure, and then he began to
feel sleepy and tired.
“I think I shall go to bed,” he said; “that is, if I can find my way
there, for it does seem to me as if the door was travelling. Never
mind, it will make a call here again presently, and then I’ll get
through.”
So saying he arose. Taking the candle in his hand, he walked with a
better step than might have been expected under the circumstance. True
it was the candle wagged to and fro, and his shadow danced upon the
wall; but still, when he got to the bed, he secured his door, put the
light in a safe place, threw himself down, and was fast asleep in a few
moments, or rather he fell into a doze instantaneously.
How long he remained in this state he knew not, but he was suddenly
awakened by a loud bang, as though something heavy and flat had fallen
upon the floor—such, for instance, as a door, or anything of that
sort. He jumped up, rubbed his eyes, and could even then hear the
reverberations through the house.
“What is that?” he muttered; “what is that?”
He listened, and thought he could hear something moving down stairs,
and for a moment he was seized with an ague fit; but recollecting, I
suppose, that there were some valuables down stairs that were worth
fighting for, he carefully extinguished the light that still burned,
and softly crept down stairs.
When he got down stairs he thought he could hear some one scramble
up the kitchen stairs, and then into the room where the bureau was.
Listening for a moment to ascertain if there were more than one, and
then feeling convinced there was not, he followed into the parlour,
when he heard the cabinet open by a key.
This was a new miracle, and one he could not understand; and then he
heard the papers begin to rattle and rustle; so, drawing out one of the
pistols, he cocked it, and walked in.
The figure instantly began to jump about; it was dressed in white—in
grave-clothes. He was terribly nervous, and shook, so he feared to fire
the pistol; but at length he did, and the report was followed by a fall
and a loud groan.
[Illustration: The ghost of the dead uncle appears to the nephew.]
This was very dreadful—very dreadful; but all was quiet, and he lit the
candle again, and approached the body to examine it, and ascertain if
he knew who it was. A groan came from it. The bureau was open, and the
figure clutched firmly a will in his hand.
The figure was dressed in grave-clothes, and he started up when he
saw the form and features of his own uncle, the man who was dead, who
somehow or other had escaped his confinement, and found his way up,
here. He held his will firmly; and the nephew was so horrified and
stunned, that he threw down the light, and rushed out of the room with
a shout of terror, and never returned again.
• • • • •
The narrator concluded, and one of the guests said,—
“And do you really believe it?”—“No, no—to be sure not.”
“You don’t?”—“Why should I? My friend was, out of all hand, one of the
greatest liars I ever came near; and why, therefore, should I believe
him? I don’t, on my conscience, believe one word of it.”
It was now half-past twelve, and, as Tom Eccles came not back, and the
landlord did not feel disposed to draw any more liquor, they left the
inn, and retired to their separate houses in a great state of anxiety
to know the fate of their respective wagers.
CHAPTER LXIV.
THE VAMPIRE IN THE MOONLIGHT.—THE FALSE FRIEND.
Part of the distance being accomplished towards the old ruins, Tom
Eccles began to feel that what he had undertaken was not altogether
such child’s-play as he had at first imagined it to be. Somehow or
another, with a singular and uncomfortable sort of distinctness, there
came across his mind every story that he had remembered of the wild and
the wonderful. All the long-since forgotten tales of superstition that
in early childhood he had learned, came now back upon him, suggesting
to his mind a thousand uncomfortable fancies of the strangest
description.
It was not likely that when once a man, under such circumstances, got
into such a frame of mind, he would readily get out of it again, while
he continued surrounded by such scenes as had first called them into
existence.
No doubt, had he turned about, and faced the inn again instead of the
old ruins he would soon have shaken off these “thick coming fancies;”
but such a result was no to be expected, so long as he kept on towards
the dismal place he had pledged himself to reach.
As he traversed meadow after meadow, he began to ask himself some
questions, which he found that he could not answer exactly in a
consolatory manner, under the present state of things.
Among these questions was the very pertinent one of,—“It’s no argument
against vampyres, because I don’t see the use of ’em—is it?” This he
was compelled to answer as he had put it; and when, in addition, he
began to recollect that, without the shadow of a doubt, Sir Francis
Varney the supposed vampyre, had been chased across the fields to that
very ruin whither he was bound, and had then and there disappeared, he
certainly found himself in decidedly uncomfortable and most unpromising
situation.
“No,” he said, “no. Hang it, I won’t go back now, to be made the
laughing-stock of the whole town, which I should be. Come what may of
it, I will go on as I have commenced; so I shall put on as stout a
heart as I can.”
Then, having come to this resolve, he strove might and main to banish
from his mind those disagreeable reminiscences that had been oppressing
him, to turn his attention to subjects of a different complexion.
During the progress of making this endeavour, which was rather futile,
he came within sight of the ruins. Then he slackened his pace a little,
telling himself, with a pardonable self-deceit, that it was common,
ordinary caution only, which induced him to do so, and nothing at all
in the shape of fear.
“Time enough,” he remarked, “to be afraid, when I see anything to be
afraid of, which I don’t see as yet. So, as all’s right, I may as well
put a good face upon the matter.”
He tried to whistle a tune, but it turned out only a melancholy
failure; so he gave that up in despair, and walked on until he got
within a hundred yards, or thereabouts, of the old ruins.
He thus proceeded, and bending his ear close to the ground, he listened
attentively for several minutes. Somehow, he fancied that a strange,
murmuring sound came to his ears; but he was not quite sure that it
proceeded from the ruins, because it was just that sort of sound that
might come from a long way off, being mellowed by distance, although,
perhaps, loud enough at its source.
“Well, well,” he whispered to himself, “it don’t matter much, after
all. Go I must, and hide the handkerchiefs somewhere, or else be
laughed at, besides losing my wages. The former I don’t like, and the
latter I cannot afford.”
Thus clinching the matter by such knock-down arguments, he walked on
until he was almost within the very shadow of the ruins, and, probably,
it was at this juncture that his footsteps may have been heard by
Marchdale and Sir Francis Varney.
Then he paused again; but all was profoundly still, and he began to
think that the strange sort of murmuring noise which he had heard must
have come from far off and not at all from any person or persons within
the ruins.
“Let me see,” he said to himself; “I have five handkerchiefs to hide
among the old ruins somewhere, and the sooner I do so the better,
because then I will get away; for, as regards staying here to watch,
Heaven knows how long, for Sir Francis Varney, I don’t intend to do
it, upon second thoughts, and second thoughts, they say, are generally
best.”
With the most careful footsteps now, as if he were treading upon some
fragile substance, which he feared to injure, he advanced until he was
fairly within the precincts of the ancient place, which now bore so ill
a reputation.
He then made to himself much the same remark that Sir Francis Varney
had made to Marchdale, with respect to the brightening up of the sky,
in consequence of its being near the time for the moon to rise from the
horizon, and he saw more clearly around him, although he could not find
any good place to hide the handkerchiefs in.
“I must and will,” he said, “hide them securely; for it would, indeed,
be remarkably unpleasant, after coming here and winning my wages, to
have the proofs that I had done so taken away by some chance visitor to
the place.”
He at length saw a tolerably large stone, which stood, in a slant
position, up against one of the walls. Its size attracted him. He
thought, if his strength was sufficient to move it, that it would be a
good thing to do so, and to place the handkerchiefs beneath it; for,
at all events, it was so heavy that it could not be kicked aside, and
no one, without some sort of motive to do so, beyond the mere love of
labour, would set about moving it from its position.
“I may go further and fare worse,” he said to himself; “so here shall
all the handkerchiefs lie, to afford a proof that I have been here.”
He packed them into a small compass, and then stooped to roll aside the
heavy stone, when, at the moment, before he could apply his strength
to that purpose, he heard some one, in his immediate neighbourhood,
say,—“Hist!”
This was so sudden, and so utterly unexpected, that he not only ceased
his exertions to move the stone, but he nearly fell down in his
surprise.
“Hist—hist!” said the voice again.
“What—what,” gasped Tom Eccles—“what are you?”—“Hush—hush—hush!”
The perspiration broke out upon his brow, and he leaned against the
wall for support, as he managed to say, faintly,—
“Well, hush—what then?”—“Hist!”
“Well, I hear you. Where are you?”
“Here at hand. Who are you?”
“Tom Eccles. Who are you?”—“A friend. Have you seen anything?”
“No; I wish I could. I should like to see you if I could.”—“I’m coming.”
There was a slow and cautious footstep, and Marchdale advanced to where
Tom Eccles was standing.
“Come, now,” said the latter, when he saw the dusky-looking form
stalking towards him; “till I know you better, I’ll be obliged to you
to keep off. I am well armed. Keep your distance, be you friend or foe.”
“Armed!” exclaimed Marchdale, and he at once paused.—“Yes, I am.”
“But I am a friend. I have no sort of objection frankly to tell you my
errand. I am a friend of the Bannerworth family, and have kept watch
here now for two nights, in the hopes of meeting with Varney, the
vampyre.”
“The deuce you have; and pray what may your name be?”—“Marchdale.”
“If you be Mr. Marchdale, I know you by sight; for I have seen you with
Mr. Henry Bannerworth several times. Come out from among the shadows,
and let us have a look at you; but, till you do, don’t come within
arm’s length of me. I am not naturally suspicious; but we cannot be too
careful.”
“Oh! certainly—certainly. The silver edge of the moon is now just
peeping up from the east, and you will be able to see me well, if you
step from the shadow of the wall by which you now are.”
This was a reasonable enough proposition, and Tom Eccles at once
acceded to it, by stepping out boldly into the partial moonlight,
which now began to fall upon the open meadows, tinting the grass with
a silvery refulgence, and rendering even minute objects visible. The
moment he saw Marchdale he knew him, and, advancing frankly to him, he
said,—
“I know you, sir, well.”
“And what brings you here?”—“A wager for one thing, and a wish to see
the vampyre for another.”
“Indeed!”—“Yes; I must own I have such a wish, along with a still
stronger one, to capture him, if possible; and, as there are now two of
us, why may we not do it?”
“As for capturing him,” said Marchdale, “I should prefer shooting
him.”—“You would?”
“I would, indeed. I have seen him once shot down, and he is now, I have
no doubt, as well as ever. What were you doing with that huge stone I
saw you bending over?”—“I have some handkerchiefs to hide here, as a
proof that I have to-night really been to this place.”
“Oh, I will show you a better spot, where there is a crevice in which
you can place them with perfect safety. Will you walk with me into the
ruins?”—“Willingly.”
“It’s odd enough,” remarked Marchdale, after he had shown Tom Eccles
where to hide the handkerchiefs, “that you and I should both be here
upon so similar an errand.”—“I’m very glad of it. It robs the place
of its gloom, and makes it ten times more endurable than it otherwise
would be. What do you propose to do if you see the vampyre?”
“I shall try a pistol bullet on him. You say you are armed?”—“Yes.”
“With pistols?”—“One. Here it is.”
“A huge weapon; loaded well, of course?”—“Oh, yes, I can depend upon
it; but I did not intend to use it, unless assailed.”
“’Tis well. What is that?”—“What—what?”
“Don’t you see anything there? Come farther back. Look—look. At the
corner of that wall there I am certain there is the flutter of a human
garment.”—“There is—there is.”
“Hush! Keep close. It must be the vampyre.”—“Give me my pistol. What
are you doing with it?”
“Only ramming down the charge more firmly for you. Take it. If that be
Varney the vampyre, I shall challenge him to surrender the moment he
appears; and if he does not, I will fire upon him, and do you do so
likewise.”—“Well, I—I don’t know.”
“You have scruples?”—“I certainly have.”
“Well, well—don’t you fire, then, but leave it to me. There; look—look.
Now have you any doubt? There he goes; in his cloak. It is—it
is——”—“Varney, by Heavens!” cried Tom Eccles.
“Surrender!” shouted Marchdale.
At the instant Sir Francis Varney sprang forward, and made off at a
rapid pace across the meadows.
“Fire after him—fire!” cried Marchdale, “or he will escape. My pistol
has missed fire. He will be off.”
On the impulse of the moment, and thus urged by the voice and the
gesture of his companion, Tom Eccles took aim as well as he could, and
fired after the retreating form of Sir Francis Varney. His conscience
smote him as he heard the report and saw the flash of the large pistol
amid the half sort of darkness that was still around.
The effect of the shot was then to him painfully apparent. He saw
Varney stop instantly; then make a vain attempt to stagger forward a
little, and finally fall heavily to the earth, with all the appearance
of one killed upon the spot.
“You have hit him,” said Marchdale—“you have hit him. Bravo!”—“I
have—hit him.”
“Yes, a capital shot, by Jove!”—“I am very sorry.”
“Sorry! sorry for ridding the world of such a being! What was in your
pistol?”—“A couple of slugs.”
“Well, they have made a lodgment in him, that’s quite clear. Let’s go
up and finish him at once.”—“He seems finished.”
“I beg your pardon there. When the moonbeams fall upon him he’ll get up
and walk away as if nothing was the matter.”—“Will he?” cried Tom, with
animation—“will he?”
“Certainly he will.”—“Thank God for that. Now, hark you, Mr. Marchdale:
I should not have fired if you had not at the moment urged me to do so.
Now, I shall stay and see if the effect which you talk of will ensue;
and although it may convince me that he is a vampyre, and that there
are such things, he may go off, scot free, for me.”
“Go off?”—“Yes; I don’t want to have even a vampyre’s blood upon my
hands.”
“You are exceedingly delicate.”—“Perhaps I am; it’s my way, though. I
have shot him—not you, mind; so, in a manner of speaking, he belongs
to me. Now, mark, me: I won’t have him touched any more to-night,
unless you think there’s a chance of making a prisoner of him without
violence.”
“There he lies; you can go and make a prisoner of him at once, dead as
he is; and if you take him out of the moonlight——”
“I understand; he won’t recover.”—“Certainly not.”
“But, as I want him to recover, that don’t suit me.”—“Well, I cannot
but honour your scruples, although I do not actually share in them;
but I promise you that, since such is your wish, I will take no steps
against the vampyre; but let us come up to him and see if he be really
dead, or only badly wounded.”
Tom Eccles hung back a little from this proposal; but, upon being urged
again by Marchdale, and told that he need not go closer than he chose,
he consented, and the two of them approached the prostrate form of Sir
Francis Varney, which lay upon its face in the faint moonlight, which
each moment was gathering strength and power.
“He lies upon his face,” said Marchdale. “Will you go and turn him
over?”—“Who—I? God forbid I should touch him.”
“Well—well, I will. Come on.”
They halted within a couple of yards of the body. Tom Eccles would not
go a step farther; so Marchdale advanced alone, and pretended to be,
with great repugnance, examining for the wound.
“He is quite dead,” he said; “but I cannot see the hurt.”—“I think he
turned his head as I fired.”
“Did he? Let us see.”
Marchdale lifted up the head, and disclosed such a mass of
clotted-looking blood, that Tom Eccles at once took to his heels, nor
stopped until he was nearly as far off as the ruins. Marchdale followed
him more slowly, and when he came up to him, he said,—
“The slugs have taken effect on his face.”—“I know it—I know it. Don’t
tell me.”
“He looks horrible.”—“And I am a murderer.”
“Psha! You look upon this matter too seriously. Think of who and what
he was, and then you will soon acquit yourself of being open to any
such charge.”—“I am bewildered, Mr. Marchdale, and cannot now know
whether he be a vampyre or not. If he be not, I have murdered, most
unjustifiably, a fellow-creature.”
“Well, but if he be?”—“Why, even then I do not know but that I ought to
consider myself as guilty. He is one of God’s creatures if he were ten
times a vampyre.”
“Well, you really do take a serious view of the affair.”—“Not more
serious than it deserves.”
“And what do you mean to do?”—“I shall remain here to await the result
of what you tell me will ensue, if he be a real vampire. Even now the
moonbeams are full upon him, and each moment increasing in intensity.
Think you he will recover?”
“I do indeed.”—“Then here will I wait.”
“Since that is your resolve, I will keep you company. We shall easily
find some old stone in the ruins which will serve us for a seat, and
there at leisure we can keep our eyes upon the dead body, and be able
to observe if it make the least movement.”
This plan was adopted, and they sat down just within the ruins, but in
such a place that they had a full view of the dead body, as it appeared
to be, of Sir Francis Varney, upon which the sweet moonbeams shone full
and clear.
Tom Eccles related how he was incited to come upon his expedition, but
he might have spared himself that trouble, as Marchdale had been in a
retired corner of the inn parlour before he came to his appointment
with Varney, and heard the business for the most part proposed.
Half-an-hour, certainly not more, might have elapsed; when suddenly Tom
Eccles uttered an exclamation, partly of surprise and partly of terror,—
“He moves; he moves!” he cried. “Look at the vampyre’s body.”
Marchdale affected to look with an all-absorbing interest, and
there was Sir Francis Varney, raising slowly one arm with the hand
outstretched towards the moon, as if invoking that luminary to shed
more of its beams upon him. Then the body moved slowly, like some one
writhing in pain, and yet unable to move from the spot on which it lay.
From the head to the foot, the whole frame seemed to be convulsed,
and now and then as the ghastly object seemed to be gathering more
strength, the limbs were thrown out with a rapid and a frightful
looking violence.
[Illustration: Tom Eccles and Marchdale watch the resuscitation of the
vampyre.]
It was truly to one, who might look upon it as a reality and no juggle,
a frightful sight to see, and although Marchdale, of course, tolerably
well preserved his equanimity, only now and then, for appearance sake,
affecting to be wonderfully shocked, poor Tom Eccles was in such a
state of horror and fright that he could not, if he would, have flown
from the spot, so fascinated was he by the horrible spectacle.
This was a state of things which continued for many minutes, and then
the body showed evident symptoms of so much returning animation, that
it was about to rise from his gory bed and mingle once again with the
living.
“Behold!” said Marchdale—“behold!”—“Heaven have mercy upon us!”
“It is as I said; the beams of the moon have revived the vampyre. You
perceive now that there can be no doubt.”—“Yes, yes, I see him; I see
him.”
Sir Francis Varney now, as if with a great struggle, rose to his
feet, and looked up at the bright moon for some moments with such an
air and manner that it would not have required any very great amount
of imagination to conceive that he was returning to it some sort of
thanksgiving for the good that it had done to him.
He then seemed for some moments in a state of considerable indecision
as to which way he should proceed. He turned round several times.
Then he advanced a step or two towards the house, but apparently his
resolution changed again, and casting his eyes upon the ruins, he at
once made towards them.
This was too much for the philosophy as well as for the courage of Tom
Eccles. It was all very well to look on at some distance, and observe
the wonderful and inexplicable proceedings of the vampyre; but when he
showed symptoms of making a nearer acquaintance, it was not to be borne.
“Why, he’s coming here,” said Tom.—“He seems so indeed,” remarked
Marchdale.
“Do you mean to stay?”—“I think I shall.”
“You do, do you?”—“Yes, I should much like to question him, and as we
are two to one I think we really can have nothing to fear.”
“Do you? I’m altogether of a different opinion. A man who has more
lives than a cat don’t much mind at what odds he fights. You may stay
if you like.”—“You do not mean to say that you will desert me?”
“I don’t see a bit how you call it deserting you; if we had come out
together on this adventure, I would have stayed it out with you; but as
we came separate and independent, we may as well go back so.”—“Well,
but——”
“Good morning,” cried Tom, and he at once took to his heels towards
the town, without staying to pay any attention to the remonstrances of
Marchdale, who called after him in vain.
Sir Francis Varney, probably, had Tom Eccles not gone off so rapidly,
would have yet taken another thought, and gone in another direction
than that which led him to the ruins, and Tom, if he had had his senses
fully about him, as well as all his powers of perception, would have
seen that the progress of the vampyre was very slow, while he continued
to converse with Marchdale, and that it was only when he went off at
good speed that Sir Francis Varney likewise thought it prudent to do so.
“Is he much terrified?” said Varney, as he came up to Marchdale.—“Yes,
most completely.”
“This then, will make a good story in the town.”—“It will, indeed, and
not a little enhance your reputation.”
“Well, well; it don’t much matter now; but if by terrifying people I
can purchase for myself anything like immunity for the past, I shall be
satisfied.”—“I think you may now safely reckon that you have done so.
This man who has fled with so much precipitation, had courage.”
“Unquestionably.”—“Or else he would have shrunk from coming here at
all.”
“True, but his courage and presence arose from his strong doubts as to
the existence of such beings as vampyres.”—“Yes, and now that he is
convinced, his bravery has evaporated along with his doubts; and such
a tale as he has now to tell, will be found sufficient to convert even
the most sceptical in the town.”
“I hope so.”—“And yet it cannot much avail you.”
“Not personally, but I must confess that I am not dead to all human
passions, and I feel some desire of revenge against those dastards
who by hundreds have hunted me, burnt down my mansion, and sought my
destruction.”—“That I do not wonder at.”
“I would fain leave among them a legacy of fear. Such fear as shall
haunt them and their children for years to come. I would wish that
the name of Varney, the vampire, should be a sound of terror for
generations.”—“It will be so.”
“It shall.”—“And now, then, for a consideration of what is to be done
with our prisoner. What is your resolve upon that point?”
“I have considered it while I was lying upon yon green sward waiting
for the friendly moonbeams to fall upon my face, and it seems to me
that there is no sort of resource but to——”—“Kill him?”
“No, no.”—“What then?”
“To set him free.”—“Nay, have you considered the immense hazard of
doing so? Think again; I pray you think again. I am decidedly of
opinion that he more than suspects who are his enemies; and, in that
case, you know what consequences would ensue; besides, have we not
enough already to encounter? Why should we add another young, bold,
determined spirit to the band which is already arrayed against us?”
“You talk in vain, Marchdale; I know to what it all tends; you have a
strong desire for the death of this young man.”—“No; there you wrong
me. I have no desire for his death, for its own sake; but, where great
interests are at stake, there must be sacrifices made.”
“So there must; therefore, I will make a sacrifice, and let this young
prisoner free from his dungeon.”—“If such be your determination, I know
well it is useless to combat with it. When do you purpose giving him
his freedom?”
“I will not act so heedlessly as that your principles of caution shall
blame me. I will attempt to get from him some promise that he will
not make himself an active instrument against me. Perchance, too, as
Bannerworth Hall, which he is sure to visit, wears such an air of
desertion, I may be able to persuade him that the Bannerworth family,
as well as his uncle, have left this part of the country altogether; so
that, without making any inquiry for them about the neighbourhood, he
may be induced to leave at once.”—“That would be well.”
“Good; your prudence approves of the plan, and therefore it shall be
done.”—“I am rather inclined to think,” said Marchdale, with a slight
tone of sarcasm, “that if my prudence did not approve of the plan, it
would still be done.”
“Most probably,” said Varney, calmly.—“Will you release him to-night?”
“It is morning, now, and soon the soft grey light of day will tint the
east. I do not think I will release him till sunset again now. Has he
provision to last him until then?”—“He has.”
“Well, then, two hours after sunset I will come here and release him
from his weary bondage, and now I must go to find some place in which
to hide my proscribed head. As for Bannerworth Hall, I will yet have
it in my power; I have sworn to do so, I will keep my oath.”—“The
accomplishment of our purpose, I regret to say, seems as far off as
ever.”
“Not so—not so. As I before remarked, we must disappear, for a time, so
as to lull suspicion. There will then arise a period when Bannerworth
Hall will neither be watched, as it is now, nor will it be inhabited,—a
period before the Bannerworth family has made up its mind to go back to
it, and when long watching without a result has become too tiresome to
be continued at all; then we can at once pursue our object.”—“Be it so.”
“And now, Marchdale, I want more money.”—“More money!”
“Yes; you know well that I have had large demands of late.”—“But I
certainly had an impression that you were possessed, by the death of
some one, with very ample means.”
“Yes, but there is a means by which all is taken from me. I have no
real resources but what are rapidly used up, so I must come upon you
again.”—“I have already completely crippled myself as regards money
matters in this enterprise, and I do certainly hope that the fruits
will not be far distant. If they be much longer delayed, I shall
really not know what to do. However, come to the lodge where you have
been staying, and then I will give you, to the extent of my ability,
whatever sum you think your present exigencies require.”
“Come on, then, at once. I would certainly, of course, rather leave
this place now, before daybreak. Come on, I say, come on.”
Sir Francis Varney and Marchdale walked for some time in silence across
the meadows. It was evident that there was not between these associates
the very best of feelings. Marchdale was always smarting under an
assumption of authority over him, on the part of Sir Francis Varney,
while the latter scarcely cared to conceal any portion of the contempt
with which he regarded his hypocritical companion.
Some very strong bond of union, indeed, must surely bind these two
strange persons together! It must be something of a more than common
nature which induces Marchdale not only to obey the behests of his
mysterious companion, but to supply him so readily with money as we
perceive he promises to do.
And, as regards Varney, the vampyre, he, too, must have some great
object in view to induce him to run such a world of risk, and take so
much trouble as he was doing with the Bannerworth family.
What his object is, and what is the object of Marchdale, will, now that
we have progressed so far in our story, soon appear, and then much that
is perfectly inexplicable, will become clear and distinct, and we shall
find that some strong human motives are at the bottom of it all.
CHAPTER LXV.
VARNEY’S VISIT TO THE DUNGEON OF THE LONELY PRISONER IN THE RUINS.
Evident it was that Marchdale was not near so scrupulous as Sir Francis
Varney, in what he chose to do. He would, without hesitation, have
sacrificed the life of that prisoner in the lonely dungeon, whom it
would be an insult to the understanding of our readers, not to presume
that they had, long ere this, established in their minds to be Charles
Holland.
His own safety seemed to be the paramount consideration with Marchdale,
and it was evident that he cared for nothing in comparison with that
object.
It says much, however, for Sir Francis Varney, that he did not give
in to such a blood-thirsty feeling, but rather chose to set the
prisoner free, and run all the chances of the danger to which he might
expose himself by such a course of conduct, than to insure safety,
comparatively, by his destruction.
Sir Francis Varney is evidently a character of strangely mixed
feelings. It is quite evident that he has some great object in view,
which he wishes to accomplish almost at any risk; but it is equally
evident, at the same time, that he wishes to do so with the least
possible injury to others, or else he would never have behaved as he
had done in his interview with the beautiful and persecuted Flora
Bannerworth, or now suggested the idea of setting Charles Holland free
from the dreary dungeon in which he had been so long confined.
We are always anxious and willing to give every one credit for the
good that is in them; and, hence, we are pleased to find that Sir
Francis Varney, despite his singular, and apparently preternatural
capabilities, has something sufficiently human about his mind and
feelings, to induce him to do as little injury as possible to others in
the pursuit of his own objects.
Of the two, vampyre as he is, we prefer him much to the despicable and
hypocritical, Marchdale, who, under the pretence of being the friend of
the Bannerworth family, would freely have inflicted upon them the most
deadly injuries.
It was quite clear that he was most dreadfully disappointed that Sir
Francis Varney, would not permit him to take the life of Charles
Holland, and it was with a gloomy and dissatisfied air that he left the
ruins to proceed towards the town, after what we may almost term the
altercation he had had with Varney the vampyre upon that subject.
It must not be supposed that Sir Francis Varney, however, was blind to
the danger which must inevitably accrue from permitting Charles Holland
once more to obtain his liberty.
What the latter would be able to state would be more than sufficient to
convince the Bannerworths, and all interested in their fortunes, that
something was going on of a character, which, however, supernatural it
might seem to be, still seemed to have some human and ordinary objects
for its ends.
Sir Francis Varney thought over all this before he proceeded, according
to his promise, to the dungeon of the prisoner; but it would seem as
if there was considerable difficulty, even to an individual of his
long practice in all kinds of chicanery and deceit, in arriving at any
satisfactory conclusion, as to a means of making Charles Holland’s
release a matter of less danger to himself, than it would be likely to
be, if, unfettered by obligation, he was at once set free.
At the solemn hour of midnight, while all was still, that is, to say,
on the night succeeding the one, on which he had had the interview
with Marchdale, we have recorded, Sir Francis Varney alone sought the
silent ruins. He was attired, as usual, in his huge cloak, and, indeed,
the chilly air of the evening warranted such protection against its
numerous discomforts.
Had any one seen him, however, upon that evening, they would have
observed an air of great doubt, and irresolution upon his brow, as if
he were struggling with some impulses which he found it extremely
difficult to restrain.
“I know well,” he muttered, as he walked among the shadow of the ruins,
“that Marchdale’s reasoning is coldly and horribly correct, when he
says that there is danger in setting this youth free; but, I am about
to leave this place, and not to show myself for some time, and I cannot
reconcile myself to inflicting upon him the horror of a death by
starvation, which must ensue.”
It was a night of more than usual dullness, and, as Sir Francis Varney
removed the massy stone, which hid the narrow and tortuous entrance to
the dungeons, a chilly feeling crept over him, and he could not help
supposing, that even then Marchdale might have played him false, and
neglected to supply the prisoner food, according to his promise.
Hastily he descended to the dungeons, and with a step, which had in it
far less of caution, than had usually characterised his proceedings, he
proceeded onwards until he reached that particular dungeon, in which
our young friend, to whom we wished so well, had been so long confined
from the beautiful and cheering light of day, and from all that his
heart’s best affections most cling to.
“Speak,” said Sir Francis Varney, as he entered the dungeon. “If the
occupant of this dreary place live, let him answer one who is as much
his friend as he has been his enemy.”
“I have no friend,” said Charles Holland, faintly; “unless it be one
who would come and restore me to liberty.”
“And how know you that I am not he?”
“Your voice sounds like that of one of my persecutors. Why do you not
place the climax to your injuries by at once taking away life. I should
be better pleased that you would do so, than that I should wear out the
useless struggle of existence in so dreary and wretched an abode as
this.”
“Young man,” said Sir Francis Varney, “I have come to you on a greater
errand of mercy than, probably, you will ever give me credit for. There
is one who would too readily have granted your present request, and
who would at once have taken that life of which you profess to be so
wearied; but which may yet present to you some of its sunniest and most
beautiful aspects.”
“Your tones are friendly,” said Charles; “but yet I dread some new
deception. That you are one of those who consigned me by stratagem, and
by brute force, to this place of durance, I am perfectly well assured,
and, therefore, any good that may be promised by you, presents itself
to me in a very doubtful character.”
“I cannot be surprised,” said Sir Francis Varney, “at such sentiments
arising from your lips; but, nevertheless, I am inclined to save you.
You have been detained here because it was supposed by being so, a
particular object would be best obtained by your absence. That object,
however has failed, notwithstanding, and I do not feel further inclined
to protract your sufferings. Have you any guess as to the parties
who have thus confined you?”—“I am unaccustomed to dissemble, and,
therefore I will say at once that I have a guess.”
“In which way does it tend?”—
“Against Sir Francis Varney, called the vampyre.”
“Does it not strike you that this may be a dangerous candour?”—“It may,
or it may not be; I cannot help it. I know I am at the mercy of my
foes, and I do not believe that anything I can say or do will make my
situation worse or better.”
“You are much mistaken there. In other hands than mine, it might
make it much worse; but it happens to be one of my weaknesses,
that I am charged with candour, and that I admire boldness of
disposition.”—“Indeed! and yet can behave in the manner you have done
towards me.”
“Yes. There are more things in heaven and on earth than are dreamt of
in your philosophy. I am the more encouraged to set you free, because,
if I procure from you a promise, which I intend to attempt, I am
inclined to believe that you will keep it.”—“I shall assuredly keep
whatever promise I may make. Propound your conditions, and if they be
such as honour and honesty will permit me to accede to, I will do so
willingly and at once. Heaven knows I am weary enough of this miserable
imprisonment.”
“Will you promise me then, if I set you free, not to mention your
suspicions that it is to Sir Francis Varney you owe this ill turn, and
not to attempt any act of vengeance against him as a retaliation for
it.”—“I cannot promise so much as that. Freedom, indeed, would be a
poor boon, if I were not permitted freely to converse of some of the
circumstances connected with my captivity.”
“You object?”—“I do to the former of your propositions, but not to the
latter. I will promise not to go at all out of my way to execute any
vengeance upon you; but I will not promise that I will not communicate
the circumstances of my forced absence from them, to those friends
whose opinion I so much value, and to return to whom is almost as dear
to me as liberty itself.”
Sir Francis Varney was silent for a few moments, and then he said, in
a tone of deep solemnity,—
“There are ninety-nine persons out of a hundred who would take your
life for the independence of your tongue; but I am as the hundredth
one, who looks with a benevolent eye at your proceedings. Will you
promise me, if I remove the fetters which now bind your limbs, that
you will make no personal attack upon me; for I am weary of personal
contention, and I have no disposition to endure it. Will you make me
this promise?”—“I will.”
Without another word, but trusting implicitly to the promise which had
been given to him, Sir Francis Varney produced a small key from his
pocket, and unlocked with it a padlock which confined the chains about
the prisoner.
With ease, Charles Holland was then enabled to shake them off, and
then, for the first time, for some weeks, he rose to his feet, and felt
all the exquisite relief of being comparatively free from bondage.
“This is delightful, indeed,” he said.
“It is,” said Sir Francis Varney—“it is but a foretaste of the
happiness you will enjoy when you are entirely free. You see that I
have trusted you.”
“You have trusted me as you might trust me, and you perceive that I
have kept my word.”
“You have; and since you decline to make me the promise which I would
fain have from you, to the effect that you would not mention me as one
of the authors of your calamity, I must trust to your honour not to
attempt revenge for what you have suffered.”
“That I will promise. There can be but little difficulty to any
generous mind in giving up such a feeling. In consequence of your
sparing me what you might still further have inflicted, I will let the
past rest, and as if it had never happened really to me; and speak of
it to others, but as a circumstance which I wish not to revert to, but
prefer should be buried in oblivion.”
“It is well; and now I have a request to make of you, which, perhaps,
you will consider the hardest of all.”
“Name it. I feel myself bound to a considerable extent to comply with
whatever you may demand of me, that is not contrary to honourable
principle.”
“Then it is this, that, comparatively free as you are, and in a
condition, as you are, to assert your own freedom, you will not do so
hastily, or for a considerable period; in fact, I wish and expect that
you should wait yet awhile, until it shall suit me to say that it is my
pleasure that you shall be free.”
“That is, indeed, a hard condition to man who feels, as you yourself
remark, that he can assert his freedom. It is one which I have still a
hope you will not persevere in.
“Nay, young man, I think that I have treated you with generosity, to
make you feel that I am not the worst of foes you could have had. All
I require of you is, that you should wait here for about an hour. It
is now nearly one o’clock; will you wait until you hear it strike two
before you actually make a movement to leave this place?”
Charles Holland hesitated for some moments, and then he said,—
“Do not fancy that I am not one who appreciates the singular trust you
have reposed in me; and, however repugnant to me it may be to remain
here, a voluntary prisoner, I am inclined to do so, if it be but to
convince you that the trust you have reposed in me is not in vain, and
that I can behave with equal generosity to you as you can to me.”
“Be it so,” said Sir Francis Varney; “I shall leave you with a full
reliance that you will keep your word; and now, farewell. When you
think of me, fancy me rather one unfortunate than criminal, and tell
yourself that even Varney the vampyre had some traits in his character,
which, although they might not raise your esteem, at all events did not
loudly call for your reprobation.”
“I shall do so. Oh! Flora, Flora, I shall look upon you once again,
after believing and thinking that I had bidden you a long and last
adieu. My own beautiful Flora, it is joy indeed to think that I shall
look upon that face again, which, to my perception, is full of all the
majesty of loveliness.”
Sir Francis Varney looked coldly on while Charles uttered this
enthusiastic speech.
“Remember,” he said, “till two o’clock;” and he walked towards the door
of the dungeon. “You will have no difficulty in finding your way out
from this place. Doubtless you already perceive the entrance by which I
gained admission.”
“Had I been free,” said Charles, “and had the use of my limbs, I
should, long ere this, have worked my way to life and liberty.”
“’Tis well. Goodnight.”
Varney walked from the place, and just closed the door behind him. With
a slow and stately step he left the ruins, and Charles Holland found
himself once more alone, but in a much more enviable condition than for
many weeks he could have called his.
CHAPTER LXVI.
FLORA BANNERWORTH’S APPARENT INCONSISTENCY.—THE ADMIRAL’S
CIRCUMSTANCES AND ADVICE.—MR. CHILLINGWORTH’S MYSTERIOUS ABSENCE.
For a brief space let us return to Flora Bannerworth, who had suffered
so much on account of her affections, as well as on account of the
mysterious attack that had been made upon her by the reputed vampyre.
After leaving Bannerworth Hall for a short time, she seemed to recover
her spirits; but this was a state of things which did not last, and
only showed how fallacious it was to expect that, after the grievous
things that had happened, she would rapidly recover her equanimity.
It is said, by learned physiologists, that two bodily pains cannot
endure at the same space of time in the system; and, whether it be
so or not, is a question concerning which it would be foreign to
the nature of our work, to enter into anything like an elaborate
disquisition.
Certainly, however, so far as Flora Bannerworth was concerned, she
seemed inclined to show that, mentally, the observation was a true one,
for that, now she became released from a continued dread of the visits
of the vampyre, her mind would, with more painful interest than ever,
recur to the melancholy condition, probably, of Charles Holland, if he
were alive, and to soul-harrowing reflections concerning him, if he
were dead.
She could not, and she did not, believe, for one moment, that his
desertion of her had been of a voluntary character. She knew, or
fancied she knew, him by far too well for that; and she more than
once expressed her opinion, to the effect that she was perfectly
convinced his disappearance was a part and parcel of all that train
of circumstances which had so recently occurred, and produced such a
world of unhappiness to her, as well as to the whole of the Bannerworth
family.
“If he had never loved me,” she said to her brother Henry, “he would
have been alive and well; but he has fallen a victim to the truth of a
passion, and to the constancy of an affection which, to my dying day, I
will believe in.”
Now that Mr. Marchdale had left the place there was no one to dispute
this proposition with Flora, for all, as well as she, were fully
inclined to think well of Charles Holland.
It was on the very morning which preceded that evening when Sir Francis
Varney called upon Charles Holland in the manner we have related,
with the gratifying news that, upon certain conditions, he might be
released, that Flora Bannerworth, when the admiral came to see them,
spoke to him of Charles Holland, saying,—
“Now, sir, that I am away from Bannerworth Hall, I do not, and cannot
feel satisfied; for the thought that Charles may eventually come back,
and seek us there, still haunts me. Fancy him, sir, doing so, and
seeing the place completely deserted.”
“Well, there’s something in that,” said the admiral; “but, however,
he’s hardly such a goose, if it were so to happen, to give up the
chase—he’d find us out somehow.”
“You think he would, sir? or, do you not think that despair would seize
upon him, and that, fancying we had all left the spot for ever, he
might likewise do so; so that we should lose him more effectually than
we have done at present?”
“No; hardly,” said the admiral; “he couldn’t be such a goose as that.
Why, when I was of his age, if I had secured the affections of a young
girl like you, I’d have gone over all the world, but I’d have found out
where she was; and what I mean to say is, if he’s half such a goose as
you think him, he deserves to lose you.”
“Did you not tell me something, sir, of Mr. Chillingworth talking of
taking possession of the Hall for a brief space of time?”
“Why, yes, I did; and I expect he is there now; in fact, I’m sure he’s
there, for he said he would be.”
“No, he ain’t,” said Jack Pringle, at that moment entering the room;
“you’re wrong again, as you always are, somehow or other.”
“What, you vagabond, are you here, you mutinous rascal?”—“Ay, ay,
sir; go on; don’t mind me. I wonder what you’d do, sir, if you hadn’t
somebody like me to go on talking about.”
“Why, you infernal rascal, I wonder what you’d do if you had not an
indulgent commander, who puts up even with real mutiny, and says
nothing about it. But where have you been? Did you go as I directed
you, and take some provisions to Bannerworth Hall?”—“Yes, I did; but I
brought them back again; there’s nobody there, and don’t seem likely to
be, except a dead body.”
“A dead body! Whose body can that be!”—“Tom somebody; for I’m d——d if
it ain’t a great he cat.”
“You scoundrel, how dare you alarm me in such a way? But do you mean to
tell me that you did not see Dr. Chillingworth at the Hall?”—“How could
I see him, if he wasn’t there?”
“But he was there; he said he would be there.”—“Then he’s gone again,
for there’s nobody there that I know of in the shape of a doctor. I
went through every part of the ship—I mean the house—and the deuce a
soul could I find; so as it was rather lonely and uncomfortable, I
came away again. ‘Who knows,’ thought I, ‘but some blessed vampyre or
another may come across me.’”
“This won’t do,” said the old admiral, buttoning up his coat to the
chin; “Bannerworth Hall must not be deserted in this way. It is
quite clear that Sir Francis Varney and his associates have some
particular object in view in getting possession of the place. Here, you
Jack.”—“Ay, ay, sir.”
“Just go back again, and stay at the Hall till somebody comes to you.
Even such a stupid hound as you will be something to scare away
unwelcome visitors. Go back to the Hall, I say. What are you staring
at?”—“Back to Bannerworth Hall!” said Jack. “What! just where I’ve come
from; all that way off, and nothing to eat, and, what’s worse, nothing
to drink. I’ll see you d—d first.”
The admiral caught up a table-fork, and made a rush at Jack; but Henry
Bannerworth interfered.
“No, no,” he said, “admiral; no, no—not that. You must recollect that
you yourself have given this, no doubt, faithful fellow of your’s
liberty to do and say a great many things which don’t look like good
service; but I have no doubt, from what I have seen of his disposition,
that he would risk his life rather than that you should come to any
harm.”
“Ay, ay,” said Jack; “he quite forgets when the bullets were scuttling
our nobs off Cape Ushant, when that big Frenchman had hold of him by
the _skirf_ of his neck, and began pummelling his head, and the lee
scuppers were running with blood, and a bit of Joe Wiggins’s brains
had come slap in my eye, while some of Jack Marling’s guts was hanging
round my neck like a nosegay, all in consequence of grape-shot—then he
didn’t say as I was a swab, when I came up, and bored a hole in the
Frenchman’s back with a pike. Ay, it’s all very well now, when there’s
peace, and no danger, to call Jack Pringle a lubberly rascal, and
mutinous. I’m blessed if it ain’t enough to make an old pair of shoes
faint away.”
“Why, you infernal scoundrel,” said the admiral, “nothing of the sort
ever happened, and you know it. Jack, you’re no seaman.”—“Werry good,”
said Jack; “then, if I ain’t no seaman, you are what shore-going people
calls a jolly fat old humbug.”
“Jack, hold your tongue,” said Henry Bannerworth; “you carry these
things too far. You know very well that your master esteems you, and
you should not presume too much upon that fact.”—“My master!” said
Jack; “don’t call him my master. I never had a master, and don’t
intend. He’s my admiral, if you like; but an English sailor don’t like
a master.”
“I tell you what it is, Jack,” said the admiral; “you’ve got your good
qualities, I admit.”—“Ay, ay, sir—that’s enough; you may as well leave
off well while you can.”
“But I’ll just tell you what you resemble more than anything
else.”—“Chew me up! what may that be, sir?”
“A French marine.”—“A what! A French marine! Good-bye. I wouldn’t say
another word to you, if you was to pay me a dollar a piece. Of all the
blessed insults rolled into one, this here’s the worstest. You might
have called me a marine, or you might have called me a Frenchman, but
to make out that I’m both a marine and a Frenchman, d—me, if it isn’t
enough to make human nature stand on an end! Now, I’ve done with you.”
“And a good job, too,” said the admiral. “I wish I’d thought of it
before. You’re worse than a third day’s ague, or a hot and a cold fever
in the tropics.”—“Very good,” said Jack; “I only hope Providence will
have mercy upon you, and keep an eye upon you when I’m gone, otherwise,
I wonder what will become of you? It wasn’t so when young Belinda, who
you took off the island of Antiggy, in the Ingies, jumped overboard,
and I went arter her in a heavy swell. Howsumdever, never mind, you
shook hands with me then; and while a bushel of the briny was weeping
out of the corner of each of your blinkers, you says, says you,—”
“Hold!” cried the admiral, “hold! I know what I said, Jack. It’s cut
a fathom deep in my memory. Give us your fist, Jack, and—and—”—“Hold
yourself,” said Jack; “I know what you’re going to say, and I won’t
hear you say it—so there’s an end of it. Lor bless you! I knows you. I
ain’t a going to leave you. Don’t be afraid; I only works you up, and
works you down again, just to see if there’s any of that old spirit in
you when we was aboard the Victory. Don’t you recollect, admiral?”
“Yes—yes; enough, Jack.”—“Why, let me see—that was a matter of forty
years ago, nearly, when I was a youngster.”
“There—there, Jack—that’ll do. You bring the events of other years
fresh upon my memory. Peace—peace. I have not forgotten; but still,
to hear what you know of them, if recited, would give the old man a
pang.”—“A pang,” said Jack; “I suppose that’s some dictionary word for
a punch in the eye. That would be mutiny with a vengeance; so I’m off.”
“Go, go.”—“I’m a going; and just to please you, I’ll go to the Hall, so
you sha’n’t say that you told me to do anything that I didn’t.”
Away went Jack, whistling an air, that might have been popular when he
and the admiral were young, and Henry Bannerworth could not but remark
that an appearance of great sadness came over the old man, when Jack
was gone.
“I fear, sir,” he said, “that heedless sailor has touched upon some
episode in your existence, the wounds of which are still fresh enough
to give you pain.”—“It is so,” said the old admiral; “just look at me,
now. Do I look like the hero of a romantic love story?”
“Not exactly, I admit.”—“Well, notwithstanding that, Jack Pringle has
touched a chord that vibrates in my heart yet,” replied the admiral.
“Have you any objection to tell me of it?”—“None, whatever; and
perhaps, by the time I have done, the doctor may have found his way
back again, or Jack may bring us some news of him. So here goes for a
short, but a true yarn.”
CHAPTER LXVII.
THE ADMIRAL’S STORY OF THE BEAUTIFUL BELINDA.
Just at this moment Flora Bannerworth stole into the room from whence
she had departed a short time since; but when she saw that old Admiral
Bell was looking so exceedingly serious, and apparently about to
address Henry upon some very important subject, she would have retired,
but he turned towards her, and said,—
“My story, my dear, I’ve no objection to your hearing, and, like all
women folks, a love story never comes amiss to you; so you may as well
stay and hear it.”—“A love story,” said Flora; “you tell a love story,
sir?”
“Yes, my dear, and not only tell it, but be the hero of it, likewise;
ain’t you astonished?”—“I am, indeed.”
“Well, you’ll be more astonished then before I’ve done; so just listen.
As Jack Pringle says, it was the matter of about somewhere forty
years ago, that I was in command of the Victory frigate, which was
placed upon the West Indian station, during a war then raging, for
the protection of our ports and harbours in that vicinity. We’d not a
strong force in that quarter, therefore, I had to cut about from place
to place, and do the best I could. After a time, though, I rather think
that we frightened off the enemy, during which time I chiefly anchored
off the island of Antigua, and was hospitably received at the house
of a planter, of the name of Marchant, who, in fact, made his house
my home, and introduced me to all the _elite_ of the society of the
island. Ah! Miss Flora, you’ve no idea, to look at me now, what I was
then; I held a captain’s commission, and was nearly the youngest man
in the service, with such a rank. I was as slender, ay, as a dancing
master. These withered and bleached locks were black as the raven’s
plume. Ay, ay, but no matter; the planter had a daughter.”
“And you loved her?” said Flora—“Loved her,” said the old man, and the
flush of youthful animation came to his countenance; “loved her, do you
say! I adored her; I worshipped her; she was to me—but what a d—d old
fool, I am; we’ll skip that if you please.”
“Nay, nay,” said Flora; “that is what I want to hear.”—“I haven’t the
least doubt of that, in the world; but that’s just what you won’t hear;
none of your nonsense, Miss Flora; the old man may be a fool, but he
isn’t quite an idiot.”
“He’s neither,” said Flora; “true feelings can never disgrace any
one.”—“Perhaps not; but, however, to make a long story short, somehow
or other, one day, Belinda was sitting alone, and I rudely pounced upon
her; I rather think then I must have said something that I oughtn’t to
have said, for it took her so aback; I was forced, somehow or other, to
hold her up, and then I—I—yes; I’m sure I kissed her; and so, I told
her I loved her; and then, what do you think she said?”
“Why,” said Flora, “that she reciprocated the passion.”—“D—n my rags,”
said Jack, who at the moment came into the room, “I suppose that’s the
name of some shell or other.”
“You here, you villain!” said the admiral; “I thought you were
gone.”—“So I was,” said Jack, “but I came back for my hat, you see.”
Away he went again, and the admiral resumed his story.
“Well, Miss Flora,” he said, “you haven’t made a good guess, as she
didn’t say anything at all, she only clung to me like some wild bird to
its mother’s breast, and cried as if her heart would break.”—“Indeed!”
“Yes; I didn’t know the cause of her emotion, but at last I got it out
of her.”—“What was it?”
“Oh, a mere trifle; she was already married to somebody else, that’s
all; some d—d fellow, who had gone trading about the islands, a fellow
she didn’t care a straw about, that was old enough to be her father.”
“And you left her?”—“No, I didn’t. Guess again. I was a mad-headed
youngster. I only felt—I didn’t think. I persuaded her to come away
with me. I took her aboard my ship, and set sail with her. A few weeks
flew like hours; but one day we were hailed by a vessel, and when we
neared her, she manned a boat and brought a letter on board, addressed
to Belinda. It was from her father, written in his last moments. It
began with a curse and ended with a blessing. There was a postscript in
another hand, to say the old man died of grief. She read it by my side
on the quarter-deck. It dropped from her grasp, and she plunged into
the sea. Jack Pringle went after her; but I never saw her again.”
“Gracious Heavens! what a tragedy!”—“Yes, tolerable,” said the old man.
He arose and took his hat and placed it on his head. He gave the crown
of it a blow that sent it nearly over his eyes. He thrust his hands
deep into his breeches pockets, clenched his teeth, and muttered
something inaudible as he strode from the apartment.
“Who would have thought, Henry,” said Flora, “that such a man as
Admiral Bell had been the hero of such an adventure?”—“Ay, who indeed;
but it shows that we never can judge from appearances, Flora; and that
those who seem to us the most heart-whole may have experienced the
wildest vicissitudes of passion.”
“And we must remember, likewise, that this was forty years ago, Henry,
which makes a material difference in the state of the case as regards
Admiral Bell.”
“It does indeed—more than half a lifetime; and yet how evident it was
that his old feelings clung to him. I can well imagine the many hours
of bitter regret which the memory of this his lost love must have given
him.”
“True—true. I can feel something for him; for have I not lost one who
loved me—a worse loss, too, than that which Admiral Bell relates; for
am I not a prey to all the horrors of uncertainty? Whereas, he knew the
worst, and that, at all events, death had claimed its victim, leaving
nothing to conjecture in the shape of suffering, so that the mind had
nothing to do but to recover slowly, but surely, as it would from the
shock which it had received.”
“That is worse than you, Flora; but rather would I have you cherish
hope of soon beholding Charles Holland, probably alive and well, than
fancy any great disaster has come over him.”
“I will endeavour to do so,” replied Flora.
“I long to hear what has become of Dr. Chillingworth. His disappearance
is most singular; for I fully suspected that he had some particular
object in view in getting possession for a short time of Bannerworth
Hall; but now, from Jack Pringle’s account, he appears not to be in it,
and, in fact, to have disappeared completely from the sight of all who
knew him.”
“Yes,” said Flora; “but he may have done that, brother, still in
furtherance of his object.”
“It may be so, and I will hope that it is so. Keep yourself close,
sister, and see no one, while I proceed to his house to inquire if they
have heard anything of him. I will return soon, be assured; and, in the
meantime, should you see my brother, tell him I shall be at home in an
hour or so, and not to leave the cottage; for it is more than likely
that the admiral has gone to Bannerworth Hall, so that you may not see
anything of him for some time.”
CHAPTER LXVIII.
MARCHDALE’S ATTEMPTED VILLANY, AND ITS RESULT.
Varney the vampyre left the dungeon of Charles Holland amid the grey
ruins, with a perfect confidence the young man would keep his word, and
not attempt to escape from that place until the time had elapsed which
he had dictated to him.
And well might he have that confidence, for having once given his
word that he would remain until he heard the clock strike two from
a neighbouring church, Charles Holland never dreamt for a moment of
breaking it.
To be sure it was a weary time to wait when liberty appeared before
him; but he was the soul of honour, and the least likely man in all the
world to infringe in the slightest upon the condition which he had, of
his own free will, acceded to.
Sir Francis Varney walked rapidly until he came nearly to the
outskirts of the town, and then he slackened his pace, proceeding more
cautiously, and looking carefully about him, as if he feared to meet
any one who might recognise him.
He had not proceeded far in this manner, when he became conscious of
the cautious figure of a man gliding along in the opposite direction to
that which he was taking.
A suspicion struck him, from the general appearance, that it was
Marchdale, and if so, he wondered to see him abroad at such a time.
Still he would not be quite certain; but he hurried forward, so as to
meet the advancing figure, and then his suspicions were confirmed; and
Marchdale, with some confusion in his looks and manners, accosted him.
“Ah, Sir Francis Varney,” he said, “you are out late.”—“Why, you know
I should be out late,” said Varney, “and you likewise know the errand
upon which I was to be out.”
“Oh, I recollect; you were to release your prisoner.”—“Yes, I was.”
“And have you done so?”—“Oh, no.”
“Oh, indeed. I—I am glad you have taken better thoughts of it. Good
night—good night; we shall meet to-morrow.”—“Adieu,” said Sir Francis
Varney; and he watched the retreating figure of Marchdale, and then he
added, in a low tone to himself,—
“I know his object well. His craven spirit shrinks at the notion, a
probable enough one, I will admit, that Charles Holland has recognised
him, and that, if once free, he would denounce him to the Bannerworths,
holding him up to scorn in his true colours, and bringing down upon
his head, perhaps, something more than detestation and contempt. The
villain! he is going now to take the life of the man whom he considers
chained to the ground. Well, well, they must fight it out together.
Charles Holland is sufficiently free to take his own part, although
Marchdale little thinks that such is the case.”
Marchdale walked on for some little distance, and then he turned and
looked after Sir Francis Varney.
“Indeed!” he said; “so you have not released him to-night, but I know
well will do so soon. I do not, for my part, admire this romantic
generosity which sets a fox free at the moment that he’s the most
dangerous. It’s all very well to be generous, but it is better to be
just first, and that I consider means looking after one’s self first. I
have a poniard here which will soon put an end to the troubles of the
prisoner in his dungeon—its edge is keen and sharp, and will readily
find a way to his heart.”
He walked on quite exultingly and carelessly now, for he had got into
the open country, and it was extremely unlikely that he would meet
anybody on his road to the ruins.
It did not take many minutes, sharp walking now to bring him close to
the spot which he intended should become such a scene of treacherous
slaughter, and just then he heard from afar off something like the
muttering of thunder, as if Heaven itself was proclaiming its vengeance
against the man who had come out to slay one of its best and noblest
creatures.
“What is that?” said Marchdale, shrinking back a moment; “what is
that—an approaching storm? It must be so, for, now I recollect me, the
sun set behind a bank of clouds of a fiery redness, and as the evening
drew in there was every appearance in the heavens of some ensuing
strife of the elements.”
He listened for a few moments, and fixed his eyes intently in the
direction of the horizon from where the muttering sounds had proceeded.
He had not long to wait before he saw a bright flash of blue lightning,
which for one instant illumined the sky; then by the time he could have
counted twelve there came the thunder which the flash preceded, and
he felt terribly anxious to complete his enterprize, so that he might
get back to the town and be safely housed before the storm, which was
evidently approaching, should burst upon him.
“It is sweeping on apace,” he said; “why did I not come earlier?”
Even as he spoke he plunged among the recesses of the ruins, and
searching about for the old stone which covered the entrance to the
dungeon, he was surprised to find it rolled from its place, and the
aperture open.
“What is the meaning of this?” he said; “how negligent of Sir Francis
Varney; or perhaps, after all, he was only jesting with me, and let the
prisoner go. If that should be the case, I am foiled indeed; but surely
he could not be so full of indiscretion.”
Again came a dazzling flash of lightning, which now, surrounded by the
ruins as he was, made him shrink back and cover his eyes for a moment;
and then followed a peal of thunder with not half the duration of time
between it and the flash which had characterized the previous electric
phenomenon.
“The storm approaches fast,” said Marchdale; “I must get my work done
quickly, if indeed my victim be here, which I begin seriously to doubt.”
He descended the intricate winding passage to the vault below, which
served the purpose of a dungeon, and when he got very nearly into the
depth of its recesses, he called aloud, saying,—
“Ho! what ho! is there any one here?”—“Yes,” said Charles Holland, who
fancied it might be his former visitor returned. “Have you come to
repent of your purpose?”
“Ah!” said Marchdale to himself, “Sir Francis, after all, has told me
the truth—the prisoner is still here.”
The light from without was not near sufficient to send the least ray
into the depths of that dungeon; so that Marchdale, when he entered the
place, could see nothing but an absolute blackness.
It was not so, however, with Charles Holland, whose eyes had been now
so long accustomed to the place that he could see in it as if a dim
twilight irradiated it, and he at once, in his visitor, saw his worst
foe, and not the man who had comparatively set him free.
He saw, too, that the hand of his visitor grasped a weapon, which
Marchdale thought that, favoured by the darkness, he might carry openly
in perfect security.
“Where are you?” said Marchdale; “I cannot see you.”—“Here!” said
Charles, “you may feel my grip;” and he sprung upon him in an instant.
The attack was so sudden and so utterly unexpected, that Marchdale was
thrown backwards, and the dagger wrested from his grasp, during the
first impulse which Charles Holland had thrown into his attack.
Moreover, his head struck with such violence against the earthern
floor, that it produced a temporary confusion of his faculties, so
that, had Charles Holland been so inclined, he might, with Marchdale’s
own weapon, have easily taken his life.
The young man did, on the impulse of the moment, raise it in his hand,
but, on the impulse of another thought, he cast it from him, exclaiming—
“No, no! not that; I should be as bad as he, or nearly so. This villain
has come to murder me, but yet I will not take his life for the deed.
What shall I do with him? Ha! a lucky thought—chains!”
He dragged Marchdale to the identical spot of earth on which he had
lain so long; and, as Sir Francis Varney had left the key of the
padlock which bound the chains together in it, he, in a few moments,
had succeeded in placing the villain Marchdale in the same durance from
which he had himself shortly since escaped.
“Remain there,” he said, “until some one comes to rescue you. I will
not let you starve to death, but I will give you a long fast; and, when
I come again, it shall be along with some of the Bannerworth family, to
show them what a viper they have fostered in their hearts.”
Marchdale was just sufficiently conscious now to feel all the realities
of his situation. In vain he attempted to rise from his prostrate
position. The chains did their duty, keeping down a villain with the
same means that they had held in ignominious confinement a true man.
He was in a perfect agony, inasmuch as he considered that he would be
allowed to remain there to starve to death, thus achieving for himself
a more horrible death than any he had ever thought of inflicting.
“Villain!” exclaimed Charles Holland, “you shall there remain; and, let
you have what mental sufferings you may, you richly deserve them.”
He heeded not the cries of Marchdale—he heeded not his imprecations
any more than he did his prayers; and the arch hypocrite used both in
abundance. Charles was but too happy once more to look upon the open
sky, although it was then in darkness, to heed anything that Marchdale,
in the agony to which he was now reduced, might feel inclined to say;
and, after glancing around him for some few moments, when he was free
of the ruins, and inhaling with exquisite delight the free air of the
surrounding meadows, he saw, by the twinkling of the lights, in which
direction the town lay, and knowing that by taking a line in that path,
and then after a time diverging a little to the right, he should come
to Bannerworth Hall, he walked on, never in his whole life probably
feeling such an enjoyment of the mere fact of existence as at such a
moment as that of exquisite liberty.
Our readers may with us imagine what it is to taste the free, fresh
air of heaven, after being long pent up, as he, Charles Holland, had
been, in a damp, noisome dungeon, teeming with unwholesome exhalations.
They may well suppose with what an amount of rapture he now found
himself unrestrained in his movements by those galling fetters which
had hung for so long a period upon his youthful limbs, and which, not
unfrequently in the despair of his heart, he had thought he should
surely die in.
And last, although not least in his dear esteem, did the rapturous
thought of once more looking in the sweet face of her he loved come
cross him with a gush of delight.
“Yes!” he exclaimed, as he quickened his pace; “yes! I shall be able
to tell Flora Bannerworth how well and how truly I love her. I shall
be able to tell her that, in my weary and hideous imprisonment, the
thought alone of her has supported me.”
As he neared the Hall, he quickened his pace to such an extent,
that soon he was forced to pause altogether, as the exertion he had
undertaken pretty plainly told him that the imprisonment, scanty diet,
and want of exercise, which had been his portion for some time past,
had most materially decreased his strength.
His limbs trembled, and a profuse perspiration bedewed his brow,
although the night was rather cold than otherwise.
“I am very weak,” he said; “and much I wonder now that I succeeded in
overcoming that villain Marchdale; who, if I had not done so, would
most assuredly have murdered me.”
And it was a wonder; for Marchdale was not an old man, although he
might be considered certainly as past the prime of life, and he was of
a strong and athletic build. But it was the suddenness of his attack
upon him which had given Charles Holland the great advantage, and had
caused the defeat of the ruffian who came bent on one of the most
cowardly and dastardly murders that could be committed—namely, upon
an unoffending man, whom he supposed to be loaded with chains, and
incapable of making the least efficient resistance.
Charles soon again recovered sufficient breath and strength to proceed
towards the Hall, and now warned, by the exhaustion which had come over
him that he had not really anything like strength enough to allow him
to proceed rapidly, he walked with slow and deliberate steps.
This mode of proceeding was more favourable to reflection than the
wild, rapid one which he had at first adopted, and in all the glowing
colours of youthful and ingenious fancy did he depict to himself the
surprise and the pleasure that would beam in the countenance of his
beloved Flora when she should find him once again by her side.
Of course, he, Charles, could know nothing of the contrivances which
had been resorted to, and which the reader may lay wholly to the
charge of Marchdale, to blacken his character, and to make him appear
faithless to the love he had professed.
Had he known this, it is probable that indignation would have added
wings to his progress, and he would not have been able to proceed at
the leisurely pace he felt that his state of physical weakness dictated
to him.
And now he saw the topmost portion at Bannerworth Hall pushing out from
amongst the trees with which the ancient pile was so much surrounded,
and the sight of the home of his beloved revived him, and quickened the
circulation of the warm blood in his veins.
“I shall behold her now,” he said—“I shall behold her now! A few
minutes more, and I shall hold her to my heart—that heart which has
been ever hers, and which carried her image enshrined in its deepest
recesses, even into the gloom of a dungeon!”
But let us, while Charles Holland is indulging in these delightful
anticipations—anticipations which, we regret, in consequence of the
departure of the Bannerworths from the Hall, will not be realized
so soon as he supposes—look back upon the discomfited hypocrite and
villain, Marchdale, who occupies his place in the dungeon of the old
ruins.
Until Charles Holland actually had left the strange, horrible, and
cell-like place, he could scarcely make up his mind that the young man
entertained a serious intention of leaving him there.
Perhaps he did not think any one could be so cruel and so wicked as he
himself; for the reader will no doubt recollect that his, Marchdale’s,
counsel to Varney, was to leave Charles Holland to his fate, chained
down as he was in the dungeon, and that fate would have been the
horrible one of being starved to death in the course of a few days.
When now, however, he felt confident that he was deserted—when he
heard the sound of Charles Holland’s retreating footsteps slowly dying
away in the distance, until not the faintest echo of them reached his
ears, he despaired indeed; and the horror he experienced during the
succeeding ten minutes, might be considered an ample atonement for some
of his crimes. His brain was in a complete whirl; nothing of a tangible
nature, but that he was there, chained down, and left to starve to
death, came across his intellect. Then a kind of madness, for a moment
or two, took possession of him; he made a tremendous effort to burst
asunder the bands that held him.
But it was in vain. The chains—which had been placed upon Charles
Holland during the first few days of his confinement, when he had
a little recovered from the effects of the violence which had been
committed upon him at the time when he was captured—effectually
resisted Marchdale.
They even cut into his flesh, inflicting upon him some grievous wounds;
but that was all he achieved by his great efforts to free himself,
so that, after a few moments, bleeding and in great pain, he, with a
deep groan, desisted from the fruitless efforts he had better not have
commenced.
Then he remained silent for a time, but it was not the silence of
reflection; it was that of exhaustion, and, as such, was not likely to
last long; nor did it, for, in the course of another five minutes, he
called out loudly.
Perhaps he thought there might be a remote chance that some one
traversing the meadows would hear him; and yet, if he had duly
considered the matter, which he was not in a fitting frame of mind to
do, he would have recollected that, in choosing a dungeon among the
underground vaults of these ruins, he had, by experiment, made certain
that no cry, however loud, from where he lay, could reach the upper
air. And thus had this villain, by the very precautions which he had
himself taken to ensure the safe custody of another, been his own
greatest enemy.
“Help! help! help!” he cried frantically. “Varney! Charles Holland!
have mercy upon me, and do not leave me here to starve! Help, oh,
Heaven! Curses on all your heads—curses! Oh, mercy—mercy—mercy!”
In suchlike incoherent expressions did he pass some hours, until, what
with exhaustion and a raging thirst that came over him, he could not
utter another word, but lay the very picture of despair and discomfited
malice and wickedness.
CHAPTER LXIX.
FLORA BANNERWORTH AND HER MOTHER.—THE EPISODE OF CHIVALRY.
Gladly we turn from such a man as Marchdale to a consideration of the
beautiful and accomplished Flora Bannerworth, to whom we may, without
destroying in any way the interest of our plot, predict a much happier
destiny than, probably, at that time, she considers as at all likely to
be hers.
She certainly enjoyed, upon her first removal from Bannerworth Hall,
greater serenity of mind than she had done there; but, as we have
already remarked of her, the more her mind was withdrawn, by change of
scene, from the horrible considerations which the attack of the vampyre
had forced upon her, the more she reverted to the fate of Charles
Holland, which was still shrouded in so much gloom.
She would sit and converse with her mother upon that subject until she
worked up her feelings to a most uncomfortable pitch of excitement, and
then Mrs. Bannerworth would get her younger brother to join them, who
would occasionally read to her some compositions of his own, or of some
favourite writer whom he thought would amuse her.
It was on the very evening when Sir Francis Varney had made up his mind
to release Charles Holland, that young Bannerworth read to his sister
and his mother the following little chivalric incident, which he told
them he had himself collated from authentic sources:—
“The knight with the green shield,” exclaimed one of a party of
men-at-arms, who were drinking together at an ancient hostel, not far
from Shrewsbury—“the knight with the green shield is as good a knight
as ever buckled on a sword, or wore spurs.”—“Then how comes it he is
not one of the victors in the day’s tournament?” exclaimed another.—“By
the bones of Alfred!” said a third, “a man must be judged of by his
deserts, and not by the partiality of his friends. That’s my opinion,
friends.”—“And mine, too,” said another.
“That is all very true, and my opinion would go with yours, too; but
not in this instance. Though you may accuse me of partiality, yet I
am not so; for I have seen some of the victors of to-day by no means
forward in the press of battle-men who, I will not say feared danger,
but who liked it not so well but they avoided it as much as possible.”
“Ay, marry, and so have I. The reason is, ’tis much easier to face a
blunted lance, than one with a spear-head; and a man may practise the
one and thrive in it, but not the other; for the best lance in the
tournament is not always the best arm in the battle.”
“And that is the reason of my saying the knight with the green shield
was a good knight. I have seen him in the midst of the melee, when
men and horses have been hurled to the ground by the shock; there he
has behaved himself like a brave knight, and has more than once been
noticed for it.”
“But how came he to be so easily overthrown to-day? That speaks
something.”—“His horse is an old one.”
“So much the better,” said another; “he’s used to his work, and as
cunning as an old man.”—“But he has been wounded more than once, and
is weakened very much; besides, I saw him lose his footing, else he had
overthrown his opponent.
“He did not seem distressed about his accident, at all events, but sat
contented in the tent.”—“He knows well that those who know him will
never attribute his misadventure either to want of courage or conduct;
moreover, he seems to be one of those who care but little for the
opinion of men who care nothing for him.”
“And he’s right. Well, dear comrades, the health of Green Knight, or
the Knight with a Green Shield, for that’s his name, or the designation
he chooses to go by.”—“A health to the Knight with the Green Shield!”
shouted the men-at-arms, as they lifted their cups on high.
“Who is he?” inquired one of the men-at-arms, of him who had spoken
favourably of the stranger.—“I don’t know.”
“And yet you spoke favourably of him a few seconds back, and said
what a brave knight he was!”—“And so I uphold him to be; but, I tell
you what, friend, I would do as much for the greatest stranger I ever
met. I have seen him fight where men and horses have bit the dust
in hundreds; and that, in my opinion, speaks out for the man and
warrior; he who cannot, then, fight like a soldier, had better tilt at
home in the castle-yard, and there win ladies’ smiles, but not the
commendation of the leader of the battle.”
“That’s true; I myself recollect very well Sir Hugh de Colbert, a very
accomplished knight in the castle-yard; but his men were as fine a
set of fellows as ever crossed a horse, to look at, but they proved
deficient at the moment of trial; they were broken, and fled in a
moment, and scarce one of them received a scratch.”
“Then they hadn’t stood the shock of the foeman?”—“No; that’s certain.”
“But still I should like to know the knight,—to know his name very
well.”—“I know it not; he has some reason for keeping it secret, I
suppose; but his deeds will not shame it, be it what it may. I can bear
witness to more than one foeman falling beneath his battle-axe.”
“Indeed!”—“Yes; and he took a banner from the enemy in the last battle
that was fought.”
“Ah, well! he deserves a better fortune to-morrow. Who is to be the
bridegroom of the beautiful Bertha, daughter of Lord de Cauci?”—“That
will have to be decided; but it is presumed that Sir Guthrie de
Beaumont is the intended.”
“Ah! but should he not prove the victor?”—“It’s understood; because
it’s known he is intended by the parents of the lady, and none would
be ungallant enough to prevail against him,—save on such conditions as
would not endanger the fruits of victory.”
“No?”—“Certainly not; they would lay the trophies at the foot of the
beauty worshipped by the knights at the tournament.”
“So, triumphant or not, he’s to be the bridegroom; bearing off the
prize of valour whether or no,—in fact, deserve her or not,—that’s the
fact.”—“So it is, so it is.”
“And a shame, too, friends; but so it is now; but yet, if the knight’s
horse recovers from the strain, and is fit for work to-morrow, it
strikes me that the Green Shield will give some work to the holiday
knight.”
• • • • •
There had been a grand tournament held near Shrewsbury Castle, in
honour of the intended nuptials of the beautiful Lady Bertha de Cauci.
She was the only daughter of the Earl de Cauci, a nobleman of some
note; he was one of an ancient and unblemished name, and of great
riches.
The lady was beautiful, but, at the same time, she was an unwilling
bride,—every one could see that; but the bridegroom cared not for
that. There was a settled sorrow on her brow,—a sorrow that seemed
sincere and lasting; but she spoke not of it to any one,—her lips were
seldom parted. She loved another. Yes; she loved one who was far away,
fighting in the wars of his country,—one who was not so rich in lands
as her present bridegroom.
When he left her, she remembered his promise; it was, to fight on till
he earned a fortune, or name that should give him some right to claim
her hand, even from her imperious father. But alas! he came not; and
what could she do against the commands of one who would be obeyed? Her
mother, too, was a proud, haughty woman, one whose sole anxiety was to
increase the grandeur and power of her house by such connections.
Thus it was pressed on by circumstances, she could no longer hold
out, more especially as she heard nothing of her knight. She knew not
where he was, or indeed if he were living or dead. She knew not he
was never named. This last circumstance, indeed, gave her pain; for
it assured her that he whom she loved had been unable to signalize
himself from among other men. That, in fact, he was unknown in the
annals of fame, as well as the probability that he had been slain in
some of the earlier skirmishes of the war. This, if it had happened,
caused her some pain to think upon; not but such events were looked
upon with almost indifference by females, save in such cases where
their affections were engaged, as on this occasion. But the event was
softened by the fact that men were continually falling by the hand
of man in such encounters, but at the same time it was considered an
honourable and praiseworthy death for a soldier. He was wounded, but
not with the anguish we now hear of; for the friends were consoled by
the reflection that the deceased warrior died covered with glory.
Bertha, however, was young, and as yet she knew not the cause of her
absent knight’s silence, or why he had not been heard of among the most
forward in the battle.
“Heaven’s will be done,” she exclaimed; “what can I do? I must submit
to my father’s behests; but my future life will be one of misery and
sorrow.”
She wept to think of the past, and to dream of the future; both alike
were sorrowful to think upon—no comfort in the past and no joy in the
future.
Thus she wept and sorrowed on the night of the first tournament;
there was to be a second, and that was to be the grand one, where her
intended bridegroom was to show himself off in her eyes, and take his
part in the sport.
• • • • •
Bertha sat late—she sat sorrowing by the light of the lamps and the
flickering flame of the fire, as it rose and fell on the hearth and
threw dancing shadows on the walls.
“Oh, why, Arthur Home, should you thus be absent? Absent, too, at
such a time when you are more needed than ever. Alas, alas! you may
no longer be in the land of the living. Your family is great and your
name known—your own has been spoken with commendation from the lips of
your friend; what more of fame do you need? but I am speaking without
purpose. Heaven have mercy on me.”
As she spoke she looked up and saw one of her women in waiting standing
by.
“Well, what would you?”—“My lady, there is one who would speak with
you,” said the hand-maiden.
“With me?”—“Yes, my lady; he named you the Lady Bertha de Cauci.”
“Who and what is he?” she inquired, with something like trepidation, of
the maiden.—“I know not, my lady.”
“But gave he not some token by which I might know who I admit to my
chamber?”—“None,” replied the maiden.
“And what does he bear by way of distinguishing himself? What crest or
device doth he bear?”—“Merely a green shield.”
“The unsuccessful knight in the tournament to-day. Heavens! what can he
desire with me; he is not—no, no, it cannot be—it cannot be.”—“Will you
admit him, lady?”
“Indeed, I know not what to do; but yet he may have some intelligence
to give me. Yes, yes, admit him; but first throw some logs on the fire.”
The attendant did as she was desired, and then quitted the room for the
purpose of admitting the stranger knight with the green shield. In a
few moments she could hear the stride of the knight as he neared the
apartment, and she thought the step was familiar to her ear—she thought
it was the step of Sir Arthur Home, her lover. She waited anxiously to
see the door open, and then the stranger entered. His form and bearing
was that of her lover, but his visor was down, and she was unable to
distinguish the features of the stranger.
His armour was such as had seen many a day’s hard wear, and there were
plenty of marks of the battle about him. His travel-worn accoutrements
were altogether such as bespoke service in the field.
“Sir, you desired to see me; say wherefore you do so, and if it is
news you bring.” The knight answered not, but pointed to the female
attendant, as if he desired she would withdraw. “You may retire,”
said Bertha; “be within call, and let me know if I am threatened with
interruption.”
The attendant retired, and then the knight and lady were left alone.
The former seemed at a loss how to break silence for some moments, and
then he said,—
“Lady ——”—“Oh, Heavens! ’tis he!” exclaimed Bertha, as she sprang to
her feet; “it is Sir Arthur Home!”
“It is,” exclaimed the knight, pulling up his visor, and dropping on
one knee he encircled his arm round the waist of the lady, and at the
same moment he pressed her lips to his own.
The first emotion of joy and surprise over, Bertha checked her
transports, and chid the knight for his boldness.
“Nay, chide me not, dear Bertha; I am what I was when I left you, and
hope to find you the same.”
“Am I not?” said Bertha.—“Truly I know not, for you seem more beautiful
than you were then; I hope that is the only change.”
“If there be a change, it is only such as you see. Sorrow and regret
form the principal causes.”—“I understand you.”
“My intended nuptials ——”—“Yes, I have heard all. I came here but late
in the morning; and my horse was jaded and tired, and my impatience to
attend the tournament caused me a disaster which it is well it came not
on the second day.”
“It is, dear Arthur. How is it I never heard your name mentioned, or
that I received no news from any one about you during the wars that
have ended?”—“I had more than one personal enemy, Bertha; men who would
have been glad to see me fall, and who, in default of that, would not
have minded bribing an assassin to secure my death for them at any risk
whatever.”
“Heavens! and how did you escape such a death from such people,
Arthur?”—“By adopting such a device as that I wear. The Knight of the
Green Shield I’m called.”
“I saw you to-day in the tournament.”—“And there my tired and jaded
horse gave way; but to-morrow I shall have, I hope, a different
fortune.”
“I hope so too.”—“I will try; my arm has been good in battle, and I see
not why it should be deficient in peaceful jousts.”
“Certainly not. What fortune have you met with since you left
England?”—“I was of course known but to a few; among those few were the
general under whom I served and my more immediate officers, who I knew
would not divulge my secret.”
“And they did not?”—“No; kept it nobly, and kept their eyes upon me in
battle; and I have reaped a rich harvest in fame, honour, and riches, I
assure you.”
“Thank Heaven!” said Bertha.—“Bertha, if I be conqueror, may I claim
you in the court-yard before all the spectators?”
“You may,” said Bertha, and she hung her head.—“Moreover,” said Sir
Arthur, “you will not make a half promise, but when I demand you, you
will at once come down to me and accept me as your husband; if I be the
victor then he cannot object to the match.”
“But he will have many friends, and his intended bride will have many
more, so that you may run some danger among so many enemies.”—“Never
fear for me, Bertha, because I shall have many friends of distinction
there too—many old friends who are tried men in battle, and whose deeds
are a glory and honour to them; besides, I shall have my commander
and several gentlemen who would at once interfere in case any unfair
advantage was attempted to be taken of my supposed weakness.”
“Have you a fresh horse?” inquired Bertha.—“I have, or shall have by
the morning; but promise me you will do what I ask you, and then my arm
will be nerved to its utmost, and I am sure to be victorious.”
“I do promise,” said Bertha; “I hope you may be as successful as you
hope to be, Arthur; but suppose fortune should declare against you;
suppose an accident of any kind were to happen, what could be done
then?”—“I must be content to hide myself for ever afterwards, as a
defeated knight; how can I appear before your friends as the claimant
of your hand?”
“I will never have any other.”—“But you will be forced to accept this
Guthrie de Beaumont, your father’s chosen son-in-law.”
“I will seek refuge in a cloister.”—“Will you fly with me, Bertha, to
some sequestered spot, where we can live in each other’s society?”
“Yes,” said Bertha, “anything, save marriage with Guthrie de
Beaumont.”—“Then await the tournament of to-morrow,” said Sir Arthur,
“and then this may be avoided; in the meantime, keep up a good heart
and remember I am at hand.”
• • • • •
These two lovers parted for the present, after a protracted interview,
Bertha to her chamber, and the Knight of the Green Shield to his tent.
The following morning was one of great preparation; the lists had
been enlarged, and the seats made more commodious, for the influx of
visitors appeared to be much greater than had been anticipated.
Moreover, there were many old warriors of distinction to be present,
which made the bridegroom look pale and feel uncomfortable as to the
results of the tournament. The tilting was to begin at an early hour,
and then the feasting and revelry would begin early in the evening,
after the tilting had all passed off.
In that day’s work there were many thrown from their saddles, and many
broke their lances. The bridegroom tilted with several knights, and
came off victorious, or without disadvantage to either.
The green knight, on the contrary, tilted with but few, and always
victorious, and such matches were with men who had been men of some
name in the wars, or at least in the tilt yard.
The sports drew to a close, and when the bridegroom became the
challenger, the Knight of the Green Shield at once rode out quietly to
meet him. The encounter could not well be avoided, and the bridegroom
would willingly have declined the joust with a knight who had disposed
of his enemies so easily, and so unceremoniously as he had.
The first encounter was enough; the bridegroom was thrown to a great
distance, and lay insensible on the ground, and was carried out of
the field. There was an immediate sensation among the friends of the
bridegroom, several of whom rode out to challenge the stranger knight
for his presumption.
In this, however, they had misreckoned the chances, for the challenged
accepted their challenges with alacrity and disposed of them one by one
with credit to himself until the day was concluded. The stranger was
then asked to declare who he was, upon which he lifted his visor, and
said,
“I am Sir Arthur Home, and claim the Lady Bertha as my bride, by the
laws of arms, and by those of love.”
• • • • •
Again the tent was felled, and again the hostelry was tenanted by the
soldier, who declared for one side and then for the other, as the cups
clanged and jingled together.
“Said I not,” exclaimed one of the troopers, “that the knight with a
green shield was a good knight?”—“You did,” replied the other.
“And you knew who he was?” said another of the troopers.—“Not I,
comrades; I had seen him fight in battle, and, therefore, partly
guessed how it would be if he had any chance with the bridegroom. I’m
glad he has won the lady.”
It was true, the Lady Bertha was won, and Sir Arthur Home claimed his
bride, and then they attempted to defeat his claim; yet Bertha at once
expressed herself in his favour, so strongly that they were, however
reluctantly compelled, to consent at last.
At this moment, a loud shout as from a multitude of persons came upon
their ears and Flora started from her seat in alarm. The cause of the
alarm we shall proceed to detail.
CHAPTER LXX.
THE FUNERAL OF THE STRANGER OF THE INN.—THE POPULAR COMMOTION, AND
MRS. CHILLINGWORTH’S APPEAL TO THE MOB.—THE NEW RIOT.—THE HALL IN
DANGER.
As yet the town was quiet; and, though there was no appearance of riot
or disturbance, yet the magistracy had taken every precaution they
deemed needful, or their position and necessities warranted, to secure
the peace of the town from the like disturbance to that which had been,
of late, a disgrace and terror of peaceably-disposed persons.
The populace were well advertised of the fact, that the body of the
stranger was to be buried that morning in their churchyard; and that,
to protect the body, should there be any necessity for so doing, a
large body of constables would be employed.
There was no disposition to riot; at least, none was visible. It
looked as if there was some event about to take place that was highly
interesting to all parties, who were peaceably assembling to witness
the interment of nobody knew who.
The early hour at which persons were assembling, at different points,
clearly indicated that there was a spirit of curiosity about the
town, so uncommon that none would have noticed it but for the fact of
the crowd of people who hung about the streets, and there remained,
listless and impatient.
The inn, too, was crowded with visitors, and there were many who, not
being blessed with the strength of purse that some were, were hanging
about in the distance, waiting and watching the motions of those who
were better provided.
“Ah!” said one of the visitors, “this is a disagreeable job in your
house, landlord.”—“Yes, sir; I’d sooner it had happened elsewhere, I
assure you. I know it has done me no good.”
“No; no man could expect any, and yet it is none the less unfortunate
for that.”—“I would sooner anything else happen than that, whatever it
might be. I think it must be something very bad, at all events; but I
dare say I shall never see the like again.”
“So much the better for the town,” said another; “for, what with
vampyres and riots, there has been but little else stirring than
mischief and disturbances of one kind and another.”
“Yes; and, what between Varneys and Bannerworths, we have had but
little peace here.”
“Precisely. Do you know it’s my opinion that the least thing would
upset the whole town. Any one unlucky word would do it, I am sure,”
said a tall thin man.
“I have no doubt of it,” said another; “but I hope the military would
do their duty under such circumstances, for people’s lives and property
are not safe in such a state of things.”—“Oh, dear no.”
“I wonder what has become of Varney, or where he can have gone
to.”—“Some thought he must have been burned when they burned his
house,” replied the landlord.
“But I believe it generally understood he’s escaped, has he not? No
traces of his body were found in the ruins.”—“None. Oh! he’s escaped,
there can be no doubt of that. I wish I had some fortune depending upon
the fact; it would be mine, I am sure.”
“Well, the lord keep us from vampyres and such-like cattle,” said an
old woman. “I shall never sleep again in my bed with any safety. It
frightens one out of one’s life to think of it. What a shame the men
didn’t catch him and stake him!”
The old woman left the inn as soon as she had spoke this Christian
speech.
“Humane!” said a gentleman, with a sporting coat on. “The old woman is
no advocate for half measures!”
“You are right, sir,” said the landlord; “and a very good look-out she
keeps upon the pot, to see it’s full, and carefully blows the froth
off!”—“Ah! I thought as much.”
“How soon will the funeral take place, landlord?” inquired a person,
who had at that moment entered the inn.—“In about an hour’s time, sir.”
“Oh! the town seems pretty full, though it is very quiet. I suppose it
is more as a matter of curiosity people congregate to see the funeral
of this stranger?”
“I hope so, sir.”
“The time is wearing on, and if they don’t make a dust, why then the
military will not be troubled.”
“I do not expect anything more, sir,” said the landlord; “for you see
they must have had their swing out, as the saying is, and be fully
satisfied. They cannot have much more to do in the way of exhibiting
their anger or dislike to vampyres—they all have done enough.”
“So they have—so they have.”
“Granted,” said an old man with a troublesome cough; “but when did you
ever know a mob to be satisfied? If they wanted the moon and got it,
they’d find out it would be necessary to have the stars also.”
“That’s uncommonly true,” said the landlord. “I shouldn’t be surprised
if they didn’t do something worse than ever.”—“Nothing more likely,”
said the little old man. “I can believe anything of a mob—anything—no
matter what.”
The inn was crowded with visitors, and several extra hands were
employed to wait upon the customers, and a scene of bustle and activity
was displayed that was never before seen. It would glad the heart of a
landlord, though he were made of stone, and landlords are usually of
much more malleable materials than that.
However, the landlord had hardly time to congratulate himself, for
the bearers were come now, and the undertaker and his troop of
death-following officials.
There was a stir among the people, who began now to awaken from the
lethargy that seemed to have come over them while they were waiting
for the moment when it should arrive, that was to place the body under
the green sod, against which so much of their anger had been raised.
There was a decent silence that pervaded the mob of individuals who had
assembled.
Death, with all its ghastly insignia, had an effect even upon the
unthinking multitude, who were ever ready to inflict death or any
violent injury upon any object that came in their way—they never
hesitated; but even these, now the object of their hatred was no more,
felt appalled.
’Tis strange what a change comes over masses of men as they gaze upon
a dead body. It may be that they all know that to that complexion they
must come at last. This may be the secret of the respect offered to the
dead.
The undertakers are men, however, who are used to the presence of
death—it is their element; they gain a living by attending upon the
last obsequies of the dead; they are used to dead bodies, and care
not for them. Some of them are humane men, that is, in their way; and
even among them are men who wouldn’t be deprived of their joke as they
screwed down the last screw. They could not forbear, even on this
occasion, to hold their converse when left alone.
“Jacobs,” said one who was turning a long screw, “Jacobs, my boy,
do you take the chair to-night?”—“Yes,” said Jacobs who was a long
lugubrious-looking man, “I do take the chair, if I live over this
blessed event.”
“You are not croaking, Jacobs, are you? Well, you are a lively
customer, you are.”—“Lively—do you expect people to be lively when
they are full dressed for a funeral? You are a nice article for your
profession. You don’t feel like an undertaker, you don’t.”
“Don’t, Jacobs, my boy. As long as I look like one when occasion
demands; when I have done my job I puts my comfort in my pocket, and
thinks how much more pleasanter it is to be going to other people’s
funerals than to our own, and then only see the difference as regards
the money.”
“True,” said Jacobs with a groan; “but death’s a melancholy article, at
all events.”—“So it is.”
“And then when you come to consider the number of people we have
buried—how many have gone to their last homes—and how many more will
go the same way.”—“Yes, yes; that’s all very well, Jacobs. You are
precious surly this morning. I’ll come to-night. You’re brewing a
sentimental tale as sure as eggs is eggs.”
“Well, that is pretty certain; but as I was saying how many more are
there——”
“Ah, don’t bother yourself with calculations that have neither
beginning nor end, and which haven’t one point to go. Come, Jacobs,
have you finished yet?”—“Quite,” said Jacobs.
They now arranged the pall, and placed all in readiness, and returned
to a place down stairs where they could enjoy themselves for an odd
half hour, and pass that time away until the moment should arrive when
his reverence would be ready to bury the deceased, upon consideration
of the fees to be paid upon the occasion.
The tap-room was crowded, and there was no room for the men, and they
were taken into the kitchen, where they were seated, and earnestly at
work, preparing for the ceremony that had so shortly to be performed.
“Any better, Jacobs?”—“What do you mean?” inquired Jacobs, with a
groan. “It’s news to me if I have been ill.”
“Oh, yes, you were doleful up stairs, you know.”—“I’ve a proper regard
for my profession—that’s the difference between you and I, you know.”
“I’ll wager you what you like, now, that I’ll handle a corpse and drive
a screw in a coffin as well as you, now, although you are so solid and
miserable.”—“So you may—so you may.”
“Then what do you mean by saying I haven’t a proper regard for my
profession?”—“I say you haven’t, and there’s the thing that shall prove
it—you don’t look it, and that’s the truth.”
“I don’t look like an undertaker! indeed I dare say I don’t if I ain’t
dressed like one.”—“Nor when you are,” reiterated Jacobs.
“Why not, pray?”—“Because you have always a grin on your face as broad
as a gridiron—that’s why.”
This ended the dispute, for the employer of the men suddenly put his
head in, saying,—
“Come, now, time’s up; you are wanted up stairs, all of you. Be quick;
we shall have his reverence waiting for us, and then we shall lose his
recommendation.”
“Ready sir,” said the round man, taking up his pint and finishing it
off at a draught, at the same moment he thrust the remains of some
bread and cheese into his pocket.
Jacobs, too, took his pot, and, having finished it, with great gravity
followed the example of his more jocose companion, and they all left
the kitchen for the room above, where the corpse was lying ready for
interment.
There was an unusual bustle; everybody was on the tip-top of
expectation, and awaiting the result in a quiet hurry, and hoped to
have the first glimpse of the coffin, though why they should do so
it was difficult to define. But in this fit of mysterious hope and
expectation they certainly stood.
“Will they be long?” inquired a man at the door of one inside,—“will
they be long before they come?”—“They are coming now,” said the man.
“Do you all keep quiet; they are knocking their heads against the top
of the landing. Hark! There, I told you so.”
The man departed, hearing something, and being satisfied that he had
got some information.
“Now, then,” said the landlord, “move out of the way, and allow the
corpse to pass out. Let me have no indecent conduct; let everything be
as it should be.”
The people soon removed from the passage and vicinity of the doorway,
and then the mournful procession—as the newspapers have it—moved
forward. They were heard coming down stairs, and thence along the
passage, until they came to the street, and then the whole number of
attendants was plainly discernible.
How different was the funeral of one who had friends. He was alone;
none followed, save the undertaker and his attendants, all of whom
looked solemn from habit and professional motives. Even the jocose man
was as supernaturally solemn as could be well imagined; indeed, nobody
knew he was the same man.
“Well,” said the landlord, as he watched them down the street, as they
slowly paced their way with funereal, not sorrowful, solemnity—“well, I
am very glad that it is all over.”
“It has been a sad plague to you,” said one.
“It has, indeed; it must be to any one who has had another such a job
as this. I don’t say it out of any disrespect to the poor man who is
dead and gone—quite the reverse; but I would not have such another
affair on my hands for pounds.”
“I can easily believe you, especially when we come to consider the
disagreeables of a mob.”
“You may say that. There’s no knowing what they will or won’t do,
confound them! If they’d act like men, and pay for what they have, why,
then I shouldn’t care much about them; but it don’t do to have other
people in the bar.”
“I should think not, indeed; that would alter the scale of your
profits, I reckon.”
“It would make all the difference to me. Business,” added the landlord,
“conducted on that scale, would become a loss; and a man might as well
walk into a well at once.”
“So I should say. Have many such occurrences as these been usual in
this part of the country?” inquired the stranger.
“Not usual at all,” said the landlord; “but the fact is, the whole
neighbourhood has run distracted about some superhuman being they call
a vampyre.”
“Indeed!”—“Yes; and they suspected the unfortunate man who has been
lying up-stairs, a corpse, for some days.”
“Oh, the man they have just taken in the coffin to bury?” said the
stranger.—“Yes, sir, the same.”
“Well, I thought perhaps somebody of great consequence had suddenly
become defunct.”—“Oh, dear no; it would not have caused half the
sensation; people have been really mad.”
“It was a strange occurrence, altogether, I believe, was it?” inquired
the stranger.—“Indeed it was, sir. I hardly know the particulars, there
have been so many tales afloat; though they all concur in one point,
and that is, it has destroyed the peace of one family.”
“Who has done so?”—“The vampyre.”
“Indeed! I never heard of such an animal, save as a fable, before; it
seems to me extraordinary.”
“So it would do to any one, sir, as was not on the spot, to see it; I’m
sure I wouldn’t.”
• • • • •
In the meantime, the procession, short as it was of itself, moved along
in slow time through a throng of people who ran out of their houses on
either side of the way, and lined the whole length of the town.
Many of these closed in behind, and followed the mourners until they
were near the church, and then they made a rush to get into the
churchyard.
As yet all had been conducted with tolerable propriety, the funeral met
with no impediment. The presence of death among so many of them seemed
some check upon the licence of the mob, who bowed in silence to the
majesty of death.
Who could bear ill-will against him who was now no more? Man, while
he is man, is always the subject of hatred, fear, or love. Some one
of these passions, in a modified state, exists in all men, and with
such feelings they will regard each other; and it is barely possible
that any one should not be the object of some of these, and hence the
stranger’s corpse was treated with respect.
In silence the body proceeded along the highway until it came to the
churchyard, and followed by an immense multitude of people of all
grades.
The authorities trembled; they knew not what all this portended.
They thought it might pass off; but it might become a storm first;
they hoped and feared by turns, till some of them fell sick with
apprehension.
There was a deep silence observed by all those in the immediate
vicinity of the coffin, but those farther in the rear found full
expression for their feelings.
“Do you think,” said an old man to another, “that he will come to life
again, eh?”—“Oh, yes, vampyres always do, and lay in the moonlight,
and then they come to life again. Moonlight recovers a vampyre to life
again.”
“And yet the moonlight is cold.”—“Ah, but who’s to tell what may happen
to a vampyre, or what’s hot or what’s cold?”
“Certainly not; oh, dear, no.”—“And then they have permission to suck
the blood of other people, to live themselves, and to make other people
vampyres, too.”
“The lord have mercy upon us!”—“Ay, but they have driven a stake
through this one, and he can’t get in moonlight or daylight; it’s all
over—he’s certainly done for; we may congratulate ourselves on this
point.”
“So we may—so we may.”
They now neared the grave, the clergyman officiating as usual on such
occasions. There was a large mob of persons on all sides, with serious
faces, watching the progress of the ceremony, and who listened in
quietness.
There was no sign of any disturbance amongst the people, and the
authorities were well pleased; they congratulated themselves upon the
quietness and orderliness of the assemblage.
The service was ended and the coffin lowered, and the earth was thrown
on the coffin-lid with a hollow sound. Nobody could hear that sound
unmoved. But in a short while the sound ceased as the grave became
filled; it was then trodden carefully down.
There were no relatives there to feel affected at the last scene of
all. They were far away, and, according to popular belief upon the
subject, they must have been dead some ages.
• • • • •
The mob watched the last shovel-full of earth thrown upon the coffin,
and witnessed the ramming down of the soil, and the heaping of it over
at top to make the usual monument; for all this was done speedily and
carefully, lest there should be any tendency to exhume the body of the
deceased.
The people were now somewhat relieved, as to their state of solemnity
and silence. They would all of them converse freely on the matter that
had so long occupied their thoughts.
They seemed now let loose, and everybody found himself at liberty to
say or do something, no matter if it were not very reasonable; that is
not always required of human beings who have souls, or, at least it
is unexpected; and were it expected, the expectation would never be
realized.
The day was likely to wear away without a riot, nay, even without a
fight; a most extraordinary occurrence for such a place under the
existing circumstances; for of late the populace, or, perhaps, the
townspeople, were extremely pugnacious, and many were the disputes that
were settled by the very satisfactory application of the knuckles to
the head of the party holding a contrary opinion.
Thus it was they were ready to take fire, and a hubbub would be the
result of the slightest provocation. But, on the present occasion,
there was a remarkable dearth of all subjects of the nature described.
Who was to lead Israel out to battle? Alas! no one on the present
occasion.
Such a one, however, appeared; at least, one who furnished a ready
excuse for a disturbance.
Suddenly, Mrs. Chillingworth appeared in the midst of a large concourse
of people. She had just left her house, which was close at hand, her
eyes red with weeping, and her children around her on this occasion.
The crowd made way for her, and gathered round her to see what was
going to happen.
“Friends and neighbours,” she said “can any of you relieve the tears
of a distressed wife and mother; have any of you seen anything of my
husband, Mr. Chillingworth?”
“What the doctor?” exclaimed one.—“Yes; Mr. Chillingworth, the surgeon.
He has not been home two days and a night. I’m distracted!—what can
have become of him I don’t know, unless——”
Here Mrs. Chillingworth paused, and some person said,—
“Unless what, Mrs. Chillingworth? there are none but friends here, who
wish the doctor well, and would do anything to serve him—unless what?
speak out.”
“Unless he’s been destroyed by the vampyre. Heaven knows what we may
all come to! Here am I and my children deprived of our protector by
some means which we cannot imagine. He never, in all his life, did the
same before.”
“He must have been spirited away by some of the vampyres. I’ll tell
you what, friend,” said one to another, “that something must be done;
nobody’s safe in their bed.”
“No; they are not, indeed. I think that all vampyres ought to be burned
and a stake run through them, and then we should be safe.”
“Ay; but you must destroy all those who are even suspected of being
vampyres, or else one may do all the mischief.”—“So he might.”
“Hurrah!” shouted the mob. “Chillingworth for ever! We’ll find the
doctor somewhere, if we pull down the whole town.”
There was an immense commotion among the populace, who began to start
throwing stones, and do all sorts of things without any particular
object, and some, as they said, to find the doctor, or to show how
willing they were to do so if they knew how.
Mrs. Chillingworth, however, kept on talking to the mob, who continued
shouting; and the authorities anticipated an immediate outbreak of
popular opinion, which is generally accompanied by some forcible
demonstration, and on this occasion some one suggested the propriety
of burning down Bannerworth Hall; because they had burned down the
vampyre’s house, and they might as well burn down that of the injured
party, which was carried by acclamation; and with loud shouts they
started on their errand.
This was a mob’s proceeding all over, and we regret very much to
say, that it is very much the characteristic of English mobs. What
an uncommonly strange thing it is that people in multitudes seem
completely to get rid of all reason—all honour—all common ordinary
honesty; while, if you were to take the same people singly, you would
find that they were reasonable enough, and would shrink with a feeling
quite approaching to horror from anything in the shape of very flagrant
injustice.
This can only be accounted for by a piece of cowardice in the human
race, which induces them when alone, and acting with the full
responsibility of their actions, to shrink from what it is quite
evident they have a full inclination to do, and will do when, having
partially lost their individuality in a crowd, they fancy, that to a
certain extent they can do so with impunity.
The burning of Sir Francis Varney’s house, although it was one of those
proceedings which would not bear the test of patient examination, was
yet, when we take all the circumstances into consideration, an act
really justifiable and natural in comparison with the one which was now
meditated.
Bannerworth Hall had never been the residence even of anyone who had
done the people any injury or given them any offence, so that to let it
become a prey to the flames was but a gratuitous act of mischief.
It was, however, or seemed to be, doomed, for all who have had any
experience in mobs, must know how extremely difficult it is to withdraw
them from any impulse once given, especially when that impulse, as in
the present instance, is of a violent character.
“Down with Bannerworth Hall!” was the cry. “Burn it—burn it,” and
augmented by fresh numbers each minute, the ignorant, and, in many
respects, ruffianly assemblage, soon arrived within sight of what had
been for so many years the bane of the Bannerworths, and whatever may
have been the fault of some of that race, those faults had been of a
domestic character, and not at all such as would interfere with the
public weal.
The astonished, and almost worn-out authorities, hastily, now, after
having disposed of their prisoners, collected together what troops
they could, and by the time the misguided, or rather the not guided
at all populace, had got halfway to Bannerworth Hall, they were being
outflanked by some of the dragoons, who, by taking a more direct route,
hoped to reach Bannerworth Hall first, and so perhaps, by letting the
mob see that it was defended, induce them to give up the idea of its
destruction on account of the danger attendant upon the proceeding by
far exceeding any of the anticipated delight of the disturbance.
CHAPTER LXXI.
THE STRANGE MEETING AT THE HALL BETWEEN MR. CHILLINGWORTH AND THE
MYSTERIOUS FRIEND OF VARNEY.
When we praise our friend Mr. Chillingworth for not telling his wife
where he was going, in pursuance of a caution and a discrimination so
highly creditable to him, we are quite certain that he has no such
excuse as regards the reader. Therefore we say at once that he had his
own reasons now for taking up his abode at Bannerworth Hall for a time.
These reasons seemed to be all dependant upon the fact of having met
the mysterious man at Sir Francis Varney’s; and although we perhaps
would have hoped that the doctor might have communicated to Henry
Bannerworth all that he knew and all that he surmised, yet have we no
doubt that what he keeps to himself he has good reasons for so keeping,
and that his actions as regards it are founded upon some very just
conclusions.
He has then made a determination to take possession of, and remain
in, Bannerworth Hall according to the full and free leave which the
admiral had given him so to do. What results he anticipated from so
lonely and so secret a watch we cannot say, but probably they will soon
exhibit themselves. It needed no sort of extraordinary discrimination
for any one to feel it once that not the least good, in the way of an
ambuscade, was likely to be effected by such persons as Admiral Bell
or Jack Pringle. They were all very well when fighting should actually
ensue, but they both were certainly remarkably and completely deficient
in diplomatic skill, or in that sort of patience which should enable
them at all to compete with the cunning, the skill, and the nice
discrimination of such a man as Sir Francis Varney.
If anything were to be done in that way it was unquestionably to
be done by some one alone, who, like the doctor, would, and could,
remain profoundly quiet and await the issue of events, be they what
they might, and probably remain a spy and attempt no overt act which
should be of a hostile character. This unquestionably was the mode, and
perhaps we should not be going too far when we say it was the only mode
which could be with anything like safety relied upon as one likely to
lead really to a discovery of Sir Francis Varney’s motives in making
such determined exertions to get possession of Bannerworth Hall.
That night was doomed to be a very eventful one, indeed; for on it had
Charles Holland been, by a sort of wild impulsive generosity of Sir
Francis Varney, rescued from the miserable dungeon in which he had
been confined, and on that night, too, he, whom we cannot otherwise
describe than as the villain Marchdale, had been, in consequence of the
evil that he himself meditated, and the crime with which he was quite
willing to stain his soul, been condemned to occupy Charles’s position.
On that night, too, had the infuriated mob determined upon the
destruction of Bannerworth Hall, and on that night was Mr.
Chillingworth waiting with what patience he could exert, at the
Hall, for whatever in the chapter of accidents might turn up of an
advantageous character to that family in whose welfare and fortunes he
felt so friendly and so deep an interest.
Let us look, then, at the worthy doctor as he keeps his solitary watch.
He did not, as had been the case when the admiral shared the place
with him in the hope of catching Varney on that memorable occasion
when he caught only his boot, sit in a room with a light and the means
and appliances for making the night pass pleasantly away; but, on the
contrary, he abandoned the house altogether, and took up a station in
that summer-house which has been before mentioned as the scene of a
remarkable interview between Flora Bannerworth and Varney the Vampyre.
Alone and in the dark, so that he could not be probably seen, he
watched that one window of the chamber where the first appearance of
the hideous vampyre had taken place, and which seemed ever since to be
the special object of his attack.
By remaining from twilight, and getting accustomed to the gradually
increasing darkness of the place, no doubt the doctor was able to see
well enough without the aid of any artificial light whether any one was
in the place besides himself.
“Night after night,” he said, “will I watch here until I have succeeded
in unravelling this mystery; for that there is some fearful and
undreamt of mystery at the bottom of all these proceedings I am well
convinced.”
When he made such a determination as this, Dr. Chillingworth was not at
all a likely man to break it, so there, looking like a modern statue in
the arbour, he sat with his eyes fixed upon the balcony and the window
of what used to be called Flora’s room for some hours.
The doctor was a contemplative man, and therefore he did not so
acutely feel the loneliness of his position as many persons would have
done; moreover, he was decidedly not of a superstitious turn of mind,
although certainly we cannot deny an imagination to him. However, if
he really had harboured some strange fears and terrors they would have
been excusable, when we consider how many circumstances had combined to
make it almost a matter of demonstration that Sir Francis Varney was
something more than mortal.
What quantities of subjects the doctor thought over during his vigil
in that garden it is hard to say, but never in his whole life,
probably, had he such a glorious opportunity for the most undisturbed
contemplation of subjects requiring deep thought to analyze, than as he
had then. At least he felt that since his marriage he had never been so
thoroughly quiet, and left so completely to himself.
It is to be hoped that he succeeded in settling any medical points of a
knotty character that might be hovering in his brain, and certain it is
that he had become quite absorbed in an abstruse matter connected with
physiology, when his ears were startled, and he was at once aroused to
a full consciousness of where he was, and why he had come there, by the
distant sound of a man’s footstep.
It was a footstep which seemed to be that of a person who scarcely
thought it at all necessary to use any caution, and the doctor’s heart
leaped within him as in the lowest possible whisper he said to himself,—
“I am successful—I am successful. It is believed now that the Hall is
deserted, and no doubt that is Sir Francis Varney come with confidence,
to carry out his object in so sedulously attacking it, be that object
what it may.”
Elated with this idea, the doctor listened intently to the advancing
footstep, which each moment sounded more clearly upon his ears.
It was evidently approaching from the garden entrance towards the
house, and he thought, by the occasional deadened sound of the person’s
feet, be he whom he might, that he could not see his way very well,
and, consequently, frequently strayed from the path, on to some of the
numerous flower-beds which were in the way.
“Yes,” said the doctor, exultingly, “it must be Varney; and now I have
but to watch him, and not to resist him; for what good on earth is it
to stop him in what he wishes to do, and, by such means, never wrest
his secret from him. The only way is to let him go on, and that will I
do, most certainly.”
Now he heard the indistinct muttering of the voice of some one, so low
that he could not catch what words were uttered; but he fancied that,
in the deep tones, he recognised, without any doubt, the voice of Sir
Francis Varney.
“It must be he,” he said, “it surely must be he. Who else would come
here to disturb the solitude of an empty house? He comes! he comes!”
Now the doctor could see a figure emerge from behind some thick
beeches, which had before obstructed his vision, and he looked
scrutinisingly about, while some doubts stole slowly over his mind
now as to whether it was the vampyre or not. The height was in favour
of the supposition that it was none other than Varney; but the figure
looked so much stouter, that Mr. Chillingworth felt a little staggered
upon the subject, and unable wholly to make up his mind upon it.
The pausing of this visitor, too, opposite that window where Sir
Francis Varney had made his attempts, was another strong reason why the
doctor was inclined to believe it must be him, and yet he could not
quite make up his mind upon the subject, so as to speak with certainty.
A very short time, however, indeed, must have sufficed to set such a
question as that at rest; and patience seemed the only quality of mind
necessary under those circumstances for Mr. Chillingworth to exert.
The visitor continued gazing either at that window, or at the whole
front of the house, for several minutes, and then he turned away from a
contemplation of it, and walked slowly along, parallel with the windows
of that dining-room, one of which had been broken so completely on the
occasion of the admiral’s attempt to take the vampyre prisoner.
The moment the stranger altered his position, from looking at the
window, and commenced walking away from it, Mr. Chillingworth’s mind
was made up. It was not Varney—of that he felt now most positively
assured, and could have no doubt whatever upon the subject.
The gait, the general air, the walk, all were different; and then arose
the anxious question of who could it be that had intruded upon that
lonely place, and what could be the object of any one else but Varney
the vampyre to do so.
The stranger looked a powerful man, and walked with a firm tread,
and, altogether, he was an opponent that, had the doctor been ever so
belligerently inclined, it would have been the height of indiscretion
for him to attempt to cope with.
It was a very vexatious thing, too, for any one to come there at such a
juncture, perhaps only from motives of curiosity, or possibly just to
endeavour to commit some petty depredations upon the deserted building,
if possible; and most heartily did the doctor wish that, in some way,
he could scare away the intruder.
The man walked along very slowly, indeed, and seemed to be quite taking
his time in making his observations of the building; and this was the
more provoking, as it was getting late, and if having projected a visit
at all, it would surely soon be made, and then, when he found any one
there, of course, he would go.
Amazed beyond expression, the doctor felt about on the ground at his
feet, until he found a tolerably large stone, which he threw at the
stranger with so good an aim, that it hit him a smart blow on the back,
which must have been anything but a pleasant surprise.
That it was a surprise, and that, too, a most complete one, was evident
from the start which the man gave, and then he uttered a furious oath,
and rubbed his back, as he glanced about him to endeavour to ascertain
from whence the missile had come.
“I’ll try him again with that,” thought the doctor; “it may succeed in
scaring him away;” and he stooped to watch for another stone.
It was well that he did so at that precise moment; for, before he
rose again, he heard the sharp report of a pistol, and a crashing
sound among some of the old wood work of which the summer-house was
composed, told him that a shot had there taken effect. Affairs were now
getting much too serious; and, accordingly, Dr. Chillingworth thought
that, rather than stay there to be made a target of, he would face the
intruder.
“Hold—hold!” he cried. “Who are you, and what do you mean by
that?”—“Oh! somebody is there,” cried the man, as he advanced. “My
friend, whoever you are, you were very foolish to throw a stone at me.”
“And, my friend, whoever you are,” responded the doctor, “you were very
spiteful to fire a pistol bullet at me in consequence.”—“Not at all.”
“But I say yes; for, probably, I can prove a right to be here, which
you cannot.”—“Ah!” said the stranger, “that voice—why—you are Dr.
Chillingworth?”
“I am; but I don’t know you,” said the doctor, as he emerged now from
the summer-house, and confronted the stranger who was within a few
paces of the entrance to it. Then he started, as he added,—
“Yes, I do know you, though. How, in the name of Heaven, came you here,
and what purpose have you in so coming?”
“What purpose have you? Since we met at Varney’s, I have been
making some inquiries about this neighbourhood, and learn strange
things.”—“That you may very easily do here; and, what is more
extraordinary, the strange things are, for the most part, I can assure
you, quite true.”
The reader will, from what has been said, now readily recognise this
man as Sir Francis Varney’s mysterious visitor, to whom he gave, from
some hidden cause or another, so large a sum of money, and between whom
and Dr. Chillingworth a mutual recognition had taken place, on the
occasion when Sir Francis Varney had, with such cool assurance, invited
the admiral to breakfast with him at his new abode.
“You, however,” said the man, “I have no doubt, are fully qualified to
tell me of more than I have been able to learn from other people; and,
first of all, let me ask you why you are here?”—“Before I answer you
that question, or any other,” said the doctor, “let me beg of you to
tell me truly, is Sir Francis Varney—”
The doctor whispered in the ear of the stranger some name, as if he
feared, even there, in the silence of that garden, where everything
conspired to convince him that he could not be overheard, to pronounce
it in an audible tone.
“He is,” said the other.—“You have no manner of doubt of it?”
“Doubt?—certainly not. What doubt can I have? I know it for a positive
certainty, and he knows, of course, that I do know it, and has
purchased my silence pretty handsomely, although I must confess that
nothing but my positive necessities would have induced me to make the
large demands upon him that I have, and I hope soon to be able to
release him altogether from them.”
The doctor shook his head repeatedly, as he said,—
“I suspected it; I suspected it, do you know, from the first
moment that I saw you there in his house. His face haunted me ever
since—awfully haunted me; and yet, although I felt certain that I had
once seen it under strange circumstances, I could not identify it
with—but no matter, no matter. I am waiting here for him.”
“Indeed!”—“Ay, that I am; and I flung a stone at you, not knowing you,
with hope that you would be, by such means, perhaps, scared away, and
so leave the coast clear for him.”
“Then you have an appointment with him?”—“By no means; but he has made
such repeated and determined attacks upon this house that the family
who inhabited it were compelled to leave it, and I am here to watch
him, and ascertain what can possibly be his object.”
“It is as I suspected, then,” muttered this man. “Confound him! Now can
I read, as if in a book, most clearly, the game that he is playing!”
“Can you?” cried the doctor, energetically—“can you? What is it? Tell
me, for that is the very thing I want to discover.”—“You don’t say so?”
“It is, indeed; and I assure you that it concerns the peace of a
whole family to know it. You say you have made inquiries about this
neighbourhood, and, if you have done so, you have discovered how the
family of the Bannerworths have been persecuted by Varney, and how, in
particular, Flora Bannerworth, a beautiful and intelligent girl, has
been most cruelly made to suffer.”
“I have heard all that, and I dare say with many exaggerations.”—“It
would be difficult for any one really to exaggerate the horrors that
have taken place in this house, so that any information which you can
give respecting the motives of Varney will tend, probably, to restore
peace to those who have been so cruelly persecuted, and be an act of
kindness which I think not altogether inconsistent with your nature.”
“You think so, and yet know who I am.”—“I do, indeed.”
“And what I am. Why, if I were to go into the market-place of yon town,
and proclaim myself, would not all shun me—ay, even the very lowest and
vilest; and yet you talk of an act of kindness not being altogether
inconsistent with my nature!”—“I do, because I know something more of
you than many.”
There was a silence of some moments’ duration, and then the stranger
spoke in a tone of voice which looked as if he were struggling with
some emotion.
“Sir, you do know more of me than many. You know what I have been, and
you know how I left an occupation which would have made me loathed. But
you—even you—do not know what made me take to so terrible a trade.”—“I
do not.”
“Would it suit you for me now to tell you?”—“Will you first promise
me that you will do all you can for this persecuted family of the
Bannerworths, in whom I take so strange an interest?”
“I will. I promise you that freely. Of my own knowledge, of course, I
can say but little concerning them, but, upon that warranting, I well
believe they deserve abundant sympathy, and from me they shall have it.”
“A thousand thanks! With your assistance, I have little doubt of being
able to extricate them from the tangled web of dreadful incidents which
has turned them from their home; and now, whatever you may choose to
tell me of the cause which drove you to be what you became, I shall
listen to with abundant interest. Only let me beseech you to come into
this summer-house, and to talk low.”
“I will, and you can pursue your watch at the same time, while I
beguile its weariness.”—“Be it so.”
“You knew me years ago, when I had all the chances in the world of
becoming respectable and respected. I did, indeed; and you may,
therefore, judge of my surprise when, some years since, being in the
metropolis, I met you, and you shunned my company.”—“Yes; but, at last,
you found out why it was that I shunned your company.”
“I did. You yourself told me once that I met you, and would not leave
you, but insisted upon your dining with me. Then you told me, when you
found that I would take no other course whatever, that you were no
other than the—the——”—“Out with it! I can bear to hear it now better
than I could then! I told you that I was the common hangman of London!”
“You did, I must confess, to my most intense surprise.”
“Yes, and yet you kept to me; and, but that I respected you too much to
allow you to do so, you would, from old associations, have countenanced
me; but I could not, and I would not, let you do so. I told you then
that, although I held the terrible office, that I had not been yet
called upon to perform its loathsome functions. Soon—soon—come the
first effort—it was the last!”
“Indeed! You left the dreadful trade?”—“I did—I did. But what I want to
tell you, for I could not then, was why I went ever to it. The wounds
my heart had received were then too fresh to allow me to speak of them,
but I will tell you now. The story is a brief one, Mr. Chillingworth. I
pray you be seated.”
CHAPTER LXXII.
THE STRANGE STORY.—THE ARRIVAL OF THE MOB AT THE HALL, AND THEIR
DISPERSION.
“You will find that the time which elapsed since I last saw you in
London, to have been spent in an eventful, varied manner.”—“You were
in good circumstances then,” said Mr. Chillingworth.—“I was, but
many events happened after that which altered the prospect; made it
even more gloomy than you can well imagine; but I will tell you all
candidly, and you can keep watch upon Bannerworth Hall at the same
time. You are well aware that I was well to do, and had ample funds,
and inclination to spend them.”—“I recollect; but you were married
then, surely?”—“I was,” said the stranger, sadly, “I was married
then.”—“And now?”—“I am a widower.” The stranger seemed much moved,
but, after a moment or so, he resumed—“I am a widower now; but how that
event came about is partly my purpose to tell you. I had not married
long—that is very long—for I have but one child, and she is not old, or
of an age to know much more than what she may be taught; she is still
in the course of education. I was early addicted to gamble; the dice
had its charms, as all those who have ever engaged in play but too
well know; it is perfectly fascinating.”—“So I have heard,” said Mr.
Chillingworth; “though, for myself, I found a wife and professional
pursuits quite incompatible with any pleasure that took either time
or resources.”—“It is so. I would I had never entered one of those
houses where men are deprived of their money and their own free will,
for at the gambling-table you have no liberty, save that in gliding
down the stream in company with others. How few have ever escaped
destruction—none, I believe—men are perfectly fascinated; it is ruin
alone that enables a man to see how he has been hurried onwards without
thought or reflection; and how fallacious were all the hopes he ever
entertained! Yes, ruin, and ruin alone, can do this; but, alas! ’tis
then too late—the evil is done. Soon after my marriage I fell in with
a Chevalier St. John. He was a man of the world in every sense of
the word, and one that was well versed in all the ways of society. I
never met with any man who was so perfectly master of himself, and
of perfect ease and self-confidence as he was. He was never at a
loss, and, come what would, never betrayed surprise or vexation—two
qualities, he thought, never ought to be shown by any man who moved
in society.”—“Indeed!”—“He was a strange man—a very strange man.”—
“Did he gamble?”—“It is difficult to give you a correct and direct
answer. I should say he did, and yet he never lost or won much; but I
have often thought he was more connected with those who did than was
believed.”—“Was that a fact?” inquired Mr. Chillingworth.—“You shall
see as we go on, and be able to judge for yourself. I have thought he
was. Well, he first took me to a handsome saloon, where gambling was
carried on. We had been to the opera. As we came out, he recommended
that we should sup at a house where he was well known, and where he was
in the habit of spending his evenings after the opera, and before he
retired. I agreed to this. I saw no reason why I should not. We went
there, and bitterly have I repented of so doing for years since, and do
to this day.”—“Your repentance has been sincere and lasting,” said Mr.
Chillingworth; “the one proves the other.”—“It does; but I thought not
so then. The place was glittering, and the wine good. It was a kind of
earthly paradise; and when we had taken some wine, the chevalier said
to me,—
“‘I am desirous of seeing a friend backwards; he is at the
hazard-table. Will you go with me?’—I hesitated. I feared to see the
place where a vice was carried on. I knew myself inclined to prudential
motives. I said to him,—‘No, St. John, I’ll wait here for you; it may
be as well—the wine is good, and it will content me?’
“‘Do so,’ he said, smiling; ‘but remember I seldom or never play
myself, nor is there any reason why you should.’—‘I’ll go, but I will
not play.’—‘Certainly not; you are free alike to look on, play, or quit
the place at any moment you please, and not be noticed, probably, by a
single soul.’
“I arose, and we walked backwards, having called one of the men who
were waiting about, but who were watchers and door-keepers of the
‘hell.’ We were led along the passage, and passed through the pair
of doors, which were well secured and rendered the possibility of a
surprise almost impossible. After these dark places, we were suddenly
let into a place where we were dazzled by the light and brilliancy of
the saloon. It was not so large as the one we left, but it was superior
to it in all its appointments.
“At first I could not well see who was, or who was not, in the room
where we were. As soon, however, as I found the use of my eyes, I
noticed many well-dressed men, who were busily engaged in play, and who
took no notice of any one who entered. We walked about for some minutes
without speaking to any one, but merely looking on. I saw men engaged
in play; some with earnestness, others again with great nonchalance,
and money changed hands without the least remark. There were but few
who spoke, and only those in play. There was a hum of conversation; but
you could not distinguish what was said, unless you paid some attention
to, and was in close vicinity with, the individual who spoke.
“‘Well,’ said St. John, ‘what do you think of this place?’—‘Why,’ I
replied, ‘I had no notion of seeing a place fitted up as this is.’
“‘No; isn’t it superb?’—‘It is beautifully done. They have many
visitors,’ said I, ‘many more than I could have believed.’
“‘Yes, they are all _bona fide_ players; men of stamp and rank—none
of your seedy legs who have only what they can cheat you out
of.’—‘Ah!’—‘And besides,’ he added, ‘you may often form friendships
here that lead to fortune hereafter. I do not mean in play, because
there is no necessity for your doing so, or, if you do so, in going
above a stake which you know won’t hurt you.’—‘Exactly.’
“‘Many men can never approach a table like this, and sit down to an
hour’s play, but, if they do, they must stake not only more than they
can afford, but all their property, leaving themselves beggars.’ ‘They
do?’ said I.
“‘But men who know themselves, their resources, and choose to indulge
for a time, may often come and lay the foundation to a very pretty
fortune.’
“‘Do you see your friend?’ I inquired.—‘No, I do not; but I will
inquire if he has been here—if not, we will go.’
“He left me for a moment or two to make some inquiry, and I stood
looking at the table, where there were four players, and who seemed
to be engaged at a friendly game; and when one party won they looked
grave, and when the other party lost they smiled and looked happy. I
walked away, as the chevalier did not return immediately to me; and
then I saw a gentleman rise up from a table. He had evidently lost. I
was standing by the seat, unconsciously holding the back in my hand. I
sat down without thinking or without speaking, and found myself at the
hazard table.
[Illustration: The hangman’s first night at the gaming table.]
“‘Do you play, sir?’—‘Yes,’ I said. I had hardly uttered the words when
I was sorry for them; but I could not recall them. I sat down, and play
at once commenced.
“In about ten or fifteen minutes, often losing and then winning, I
found myself about a hundred and twenty pounds in pocket, clear gain by
the play.
“‘Ah!’ said the chevalier, who came up at that moment, ‘I thought you
wouldn’t play.’—‘I really don’t know how it happened,’ said I, ‘but I
suddenly found myself here without any previous intention.’
“‘You are not a loser, I hope?’—‘Indeed I am not,’ I replied; ‘but not
much a gainer.’
“‘Nor need you desire to be. Do you desire to give your adversary his
revenge now, or take another opportunity.’—‘At another time,’ I replied.
“‘You will find me here the day after to-morrow, when I shall be at
your service;’ then bowing, he turned away.
“‘He is a very rich man whom you have been playing with,’ said the
chevalier.—‘Indeed!’
“‘Yes, and I have known him to lose for three days together; but you
may take his word for any amount; he is a perfect gentleman and man of
honour.’—‘’Tis well to play with such,’ I replied; ‘but I suppose you
are about to leave.’
“‘Yes, it grows late, and I have some business to transact to-morrow,
so I must leave.’—‘I will accompany you part of the way home,’ said I,
‘and then I shall have finished the night.’
“I did leave with him, and accompanied him home, and then walked to my
own home.”
• • • • •
“This was my first visit, and I thought a propitious beginning, but it
was the more dangerous. Perhaps a loss might have effectually deterred
me, but it is doubtful to tell how certain events might have been
altered. It is just possible that I might have been urged on by my
desire to retrieve any loss I might have incurred, and so made myself
at once the miserable being it took months to accomplish in bringing me
to.
“I went the day but one after this, to meet the same individual at the
gambling-table, and played some time with varied success, until I left
off with a trifling loss upon the night’s play, which was nothing of
any consequence.
“Thus matters went on; I sometimes won and sometimes lost, until I won
a few hundreds, and this determined me to play for higher stakes than
any I had yet played for.
“It was no use going on in the peddling style I had been going on; I
had won two hundred and fifty pounds in three months, and had I been
less fearful I might have had twenty-five thousand pounds. Ah! I’ll try
my fortune at a higher game.
“Having once made this resolution, I was anxious to begin my new
plan, which I hoped would have the effect of placing me far above my
then present position in society, which was good, and with a little
attention it would have made me an independent man; but then it
required patience, and nothing more. However, the other method was so
superior since it might all be done with good luck in a few months. Ah!
good luck; how uncertain is good luck; how changeful is fortune; how
soon is the best prospect blighted by the frosts of adversity. In less
than a month I had lost more than I could pay, and then I gambled on
for a living.
“My wife had but one child; her first and only one; an infant at her
breast; but there was a change came over her; for one had come over
me—a fearful one it was too—one not only in manner but in fortune too.
She would beg me to come home early; to attend to other matters, and
leave the dreadful life I was then leading.
“‘Lizzy,’ said I, ‘we are ruined.’—‘Ruined!’ she exclaimed, and
staggered back, until she fell into a seat. ‘Ruined!’
“‘Ay, ruined. It is a short word, but expressive.’—‘No, no, we are not
ruined. I know what you mean, you would say, we cannot live as we have
lived; we must retrench, and so we will, right willingly.’
“‘You must retrench most wonderfully,’ I said, with desperate calmness,
‘for the murder must out.’—‘And so we will; but you will be with
us; you will not go out night after night, ruining your health, our
happiness, and destroying both peace and prospects.’
“‘No, no, Lizzy, we have no chance of recovering ourselves; house and
home—all gone—all, all.’—‘My God!’ she exclaimed.
“‘Ay, rail on,’ said I; ‘you have cause enough; but, no matter—we have
lost all.’—‘How—how?’
“‘It is useless to ask how; I have done, and there is an end of the
matter; you shall know more another day; we must leave this house for a
lodging.’—‘It matters little,’ she said; ‘all may be won again, if you
will but say you will quit the society of those who have ruined you.’
“‘No one,’ said I, ‘has ruined me; I did it; it was no fault of any one
else’s; I have not that excuse.’—‘I am sure you can recover.’
“‘I may; some day fortune will shower her favours upon me, and I live
on in that expectation.’—‘You cannot mean that you will chance the
gaming-table? for I am sure you must have lost all there?’
“‘I have.’—‘God help me,’ she said; ‘you have done your child a wrong,
but you may repair it yet.’
“‘Never!’—‘’Tis a long day! let me implore you, on my knees, to leave
this place, and adopt some other mode of life; we can be careful; a
little will do, and we shall, in time, be equal to, and better than
what we have been.’
“‘We never can, save by chance.’—‘And by chance we never shall,’ she
replied; ‘if you will exert yourself, we may yet retrieve ourselves.’
“‘And exert myself I will.’—‘And quit the gaming-table?’
“‘Ask me to make no promises,’ said I; ‘I may not be able to keep them;
therefore, ask me to make none.’—‘I do ask you, beg of, entreat of you
to promise, and solemnly promise me that you will leave that fearful
place, where men not only lose all their goods, but the feelings of
nature also.’
“‘Say no more, Lizzy; if I can get a living elsewhere I will, but if
not, I must get it there.’
“She seemed to be cast down at this, and she shed tears. I left the
room, and again went to the gambling-house, and there that night, I
won a few pounds, which enabled me to take my wife and child away from
the house they had so long lived in, and took them afterwards to a
miserable place,—one room, where, indeed, there were a few articles of
furniture that I had saved from the general wreck of my own property.
“She took things much less to heart than I could have anticipated;
she seemed cheerful and happy,—she endeavoured to make my home as
comfortable as she could.
“Her whole endeavour was to make me, as much as possible, forget the
past. She wanted, as much as possible, to wean me away from my gambling
pursuits, but that was impossible. I had no hope, no other prospect.
“Thus she strove, but I could see each day she was getting paler, and
more pale; her figure, before round, was more thin, and betrayed signs
of emaciation. This preyed upon me; and, when fortune denied me the
means of carrying home that which she so much wanted, I could never
return for two days at a time. Then I would find her shedding tears,
and sighing; what could I say? If I had anything to take her, then I
used to endeavour to make her forget that I had been away.
“‘Ah!’ she would exclaim, ‘you will find me dead one of these days;
what you do now for one or two days, you will do by-and-bye for many
days, perhaps weeks.’—‘Do not anticipate evil.’
“‘I cannot do otherwise; were you in any other kind of employment but
that of gambling,’ she said, ‘I should have some hope of you; but,
as it is, there is none.’—‘Speak not of it; my chances may turn out
favourable yet, and you may be again as you were.’
“‘Never.’—‘But fortune is inconstant, and may change in my favour as
much as she has done in others.’
“‘Fortune is indeed constant, but misfortune is as inconstant.’—‘You
are prophetic of evil.’
“‘Ah! I would to Heaven I could predict good; but who ever yet heard of
a ruined gambler being able to retrieve himself by the same means that
he was ruined?’
“Thus we used to converse, but our conversation was usually of but
little comfort to either of us, for we could give neither any comfort
to the other; and as that was usually the case, our interviews became
less frequent, and of less duration. My answer was always the same.
“‘I have no other chance; my prospects are limited to that one place;
deprive me of that, and I never more should be able to bring you a
mouthful of bread.’
“Day after day,—day after day, the same result followed, and I was as
far from success as ever I was, and ever should be; I was yet a beggar.
“The time flew by; my little girl was nearly four years old, but she
knew not the misery her father and mother had to endure. The poor
little thing sometimes went without more than a meal a day; and while
I was living thus upon the town, upon the chances of the gaming table,
many a pang did she cause me, and so did her mother. My constant
consolation was this,—
“‘It is bad luck now,’ I would say; ‘but will be better by-and-bye;
things cannot always continue thus. It is all for them—all for them.’
“I thought that by continuing constantly in one course, I must be
at land at the ebb of the tide. ‘It cannot always flow one way,’ I
thought. I had often heard people say that if you could but have the
resolution to play on, you must in the end seize the turn of fortune.
“‘If I could but once do that, I would never enter a hell again as long
as I drew breath.’
“This was a resolve I could not only make but keep, because I had
suffered so much that I would never run through the same misery again
that I had already gone through. However, fortune never seemed inclined
to take the turn I had hoped for; fortune was as far off as ever, and
had in no case given me any opportunity of recovering myself.
“A few pounds were the utmost I could at any time muster, and I had to
keep up something of an appearance, and seem as if I had a thousand a
year; when, God knows, I could not have mustered a thousandth part of
that sum, were all done and paid for.
“Day after day passed on, and yet no change. I had almost given myself
up to despair, when one night when I went home I saw my wife was more
than usually melancholy and sad, and perhaps ill; I didn’t look at
her—I seldom did, because her looks were always a reproach to me; I
could not help feeling them so.
“‘Well,’ said I, ‘I have come home to you because I have something to
bring you; not what I ought—but what I can—you must be satisfied!’—‘I
am,’ she said.
“‘I know also you want it; how is the child, is she quite well?’—‘Yes,
quite.’
“‘Where is she?’ inquired I, looking round the room, but I didn’t see
her; she used to be up.—‘She has gone to bed,’ she said.
“‘It is very early.’—‘Yes, but she cried so for food that I was obliged
to get her to sleep to forget her hunger; poor thing, she has wanted
bread very badly.’
“‘Poor thing!’ I said, ‘let her be awakened and partake of what I have
brought home.’
“With that my wife waked her up, and the moment she opened her eyes she
again began to cry for food, which I immediately gave her, and saw her
devour with the utmost haste and hunger. The sight smote my heart, and
my wife sat by watching, and endeavouring to prevent her from eating so
fast.
“‘This is bad,’ I said.—‘Yes, but I hope it may be the worst,’ she
replied, in a deep and hollow voice.
“‘Lizzy,’ I exclaimed, ‘what is the matter—are you ill?’—‘Yes, very
ill.’
“‘What is the matter with you? For God’s sake tell me,’ I said, for I
was alarmed.—‘I am very ill,’ she said, ‘very ill indeed; I feel my
strength decreasing every day. I must drink.’
“‘You, too, want food?’—‘I have and perhaps do, though the desire to
eat seems almost to have left me.’
“‘For Heaven’s sake eat,’ said I; ‘I will bring you home something more
by to-morrow; eat and drink Lizzy. I have suffered; but for you and
your child’s sake, I will do my best.’—‘Your best,’ she said, ‘will
kill us both; but, alas, there is no other aid at hand. You may one
day, however, come here too late to find us living.’
“‘Say no more, Lizzy, you know not my feelings when you speak thus;
alas, I have no hope—no aid—no friend.’—‘No,’ she replied, ‘your love
of gaming drove them from you, because they would not aid a gambler.’
“‘Say no more, Lizzy,’ I said; ‘if there be not an end to this life
soon, there will be an end to me. In two days more I shall return to
you. Good bye; God bless you. Keep up your heart and the child.’—‘Good
bye,’ she said, sorrowfully. She shed tears, and wrung her hands
bitterly. I hastened away—my heart was ready to burst, and I could not
speak.
“I walked about to recover my serenity, but could not do so
sufficiently well to secure anything like an appearance that would
render me fit to go to the gaming-house. That night I remained away,
but I could not avoid falling into a debauch to drown my misfortunes,
and shift the scene of misery that was continually before my eyes.”
• • • • •
“The next night I was at the gaming-house. I went there in better
than usual spirits. I saw, I thought, a change in fortune, and hailed
that as the propitious moment of my life, when I was to rise above my
present misfortunes.
“I played and won—played and lost—played and won, and then lost again;
thus I went on, fluctuating more and more, until I found I was getting
money in my pocket. I had, at one moment more than three hundred
pounds in my pocket, and I felt that then was my happy moment—then
the tide of fortune was going in my favour. I ought to have left off
with that—to have been satisfied with such an amount of money; but the
demon of avarice seemed to have possessed me, and I went on and on with
fluctuating fortune, until I lost the whole of it.
“I was mad—desperate, and could have destroyed myself; but I thought
of the state my wife and child were in; I thought that that night they
would want food; but they could not hurt for one day—they must have
some, or would procure some.
“I was too far gone to be able to go to them, even if I were possessed
of means; but I had none, and daylight saw me in a deep sleep, from
which I awoke not until the next evening set in, and then I once more
determined that I would make a desperate attempt to get a little money.
I had always paid, and thought my word would be taken for once; and, if
I won, all well and good; if not, then I was no worse off than before.
“This was easy to plan, but not to execute. I went there, but there
were none present in whom I had sufficient interest to dare make the
attempt. I walked about, and felt in a most uncomfortable state. I
feared I should not succeed at all, then what was to become of me—of
my wife and child? This rendered me almost mad. I could not understand
what I was to do, what to attempt, or where to go. One or two persons
came up, and asked me if I were ill. My answers were, that I was
well enough. Good God! how far from the truth was that; but I found
I must place more control on my feelings, else I should cause much
conversation, and then I should lose all hope of recovering myself, and
all prospect of living, even.
“At length some one did come in, and I remarked I had been there all
the evening and had not played. I had an invitation to play with him,
which ended, by a little sleight of hand, in my favour; and on that I
had calculated as much as on any good fortune I might meet. The person
I played with observed it not, and, when we left off playing, I had
some six or seven pounds in pocket. This, to me, was a very great sum;
and, the moment I could decently withdraw myself, I ran off home.
“I was fearful of the scene that awaited me. I expected something;
worse than I had yet seen. Possibly Lizzy might be angry, and scold as
well as complain. I therefore tapped at the door gently, but heard no
one answer; but of this I took no notice, as I believed that they might
be, and were, most probably, fast asleep. I had provided myself with a
light, and I therefore opened the door, which was not fastened.
“‘Lizzy!’ said I, ‘Lizzy!’ There was no answer given, and I paused.
Everything was as still as death. I looked on the bed—there lay my wife
with her clothes on.
“‘Lizzy! Lizzy!’ said I. But still she did not answer me.
“‘Well,’ said I, ‘she sleeps sound;’ and I walked towards the bed, and
placed my hand upon her shoulder, and began to shake her, saying, as I
did so,—
“‘Lizzy! Lizzy! I’m come home.’ But still no answer, or signs of
awaking.
“I went on the other side of the bed to look at her face, and some
misgivings overtook me. I trembled much. She lay on the bed, with her
back towards the spot where I stood.
“I came towards her face. My hand shook violently as I endeavoured to
look at her. She had her eyes wide open, as if staring at me.
“‘Lizzy,’ said I. No answer was returned. I then placed my hand upon
her cheek. It was enough, and I started back in great horror. She was
dead!
“This was horror itself. I staggered back and fell into a chair. The
light I placed down, Heaven knows how or why; but there I sat staring
at the corpse of my unfortunate wife. I can hardly tell you the
tremendous effect this had upon me. I could not move. I was fascinated
to the spot. I could not move and could not turn.”
[Illustration: The hangman discovers his dead wife and child.]
• • • • •
“It was morning, and the rays of the sun illumined the apartment; but
there sat I, still gazing upon the face of my unfortunate wife, I saw,
I knew she was dead; but yet I had not spoken, but sat looking at her.
“I believe my heart was as cold as she was; but extreme horror and
dread had dried up all the warm blood in my body, and I hardly think
there was a pulsation left. The thoughts of my child never once seemed
to cross my mind. I had, however, sat there long—some hours before I
was discovered, and this was by the landlady.
“I had left the door open behind me, and she, in passing down, had the
curiosity to peep, and saw me sitting in what she thought to be a very
strange attitude, and could hear no sounds.
“After some time she discovered my wife was dead, and, for some time,
she thought me so, too. However, she was convinced to the contrary,
and then began to call for assistance. This awoke the child, which was
nearly famished. The landlady, to become useful, and to awaken me from
my lethargy, placed the child in my hands, telling me I was the best
person now to take care of it.
“And so I was; there was no doubt of the truth of that, and I was
compelled to acknowledge it. I felt much pride and pleasure in my
daughter, and determined she should, if I starved, have the benefit of
all I could do for her in the way of care, &c.”
• • • • •
“The funeral over, I took my child and carried it to a school, where
I left her, and paid in advance, promising to do so as often as the
quarter came round. My wife I had seen buried by the hands of man, and
I swore I would do the best for my child, and to keep this oath was a
work of pleasure.
“I determined also I would never more enter a gaming-house, be the
extremity what it might; I would suffer even death before I would
permit myself to enter the house in which it took place.
“‘I will,’ I thought, ‘obtain some employment of some kind or other.
I could surely obtain that. I have only to ask and I have it,
surely—something, however menial, that would keep me and my child. Yes,
yes—she ought, she must have her charges paid at once.’”
“The effect of my wife’s death was a very great shock to me, and such a
one I could not forget—one I shall ever remember, and one that at least
made a lasting impression upon me.”
• • • • •
“Strange, but true, I never entered a gambling-house; it was my horror
and my aversion. And yet I could obtain no employment. I took my
daughter and placed her at a boarding-school, and tried hard to obtain
bread by labour; but, do what would, none could be had; if my soul
depended upon it, I could find none. I cared not what it was—anything
that was honest.
“I was reduced low—very low; gaunt starvation showed itself in my
cheeks; but I wandered about to find employment; none could be found,
and the world seemed to have conspired together to throw me back to the
gaming-table.
“But this I would not. At last employment was offered; but what was
it? The situation of common hangman was offered me. The employment was
disgusting and horrible; but, at the same time, it was all I could get,
and that was a sufficient inducement for me to accept of it. I was,
therefore, the common executioner; and in that employment for some time
earned a living. It was terrible; but necessity compelled me to accept
the only thing I could obtain. You now know the reason why I became
what I have told you.”
CHAPTER LXXIII.
THE VISIT OF THE VAMPIRE.—THE GENERAL MEETING.
The mysterious friend of Mr. Chillingworth finished his narrative, and
then the doctor said to him,—
“And that, then, is the real cause why you, a man evidently far above
the position of life which is usually that of those who occupy the
dreadful post of executioner, came to accept of it.”—“The real reason,
sir. I considered, too, that in holding such a humiliating situation
that I was justly served for the barbarity of which I had been guilty;
for what can be a greater act of cruelty than to squander, as I did, in
the pursuit of mad excitement, those means which should have rendered
my home happy, and conduced to the welfare of those who were dependant
upon me?”
“I do not mean to say that your self-reproaches are unjust altogether,
but—What noise is that? do you hear anything?”—“Yes—yes.”
“What do you take it to be?”—“It seemed like the footsteps of a number
of persons, and it evidently approaches nearer and nearer. I know not
what to think.”
“Shall I tell you?” said a deep-toned voice, and some one, through the
orifice in the back of the summer-house, which, it will be recollected,
sustained some damage at the time that Varney escaped from it, laid a
hand upon Mr. Chillingworth’s shoulder. “God bless me!” exclaimed the
doctor; “who’s that?” and he sprang from his seat with the greatest
perturbation in the world.
[Illustration: The vampyre interrupts the conference in the
summer-house.]
“Varney, the vampyre!” added the voice, and then both the doctor and
his companion recognised it, and saw the strange, haggard features,
that now they knew so well, confronting them. There was a pause of
surprise, for a moment or two, on the part of the doctor, and then he
said, “Sir Francis Varney, what brings you here? I conjure you to tell
me, in the name of common justice and common feeling, what brings you
to this house so frequently? You have dispossessed the family, whose
property it is, of it, and you have caused great confusion and dismay
over a whole county. I implore you now, not in the language of menace
or as an enemy, but as the advocate of the oppressed, and one who
desires to see justice done to all, to tell me what it is you require.”
“There is no time now for explanation,” said Varney, “if explanations
were my full and free intent. You wished to know what noise was that
you heard?”
“I did; can you inform me?”—“I can. The wild and lawless mob which
you and your friends first induced to interfere in affairs far beyond
their or your control, are now flushed with the desire of riot and of
plunder. The noise you hear is that of their advancing footsteps; they
come to destroy Bannerworth Hall.”
“Can that be possible? The Bannerworth family are the sufferers from
all that has happened, and not the inflictors of suffering.”—“Ay, be it
so; but he who once raises a mob has raised an evil spirit, which, in
the majority of cases, it requires a far more potent spell than he is
master of to quell again.”
“It is so. That is a melancholy truth; but you address me, Sir Francis
Varney, as if I led on the mob, when in reality I have done all that
lay in my power, from the very first moment of their rising on account
of this affair, which, in the first instance, was your work, to prevent
them from proceeding to acts of violence.”—“It may be so; but if you
have now any regard for your own safety you will quit this place. It
will too soon become the scene of a bloody contention. A large party of
dragoons are even now by another route coming towards it, and it will
be their duty to resist the aggressions of the mob; then should the
rioters persevere, you can guess the result.”—“I can, indeed.”
“Retire then while you may, and against the bad deeds of Sir Francis
Varney at all events place some of his good ones, that he may not seem
wholly without one redeeming trait.”—“I am not accustomed,” said the
doctor, “to paint the devil blacker than he really is; but yet the
cruel persecutions that the Bannerworth family have endured call aloud
for justice. You still, with a perseverance which shows you regardless
of what others suffer so that you compass your own ends, hover round a
spot which you have rendered desolate.”
“Hark, sir; do you not hear the tramp of horses’ feet?”—“I do.”
The noise made by the feet of the insurgents was now almost drowned in
the louder and more rapid tramp of the horses’ feet of the advancing
dragoons, and, in a few moments more, Sir Francis Varney waved his arm,
exclaiming,—
“They are here. Will you not consult your safety by flight?”—“No,” said
Mr. Chillingworth’s companion; “we prefer remaining here at the risk
even of whatever danger may accrue to us.”
“Fools, would you die in a chance _melee_ between an infuriated
populace and soldiery?”—“Do not leave,” whispered the ex-hangman to Mr.
Chillingworth; “do not leave, I pray you. He only wants to have the
Hall to himself.”
There could be no doubt now of the immediate appearance of the cavalry,
and, before Sir Francis Varney could utter another word, a couple of
the foremost of the soldiers cleared the garden fence at a part where
it was low, and alighted not many feet from the summer-house in which
this short colloquy was taking place. Sir Francis Varney uttered a
bitter oath, and immediately disappeared in the gloom.
“What shall we do?” said the hangman.—“You can do what you like, but I
shall avow my presence to the military, and claim to be on their side
in the approaching contest, if it should come to one, which I sincerely
hope it will not.”
The military detachment consisted of about twenty-five dragoons, who
now were all in the gardens. An order was given by the officer in
command for them to dismount, which was at once obeyed, and the horses
were fastened by their bridles to the various trees with which the
place abounded.
“They are going to oppose the mob on foot, with their carbines,” said
the hangman; “there will be sad work here I am afraid.”—“Well, at all
events,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “I shall decline acting the part of a
spy here any longer; so here goes.”
“Hilloa! a friend,—a friend here, in the summer-house!”
“Make it two friends,” cried the hangman, “if you please, while you are
about it.”
A couple of the dragoons immediately appeared, and the doctor, with his
companion, were marched, as prisoners, before the officer in command.
“What do you do here?” he said; “I was informed that the Hall was
deserted. Here, orderly, where is Mr. Adamson, the magistrate, who came
with me?”—“Close at hand sir, and he says he’s not well.”
“Well, or ill, he must come here, and do something with these people.”
A magistrate of the district who had accompanied the troops, and been
accommodated with a seat behind one of the dragoons, which seemed very
much to have disagreed with him, for he was as pale as death, now
stepped forward.
“You know me, Mr. Adamson?” said the doctor; “I am Mr.
Chillingworth.”—“Oh! yes; Lord bless you! how came you here?”
“Never mind that just now; you can vouch for my having no connection
with the rioters.”—“Oh! dear, yes; certainly. This is a respectable
gentleman, Captain Richardson, and a personal friend of mine.”
“Oh! very good.”—“And I,” said the doctor’s companion, “am likewise a
respectable and useful member of society, and a great friend of Mr.
Chillingworth.”
“Well, gentlemen,” said the captain in command, “you may remain here,
if you like, and take the chances, or you may leave.”
They intimated that they preferred remaining, and, almost at the moment
that they did so, a loud shout from many throats announced the near
approach of the mob.—“Now, Mr. Magistrate, if you please,” said the
officer; “you will be so good as to tell the mob that I am here with my
troop, under your orders, and strongly advise them to be off while they
can, with whole skins, for if they persevere in attacking the place, we
must persevere in defending it; and, if they have half a grain of sense
among them, they can surely guess what the result of that will be.”
“I will do the best I can, as Heaven is, my judge,” said the
magistrate, “to produce a peaceable result,—more no man can do.”
“Hurrah! hurrah!” shouted the mob, “down with the Vampyre! down with
the Hall!” and then one, more candid than his fellows, shouted,—“Down
with everything and everybody!”
“Ah!” remarked the officer; “that fellow now knows what he came about.”
A great number of torches and links were lighted by the mob, but the
moment the glare of light fell upon the helmets and accoutrements
of the military, there was a pause of consternation on the part of
the multitude, and Mr. Adamson, urged on by the officer, who, it was
evident, by no means liked the service he was on, took advantage of the
opportunity, and, stepping forward, he said,—
“My good people, and fellow townsmen, let me implore you to listen
to reason, and go to your homes in peace. If you do not, but, on the
contrary, in defiance of law and good order, persist in attacking this
house, it will become my painful duty to read the riot act, and then
the military and you will have to fight it out together, which I beg
you will avoid, for you know that some of you will be killed, and a lot
more of you receive painful wounds. Now disperse, let me beg of you, at
once.”
There seemed for a moment a disposition among the mob to give up the
contest, but there were others among them who were infuriated with
drink, and so regardless of all consequences. Those set up a shout of
“Down with the red coats; we are Englishmen, and will do what we like.”
Some one then threw a heavy stone, which struck one of the soldiers,
and brought blood from his cheek. The officer saw it, but he said at
once,—
“Stand firm, now, stand firm. No anger—steady.”
“Twenty pounds for the man who threw that stone,” said the
magistrate.—“Twenty pound ten for old Adamson, the magistrate,” cried
a voice in the crowd, which, no doubt came from him who had cast the
missile.
Then, at least fifty stones were thrown, some of which hit the
magistrate, and the remainder came rattling upon the helmets of the
dragoons, like a hail shower.
“I warn you, and beg of you to go,” said Mr. Adamson; “for the sake
of your wives and families, I beg of you not to pursue this desperate
game.”
Loud cries now arose of “Down with the soldiers; down with the vampyre.
He’s in Bannerworth Hall. Smoke him out.” And then one or two links
were hurled among the dismounted dragoons. All this was put up with
patiently; and then again the mob were implored to leave, which being
answered by fresh taunts, the magistrate proceeded to read the riot
act, not one word of which was audible amid the tumult that prevailed.
“Put out all the lights,” cried a voice among the mob. The order was
obeyed, and the same voice added; “they dare not fire on us. Come on:”
and a rush was made at the garden wall.
“Make ready—present,” cried the officer. And then he added, in an under
tone, “above their heads, now—fire.”
There was a blaze of light for a moment, a stunning noise, a shout of
dismay from the mob, and in another moment all was still.
“I hope,” said Dr. Chillingworth, “that this is, at all events, a
bloodless victory.”
“You may depend upon that,” said his companion; “but is not there some
one yet remaining? Look there, do you not see a figure clambering over
the fence?”
“Yes, I do, indeed. Ah, they have him a prisoner, at all events. Those
two dragoons have him, fast enough; we shall now, perhaps, hear from
this fellow who is the actual ringleader in such an affair, which, but
for the pusillanimity of the mob, might have turned out to be really
most disastrous.”
It was strange how one man should think it expedient to attack the
military post after the mob had been so completely routed at the first
discharge of fire-arms, but so it was. One man did make an attempt to
enter the garden, and it was so rapid and so desperate an one, that he
rather seemed to throw himself bodily at the fence, which separated it
from the meadows without, than to clamber over it, as any one under
ordinary circumstances, who might wish to effect an entrance by that
means, would have done.
He was no sooner, however, perceived, than a couple of the dismounted
soldiers stepped forward and made a prisoner of him.
“Good God!” exclaimed Mr. Chillingworth, as they approached nearer with
him. “Good God! what is the meaning of that? Do my eyes deceive me, or
are they, indeed, so blessed?”
“Blessed by what?” exclaimed the hangman.
“By a sight of the long lost, deeply regretted Charles Holland.
Charles—Charles, is that indeed you, or some unsubstantial form in your
likeness?”
Charles Holland, for it was, indeed, himself, heard the friendly voice
of the doctor, and he called out to him.
“Speak to me of Flora. Oh, speak to me of Flora, if you would not have
me die at once of suspense, and all the torture of apprehension.”
“She lives and is well.”
“Thank Heaven. Do with me what you please.”
Dr. Chillingworth sprang forward, and addressing the magistrate, he
said,—
“Sir, I know this gentleman. He is not one of the rioters, but a dear
friend of the family of the Bannerworths. Charles Holland, what in the
name of Heaven had become of you so long, and what brought you here at
such a juncture as this?”
“I am faint,” said Charles; “I—I only arrived as the crowd did. I had
not strength to fight my way through them, and was compelled to pause
until they had dispersed Can—can you give me water?”
“Here’s something better,” said one of the soldiers, as he handed a
flask to Charles, who partook of some of the contents, which greatly
revived him, indeed.
“I am better now,” he said. “Thank you kindly. Take me into the house.
Good God! why is it made a point of attack? Where are Flora and Henry?
Are they all well? And my uncle? Oh! what must you all have thought of
my absence! But you cannot have endured a hundredth part of what I have
suffered. Let me look once again upon the face of Flora. Take me into
the house.”
“Release him,” said the officer, as he pointed to his head, and looked
significantly, as much as to say, “Some mad patient of yours, I
suppose.”
“You are much mistaken, sir,” said Dr. Chillingworth; “this gentleman
has been cruelly used, I have no doubt. He has, I am inclined to
believe, been made the victim, for a time, of the intrigues of that
very Sir Francis Varney, whose conduct has been the real cause of all
the serious disturbances that have taken place in the country.”
“Confound Sir Francis Varney,” muttered the officer; “he is enough to
set a whole nation by the ears. However, Mr. Magistrate, if you are
satisfied that this young man is not one of the rioters, I have, of
course, no wish to hold him a prisoner.”
“I can take Mr. Chillingworth’s word for more than that,” said the
magistrate.
Charles Holland was accordingly released, and then the doctor, in
hurried accents, told him the principal outlines of what had occurred.
“Oh! take me to Flora,” he said; “let me not delay another moment in
seeking her, and convincing her that I could not have been guilty of
the baseness of deserting her.”
“Hark you, Mr. Holland, I have quite made up my mind that I will not
leave Bannerworth Hall yet; but you can go alone, and easily find
them by the directions which I will give you; only let me beg of you
not to go abruptly into the presence of Flora. She is in an extremely
delicate state of health, and although I do not take upon myself to say
that a shock of a pleasurable nature would prove of any paramount bad
consequence to her, yet it is as well not to risk it.”
“I will be most careful, you may depend.”
At this moment there was a loud ringing at the garden bell, and, when
it was answered by one of the dragoons, who was ordered to do so by his
officer, he came back, escorting no other than Jack Pringle, who had
been sent by the admiral to the Hall, but who had solaced himself so
much on the road with divers potations, that he did not reach it till
now, which was a full hour after the reasonable time in which he ought
to have gone the distance.
Jack was not to say dumb, but he had had enough to give him a very
jolly sort of feeling of independence, and so he came along quarrelling
with the soldier all the way, the latter only laughing and keeping his
temper admirably well, under a great deal of provocation.
“Why, you land lubbers,” cried Jack, “what do you do here, all of you,
I wonder! You are all wamphighers, I’ll be bound, every one of you. You
mind me of marines, you do, and that’s quite enough to turn a proper
seaman’s stomach, any day in the week.”
The soldier only laughed, and brought Jack up to the little group of
persons consisting of Dr. Chillingworth, the hangman, Charles Holland,
and the officer.
“Why, Jack Pringle,” said Dr. Chillingworth, stepping before Charles,
so that Jack should not see him,—“why, Jack Pringle, what brings you
here?”
“A slight squall, sir, to the nor’west. Brought you something to eat.”
Jack produced a bottle.
“To drink, you mean?”
“Well, it’s all one; only in this here shape, you see, it goes down
better, I’m thinking, which does make a little difference somehow.”
“How is the admiral?”
“Oh, he’s as stupid as ever; Lord bless you, he’d be like a ship
without a rudder without me, and would go swaying about at the mercy of
winds and waves, poor old man. He’s bad enough as it is, but if so be I
wasn’t to give the eye to him as I does, bless my heart if I thinks as
he’d be above hatches long. Here’s to you all.”
Jack took the cork from the bottle he had with him, and there came
from it a strong odour of rum. Then he placed it to his lips, and
was enjoying the pleasant gurgle of the liquor down his throat, when
Charles stepped up to him, and laying hold of the lower end of the
bottle, he dragged it from his mouth, saying,—
“How dare you talk in the way you have of my uncle, you drunken,
mutinous rascal, and behind his back too!”
The voice of Charles Holland was as well known to Jack Pringle as
that of the admiral, and his intense astonishment at hearing himself
so suddenly addressed by one, of whose proximity he had not the least
idea, made some of the rum go, what is popularly termed, the wrong way,
and nearly choked him.
He reeled back, till he fell over some obstruction, and then down he
sat on a flower bed, while his eyes seemed ready to come out of his
head.
[Illustration: Jack Pringle falls on his seat in the forest.]
“Avast heavings,” he cried, “Who’s that?”
“Come, come,” said Charles Holland, “don’t pretend you don’t know me; I
will not have my uncle spoken of in a disrespectful manner by you.”
“Well, shiver my timbers, if that ain’t our nevey. Why, Charley, my
boy, how are you? Here we are in port at last. Won’t the old commodore
pipe his eye, now. Whew! here’s a go. I’ve found our nevey, after all.”
“You found him,” said Dr. Chillingworth; “now, that is as great a piece
of impudence as ever I heard in all my life. You mean that he has found
you, and found you out, too, you drunken fellow. Jack, you get worse
and worse every day.”
“Ay, ay, sir.”
“What, you admit it?”
“Ay, ay, sir. Now, Master Charley, I tell you what it is, I shall take
you off to your old uncle, you shore-going sneak, and you’ll have to
report what cruise you’ve been upon all this while, leaving the ship to
look after itself. Lord love you all, if it hadn’t been for me I don’t
know what anybody would have done.”
“I only know of the result,” said Dr. Chillingworth, “that would ensue,
if it were not for you, and that would consist in a great injury to the
revenue, in consequence of the much less consumption of rum and other
strong liquors.”
“I’ll be hanged up at the yard if I understands what you mean,” said
Jack; “as if I ever drunk anything—I, of all people in the world. I am
ashamed of you. You are drunk.”
Several of the dragoons had to turn aside to keep themselves from
laughing, and the officer himself could not forbear from a smile as he
said to the doctor,—
“Sir, you seem to have many acquaintances, and by some means or another
they all have an inclination to come here to-night. If, however, you
consider that you are bound to remain here from a feeling that the Hall
is threatened with any danger, you may dismiss that fear, for I shall
leave a picquet here all night.”
“No, sir,” replied Dr. Chillingworth, “it is not that I fear now, after
the manner in which they have been repulsed, any danger to the Hall
from the mob; but I have reasons for wishing to be in it or near it for
some time to come.”
“As you please.”
“Charles, do not wait for or accept the guidance of that drunken
fellow, but go yourself with a direction which I will write down for
you in a leaf of my pocket-book.”
“Drunken fellow,” exclaimed Jack, who had now scrambled to his feet,
“who do you call a drunken fellow?”
“Why you, unquestionably.”
“Well, now, that is hard. Come along, nevey; I’ll shew you where they
all are. I could walk a plank on any deck with any man in the service,
I could. Come along, my boy, come along.”
“You can accept of him as a guide if you like, of course,” said the
doctor; “he may be sober enough to conduct you.”
“I think he can,” said Charles. “Lead on, Jack; but mark me, I shall
inform my uncle of this intemperance, as well as of the manner in
which you let your tongue wag about him behind his back, unless you
promise to reform.”
“He is long past all reformation,” remarked Dr. Chillingworth; “it is
out of the question.”
“And I am afraid my uncle will not have courage to attempt such an
ungrateful task, when there is so little chance of success,” replied
Charles Holland, shaking the worthy doctor by the hand. “Farewell, for
the present, sir; the next time I see you, I hope we shall both be more
pleasantly situated.”
“Come along, nevey,” interrupted Jack Pringle; “now you’ve found your
way back, the first thing you ought to do, is to report yourself as
having come aboard. Follow me, and I’ll soon show yer the port where
the old hulk’s laid hisself up.”
Jack walked on first, tolerably steady, if one may take into account
his divers deep potations, and Charles Holland, anticipating with
delight again looking upon the face of his much loved Flora, followed
closely behind him.
We can well imagine the world of delightful thoughts that came crowding
upon him when Jack, after rather a long walk, announced that they were
now very near the residence of the object of his soul’s adoration.
We trust that there is not one of our readers who, for one moment, will
suppose that Charles Holland was the sort of man to leave even such a
villain and double-faced hypocrite as Marchdale, to starve amid the
gloomy ruins where he was immured.
Far from Charles’s intentions was any such thing; but he did think that
a night passed there, with no other company than his own reflections,
would do him a world of good, and was, at all events, no very great
modicum of punishment for the rascality with which he had behaved.
Besides, even during that night there were refreshments in the shape of
bread and water, such as had been presented to Charles himself, within
Marchdale’s reach as they had been within his.
That individual now, Charles thought, would have a good opportunity of
testing the quality of that kind of food, and of finding out what an
extremely light diet it was for a strong man to live upon.
But in the morning it was Charles’s intention to take Henry Bannerworth
and the admiral with him to the ruins, and then and there release
the wretch from his confinement, on condition that he made a full
confession of his villanies before those persons.
Oh, how gladly would Marchdale have exchanged the fate which actually
befell him for any amount of personal humiliation, always provided that
it brought with it a commensurate amount of personal safety.
But that fate was one altogether undreamt of by Charles Holland, and
wholly without his control.
It was a fate which would have been his, but for the murderous purpose
which had brought Marchdale to the dungeon, and those happy accidents
which had enabled Charles to change places with him, and breathe the
free, cool, fresh air; while he left his enemy loaded with the same
chains that had encumbered his limbs so cruelly, and lying on that same
damp dungeon floor, which he thought would be his grave.
We mentioned that as Charles left the ruins, the storm, which had
been giving various indications of its coming, seemed to be rapidly
approaching.
It was one of these extremely local tempests which expend all their
principal fury over a small space of country; and, in this instance,
the space seemed to include little more than the river, and the few
meadows which immediately surrounded it, and lent it so much of its
beauty.
Marchdale soon found that his cries were drowned by the louder voices
of the elements. The wailing of the wind among the ancient ruins
was much more full of sound than his cries; and, now and then, the
full-mouthed thunder filled the air with such a volume of roaring, and
awakened so many echoes among the ruins, that, had he possessed the
voices of fifty men, he could not have hoped to wage war with it.
And then, although we know that Charles Holland would have encountered
death himself, rather than he would have willingly left anything human
to expire of hunger in that dungeon, yet Marchdale, judging of others
by himself, felt by no means sure of any such thing, and, in his
horror of apprehension, fancied that that was just the sort of easy,
and pleasant, and complete revenge that it was in Charles Holland’s
power to take, and just the one which would suggest itself, under the
circumstances, to his mind.
Could anything be possibly more full of horror than such a thought?
Death, let it come in any shape it may, is yet a most repulsive and
unwelcome guest; but, when it comes, so united with all that can add to
its terrors, it is enough to drive reason from its throne, and fill the
mind with images of absolute horror.
Tired of shrieking, for his parched lips and clogged tongue would
scarcely now permit him to utter a sound higher than a whisper.
Marchdale lay, listening to the furious storm without, in the last
abandonment of despair.
“Oh! what a death is this,” he groaned. “Here, alone—all alone—and
starvation to creep on me by degrees, sapping life’s energies one by
one. Already do I feel the dreadful sickening weakness growing on me.
Help, oh! help me Heav—no, no! Dare I call on Heaven to help me? Is
there no fiend of darkness who now will bid me a price for a human
soul? Is there not one who will do so—not one who will rescue me from
the horror that surrounds me, for Heaven will not? I dare not ask mercy
there.”
The storm continued louder and louder. The wind, it is true, was nearly
hushed, but the roar and the rattle of the echo-awakening thunder fully
made up for its cessation, while, now and then, even there, in that
underground abode, some sudden reflection of the vivid lightning’s
light would find its way, lending, for a fleeting moment, sufficient
light to Marchdale, wherewith he could see the gloomy place in which he
was.
At times he wept, and at times he raved, while ever and anon he made
such frantic efforts to free himself from the chains that were around
him, that, had they not been strong, he must have succeeded; but, as it
was, he only made deep indentations into his flesh, and gave himself
much pain.
“Charles Holland!” he shouted; “oh! release me! Varney! Varney! why do
you not come to save me? I have toiled for you most unrequitedly—I have
not had my reward. Let it all consist in my release from this dreadful
bondage. Help! help! oh, help!”
There was no one to hear him. The storm continued, and now, suddenly, a
sudden and a sharper sound than any awakened by the thunder’s roar came
upon his startled ear, and, in increased agony, he shouted,—
“What is that? oh! what is that? God of heaven, do my fears translate
that sound aright? Can it be, oh! can it be, that the ruins which have
stood for so many a year are now crumbling down before the storm of
to-night?”
The sound came again, and he felt the walls of the dungeon in which
he was shake. Now there could be no doubt but that the lightning had
struck some part of the building, and so endangered the safety of all
that was above ground. For a moment there came across his brain such
a rush of agony, that he neither spoke nor moved. Had that dreadful
feeling continued much longer, he must have lapsed into insanity; but
that amount of mercy—for mercy it would have been—was not shown to him.
He still felt all the accumulating horrors of his situation, and then,
with such shrieks as nothing but a full appreciation of such horrors
could have given him strength to utter, he called upon earth, upon
heaven and upon all that was infernal, to save him from his impending
doom.
All was in vain. It was an impending doom which nothing but the direct
interposition of Heaven could have at all averted; and it was not
likely that any such perversion of the regular laws of nature would
take place to save such a man as Marchdale.
Again came the crashing sound of falling stones, and he was certain
that the old ruins, which had stood for so many hundred years the
storm, and the utmost wrath of the elements, was at length yielding,
and crumbling down.
What else could he expect but to be engulphed among the
fragments—fragments still weighty and destructive, although in decay.
How fearfully now did his horrified imagination take in at one glance,
as it were, a panoramic view of all his past life, and how absolutely
contemptible, at that moment, appeared all that he had been striving
for.
But the walls shake again, and this time the vibration is more fearful
than before. There is a tremendous uproar above him—the roof yields to
some superincumbent pressure—there is one shriek, and Marchdale lies
crushed beneath a mass of masonry that it would take men and machinery
days to remove from off him.
[Illustration: The destruction of the traitor, Marchdale.]
All is over now. That bold, bad man—that accomplished hypocrite—that
mendacious, would-be murderer was no more. He lies but a mangled,
crushed, and festering corpse.
May his soul find mercy with his God!
The storm, from this moment, seemed to relax in its violence, as if
it had accomplished a great purpose, and, consequently, now, need
no longer “vex the air with its boisterous presence.” Gradually the
thunder died away in the distance. The wind no longer blew in blustrous
gusts, but, with a gentle murmuring, swept around the ancient pile, as
if singing the requiem of the dead that lay beneath—that dead which
mortal eyes were never to look upon.
CHAPTER LXXIV.
THE MEETING OF CHARLES AND FLORA.
Charles Holland followed Jack Pringle for some time in silence from
Bannerworth Hall; his mind was too full of thought concerning the past
to allow him to indulge in much of that kind of conversation in which
Jack Pringle might be fully considered to be a proficient.
As for Jack, somehow or another, he had felt his dignity offended in
the garden of Bannerworth Hall, and he had made up his mind, as he
afterwards stated in his own phraseology, not to speak to nobody till
somebody spoke to him.
A growing anxiety, however, to ascertain from one who had seen her
lately, how Flora had borne his absence, at length induced Charles
Holland to break his self-imposed silence.
“Jack,” he said, “you have had the happiness of seeing her lately, tell
me, does Flora Bannerworth look as she was wont to look, or have all
the roses faded from her cheeks?”
“Why, as for the roses,” said Jack, “I’m blowed if I can tell, and
seeing as how she don’t look at me much, I doesn’t know nothing about
her; I can tell you something, though, about the old admiral that will
make you open your eyes.”
“Indeed, Jack, and what may that be?”
“Why, he’s took to drink, and gets groggy about every day of his life,
and the most singular thing is, that when that’s the case with the old
man, he says it’s me.”
“Indeed, Jack! taken to drinking has my poor old uncle, from grief, I
suppose, Jack, at my disappearance.”
“No, I don’t think it’s grief,” said Jack; “it strikes me it’s
rum-and-water.”
“Alas, alas, I never could have imagined he could have fallen into that
habit of yours; he always seemed so far from anything of this kind.”
“Ay, ay, sir,” said Jack, “I know’d you’d be astonished. It will be
the death of him, that’s my opinion; and the idea, you know, Master
Charles, of accusing me when he gets drunk himself.”
“I believe that is a common delusion of intemperate persons,” said
Charles.
“Is it, sir; well, it’s a very awkward thing, because you know, sir, as
well as most people, that I’m not the fellow to take a drop too much.”
“I cannot say, Jack, that I know so much, for I have certainly heard my
uncle accuse you of intoxication.”
“Lor’, sir, that was all just on account of his trying it hisself; he
was a thinking on it then, and wanted to see how I’d take it.”
“But tell me of Flora; are you quite certain that she has had no more
alarms from Varney?”
“What, that ere vampyre fellow? not a bit of it, your honour. Lor’
bless you, he must have found out by some means or another that I was
on the look out, and that did the business. He’ll never come near Miss
Flora again, I’ll be bound, though to be sure we moved away from the
Hall on account of him; but not that I saw the good of cruising out of
one’s own latitude, but somehow or another you see the doctor and the
admiral got it into their heads to establish a sort of blockade, and
the idea of the thing was to sail away in the night quite quiet, and
after that take up a position that would come across the enemy on the
larboard tack, if so be as he made his appearance.”
“Oh, you allude to watching the Hall, I presume?”
“Ay, ay, sir, just so; but would you believe it, Master Charlie, the
admiral and the doctor got so blessed drunk that I could do nothing
with ’em.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes, they did indeed, and made all kinds of queer mistakes, so that
the end of all that was, that the vampyre did come; but he got away
again.”
“He did come then; Sir Francis Varney came again after the house was
presumed to be deserted?”
“He did, sir.”
“That is very strange; what on earth could have been his object? This
affair is most inexplicably mysterious. I hope the distance, Jack,
is not far that you’re taking me, for I’m incapable of enduring much
fatigue.”
“Not a great way, your honour; keep two points to the westward, and
sail straight on; we’ll soon come to port. My eye, won’t there be a
squall when you get in. I expect as Miss Flora will drop down as dead
as a herring, for she doesn’t think you’re above the hatches.”
“A good thought, Jack; my sudden appearance may produce alarm. When we
reach the place of abode of the Bannerworths, you shall precede me, and
prepare them in some measure for my reception.”
“Very good, sir; do you see that there little white cottage a-head,
there in the offing?”
“Yes, yes; is that the place?”
“Yes, your honour, that’s the port to which we are bound.”
“Well, then, Jack, you hasten a-head, and see Miss Flora, and be
sure you prepare her gently and by degrees, you know, Jack, for my
appearance, so that she shall not be alarmed.”
“Ay, ay, sir, I understand; you wait here, and I’ll go and do it; there
would be a squall if you were to make your appearance, sir, all at
once. She looks upon you as safely lodged in Davy’s locker; she minds
me, all the world, of a girl I knew at Portsmouth, called Bet Bumplush.
She was one of your delicate little creatures as don’t live long in
this here world; no, blow me; when I came home from a eighteen months’
cruise, once I seed her drinking rum out of a quart pot, so I says,
‘Hilloa, what cheer?’ And only to think now of the wonderful effect
that there had upon her; with that very pot she gives the fellow as was
standing treat a knobber on the head as lasted him three weeks. She
was too good for this here world, she was, and too rummantic. ‘Go to
blazes,’ she says to him, ‘here’s Jack Pringle come home.’”
“Very romantic indeed,” said Charles.
“Yes, I believe you, sir; and that puts me in mind of Miss Flora and
you.”
“An extremely flattering comparison. Of course I feel much obliged.”
“Oh, don’t name it, sir. The British tar as can’t oblige a
feller-cretor is unworthy to tread the quarter-deck, or to bear a hand
to the distress of a woman.”
“Very well,” said Charles. “Now, as we are here, precede me, if you
please, and let me beg of you to be especially cautious in your manner
of announcing me.”
“Ay, ay, sir,” said Jack; and away he walked towards the cottage,
leaving Charles some distance behind.
Flora and the admiral were sitting together conversing. The old man,
who loved her as if she had been a child of his own, was endeavouring,
to the extent of his ability, to assuage the anguish of her thoughts,
which at that moment chanced to be bent upon Charles Holland.
“Nevermind, my dear,” he said; “he’ll turn up some of these days, and
when he does, I sha’n’t forget to tell him that it was you who stood
out for his honesty and truth, when every one else was against him,
including myself, an old wretch that I was.”
“Oh, sir, how could you for one moment believe that those letters could
have been written by your nephew Charles? They carried, sir, upon the
face of them their own refutation; and I’m only surprised that for one
instant you, or any one who knew him, could have believed him capable
of writing them.”
“Avast, there,” said the admiral; “that’ll do. I own you got the better
of the old sailor there. I think you and Jack Pringle were the only two
persons who stood out from the first.”
“Then I honour Jack for doing so.”
“And here he is,” said the admiral, “and you’d better tell him. The
mutinous rascal! he wants all the honour he can get, as a set-off
against his drunkenness and other bad habits.”
Jack walked into the room, looked about him in silence for a moment,
thrust his hands in his breeches pockets, and gave a long whistle.
“What’s the matter now?” said the admiral.
“D—me, if Charles Holland ain’t outside, and I’ve come to prepare you
for the blessed shock,” said Jack. “Don’t faint either of you, because
I’m only going to let you know it by degrees, you know.”
A shriek burst from Flora’s lips, and she sprung to the door of the
apartment.
“What!” cried the admiral, “my nephew—my nephew Charles! Jack, you
rascal, if you’re joking, it’s the last joke you shall make in this
world; and if it’s true, I—I—I’m an old fool, that’s all.”
“Ay, ay, sir,” said Jack; “didn’t you know that afore?”
“Charles—Charles!” cried Flora. He heard the voice. Her name escaped
his lips, and rang with a pleasant echo through the house.
In another moment he was in the room, and had clasped her to his breast.
“My own—my beautiful—my true!”
“Charles, dear Charles!”
[Illustration: Admiral Bell and Jack Pringle witness the reunion of
Flora and Charles.]
“Oh, Flora, what have I not endured since last we met; but this repays
me—more than repays me for all.”
“What is the past now,” cried Flora—“what are all its miseries placed
against this happy, happy moment?”
“D—me, nobody thinks of me,” said the admiral.
“My dear uncle,” said Charles, looking over Flora’s shoulder, as he
still held her in his arms, “is that you?”
“Yes, yes, swab, it is me, and you know it; but give us your five,
you mutinous vagabond; and I tell you what, I’ll do you the greatest
favour I’ve had an opportunity of doing you some time—I’ll leave you
alone, you dog. Come along, Jack.”
“Ay, ay, sir,” said Jack; and away they went out of the apartment.
And now those two loving hearts were alone—they who had been so long
separated by malignant destiny, once again were heart to heart, looking
into each other’s faces with all the beaming tenderness of an affection
of the truest, holiest character.
The admiral had done a favour to them both to leave them alone,
although we much doubt whether his presence, or the presence of the
whole world, would have had the effect of controlling one generous
sentiment of noble feeling.
They would have forgotten everything but that they were together,
and that once again each looked into the other’s eyes with all the
tenderness of a love purer and higher than ordinarily belongs to mortal
affections.
Language was weak to give utterance to the full gust of happy feelings
that now were theirs. It was ecstasy enough to feel, to know that the
evil fortune which had so long separated them, depriving each existence
of its sunniest aspect, was over. It was enough for Charles Holland to
feel that she loved him still. It was enough for Flora Bannerworth to
know, as she looked into his beaming countenance, that that love was
not misplaced, but was met by feelings such as she herself would have
dictated to be the inhabitants of the heart of him whom she would have
chosen from the mass of mankind as her own.
“Flora—dear Flora,” said Charles, “and you have never doubted me?”
“I’ve never doubted, Charles, Heaven or you. To doubt one would have
been to doubt both.”
“Generous and best of girls, what must you have thought of my enforced
absence! Oh! Flora, I was unjust enough to your truth to make my
greatest pang the thought that you might doubt me, and cast me from
your heart for ever.”
“Ah! Charles, you ought to have known me better. I stood amid sore
temptation to do so much. There were those who would have urged me on
to think that you had cast me from your heart for ever. There were
those ready and willing to place the worst construction upon your
conduct, and with a devilish ingenuity to strive to make me participate
in such a feeling; but, no, Charles, no—I loved you, and I trusted you,
and I could not so far belie my own judgment as to tell you other than
what you always seemed to my young fancy.”
“And you are right, my Flora, right; and is it not a glorious triumph
to see that love—that sentiment of passion—has enabled you to have so
enduring and so noble a confidence in aught human?”
“Ay, Charles, it is the sentiment of passion, for our love has been
more a sentiment than a passion. I would fain think that we had loved
each other with an affection not usually known, appreciated, or
understood, and so, in the vanity of my best affections, I would strive
to think them something exclusive, and beyond the common feelings of
humanity.”
“And you are right, my Flora; such love as yours is the exception;
there may be preferences, there may be passions, and there may be
sentiments, but never, never, surely, was there a heart like yours.”
“Nay, Charles, now you speak from a too poetical fancy; but is it
possible that I have had you here so long, with your hand clasped in
mine, and asked you not the causes of your absence?”
“Oh, Flora, I have suffered much—much physically, but more mentally. It
was the thought of you that was at once the bane and the antidote of my
existence.”
“Indeed, Charles! Did I present myself in such contradictory colours to
you?”
“Yes, dearest, as thus. When I thought of you, sometimes, in the deep
seclusion of a dungeon, that thought almost goaded me to madness,
because it brought with it the conviction—a conviction peculiar to a
lover—that none could so effectually stand between you and all evil as
myself.”
“Yes, yes, Charles; most true.”
“It seemed to me as if all the world in arms could not have protected
you so well as this one heart, clad in the triple steel of its
affections, could have shielded you from evil.”
“Ay, Charles; and then I was the bane of your existence, because I
filled you with apprehension?”
“For a time, dearest; and then came the antidote; for when exhausted
alike in mind and body—when lying helpless, with chains upon my
limbs—when expecting death at every visit of those who had dragged me
from light and from liberty, and from love; it was but the thought of
thy beauty and thy affection that nerved me, and gave me a hope even
amidst the cruellest disasters.”
“And then—and then, Charles?”
“You were my blessing, as you have ever been—as you are, and as you
will ever be—my own Flora, my beautiful—my true!”
We won’t go so far as to say it is the fact; but, from a series of
singular sounds which reached even to the passage of the cottage,
we have our own private opinion to the effect, that Charles began
kissing Flora at the top of her forehead, and never stopped, somehow
or another, till he got down to her chin—no, not her chin—her sweet
lips—he could not get past them. Perhaps it was wrong; but we can’t
help it—we are faithful chroniclers. Reader, if you be of the sterner
sex, what would you have done?—if of the gentler, what would you have
permitted?
CHAPTER LXXV.
MUTUAL EXPLANATIONS, AND THE VISIT TO THE RUINS.
During the next hour, Charles informed Flora of the whole particulars
of his forcible abduction; and to his surprise he heard, of course,
for the first time, of those letters, purporting to be written by him,
which endeavoured to give so bad an aspect to the fact of his sudden
disappearance from Bannerworth Hall.
Flora would insist upon the admiral, Henry, and the rest of the family,
hearing all that Charles had to relate concerning Mr. Marchdale; for
well she knew that her mother, from early associations, was so far
impressed in the favour of that hypocritical personage, that nothing
but damning facts, much to his prejudice, would suffice to convince her
of the character he really was.
But she was open to conviction, and when she really found what a
villain she had cherished and given her confidence to, she shed
abundance of tears, and blamed herself exceedingly as the cause of some
of the misfortunes which had fallen upon her children.
“Very good,” said the admiral; “I ain’t surprised a bit. I knew he was
a vagabond from the first time I clapped eyes upon him. There was a
down look about the fellow’s figure-head that I didn’t like, and be
hanged to him, but I never thought he would have gone the length he has
done. And so you say you’ve got him safe in the ruins, Charles?”
“I have, indeed, uncle.”
“And then there let him remain, and a good place, too, for him.”
“No, uncle, no. I’m sure you speak without thought. I intend to release
him in a few hours, when I have rested from my fatigues. He could not
come to any harm if he were to go without food entirely for the time
that I leave him; but even that he will not do, for there is bread and
water in the dungeon.”
“Bread and water! that’s too good for him. But, however, Charles, when
you go to let him out, I’ll go with you, just to tell him what I think
of him, the vagabond.”
“He must suffer amazingly, for no doubt knowing well, as he does, his
own infamous intentions, he will consider that if I were to leave him
to starve to death, I should be but retailing upon him the injuries he
would have inflicted upon me.”
“The worst of it is,” said the admiral, “I can’t think what to do with
him.”
“Do nothing, uncle, but just let him go; it will be a sufficient
punishment for such a man to feel that, instead of succeeding in his
designs, he has only brought upon himself the bitterest contempt of
those whom he would fain have injured. I can have no desire for revenge
on such a man as Marchdale.”
“You are right, Charles,” said Flora; “let him go, and let him go
with a feeling that he has acquired the contempt of those whose best
opinions might have been his for a far less amount of trouble than he
has taken to acquire their worst.”
Excitement had kept up Charles to this point, but now, when he arose
and expressed his intention of going to the ruins, for the purpose
of releasing Marchdale, he exhibited such unequivocal symptoms of
exhaustion and fatigue that neither his uncle nor Flora would permit
him to go, so, in deference to them, he gave up the point, and
commissioned the admiral and Jack, with Henry, to proceed to the place,
and give the villain his freedom; little suspecting what had occurred
since he had himself left the neighbourhood of those ruins.
Of course Charles Holland couldn’t be at all accountable for the work
of the elements, and it was not for him to imagine that when he left
Marchdale in the dungeon that so awful a catastrophe as that we have
recorded to the reader was to ensue.
The distance to the ruins was not so great from this cottage even as it
was from Bannerworth Hall, provided those who went knew the most direct
and best road to take; so that the admiral was not gone above a couple
of hours, and when he returned he sat down and looked at Charles with
such a peculiar expression, that the latter could not for the life of
him tell what to make of it.
“Something has happened, uncle,” he said, “I am certain; tell me at
once what it is.”
“Oh! nothing, nothing,” said the admiral, “of any importance.”
“Is that what you call your feelings?” said Jack Pringle. “Can’t you
tell him as there came on a squall last night, and the ruins have come
in with a dab upon old Marchdale, crushing his guts, so that we smelt
him as soon as we got nigh at hand?”
“Good God!” said Charles, “has such a catastrophe occurred?”
“Yes, Charles, that’s just about the catastrophe that has occurred.
He’s dead; and rum enough it is that it should happen on the very night
that you escaped.”
“Rum!” said Jack, suddenly; “my eye, who mentions rum? What a singular
sort of liquor rum must be. I heard of a chap as used to be fond of it
once on board a ship; I wonder if there’s any in the house.”
“No!” said the admiral; “but there’s a fine pump of spring water
outside if you feel a little thirsty, Jack; and I’ll engage it shall do
you more good than all the rum in the world.”
“Uncle,” said Charles, “I’m glad to hear you make that observation.”
“What for?”
“Why, to deal candidly with you, uncle, Jack informed me that you had
lately taken quite a predilection for drinking.”
“Me!” cried the admiral; “why the infernal rascal, I’ve had to threaten
him with his discharge a dozen times, at least, on that very ground,
and no other.”
“There’s somebody calling me,” said Jack. “I’m a coming! I’m a coming!”
and, so he bolted out of the room, just in time to escape an inkstand,
which the admiral caught up and flung after him.
“I’ll strike that rascal off the ship’s books this very day,” muttered
Admiral Bell. “The drunken vagabond, to pretend that I take anything,
when all the while it’s himself!”
“Well, well, I ought certainly to have suspected the quarter from
whence the intelligence came; but he told it to me so circumstantially,
and with such an apparent feeling of regret for the weakness into which
he said you had fallen, that I really thought there might be some truth
in it.”
“The rascal! I’ve done with him from this moment; I have put up with
too much from him for years past.”
“I think now that you have given him a great deal of liberty, and that,
with a great deal more he has taken, makes up an amount which you find
it difficult to endure.”
“And I won’t endure it.”
“Let me talk to him, and I dare say I shall be able to convince him
that he goes too far, and when he finds that such is the case he will
mend.”
“Speak to him, if you like, but I have done with such a mutinous
rascal, I have. You can take him into your service, if you like, till
you get tired of him; and that won’t be very long.”
“Well, well, we shall see. Jack will apologise to you I have no doubt;
and then I shall intercede for him, and advise you to give him another
trial.”
“If you get him into the apology, then there’s no doubt about me giving
him another trial. But I know him too well for that; he’s as obstinate
as a mule, he is, and you won’t get a civil word out of him; but never
mind that, now. I tell you what, Master Charley, it will take a good
lot of roast beef to get up your good looks again.”
“It will, indeed, uncle; and I require, now, rest, for I am thoroughly
exhausted. The great privations I have undergone, and the amount
of mental excitement which I have experienced, in consequence of
the sudden and unexpected release from a fearful confinement, have
greatly weakened all my energies. A few hours’ sleep will make quite a
different being of me.”
“Well, my boy, you know best,” returned the admiral; “and I’ll take
care, if you sleep till to-morrow, that you sha’n’t be disturbed. So
now be off to bed at once.”
The young man shook his uncle’s hand in a cordial manner, and then
repaired to the apartment which had been provided for him.
Charles Holland did, indeed, stand in need of repose; and for the first
time now for many days he laid down with serenity at his heart, and
slept for many hours. And was there not now a great and a happy change
in Flora Bannerworth! As if by magic, in a few short hours, much of
the bloom of her before-fading beauty returned to her. Her step again
recovered its springy lightness; again she smiled upon her mother, and
suffered herself to talk of a happy future; for the dread even of the
vampyre’s visitations had faded into comparative insignificance against
the heart’s deep dejection which had come over her at the thought that
Charles Holland must surely be murdered, or he would have contrived to
come to her.
And what a glorious recompense she had now for the trusting confidence
with which she had clung to a conviction of his truth! Was it not
great, now, to feel that when he was condemned by others, and when
strong and unimpeachable evidence seemed to be against him, she had
clung to him and declared her faith in his honour, and wept for him
instead of condemning?
Yes, Flora; you were of that order of noble minds that, where once
confidence is given, give it fully and completely, and will not harbour
a suspicion of the faith of the loved one, a happy disposition when
verified, as in this instance, by an answering truthfulness.
But when such a heart trusts not with judgment—when that pure, exalted,
and noble confidence is given to an object unworthy of it—then comes,
indeed, the most fearful of all mental struggles; and if the fond
heart, that has hugged to its inmost core so worthless a treasure, do
not break in the effort to discard it, we may well be surprised at the
amount of fortitude that has endured so much.
Although the admiral had said but little concerning the fearful end
Marchdale had come to, it really did make some impression upon him;
and, much as he held in abhorrence the villany of Marchdale’s conduct,
he would gladly in his heart have averted the fate from him that he had
brought upon himself.
On the road to the ruins, he calculated upon taking a different kind of
vengeance.
When they had got some distance from the cottage, Admiral Bell made
a proposal to Henry to be his second while he fought Marchdale, but
Henry would not hear of it for a moment.
“My dear sir,” he said, “could I, do you think, stand by and see a
valuable, revered, and a respected life like yours exposed to any
hazard merely upon the chance of punishing a villain? No, no; Marchdale
is too base now to be met in honourable encounter. If he is dealt with
in any way let it be by the laws.”
This was reasonable enough, and after some argument the admiral
coincided in it, and then they began to wonder how, without Charles,
they should be able to get an entrance to the dungeons, for it had been
his intention originally, had he not felt so fatigued, to go with them.
As soon, however, as they got tolerably near to the ruins, they saw
what had happened. Neither spoke, but they quickened their pace, and
soon stood close to the mass of stone-work which now had assumed so
different a shape to what it had a few short hours before.
It needed little examination to let them feel certain that whoever
might have been in any of the underground dungeons must have been
crushed to death.
“Heaven have mercy upon his soul!” said Henry.
“Amen!” said the admiral.
They both turned away, and for some time they neither of them spoke,
for their thoughts were full of reflection upon the horrible death
which Marchdale must have endured. At length the admiral said—
“Shall we tell this or not?”
“Tell it at once,” said Henry; “let us have no secrets.”
“Good. Then I will not make one you may depend. I only wish that while
he was about it, Charley could have popped that rascal Varney as well
in the dungeon, and then there would have been an end and a good
riddance of them both.”
CHAPTER LXXVI.
THE SECOND NIGHT-WATCH OF MR. CHILLINGWORTH AT THE HALL.
The military party in the morning left Bannerworth Hall, and the
old place resumed its wonted quiet. But Dr. Chillingworth found it
difficult to get rid of his old friend, the hangman, who seemed quite
disposed to share his watch with him.
The doctor, without being at all accused of being a prejudiced man,
might well object to the continued companionship of one, who, according
to his own account, was decidedly no better than he should be, if he
were half so good.
Moreover, it materially interfered with the proceedings of our medical
friend, whose object was to watch the vampyre with all imaginable
quietness and secrecy, in the event of his again visiting Bannerworth
Hall.
“Sir,” he said, to the hangman, “now that you have so obligingly
related to me your melancholy history, I will not detain you.”
“Oh, you are not detaining me.”
“Yes, but I shall probably remain here for a considerable time.”
“I have nothing to do; and one place is about the same as another to
me.”
“Well, then, if I must speak plainly, allow me to say, that as I
came here upon a very important and special errand, I desire most
particularly to be left alone. Do you understand me now?”
“Oh! ah!—I understand; you want me to go?”
“Just so.”
“Well, then, Dr. Chillingworth, allow me to tell you, I have come here
on a very special errand likewise.”
“You have?”
“I have. I have been putting one circumstance to another, and drawing
a variety of conclusions from a variety of facts, so that I have come
to what I consider an important resolve, namely, to have a good look at
Bannerworth Hall, and if I continue to like it as well as I do now, I
should like to make the Bannerworth family an offer for the purchase of
it.”
“The devil you would! Why all the world seems mad upon the project of
buying this old building, which really is getting into such a state of
dilapidation, that it cannot last many years longer.”
“It is my fancy.”
“No, no; there is something more in this than meets the eye. The same
reason, be it what may, that has induced Varney the vampyre to become
so desirous of possessing the Hall, actuates you.”
“Possibly.”
“And what is that reason? You may as well be candid with me.”
“Yes, I will, and am. I like the picturesque aspect of the place.”
“No, you know that that is a disingenuous answer, that you know well.
It is not the aspect of the old Hall that has charms for you. But I
feel, only from your conduct, more than ever convinced, that some plot
is going on, having the accomplishment of some great object as its
climax, a something of which you have guessed.”
“How much you are mistaken!”
“No, I am certain I am right; and I shall immediately advise the
Bannerworth family to return, and to take up their abode again here, in
order to put an end to the hopes which you, or Varney, or any one else
may have, of getting possession of the place.”
“If you were a man,” said the hangman, “who cared a little more for
yourself, and a little less for others, I would make a confidant of
you.”
“What do you mean?”
“Why, I mean, candidly, that you are not selfish enough to be entitled
to my confidence.”
“That is a strange reason for withholding confidence from any man.”
“It is a strange reason; but, in this case, a most abundantly true one.
I cannot tell you what I would tell you, because I cannot make the
agreement with you that I would fain make.”
“You talk in riddles.”
“To explain which, then, would be to tell my secret.”
Dr. Chillingworth was, evidently, much annoyed, and yet he was in an
extremely helpless condition; for as to forcing the hangman to leave
the Hall, if he did not feel disposed to do so, that was completely out
of the question, and could not be done. In the first place, he was a
much more powerful man than the doctor, and in the second, it was quite
contrary to all Mr. Chillingworth’s habits, to engage in anything like
personal warfare.
He could only, therefore, look his vexation, and say,—
“If you are determined upon remaining, I cannot help it; but, when some
one, as there assuredly will, comes from the Bannerworths, here, to
me, or I shall be under the necessity of stating candidly that you are
intruding.”
“Very good. As the morning air is keen, and as we now are not likely
to be as good company to each other as we were, I shall go inside the
house.”
This was a proposition which the doctor did not like, but he was
compelled to submit to it; and he saw, with feelings of uneasiness, the
hangman make his way into the Hall by one of the windows.
Then Dr. Chillingworth sat down to think. Much he wondered what could
be the secret of the great desire which Varney, Marchdale, and even
this man had, all of them to be possessors of the old Hall.
That there was some powerful incentive he felt convinced, and he longed
for some conversation with the Bannerworths, or with Admiral Bell, in
order that he might state what had now taken place. That some one would
soon come to him, in order to bring fresh provisions for the day, he
was certain, and all he could do, in the interim, was, to listen to
what the hangman was about in the Hall.
Not a sound, for a considerable time, disturbed the intense stillness
of the place; but, now, suddenly, Mr. Chillingworth thought he heard a
hammering, as if some one was at work in one of the rooms of the Hall.
“What can be the meaning of that?” he said, and he was about to proceed
at once to the interior of the building, through the same window which
had enabled the hangman to gain admittance, when he heard his own
name pronounced by some one at the back of the garden fence, and upon
casting his eyes in that direction, he, to his great relief, saw the
admiral and Henry Bannerworth.
“Come round to the gate,” said the doctor. “I am more glad to see you
than I can tell you just now. Do not make more noise than you can help;
but, come round to the gate at once.”
They obeyed the injunction with alacrity, and when the doctor had
admitted them, the admiral said, eagerly,—
“You don’t mean to tell us that he is here?”
“No, no, not Varney; but he is not the only one who has taken a great
affection for Bannerworth Hall; you may have another tenant for it, and
I believe at any price you like to name.”
“Indeed!”
“Hush! creep along close to the house, and then you will not be seen.
There! do you hear that noise in the hall?”
“Why it sounds,” said the admiral, “like the ship’s carpenter at work.”
“It does, indeed, sound like a carpenter; it’s only the new tenant
making, I dare say, some repairs.”
“D—n his impudence!”
“Why, it certainly does look like a very cool proceeding, I must admit.”
“Who, and what is he?”
“Who he is now, I cannot tell you, but he was once the hangman of
London, at a time when I was practising in the metropolis, and so I
became acquainted with him. He knows Sir Francis Varney, and, if I
mistake not, has found out the cause of that mysterious personage’s
great attachment to Bannerworth Hall, and has found the reasons so
cogent, that he has got up an affection for it himself.”
“To me,” said Henry, “all this is as incomprehensible as anything can
possibly be. What on earth does it all mean?”
“My dear Henry,” said the doctor, “will you be ruled by me?”
“I will be ruled by any one whom I know I can trust; for I am like a
man groping his way in the dark.”
“Then allow this gentleman who is carpentering away so pleasantly
within the house, to do so to his heart’s content, but don’t let him
leave it. Show yourselves now in the garden, he has sufficient prudence
to know that three constitute rather fearful odds against one, and so
he will be careful, and remain where he is. If he should come out, we
need not let him go until we thoroughly ascertain what he has been
about.”
“You shall command the squadron, doctor,” said the admiral, “and have
it all your own way, you know, so here goes! Come along, Henry, and
let’s show ourselves; we are both armed too!”
They walked out into the centre of the garden, and they were soon
convinced that the hangman saw them, for a face appeared at the window,
and was as quickly withdrawn again.
“There,” said the doctor, “now he knows he is a prisoner, and we may as
well place ourselves in some position which commands a good view of the
house, as well as of the garden gate, and so see if we cannot starve
him out, though we may be starved out ourselves.”
“Not at all!” said Admiral Bell, producing from his ample pockets
various parcels,—“we came to bring you ample supplies.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes; we have been as far as the ruins.”
“Oh, to release Marchdale. Charles told me how the villain had fallen
into the trap he had laid for him.”
“He has, indeed, fallen into the trap, and it’s one he won’t easily get
out of again. He’s dead.”
“Dead!—dead!”
“Yes; in the storm of last night the ruins have fallen, and he is by
this time as flat as a pancake.”
“Good God! and yet it is but a just retribution upon him. He would have
assassinated poor Charles Holland in the cruelest and most cold-blooded
manner, and, however we may shudder at the manner of his death, we
cannot regret it.”
“Except that he has escaped your friend the hangman,” said the admiral.
“Don’t call him my friend, if you please,” said Dr. Chillingworth,
“but, hark how he is working away, as if he really intended to carry
the house away piece by piece, as opportunity may serve, if you will
not let it to him altogether, just as it stands.”
“Confound him! he is evidently working on his own account,” said the
admiral, “or he would not be half so industrious.”
There was, indeed, a tremendous amount of hammering and noise, of one
sort and another, from the house, and it was quite clear that the
hangman was too heart and soul in his work, whatever may have been the
object of it, to care who was listening to him, or to what conjecture
he gave rise.
He thought probably that he could but be stopped in what he was about,
and, until he was so, that he might as well go on.
And on he went, with a vengeance, vexing the admiral terribly, who
proposed so repeatedly to go into the house and insist upon knowing
what he was about, that his wishes were upon the point of being
conceded to by Henry, although they were combatted by the doctor, when,
from the window at which he had entered, out stepped the hangman.
“Good morning, gentlemen! good morning,” he said, and he moved towards
the garden gate. “I will not trouble you any longer. Good morning!”
“Not so fast,” said the admiral, “or we may bring you up with a round
turn, and I never miss my mark when I can see it, and I shall not let
it get out of sight, you may depend.”
He drew a pistol from his pocket, as he spoke, and pointed it at the
hangman, who, thereupon paused and said:—
“What! am I not to be permitted to go in peace? Why it was but a short
time since the doctor was quarrelling with me because I did not go, and
now it seems that I am to be shot if I do.”
“Yes,” said the admiral, “that’s it.”
“Well! but,——”
“You dare,” said he, “stir another inch towards the gate, and you are a
dead man!”
The hangman hesitated a moment, and looked at Admiral Bell; apparently
the result of the scrutiny was, that he would keep his word, for he
suddenly turned and dived in at the window again without saying another
word.
“Well; you have certainly stopped him from leaving,” said Henry; “but
what’s to be done now?”
“Let him be, let him be,” said the doctor; “he must come out again, for
there are no provisions in the place, and he will be starved out.”
“Hush! what is that?” said Henry.
There was a very gentle ring at the bell which hung over the garden
gate.
“That’s an experiment, now, I’ll be bound,” said the doctor, “to
ascertain if any one is here; let us hide ourselves, and take no
notice.”
The ring in a few moments was repeated, and the three confederates hid
themselves effectually behind some thick laurel bushes and awaited with
expectation what might next ensue.
Not long had they occupied their place of concealment, before they
heard a heavy fall upon the gravelled pathway, immediately within the
gate, as if some one had clambered to the top from the outside, and
then jumped down.
That this was the case the sound of footsteps soon convinced them,
and to their surprise as well as satisfaction, they saw through the
interstices of the laurel bush behind which they were concealed, no
less a personage than Sir Francis Varney himself.
“It is Varney,” said Henry.
“Yes, yes,” whispered the doctor. “Let him be, do not move for any
consideration, for the first time let him do just what he likes.”
“D—n the fellow!” said the admiral; “there are some points about him
that I like, after all, and he’s quite an angel compared to that rascal
Marchdale.”
“He is,—he saved Charles.”
“He did, and not if I know it shall any harm come to him, unless he
were terribly to provoke it by becoming himself the assailant.”
“How sad he looks!”
“Hush! he comes nearer; it is not safe to talk. Look at him.”
CHAPTER LXXVII.
VARNEY IN THE GARDEN.—THE COMMUNICATION OF DR. CHILLINGWORTH TO THE
ADMIRAL AND HENRY.
Kind reader, it was indeed Varney who had clambered over the garden
wall, and thus made his way into the garden of Bannerworth Hall; and
what filled those who looked at him with the most surprise was, that he
did not seem in any particular way to make a secret of his presence,
but walked on with an air of boldness which either arose from a feeling
of absolute impunity, from his thinking there was no one there, or from
an audacity which none but he could have compassed.
As for the little party that was there assembled, and who looked
upon him, they seemed thunderstricken by his presence; and Henry,
probably, as well as the admiral, would have burst out into some sudden
exclamation, had they not been restrained by Dr. Chillingworth, who,
suspecting that they might in some way give an alarm, hastened to speak
first, saying in a whisper,—
“For Heaven’s sake, be still; fortune, you see, favours us most
strangely. Leave Varney alone. You have no other mode whatever of
discovering what he really wants at Bannerworth Hall.”
“I am glad you have spoken,” said Henry, as he drew a long breath. “If
you had not, I feel convinced that in another moment I should have
rushed forward and confronted this man who has been the very bane of my
life.”
“And so should I,” said the admiral; “although I protest against any
harm being done to him, on account of some sort of good feeling that
he has displayed, after all, in releasing Charles from that dungeon in
which Marchdale has perished.”
“At the moment,” said Henry, “I had forgotten that; but I will own
that his conduct has been tinctured by a strange and wild kind of
generosity at times, which would seem to bespeak, at the bottom of his
heart, some good feelings, the impulses of which were only quenched by
circumstances.”
“That is my firm impression of him, I can assure you,” said Dr.
Chillingworth.
They watched Varney now from the leafy covert in which they were
situated, and, indeed, had they been less effectually concealed, it
did not seem likely that the much dreaded vampyre would have perceived
them; for not only did he make no effort at concealment himself, but he
took no pains to see if any one was watching him in his progress to the
house.
His footsteps were more rapid than they usually were, and there was
altogether an air and manner about him, as if he were moved to some
purpose which of itself was sufficiently important to submerge in its
consequences all ordinary risks and all ordinary cautions.
He tried several windows of the house along that terrace of which we
have more than once had occasion to speak, before he found one that
opened; but at length he did succeed, and stepped at once into the
Hall, leaving those, who now for some moments in silence had regarded
his movements, to lose themselves in a fearful sea of conjecture as to
what could possibly be his object.
“At all events,” said the admiral, “I’m glad we are here. If the
vampyre should have a fight with that other fellow, that we heard doing
such a lot of carpentering work in the house, we ought, I think, to see
fair play.”
“I, for one,” said the doctor, “would not like to stand by and see the
vampyre murdered; but I am inclined to think he is a good match for any
mortal opponent.”
“You may depend he is,” said Henry. “But how long, doctor, do you
purpose that we should wait here in such a state of suspense as to what
is going on within the house?”
“I hope not long; but that something will occur to make us have food
for action. Hark! what is that?”
There was a loud crash within the building, as of broken glass. It
sounded as if some window had been completely dashed in; but although
they looked carefully over the front of the building, they could see
no evidences of such a thing having happened, and were compelled,
consequently, to come to the opinion that Varney and the other man must
have met in one of the back rooms, and that the crash of glass had
arisen from some personal conflict in which they had engaged.
“I cannot stand this,” said Henry.
“Nay, nay,” said the doctor; “be still, and I will tell you something,
than which there can be no more fitting time than this to reveal it.”
“Refers it to the vampyre?”
“It does—it does.”
“Be brief, then; I am in an agony of impatience.”
“It is a circumstance concerning which I can be brief; for, horrible
as it is, I have no wish to dress it in any adventitious colours. Sir
Francis Varney, although under another name, is an old acquaintance of
mine.”
“Acquaintance!” said Henry.
“Why, you don’t mean to say you are a vampyre?” said the admiral; “or
that he has ever visited you?”
“No; but I knew him. From the first moment that I looked upon him in
this neighbourhood, I thought I knew him; but the circumstance which
induced me to think so was of so terrific a character, that I made some
efforts to chase it from my mind. It has, however, grown upon me day
by day, and, lately, I have had proof sufficient to convince me of his
identity with one whom I first saw under most singular circumstances of
romance.”
“Say on,—you are agitated.”
“I am, indeed. This revelation has several times, within the last few
days, trembled on my lips, but now you shall have it; because you ought
to know all that it is possible for me to tell you of him who has
caused you so serious an amount of disturbance.”
“You awaken, doctor,” said Henry, “all my interest.”
“And mine, too,” remarked the admiral. “What can it be all about? and
where, doctor, did you first see this Varney the vampyre?”
“In his coffin.”
Both the admiral and Henry gave starts of surprise as, with one accord,
they exclaimed,—
“Did you say coffin?”
“Yes; I tell you, on my word of honour, that the first time in my life
I saw ever Sir Francis Varney, was in his coffin.”
“Then he is a vampyre, and there can be no mistake,” said the admiral.
“Go on, I pray you, doctor, go on,” said Henry, anxiously.
“I will. The reason why he became the inhabitant of a coffin was simply
this:—he had been hanged,—executed at the Old Bailey, in London, before
ever I set eyes upon that strange countenance of his. You know that I
was practising surgery at the London schools some years ago, and that,
consequently, as I commenced the profession rather late in life, I was
extremely anxious to do the most I could in a very short space of time.”
“Yes—yes.”
“Arrived, then, with plenty of resources, which I did not, as the young
men who affected to be studying in the same classes as myself, spend in
the pursuit of what they considered life in London, I was indefatigable
in my professional labours, and there was nothing connected with them
which I did not try to accomplish.
“At that period, the difficulty of getting a subject for anatomization
was very great, and all sorts of schemes had to be put into requisition
to accomplish so desirable, and, indeed, absolutely necessary a
purpose.
“I became acquainted with the man who, I have told you, is in the
Hall, at present, and who then filled the unenviable post of public
executioner. It so happened, too, that I had read a learned treatise,
by a Frenchman, who had made a vast number of experiments with galvanic
and other apparatus, upon persons who had come to death in different
ways, and, in one case, he asserted that he had actually recovered a
man who had been hanged, and he had lived five weeks afterwards.
“Young as I then was, in comparison to what I am now, in my profession,
this inflamed my imagination, and nothing seemed to me so desirable
as getting hold of some one who had only recently been put to death,
for the purpose of trying what I could do in the way of attempting a
resuscitation of the subject. It was precisely for this reason that
I sought out the public executioner, and made his acquaintance, whom
every one else shunned, because I thought he might assist me by handing
over to me the body of some condemned and executed man, upon whom I
could try my skill.
“I broached the subject to him, and found him not averse. He said,
that if I would come forward and claim, as next of kin, the body of
the criminal who was to be executed the first time, from that period,
that he could give me a hint that I should have no real next of kin
opponents, he would throw every facility in my way, and allow the body
to be removed to his house.
“This was just what I wanted; and, I believe, I waited with impatience
for some poor wretch to be hurried to his last account by the hands of
my friend, the public executioner.
“At length a circumstance occurred which favoured my designs most
effectually,—A man was apprehended for a highway robbery of a most
aggravated character. He was tried, and the evidence against him was so
conclusive, that the defence which was attempted by his counsel, became
a mere matter of form.
“He was convicted, and sentenced. The judge told him not to flatter
himself with the least notion that mercy would be extended to him.
The crime of which he had been found guilty was on the increase; it
was highly necessary to make some great public example, to show evil
doers that they could not, with impunity, thus trample upon the liberty
of the subject, and had suddenly, just as it were, in the very nick
of time, committed the very crime, attended with all the aggravated
circumstances which made it easy and desirable to hang him out of hand.
“He heard his sentence, they tell me unmoved. I did not see him, but
he was represented to me as a man of a strong, and well-knit frame,
with rather a strange, but what some would have considered a handsome
expression of countenance, inasmuch as that there was an expression of
much haughty resolution depicted on it.
“I flew to my friend the executioner.
“‘Can you,’ I said, ‘get me that man’s body, who is to be hanged for
the highway robbery, on Monday?’
“‘Yes,’ he said; ‘I see nothing to prevent it. Not one soul has offered
to claim even common companionship with him,—far less kindred. I think
if you put in your claim as a cousin, who will bear the expense of his
decent burial, you will have every chance of getting possession of the
body.’
“I did not hesitate, but, on the morning before the execution, I called
upon one of the sheriffs.
“I told him that the condemned man, I regretted to say, was related to
me; but as I knew nothing could be done to save him on the trial, I
had abstained from coming forward; but that as I did not like the idea
of his being rudely interred by the authorities, I had come forward to
ask for the body, after the execution should have taken place, in order
that I might, at all events, bestow upon it, in some sequestered spot,
a decent burial, with all the rites of the church.
“The sheriff was a man not overburthened with penetration. He applauded
my pious feelings, and actually gave me, without any inquiry, a written
order to receive the body from the hands of the hangman, after it had
hung the hour prescribed by the law.
“I did not, as you may well suppose, wish to appear more in the
business than was absolutely necessary; but I gave the executioner the
sheriff’s order for the body, and he promised that he would get a shell
ready to place it in, and four stout men to carry it at once to his
house, when he should cut it down.
“‘Good!’ I said; ‘and now as I am not a little anxious for the success
of my experiment, do you not think that you can manage so that the fall
of the criminal shall not be so sudden as to break his neck?’
“‘I have thought of that,’ he said, ‘and I believe that I can manage to
let him down gently, so that he shall die of suffocation, instead of
having his neck put out of joint. I will do my best.’
“‘If you can but succeed in that,’ said I, for I was quite in a state
of mania upon the subject, ‘I shall be much indebted to you, and will
double the amount of money which I have already promised.’
“This was, as I believed it would be, a powerful stimulus to him to
do all in his power to meet my wishes, and he took, no doubt, active
measures to accomplish all that I desired.
“You can imagine with what intense impatience I waited the result. He
resided in an old ruinous looking house, a short distance on the Surrey
side of the river, and there I had arranged all my apparatus for making
experiments upon the dead man, in an apartment the windows of which
commanded a view of the entrance.”
“I was completely ready by half-past eight, although a moment’s
consideration of course told me that at least another hour must elapse
before there could be the least chance of my seeing him arrive, for
whom I so anxiously longed.
“I can safely say so infatuated was I upon the subject, that no fond
lover ever looked with more nervous anxiety for the arrival of the
chosen object of his heart, than I did for that dead body, upon which I
proposed to exert all the influences of professional skill, to recall
back the soul to its earthly dwelling-place.
“At length I heard the sound of wheels. I found that my friend the
hangman had procured a cart, in which he brought the coffin, that
being a much quicker mode of conveyance than by bearers, so that about
a quarter past nine o’clock the vehicle, with its ghastly content,
stopped at the door of his house.
“In my impatience I ran down stairs to meet that which ninety-nine
men out of a hundred would have gone some distance to avoid the
sight of, namely, a corpse, livid and fresh from the gallows. I,
however, heralded it as a great gift, and already, in imagination I
saw myself imitating the learned Frenchman, who had published such an
elaborate treatise on the mode of restoring life under all sorts of
circumstances, to those who were already pronounced by unscientific
persons to be dead.
“To be sure, a sort of feeling had come over me at times, knowing
as I did that the French are a nation that do not scruple at all to
sacrifice truth on the altar of vanity, that it might be after all a
mere rhodomontade; but, however, I could only ascertain so much by
actually trying, so the suspicion that such might, by a possibility, be
the end of the adventure, did not deter me.
“I officiously assisted in having the coffin brought into the room
where I had prepared everything that was necessary in the conduction
of my grand experiment; and then, when no one was there with me but my
friend the executioner, I, with his help, the one of us taking the head
and the other the feet, took the body from the coffin and laid it upon
a table.
“Hastily I placed my hand upon the region of the heart, and to my great
delight I found it still warm. I drew off the cap that covered the
face, and then, for the first time, my eyes rested upon the countenance
of him who now calls himself—Heaven only knows why—Sir Francis Varney.”
“Good God!” said Henry, “are you certain?”
“Quite.”
“It may have been some other rascal like him,” said the admiral.
“No, I am quite sure now; I have, as I have before mentioned to you,
tried to get out of my own conviction upon the subject, but I have been
actually assured that he is the man by the very hangman himself.”
“Go on, go on! Your tale certainly is a strange one, and I do not say
it either to compliment you or to cast a doubt upon you, but, except
from the lips of an old, and valued friend, such as you yourself are, I
should not believe it.’
“I am not surprised to hear you say that,” replied the doctor; “nor
should I be offended even now if you were to entertain a belief that I
might, after all, be mistaken.”
“No, no; you would not be so positive upon the subject, I well know, if
there was the slightest possibility of an error.”
“Indeed I should not.”
“Let us have the sequel, then.”
“It is this. I was most anxious to effect an immediate resuscitation,
if it were possible, of the hanged man. A little manipulation soon
convinced me that the neck was not broken, which left me at once
everything to hope for. The hangman was more prudent than I was, and
before I commenced my experiments, he said,—
“‘Doctor, have you duly considered what you mean to do with this
fellow, in case you should be successful in restoring him to life?’
“‘Not I,’ said I.
“‘Well,’ he said, ‘you can do as you like; but I consider that it is
really worth thinking of.’
“I was headstrong on the matter, and could think of nothing but the
success or the non-success, in a physiological point of view, of my
plan for restoring the dead to life; so I set about my experiments
without any delay, and with a completeness and a vigour that promised
the most completely successful results, if success could at all be an
ingredient in what sober judgment would doubtless have denominated a
mad-headed and wild scheme.
“For more than half an hour I tried in vain, by the assistance of
the hangman, who acted under my directions. Not the least symptom of
vitality presented itself; and he had a smile upon his countenance, as
he said in a bantering tone,—
“‘I am afraid, sir, it is much easier to kill than to restore their
patients with doctors.’
“Before I could make him any reply, for I felt that his observation
had a good amount of truth in it, joined to its sarcasm the hanged man
uttered a loud scream, and opened his eyes.
“I must own I was myself rather startled; but I for some moments longer
continued the same means which had produced such an effect, when
suddenly he sprang up and laid hold of me, at the same time exclaiming,—
“‘Death, death, where is the treasure?’
[Illustration: The vampyre is restored to life by Dr. Chillingworth’s
galvanic experiment.]
“I had fully succeeded—too fully; and while the executioner looked on
with horror depicted in his countenance, I fled from the room and the
house, taking my way home as fast as I possibly could.
“A dread came over me, that the restored man would follow me if
he should find out to whom it was he was indebted for the rather
questionable boon of a new life. I packed up what articles I set the
greatest store by, bade adieu to London, and never have I since set
foot within that city.”
“And you never met the man you had so resuscitated?”
“Not till I saw Varney, the vampyre; and, as I tell you, I am now
certain that he is the man.”
“That is the strangest yarn that ever I heard,” said the admiral.
“A most singular circumstance,” said Henry.
“You may have noticed about his countenance,” said Dr. Chillingworth,
“a strange distorted look?”
“Yes, yes.”
“Well, that has arisen from a spasmodic contraction of the muscles,
in consequence of his having been hanged. He will never lose it, and
it has not a little contributed to give him the horrible look he has,
and to invest him with some of the seeming outward attributes of the
vampyre.”
“And that man who is now in the hall with him, doctor,” said Henry, “is
the very hangman who executed him?”
“The same. He tells me that after I left, he paid attention to the
restored man, and completed what I had nearly done. He kept him in his
house for a time, and then made a bargain with him, for a large sum of
money per annum, all of which he has regularly been paid, although he
tells me he has no more idea where Varney gets it, than the man in the
moon.”
“It is very strange; but, hark! do you not hear the sound of voices in
angry altercation?”
“Yes, yes, they have met. Let us approach the windows now. We may
chance to hear something of what they say to each other.”
CHAPTER LXXVIII.
THE ALTERCATION BETWEEN VARNEY AND THE EXECUTIONER IN THE HALL.—THE
MUTUAL AGREEMENT.
There was certainly a loud wrangling in the Hall, just as the doctor
finished his most remarkable revelation concerning Sir Francis Varney,
a revelation which by no means attacked the fact of his being a vampyre
or not; but rather on the contrary, had a tendency to confirm any
opinion that might arise from the circumstance of his being restored to
life after his execution, favourable to that belief.
They all three now carefully approached the windows of the Hall, to
listen to what was going on, and after a few moments they distinctly
heard the voice of the hangman, saying in loud and rather angry
accents,—
“I do not deny but that you have kept your word with me—our bargain has
been, as you say, a profitable one; but, still I cannot see why that
circumstance should give you any sort of control over my actions.”
“But what do you here?” said Varney, impatiently.
“What do you?” cried the other.
“Nay, to ask another question, is not to answer mine. I tell you that I
have special and most important business in this house; you can have no
motive but curiosity.”
“Can I not, indeed? What, too, if I have serious and important business
here?”
“Impossible.”
“Well, I may as easily use such a term as regards what you call
important business, but here I shall remain.”
“Here you shall not remain.”
“And will you make the somewhat hazardous attempt to force me to leave?”
“Yes, much as I dislike lifting my hand against you, I must do so;
I tell you that I must be alone in this house. I have most special
reasons—reasons which concern my continued existence.
“Your continued existence you talk of.—Tell me, now, how is it that you
have acquired so frightful a reputation in this neighbourhood? Go where
I will, the theme of conversation is Varney, the vampyre! and it is
implicitly believed that you are one of those dreadful characters that
feed upon the life-blood of others, only now and then revisiting the
tomb to which you ought long since to have gone in peace.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes; what, in the name of all that’s inexplicable, has induced you to
enact such a character?”
“Enact it! you say. Can you, then, from all you have heard of me,
and from all you know of me, not conceive it possible that I am not
enacting any such character? Why may it not be real? Look at me. Do I
look like one of the inhabitants of the earth?”
“In sooth, you do not.”
“And yet I am, as you see, upon it. Do not, with an affected
philosophy, doubt all that may happen to be in any degree repugnant to
your usual experiences.”
“I am not one disposed to do so; nor am I prepared to deny that such
dreadful beings may exist as vampyres. However, whether or not you
belong to so frightful a class of creatures, I do not intend to leave
here; but, I will make an agreement with you.”
Varney was silent; and after a few moments’ pause, the other exclaimed,—
“There are people, even now, watching the place, and no doubt you have
been seen coming into it.”
“No, no, I was satisfied no one was here but you.”
“Then you are wrong. A Doctor Chillingworth, of whom you know
something, is here; and him, you have said, you would do no harm to,
even to save your life.”
“I do know him. You told me that it was to him that I was mainly
indebted for my mere existence; and although I do not consider human
life to be a great boon, I cannot bring myself to raise my hand against
the man who, whatever might have been the motives for the deed, at all
events, did snatch me from the grave.”
“Upon my word,” whispered the admiral, “there is something about that
fellow that I like, after all.”
“Hush!” said Henry, “listen to them. This would all have been
unintelligible to us, if you had not related to us what you have.”
“I have just told you in time,” said Chillingworth, “it seems.”
“Will you, then,” said the hangman, “listen to proposals?”
“Yes,” said Varney.
“Come along, then, and I will show you what I have been about; and I
rather think you have already a shrewd guess as to my motive. This
way—this way.”
They moved off to some other part of the mansion, and the sound of
their voices gradually died away, so that after all, the friends had
not got the least idea of what that motive was, which still induced the
vampyre and the hangman, rather than leave the other on the premises,
to make an agreement to stay with each other.
“What’s to be done now?” said Henry.
“Wait,” said Dr. Chillingworth, “wait, and watch still. I see nothing
else that can be done with any degree of safety.”
“But what are we to wait for?” said the admiral.
“By waiting, we shall, perhaps, find out,” was the doctor’s reply; “but
you may depend that we never shall by interfering.”
“Well, well, be it so. It seems that we have no other resource. And
when either or both of those fellows make their appearance, and seem
about to leave, what is to be done with them?”
“They must be seized then, and in order that that may be done without
any bloodshed, we ought to have plenty of force here. Henry, could you
get your brother, and Charles, if he be sufficiently recovered, to
come?”
“Certainly, and Jack Pringle.”
“No,” said the admiral, “no Jack Pringle for me; I have done with him
completely, and I have made up my mind to strike him off the ship’s
books, and have nothing more to do with him.”
“Well, well,” added the doctor, “we will not have him, then; and it is
just as well, for, in all likelihood, he would come drunk, and we shall
be—let me see—five strong without him, which ought to be enough to take
prisoners two men.”
“Yes,” said Henry, “although one of them may be a vampyre.”
“That makes no difference,” said the admiral. “I’d as soon take a ship
manned with vampyres as with Frenchmen.”
Henry started off upon his errand, certainly leaving the admiral and
the doctor in rather a critical situation while he was gone; for had
Varney the vampyre and the hangman chosen, they could certainly easily
have overcome so inefficient a force.
The admiral would, of course, have fought, and so might the doctor,
as far as his hands would permit him; but if the others had really
been intent upon mischief, they could, from their downright superior
physical power, have taken the lives of the two that were opposed to
them.
But somehow the doctor appeared to have a great confidence in the
affair. Whether that confidence arose from what the vampyre had said
with regard to him, or from any hidden conviction of his own that they
would not yet emerge from the Hall, we cannot say; but certain it is,
he waited the course of events with great coolness.
No noise for some time came from the house; but then the sounds, as
if workmen were busy within it, were suddenly resumed, and with more
vigour than before.
It was nearly two hours before Henry made the private signal which had
been agreed upon as that which should proclaim his return; and then he
and his brother, with Charles, who, when he heard of the matter, would,
notwithstanding the persuasions of Flora to the contrary, come, got
quietly over the fence at a part of the garden which was quite hidden
from the house by abundant vegetation, and the whole three of them
took up a position that tolerably well commanded a view of the house,
while they were themselves extremely well hidden behind a dense mass of
evergreens.
“Did you see that rascal, Jack Pringle?” said the admiral.
“Yes,” said Henry; “he is drunk.”
“Ah, to be sure.”
“And we had no little difficulty in shaking him off. He suspected where
we were going; but I think, by being peremptory, we got fairly rid of
him.”
“The vagabond! if he comes here, I’ll brain him, I will, the swab. Why,
lately he’s done nothing but drink. That’s the way with him. He’ll go
on sometimes for a year and more, and not take more than enough to do
him good, and then all at once, for about six or eight weeks, he does
nothing but drink.”
“Well, well, we can do without him,” said Henry.
“Without him! I should think so. Do you hear those fellows in the Hall
at work? D—n me, if I haven’t all of a sudden thought what the reason
of it all is.”
“What—what?” said the doctor, anxiously.
“Why, that rascal Varney, you know, had his house burnt down.”
“Yes; well?”
“Yes, well. I dare say he didn’t think it well. But, however, he no
doubt wants another; so, you see, my idea is, that he’s stealing the
material from Bannerworth Hall.”
“Oh, is that your notion?”
“Yes, and a very natural one, I think, too, Master Doctor, whatever you
may think of it. Come, now, have you a better?”
“Oh, dear, no, certainly not; but I have a notion that something to eat
would comfort the inward man much.”
“And so would something to drink, blow me if it wouldn’t,” said Jack
Pringle, suddenly making his appearance.
The admiral made a rush upon him; but he was restrained by the others,
and Jack, with a look of triumph, said,—
“Why, what’s amiss with you now? I ain’t drunk now. Come, come, you
have something dangerous in the wind, I know, so I’ve made up my mind
to be in it, so don’t put yourself out of the way. If you think I don’t
know all about it, you are mistaken, for I do. The vampyre is in the
house yonder, and I’m the fellow to tackle him, I believe you, my boys.”
“Good God!” said the doctor, “what shall we do?”
“Nothing,” said Jack, as he took a bottle from his pocket and applied
the neck of it to his lips—“nothing—nothing at all.”
“There’s something to begin with,” said the admiral, as with his stick
he gave the bottle a sudden blow that broke it and spilt all its
contents, leaving Jack petrified, with the bit of the neck of it still
in his mouth.
“My eye, admiral,” he said, “was that done like a British seaman? My
eye—was that the trick of a lubber, or of a thorough-going first-rater?
first-rater? My eye——”
“Hold your noise, will you; you are not drunk yet, and I was determined
that you should not get so, which you soon would with that rum-bottle,
if I had not come with a broadside across it. Now you may stay; but,
mark me, you are on active service now, and must do nothing without
orders.”
“Ay, ay, your honour,” said Jack, as he dropped the neck of the bottle,
and looked ruefully upon the ground, from whence arose the aroma of
rum—“ay, ay; but it’s a hard case, take it how you will, to have your
grog stopped; but, d—n it, I never had it stopped yet when it was in my
mouth.”
Henry and Charles could not forbear a smile at Jack’s discomfiture,
which, however, they were very glad of, for they knew full well his
failing, and that in the course of another half hour he would have been
drunk, and incapable of being controlled, except, as on some former
occasions, by the exercise of brute force.
But Jack was evidently displeased, and considered himself to be
grievously insulted, which, after all, was the better, inasmuch as,
while he was brooding over his wrongs, he was quiet; when, otherwise,
it might have been a very difficult matter to make him so.
They partook of some refreshments, and, as the day advanced, the
brothers Bannerworth, as well as Charles Holland, began to get very
anxious upon the subject of the proceedings of Sir Francis Varney in
the Hall.
They conversed in low tones, exhausting every, as they considered,
possible conjecture to endeavour to account for his mysterious
predilection for that abode, but nothing occurred to them of a
sufficiently probable motive to induce them to adopt it as a conclusion.
They more than suspected Dr. Chillingworth, because he was so silent,
and hazarded no conjecture at all of knowing something, or of having
formed to himself some highly probable hypothesis upon the subject;
but they could not get him to agree that such was the case.
When they challenged him upon the subject, all he would say was,—
“My good friends, you perceive that, there is a great mystery
somewhere, and I do hope that to-night it will be cleared up
satisfactorily.”
With this they were compelled to be satisfied; and now the soft and
sombre shades of evening began to creep over the scene, enveloping all
objects in the dimness and repose of early night.
The noise from the house had ceased, and all was profoundly still. But
more than once Henry fancied he heard footsteps outside the garden.
He mentioned his suspicions to Charles Holland, who immediately said,—
“The same thing has come to my ears.”
“Indeed! Then it must be so; we cannot both of us have merely imagined
such a thing. You may depend that this place is beleaguered in some
way, and that to-night will be productive of events which will throw
a great light upon the affairs connected with this vampyre that have
hitherto baffled conjecture.”
“Hush!” said Charles; “there, again; I am quite confident I heard a
sound as of a broken twig outside the garden-wall. The doctor and the
admiral are in deep discussion about something,—shall we tell them?”
“No; let us listen, as yet.”
They bent all their attention to listening, inclining their ears
towards the ground, and, after a few moments, they felt confident that
more than one footstep was creeping along, as cautiously as possible,
under the garden wall. After a few moments’ consultation, Henry made
up his mind—he being the best acquainted with the localities of the
place—to go and reconnoitre, so he, without saying anything to the
doctor or the admiral, glided from where he was, in the direction of a
part of the fence which he knew he could easily scale.
CHAPTER LXXIX.
THE VAMPYRE’S DANGER.—THE LAST REFUGE.—THE RUSE OF HENRY BANNERWORTH.
Yet knowing to what deeds of violence the passions of a lawless mob
will sometimes lead them, and having the experience of what had been
attempted by the alarmed and infuriated populace on a former occasion,
against the Hall, Henry Bannerworth was, reasonably enough, not without
his fears that something might occur of a nature yet highly dangerous
to the stability of his ancient house.
He did not actually surmount the fence, but he crept so close to it,
that he could get over in a moment, if he wished; and, if any one
should move or speak on the other side, he should be quite certain to
hear them.
For a few moments all was still, and then suddenly he heard some one
say, in a low voice,—
“Hist! hist! did you hear nothing?”
“I thought I did,” said another; “but I now am doubtful.”
“Listen again.”
“What,” thought Henry, “can be the motives of these men lying secreted
here? It is most extraordinary what they can possibly want, unless they
are brewing danger for the Hall.”
Most cautiously now he raised himself, so that his eyes could just look
over the fence, and then, indeed, he was astonished.
He had expected to see two or three persons, at the utmost; what was
his surprise to find a compact mass of men crouching down under the
garden wall, as far as his eye could reach.
For a few moments, he was so surprised, that he continued to gaze on,
heedless of the danger there might be from a discovery that he was
playing the part of a spy upon them.
When, however, his first sensations of surprise were over, he
cautiously removed to his former position, and, just as he did, so, he
heard those who had before spoken, again, in low tones, breaking the
stillness of the night.
“I am resolved upon it,” said one; “I am quite determined. I will,
please God, rid the country of that dreadful man.”
“Don’t call him a man,” said the other.
“Well, well; it is a wrong name to apply to a vampyre.”
“It is Varney, after all, then,” said Henry Bannerworth, to
himself;—“it is his life that they seek. What can be done to save
him?—for saved he shall be if I can compass such an object. I feel
that there is yet a something in his character which is entitled to
consideration, and he shall not be savagely murdered while I have an
arm to raise in his defence. But if anything is now to be done, it must
be done by stratagem, for the enemy are, by far, in too great force to
be personally combatted with.”
Henry resolved to take the advice of his friends, and with that view he
went silently and quietly back to where they were, and communicated to
them the news that he had so unexpectedly discovered.
They were all much surprised, and then the doctor said,
“You may depend, that since the disappointment of the mob in the
destruction of this place, they have had their eye upon Varney. He has
been dogged here by some one, and then by degrees that assemblage has
sought the spot.”
“He’s a doomed man, then,” remarked the admiral; “for what can save him
from a determined number of persons, who, by main force, will overcome
us, let us make what stand we may in his defence.”
“Is there no hiding-place in the house,” said Charles, “where you
might, after warning him of his danger, conceal him?”
“There are plenty, but of what avail would that be, if they burn down
the Hall, which in all probability they will!”
“None, certainly.”
“There is but one chance,” said Henry, “and that is to throw them off
the scent, and induce them to think that he whom they seek is not here;
I think that may possibly be done by boldness.”
“But how?”
“I will go among them and make the effort.”
He at once left the friends, for he felt that there might be no time
to lose, and hastening to the same part of the wall, over which he had
looked so short a time before, he clambered over it, and cried, in a
loud voice,
“Stop the vampyre! stop the vampyre!”
“Where, where?” shouted a number of persons at once, turning their eyes
eagerly towards the spot where Henry stood.
“There, across the fields,” cried Henry. “I have lain in wait for him
long; but he has eluded me, and is making his way again towards the old
ruins, where I am sure he has some hiding-place that he thinks will
elude all search. There, I see his dusky form speeding onwards.”
“Come on,” cried several; “to the ruins! to the ruins! We’ll smoke him
out if he will not come by fair means; we must have him, dead or alive.”
“Yes, to the ruins!” shouted the throng of persons, who up to this
time had preserved so cautious a silence, and, in a few moments more,
Henry Bannerworth had the satisfaction of finding that his ruse had
been perfectly successful, for Bannerworth Hall and its vicinity were
completely deserted, and the mob, in a straggling mass, went over hedge
and ditch towards those ruins in which there was nothing to reward the
exertions they might choose to make in the way of an exploration of
them, but the dead body of the villain Marchdale, who had come there to
so dreadful, but so deserved a death.
CHAPTER LXXX.
THE DISCOVERY OF THE BODY OF MARCHDALE IN THE RUINS BY THE MOB.—THE
BURNING OF THE CORPSE.—THE MURDER OF THE HANGMAN.
The mob reached the ruins of Bannerworth Hall, and crowded round it
on all sides, with the view of ascertaining if a human creature, dead
or alive, were there; various surmises were afloat, and some were for
considering that everybody but themselves, or their friends, must be
nothing less than vampyres. Indeed, a strange man, suddenly appearing
among them, would have caused a sensation, and a ring would no doubt
have been formed round him, and then a hasty council held, or, what
was more probable, some shout, or word uttered by some one behind, who
could not understand what was going on in front, would have determined
them to commit some desperate outrage, and the sacrifice of life would
have been the inevitable result of such an unfortunate concurrence of
circumstances.
There was a pause before anyone ventured among the ruins; the walls
were carefully looked to, and in more than one instance, but they were
found dangerous, what were remaining; some parts had been so completely
destroyed, that there were nothing but heaps of rubbish.
However, curiosity was exerted to such an extraordinary pitch that
it overcame the fear of danger, in search of the horrible; for they
believed that if there were any one in the ruins he must be a vampyre,
of course, and they were somewhat cautious in going near such a
creature, lest in so doing they should meet with some accident, and
become vampyres too.
This was a dreadful reflection, and one that every now and then
impressed itself upon the individuals composing the mob; but at the
same time any new impulse, or a shout, and they immediately became
insensible to all fear; the mere impulse is the dominant one, and then
all is forgotten.
The scene was an impressive one; the beautiful house and grounds looked
desolate and drear; many of the trees were stripped and broken down,
and many scorched and burned, while the gardens and flower beds, the
delight of the Bannerworth family, were rudely trodden under foot by
the rabble, and all those little beauties so much admired and tended by
the inhabitants, were now utterly destroyed, and in such a state that
their site could not even be detected by the former owners.
It was a sad sight to see such a sacrilege committed,—such violence
done to private feelings, as to have all these places thrown open
to the scrutiny of the brutal and vulgar, who are incapable of
appreciating or understanding the pleasures of a refined taste.
The ruins presented a remarkable contrast to what the place had been
but a very short time before; and now the scene of desolation was
complete, there was no one spot in which the most wretched could find
shelter.
To be sure, under the lee of some broken and crumbling wall, that
tottered, rather than stood, a huddled wretch might have found shelter
from the wind, but it would have been at the risk of his life, and not
there complete.
The mob became quiet for some moments, but was not so long; indeed,
a mob of people,—which is, in fact, always composed of the most
disorderly characters to be found in a place, is not exactly the
assembly that is most calculated for quietness; somebody gave a shout,
and then somebody else shouted, and the one wide throat of the whole
concourse was opened, and sent forth a mighty yell.
After this exhibition of power, they began to run about like
mad,—traverse the grounds from one end to the other, and then the ruins
were in progress of being explored.
This was a tender affair, and had to be done with some care and caution
by those who were so engaged; and they walked over crumbling and
decayed masses.
In one or two places, they saw what appeared to be large holes, into
which the building materials had been sunk, by their own weight,
through the flooring, that seemed as roofs to some cellars or dungeons.
Seeing this, they knew not how soon some other part might sink in,
and carry their precious bodies down with the mass of rubbish; this
gave an interest to the scene,—a little danger is a sort of salt to an
adventure, and enables those who have taken part in it to talk of their
exploits, and of their dangers, which is pleasant to do, and to hear in
the ale-house, and by the inglenook in the winter.
However, when a few had gone some distance, others followed, when they
saw them enter the place in safety; and at length the whole ruins were
covered with living men, and not a few women, who seemed necessary to
make up the elements of mischief in this case.
There were some shouting and hallooing from one to the other as they
hurried about the ruins.
At length they had explored the ruins nearly all over, when one
man, who had stood a few minutes upon a spot, gazing intently upon
something, suddenly exclaimed,—
“Hilloa! hurrah! here we are, altogether,—come on,—I’ve found him,—I’ve
found—recollect it’s me, and nobody else has found,—hurrah!”
Then, with a wild kind of frenzy, he threw his hat up into the air, as
if to attract attention, and call others round him, to see what it was
he had found.
“What’s the matter, Bill?” exclaimed one who came up to him, and who
had been close at hand.
“The matter? why, I’ve found him; that’s the matter, old man,” replied
the first.
“What, a whale?
“No, a wampyre; the blessed wampyre! there he is,—don’t you see him
under them ere bricks?”
“Oh, that’s not him; he got away.”
“I don’t care,” replied the other, “who got away, or who didn’t; I know
this much, that he’s a wampyre,—he wouldn’t be there if he warn’t.”
This was an unanswerable argument, and nobody could deny it;
consequently, there was a cessation of talk, and the people then came
up, as the two first were looking at the body.
“Whose is it?” inquired a dozen voices.
“Not Sir Francis Varney’s!” said the second speaker; “the clothes are
not his—”
“No, no; not Sir Francis’s.”
“But I tell you what, mates,” said the first speaker; “that if it isn’t
Sir Francis Varney’s, it is somebody else’s as bad. I dare say, now,
he’s a wictim.”
“A what!”
“A wictim to the wampyre; and, if he sees the blessed moonlight, he
will be a wampyre hisself, and so shall we be, too, if he puts his
teeth into us.”
“So we shall,—so we shall,” said the mob, and their flesh began to run
cold, and there was a feeling of horror creeping over the whole body of
persons within hearing.
“I tell you what it is; our only plan will be to get him out of the
ruins, then, remarked another.
“What!” said one; “who’s going to handle such cattle? if you’ve a sore
about you, and his blood touches you, who’s to say you won’t be a
vampyre, too!”
“No, no you won’t,” said an old woman.
“I won’t try,” was the happy rejoinder; “I ain’t a-going to carry
a wampyre on my two legs home to my wife and small family of seven
children, and another a-coming.”
There was a pause for a few moments, and then one man more adventurous
than the rest, exclaimed,—
“Well, vampyre, or no vampyre, his dead body can harm no one; so here
goes to get it out, help me who will; once have it out, and then we can
prevent any evil, by burning it, and thus destroying the whole body.
“Hurrah!” shouted three or four more, as they jumped down into the hole
formed by the falling in of the materials which had crushed Marchdale
to death, for it was his body they had discovered.
They immediately set to work to displace such of the materials as lay
on the body, and then, having cleared it of all superincumbent rubbish,
they proceeded to lift it up, but found that it had got entangled, as
they called it, with some chains; with some trouble they got them off,
and the body was lifted out to a higher spot.
“Now, what’s to be done?” inquired one.
“Burn it,” said another.
“Hurrah!” shouted a female voice; “we’ve got the wampyre! run a stake
through his body, and then place him upon some dry wood,—there’s plenty
to be had about here, I am sure,—and then burn him to a cinder.”
“That’s right, old woman,—that’s right,” said a man; “nothing better:
the devil must be in him if he come to life after that, I should say.”
There might be something in that, and the mob shouted its approbation,
as it was sure to do at anything stupid or senseless, and the proposal
might be said to have been carried by acclamation, and it required only
the execution.
This was soon done. There were plenty of laths and rafters, and the
adjoining wood furnished an abundant supply of dry sticks, so there was
no want of fuel.
There was a loud shout as each accession of sticks took place, and,
as each individual threw his bundle into the heap, each man felt
all the self-devotion to the task as the Scottish chieftain who
sacrificed himself and seven sons in the battle for his superior;
and, when one son was cut down, the man filled up his place with the
exclamation,—“Another for Hector,” until he himself fell as the last of
his race.
Soon now the heap became prodigious, and it required an effort to get
the mangled corpse upon this funeral bier; but it was then a shout
from the mob that rent the air announced, both the fact and their
satisfaction.
The next thing to be done was to light the pile—this was no easy task;
but like all others, it was accomplished, and the dead body of the
vampyre’s victim was thrown on to prevent that becoming a vampyre too,
in its turn.
“There, boys,” said one, “he’ll not see the moonlight, that’s certain,
and the sooner we put a light to this the better; for it may be, the
soldiers will be down upon us before we know anything of it; so now,
who’s got a light?”
This was a question that required a deal of searching; but, at length
one was found by one of the mob coming forward, and after drawing his
pipe vigorously for some moments, he collected some scraps of paper,
upon which he emptied the contents of the pipe, with the hope they
would take fire.
In this, however, he was doomed to disappointment; for it produced
nothing but a deal of smoke, and the paper burned without producing any
flame.
This act of disinterestedness, however was not without its due
consequences, for there were several who had pipes, and, fired with the
hope of emulating the first projector of the scheme for raising the
flame, they joined together, and putting the contents of their pipes
together on some paper, straw, and chips, they produced, after some
little trouble, a flame.
Then there was a shout, and the burning mass was then placed in
a favourable position nearer the pile of materials collected for
burning, and then, in a few moments, it began to take light; one piece
communicated the fire to another, until the whole was in a blaze.
When the first flame fairly reached the top, a loud and tremendous
shout arose from the mob, and the very welkin re-echoed with its
fulness.
Then the forked flames rushed through the wood, and hissed and crackled
as they flew, throwing up huge masses of black smoke, and casting a
peculiar reflection around. Not a sound was heard save the hissing and
roaring of the flames, which seemed like the approaching of a furious
whirlwind.
[Illustration: The burning of Marchdale’s body by the mob.]
At length there was nothing to be seen but the blackened mass; it was
enveloped in one huge flame, that threw out a great heat, so much so,
that those nearest to it felt induced to retire from before it.
“I reckon,” said one, “that he’s pretty well done by this time—he’s had
a warm berth of it up there.”
“Yes,” said another, “farmer Watkins’s sheep he roasted whole at last
harvest-home hadn’t such a fire as this, I’ll warrant; there’s no such
fire in the county—why, it would prevent a frost, I do believe it
would.”
“So it would, neighbour,” answered another.
“Yes,” replied a third, “but you’d want such a one corner of each field
though.”
• • • • •
There was much talk and joking going on among the men who stood
around, in the midst of which, however, they were disturbed by a
loud shout, and upon looking in the quarter whence it came, they saw
stealing from among the ruins, the form of a man.
He was a strange, odd looking man, and at the time it was very doubtful
among the mob as to whom it was—nobody could tell, and more than one
looked at the burning pile, and then at the man who seemed to be so
mysteriously present, as if they almost imagined that the body had got
away.
“Who is it?” exclaimed one.
“Danged if I knows,” said another, looking very hard, and very white at
the same time;—“I hope it ain’t the chap what we’ve burned here jist
now.”
“No,” said the female, “that you may be sure of, for he’s had a stake
through his body, and as you said, he can never get over that, for as
the stake is consumed, so are his vitals, and that’s a sure sign he’s
done for.”
“Yes, yes, she’s right—a vampyre may live upon blood, but cannot do
without his inside.”
This was so obvious to them all, that it was at once conceded, and
a general impression pervaded the mob that it might be Sir Francis
Varney; a shout ensued.
“Hurrah!—After him—there’s a vampyre—there he goes!—after him—catch
him—burn him!”
And a variety of other exclamations were uttered, at the same time; the
victim of popular wrath seemed to be aware that he was now discovered,
and made off with all possible expedition, towards some wood.
Away went the mob in pursuit, hooting and hallooing like demons, and
denouncing the unfortunate being with all the terrors that could be
imagined, and which naturally added greater speed to the unfortunate
man.
However, some among the mob, seeing that there was every probability
of the stranger’s escaping at a mere match of speed, brought a little
cunning to bear upon matter, and took a circuit round, and thus
intercepted him.
This was not accomplished without a desperate effort, and by the best
runners, who thus reached the spot he made for, before he could get
there.
When the stranger saw himself thus intercepted, he endeavoured to fly
in a different direction; but was soon secured by the mob, who made
somewhat free with his person, and commenced knocking him about.
“Have mercy on me,” said the stranger. “What do you want? I am not
rich; but take all I have.”
“What do you do here?” inquired twenty voices. “Come, tell us that—what
do you do here, and who are you?”
“A stranger, quite a stranger to these parts.”
“Oh, yes! he’s a stranger; but that’s all the worse for him—he’s a
vampyre—there’s no doubt about that.”
“Good God,” said the man, “I am a living and breathing man like
yourselves. I have done no wrong, and injured no man—be merciful unto
me; I intend no harm.”
“Of course not; send him to the fire—take him back to the ruins—to the
fire.”
“Ay, and run a stake through his body, and then he’s safe for life. I
am sure he has something to do with the vampyre; and who knows, if he
ain’t a vampyre, how soon he may become one?”
“Ah! that’s very true; bring him back to the fire, and we’ll try the
effects of the fire upon his constitution.”
“I tell you what, neighbour, it’s my opinion, that as one fool makes
many, so one vampyre makes many.”
“So it does, so it does; there’s much truth and reason in that
neighbour; I am decidedly of that opinion, too.”
“Come along then,” cried the mob, cuffing and pulling the unfortunate
stranger with them.
“Mercy, mercy!”
But it was useless to call for mercy to men whose superstitious
feelings urged them on; for when the demon of superstition is active,
no matter what form it may take, it always results in cruelty and
wickedness to all.
Various were the shouts and menaces of the mob, and the stranger saw no
hope of life unless he could escape from the hands of the people who
surrounded him.
They had now nearly reached the ruins, and the stranger, who was
certainly a somewhat odd and remarkable looking man, and who appeared
in their eyes the very impersonation of their notions of a vampyre, was
thrust from one to the other, kicked by one, and then cuffed by the
other, as if he was doomed to run the gauntlet.
“Down with the vampyre!” said the mob.
“I am no vampyre,” said the stranger; “I am new to these parts, and I
pray you have mercy upon me. I have done you no wrong. Hear me,—I know
nothing of these people of whom you speak.”
“That won’t do; you’ve come here to see what you can do, I dare say;
and, though you may have been hurt by the vampyre, and may be only
your misfortune, and not your fault, yet the mischief is as great as
ever it was or can be, you become, in spite of yourself, a vampyre, and
do the same injury to others that has been done to you—there’s no help
for you.”
“No help,—we can’t help it,” shouted the mob; “he must die,—throw him
on the pile.”
“Put a stake through him first, though,” exclaimed the humane female;
“put a stake through him, and then he’s safe.”
This horrible advice had an electric effect on the stranger, who jumped
up, and eluded the grasp of several hands that were stretched forth to
seize him.
“Throw him upon the burning wood!” shouted one.
“And a stake through his body,” suggested the humane female again, who
seemed to have this one idea in her heart, and no other, and, upon
every available opportunity, she seemed to be anxious to give utterance
to the comfortable notion.
“Seize him!” exclaimed one.
“Never let him go,” said another; “we’ve gone too far to hang back now;
and, if he escape, he will visit us in our sleep, were it only out of
spite.”
The stranger made a dash among the ruins, and, for a moment,
out-stripped his pursuers; but a few, more adventurous than the rest,
succeeded in driving him into an angle formed by two walls, and the
consequence was, he was compelled to come to a stand.
“Seize him—seize him!” exclaimed all those at a distance.
The stranger, seeing he was now nearly surrounded, and had no chance
of escape, save by some great effort, seized a long piece of wood, and
struck two of his assailants down at once, and then dashed through the
opening.
He immediately made for another part of the ruins, and succeeded in
making his escape for some short distance, but was unable to keep up
the speed that was required, for his great exertion before had nearly
exhausted him, and the fear of a cruel death before his eyes was not
enough to give him strength, or lend speed to his flight. He had
suffered too much from violence, and, though he ran with great speed,
yet those who followed were uninjured, and fresher,—he had no chance.
They came very close upon him at the corner of a field, which he
endeavoured to cross, and had succeeded in doing, and he made a
desperate attempt to scramble up the bank that divided the field from
the next, but he slipped back, almost exhausted, into the ditch, and
the whole mob came up.
However, he got on the bank, and leaped into the next field, and then
he was immediately surrounded by those who pursued him, and he was
struck down.
“Down with the vampyre!—kill him,—he’s one of ’em,—run a stake through
him!” were a few of the cries of the infuriated mob of people, who
were only infuriated because he attempted to escape their murderous
intentions.
It was strange to see how they collected in a ring as the unfortunate
man lay on the ground, panting for breath, and hardly able to
speak—their infuriated countenances plainly showing the mischief they
were intent upon.
“Have mercy upon me!” he exclaimed, as he lay on the earth; “I have no
power to help myself.”
The mob returned no answer, but stood collecting their numbers as they
came up.
“Have mercy on me! it cannot be any pleasure to you to spill my blood.
I am unable to resist—I am one man among many,—you surely cannot wish
to beat me to death?”
“We want to hurt no one, except in our own defence, and we won’t be
made vampyres of because you don’t like to die.”
“No, no; we won’t be vampyres,” exclaimed the mob, and there arose a
great shout from the mob.
“Are you men—fathers?—have you families? if so, I have the same ties as
you have; spare me for their sakes,—do not murder me,—you will leave
one an orphan if you do; besides, what have I done? I have injured no
one.”
“I tell you what, friends, if we listen to him we shall all be
vampyres, and all our children will all be vampyres and orphans.”
“So we shall, so we shall; down with him!”
The man attempted to get up, but, in doing so, he received a heavy blow
from a hedge-stake, wielded by the herculean arm of a peasant. The
sound of the blow was heard by those immediately around, and the man
fell dead. There was a pause, and those nearest, apparently fearful
of the consequences, and hardly expecting the catastrophe, began to
disperse, and the remainder did so very soon afterwards.
CHAPTER LXXXI.
THE VAMPYRE’S FLIGHT.—HIS DANGER, AND THE LAST PLACE OF REFUGE.
Leaving the disorderly and vicious mob, who were thus sacrificing human
life to their excited passions, we return to the brothers Bannerworth
and the doctor, who together with Admiral Bell, still held watch over
the hall.
No indication of the coming forth of Varney presented itself for some
time longer, and then, at least they thought, they heard a window open;
and, turning their eyes in the direction whence the sound proceeded,
they could see the form of a man slowly and cautiously emerging from it.
As far as they could judge, from the distance at which they were, that
form partook much of the appearance and the general aspect of Sir
Francis Varney, and the more they looked and noticed its movements, the
more they felt convinced that such was the fact.
“There comes your patient, doctor,” said the admiral.
“Don’t call him my patient,” said the doctor, “if you please.”
“Why you know he is; and you are, in a manner of speaking, bound to
look after him. Well, what is to be done?”
“He must not, on any account,” said Dr. Chillingworth, “be allowed to
leave the place. Believe me, I have the very strongest reasons for
saying so.”
“He shall not leave it then,” said Henry.
Even as he spoke, Henry Bannerworth darted forward, and Sir Francis
Varney dropped from the window, out of which he had clambered, close to
his feet.
“Hold!” cried Henry, “you are my prisoner.”
With the most imperturbable coolness in the world, Sir Francis Varney
turned upon him, and replied,—
“And pray, Henry Bannerworth, what have I done to provoke your wrath?”
“What have you done?—have you not, like a thief, broken into my house?
Can you ask what you have done?”
“Ay,” said the vampyre, “like a thief, perchance, and yet no thief. May
I ask you, what there is to steal, in the house?”
By the time this short dialogue had been uttered, the rest of the party
had come up, and Varney was, so far as regarded numbers, a prisoner.
“Well, gentlemen,” he said, with that strange contortion of countenance
which, now they all understood, arose from the fact of his having been
hanged, and restored to life again. “Well, gentlemen, now that you have
beleaguered me in such a way, may I ask you what it is about?”
“If you will step aside with me, Sir Francis Varney, for a moment,”
said Dr. Chillingworth, “I will make to you a communication which will
enable you to know what it is all about.”
“Oh, with pleasure,” said the vampyre. “I am not ill at present; but
still, sir, I have no objection to hear what you have to say.”
He stepped a few paces on one side with the doctor, while the others
waited, not without some amount of impatience for the result of the
communication. All that they could hear was, that Varney said, suddenly—
“You are quite mistaken.”
And then the doctor appeared to be insisting upon something, which the
vampyre listened to patiently; and, at the end, burst out with,—
“Why, doctor, you must be dreaming.”
At this, Dr. Chillingworth at once left him, and advancing to his
friends, he said,—
“Sir Francis Varney denies in toto all that I have related to you
concerning him; therefore, I can say no more than that I earnestly
recommend you, before you let him go, to see that he takes nothing of
value with him.”
“Why, what can you mean?” said Varney.
“Search him,” said the doctor; “I will tell you why, very shortly.”
“Indeed—indeed!” said Sir Francis Varney. “Now, gentlemen, I will give
you a chance of behaving justly and quietly, so saving yourself the
danger of acting otherwise. I have made repeated offers to take this
house, either as a tenant or as a purchaser, all of which offers have
been declined, upon, I dare say, a common enough principle, namely,
one which induces people to enhance the value of anything they have
for disposal, if it be unique, by making it difficult to come at.
Seeing that you had deserted the place, I could make no doubt but
that it was to be had, so I came here to make a thorough examination
of its interior, to see if it would suit me. I find that it will not;
therefore, I have only to apologise for the intrusion, and to wish you
a remarkably good evening.”
“That won’t do,” said the doctor.
“What won’t do, sir?”
“This excuse will not do, Sir Francis Varney. You are, although you
deny it, the man who was hanged in London some years ago for a highway
robbery.”
Varney laughed, and held up his hands, exclaiming,—
“Alas! alas! our good friend, the doctor, has studied too hard; his
wits, probably, at the best of times, none of the clearest, have become
hopelessly entangled.”
“Do you deny,” said Henry, “then, that you are that man?”
“Most unequivocally.”
“I assert it,” said the doctor, “and now, I will tell you all, for I
perceive you hesitate about searching, Sir Francis Varney, I tell you
all why it is that he has such an affection for Bannerworth Hall.”
“Before you do,” said Varney, “there is a pill for you, which you may
find more nauseous and harder of digestion, than any your shop can
furnish.”
As Varney uttered these words, he suddenly drew from his pocket a
pistol, and, levelling it at the unfortunate doctor, he fired it full
at him.
[Illustration: Varney suddenly shoots the doctor.]
The act was so sudden, so utterly unexpected, and so stunning, that it
was done before any one could move hand or foot to prevent it. Henry
Bannerworth and his brother were the furthest off from the vampyre;
and, unhappily, in the rush which they, as soon us possible, made
towards him, they knocked down the admiral, who impeded them much; and,
before they could spring over, or past him, Sir Francis Varney was gone.
So sudden, too, had been his departure, that they had not the least
idea in which direction he had gone; so that to follow him would have
been a work of the greatest possible difficulty.
Notwithstanding, however, both the difficulty and the danger, for no
doubt the vampyre was well enough armed, Henry and his brother both
rushed after the murderer, as they now believed him to be, in the route
which they thought it was most probable he would take, namely, that
which led towards the garden gate.
They reached that spot in a few moments, but all was profoundly still.
Not the least trace of any one could be seen, high or low, and they
were compelled, after a cursory examination, to admit that Sir Francis
Varney had again made his escape, despite the great odds that were
against him in point of numbers.
“He has gone,” said Henry. “Let us go back, and see into the state of
poor Dr. Chillingworth, who, I fear, is a dead man.”
They hurried back to the spot, and there they found the admiral looking
as composed as possible, and solacing himself with a pinch of snuff, as
he gazed upon the apparently lifeless form at his feet.
“Is he dead?” said Henry.
“I should say he was,” replied the admiral; “such a shot as that was
don’t want to be repeated. Well, I liked the doctor with all his
faults. He only had one foolish way with him, and that was, that he
shirked his grog.”
“This is an awful catastrophe,” said Henry, as he knelt down by the
side of the body. “Assist me, some of you. Where is Charles?”
“I’ll be hanged,” said the admiral, “if I know. He disappeared
somewhere.”
“This is a night of mystery as well as terror. Alas! poor Dr.
Chillingworth! I little thought that you would have fallen a victim
to the man whom you preserved from death. How strange it is that
you should have snatched from the tomb the very individual who was,
eventually, to take your own life.”
The brothers gently raised the body of the doctor, and carried it on to
the grass plot, which was close at hand.
“Farewell, kind and honest-hearted Chillingworth,” said Henry; “I
shall, many and many a time, feel your loss; and now I will rest not
until I have delivered up to justice your murderer. All consideration,
or feeling, for what seemed to be latent virtues in that strange
and inexplicable man, Varney, shall vanish, and he shall reap the
consequences of the crime he has now committed.”
“It was a cold blooded, cowardly murder,” said his brother.
“It was; but you may depend the doctor was about to reveal something
to us, which Varney so much dreaded, that he took his life as the only
effectual way, at the moment, of stopping him.”
“It must be so,” said Henry.
“And now,” said the admiral, “it’s too late, and we shall not know it
at all. That’s the way. A fellow saves up what he has got to tell till
it is too late to tell it, and down he goes to Davy Jones’s locker with
all his secrets aboard.”
“Not always,” said Dr. Chillingworth, suddenly sitting bolt
upright—“not always.”
Henry and his brother started back in amazement, and the admiral was
so taken by surprise, that had not the resuscitated doctor suddenly
stretched out his hand and laid hold of him by the ankle, he would
have made a precipitate retreat.
“Hilloa! murder!” he cried. “Let me go! How do I know but you may be a
vampyre by now, as you were shot by one.”
Henry soonest recovered from the surprise of the moment, and with the
most unfeigned satisfaction, he cried,—
“Thank God you are unhurt, Dr. Chillingworth! Why he must have missed
you by a miracle.”
“Not at all,” said the doctor. “Help me up—thank you—all right. I’m
only a little singed about the whiskers. He hit me safe enough.”
“Then how have you escaped?”
“Why from the want of a bullet in the pistol, to be sure. I can
understand it all well enough. He wanted to create sufficient confusion
to cover a desperate attempt to escape, and he thought that would be
best done by seeming to shoot me. The suddenness of the shock, and the
full belief, at the moment, that he had sent a bullet into my brains,
made me fall, and produced a temporary confusion of ideas, amounting to
insensibility.”
“From which you are happily recovered. Thank Heaven that, after all, he
is not such a villain as this act would have made him.”
“Ah!” said the admiral, “it takes people who have lived a little in
these affairs to know the difference in sound between a firearm with a
bullet in it, and one without. I knew it was all right.”
“Then why did you not say so, admiral?”
“What was the use? I thought the doctor might be amused to know what
you should say of him, so you see I didn’t interfere; and, as I am not
a good hand at galloping after anybody, I didn’t try that part of the
business, but just remained where I was.”
“Alas! alas!” cried the doctor, “I much fear that, by his going, I have
lost all that I expected to be able to do for you, Henry. It’s of not
the least use now telling you or troubling you about it. You may now
sell or let Bannerworth Hall to whomever you please, for I am afraid it
is really worthless.”
“What on earth do you mean?” said Henry. “Why, doctor, will you keep up
this mystery among us? If you have anything to say, why not say it at
once?”
“Because, I tell you it’s of no use now. The game is up, Sir Francis
Varney has escaped; but still I don’t know that I need exactly
hesitate.”
“There can be no reason for your hesitating about making a
communication to us,” said Henry. “It is unfriendly not to do so.”
“My dear boy, you will excuse me for saying that you don’t know what
you are talking about.”
“Can you give any reason?”
“Yes; respect for the living. I should have to relate something of the
dead which would be hurtful to their feelings.”
Henry was silent for a few moments, and then he said,——
“What dead? And who are the living?”
“Another time,” whispered the doctor to him; “another time, Henry. Do
not press me now. But you shall know all another time.”
“I must be content. But now let us remember that another man yet
lingers in Bannerworth Hall. I will endure suspense on his account no
longer. He is an intruder there; so I go at once to dislodge him.”
No one made any opposition to this move, not even the doctor; so
Henry preceded them all to the house. They passed through the open
window into the long hall, and from thence into every apartment of
the mansion, without finding the object of their search. But from
one of the windows up to which there grew great masses of ivy, there
hung a rope, by which any one might easily have let himself down; and
no doubt, therefore, existed in all their minds that the hangman had
sufficiently profited by the confusion incidental to the supposed
shooting of the doctor, to make good his escape from the place.
“And so, after all,” said Henry, “we are completely foiled?”
“We may be,” said Dr. Chillingworth; “but it is, perhaps, going too far
to say that we actually are. One thing, however, is quite clear; and
that is, no good can be done here.”
“Then let us go home,” said the admiral. “I did not think from the
first that any good would be done here.”
They all left the garden together now; so that, almost for the first
time, Bannerworth Hall was left to itself, unguarded and unwatched
by any one whatever. It was with an evident and a marked melancholy
that the doctor proceeded with the party to the cottage-house of
the Bannerworths; but, as after what he had said, Henry forbore to
question him further upon those subjects which he admitted he was
keeping secret; and as none of the party were much in a cue for general
conversation, the whole of them walked on with more silence than
usually characterised them.
CHAPTER LXXXII.
CHARLES HOLLAND’S PURSUIT OF THE VAMPYRE.—THE DANGEROUS INTERVIEW.
It will be recollected that the admiral had made a remark about Charles
Holland having suddenly disappeared; and it is for us now to account
for that disappearance and to follow him to the pathway he had chosen.
The fact was, that he, when Varney fired the shot at the doctor, or
what was the supposed shot, was the farthest from the vampyre; and he,
on that very account, had the clearest and best opportunity of marking
which route he took when he had discharged the pistol.
He was not confused by the smoke, as the others were; nor was he
stunned by the noise of the discharge; but he distinctly saw Varney
dart across one of the garden beds, and make for the summer-house,
instead of for the garden gate, as Henry had supposed was the most
probable path he had chosen.
Now, Charles Holland either had an inclination, for some reasons of his
own, to follow the vampyre alone; or, on the spur of the moment, he had
not time to give an alarm to the others; but certain it is that he did,
unaided, rush after him. He saw him enter the summer-house, and pass
out of it again at the back portion of it, as he had once before done,
when surprised in his interview with Flora.
But the vampyre did not now, as he had done on the former occasion,
hide immediately behind the summer-house. He seemed to be well aware
that that expedient would not answer twice; so he at once sped onwards,
clearing the garden fence, and taking to the meadows.
It formed evidently no part of the intentions of Charles Holland to
come up with him. He was resolved upon dogging his footsteps, to
know where he should go; so that he might have a knowledge of his
hiding-place, if he had one.
“I must and will,” said Charles to himself, “penetrate the mystery that
hangs about this most strange and inexplicable being. I will have an
interview with him, not in hostility, for I forgive him the evil he has
done me, but with a kindly spirit; and I will ask him to confide in me.”
Charles, therefore, did not keep so close upon the heels of the vampyre
as to excite any suspicions of his intention to follow him; but he
waited by the garden paling long enough not only for Varney to get some
distance off, but long enough likewise to know that the pistol which
had been fired at the doctor had produced no real bad effects, except
singing some curious tufts of hair upon the sides of his face, which
the doctor was pleased to call whiskers.
“I thought as much,” was Charles’s exclamation when he heard the
doctor’s voice. “It would have been strikingly at variance with all
Varney’s other conduct, if he had committed such a deliberate and
heartless murder.”
Then, as the form of the vampyre could be but dimly seen, Charles ran
on for some distance in the direction he had taken, and then paused
again; so that if Varney heard the sound of footsteps, and paused to
listen they had ceased again probably, and nothing was discernible.
In this manner he followed the mysterious individual, if we may really
call him such, for above a mile; and then Varney made a rapid detour,
and took his way towards the town.
He went onwards with wonderful precision now in a right line, not
stopping at any obstruction, in the way of fences, hedges, or ditches,
so that it took Charles some exertion, to which, just then, he was
scarcely equal, to keep up with him.
At length the outskirts of the town were gained, and then Varney
paused, and looked around him, scarcely allowing Charles, who was now
closer to him than he had been, time to hide himself from observation,
which, however, he did accomplish, by casting himself suddenly upon the
ground, so that he could not be detected against the sky, which then
formed a back ground to the spot where he was.
Apparently satisfied that he had completely now eluded the pursuit, if
any had been attempted, of those whom he had left in such a state of
confusion, the vampyre walked hastily towards a house that was to let,
and which was only to be reached by going up an avenue of trees, and
then unlocking a gate in a wall which bounded the premises next to the
avenue. But the vampyre appeared to be possessed of every facility for
effecting an entrance to the place and, producing from his pocket a
key, he at once opened the gate, and disappeared within the precincts
of those premises.
He, no doubt, felt that he was hunted by the mob of the town, and
hence his frequent change of residence, since his own had been burnt
down, and, indeed, situated as he was, there can be no manner of doubt
that he would have been sacrificed to the superstitious fury of the
populace, if they could but have got hold of him.
He had, from his knowledge, which was no doubt accurate and complete,
of what had been done, a good idea of what his own fate would be, were
he to fall into the hands of that ferocious multitude, each individual
composing which, felt a conviction that there would be no peace, nor
hope of prosperity or happiness, in the place, until he, the arch
vampyre of all the supposed vampyres, was destroyed.
Charles did pause for a few moments, after having thus become roused,
to consider whether he should then attempt to have the interview he had
resolved upon having by some means or another, or defer it, now that he
knew where Varney was to be found, until another time.
But when he came to consider how extremely likely it was that, even in
the course of a few hours, Varney might shift his abode for some good
and substantial reasons, he at once determined upon attempting to see
him.
But how to accomplish such a purpose was not the easiest question in
the world to answer. If he rung the bell that presented itself above
the garden gate, was it at all likely that Varney, who had come there
for concealment, would pay any attention to the summons?
After some consideration, he did, however, think of a plan by which, at
all events, he could ensure effecting an entrance into the premises,
and then he would take his chance of finding the mysterious being whom
he sought, and who probably might have no particular objection to
meeting with him, Charles Holland, because their last interview in the
ruins could not be said to be otherwise than of a peaceable and calm
enough character.
He saw by the board, which was nailed in the front of the house, that
all applications to see it were to be made to a Mr. Nash, residing
close at hand; and, as Charles had the appearance of a respectable
person, he thought he might possibly have the key entrusted to him,
ostensibly to look at the house, preparatory possibly to taking it, and
so he should, at all events, obtain admission.
He, accordingly, went at once to this Mr. Nash, and asked about the
house; of course he had to affect an interest in its rental and
accommodations, which he did not feel, in order to lull any suspicion,
and, finally, he said,—
“I should like to look over it if you will lend me the key, which I
will shortly bring back to you.”
There was an evident hesitation about the agent when this proposal was
communicated by Charles Holland, and he said,—
“I dare say, sir, you wonder that I don’t say yes, at once; but the
fact is there came a gentleman here one day when I was out, and got a
key, for we have two to open the house, from my wife, and he never came
back again.”
That this was the means by which Varney, the vampyre, had obtained the
key, by the aid of which Charles had seen him effect so immediate an
entrance to the house, there could be no doubt.
“How long ago were you served that trick?” he said.
“About two days ago, sir.”
“Well, it only shows how, when one person acts wrongly, another is at
once suspected of a capability to do so likewise. There is my name and
my address; I should like rather to go alone to see the house, because
I always fancy I can judge better by myself of the accommodation,
and I can stay as long as I like, and ascertain the sizes of all the
rooms without the disagreeable feeling upon my mind, which no amount
of complaisance on your part, could ever get me over, that I was most
unaccountably detaining somebody from more important business of their
own.”
“Oh, I assure you, sir,” said Mr. Nash, “that I should not be at all
impatient. But if you would rather go alone——”
“Indeed I would.”
“Oh, then, sir, there is the key. A gentleman who leaves his name and
address, of course, we can have no objection to. I only told you of
what happened, sir, in the mere way of conversation, and I hope you
won’t imagine for a moment that I meant to insinuate that you were
going to keep the key.”
“Oh, certainly not—certainly not,” said Charles, who was only too glad
to get the key upon any terms. “You are quite right, and I beg you will
say no more about it; I quite understand.”
He then walked off to the empty house again, and, proceeding to the
avenue, he fitted the key to the lock, and had the satisfaction of
finding the gate instantly yield to him.
When he passed through it, and closed the door after him, which he did
carefully, he found himself in a handsomely laid-out garden, and saw
the house a short distance in front of him, standing upon a well got-up
lawn.
He cared not if Varney should see him before he reached the house,
because the fact was sufficiently evident to himself that after all he
could not actually enforce an interview with the vampyre. He only hoped
that as he had found him out it would be conceded to him.
He, therefore, walked up the lawn without making the least attempt at
concealment, and when he reached the house he allowed his footsteps to
make what noise they would upon the stone steps which led up to it.
But no one appeared; nor was there, either by sight or by sound, any
indication of the presence of any living being in the place besides
himself.
Insensibly, as he contemplated the deserted place around him, the
solemn sort of stillness began to have its effect upon his imagination,
and, without being aware that he did so, he had, with softness and
caution, glided onwards, as if he were bent on some errand requiring
the utmost amount of caution and discrimination in the conduction of it.
And so he entered the hall of the house, where he stood some time, and
listened with the greatest attention, without, however, being able to
hear the least sound throughout the whole of the house.
“And yet he must be here,” thought Charles to himself; “I was not gone
many minutes, and it is extremely unlikely that in so short a space of
time he has left, after taking so much trouble, by making such a detour
around the meadows to get here, without being observed. I will examine
every room in the place, but I will find him.”
Charles immediately commenced going from room to room of that house in
his search for the vampyre. There were but four apartments upon the
ground floor, and these, of course, he quickly ran through. Nothing
whatever at all indicative of any one having been there met his gaze,
and with a feeling of disappointment creeping over him, he commenced
the ascent of the staircase.
The day had now fairly commenced, so that there was abundance of light,
although, even for the country, it was an early hour, and probably Mr.
Nash had been not a little surprised to have a call from one whose
appearance bespoke no necessity for rising with the lark at such an
hour.
All these considerations, however, sank into insignificance in
Charles’s mind, compared with the object he had in view, namely, the
unravelling the many mysteries that hung around that man. He ascended
to the landing of the first story, and then, as he could have no
choice, he opened the first door that his eyes fell upon, and entered a
tolerably large apartment. It was quite destitute of furniture, and at
the moment Charles was about to pronounce it empty; but then his eyes
fell upon a large black-looking bundle of something, that seemed to be
lying jammed up under the window on the floor—that being the place of
all others in the room which was enveloped in the most shadow.
He started back involuntarily at the moment, for the appearance was one
so shapeless, that there was no such thing as defining, from even that
distance, what it really was.
Then he slowly and cautiously approached it, as we always approach that
of the character of which we are ignorant, and concerning the powers of
which to do injury we can consequently have no defined idea.
That it was a human form there, was the first tangible opinion he had
about it; and from its profound stillness, and the manner in which
it seemed to be laid close under the window, he thought that he was
surely upon the point of finding out that some deed of blood had been
committed, the unfortunate victim of which was now lying before him.
Upon a nearer examination, he found that the whole body, including the
greater part of the head and face, was wrapped in a large cloak; and
there, as he gazed, he soon found cause to correct his first opinion
as to the form belonging to the dead, for he could distinctly hear the
regular breathing, as of some one in a sound and dreamless sleep.
Closer he went, and closer still. Then, as he clasped his hands, he
said, in a voice scarcely above a whisper,—
“It is—it is the vampyre.”
Yes, there could be no doubt of the fact. It was Sir Francis Varney who
lay there, enveloped in the huge horseman’s cloak, in which, on two or
three occasions during the progress of this narrative, he had figured.
There he lay, at the mercy completely of any arm that might be raised
against him, apparently so overcome by fatigue that no ordinary noise
would have awakened him.
Well might Charles Holland gaze at him with mingled feelings. There
lay the being who had done almost enough to drive the beautiful Flora
Bannerworth distracted—the being who had compelled the Bannerworth
family to leave their ancient house, to which they had been bound
by every description of association. The same mysterious existence,
too, who, the better to carry on his plots and plans, had, by dint
of violence, immured him, Charles, in a dungeon, and loaded him with
chains. There he lay sleeping, and at his mercy.
“Shall I awaken him,” said Charles, “or let him sleep off the fatigue,
which, no doubt, is weighing down his limbs, and setting heavily on his
eyelids. No, my business with him is too urgent.”
He then raised his voice, and cried,—
“Varney, Varney, awake!”
The sound disturbed, without altogether breaking up, the deep slumber
of the vampyre, and he uttered a low moan, and moved one hand
restlessly. Then, as if that disturbance of the calm and deep repose
which had sat upon him, had given at once the reins to fancy, he began
to mutter strange words in his sleep, some of which could be heard by
Charles distinctly, while others were too incoherently uttered to be
clearly understood.
“Where is it?” he said; “where—where hidden?—Pull the house
down!—Murder! No, no, no! no murder!—I will not, I dare not. Blood
enough is upon my hands.—The money!—the money! Down, villains! down!
down! down!”
What these incoherent words alluded to specifically, Charles, of
course, could not have the least idea, but he listened attentively,
with a hope that something might fall from his lips that would afford
a key to some of the mysterious circumstances with which he was so
intimately connected.
Now, however, there was a longer silence than before, only broken
occasionally by low moans; but suddenly, as Charles was thinking of
again speaking, he uttered some more disjointed sentences.
“No harm,” he said, “no harm,—Marchdale is a villain!—Not a hair of his
head injured—no, no. Set him free—yes, I will set him free. Beware!
beware, Marchdale! and you, Mortimer. The scaffold! ay, the scaffold!
but where is the bright gold? The memory of the deed of blood will not
cling to it. Where is it hidden? The gold! the gold! the gold! It is
not in the grave—it cannot be there—no, no, no!—not there, not there!
Load the pistols. There, there! Down, villain, down!—down, down!”
Despairing, now, of obtaining anything like tangible information
from these ravings, which, even if they did, by accident, so connect
themselves together as to seem to mean something, Charles again cried
aloud,—
“Varney, awake, awake!”
But, as before, the sleeping man was sufficiently deaf to the cry to
remain, with his eyes closed, still in a disturbed slumber, but yet a
slumber which might last for a considerable time.
“I have heard,” said Charles, “that there are many persons whom no
noise will awaken, while the slightest touch rouses them in an instant.
I will try that upon this slumbering being.”
As he spoke, he advanced close to Sir Francis Varney, and touched him
slightly with the toe of his boot.
The effect was as startling as it was instantaneous. The vampyre sprang
to his feet, as he had been suddenly impelled up by some powerful
machinery; and, casting his cloak away from his arms, so as to have
them at liberty, he sprang upon Charles Holland, and hurled him to the
ground, where he held him with a giant’s grip, as he cried,—
“Rash fool! be you whom you may. Why have you troubled me to rid the
world of your intrusive existence?”
[Illustration: Varney attacks Charles Holland.]
The attack was so sudden and so terrific, that resistance to it, even
if Charles had had the power, was out of the question. All he could
say, was,—
“Varney, Varney! do you not know me? I am Charles Holland. Will you
now, in your mad rage, take the life you might more easily have taken
when I lay in the dungeon from which you released me?”
The sound of his voice at once convinced Sir Francis Varney of his
identity; and it was with a voice that had some tones of regret in it,
that he replied,—
“And wherefore have you thought proper, when you were once free and
unscathed, to cast yourself into such a position of danger as to follow
me to my haunt?”
“I contemplated no danger,” said Charles, “because I contemplated no
evil. I do not know why you should kill me.”
“You came here, and yet you say you do not know why I should kill you.
Young man, have you a dozen lives that you can afford to tamper with
them thus? I have, at much chance of imminence to myself, already once
saved you, when another, with a sterner feeling, would have gladly
taken your life; but now, as if you were determined to goad me to an
act which I have shunned committing, you will not let me close my eyes
in peace.”
“Take your hand from off my throat, Varney, and I will then tell you
what brought me here.”
Sir Francis Varney did so.
“Rise,” he said—“rise; I have seen blood enough to be sickened at the
prospect of more; but you should not have come here and tempted me.”
“Nay, believe me, I came here for good and not for evil. Sir Francis
Varney, hear me out, and then judge for yourself whether you can
blame the perseverance which enabled me to find out this secret place
of refuge; but let me first say that now it is as good a place of
concealment to you as before it was, for I shall not betray you.”
“Go on, go on. What is it you desire?”
“During the long and weary hours of my captivity, I thought deeply,
and painfully too, as may be well imagined, of all the circumstances
connected with your appearance at Bannerworth Hall, and your subsequent
conduct. Then I felt convinced that there was something far more than
met the eye, in the whole affair, and, from what I have been informed
of since, I am the more convinced that some secret, some mystery, which
it is in your power only perhaps to explain, lurks at the bottom of all
your conduct.”
“Well, proceed,” said Varney.
“Have I not said enough now to enable you to divine the object of my
visit? It is that you should shake off the trammels of mystery in which
you have shrouded yourself, and declare what it is you want, what
it is you desire, that has induced you to set yourself up as such a
determined foe of the Bannerworth family.”
“And that, you say, is the modest request that brings you here?”
“You speak as if you thought it was idle curiosity that prompts me, but
you know it is not. Your language and manner are those of a man of too
much sagacity not to see that I have higher notions.”
“Name them.”
“You have yourself, in more than one instance, behaved with a strange
sort of romantic generosity, as if, but for some great object which you
felt impelled to seek by any means, and at any sacrifice, you would
be a something in character and conduct very different from what you
are. One of my objects, then, is to awaken that better nature which is
slumbering within you, only now and then rousing itself to do some deed
which should be the character of all your actions—for your own sake I
have come.”
“But not wholly?”
“Not wholly, as you say. There is another than whom, the whole world
is not so dear to me. That other one was serene as she was beautiful.
Happiness danced in her eyes, and she ought—for not more lovely is the
mind that she possesses than the glorious form that enshrines it—to
be happy. Her life should have passed like one long summer’s day of
beauty, sunshine, and pure heavenly enjoyment. You have poisoned the
cup of joy that the great God of nature had permitted her to place to
her lips and taste of mistrustingly. Why have you done this? I ask
you—why have you done this?”
“Have you said all that you came to say?”
“I have spoken the substance of my message. Much could I elaborate
upon such a theme; but it is not one, Varney, which is congenial to
my heart; for your sake, however, and for the sakes of those whom I
hold most dear, let me implore you to act in this matter with a kindly
consideration. Proclaim your motives; you cannot say that they are not
such as we may aid you in.”
Varney was silent for several moments; he seemed perceptibly moved by
the manner of the young man, as well as by the matter of his discourse.
In fact, one would suppose that Charles Holland had succeeded in
investing what he said with some sort of charm that won much upon the
fancy of Sir Francis Varney, for when he ceased to speak, the latter
said in a low voice,—
“Go on, go on; you have surely much more to say.”
“No, Varney; I have said enough, and not thus much would I have said
had I not been aware, most certainly and truly aware, without the
shadow of a doubt, by your manner, that you were most accessible to
human feeling.”
“I accessible to human feeling! know you to whom you speak? Am I not
he before whom all men shudder, whose name has been a terror and a
desolation; and yet you can talk of my human feelings. Nay, if I had
had any, be sure they would have been extinguished by the persecutions
I have endured from those who, you know, with savage ferocity have
sought my life.”
“No, Varney; I give you credit for being a subtler reasoner than thus
to argue; you know well that you were the aggressor to those parties
who sought your life; you know well that with the greatest imaginable
pains you held yourself up to them as a thing of great terror.”
“I did—I did.”
“You cannot, then, turn round upon ignorant persons, and blame them
because your exertions to make yourself seem what you wish were but too
successful.”
“You use the word _seem_,” said Varney, with a bitterness of aspect,
“as if you would imply a doubt that I am that which thousands, by their
fears, would testify me to be.”
“Thousands might,” said Charles Holland; “but not among them am I,
Varney; I will not be made the victim of superstition. Were you to
enact before my very eyes some of those feats which, to the senses of
others, would stamp you as the preternatural being you assume to be,
I would doubt the evidence of my own senses ere I permitted such a
bugbear to oppress my brain.”
“Go,” said Sir Francis Varney, “go; I have no more words for you; I
have nothing to relate to you.”
“Nay, you have already listened sufficiently to me to give me a hope
that I had awakened some of the humanity that was in your nature.
Do not, Sir Francis Varney, crush that hope, even as it was budding
forth; not for my own sake do I ask you for revelations; that may,
perhaps—must be painful for you; but for the sake of Flora Bannerworth,
to whom you owe abundance of reparation.”
“No, no.”
“In the name of all that is great, and good, and just, I call upon you
for justice.”
“What have I to do with such an invocation? Utter such a sentiment to
men who, like yourself, are invested with the reality as well as the
outward show of human nature.”
“Nay, Sir Francis Varney, now you belie yourself. You have passed
through a long, and, perchance, a stormy life. Can you look back upon
your career, and find no reminiscences of the past that shall convince
you that you are of the great family of man, and have had abundance of
human feelings and of human affections?”
“Peace, peace!”
“Nay, Sir Francis Varney, I will take your word, and if you will lay
your hand upon your heart, and tell me truly that you never felt what
it was to love—to have all feeling, all taste, and all hope of future
joy, concentrated in one individual, I will despair, and leave you.
If you will tell me that never, in your whole life, you have felt for
any fair and glorious creature, as I now feel for Flora Bannerworth, a
being for whom you could have sacrificed not only existence, but all
the hopes of a glorious future that bloom around it—if you will tell
me, with the calm, dispassionate aspect of truth, that you have held
yourself aloof from such human feelings, I will no longer press you to
a disclosure which I shall bring no argument to urge.”
The agitation of Sir Francis Varney’s countenance was perceptible, and
Charles Holland was about to speak again, when, striking him upon the
breast with his clinched hand, the vampyre checked him, saying—
“Do you wish to drive me mad, that you thus, from memory’s hidden
cells, conjure up images of the past?”
“Then there are such images to conjure up—there are such shadows only
sleeping, but which require only, as you did even now, but a touch to
awaken them to life and energy. Oh, Sir Francis Varney, do not tell me
that you are not human.”
The vampyre made a furious gesture, as if he would have attacked
Charles Holland; but then he sank nearly to the floor, as if
soul-stricken by some recollection that unnerved his arm; he shook
with unwonted emotion, and, from the frightful livid aspect of his
countenance, Charles dreaded some serious accession of indisposition,
which might, if nothing else did, prevent him from making the
revelation he so much sought to hear from his lips.
“Varney,” he cried, “Varney, be calm! you will be listened to by one
who will draw no harsh—no hasty conclusions; by one, who, with that
charity, I grieve to say, is rare, will place upon the words you utter
the most favourable construction. Tell me all, I pray you, tell me all.”
“This is strange,” said the vampyre. “I never thought that aught human
could thus have moved me. Young man, you have touched the chords of
memory; they vibrate throughout my heart, producing cadences and sounds
of years long past. Bear with me awhile.”
“And you will speak to me?”
“I will.”
“Having your promise, then, I am content, Varney.”
“But you must be secret; not even in the wildest waste of nature,
where you can well presume that naught but Heaven can listen to your
whisperings, must you utter one word of that which I shall tell to you.”
“Alas!” said Charles, “I dare not take such a confidence; I have said
that it is not for myself; I seek such knowledge of what you are, and
what you have been, but it is for another so dear to me, that all
the charms of life that make up other men’s delights, equal not the
witchery of one glance from her, speaking as it does of the glorious
light from that Heaven which is eternal, from whence she sprung.”
“And you reject my communication,” said Varney, “because I will not
give you leave to expose it to Flora Bannerworth?”
“It must be so.”
“And you are most anxious to hear that which I have to relate?”
“Most anxious, indeed—indeed, most anxious.”
“Then have I found in that scruple which besets your mind, a better
argument for trusting you, than had ye been loud in protestation. Had
your promises of secrecy been but those which come from the lip, and
not from the heart, my confidence would not have been rejected on such
grounds. I think that I dare trust you.”
“With leave to tell to Flora that which you shall communicate.”
“You may whisper it to her, but to no one else, without my special
leave and licence.”
“I agree to those terms, and will religiously preserve them.”
“I do not doubt you for one moment; and now I will tell to you what
never yet has passed my lips to mortal man. Now will I connect together
some matters which you may have heard piecemeal from others.”
“What others are they?”
“Dr. Chillingworth, and he who once officiated as a London hangman.”
“I have heard something from those quarters.”
“Listen then to me, and you shall better understand that which you have
heard. Some years ago, it matters not the number, on a stormy night,
towards the autumn of the year, two men sat alone in poverty, and that
species of distress which beset the haughty, profligate, daring man,
who has been accustomed all his life to its most enticing enjoyments,
but never to that industry which alone ought to produce them, and
render them great and magnificent.”
“Two men; and who were they?”
“I was one. Look upon me! I was one of those men; and strong and evil
passions were battling in my heart.”
“And the other!”
“Was Marmaduke Bannerworth.”
“Gracious Heaven! the father of her whom I adore; the suicide.”
“Yes, the same; that man stained with a thousand vices—blasted by a
thousand crimes—the father of her who partakes nothing of his nature,
who borrows nothing from his memory but his name—was the man who there
sat with me, plotting and contriving how, by fraud or violence, we were
to lead our usual life of revelry and wild audacious debauch.”
“Go on, go on; believe me, I am deeply interested.”
“I can see as much. We were not nice in the various schemes which our
prolific fancies engendered. If trickery, and the false dice at the
gaming-table, sufficed not to fill our purses, we were bold enough for
violence. If simple robbery would not succeed, we could take a life.”
“Murder?”
“Ay, call it by its proper name, a murder. We sat till the midnight
hour had passed, without arriving at a definite conclusion; we saw no
plan of practicable operation, and so we wandered onwards to one of
those deep dens of iniquity, a gaming-house, wherein we had won and
lost thousands.
“We had no money, but we staked largely, in the shape of a wager, upon
the success of one of the players; we knew not, or cared not, for the
consequence, if we had lost; but, as it happened, we were largely
successful, and beggars as we had walked into that place, we might have
left it independent men.
“But when does the gambler know when to pause in his career? If defeat
awakens all the raging passions of humanity within his bosom, success
but feeds the great vice that has been there engendered. To the dawn of
morn we played; the bright sun shone in, and yet we played—the midday
came, and went—the stimulant of wine supported us, and still we played;
then came the shadows of evening, stealing on in all their beauty. But
what were they to us, amid those mutations of fortune, which, at one
moment, made us princes, and placed palaces at our control, and, at
another, debased us below the veriest beggar, that craves the stinted
alms of charity from door to door.
“And there was one man who, from the first to the last, stayed by us
like a very fiend; more than man, I thought he was not human. We won
of all, but of him. People came and brought their bright red gold, and
laid it down before us, but for us to take it up, and then, by a cruel
stroke of fortune, he took it from us.
“The night came on; we won, and he won of us; the clock struck
twelve—we were beggars. God knows what was he.
“We saw him place his winnings about his person—we saw the smile that
curved the corners of his lips; he was calm, and we were maddened. The
blood flowed temperately through his veins, but in ours it was burning
lava, scorching as it went through every petty artery, and drying up
all human thought—all human feeling.
“The winner left, and we tracked his footsteps. When he reached the
open air, although he had taken much less than we of the intoxicating
beverages that are supplied gratis to those who frequent those haunts
of infamy, it was evident that some sort of inebriation attacked him;
his steps were disordered and unsteady, and, as we followed him, we
could perceive, by the devious track that he took, that he was somewhat
uncertain of his route.
“We had no fixed motive in so pursuing this man. It was but an
impulsive proceeding at the best; but as he still went on and cleared
the streets, getting into the wild and open country, and among the
hedge-rows, we began to whisper together, and to think that what we did
not owe to fortune, we might to our own energy and courage at such a
moment.
“I need not hesitate to say so, since, to hide the most important
feature of my revelation from you, would be but to mock you; we
resolved upon robbing him.
“And was that all?”
“It was all that our resolution went to. We were not anxious to spill
blood; but still we were resolved that we would accomplish our purpose,
even if it required murder for its consummation. Have you heard enough?”
“I have not heard enough, although I guess the rest.”
“You may well guess it, from its preface. He turned down a lonely
pathway, which, had we chosen it ourselves, could not have been more
suitable for the attack we meditated.
“There were tall trees on either side, and a hedge-row stretching high
up between them. We knew that that lane led to a suburban village,
which, without a doubt, was the object of his destination.
“Then Marmaduke Bannerworth spoke, saying,—
“‘What we have to do, must be done now or never. There needs not two in
this adventure. Shall you or I require him to refund what he has won
from us?’
“‘I care not,’ I said; ‘but if we are to accomplish our purpose without
arousing even a shadow of resistance, it is better to show him its
futility by both appearing, and take a share in the adventure.’
“This was agreed upon, and we hastened forward. He heard footsteps
pursuing him and quickened his pace. I was the fleetest runner, and
overtook him. I passed him a pace or two, and then turning, I faced
him, and impeded his progress.
“The lane was narrow, and a glance behind him showed him Marmaduke
Bannerworth; so that he was hemmed in between two enemies, and could
move neither to the right nor to the left, on account of the thick
brushwood that intervened between the trees.
“Then, with an assumed courage, that sat but ill upon him, he demanded
of us what we wanted, and proclaimed his right to pass despite the
obstruction we placed in his way.
“The dialogue was brief. I, being foremost, spoke to him.
“‘Your money,’ I said; ‘your winnings at the gaming-table. We cannot,
and we will not lose it.’
“So suddenly, that he had nearly taken my life, he drew a pistol from
his pocket, and levelling it at my head, he fired upon me.
“Perhaps, had I moved, it might have been my death; but, as it was,
the bullet furrowed my cheek, leaving a scar, the path of which is yet
visible in a white cicatrix.
“I felt a stunning sensation, and thought myself a dead man. I cried
aloud to Marmaduke Bannerworth, and he rushed forward. I knew not that
he was armed, and that he had the power about him to do the deed which
he then accomplished; but there was a groan, a slight struggle, and the
successful gamester fell upon the green sward, bathed in his blood.”
“And this is the father of her whom I adore?”
“It is. Are you shocked to think of such a near relationship between
so much beauty and intelligence and a midnight murderer? Is your
philosophy so poor, that the daughter’s beauty suffers from the
commission of a father’s crime?”
“No, no, it is not so. Do not fancy that, for one moment, I can
entertain such unworthy opinions. The thought that crossed me was that
I should have to tell one of such a gentle nature that her father had
done such a deed.”
“On that head you can use your own discretion. The deed was done; there
was sufficient light for us to look upon the features of the dying man.
Ghastly and terrific they glared upon us; while the glazed eyes, as
they were upturned to the bright sky, seemed appealing to Heaven for
vengeance against us, for having done the deed.
“Many a day and many an hour since, at all times and all seasons, I
have seen those eyes, with the glaze of death upon them, following me,
and gloating over the misery they had the power to make. I think I see
them now.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes; look—look—see how they glare upon me—with what a fixed and
frightful stare the bloodshot pupils keep their place—there, there! oh!
save me from such a visitation again. It is too horrible. I dare not—I
cannot endure it; and yet why do you gaze at me with such an aspect,
dread visitant? You know that it was not my hand that did the deed—who
laid you low. You know that not to me are you able to lay the heavy
charge of your death!”
“Varney, you look upon vacancy,” said Charles Holland.
“No, no; vacancy it may be to you, but to me ’tis full of horrible
shapes.”
“Compose yourself; you have taken me far into your confidence already;
I pray you now to tell me all. I have in my brain no room for horrible
conjectures such as those which might else torment me.”
Varney was silent for a few minutes, and then he wiped from his brow
the heavy drops of perspiration that had there gathered, and heaved a
deep sigh.
“Speak to me,” added Charles; “nothing will so much relieve you from
the terrors of this remembrance as making a confidence which reflection
will approve of, and which you will know that you have no reason to
repent.”
“Charles Holland,” said Varney, “I have already gone too far to
retract—much too far, I know, and can well understand all the danger of
half confidence. You already know so much, that it is fit you should
know more.”
“Go on then, Varney, I will listen to you.”
“I know not if, at this juncture, I can command myself to say more.
I feel that what next has to be told will be most horrible for me to
tell—most sad for you to hear told.”
“I can well believe, Varney, from your manner of speech, and from the
words you use, that you have some secret to relate beyond this simple
fact of the murder of this gamester by Marmaduke Bannerworth.”
“You are right—such is the fact; the death of that man could not have
moved me as you now see me moved. There is a secret connected with his
fate which I may well hesitate to utter—a secret too horrible even to
whisper to the winds of heaven—although I did not do the deed, no, no—I
did not strike the blow—not I—not I!”
“Varney, it is astonishing to me the pains you take to assure yourself
of your innocence of this deed; no one accuses you, but still, were it
not that I am impressed with a strong conviction that you’re speaking
to me nothing but the truth, the very fact of your extreme anxiety to
acquit yourself, would engender suspicion.”
“I can understand that feeling, Charles Holland; I can fully understand
it. I do not blame you for it—it is a most natural one; but when you
know all, you will feel with me how necessary it must have been to my
peace to seize upon every trivial circumstance that can help me to a
belief in my own innocence.”
“It may be so; as yet, you well know, I speak in ignorance. But what
could there have been in the character of that gambler, that has made
you so sympathetic concerning his decease?”
“Nothing—nothing whatever in his character. He was a bad man; not
one of those free, open spirits which are seduced into crime by
thoughtlessness—not one of those whom we pity, perchance, more than we
condemn; but a man without a redeeming trait in his disposition—a man
so heaped up with vices and iniquities, that society gained much by
his decease, and not an individual could say that he had lost a friend.”
“And yet the mere thought of the circumstances connected with his death
seems almost to drive you to the verge of despair.”
“You are right; the mere thought has that effect.”
“You have aroused all my curiosity to know the causes of such a
feeling.”
Varney paced the apartment in silence for many minutes. He seemed to
be enduring a great mental struggle, and at length, when he turned to
Charles Holland and spoke, there were upon his countenance traces of
deep emotion.
“I have said, young man, that I will take you into my confidence. I
have said that I will clear up many seeming mysteries, and that I
will enable you to understand what was obscure in the narrative of
Dr. Chillingworth, and of that man who filled the office of public
executioner, and who has haunted me so long.”
“It is true, then, as the doctor states, that you were executed in
London?”
“I was.”
“And resuscitated by the galvanic process, put into operation by Dr.
Chillingworth?”
“As he supposed; but there are truths connected with natural philosophy
which he dreamed not of. I bear a charmed life, and it was but accident
which produced a similar effect upon the latent springs of my existence
in the house to which the executioner conducted me, to what would have
been produced had I been suffered, in the free and open air, to wait
until the cool moonbeams fell upon me.”
“Varney, Varney,” said Charles Holland, “you will not succeed in
convincing me of your supernatural powers. I hold such feelings and
sensations at arm’s length. I will not—I cannot assume you to be what
you affect.”
“I ask for no man’s belief. I know that which I know, and, gathering
experience from the coincidences of different phenomena, I am compelled
to arrive at certain conclusions. Believe what you please, doubt what
you please; but I say again that I am not as other men.”
“I am in no condition to dispute your proposition; I wish not to
dispute it; but you are wandering, Varney, from the point. I wait
anxiously for a continuation of your narrative.”
“I know that I am wandering from it—I know well that I am wandering
from it, and that the reason I do so is that I dread that continuation.”
“That dread will not be the less for its postponement.”
“You are right; but tell me, Charles Holland, although you are young
you have been about in the great world sufficiently to form correct
opinions, and to understand that which is related to you, drawing
proper deductions from certain facts, and arriving possibly at more
correct conclusions than some of maturer years with less wisdom.”
“I will freely answer, Varney, any question you may put to me.”
“I know it; tell me then what measure of guilt you attach to me in the
transaction I have noticed to you.”
“It seems then to me that, not contemplating the man’s murder,
you cannot be accused of the act, although a set of fortuitous
circumstances made you appear an accomplice to its commission.”
“You think I may be acquitted?”
“You can acquit yourself, knowing that you did not contemplate the
murder.”
“I did not contemplate it. I know not what desperate deed I should have
stopped short at then, in the height of my distress, but I neither
contemplated taking that man’s life, nor did I strike the blow which
sent him from existence.”
“There is even some excuse as regards the higher crime for Marmaduke
Bannerworth.”
“Think you so?”
“Yes; he thought that you were killed, and impulsively he might have
struck the blow that made him a murderer.”
“Be it so. I am willing, extremely willing that anything should occur
that should remove the odium of guilt from any man. Be it so, I say,
with all my heart; but now, Charles Holland, I feel that we must meet
again ere I can tell you all; but in the meantime let Flora Bannerworth
rest in peace—she need dread nothing from me. Avarice and revenge, the
two passions which found a home in my heart, are now stifled for ever.”
“Revenge! did you say revenge?”
“I did; whence the marvel, am I not sufficiently human for that?”
“But you coupled it with the name of Flora Bannerworth.”
“I did, and that is part of my mystery.”
“A mystery, indeed, to imagine that such a being as Flora could awaken
any such feeling in your heart—a most abundant mystery.”
“It is so. I do not affect to deny it; but yet it is true, although so
greatly mysterious; but tell her that although at one time I looked
upon her as one whom I cared not if I injured, her beauty and distress
changed the current of my thoughts, and won upon me greatly. From the
moment I found I had the power to become the bane of her existence, I
ceased to wish to be so, and never again shall she experience a pang of
alarm from Varney, the vampyre.”
“Your message shall be faithfully delivered, and doubt not that it will
be received with grateful feelings. Nevertheless I should have much
wished to have been in a position to inform her of more particulars.”
“Come to me here at midnight to-morrow, and you shall know all. I will
have no reservation with you, no concealments; you shall know whom I
have had to battle against, and how it is that a world of evil passions
took possession of my heart and made me what I am.”
“Are you firm in this determination, Varney—will you indeed tell me no
more to-night?”
“No more, I have said it. Leave me now. I have need of more repose, for
of late sleep has seldom closed my eyelids.”
Charles Holland was convinced, from the positive manner in which he
spoke, that nothing more in the shape of information, at that time, was
to be expected from Varney; and being fearful that if he urged this
strange being too far, at a time when he did not wish it, he might
refuse all further communication, he thought it prudent to leave him,
so he said to him,—
“Be assured, Varney, I shall keep the appointment you have made, with
an expectation when we do meet of being rewarded by a recital of some
full particulars.”
“You shall not be disappointed; farewell, farewell!”
Charles Holland bade him adieu, and left the place.
Although he had now acquired all the information he hoped to take
away with him when Varney first began to be communicative, yet, when
he came to consider how strange and unaccountable a being he had been
in communication with, Charles could not but congratulate himself
that he had heard so much; for, from the manner of Varney, he could
well suppose that that was, indeed, the first time he had been so
communicative upon subjects which evidently held so conspicuous a place
in his heart.
And he had abundance of hope, likewise, from what had been said by
Varney, that he would keep his word, and communicate to him fully all
else that he required to know; and when he recollected those words
which Varney had used, signifying that he knew the danger of half
confidences, that hope grew into a certainty, and Charles began to have
no doubt but that on the next evening all that was mysterious in the
various affairs connected with the vampyre would become clear and open
to the light of day.
He strolled down the lane in which the lone house was situated,
revolving these matters in his mind, and when he arrived at its
entrance, he was rather surprised to see a throng of persons hastily
moving onward, with some appearance of dismay about them, and anxiety
depicted upon their countenances.
He stopped a lad, and inquired of him the cause of the seeming tumult.
“Why, sir, the fact is,” said the boy, “a crowd from the town’s been
burning down Bannerworth Hall, and they’ve killed a man.”
“Bannerworth Hall! you must be mistaken.”
“Well, sir, I ought not to call it Bannerworth Hall, because I mean
the old ruins in the neighbourhood that are supposed to have been
originally Bannerworth Hall before the house now called such was built;
and, moreover, as the Bannerworths have always had a garden there, and
two or three old sheds, the people in the town called it Bannerworth
Hall in common with the other building.”
“I understand. And do you say that all have been destroyed?”
“Yes, sir. All that was capable of being burnt has been burnt, and,
what is more, a man has been killed among the ruins. We don’t know who
he is, but the folks said he was a vampyre, and they left him for dead.”
“When will these terrible outrages cease? Oh! Varney, Varney, you
have much to answer for; even if in your conscience you succeed in
acquitting yourself of the murder, some of the particulars concerning
which you have informed me of.”
CHAPTER LXXXIII.
THE MYSTERIOUS ARRIVAL AT THE INN.—THE HUNGARIAN NOBLEMAN.—THE LETTER
TO VARNEY.
While these affairs are proceeding, and when there seems every
appearance of Sir Francis Varney himself quickly putting an end to
some of the vexatious circumstances connected with himself and the
Bannerworth family, it is necessary that we should notice an occurrence
which took place at the same inn which the admiral had made such a
scene of confusion upon the occasion of his first arrival in the town.
Not since the admiral had arrived with Jack Pringle, and so disturbed
the whole economy of the household, was there so much curiosity excited
as on the morning following the interview which Charles Holland had had
with Varney, the vampyre.
The inn was scarcely opened, when a stranger arrived, mounted on a
coal-black horse, and, alighting, he surrendered the bridle into the
hands of a boy who happened to be at the inn-door, and stalked slowly
and solemnly into the building.
He was tall, and of a cadaverous aspect; in attire he was plainly
apparelled, but there was no appearance of poverty about him; on the
contrary, what he really had on was of a rich and costly character,
although destitute of ornament.
He sat down in the first room that presented itself, and awaited the
appearance of the landlord, who, upon being informed that a guest of
apparently ample means, and of some consequence, had entered the place,
hastily went to him to receive his commands.
With a profusion of bows, our old friend, who had been so obsequious
to Admiral Bell, entered the room, and begged to know what orders the
gentleman had for him.
“I presume,” said the stranger, in a deep, solemn voice, “I presume
that you have no objection, for a few days that I shall remain in this
town, to board and lodge me for a certain price which you can name to
me at once?”
“Certainly, sir,” said the landlord; “any way you please; without wine,
sir, I presume?”
“As you please; make your own arrangements.”
“Well, sir, as we can’t tell, of course, what wine a gentleman may
drink, but when we come to consider breakfast, dinner, tea, and supper,
and a bed, and all that sort of thing, and a private sitting-room, I
suppose, sir?”
“Certainly.”
“You would not, then, think, sir, a matter of four guineas a week will
be too much, perhaps.”
“I told you to name your own charge. Let it be four guineas; if you had
said eight I should have paid it.”
“Good God!” said the publican, “here’s a damned fool that I am. I beg
your pardon, sir, I didn’t mean you. Now I could punch my own head—will
you have breakfast at once, sir, and then we shall begin regular, you
know, sir?”
“Have what?”
“Breakfast, breakfast, you know, sir; tea, coffee, cocoa, or chocolate;
ham, eggs, or a bit of grilled fowl, cold sirloin of roast beef, or a
red herring—anything you like, sir.”
“I never take breakfast, so you may spare yourself the trouble of
providing anything for me.”
“Not take breakfast, sir! not take breakfast! Would you like to take
anything to drink then, sir? People say it’s an odd time, at eight
o’clock in the morning, to drink; but, for my part, I always have
thought that you couldn’t begin a good thing too soon.”
“I live upon drink,” said the stranger; “but you have none in the
cellar that will suit me.”
“Indeed, sir.”
“No, no, I am certain.”
“Why, we’ve got some claret now, sir,” said the landlord.
“Which may look like blood, and yet not be it.”
“Like what, sir?—damn my rags!”
“Begone, begone.”
The stranger uttered these words so peremptorily that the landlord
hastily left the room, and going into his own bar, he gave himself so
small a tap on the side of the head, that it would not have hurt a fly,
as he said,—
“I could punch myself into bits, I could tear my hair out by the
roots;” and then he pulled a little bit of his hair, so gently and
tenderly that it showed what a man of discretion he was, even in the
worst of all his agony of passion.
“The idea,” he added, “of a fellow coming here, paying four guineas a
week for board and lodging, telling me he would not have minded eight,
and then not wanting any breakfast; it’s enough to aggravate half a
dozen saints; but what an odd fish he looks.”
At this moment the ostler came in, and, standing at the bar, he wiped
his mouth with his sleeve, as he said,—
“I suppose you’ll stand a quart for that, master?”
“A quart for what, you vagabond? A quart because I’ve done myself up in
heaps; a quart because I’m fit to pull myself into fiddlestrings?”
“No,” said the ostler; “because I’ve just put up the gentleman’s horse.”
“What gentleman’s horse?”
“Why, the big-looking fellow with the white face, now in the parlour.”
“What, did he come on a horse, Sam? What sort of a looking creature is
it? you may judge of a man from the sort of horse-company he keeps.”
“Well, then, sir, I hardly know. It’s coal black, and looks as knowing
as possible; it’s tried twice to get a kick at me, but I was down upon
him, and put the bucket in his way. Howsomdever, I don’t think it’s a
bad animal, as a animal, mind you, sir, though a little bit wicious or
so.”
“Well,” said the publican, as he drew the ostler half a pint instead of
a quart, “you’re always drinking; take that.”
“Blow me,” said the ostler, “half a pint, master!”
“Plague take you, I can’t stand parleying with you, there’s the parlour
bell; perhaps, after all, he will have some breakfast.”
While the landlord was away the ostler helped himself to a quart of the
strongest ale, which, by a singular faculty that he had acquired, he
poured down his throat without any effort at swallowing, holding his
head back, and the jug at a little distance from his mouth.
Having accomplished this feat, he reversed the jug, giving it a knowing
tap with his knuckles as though he would have signified to all the
world that it was empty, and that he had accomplished what he desired.
In the meantime, the landlord had made his way to his strange guest,
who said to him, when he came into the room,
“Is there not one Sir Francis Varney residing in this town?”
“The devil!” thought the landlord; “this is another of them, I’ll bet a
guinea. Sir Francis Varney, sir, did you say? Why, sir, there was a Sir
Francis Varney, but folks seem to think as how he’s no better than he
should be—a sort of vampyre, sir, if you know what that is.”
“I have, certainly, heard of such things; but can you not tell me
Varney’s address? I wish to see him.”
“Well, then, sir, I cannot tell it to you, for there’s really been such
a commotion and such a riot about him that he’s taken himself off, I
think, altogether, and we can hear nothing of him. Lord bless you, sir,
they burnt down his house, and hunted him about so, that I don’t think
that he’ll ever show his face here again.”
“And cannot you tell me where he was seen last?”
“That I cannot, sir; but, if anybody knows anything about him, it’s Mr.
Henry Bannerworth, or perhaps Dr. Chillingworth, for they have had more
to do with him than anybody else.”
“Indeed; and can you tell me the address of the former individual?”
“That I can’t, sir, for the Bannerworths have left the Hall. As for
the doctor, sir, you’ll see his house in the High-street, with a large
brass plate on the door, so that you cannot mistake it. It’s No. 9, on
the other side of the way.”
“I thank you for so much information,” said the stranger, and rising,
he walked to the door. Before, however, he left, he turned, and
added,—“You can say, if you should by chance meet Mr. Bannerworth, that
a Hungarian nobleman wishes to speak to him concerning Sir Francis
Varney, the vampyre?”
“A what, sir?”
“A nobleman from Hungary,” was the reply.
“The deuce!” said the landlord, as he looked after him. “He don’t
seem at all hungry here, not thirsty neither. What does he mean by a
nobleman from Hungary? The idea of a man talking about hungry, and not
taking any breakfast. He’s queering me. I’ll be hanged if I’ll stand
it. Here I clearly lose four guineas a week, and then get made game of
besides. A nobleman, indeed! I think I see him. Why, he isn’t quite so
big as old Slaney, the butcher. It’s a do. I’ll have at him when he
comes back.”
Meanwhile, the unconscious object of this soliloquy passed down the
High-street, until he came to Dr. Chillingworth’s, at whose door he
knocked.
Now Mrs. Chillingworth had been waiting the whole night for the return
of the doctor, who had not yet made his appearance, and, consequently,
that lady’s temper had become acidulated to an uncommon extent, and
when she heard a knock at the door, something possessed her that it
could be no other than her spouse, and she prepared to give him that
warm reception which she considered he had a right, as a married man,
to expect after such conduct.
She hurriedly filled a tolerably sized hand-basin with not the cleanest
water in the world, and then, opening the door hurriedly with one hand,
she slouced the contents into the face of the intruder, exclaiming,—
“Now you’ve caught it!”
“D——n!” said the Hungarian nobleman, and then Mrs. Chillingworth
uttered a scream, for she feared she had made a mistake.
“Oh, sir! I’m very sorry; but I thought it was my husband.”
“But if you did,” said the stranger, “there was no occasion to drown
him with a basin of soap-suds. It is your husband I want, madam, if he
be Dr. Chillingworth.”
“Then, indeed, you must go on wanting him, sir, for he’s not been to
his own home for a day and a night. He takes up all his time in hunting
after that beastly vampyre.”
“Ah! Sir Francis Varney, you mean.”
“I do; and I’d Varney him if I caught hold of him.”
“Can you give me the least idea of where he can be found?”
“Of course I can.”
“Indeed! where?” said the stranger, eagerly.
“In some churchyard, to be sure, gobbling up the dead bodies.”
With this Mrs. Chillingworth shut the door with a bang that nearly
flattened the Hungarian’s nose with his face, and he was fain to walk
away, quite convinced that there was no information to be had in that
quarter.
He returned to the inn, and having told the landlord that he would give
a handsome reward to any one who would discover to him the retreat of
Sir Francis Varney, he shut himself up in an apartment alone, and was
busy for a time in writing letters.
Although the sum which the stranger offered was an indefinite one,
the landlord mentioned the matter across the bar to several persons;
but all of them shook their heads, believing it to be a very perilous
adventure indeed to have anything to do with so troublesome a subject
as Sir Francis Varney. As the day advanced, however, a young lad
presented himself, and asked to see the gentleman who had been
inquiring for Varney.
The landlord severely questioned and cross-questioned him, with the
hope of discovering if he had any information; but the boy was quite
obdurate, and would speak to no one but the person who had offered
the reward, so that mine host was compelled to introduce him to the
Hungarian nobleman, who, as yet, had neither eaten nor drunk in the
house.
The boy wore upon his countenance the very expression of juvenile
cunning, and when the stranger asked him if he really was in possession
of any information concerning the retreat of Sir Francis Varney, he
said,—
“I can tell you where he is, but what are you going to give?”
“What sum do you require?” said the stranger.
“A whole half-crown.”
“It is your’s; and, if your information prove correct, come to-morrow,
and I’ll add another to it, always provided, likewise, you keep the
secret from any one else.”
“Trust me for that,” said the boy. “I live with my grandmother; she’s
precious old, and has got a cottage. We sell milk and cakes, sticky
stuff, and pennywinkles.”
“A goodly collection. Go on.”
“Well, sir, this morning, there comes a man in with a bottle, and he
buys a bottle full of milk and a loaf. I saw him, and I knew it was
Varney, the vampyre.”
“You followed him?”
“Of course I did, sir; and he’s staying at the house that’s to let down
the lane, round the corner, by Mr. Biggs’s, and past Lee’s garden,
leaving old Slaney’s stacks on your right hand, and so cutting on
till you come to Grants’s meadow, when you’ll see old Madhunter a
brick-field staring of you in the face; and, arter that—”
“Peace—peace!—you shall yourself conduct me. Come to this place at
sunset; be secret, and, probably, ten times the reward you have already
received may be yours,” said the stranger.
“What, ten half-crowns?”
“Yes, I will keep my word with you.”
“What a go! I know what I’ll do. I’ll set up as a showman, and what a
glorious treat it will be, to peep through one of the holes all day
myself, and get somebody to pull the strings up and down, and when I’m
tired of that, I can blaze away upon the trumpet like one o’clock. I
think I see me. Here you sees the Duke of Marlborough a whopping of
everybody, and here you see the Frenchmen flying about like parched
peas in a sifter.”
CHAPTER LXXXIV.
THE EXCITED POPULACE.—VARNEY HUNTED.—THE PLACE OF REFUGE.
There seemed now a complete lull in the proceedings as connected with
Varney, the vampyre. We have reason to believe that the executioner
who had been as solicitous as Varney to obtain undisputed possession
of Bannerworth Hall, has fallen a victim to the indiscriminating
rage of the mob. Varney himself is a fugitive, and bound by the most
solemn ties to Charles Holland, not only to communicate to him such
particulars of the past, as will bring satisfaction to his mind, but to
abstain from any act which, for the future, shall exercise a disastrous
influence upon the happiness of Flora.
The doctor and the admiral, with Henry, had betaken themselves from the
Hall as we had recorded, and, in due time, reached the cottage where
Flora and her mother had found a temporary refuge.
Mrs. Bannerworth was up; but Flora was sleeping, and, although the
tidings they had to tell were of a curious and mixed nature, they would
not have her disturbed to listen to them.
And, likewise, they were rather pleased than otherwise, since they knew
not exactly what had become of Charles Holland, to think that they
would probably be spared the necessity of saying they could not account
for his absence.
That he had gone upon some expedition, probably dangerous, and so one
which he did not wish to communicate the particulars of to his friends,
lest they should make a strong attempt to dissuade him from it, they
were induced to believe.
But yet they had that confidence in his courage and active intellectual
resources, to believe that he would come through it unscathed, and,
probably, shortly show himself at the cottage.
In this hope they were not disappointed, for in about two hours Charles
made his appearance; but, until he began to be questioned concerning
his absence by the admiral, he scarcely considered the kind of dilemma
he had put himself into by the promise of secrecy he had given to
Varney, and was a little puzzled to think how much he might tell, and
how much he was bound in honour to conceal.
“Avast there!” cried the admiral; “what’s become of your tongue,
Charles? You’ve been on some cruize, I’ll be bound. Haul over the
ship’s books, and tell us what’s happened.”
“I have been upon an adventure,” said Charles, “which I hope will be
productive of beneficial results to us all; but, the fact is, I have
made a promise, perhaps incautiously, that I will not communicate what
I know.”
“Whew!” said the admiral, “that’s awkward; but, however, if a man sails
under sealed instructions, there’s an end of it. I remember when I was
off Candia once——”
“Ha!” interposed Jack, “that was the time you tumbled over the blessed
binnacle, all in consequence of taking too much Madeira. I remember
it, too—it’s an out and out good story, that ’ere. You took a rope’s
end, you know, and laid into the bowsprit; and, says you, ‘Get up, you
lubber,’ says you, all the while a thinking, I supposes, as it was long
Jack Ingram, the carpenter’s mate, laying asleep. What a lark!”
“This scoundrel will be the death of me,” said the admiral; “there
isn’t one word of truth in what he says. I never got drunk in all my
life, as everybody knows. Jack, affairs are getting serious between
you and I—we must part, and for good. It’s a good many times that I’ve
told you you’ve forgot the difference between the quarter-deck and the
caboose. Now, I’m serious—you’re off the ship’s books, and there’s an
end of you.”
“Very good,” said Jack; “I’m willing. I’ll leave you. Do you think I
want to keep you any longer? Good bye, old bloak—I’ll leave you to
repent, and when old grim death comes yard-arm and yard-arm with you,
and you can’t shake off his boarding-tackle, you’ll say, ‘Where’s Jack
Pringle?’ says you; and then what’s his name—oh ah! echo you call
it—echo’ll say, it’s d—d if it knows.”
Jack turned upon his heel, and, before the admiral could make any reply
he left the place.
“What’s the rascal up to now?” said the admiral. “I really didn’t think
he’d have taken me at my word.”
“Oh, then, after all, you didn’t mean it, uncle?” said Charles.
“What’s that to you, you lubber, whether I mean it, or not, you
shore-going squab? Of course I expect everybody to desert an old hulk,
rats and all—and now Jack Pringle’s gone; the vagabond, couldn’t he
stay, and get drunk as long as he liked! Didn’t he say what he pleased,
and do what he pleased, the mutinous thief? Didn’t he say I run away
from a Frenchman off Cape Ushant, and didn’t I put up with that?”
“But, my dear uncle, you sent him away yourself.”
“I didn’t, and you know I didn’t; but I see how it is, you’ve disgusted
Jack among you. A better seaman never trod the deck of a man-of-war.”
“But his drunkenness, uncle?”
“It’s a lie. I don’t believe he ever got drunk. I believe you all
invented it, and Jack’s so good-natured, he tumbled about just to keep
you in countenance.”
“But his insolence, uncle; his gross insolence towards you—his
inventions, his exaggerations of the truth?”
“Avast, there—avast, there—none of that, Master Charlie; Jack couldn’t
do anything of the sort; and I means to say this, that if Jack was here
now, I’d stick up for him, and say he was a good seaman.”
“Tip us your fin, then,” said Jack, darting into the room; “do you
think I’d leave you, you d—d old fool? What would become of you, I
wonder, if I wasn’t to take you in to dry nurse? Why, you blessed old
babby, what do you mean by it?”
“Jack, you villain!”
“Ah! go on and call me a villain as much as you like. Don’t you
remember when the bullets were scuttling our nobs?”
“I do, I do, Jack; tip us your fin, old fellow. You’ve saved my life
more than once.”
“It’s a lie.”
“It ain’t. You did, I say.”
“You be d—d!”
And thus was the most serious misunderstanding that these two worthies
ever had together made up. The real fact is, that the admiral could as
little do without Jack, as he could have done without food; and as for
Pringle, he no more thought of leaving the old commodore, than of—what
shall we say? forswearing rum. Jack himself could not have taken a
stronger oath.
But the old admiral had suffered so much from the idea that Jack had
actually left him, that although he abused him as usual often enough,
he never again talked of taking him off the ship’s books; and, to the
credit of Jack be it spoken, he took no advantage of the circumstance,
and only got drunk just as usual, and called his master an old fool
whenever it suited him.
CHAPTER LXXXV.
THE HUNGARIAN NOBLEMAN GETS INTO DANGER.—HE IS FIRED AT, AND SHOWS
SOME OF HIS QUALITY.
Considerably delighted was the Hungarian, not only at the news he had
received from the boy, but as well for the cheapness of it. Probably he
did not conceive it possible that the secret of the retreat of such a
man as Varney could have been attained so easily.
He waited with great impatience for the evening, and stirred not
from the inn for several hours; neither did he take any refreshment,
notwithstanding he had made so liberal an arrangement with the landlord
to be supplied.
All this was a matter of great excitement and speculation in the inn,
so much so, indeed, that the landlord sent for some of the oldest
customers of his house, regular topers, who sat there every evening,
indulging in strong drinks, and pipes and tobacco, to ask their serious
advice as to what he should do, as if it were necessary he should do
anything at all.
But, somehow or another, these wiseacres who assembled at the
landlord’s bidding, and sat down, with something strong before them,
in the bar parlour, never once seemed to think that a man might, if he
choosed, come to an inn, and agree to pay four guineas a week for board
and lodging, and yet take nothing at all.
No; they could not understand it, and therefore they would not have
it. It was quite monstrous that anybody should attempt to do anything
so completely out of the ordinary course of proceeding. It was not to
be borne; and as in this country it happens, free and enlightened as
we are, that no man can commit a greater social offence than doing
something that his neighbours never thought of doing themselves, the
Hungarian nobleman was voted a most dangerous character, and, in fact,
not to be put up with.
“I shouldn’t have thought so much of it,” said the landlord; “but only
look at the aggravation of the thing. After I have asked him four
guineas a week, and expected to be beaten down to two, to be then told
that he would not have cared if it had been eight. It is enough to
aggravate a saint.”
“Well, I agree with you there,” said another; “that’s just what it is,
and I only wonder that a man of your sagacity has not quite understood
it before.”
“Understood what?”
“Why, that he is a vampyre. He has heard of Sir Francis Varney, that’s
the fact, and he’s come to see him. Birds of a feather, you know, flock
together, and now we shall have two vampyres in the town instead of
one.”
The party looked rather blank at this suggestion, which, indeed, seemed
rather uncomfortable probably. The landlord had just opened his mouth
to make some remark, when he was stopped by the violent ringing of what
he now called the vampyre’s bell, since it proceeded from the room
where the Hungarian nobleman was.
“Have you an almanack in the house?” was the question of the mysterious
guest.
“An almanack, sir? well, I really don’t know. Let me see, an almanack.”
“But, perhaps, you can tell me. I was to know the moon’s age.”
“The devil!” thought the landlord; “he’s a vampyre, and no mistake.
Why, sir, as to the moon’s age, it was a full moon last night, very
bright and beautiful, only you could not see it for the clouds.”
“A full moon last night,” said the mysterious guest, thoughtfully; “it
may shine, then, brightly, to-night, and if so, all will be well. I
thank you,—leave the room.”
“Do you mean to say, sir, you don’t want anything to eat now?”
“What I want I’ll order.”
“But you have ordered nothing.”
“Then presume that I want nothing.”
The discomfited landlord was obliged to leave the room, for there was
no such a thing as making any answer to this, and so, still further
confirmed in his opinion that the stranger was a vampyre that came to
see Sir Francis Varney from a sympathetic feeling towards him, he again
reached the bar-parlour.
“You may depend,” he said, “as sure as eggs is eggs, that he is a
vampyre. Hilloa! he’s going off,—after him—after him; he thinks we
suspect him. There he goes—down the High-street.”
The landlord ran out, and so did those who were with him, one of whom
carried his brandy and water in his hand, which, being too hot for him
to swallow all at once, he still could not think of leaving behind.
It was now getting rapidly dark, and the mysterious stranger was
actually proceeding towards the lane to keep his appointment with the
boy who had promised to conduct him to the hiding-place of Sir Francis
Varney.
He had not proceeded far, however, before he began to suspect that
he was followed, as it was evident on the instant that he altered
his course; for, instead of walking down the lane, where the boy was
waiting for him, he went right on, and seemed desirous of making his
way into the open country between the town and Bannerworth Hall.
His pursuers—for they assumed that character—when they saw this became
anxious to intercept him; and thinking that the greater force they had
the better, they called out aloud as they passed a smithy, where a man
was shoeing a horse,—
“Jack Burdon, here is another vampyre!”
“The deuce there is!” said the person who was addressed. “I’ll soon
settle him. Here’s my wife gets no sleep of a night as it is, all owing
to that Varney, who has been plaguing us so long. I won’t put up with
another.”
So saying, he snatched from a hook on which it hung, an old
fowling-piece, and joined the pursuit, which now required to be
conducted with some celerity, for the stranger had struck into the open
country, and was getting on at good speed.
The last remnants of the twilight were fading away, and although the
moon had actually risen, its rays were obscured by a number of light,
fleecy clouds, which, although they did not promise to be of long
continuance, as yet certainly impeded the light.
“Where is he going?” said the blacksmith. “He seems to be making his
way towards the mill-stream.”
“No,” said another; “don’t you see he is striking higher up towards the
old ford, where the stepping-stones are?”
“He is—he is,” cried the blacksmith. “Run on—run on; don’t you see he
is crossing it now? Tell me, all of you, are you quite sure he is a
vampyre, and no mistake? He ain’t the exciseman, landlord, now, is he?”
“The exciseman, the devil! Do you think I want to shoot the exciseman?”
“Very good—then here goes,” exclaimed the Smith.
He stooped, and just as the brisk night air blew aside the clouds from
before the face of the moon, and as the stranger was crossing the
slippery stones, he fired at him.
• • • • •
How silently and sweetly the moon’s rays fall upon the water, upon
the meadows, and upon the woods. The scenery appeared the work
of enchantment, some fairy land, waiting the appearance of its
inhabitants. No sound met the ear; the very wind was hushed; nothing
was there to distract the sense of sight, save the power of reflection.
This, indeed, would aid the effect of such a scene. A cloudless sky,
the stars all radiant with beauty, while the moon, rising higher and
higher in the heavens, increasing in the strength and refulgence of
her light, and dimming the very stars, which seemed to grow gradually
invisible as the majesty of the queen of night became more and more
manifest.
The dark woods and the open meadows contrasted more and more strongly;
like light and shade, the earth and sky were not more distinct and
apart; and the rippling stream, that rushed along with all the
impetuosity of uneven ground.
The banks are clothed with verdure; the tall sedges, here and there,
lined the sides; beds of bulrushes raised their heads high above all
else, and threw out their round clumps of blossoms like tufts, and
looked strange in the light of the moon.
Here and there, too, the willows bent gracefully over the stream, and
their long leaves were wafted and borne up and down by the gentler
force of the stream.
Below, the stream widened, and ran foaming over a hard, stony bottom,
and near the middle is a heap of stones—of large stones, that form the
bed of the river, from which the water has washed away all earthy
particles, and left them by themselves.
These stones in winter could not be seen, they were all under water,
and the stream washed over in a turbulent and tumultuous manner. But
now, when the water was clear and low, they are many of them positively
out of the water, the stream running around and through their
interstices; the water-weeds here and there lying at the top of the
stream, and blossoming beautifully.
The daisy-like blossoms danced and waved gently on the moving flood,
at the same time they shone in the moonlight, like fairy faces rising
from the depths of the river, to receive the principle of life from the
moon’s rays.
’Tis sweet to wander in the moonlight at such an hour, and it is sweet
to look upon such a scene with an unruffled mind, and to give way to
the feelings that are engendered by a walk by the river side.
See, the moon is rising higher and higher, the shadows grow shorter and
shorter; the river, which in places was altogether hidden by the tall
willow trees, now gradually becomes less and less hidden, and the water
becomes more and more lit up.
The moonbeams play gracefully on the rippling surface, here and there
appearing like liquid silver, that each instant changed its position
and surface exposed to the light.
Such a moment—such a scene, were by far too well calculated to cause
the most solemn and serious emotions of the mind, and he must have been
but at best insensible, who could wander over meadow and through grove,
and yet remain untouched by the scene of poetry and romance in which he
breathed and moved.
At such a time, and in such a place, the world is alive with all the
finer essences of mysterious life. ’Tis at such an hour that the
spirits quit their secret abodes, and visit the earth, and whirl round
the enchanted trees.
’Tis now the spirits of earth and air dance their giddy flight from
flower to flower. ’Tis now they collect and exchange their greetings;
the wood is filled with them, the meadows teem with them, the hedges at
the river side have them hidden among the deep green leaves and blades.
But what is that yonder, on the stones, partially out of the water—what
can it be?
The more it is looked at, the more it resembles the human form—and yet
it is still and motionless on the hard stones—and yet it is a human
form. The legs are lying in the water, the arms appear to be partially
in and partially out, they seem moved by the stream now and then, but
very gently—so slightly, indeed, that it might well be questioned if it
moved at all.
The moon’s rays had not yet reached it; the bank on the opposite side
of the stream was high, and some tall trees rose up and obscured the
moon. But she was rising higher and higher each moment, and, finally,
when it has reached the tops of those trees, then the rays will reach
the middle of the river, and then, by degrees, it will reach the stones
in the river, and, finally, the body that lies there so still and so
mysteriously.
How it came there it would be difficult to say. It appeared as though,
when the waters were high, the body had floated down, and, at the
subsidence of the waters, it had been left upon the stones, and now it
was exposed to view.
It was strange and mysterious, and those who might look upon such
a sight would feel their blood chill, and their body creep, to
contemplate the remains of humanity in such a place, and in such a
condition as that must be in.
A human life had been taken! How? Who could tell? Perhaps accident
alone was the cause of it; perhaps some one had taken a life by violent
means, and thrown the body in the waters to conceal the fact and the
crime.
The waters had brought it down, and deposited it there in the middle of
the river, without any human creature being acquainted with the fact.
But the moon rises—the beams come trembling through the tree tops and
straggling branches, and fall upon the opposite bank, and there lies
the body, mid stream, and in comparative darkness.
By the time the river is lit up by the moon’s rays, then the object on
the stones will be visible, then it can be ascertained what appears now
only probable, namely, is the dark object a human form or not?
In the absence of light it appears to be so, but when the flood of
silver light falls upon it, it would be placed then beyond a doubt.
The time is approaching—the moon each moment approaches her meridian,
and each moment do the rays increase in number and in strength, while
the shadows shorten.
The opposite bank each moment becomes more and more distinct, and the
side of the stream, the green rushes and sedges, all by degrees come
full into view.
Now and then a fish leaps out of the stream, and just exhibits itself,
as much as to say, “There are things living in the stream, and I am one
of them.”
The moment is one of awe—the presence of that mysterious and
dreadful-looking object, even while its identity remains doubt, chills
the heart—it contracts the expanding thoughts to that one object—all
interest in the scene lies centered in that one point.
What could it be? What else but a human body? What else could assume
such a form? But see, nearly half the stream is lit by the moonbeams
struggling through the tree tops, and now rising above them. The light
increases, and the shadows shorten.
The edge of the bed of stones now becomes lit up by the moonlight; the
rippling stream, the bubbles, and the tiny spray that was caused by
the rush of water against the stones, seemed like sparkling flashes of
silver fire.
Then came the moonbeams upon the body, for it was raised above the
level of the water, and shewed conspicuously; for the moonbeams reached
the body before they fell on the surrounding water; for that reason
then it was the body presented a strange and ghastly object against a
deep, dark background, by which it was surrounded.
But this did not last long—the water in another minute was lit up by
the moon’s pale beams, and then indeed could be plainly enough seen the
body of a man lying on the heap of stones motionless and ghastly.
The colourless hue of the moonlight gave the object a most horrific and
terrible appearance! The face of the dead man was turned towards the
moon’s rays, and the body seemed to receive all the light that could
fall upon it.
It was a terrible object to look upon, and one that added a new and
singular interest to the scene! The world seemed then to be composed
almost exclusively of still life, and the body was no impediment to the
stillness of the scene.
It was, all else considered, a calm, beautiful scene, lovely the night,
gorgeous the silvery rays that lit up the face of nature; the hill
and dale, meadow, and wood, and river, all afforded contrasts strong,
striking, and strange.
But strange, and more strange than any contrast in nature, was that
afforded to the calm beauty of the night and place by the deep
stillness and quietude imposed upon the mind by that motionless human
body.
The moon’s rays now fell upon its full length; the feet were lying in
the water, the head lay back, with its features turned towards the
quarter of the heavens where the moon shone from; the hair floated
on the shallow water, while the face and body were exposed to all
influences, from its raised and prominent position.
The moonbeams had scarcely settled upon it—scarce a few minutes—when
the body moved. Was it the water that moved it? it could not be,
surely, that the moonbeams had the power of recalling life into that
inanimate mass, that lay there for some time still and motionless as
the very stones on which it lay.
It was endued with life; the dead man gradually rose up, and leaned
himself upon his elbow; he paused a moment like one newly recalled
to life; he seemed to become assured he did live. He passed one hand
through his hair, which was wet, and then rose higher into a sitting
posture, and then he leaned on one hand, inclining himself towards the
moon.
His breast heaved with life, and a kind of deep inspiration, or groan,
came from him, as he first awoke to life, and then he seemed to pause
for a few moments. He turned gradually over, till his head inclined
down the stream.
Just below, the water deepened, and ran swiftly and silently on amid
meads and groves of trees. The vampyre was revived; he awoke again to a
ghastly life; he turned from the heap of stones, he gradually allowed
himself to sink into deep water, and then, with a loud plunge, he swam
to the centre of the river.
Slowly and surely did he swim into the centre of the river, and down
the stream he went. He took long, but easy strokes, for he was going
down the stream, and that aided him.
For some distance might he be heard and seen through the openings in
the trees, but he became gradually more and more indistinct, till sound
and sight both ceased, and the vampyre had disappeared.
During the continuance of this singular scene, not one word had passed
between the landlord and his companions. When the blacksmith fired the
fowling-piece, and saw the stranger fall, apparently lifeless, upon the
stepping-stones that crossed the river, he became terrified at what he
had done, and gazed upon the seeming lifeless form with a face on which
the utmost horror was depicted.
They all seemed transfixed to the spot, and although each would have
given worlds to move away, a kind of nightmare seemed to possess them,
which stunned all their faculties, and brought over them a torpidity
from which they found it impossible to arouse themselves.
But, when the apparently dead man moved again, and when, finally, the
body, which appeared so destitute of life, rolled into the stream, and
floated away with the tide, their fright might be considered to have
reached its climax. The absence of the body, however, had seemingly, at
all events, the effect of releasing them from the mental and physical
thraldom in which they were, and they were enabled to move from the
spot, which they did immediately, making their way towards the town
with great speed.
As they got near, they held a sort of council of war as to what they
should do under the circumstances, the result of which was, that
they came to a conclusion to keep all that they had done and seen to
themselves; for, if they did not, they might be called upon for some
very troublesome explanations concerning the fate of the supposed
Hungarian nobleman whom they had taken upon themselves to believe was
a vampyre, and to shoot accordingly, without taking the trouble to
inquire into the legality of such an act.
How such a secret was likely to be kept, when it was shared amongst
seven people, it is hard to say; but, if it were so kept, it could only
be under the pressure of a strong feeling of self-preservation.
They were forced individually, of course, to account for their absence
during the night at their respective homes, and how they managed to do
that is best known to themselves.
As to the landlord, he felt compelled to state that, having his
suspicions of his guest aroused, he followed him on a walk that he
pretended to take, and he had gone so far, that at length he had given
up the chase, and lost his own way in returning.
Thus was it, then, that this affair still preserved all its mystery,
with a large superadded amount of fear attendant upon it; for, if the
mysterious guest were really anything supernatural, might he not come
again in a much more fearful shape, and avenge the treatment he had
received?
The only person who fell any disappointment in the affair, or
whose expectations were not realised, was the boy who had made the
appointment with the supposed vampyre at the end of the lane, and who
was to have received what he considered so large a reward for pointing
out the retreat of Sir Francis Varney.
He waited in vain for the arrival of the Hungarian nobleman, and, at
last, indignation got the better of him, and he walked away. Feeling
that he had been jilted, he resolved to proceed to the public-house and
demand the half-crowns which had been so liberally promised him; but
when he reached there he found that the party whom he sought was not
within, nor the landlord either, for that was the precise time when
that worthy individual was pursuing his guest over meadow and hill,
through brake and through briar, towards the stepping stones on the
river.
What the boy further did on the following day, when he found that he
was to reap no more benefit for the adventure, we shall soon perceive.
As for the landlord, he did endeavour to catch a few hours’ brief
repose; but as he dreamed that the Hungarian nobleman came in the
likeness of a great toad, and sat upon his chest, feeling like the
weight of a mountain, while he, the landlord, tried to scream and cry
for help, but found that he could neither do one thing nor the other,
we may guess that his repose did not at all invigorate him.
As he himself expressed it, he got up all of a shake, with a strong
impression that he was a very ill-used individual, indeed, to have had
the night-mare in the day time.
And now we will return to the cottage where the Bannerworth family were
at all events, making themselves quite as happy as they did at their
ancient mansion, in order to see what is there passing, and how Dr.
Chillingworth made an effort to get up some evidence of something that
the Bannerworth family knew nothing of, therefore could not very well
be expected to render him much assistance. That he did, however, make
what he considered an important discovery, we shall perceive in the
course of the ensuing chapter, in which it will be seen that the best
hidden things will, by the merest accident, sometimes come to light,
and that, too, when least expected by any one at all connected with the
result.
CHAPTER LXXXVI.
THE DISCOVERY OF THE POCKET BOOK OF MARMADUKE BANNERWORTH.—ITS
MYSTERIOUS CONTENTS.
The little episode had just taken place which we have recorded between
the old admiral and Jack Pringle, when Henry Bannerworth and Charles
Holland stepped aside to converse.
“Charles,” said Henry, “it has become absolutely necessary that I
should put an end to this state of dependence in which we all live upon
your uncle. It is too bad to think, that because, through fighting the
battles of his country, he has amassed some money, we are to eat it up.”
“My dear friend,” said Charles, “does it not strike you, that it would
be a great deal worse than too bad, if my uncle could not do what he
liked with his own?”
“Yes; but, Charles, that is not the question.”
“I think it is, though I know not what other question you can make of
it.”
“We have all talked it over, my mother, my brother, and Flora; and my
brother and I have determined, if this state of things should last much
longer, to find out some means of honourable exertion by which we may,
at all events, maintain ourselves without being burdensome to any.”
“Well, well, we will talk of that another time.”
“Nay, but hear me; we were thinking that if we went into some branch
of the public service, your uncle would have the pleasure, such we are
quite sure it would be to him, of assisting us greatly by his name and
influence.”
“Well, well, Henry, that’s all very well; but for a little time do not
throw up the old man and make him unhappy. I believe I am his only
relative in the world, and, as he has often said, he intended leaving
me heir to all he possesses, you see there is no harm done by you
receiving a small portion of it beforehand.”
“And,” said Henry, “by that line of argument, we are to find an excuse
for robbing your uncle; in the fact, that we are robbing you likewise.”
“No, no; indeed, you do not view the matter rightly.”
“Well, all I can say is, Charles, that while I feel, and while we all
feel, the deepest debt of gratitude towards your uncle, it is our duty
to do something. In a box which we have brought with us from the Hall,
and which has not been opened since our father’s death, I have stumbled
over some articles of ancient jewellery and plate, which, at all
events, will produce something.”
“But which you must not part with.”
“Nay, but, Charles, these are things I knew not we possessed, and most
ill-suited do they happen to be to our fallen fortunes. It is money we
want, not the gewgaws of a former state, to which we can have now no
sort of pretension.”
“Nay, I know you have all the argument; but still is there something
sad and uncomfortable to one’s feelings in parting with such things as
those which have been in families for many years.”
“But we knew not that we had them; remember that, Charles. Come and
look at them. Those relics of a bygone age may amuse you, and, as
regards myself, there are no circumstances whatever associated with
them that give them any extrinsic value; so laugh at them or admire
them, as you please, I shall most likely be able to join with you in
either feeling.”
“Well, be it so—I will come and look at them; but you must think better
of what you say concerning my uncle, for I happen to know—which you
ought likewise by this time—how seriously the old man would feel any
rejection on your part of the good he fancies he is doing you. I tell
you, Henry, it is completely his hobby, and let him have earned his
money with ten times the danger he has, he could not spend it with
anything like the satisfaction that he does, unless he were allowed to
dispose of it in this way.”
“Well, well; be it so for a time.”
“The fact is, his attachment to Flora is so great—which is a most
fortunate circumstance for me—that I should not be at all surprised
that she cuts me out of one half my estate, when the old man dies. But
come, we will look at your ancient bijouterie.”
Henry led Charles into an apartment of the cottage where some of the
few things had been placed that were brought from Bannerworth Hall,
which were not likely to be in constant and daily use.
Among these things happened to be the box which Henry had mentioned,
and from which he had taken a miscellaneous assortment of things of an
antique and singular character.
There were old dresses of a season and of a taste long gone by;
ancient articles of defence; some curiously wrought daggers; and a few
ornaments, pretty, but valueless, along with others of more sterling
pretensions, which Henry pointed out to Charles.
“I am almost inclined to think,” said the latter, “that some of these
things are really of considerable value; but I do not I profess to be
an accurate judge, and, perhaps, I am more taken with the beauty of an
article, than the intrinsic worth. What is that which you have just
taken from the box?”
“It seems a half-mask,” said Henry, “made of silk; and here are initial
letters within it—M. B.”
“To what do they apply?”
“Marmaduke Bannerworth, my father.”
“I regret I asked you.”
“Nay, Charles, you need not. Years have now elapsed since that
misguided man put a period to his own existence, in the gardens of
Bannerworth Hall. Of course, the shock was a great one to us all,
although I must confess that we none of us knew much of a father’s
affections. But time reconciles one to these dispensations, and to a
friend, like yourself, I can talk upon these subjects without a pang.”
He laid down the mask, and proceeded further in his search in the old
box.
Towards the bottom of it there were some books, and, crushed in by the
side of them, there was an ancient-looking pocket-book, which Charles
pointed out, saying,—
“There, Henry, who knows but you may find a fortune when you least
expect it?”
“Those who expect nothing,” said Henry, “will not be disappointed. At
all events, as regards this pocket-book, you see it is empty.”
“Not quite. A card has fallen from it.”
Charles took up the card, and read upon it the name of Count Barrare.
“That name,” he said, “seems familiar to me. Ah! now I recollect, I
have read of such a man. He flourished some twenty, or five-and-twenty
years ago, and was considered a _roue_ of the first water—a finished
gamester; and, in a sort of brief memoir I read once of him, it said
that he disappeared suddenly one day, and was never again heard of.”
“Indeed! I’m not puzzled to think how his card came into my father’s
pocket-book. They met at some gaming-house; and, if some old
pocket-book of the Count Barrare’s were shaken, there might fall from
it a card, with the name of Mr. Marmaduke Bannerworth upon it.”
“Is there nothing further in the pocket-book—no memoranda?”
“I will look. Stay! here is something upon one of the leaves—let me
see—‘Mem., twenty-five thousand pounds!’ He who robs the robber, steals
little; it was not meant to kill him; but it will be unsafe to use the
money for a time—my brain seems on fire—the remotest hiding-place in
the house is behind the picture.”
“What do you think of that?” said Charles.
“I know not what to think. There is one thing though, that I do know.”
“And what is that?”
“It is my father’s handwriting. I have many scraps of his, and his
peculiar hand is familiar to me.”
“It’s very strange, then, what it can refer to.”
“Charles—Charles! there is a mystery connected with our fortunes, that
I never could unravel; and once or twice it seemed as if we were upon
the point of discovering all; but something has ever interfered to
prevent us, and we have been thrown back into the realms of conjecture.
My father’s last words were, ‘The money is hidden;’ and then he tried
to add something; but death stopped his utterance. Now, does it not
almost seem that this memorandum alluded to the circumstance?”
“It does, indeed.”
“And then, scarcely had my father breathed his last, when a man comes
and asks for him at the garden-gate, and, upon hearing that he is dead,
utters some imprecations, and walks away.”
“Well, Henry, you must trust to time and circumstances to unravel these
mysteries. For myself, I own that I cannot do so; I see no earthly way
out of the difficulty whatever. But still it does appear to me as if
Dr. Chillingworth knew something or had heard something, with which he
really ought to make you acquainted.”
“Do not blame the worthy doctor; he may have made an error of judgment,
but never one of feeling; and you may depend, if he is keeping anything
from me, that he is doing so from some excellent motive; most probably
because he thinks it will give me pain, and so will not let me endure
any unhappiness from it, unless he is quite certain as regards the
facts. When he is so, you may depend he will be communicative, and I
shall know all that he has to relate. But, Charles, it is evident to me
that you, too, are keeping something.”
“I!”
“Yes; you acknowledge to having had an interview, and a friendly one,
with Varney; and you likewise acknowledge that he had told you things
which he has compelled you to keep secret.”
“I have promised to keep them secret, and I deeply regret the promise
that I have made. There cannot be anything to my mind more essentially
disagreeable than to have one’s tongue tied in one’s interview with
friends. I hate to hear anything that I may not repeat to those whom I
take into my own confidence.”
“I can understand the feeling; but here comes the worthy doctor.”
“Show him the memorandum.”
“I will.”
As Dr. Chillingworth entered the apartments Henry handed him the
memorandum that had been found in the old pocket-book, saying as he did
so,—
“Look at that, doctor, and give us your candid opinion upon it.”
Dr. Chillingworth fitted on his spectacles, and read the paper
carefully. At its conclusion, he screwed up his mouth into an extremely
small compass, and doubling up the paper, he put it into his capacious
waistcoat pocket, saying as he did so,—
“Oh! oh! oh! oh! hum!”
“Well, doctor,” said Henry; “we are waiting for your opinion.”
“My opinion! Well, then, my dear boy, I must say, my opinion, to the
best of my belief is, that I really don’t know anything about it.”
“Then, perhaps, you’ll surrender us the memorandum,” said Charles;
“because, if you don’t know anything, we may as well make a little
inquiry.”
“Ha!” said the worthy doctor; “we can’t put old heads upon young
shoulders, that’s quite clear. Now, my good young men, be patient and
quiet; recollect, that what you know you’re acquainted with, and that
that which is hidden from you, you cannot very well come to any very
correct conclusion upon. There’s a right side and a wrong one you may
depend, to every question; and he who walks heedlessly in the dark, is
very apt to run his head against a post. Good evening, my boys—good
evening.”
Away bustled the doctor.
“Well,” said Charles, “what do you think of that, Mr. Henry?”
“I think he knows what he’s about.”
“That may be; but I’ll be hanged if anybody else does. The doctor is
by no means favourable to the march of popular information; and I
really think he might have given us some food for reflection, instead
of leaving us so utterly and entirely at fault as he has; and you know
he’s taken away your memorandum even.”
“Let him have it, Charles—let him have it; it is safe with him. The old
man may be, and I believe is, a little whimsical and crotchety; but he
means abundantly well, and he’s just one of those sort of persons, and
always was, who will do good his own way, or not at all; so we must
take the good with the bad in those cases, and let Dr. Chillingworth do
as he pleases.”
“I cannot say it is nothing to me, although those words were rising to
my lips, because you know, Henry, that everything which concerns you
or yours is something to me; and therefore it is that I feel extremely
anxious for the solution of all this mystery. Before I hear the sequel
of that which Varney, the vampyre, has so strongly made me a confidant
of, I will, at all events, make an effort to procure his permission to
communicate it to all those who are in any way beneficially interested
in the circumstances. Should he refuse me that permission, I am almost
inclined myself to beg him to withhold his confidence.”
“Nay, do not do so, Charles—do not do that, I implore you. Recollect,
although you cannot make us joint recipients with you in your
knowledge, you can make use of it, probably, to our advantage, in
saving us, perchance, from the different consequences, so that you can
make what you know in some way beneficial to us, although not in every
way.”
“There is reason in that, and I give in at once. Be it so, Henry.
I will wait on him, and if I cannot induce him to change his
determination, and allow me to tell some other as well as Flora, I must
give in, and take the thing as a secret, although I shall not abandon a
hope, even after he has told me all he has to tell, that I may induce
him to permit me to make a general confidence, instead of the partial
one he has empowered me to do.”
“It may be so; and, at all events, we must not reject a proffered good
because it is not quite so complete as it might be.”
“You are right; I will keep my appointment with him, entertaining the
most sanguine hope that our troubles and disasters—I say our, because
I consider myself quite associated in thought, interest, and feelings
with your family—may soon be over.”
“Heaven grant it may be so, for your’s and Flora’s sake; but I feel
that Bannerworth Hall will never again be the place it was to us. I
should prefer that we sought for new associations, which I have no
doubt we may find, and that among us we get up some other home that
would be happier, because not associated with so many sad scenes in our
history.”
“Be it so; and I am sure that the admiral would gladly give way to such
an arrangement. He has often intimated that he thought Bannerworth
Hall a dull place; consequently, although he pretends to have purchased
it of you, I think he will be very glad to leave it.”
“Be it so, then. If it should really happen that we are upon the eve of
any circumstances that will really tend to relieve us from our misery
and embarrassments, we will seek for some pleasanter abode than the
Hall, which you may well imagine, since it became the scene of that
dreadful tragedy that left us fatherless, has borne but a distasteful
appearance to all our eyes.”
“I don’t wonder at that, and am only surprised that, after such a thing
had happened, any of you liked to inhabit the place.”
“We did not like, but our poverty forced us. You have no notion of the
difficulties through which we have struggled; and the fact that we had
a home rent free was one of so much importance to us, that had it been
surrounded by a thousand more disagreeables than it was, we must have
put up with it; but now that we owe so much to the generosity of your
uncle, I suppose we can afford to talk of what we like and of what we
don’t like.”
“You can, Henry, and it shall not be my fault if you do not always
afford to do so; and now, as the time is drawing on, I think I will
proceed at once to Varney, for it is better to be soon than late, and
get from him the remainder of his story.”
• • • • •
There were active influences at work, to prevent Sir Francis Varney
from so quickly as he had arranged to do, carrying out his intention
of making Charles Holland acquainted with the history of the eventful
period of his life, which had been associated with Marmaduke
Bannerworth.
One would have scarcely thought it possible that anything now would
have prevented Varney from concluding his strange narrative; but that
he was prevented, will appear.
The boy who had been promised such liberal payment by the Hungarian
nobleman, for betraying the place of Varney’s concealment, we have
already stated, felt bitterly the disappointment of not being met,
according to promise, at the corner of the lane, by that individual.
It not only deprived him of the half-crowns, which already in
imagination he had laid out, but it was a great blow to his own
importance, for after his discovery of the residence of the vampyre,
he looked upon himself as quite a public character, and expected great
applause for his cleverness.
But when the Hungarian nobleman came not, all these dreams began to
vanish into thin air, and, like the unsubstantial fabric of a vision,
to leave no trace behind them.
He got dreadfully aggravated, and his first thought was to go to
Varney, and see what he could get from him, by betraying the fact that
some one was actively in search of him.
That seemed, however, a doubtful good, and perhaps there was some
personal dread of the vampyre mixed up with the rejection of this
proposition. But reject it he did, and then he walked moodily into the
town without any fixed resolution of what he should do.
All that he thought of was a general idea that he should like to create
some mischief, if possible—what it was he cared not, so long as it made
a disturbance.
Now, he knew well that the most troublesome and fidgetty man in the
town was Tobias Philpots, a saddler, who was always full of everybody’s
business but his own, and ever ready to hear any scandal of his
neighbours.
“I have a good mind,” said the boy, “to go to old Philpots, and tell
him all about it, that I have.”
The good mind soon strengthened itself into a fixed resolution, and
full of disdain and indignation at the supposed want of faith of the
Hungarian nobleman, he paused opposite the saddler’s door.
Could he but for a moment have suspected the real reason why the
appointment had not been kept with him, all his curiosity would have
been doubly aroused, and he would have followed the landlord of the inn
and his associate upon the track of the second vampyre that had visited
the town.
But of this he knew nothing, for that proceeding had been conducted
with amazing quietness; and the fact of the Hungarian nobleman, when he
found that he was followed, taking a contrary course to that in which
Varney was concealed, prevented the boy from knowing anything of his
movements.
Hence the thing looked to him like a piece of sheer neglect and
contemptuous indifference, which he felt bound to resent.
He did not pause long at the door of the saddler’s, but, after a few
moments, he walked boldly in, and said,—
“Master Philpots, I have got something extraordinary to tell you, and
you may give me what you like for telling you.”
“Go on, then,” said the saddler, “that’s just the price I always likes
to pay for everything.”
“Will you keep it secret?” said the boy.
“Of course I will. When did you ever hear of me telling anything to a
single individual?”
“Never to a single individual, but I have heard you tell things to the
whole town.”
“Confound your impudence. Get out of my shop directly.”
“Oh! very good. I can go and tell old Mitchell, the pork-butcher.”
“No, I say—stop; don’t tell him. If anybody is to know, let it be me,
and I’ll promise you I’ll keep it secret.”
“Very good,” said the boy, returning, “you shall know it; and, mind,
you have promised me to keep it secret, so that if it gets known, you
know it cannot be any fault of mine.”
The fact was, the boy was anxious it should be known, only that in
case some consequences might arise, he thought he would quiet his own
conscience, by getting a promise of secrecy from Tobias Philpots, which
he well knew that individual would not think of keeping.
He then related to him the interview he had had with the Hungarian
nobleman at the inn, how he had promised a number of half-crowns, but a
very small instalment of which he had received.
All this Master Philpots cared very little for, but the information
that the dreaded Varney, the vampyre, was concealed so close to the
town was a matter of great and abounding interest, and at that part of
the story he suddenly pricked up his ears amazingly.
“Why, you don’t mean to say that?” he exclaimed. “Are you sure it was
he?”
“Yes, I am quite certain. I have seen I him more than once. It was Sir
Francis Varney, without any mistake.”
“Why, then you may depend he’s only waiting until it’s very dark, and
then he will walk into somebody, and suck his blood. Here’s a horrid
discovery! I thought we had had enough of Master Varney, and that he
would hardly show himself here again, and now you tell me he is not ten
minutes’ walk off.”
“It’s a fact,” said the boy. “I saw him go in, and he looks thinner
and more horrid than ever. I am sure he wants a dollop of blood from
somebody.”
“I shouldn’t wonder.”
“Now there is Mrs. Philpots, you know, sir; she’s rather big, and seems
most ready to burst always; I shouldn’t wonder if the vampyre came to
her to-night.”
“Wouldn’t you?” said Mrs. Philpots, who had walked into the shop, and
overheard the whole conversation; “wouldn’t you, really? I’ll vampyre
you, and teach you to make these remarks about respectable married
women. You young wretch, take that, will you!”
She gave the boy such a box on the ears, that the place seemed to spin
round with him. As soon as he recovered sufficiently to be enabled to
walk, he made his way from the shop with abundance of precipitation,
much regretting that he had troubled himself to make a confidant of
Master Philpots.
But, however, he could not but tell himself that if his object was to
make a general disturbance through the whole place, he had certainly
succeeded in doing so.
He slunk home perhaps with a feeling that he might be called upon to
take part in something that might ensue, and at all events be compelled
to become a guide to the place of Sir Francis Varney’s retreat, in
which case, for all he knew, the vampyre might, by some more than
mortal means, discover what a hand he had had in the matter, and punish
him accordingly.
The moment he had left the saddler’s Mrs. Philpots, after using some
bitter reproaches to her husband for not at once sacrificing the boy
upon the spot for the disrespectful manner in which he had spoken of
her, hastily put on her bonnet and shawl, and the saddler, although it
was a full hour before the usual time, began putting up the shutters of
his shop.
“Why, my dear,” he said to Mrs. Philpots, when she came down stairs
equipped for the streets, “why, my dear, where are you going?”
“And pray, sir, what are you shutting up the shop for at this time of
the evening?”
“Oh! why, the fact is, I thought I’d just go to the Rose and Crown, and
mention that the vampyre was so near at hand.”
“Well, Mr. Philpots, and in that case there can be no harm in my
calling upon some of my acquaintance and mentioning it likewise.”
“Why, I don’t suppose there would be much harm; only remember, Mrs.
Philpots, remember if you please——”
“Remember what?”
“To tell everybody to keep it secret.”
“Oh, of course I will; and mind you do it likewise.”
“Most decidedly.”
The shop was closed, Mr. Philpots ran off to the Rose and Crown, and
Mrs. Philpots, with as much expedition as she could, purposed making
the grand tour of all her female acquaintance in the town, just to tell
them, as a great secret, that the vampyre, Sir Francis Varney, as he
called himself, had taken refuge at the house that was to let down the
lane leading to Higgs’s farm.
“But by no means,” she said, “let it go no further, because it is a
very wrong thing to make any disturbance, and you will understand that
it’s quite a secret.”
She was listened to with breathless attention, as may well be supposed,
and it was a singular circumstance that at every house she left some
other lady put on her bonnet and shawl, and ran out to make the circle
of her acquaintance, with precisely the same story, and precisely the
same injunctions to secrecy.
And, as Mr. Philpots pursued an extremely similar course, we are not
surprised that in the short space of one hour the news should have
spread through all the town, and that there was scarcely a child old
enough to understand what was being talked about, who was ignorant of
the fact, that Sir Francis Varney was to be found at the empty house
down the lane.
It was an unlucky time, too, for the night was creeping on, a period
at which people’s apprehension of the supernatural becomes each moment
stronger and more vivid—a period at which a number of idlers are let
loose for different employments, and when anything in the shape of a
row or a riot presents itself in pleasant colours to those who have
nothing to lose and who expect, under the cover of darkness, to be able
to commit outrages they would be afraid to think of in the daytime,
when recognition would be more easy.
Thus was it that Sir Francis Varney’s position, although he knew it
not, became momentarily one of extreme peril, and the danger he was
about to run, was certainly greater than any he had as yet experienced.
Had Charles Holland but known what was going on, he would undoubtedly
have done something to preserve the supposed vampyre from the mischief
that threatened him, but the time had not arrived when he had promised
to pay him a second visit, so he had no idea of anything serious having
occurred.
Perhaps, too, Mr. and Mrs. Philpots scarcely anticipated creating so
much confusion, but when they found that the whole place was in an
uproar, and that a tumultuous assemblage of persons called aloud for
vengeance upon Varney, the vampyre, they made their way home again in
no small fright.
And, now, what was the result of all these proceedings will be best
known by our introducing the reader to the interior of the house in
which Varney had found a temporary refuge, and following in detail his
proceedings as he waited for the arrival of Charles Holland.
CHAPTER LXXXVII.
THE HUNT FOR VARNEY.—THE HOUSE-TOPS.—THE MIRACULOUS ESCAPE.—THE LAST
PLACE OF REFUGE.—THE COTTAGE.
On the tree tops the moon shines brightly, and the long shadows are
shooting its rays down upon the waters, and the green fields appear
clothed in a flood of silver light; the little town was quiet and
tranquil—nature seemed at rest.
The old mansion in which Sir Francis Varney had taken refuge, stood
empty and solitary; it seemed as though it were not associated with the
others by which it was surrounded. It was gloomy, and in the moonlight
it reminded one of things long gone by, existences that had once been,
but now no longer of this present time—a mere memento of the past.
Sir Francis Varney reclined upon the house-top; he gazed upon the sky,
and upon the earth; he saw the calm tranquility that reigned around,
and could not but admire what he saw; he sighed, he seemed to sigh,
from a pleasure he felt in the fact of his security; he could repose
there without fear, and breathe the balmy air that fanned his cheek.
“Certainly,” he muttered, “things might have been worse, but not
much worse; however, they might have been much better; the ignorant
are always the most to be feared, because they have no guide and no
control, save what can be exerted over them by their fears and their
passions.”
He paused to look again over the scene, and, as far as the eye could
reach, and that, moonlight as it was, was many miles, the country was
diversified with hill and dale, meadow and ploughed land; the open
fields, and the darker woods, and the silvery stream that ran at no
great distance, all presented a scene that was well calculated to warm
the imagination, and to give the mind that charm which a cultivated
understanding is capable of receiving.
There was but one thing wanted to make such a scene one of pure
happiness, and that was all absence of care of fears for the future and
the wants of life.
Suddenly there was a slight sound that came from the town. It was very
slight, but the ears of Sir Francis Varney were painfully acute of
late; the least sound that came across him was heard in a moment, and
his whole visage was changed to one of listening interest.
The sound was hushed; but his attention was not lulled, for he had been
placed in circumstances that made all his vigilance necessary for his
own preservation. Hence it was, what another would have passed over,
or not heard at all, he both heard and noticed. He was not sure of the
nature of the sound, it was so slight and so indistinct.
There it was again! Some persons were moving about in the town. The
sounds that came upon the night air seemed to say that there was an
unusual bustle in the town, which was, to Sir Francis Varney, ominous
in the extreme.
What could people in such a quiet, retired place require out at such
an hour at night? It must be something very unusual—something that
must excite them to a great degree; and Sir Francis began to feel very
uneasy.
“They surely,” he muttered to himself—“they surely cannot have found
out my hiding place, and intend to hunt me from it, the blood-thirsty
hounds! they are never satisfied. The mischief they are permitted
to do on one occasion is but the precursor to another. The taste has
caused the appetite for more, and nothing short of his blood can
satisfy it.”
The sounds increased, and the noise came nearer and nearer, and it
appeared as though a number of men had collected together, and were
coming towards him. Yes, they were coming down the lane towards the
deserted mansion where he was.
For once in his life, Sir Francis Varney trembled; he felt sick at
heart, though no man was less likely to give up hope and to despair
than he; yet this sign of unrelenting hatred and persecution was too
unequivocal and too stern not to produce its effect upon even his mind;
for he had no doubt but that they were coming with the express purpose
of seeking him.
How they could have found him out was a matter he could not imagine.
The Bannerworths could not have betrayed him—he was sure of that; and
yet who could have seen him, so cautious and so careful as he had
been, and so very sparing had he lived, because he would not give the
slightest cause for all that was about to follow. He hoped to have
hidden himself; but now he could hear the tramp of men distinctly, and
their voices came now on the night air, though it was in a subdued
tone, as if they were desirous of approaching unheard and unseen by
their victim.
Sir Francis Varney stirred not from his position. He remained silent
and motionless. He appeared not to heed what was going on; perhaps he
hoped to see them go by—to be upon some false scent; or, if they saw no
signs of life, they might leave the place, and go elsewhere.
Hark! they stop at the house—they go not by; they seem to pause, and
then a thundering knock came at the door, which echoed and re-echoed
through the empty and deserted house, on the top of which sat, in
silent expectation, the almost motionless Sir Francis Varney, the
redoubted vampyre.
The knock which came so loud and so hard upon the door caused Sir
Francis to start visibly, for it seemed his own knell. Then, as if the
mob were satisfied with their knowledge of his presence, and of their
victory, and of his inability to escape them, they sent up a loud shout
that filled the whole neighbourhood with its sound.
It seemed to come from below and around the house; it rose from all
sides, and that told Sir Francis Varney that the house was surrounded
and all escape was cut off; there was no chance of his being able to
rush through such a multitude of men as that which now encircled him.
With the calmest despair, Sir Francis Varney lay still and motionless
on the house-top, and listened to the sounds that proceeded from below.
Shout after shout arose on the still, calm air of the night; knock
after knock came upon the stout old door, which awakened responsive
echoes throughout the house that had for many years lain dormant, and
which now seemed disturbed, and resounded in hollow murmurs to the
voices from without.
Then a loud voice shouted from below, as if to be heard by any one who
might be within,—
“Sir Francis Varney, the vampyre, come out and give yourself up at
discretion! If we have to search for you, you may depend it will be to
punish you; you will suffer by burning. Come out and give yourself up.”
There was a pause, and then a loud shout.
Sir Francis Varney paid no attention to this summons, but sat,
motionless, on the house-top, where he could hear all that passed below
in the crowd.
“He will not come out,” said one.
“Ah! he’s much too cunning to be caught in such a trap. Why, he knows
what you would do with him; he knows you would stake him, and make a
bonfire about him.”
“So he has no taste for roasting,” remarked another; “but still, it’s
no use hiding; we have too many hands, and know the house too well to
be easily baffled.”
“That may be; and, although he don’t like burning, yet we will unearth
the old fox, somehow or other; we have discovered his haunt at last,
and certainly we’ll have him out.”
“How shall we get in?”
“Knock in the door—break open the door! the front door—that is the
best, because it leads to all parts of the house, and we can secure any
one who attempts to move from one to the other, as they come down.”
“Hurrah!” shouted several men in the crowd.
“Hurrah!” echoed the mob, with one accord, and the shout rent the air,
and disturbed the quietude and serenity that scarce five minutes before
reigned through the place.
Then, as if actuated by one spirit, they all set to work to force the
door in. It was strong, and capable of great defence, and employed
them, with some labour, for fifteen or twenty minutes, and then, with a
loud crash, the door fell in.
“Hurrah!” again shouted the crowd.
These shouts announced the fall of the door, and then, and not until
then, did Sir Francis Varney stir.
“They have broken in the door,” he muttered, “well, if die I must, I
will sell my life dearly. However, all is not yet lost, and, in the
struggle for life, the loss is not so much felt.”
He got up, and crept towards the trap that led into the house, or out
of it, as the occasion might require.
“The vampyre! the vampyre!” shouted a man who stood on a garden wall,
holding on by the arm of an apple-tree.
“Varney, the vampyre!” shouted a second.
“Hurrah! boys, we are on the right scent; now for a hunt; hurrah! we
shall have him now.”
They rushed in a tumultuous riot up the stone steps, and into the hall.
It was a large, spacious place, with a grand staircase that led up to
the upper floor, but it had two ends, and then terminated in a gallery.
It could not be defended by one man, save at the top, where it could
not long be held, because the assailants could unite, and throw their
whole weight against the entrance, and thus storm it. This actually
happened.
They looked up, and, seeing nobody, they rushed up, some by one stair,
and some by the other; but it was dark; there were but few of the
moon’s rays that pierced the gloom of that place, and those who first
reached the place which we have named, were seized with astonishment,
staggered, and fell.
Sir Francis Varney had met them; he stood there with a staff—something
he had found about the house—not quite so long as a broom-handle, but
somewhat thicker and heavier, being made of stout ash.
This formidable weapon, Sir Francis Varney wielded with strength and
resolution; he was a tall man, and one of no mean activity and personal
strength, and such a weapon, in his hands, was one of a most fearful
character, and, for the occasion, much better than his sword.
Man after man fell beneath the fearful force of these blows, for
though they could not see Sir Francis, yet he could see them, for the
hall-lights were behind them at the time, while he stood in the dark,
and took advantage of this to deal murderous blows upon his assailants.
This continued for some minutes, till they gave way before such a
vigorous defence, and paused.
“On, neighbours, on,” cried one; “will you be beaten off by one man?
Rush in at once and you must force him from his position—push him hard,
and he must give way.”
“Ay,” said one fellow who sat upon the ground rubbing his head; “it’s
all very well to say push him hard, but if you felt the weight of that
d—d pole on your head, you wouldn’t be in such a blessed hurry.”
However true that might be, there was but little attention paid to it,
and a determined rush was made at the entrance to the gallery, and they
found that it was unoccupied; and that was explained by the slamming
of a door, and its being immediately locked upon them; and when the
mob came to the door, they found they had to break their way through
another door.
This did not take long in effecting; and in less than five minutes they
had broken through that door which led into another room; but the first
man who entered it fell from a crashing blow on the head from the ashen
staff of Sir Francis Varney, who hurried and fled, closely pursued,
until he came to another door, through which he dashed.
Here he endeavoured to make a stand and close it, but was immediately
struck and grappled with; but he threw his assailant, and turned and
fled again.
His object had been to defend each inch of the ground as long as he was
able; but he found they came too close upon his steps, and prevented
his turning in time to try the strength of his staff upon the foremost.
He dashed up the first staircase with surprising rapidity, leaving his
pursuers behind; and when he had gained the first landing, he turned
upon those who pursued him, who could hardly follow him two abreast.
“Down with the vampyre!” shouted the first, who rushed up heedless of
the staff.
“Down with a fool!” thundered Varney, as he struck the fellow a
terrific blow, which covered his face with blood, and he fell back into
the arms of his companions.
A bitter groan and execration arose from them below, and again they
shouted, and rushed up headlong.
“Down with the vampyre!” was again shouted, and met by a corresponding,
but deep guttural sound of—
“Down with a fool!”
And sure enough the first again came to the earth without any
preparation, save the application of an ashen stick to his skull,
which, by-the-bye, no means aided the operation of thinking.
Several more shared a similar fate; but they pressed hard, and Sir
Francis was compelled to give ground to keep them at the necessary
length from him, as they rushed on regardless of his blows, and if he
had not he would soon have been engaged in a personal struggle, for
they were getting too close for him to use the staff.
“Down with the vampyre!” was the renewed cry, as they drove him from
spot to spot until he reached the roof of the house, and then he ran
up the steps to the loft, which he had just reached when they came up
to the bottom.
Varney attempted to draw the ladder up, but four or five stout men held
that down; then by a sudden turn, as they were getting up, he turned
it over, threw those on it down, and the ladder too, upon the heads of
those who were below.
“Down with the vampyre!” shouted the mob, as they, with the most
untiring energy, set the ladder, or steps, against the loft, and as
many as could held it, while others rushed up to attack Varney with all
the ferocity and courage of so many bull-dogs.
It was strange, but the more they were baffled the more enraged and
determined they rushed on to a new attack, with greater resolution than
ever.
On this occasion, however, they were met with a new kind of missile,
for Sir Francis had either collected and placed there for the occasion,
or they had been left there for years, a number of old bricks, which
lay close at hand. These he took, one by one, and deliberately took aim
at them, and flung them with great force, striking down every one they
hit.
This caused them to recoil; the bricks caused fearful gashes in their
heads, and the wounds were serious, the flesh being, in many places,
torn completely off. They however, only paused, for one man said,—
“Be of good heart, comrades, we can do as he does; he has furnished us
with weapons, and we can thus attack him in two ways, and he must give
way in the end.”
“Hurrah! down with the vampyre!” sounded from all sides, and the shout
was answered by a corresponding rush.
It was true; Sir Francis had furnished them with weapons to attack
himself, for they could throw them back at him, which they did, and
struck him a severe blow on the head, and it covered his face with
blood in a moment.
“Hurrah!” shouted the assailants; “another such a blow, and all will be
over with the vampyre.”
“He’s got——”
“Press him sharp, now,” cried another man, as he aimed another blow
with a brick, which struck Varney on the arm, causing him to drop the
brick he held in his hand. He staggered back, apparently in great pain.
“Up! up! we have him now; he cannot get away; he’s hurt; we have him—we
have him.”
And up they went with all the rapidity they could scramble up the
steps; but this had given Varney time to recover himself; and though
his right arm was almost useless, yet he contrived, with his left, to
pitch the bricks so as to knock over the first three or four, when,
seeing that he could not maintain his position to advantage, he rushed
to the outside of the house, the last place he had capable of defence.
There was a great shout by those outside, when they saw him come out
and stand with his staff, and those who came first got first served,
for the blows resounded, while he struck them, and sent them over below.
Then came a great shout from within and without, and then a desperate
rush was made at the door, and, in the next instant, Varney was seen
flying, followed by his pursuers, one after the other, some tumbling
over the tiles, to the imminent hazard of their necks.
Sir Francis Varney rushed along with a speed that appeared by far too
great to admit of being safely followed, and yet those who followed
appeared infected by his example, and appeared heedless of all
consequences by which their pursuit might be attended to themselves.
“Hurrah!” shouted the mob below.
“Hurrah!” answered the mob on the tiles.
Then, over several housetops might be seen the flying figure of Sir
Francis Varney, pursued by different men at a pace almost equal to his
own.
They, however, could keep up the same speed, and not improve upon it,
while he kept the advantage he first obtained in the start.
Then suddenly he disappeared.
It seemed to the spectators below that he had dropped through a house,
and they immediately surrounded the house, as well as they could, and
then set up another shout.
This took place several times, and as often was the miserable man
hunted from his place of refuge only to seek another, from which he was
in like manner hunted by those who thirsted for his blood.
On one occasion, they drove him into a house which was surrounded, save
at one point, which had a long room, or building in it, that ran some
distance out, and about twenty feet high.
At the entrance to the roof of this place, or leads, he stood and
defended himself for some moments with success; but having received a
blow himself, he was compelled to retire, while the mob behind forced
those in front forward faster than he could by any exertion wield the
staff that had so much befriended him on this occasion.
He was, therefore, on the point of being overwhelmed by numbers, when
he fled; but, alas! there was no escape; a bare coping stone and rails
ran round the top of that.
There was not much time for hesitation, but he jumped over the rails
and looked below. It was a great height, but if he fell and hurt
himself, he knew he was at the mercy of the bloodhounds behind him, who
would do anything but show him any mercy, or spare him a single pang.
He looked round and beheld his pursuers close upon him, and one was so
close to him that he seized upon his arm, saying, as he shouted to his
companions,—
“Hurrah, boys! I have him.”
With an execration, Sir Francis wielded his staff with such force, that
he struck the fellow on the head, crushing in his hat as if it had
been only so much paper. The man fell, but a blow followed from some
one else which caused Varney to relax his hold, and finding himself
falling, he, to save himself, sprang away.
The rails, at that moment, were crowded with men who leaned over to
ascertain the effect of the leap.
“He’ll be killed,” said one.
“He’s sure to be smashed,” said another.
“I’ll lay any wager he’ll break a limb!” said a third.
Varney came to the earth—for a moment he lay stunned, and not able to
move hand or foot.
“Hurrah!” shouted the mob.
Their triumph was short, for just as they shouted Varney arose, and
after a moment or two’s stagger he set off at full speed, which
produced another shout from the mob; and just at that moment, a body of
his pursuers were seen scaling the walls after him.
There was now a hunt through all the adjoining fields—from cover after
cover they pursued him until he found no rest from the hungry wolves
that beset him with cries, resembling beasts of prey rather than any
human multitude.
Sir Francis heard them, at the same time, with the despair of a man who
is struggling for life, and yet knows he is struggling in vain; he knew
his strength was decaying—his immense exertions and the blows he had
received, all weakened him, while the number and strength of his foes
seemed rather to increase than to diminish.
Once more he sought the houses, and for a moment he believed himself
safe, but that was only a momentary deception, for they had traced him.
He arrived at a garden wall, over which he bounded, and then he rushed
into the house, the door of which stood open, for the noise and
disturbance had awakened most of the inhabitants, who were out in all
directions.
He took refuge in a small closet on the stairs, but was seen to do so
by a girl, who screamed out with fear and fright,
“Murder! murder!—the wampyre!—the wampyre!” with all her strength, and
in the way of screaming that was no little, and then she went off into
a fit.
This was signal enough, and the house was at once entered, and beset on
all sides by the mob, who came impatient of obtaining their victim who
had so often baffled them.
“There he is—there he is,” said the girl, who came to as soon as other
people came up.
“Where?—where?”
“In that closet,” she said, pointing to it with her finger. “I see’d
him go in the way above.”
Sir Francis, finding himself betrayed, immediately came out of the
closet, just as two or three were advancing to open it, and dealt
so hard a blow on the head of the first that came near him that he
fell without a groan, and a second shared the same fate; and then Sir
Francis found himself grappled with, but with a violent effort he
relieved himself and rushed up stairs.
“Oh! murder—the wampyre! what shall I do—fire—fire!”
These exclamations were uttered in consequence of Varney in his haste
to get up stairs, having inadvertently stepped into the girl’s lap
with one foot, while he kicked her in the chin with the other, besides
scratching her nose till it bled.
“After him—stick to him,” shouted the mob, but the girl kicked and
sprawled so much they were impeded, till, regardless of her cries,
they ran over her and pursued Varney, who was much distressed with the
exertions he had made.
After about a minute’s race he turned upon the head of the stair, not
so much with the hope of defending it as of taking some breathing time;
but seeing his enemies so close, he drew his sword, and stood panting,
but prepared.
“Never mind his toasting-fork,” said one bulky fellow, and, as he
spoke, he rushed on, but the point of the weapon entered his heart and
he fell dead.
[Illustration: Varney stabs one of the mob on the stairs.]
There was a dreadful execration uttered by those who came up after
him, and there was a momentary pause, for none liked to rush on to the
bloody sword of Sir Francis Varney, who stood so willing and so capable
of using it with the most deadly effect. They paused, as well they
might, and this pause was the most welcome thing next to life to the
unfortunate fugitive, for he was dreadfully distressed and bleeding.
“On to him boys! He can hardly stand. See how he pants. On to him, I
say—push him hard.”
“He pushes hard, I tell you,” said another. “I felt the point of his
sword, as it came through Giles’s back.”
“I’ll try my luck, then,” said another, and he rushed up; but he was
met by the sword of Sir Francis, who pierced it through his side, and
he fell back with a groan.
Sir Francis, fearful of stopping any longer to defend that point,
appeared desirous of making good his retreat with some little
advantage, and he rushed up stairs before they had recovered from the
momentary consternation into which they had been thrown by the sudden
disaster they had received.
But they were quickly after him, and before he, wearied as he was,
could gain the roof, they were up the ladder after him.
The first man who came through the trap was again set upon by Varney,
who made a desperate thrust at him, and it took effect; but the sword
snapped by the handle.
With an execration, Sir Francis threw the hilt at the head of the
next man he saw; then rushing, with headlong speed, he distanced his
pursuers for some house tops.
But the row of houses ended at the one he was then at, and he could go
no further. What was to be done? The height was by far too great to be
jumped; death was certain. A hideous heap of crushed and mangled bones
would be the extent of what would remain of him, and then, perhaps,
life not extinct for some hours afterwards.
He turned round; he saw them coming hallooing over the house tops, like
a pack of hounds. Sir Francis struck his hands together, and groaned.
He looked round, and perceived some ivy peeping over the coping-stone.
A thought struck him, and he instantly ran to the spot and leaned over.
“Saved—saved!” he exclaimed.
Then, placing his hand over, he felt for the ivy; then he got over, and
hung by the coping-stone, in a perilous position, till he found a spot
on which he could rest his foot, and then he grasped the ivy as low
down as he could, and thus he lowered himself a short way, till he came
to where the ivy was stronger and more secure to the wall, as the upper
part was very dangerous with his weight attached to it.
The mob came on, very sure of having Sir Francis Varney in their power,
and they did not hurry on so violently, as their position was dangerous
at that hour of the night.
“Easy, boys, easy,” was the cry. “The bird is our own; he can’t get
away, that’s very certain.”
They, however, came on, and took no time about it hardly; but what was
their amazement and rage at finding he had disappeared.
“Where is he?” was the universal inquiry, and “I don’t know,” an almost
universal answer.
There was a long pause, while they searched around; but they saw no
vestige of the object of their search.
“There’s no trap door open,” remarked one; “and I don’t think he could
have got in at any one.”
“Perhaps, finding he could not get away, he has taken the desperate
expedient of jumping over, and committing suicide, and so escape the
doom he ought to be subjected to.”
“Probably he has; but then we can run a stake through him and burn him
all the same.”
They now approached the extreme verge of the houses, and looked over
the sides, but they could see nothing. The moon was up, and there was
light enough to have seen him if he had fallen to the earth, and they
were quite sure that he could not have got up after such a fall as he
must have received.
“We are beaten after all, neighbours.”
“I am not so sure of that,” was the reply. “He may now be hidden about,
for he was too far spent to be able to go far; he could not do that, I
am sure.”
“I think not either.”
“Might he not have escaped by means of that ivy, yonder?” said one of
the men, pointing to the plant, as it climbed over the coping-stones of
the wall.
“Yes; it may be possible,” said one; “and yet it is very dangerous, if
not certain destruction to get over.”
“Oh, yes; there is no possibility of escape that way. Why, it wouldn’t
bear a cat, for there are no nails driven into the wall at this height.”
“Never mind,” said another, “we may as well leave no stone unturned, as
the saying is, but at once set about looking out for him.”
The individual who spoke now leant over the coping stone, for some
moments, in silence. He could see nothing, but yet he continued to gaze
for some moments.
“Do you see him?” inquired one.
“No,” was the answer.
“Ay, ay, I thought as much,” was the reply. “He might as well have got
hold of a corner of the moon, which, I believe, is more likely—a great
deal more likely.”
“Hold still a moment,” said the man, who was looking over the edge of
the house.
“What’s the matter now? A gnat flew into your eye?”
“No; but I see him—by Jove, I see him!”
“See who—see who?”
“Varney, the vampyre!” shouted the man. “I see him about half-way down
clinging, like a fly, to the wall. Odd zounds! I never saw the like
afore!”
“Hurrah! after him then, boys!”
“Not the same way, if you please. Go yourself, and welcome; but I won’t
go that way.”
“Just as you please,” said the man; “but what’s good for the goose is
good for the gander is an old saying, and so is Jack as good as his
master.”
“So it may be; but cuss me if you ain’t a fool if you attempt that!”
The man made no reply, but did as Varney had done before, got over the
coping stone, and then laid hold of the ivy; but, whether his weight
was heavier than Varney’s, or whether it was that the latter had
loosened the hold of the ivy or not, but he had no sooner left go of
the coping stone than the ivy gave way, and he was precipitated from
the height of about fifty feet to the earth—a dreadful fall!
There was a pause—no one spoke. The man lay motionless and dead—he had
dislocated his neck!
The fall had not, however, been without its effect upon Varney, for the
man’s heels struck him so forcibly on his head as he fell, that he was
stunned, and let go his hold, and he, too, fell to the earth, but not
many feet.
He soon recovered himself, and was staggering away, when he was
assailed by those above with groans, and curses of all kinds, and then
by stones, and tiles, and whatever the mob could lay their hands upon.
Some of these struck him, and he was cut about in various places, so
that he could hardly stand.
The hoots and shouts of the mob above had now attracted those below to
the spot where Sir Francis Varney was trying to escape, but he had not
gone far before the loud yells of those behind him told him that he was
again pursued.
Half dead, and almost wholly spent, unarmed, and defenceless, he
scarce knew what to do; whether to fly, or to turn round and die as
a refuge from the greater evil of endeavouring to prolong a struggle
which seemed hopeless. Instinct, however, urged him on, at all risks,
and though he could not go very far, or fast, yet on he went, with the
crowd after him.
“Down with the vampyre!—seize him—hold him—burn him! he must be down
presently, he can’t stand!”
This gave them new hopes, and rendered Varney’s fate almost certain.
They renewed their exertions to overtake him, while he exerted himself
anew, and with surprising agility, considering how he had been employed
for more than two hours.
There were some trees and hedges now that opposed the progress of both
parties. The height of Sir Francis Varney gave him a great advantage,
and, had he been fresh, he might have shown it to advantage in vaulting
over the hedges and ditches, which he jumped when obliged, and walked
through when he could.
Every now and then, the party in pursuit, who had been behind him
some distance, now they gained on him; however, they kept, every now
and then, losing sight of him among the trees and shrubs, and he made
direct for a small wood, hoping that when there, he should to be able
to conceal himself for some time, so as to throw his pursuers off the
track.
They were well aware of this, for they increased their speed, and one
or two swifter of foot than the others, got a-head of them and cried
out aloud as they ran,—
“Keep up! keep up! he’s making for the wood.”
“He can’t stop there long; there are too many of us to beat that cover
without finding our game. Push, lads, he’s our own now, as sure as we
know he’s on a-head.”
They did push on, and came in full sight as they saw Sir Francis enter
the wood, with what speed he could make; but he was almost spent. This
was a cheering sight to them, and they were pretty certain he would not
leave the wood in the state he was then—he must seek concealment.
However, they were mistaken, for Sir Francis Varney, as soon as he got
into the wood, plunged into the thickest of it, and then paused to gain
breath.
“So far safe,” he muttered; “but I have had a narrow escape; they are
not yet done, though, and it will not be safe here long. I must away,
and seek shelter and safety elsewhere, if I can;—curses on the hounds
that run yelping over the fields!”
He heard the shouts of his pursuers, and prepared to quit the wood when
he thought the first had entered it.
“They will remain here some time in beating about,” he muttered; “that
is the only chance I have had since the pursuit; curse them! I say
again. I may now get free; this delay must save my life, but nothing
else will.”
He moved away, and, at a slow and lazy pace, left the wood, and then
made his way across some fields, towards some cottages, that lay on the
left.
The moon yet shone on the fields; he could hear the shouts of the mob,
as various parties went through the wood from one covert to another,
and yet unable to find him.
Then came a great shout upon his ears, as though they had found out he
had left the wood. This caused him to redouble his speed, and, fearful
lest he should be seen in the moonlight, he leaped over the first fence
that he came to, with almost the last effort he could make, and then
staggered in at an open door—through a passage—into a front parlour,
and there fell, faint, and utterly spent and speechless, at the feet of
Flora Bannerworth.
CHAPTER LXXXVIII.
THE RECEPTION OF THE VAMPYRE BY FLORA.—VARNEY SUBDUED.
We must say that the irruption into the house of the Bannerworths by
Sir Francis Varney, was certainly unpremeditated by him, for he knew
not into whose house he had thus suddenly rushed for refuge from the
numerous foes who were pursuing him with such vengeful ire. It was a
strange and singular incident, and one well calculated to cause the
mind to pause before it passed it by, and consider the means to an end
which are sometimes as wide of the mark, as it is in nature possible to
be.
But truth is stronger than fiction by far, and the end of it was, that,
pressed on all sides by danger, bleeding, faint, and exhausted, he
rushed into the first house he came to, and thus placed himself in the
very house of those whom he had brought to such a state of misfortune.
Flora Bannerworth was seated at some embroidery, to pass away an hour
or so, and thus get over the tedium of time; she was not thinking,
either, upon the unhappy past; some trifling object or other engaged
her attention. But what was her anguish when she saw a man staggering
into the room bleeding, and bearing the marks of a bloody contest, and
sinking at her feet.
Her astonishment was far greater yet, when she recognised that man to
be Sir Francis Varney.
“Save me!—save me! Miss Bannerworth, save me!—only you can save me from
the ruthless multitude which follows, crying aloud for my blood.”
As he spoke, he sank down speechless. Flora was so much amazed, not
to say terrified, that she knew not what to do. She saw Sir Francis a
suppliant at her feet, a fugitive from his enemies, who would show him
no mercy—she saw all this at a moment’s glance; and yet she had not
recovered her speech and presence of mind enough to enable her to make
any reply to him.
“Save me! Miss Flora Bannerworth, save me!” he again said, raising
himself on his hands. “I am beset, hunted like a wild beast—they
seek my life—they have pursued me from one spot to another, and I
have unwittingly intruded upon you. You will save me; I am sure your
kindness and goodness of heart will never permit me to be turned out
among such a crew of blood-thirsty butchers as those who pursue me are.”
[Illustration: Varney kneels at the feet of Flora Bannerworth after his
escape from the mob.]
“Rise, Sir Francis Varney,” said Flora, after a moment’s hesitation;
“in such an extremity as that which you are in, it would be inhuman
indeed to thrust you out among your enemies.”
“Oh! it would,” said Varney. “I had thought, until now, I could have
faced such a mob, until I was in this extremity; and then, disarmed
and thrown down, bruised, beaten, and incapable of stemming such a
torrent, I fled from one place to another, till hunted from each, and
then instinct alone urged me to greater exertion than before, and here
I am—this is now my last and only hope.”
“Rise, Sir Francis.”
“You will not let me be torn out and slaughtered like an ox. I am sure
you will not.”
“Sir Francis, we are incapable of such conduct; you have sought refuge
here, and shall find it as far as we are able to afford it to you.”
“And your brother—and——”
“Yes—yes—all who are here will do the same; but here they come to speak
for themselves.”
As she spoke, Mrs. Bannerworth entered, also Charles Holland, who both
started on seeing the vampyre present, Sir Francis Varney, who was too
weak to rise without assistance.
“Sir Francis Varney,” said Flora, speaking to them as they entered,
“has sought refuge here; his life is in peril, and he has no other hope
left; you will, I am sure, do what can be done for him.”
“Mr. Holland,” said Sir Francis, “I am, as you may see by my condition,
a fugitive, and have been beaten almost to death; instinct alone urged
me on to save my life, and I, unknowingly, came in here.”
“Rise, Sir Francis,” said Charles Holland; “I am not one who would feel
any pleasure in seeing you become the victim of any brutal mob. I am
sure there are none amongst us who would willingly do so. You have
trusted to those who will not betray you.”
“Thank you,” said Sir Francis, faintly. “I thank you; your conduct is
noble, and Miss Bannerworth’s especially so.”
“Are you much hurt, Sir Francis?” inquired Charles.
“I am much hurt, but not seriously or dangerously; but I am weak and
exhausted.”
“Let me assist you to rise,” said Charles Holland.
“Thank you,” said Sir Francis, as he accepted of the assistance, and
when he stood up, he found how incapable he really was, for a child
might have grappled with him.
“I have been sore beset, Mrs. Bannerworth,” he said, endeavouring to
bow to that lady; “and I have suffered much ill-usage. I am not in such
a plight as I could wish to be seen in by ladies; but my reasons for
coming will be an excuse for my appearance in such disorder.”
“We will not say anything about that,” said Charles Holland; “under the
circumstances, it could not be otherwise.”
“It could not,” said Sir Francis, as he took the chair Miss Flora
Bannerworth placed for him.
“I will not ask you for any explanation as to how this came about; but
you need some restorative and rest.”
“I think I suffer more from exhaustion than anything else. The bruises
I have, of course, are not dangerous.”
“Can you step aside a few moments?” said Mrs. Bannerworth. “I will show
you where you can remove some of those stains, and make yourself more
comfortable.”
“Thank you, madam—thank you. It will be most welcome to me, I assure
you.”
Sir Francis rose up, and, with the aid of Charles Holland, he walked to
the next room, where he washed himself, and arranged his dress as well
as it would admit of its being done.
“Mr. Holland,” he said, “I cannot tell you how grateful I feel for
this. I have been hunted from the house where you saw me. From what
source they learned my abode—my place of concealment—I know not; but
they found me out.”
“I need hardly say, Sir Francis, that it could not have occurred
through me,” said Charles Holland.
“My young friend,” said Sir Francis, “I am quite sure you were not;
and, moreover, I never, for one moment, suspected you. No, no; some
accidental circumstance alone has been the cause. I have been very
cautious—I may say extremely so—but at the same time, living, as I
have, surrounded by enemies on all sides, it is not to be wondered at
that I should be seen by some one, and thus traced to my lair, whither
they followed me at their leisure.”
“They have been but too troublesome in this matter. When they become a
little reasonable, it will be a great miracle; for, when their passions
and fears are excited, there is no end to the extremes they will
perpetrate.”
“It is so,” said Varney, “as the history of these last few days amply
testifies to me. I could never have credited the extent to which
popular excitement could be carried, and the results it was likely to
produce.”
“It is an engine of very difficult control,” pursued Charles Holland;
“but what will raise it will not allay it, but add fuel to the fire
that burns so fiercely already.”
“True enough,” said Sir Francis.
“If you have done, will you again step this way?”
Sir Francis Varney followed Charles Holland into the sitting-room, and
sat down with them, and before him was spread a light supper, with some
good wine.
“Eat, Sir Francis,” said Mrs. Bannerworth. “Such a state as that in
which you are, must, of necessity, produce great exhaustion, and you
must require food and drink.”
Sir Francis bowed as well as he was able, and even then, sore and
bruised as he was, fugitive as he had been, he could not forget his
courtesy; but it was not without an effort. His equanimity was,
however, much disturbed, by finding himself in the midst of the
Bannerworths.
“I owe you a relation,” he said, “of what occurred to drive me from my
place of concealment.”
“We should like to hear it, if you are not too far fatigued to relate
it,” said Charles.
“I will. I was sitting at the top of that house in which I sought to
hide myself, when I heard sounds come that were of a very suspicious
nature; but did not believe that it could happen that they had
discovered my lurking-place; far from it; though, of late, I had been
habitually cautious and suspicious, yet I thought I was safe, till
I heard the noise of a multitude coming towards me. I could not be
mistaken in it, for the sounds are so peculiar that they are like
nothing else. I heard them coming.
“I moved not; and when they surrounded the house as far as was
practicable, they gave an immense shout, and made the welkin ring with
the sound.”
“I heard a confused noise at a distance,” remarked Flora; “but I had no
idea that anything serious was contemplated. I imagined it was some
festival among some trade, or portion of the townspeople, who were
shouting from joy.”
“Oh, dear no,” said Sir Francis; “but I am not surprised at the
mistake, because there are such occurrences occasionally; but whenever
the mob gained any advantage upon me they shouted, and when I was able
to oppose them with effect, they groaned at me most horribly.”
“The deuce,” said Charles; “the sound, I suppose, serves to express
their feelings, and to encourage each other.”
“Something of the sort, I dare say,” said Varney; “but at length, after
defending the house with all the desperation that despair imparted to
me, I was compelled to fly from floor to floor, until I had reached the
roof; there they followed me, and I was compelled again to fly. House
after house they followed me to, until I could go no farther,” said
Varney.
“How did you escape?”
“Fortunately I saw some ivy growing and creeping over the
coping-stones, and by grasping that I got over the side, and so let
myself down by degrees, as well as I was able.”
“Good heavens! what a dreadful situation,” exclaimed Flora; “it is
really horrible!”
“I could not do it again, under, I think, any circumstances.”
“Not the same?” said Mrs. Bannerworth.
“I really doubt if I could,” said Varney. “The truth is, the excitement
of the moment was great, and I at that moment thought of nothing but
getting away.
“The same circumstances, the same fear of death, could hardly be
produced in me again, and I am unable to account for the phenomenon on
this occasion.”
“Your escape was very narrow indeed,” said Flora; “it makes me shudder
to think of the dangers you have gone through; it is really terrible to
think of it.”
“You,” said Sir Francis, “are young and susceptible, and generous in
your disposition, You can feel for me, and do; but how little I could
have expected it, it is impossible to say; but your sympathy sinks into
my mind and causes such emotions as never can be erased from my soul.
“But to proceed. You may guess how dreadful was my position, by the
fact that the first man who attempted to get over tore the ivy away and
fell, striking me in his fall; he was killed, and I thrown down and
stunned. I then made for the wood, closely pursued, and got into it;
then I baffled them; they searched the wood, and I went through it. I
then ran across the country to these houses here; I got over the fence,
and in at the back door.”
“Did they see you come?” inquired Charles Holland.
“I cannot say, but I think that they did not; I heard them give a loud
shout more than once when on this side of the wood.”
“You did? How far from here were you when you heard the shouts?”
inquired Mrs. Bannerworth.
“I was close here; and, as I jumped over the fence, I heard them shout
again; but I think they cannot see so far; the night was moonlight, to
be sure, but that is all; the shadow of the hedge, and the distance
together, would make it, if not impossible, at least very improbable.”
“That is very likely,” said Mrs. Bannerworth.
“In that case,” said Charles Holland, “you are safe here; for none will
suspect your being concealed here.”
“It is the last place I should myself have thought of,” said Varney;
“and I may say the last place I would knowingly have come to; but had
I before known enough of you, I should have been well assured of your
generosity, and have freely come to claim your aid and shelter, which
accident has so strangely brought me to be a candidate for, and which
you have so kindly awarded me.”
“The night is wearing away,” said Flora, “and Sir Francis is doubtless
fatigued to an excess; sleep, I dare say, will be most welcome to him.”
“It will indeed, Miss Bannerworth,” said Varney; “but I can do that
under any circumstances; do not let me put you to any inconvenience; a
chair, and at any hour, will serve me for sleep.”
“We cannot do for you what we would wish,” said Flora, looking at her
mother; “but something better than that, at all events, we can and will
provide for you.”
“I know not how to thank you,” said Sir Francis Varney; “I assure you,
of late I have not been luxuriously lodged, and the less trouble I give
you the greater I shall esteem the favour.”
The hour was late, and Sir Francis Varney, before another half hour
had elapsed, was consigned to his own reflections, in a small but neat
room, there to repose his bruised and battered carcass, and court the
refreshing influence of sleep.
His reflections were, for nearly an hour, of the most contradictory
character; some one passion was trying to overcome the other; but he
seemed quite subdued.
“I could not have expected this,” he muttered; “Flora Bannerworth has
the soul of a heroine. I deserved not such a reception from them; and
yet, in my hour of utmost need, they have received me like a favoured
friend; and yet all their misfortunes have taken their origin from me;
I am the cause of all.”
Filled with these thoughts, he fell asleep; he slept till morning
broke. He was not disturbed; it seemed as though the influence of sleep
was sweeter far there, in the cottage of the Bannerworths, than ever he
had before received.
It was late on that morning before Sir Francis rose, and then only
through hearing the family about, and, having performed his toilet,
so far as circumstances permitted, he descended, and entered the
front-parlour, the room he had been in the night before.
Flora Bannerworth was already there; indeed, breakfast was waiting the
appearance of Sir Francis Varney.
“Good morning, Miss Bannerworth,” said Sir Francis, bowing with his
usual dignified manner, but in the kindest and sincerest way he was
able to assume.
“Good morning, Sir Francis,” said Flora, rising to receive him; and she
could not avoid looking at him as he entered the room. “I hope you have
had a pleasant night?”
“It has been the best night’s rest I have had for some time, Miss
Bannerworth. I assure you I have to express my gratitude to you for so
much kindness. I have slept well, and soundly.”
“I am glad to hear it.”
“I think yet I shall escape the search of these people who have hunted
me from so many places.”
“I hope you may, indeed, Sir Francis.”
“You, Miss Bannerworth! and do you hope I may escape the vengeance of
these people—the populace?”
“I do, Sir Francis, most sincerely hope so. Why should I wish evil to
you, especially at their hands?”
Sir Francis did not speak for a minute or two, and then he said,
turning full upon Flora—
“I don’t know why, Miss Bannerworth, that I should think so, but
perhaps it is because there are peculiar circumstances connected with
myself, that have made me feel conscious that I have not deserved so
much goodness at your hands.”
“You have not deserved any evil. Sir Francis, we could not do that if
it were in our power; we would do you a service at any time.”
“You have done so, Miss Bannerworth—the greatest that can be performed.
You have saved my life.”
At that moment Charles Holland entered, and Sir Francis bowed, as he
said,—
“I hope you, Mr. Holland, have slept as well, and passed as good a
night as I have passed?”
“I am glad you, at least, have passed a quiet one,” said Charles
Holland; “you, I dare say, feel all the better for it? How do you feel
yourself? Are you much hurt?”
“Not at all, not at all,” said Sir Francis Varney. “Only a few bruises,
and so forth, some of which, as you may perceive, do not add to one’s
personal appearance. A week or two’s quiet would rid me of them. At all
events, I would it may do the same with my enemies.”
“I wish they were as easily gotten rid of myself,” said Charles; “but
as that cannot be, we must endeavour to baffle them in the best way we
may.”
“I owe a debt to you I shall never be able to repay; but where there
is a will, they say there is a way; and if the old saying be good for
anything, I need not despair, though the way is by no means apparent at
present.”
“Time is the magician,” said Flora, “whose wand changes all things—the
young to the aged, and the aged to nothing.”
“Certainly, that is true,” said Varney, “and many such changes have I
seen. My mind is stored with such events; but this is sadness, and I
have cause to rejoice.”
• • • • •
The breakfast was passed off in pleasing conversation, and Varney found
himself much at home with the Bannerworths, whose calm and even tenour
was quite new to him.
He could not but admit the charms of such a life as that led by the
Bannerworths; but what it must have been when they were supplied by
ample means, with nothing to prey upon their minds, and no fearful
mystery to hang on and weigh down their spirits, he could scarcely
imagine.
They were amiable, accomplished; they were in the same mind at all
times, and nothing seemed to ruffle them; and when night came, he
could not but acknowledge to himself that he had never formed half the
opinion of them they were deserving of.
Of course during that day he was compelled to lie close, so as not to
be seen by any one, save the family. He sat in a small room, which was
overlooked by no other in the neighbourhood, and he remained quiet,
sometimes conversing, and sometimes reading, but at the same time ever
attentive to the least sound that appeared at all of a character to
indicate the approach of persons for any purpose whatever.
At supper time he spoke to Flora and to Charles Holland, saying,—
“There are certain matters connected with myself—I may say with you
now—sure all that has happened will make it so—of which you would be
glad to hear some thing.”
“You mean upon the same subject upon which I had some conversation with
you a day or two back?”
“Yes, the same. Allow me one week, and you shall know all. I will then
relate to you that which you so much desire to know—one week, and all
shall be told.”
“Well,” said Charles Holland, “this has not been exacted from you as
the price of your safety, but you can choose your own time, of course;
what you promise is most desired, for it will render those happy who
now are much worse than they were before these occurrences took place.”
“I am aware of all that; grant me but one week, and then you shall be
made acquainted with all.”
“I am satisfied, Sir Francis,” said Flora; “but while here under our
roof, we should never have asked you a question.”
“Of this, Miss Bannerworth, the little I have seen of you assures me
you would not do so; however, I am the more inclined to make it—I am
under so deep an obligation to you all, that I can never repay it.”
• • • • •
Sir Francis Varney retired to rest that night—his promise to the
Bannerworths filled his mind with many reflections—the insecurity of
his own position, and the frail tenure which he even held in the hands
of those whom he had most injured.
This produced a series of reflections of a grave and melancholy nature,
and he sat by his window, watching the progress of the clouds, as they
appeared to chase each other over the face of the scene—now casting a
shade over the earth, and then banishing the shadows, and throwing a
gentle light over the earth’s surface, which was again chased away, and
shadows again fell upon the scene below.
How long he had sat there in melancholy musing he knew not; but
suddenly he was aroused from his dreams by a voice that shook the
skies, and caused him to start to his feet.
“Hurrah!—hurrah!—hurrah!” shouted the mob, which had silently collected
around the cottage of the Bannerworths.
“Curses!” muttered Sir Francis, as he again sank in his chair, and
struck his head with his hand. “I am hunted to death—they will not
leave me until my body has graced a cross-road.”
“Hurrah!—down with the vampyre—pull him out!”
Then came an instant knocking at the doors, and the people on the
outside made so great a din, that it seemed as though they contemplated
knocking the house down at once, without warning the inmates that they
waited there.
There was a cessation for about a minute, when one of the family
hastened to the door, and inquired what was wanted.
“Varney, the vampyre,” was the reply.
“You must seek him elsewhere.”
“We will search this place before we go further,” replied a man.
“But he is not here.”
“We have reason to believe otherwise. Open the door, and let us in—no
one shall be hurt, or one single object in the house; but we must come
in, and search for the vampyre.”
“Come to-morrow, then.”
“That will not do,” said the voice; “open, or we force our way in
without more notice.”
At the same a tremendous blow was bestowed upon the door, and then much
force was used to thrust it in. A consultation was suddenly held among
the inmates, as to what was to be done, but no one could advise, and
each was well aware of the utter impossibility of keeping the mob out.
“I do not see what is to become of me,” said Sir Francis Varney,
suddenly appearing before them. “You must let them in; there is no
chance of keeping them off, neither can you conceal me. You will have
no place, save one, that will be sacred from their profanation.”
“And which is that?”
“Flora’s own room.”
All started at the thought that Flora’s chamber could in any way be
profaned by any such presence as Sir Francis Varney’s.
However, the doors below were suddenly burst open, amid loud cries from
the populace, who rushed in in great numbers, and began to search the
lower rooms, immediately.
“All is lost!” said Sir Francis Varney, as he dashed away and rushed to
the chamber of Flora, who, alarmed at the sounds that were now filling
the house, stood listening to them.
“Miss Bannerworth—” began Varney.
“Sir Francis!”
“Yes, it is indeed I, Miss Bannerworth; hear me, for one moment.”
“What is the matter?”
“I am again in peril—in more imminent peril than before; my life is
not worth a minute’s purchase, unless you save me. You, and you alone,
can now save me. Oh! Miss Bannerworth, if ever pity touched your
heart, save me from those only whom I now fear. I could meet death in
any shape but that in which they will inflict it upon me. Hear their
execrations below!”
“Death to the vampyre! death to Varney! burn him! run a stake through
his body!”
“What can I do, Sir Francis?”
“Admit me to your chamber.”
“Sir Francis, are you aware of what you are saying?”
“I am well. It is a request which you would justly scorn to reply
to; but now my life—recollect you have saved me once—my life;—do not
now throw away the boon you have so kindly bestowed. Save me, Miss
Bannerworth.”
“It is not possible. I—”
“Nay, Miss Bannerworth, do you imagine this is a time for ceremony,
or the observances of polished life? On my honour, you run no risk of
censure.”
“Where is Varney? Where is the vampyre? He ain’t far off.”
“Hear—hear them, Miss Bannerworth. They are now at the foot of the
stairs. Not a moment to lose. One minute more, and I am in the hands of
a crew that has no mercy.”
“Hurrah! upstairs! He’s not below. Upstairs, neighbours, we shall have
him yet!”
These words sounded on the stairs; half-a-dozen more steps, and Varney
would be seen. It was a miracle he was not heard begging for his life.
Varney cast a look of despair at the stairhead and felt for his sword,
but it was not there, he had lost it. He struck his head with his
clenched hand, and was about to rush upon his foes, when he heard the
lock turn; he looked, and saw the door opened gently, and Flora stood
there; he passed in, and sank cowering into a chair, at the other end
of the room, behind some curtains.
The door was scarcely shut ere some tried to force it, and then a loud
knocking came at the door.
“Open! open! we want Varney, the vampyre. Open! or we will burst it
open.”
Flora did open it, but stood resolutely in the opening, and held up her
hand to impose silence.
[Illustration: Flora confronts the mob in search of Varney.]
“Are you men, that you can come thus to force yourselves upon the
privacy of a female? Is there nothing in the town or house, that you
must intrude in numbers into a private apartment? Is no place sacred
from you?”
“But, ma’am—miss—we only want Varney, the vampyre.”
“And can you find him nowhere but in a female’s bedroom? Shame on you!
shame on you! Have you no sisters, wives, or mothers, that you act
thus?”
“He’s not there, you may be sure of that, Jack,” said a gruff voice.
“Let the lady be in quiet; she’s had quite enough trouble with him to
sicken her of a vampyre. You may be sure that’s the last place to find
him in.”
With this they all turned away, and Flora shut the door and locked it
upon them, and Varney was safe.
“You have saved me,” said Varney.
“Hush!” said Flora. “Speak not; there may be some one listening.”
Sir Francis Varney stood in the attitude of one listening most
anxiously to catch some sounds; the moon fell across his face, and gave
it a ghastly hue, that, added to his natural paleness and wounds, gave
him an almost unearthly aspect.
The sounds grew more and more distant; the shouts and noise of men
traversing the apartments subsided, and gradually the place became
restored to its original silence. The mob, after having searched every
other part of the house, and not finding the object of their search,
they concluded that he was not there, but must have made his escape
before.
• • • • •
This most desperate peril of Sir Francis Varney seemed to have more
effect upon him than anything that had occurred during his most strange
and most eventful career.
When he was assured that the riotous mob that had been so intent upon
his destruction was gone, and that he might emerge from his place of
concealment, he did so with an appearance of such utter exhaustion that
the Bannerworth family could not but look upon him as a being who was
near his end.
At any time his countenance, as we long have had occasion to remark,
was a strange and unearthly looking one; but when we come to superadd
to the strangeness of his ordinary appearance the traces of deep mental
emotion, we may well say that Varney’s appearance was positively of the
most alarming character.
When he was seated in the ordinary sitting apartment of the
Bannerworths, he drew a long sighing breath, and placing his hand upon
his heart, he said, in a faint tone of voice,—
“It beats now laboriously, but it will soon cease its pulsations for
ever.”
These words sounded absolutely prophetic, there was about them such a
solemn aspect, and he looked at the same time that he uttered them so
much like one whose mortal race was run, and who was now a candidate
for the grave.
“Do not speak so despairingly,” said Charles Holland; “remember, that
if your life has been one of errors hitherto, how short a space of time
may suffice to redeem some of them at least, and the communication to
me which you have not yet completed may to some extent have such an
effect.”
“No, no. It may contribute to an act of justice, but it can do no good
to me. And yet do not suppose that because such is my impression that I
mean to hesitate in finishing to you that communication.”
“I rejoice to hear you say so, and if you would, now that you must
be aware of what good feelings towards you we are all animated with,
remove the bar of secrecy from the communication, I should esteem it a
great favour.”
Varney appeared to be considering for a few moments, and then he said,—
“Well, well. Let the secrecy no longer exist. Have it removed at once.
I will no longer seek to maintain it. Tell all, Charles Holland—tell
all.”
Thus empowered by the mysterious being, Charles Holland related briefly
what Varney had already told him, and then concluded by saying,—
“That is all that I have myself as yet been made aware of, and I now
call upon Sir Francis Varney to finish his narration.”
“I am weak,” said Varney, “and scarcely equal to the task; but yet I
will not shrink from the promise that I have made. You have been the
preservers of my life, and more particularly to you, Flora Bannerworth,
am I indebted for a continued existence, which otherwise must have
been sacrificed upon the altar of superstition.”
“But you will recollect, Master Varney,” said the admiral, who had
sat looking on for some time in silent wonder, “you must recollect,
Master Varney, that the people are, after all, not so much to blame for
their superstition, because, whether you are a vampyre or not, and I
don’t pretend to come to a positive opinion now, you took good care to
persuade them you were.”
“I did,” said Varney, with a shudder; “but why did I?”
“Well, you know best.”
“It was, then, because I did believe, and do believe, that there is
something more than natural about my strangely protracted existence;
but we will waive that point, and, before my failing strength, for it
appears to me to be failing, completely prevents me from doing so, let
me relate to you the continued particulars of the circumstances that
made me what I am.”
Flora Bannerworth, although she had heard before from the lips of
Charles Holland the to her dreadful fact, that her father, in addition
to having laid violent hands upon his own life, was a murderer, now
that that fearful circumstance was related more publicly, felt a
greater pang than she had done when it was whispered to her in the
accents of pure affection, and softened down by a gentleness of tone,
which Charles Holland’s natural delicacy would not allow him to use
even to her whom he loved so well in the presence of others.
She let her beautiful face be hidden by her hands, and she wept as she
listened to the sad detail.
Varney looked inquiringly in the countenance of Charles Holland,
because, having given him leave to make Flora acquainted with the
circumstance, he was rather surprised at the amount of emotion which it
produced in her.
Charles Holland answered the appealing look by saying,—
“Flora is already aware of the facts, but it naturally affects her much
to hear them now repeated in the presence of others, and those too,
towards whom she cannot feel——”
What Charles Holland was going to say was abruptly stopped short by the
admiral, who interposed, exclaiming,—
“Why, what do you mean, you son of a sea cook? The presence of who do
you mean? Do you mean to say that I don’t feel for Miss Flora, bless
her heart! quite as much as a white-faced looking swab like you? Why, I
shall begin to think you are only fit for a marine.”
“Nay, uncle, now do not put yourself out of temper. You must be well
aware that I could not mean anything disrespectful to you. You should
not suppose such a state of things possible; and although, perhaps, I
did not express myself so felicitously as I might, yet what I intended
to say, was——”
“Oh, bother what you intended to say. You go on, Mr. Vampyre, with your
story. I want to know what became of it all; just you get on as quick
as you can, and let us know what you did after the man was murdered.”
“When the dreadful deed was committed,” said Varney, “and our victim
lay weltering in his blood, and had breathed his last, we stood like
men who for the first time were awakened to the frightful consequences
of what they had done.
“I saw by the dim light that hovered round us a great change come over
the countenance of Marmaduke Bannerworth, and he shook in every limb.
“This soon passed away, however, and the powerful and urgent necessity
which arose of avoiding the consequences of the deed that we had
done, restored us to ourselves. We stooped and took from the body the
ill-gotten gains of the gambler. They amounted to an immense sum, and I
said to Marmaduke Bannerworth,—
“‘Take you the whole of this money and proceed to your own home with
it, where you will be least suspected. Hide it in some place of great
secrecy, and to-morrow I will call upon you, when we will divide it,
and will consider of some means of safely exchanging the notes for
gold.’
“He agreed to this, and placed the money in his pocket, after which
it became necessary that we should dispose of the body, which, if
we did not quickly remove, must in a few hours be discovered, and
so, perchance, accompanied by other criminating circumstances,
become a frightful evidence against us, and entail upon us all those
consequences of the deed which we were so truly anxious to escape from.
“It is ever the worst part of the murderer’s task, that after he has
struck the blow that has deprived his victim of existence, it becomes
his frightful duty to secrete the corpse, which, with its dead eyes,
ever seems to be glaring upon him such a world of reproach.
“That it is which should make people pause ere they dipped their
hands in the blood of others, and that it is which becomes the first
retribution that the murderer has to endure for the deep crime that he
has committed.
“We tore two stakes from a hedge, and with their assistance we
contrived to dig a very superficial hole, such a hole as was only
sufficient, by placing a thin coating of earth over it, to conceal the
body of the murdered man.
“And then came the loathsome task of dragging him into it—a task full
of horror, and from which we shrunk aghast; but it had to be done, and,
therefore, we stooped, and grasping the clothes as best we might, we
dragged the body into the chasm we had prepared for its reception. Glad
were we then to be enabled to throw the earth upon it and to stamp upon
it with such vehemence as might well be supposed to actuate men deeply
anxious to put out of sight some dangerous and loathsome object.
[Illustration: Burying the murdered gambler.]
“When we had completed this, and likewise gathered handsfull of dust
from the road, and dry leaves, and such other matter, to sprinkle upon
the grave, so as to give the earth an appearance of not having been
disturbed, we looked at each other and breathed from our toil.
“Then, and not till then, was it that we remembered that among other
things which the gambler had won of Marmaduke were the deeds belonging
to the Dearbrook property.”
“The Dearbrook property!” exclaimed Henry Bannerworth; “I know that
there was a small estate going by that name, which belonged to our
family, but I always understood that long ago my father had parted with
it.”
“Yes; it was mortgaged for a small sum—a sum not a fourth part of its
value—and it had been redeemed by Marmaduke Bannerworth, not for the
purpose of keeping it, but in order that he might sell it outright, and
so partially remedy his exhausted finances.”
“I was not aware of that,” returned Henry.
“Doubtless you were not, for of late—I mean for the twelve months or
so preceding your father’s death—you know he was much estranged from
all the family, so that you none of you knew much of what he was doing,
except that he was carrying on a very wild and reckless career, such
as was sure to end in dishonour and poverty; but I tell you he had the
title deeds of the Dearbrook property, and that they were only got
from him, along with everything else of value that he possessed, at
the gaming table, by the man who paid such a fearful penalty for his
success.
“It was not until after the body was completely buried, and we had
completed all our precautions for more effectually hiding it from
observation, that we recollected the fact of those important papers
being in his possession. It was Marmaduke Bannerworth who first
remembered it, and he exclaimed,—
“‘By Heaven, we have buried the title deeds of the property, and we
shall have again to exhume the corpse for the purpose of procuring
them.’
“Now those deeds were nothing to me, and repugnant as I had felt from
the first to having anything whatever to do with the dead body, it was
not likely that I would again drag it from the earth for such an object.
“‘Marmaduke Bannerworth,’ I said, ‘you can do what you please, and
take the consequences of what you do, but I will not again, if I can
help it, look upon the face of that corpse. It is too fearful a sight
to contemplate again. You have a large sum of money, and what need you
care now for the title deeds of a property comparatively insignificant?’
“‘Well, well,’ he said, ‘I will not, at the present time, disturb the
remains; I will wait to see if anything should arise from the fact of
the murder; if it should turn out that no suspicion of any kind is
excited, but that all is still and quiet, I can then take measures
to exhume the corpse, and recover those papers, which certainly are
important.’
“By this time the morning was creeping on apace, and we thought it
prudent to leave the spot. We stood at the end of the lane for a few
moments conversing, and those moments were the last in which I ever saw
Marmaduke Bannerworth.”
“Answer me a question,” said Henry.
“I will; ask me what you please, I will answer it.”
“Was it you that called at Bannerworth Hall, after my father’s
melancholy death, and inquired for him?”
“I did; and when I heard of the deed that he had done, I at once
left, in order to hold counsel with myself as to what I should do to
obtain at least a portion of the property, one-half of which, it was
understood, was to have been mine. I heard what had been the last
words used by Marmaduke Bannerworth on the occasion of his death, and
they were amply sufficient to let me know what had been done with the
money—at all events, so far as regards the bestowal of it in some
secret place; and from that moment the idea of, by some means or
another, getting the exclusive possession of it, never forsook my mind.
“I thought over the matter by day and, by night; and with the
exception of having a knowledge of the actual hiding-place of the
money, I could see, in the clearest possible manner, how the whole
affair had been transacted. There can be no doubt but that Marmaduke
Bannerworth had reached home safely with the large sum of which he had
become possessed, and that he had hidden it securely, which was but
an ordinary measure of precaution, when we come to consider how the
property had been obtained.
“Then I suspect that, being alone, and left to the gloom of his own
miserable thoughts, they reverted so painfully to the past that he was
compelled to drink deeply for the purpose of drowning reflection.
“The natural consequence of this, in his state, was, that partial
insanity supervened, and at a moment when frenzy rose far above
reflection, he must have committed the dreadful act which hurried him
instantaneously to eternity.”
“Yes,” said Henry; “it must have been so; you have guessed truly. He
did on that occasion drink an immense quantity of wine; but instead
of stilling the pangs of remorse it must have increased them, and
placed him in such a frenzied condition of intellect, that he found it
impossible to withstand the impulse of it, unless by the terrific act
which ended his existence.”
“Yes, and which at once crushed all my expectations of the large
fortune which was to have been mine; for even the one-half of the
sum which had been taken from the gamester’s pocket would have been
sufficient to have enabled me to live for the future in affluence.
“I became perfectly maddened at the idea that so large a sum had passed
out of my hands. I constantly hovered about Bannerworth Hall, hoping
and expecting that something might arise which would enable me to get
admittance to it, and make an active search through its recesses for
the hidden treasure.
“All my exertions were in vain. I could hit upon no scheme whatever;
and at length, wearied and exhausted, I was compelled to proceed
to London for the sake of a subsistence. It is only in that great
metropolis that such persons as myself, destitute of real resources,
but infinitely reckless as regards the means by which they acquire a
subsistence, can hope to do so. Once again, therefore, I plunged into
the vortex of London life, and proceeded, heedless of the criminality
of what I was about, to cater for myself by robbery, or, indeed,
in any manner which presented a prospect of success. It was during
this career of mine, that I became associated with some of the most
desperate characters of the time; and the offences we committed were of
that daring character that it could not be wondered at eventually so
formidable a gang of desperadoes must be by force broken up.
“It so occurred, but unknown to us, that the police resolved upon
making one of the most vigorous efforts to put an end to the affair,
and in consequence a watch was set upon every one of our movements.
“The result of this was, as might have been expected, our complete
dispersion, and the arrest of some our members, and among them myself.
“I knew my fate almost from the first. Our depredations had created
such a sensation, that the legislature, even, had made it a matter
of importance that we should be suppressed, and it was an understood
thing among the judges, that the severest penalties of the law should
be inflicted upon any one of the gang who might be apprehended and
convicted.
“My trial scarcely occupied an hour, and then I was convicted and
sentenced to execution, with an intimation from the judge that it would
be perfectly absurd of me to dream, for one moment, of a remission of
that sentence.
“In this state of affairs, and seeing nothing but death before me, I
gave myself up to despair, and narrowly missed cheating the hangman of
his victim.
“More dead than alive, I was, however, dragged out to be judicially
murdered, and I shall never forget the crowd of frightful sensations
that came across my mind upon that terrific occasion.
“It seemed as if my fate had then reached its climax, and I have really
but a dim recollection of the terrible scene.
“I remember something of the confused murmur arising from an immense
throng of persons. I remember looking about me, and seeing nothing but
what appeared to me an immense sea of human heads, and then suddenly I
heard a loud roar of execration burst from the multitude.
“I shrunk back terrified, and it did, indeed, seem to me a brutal thing
thus to roar and shout at a man who was brought out to die. I soon,
however, found that the mob who came to see such a spectacle was not so
debased as I imagined, but that it was at the hangman, who had suddenly
made his appearance on the scaffold, at whom they raised that fearful
yell.
“Some one—I think it was one of the sheriffs—must have noticed that
I was labouring under the impression that the cry from the mob was
levelled at me, for he spoke, saying,—
“‘It is at the hangman they shout,’ and he indicated with his finger
that public functionary. In my mind’s eye I think I see him now, and
I am certain that I shall never forget the expression of his face. It
was perfectly fearful; and afterwards, when I learned who and what he
was, I was not surprised that he should feel so acutely the painfully
degrading office which he had to perform.
“The fatal rope was in a few minutes adjusted to my neck. I felt its
pressure, and I heard the confused sounds of the monotonous voice of
the clergyman, as he muttered some prayers, that I must confess sounded
to me at the time like a mockery of human suffering.
“Then suddenly there was a loud shout—I felt the platform give way
beneath my feet—I tried to utter a yell of agony, but could not—it
seemed to me as if I was encompassed by fire, and then sensation left
me, and I knew no more.
• • • • •
“The next feelings of existence that came over me consisted in a
frightful tingling sensation throughout my veins, and I felt myself
making vain efforts to scream. All the sensations of a person suffering
from a severe attack of night-mare came across me, and I was in such
an agony, that I inwardly prayed for death to release me from such a
cruel state of suffering. Then suddenly the power to utter a sound came
to me, and I made use of it well, for the piercing shriek I uttered,
must have struck terror into the hearts of all who heard it, since it
appalled even myself.
“Then I suppose I must have fainted, but when I recovered consciousness
again, I found myself upon a couch, and a man presenting some stimulus
to me in a cup. I could not distinguish objects distinctly, but I heard
him say, ‘Drink, and you will be better.’
“I did drink, for a raging thirst consumed me, and then I fell into a
sound sleep, which, I was afterwards told, lasted nearly twenty-four
hours, and when I recovered from that, I heard again the same voice
that had before spoken to me, asking me how I was.
“I turned in the direction of the sound, and, as my vision was now
clearer, I could see that it was the hangman, whose face had made upon
the scaffold such an impression upon me—an impression which I then
considered my last in this world, but which turned out not to be such
by many a mingled one of pain and pleasure since.
“It was some time before I could speak, and when I did, it was only in
a few muttered words, to ask what had happened, and where I was.
“‘Do you not remember,’ he said, ‘that you were hanged?’
“‘I do—I do,’ was my reply. ‘Is this the region of damned souls?’
“‘No; you are still in this world, however strange you may think it.
Listen to me, and I will briefly tell you how it is that you have come
back again, as it were, from the very grave, to live and walk about
among the living.’
“I listened to him with a strange and rapt attention, and then he told
how a young and enthusiastic medical man had been anxious to try some
experiments with regard to the restoration of persons apparently dead,
and he proceeded to relate how it was that he had given ear to the
solicitations of the man, and had consented to bring my body after it
was hung for him to experiment upon. He related how the doctor had been
successful, but how he was so terrified at his own success, that he
hastily fled, and had left London, no one knowing whither he had gone.
“I listened to this with the most profound attention, and then he
concluded, by saying to me,—
“‘There can be no doubt but my duty requires of me to give you up again
to the offended laws of your country. I will not, however, do that, if
you will consent to an arrangement that I shall propose to you.’
“I asked him what the arrangement was, and he said that if I would
solemnly bind myself to pay to him a certain sum per annum, he would
keep my secret, and forsaking his calling as hangman, endeavour to
do something that should bring with it pleasanter results. I did so
solemnly promise him, and I have kept my word. By one means or another
I have succeeded in procuring the required amount, and now he is no
more.”
“I believe,” cried Henry, “that he has fallen a victim to the blind
fury of the populace.”
“You are right, he has so, and accordingly I am relieved from the
burden of those payments; but it matters little, for now I am so near
the tomb myself, that, together with all my obligations, I shall soon
be beyond the reach of mortal cavilling.”
“You need not think so, Varney; you must remember that you are at
present suffering from circumstances, the pressure of which will soon
pass away, and then you will resume your wonted habits.”
“What did you do next?” said the admiral. “Let’s know all while you are
about it.”
“I remained at the hangman’s house for some time, until all fear of
discovery was over, and then he removed me to a place of greater
security, providing me from his own resources with the means of
existence, until I had fully recovered my health, and then he told me
to shift for myself.
“During my confinement though, I had not been idle mentally, for I
concocted a plan, by which I should be enabled not only to live well
myself, but to pay to the hangman, whose name was Mortimore, the annual
sum I had agreed upon. I need not go into the details of this plan. Of
course it was neither an honest nor respectable one, but it succeeded,
and I soon found myself in a position to enable me thereby to keep my
engagement, as well as to supply me with means of plotting and planning
for my future fortunes.
“I had never for a moment forgotten that so large a sum of money was
somewhere concealed about Bannerworth Hall, and I still looked forward
to obtaining it by some means or another.
“It was in this juncture of affairs, that one night I was riding on
horseback through a desolate part of England. The moon was shining
sweetly, as I came to a broad stream of water, across which, about a
mile further on, I saw that there was a bridge, but being unwilling to
waste time by riding up to it, and fancying, by the lazy ripple of the
waters, that the river was not shallow, I plunged my horse boldly into
the stream.
“When we reached its centre, some sudden indisposition must have seized
the horse, for instead of swimming on well and gallantly as it had done
before, it paused for a moment, and then plunged headlong into the
torrent.
“I could not swim, and so, for a second time, death, with all its
terrors, appeared to be taking possession of me. The waters rolled over
my head, gurgling and hissing in my ears, and then all was past. I know
no more, until I found myself lying upon a bright green meadow, and the
full beams of the moon shining upon me.
“I was giddy and sick, but I rose, and walked slowly away, each
moment gathering fresh strength, and from that time to this, I never
discovered how I came to be rescued from the water, and lying upon that
green bank. It has ever been a mystery to me, and I expect it ever will.
“Then from that moment the idea that I had a sort of charmed life came
across me, and I walked about with an impression that such was the
case, until I came across a man who said that he was a Hungarian, and
who was full of strange stories of vampyres. Among other things, he
told me that a vampyre could not be drowned, for that the waters would
cast him upon its banks, and, if the moonbeams fell upon him, he would
be restored to life.
“This was precisely my story, and from that moment I believed myself
to be one of those horrible, but charmed beings, doomed to such a
protracted existence. The notion grew upon me day by day, and hour
by hour, until it became quite a fixed and strong belief, and I
was deceiving no one when I played the horrible part that has been
attributed to me.”
“But you don’t mean to say that you believe you are a vampyre now?”
said the admiral.
“I say nothing, and know not what to think. I am a desperate man, and
what there is at all human in me, strange to say, all of you whom I
sought to injure, have awakened.”
“Heed not that,” said Henry, “but continue your narrative. We have
forgiven everything, and that ought to suffice to quiet your mind upon
such a subject.”
“I will continue; and, believe me, I will conceal nothing from you.
I look upon the words I am now uttering as a full, candid, and free
confession; and, therefore, it shall be complete.
“The idea struck me that if, by taking advantage of my supposed
preternatural gifts, I could drive you from Bannerworth Hall, I should
have it to myself to hunt through at my leisure, and possibly find the
treasure. I had heard from Marmaduke Bannerworth some slight allusion
to concealing the money behind a picture that was in a bed-room called
the panelled chamber. By inquiry, I ascertained that in that bed-room
slept Flora Bannerworth.
“I had resolved, however, at first to try pacific measures, and
accordingly, as you are well aware, I made various proposals to you to
purchase or to rent Bannerworth Hall, the whole of which you rejected;
so that I found myself compelled to adopt the original means that had
suggested themselves to me, and endeavour to terrify you from the house.
“By prowling about, I made myself familiar with the grounds, and with
all the plan of the residence, and then one night made my appearance in
Flora’s chamber by the window.”
“But how do you account,” said Charles Holland, “for your extraordinary
likeness to the portrait?”
“It is partly natural, for I belong to a collateral branch of the
family; and it was previously arranged. I had seen the portrait in
Marmaduke Bannerworth’s time, and I knew some of its peculiarities and
dress sufficiently well to imitate them. I calculated upon producing a
much greater effect by such an imitation; and it appears that I was not
wrong, for I did produce it to the full.”
“You did, indeed,” said Henry; “and if you did not bring conviction
to our minds that you were what you represented yourself to be, you
at least staggered our judgments upon the occasion, and left us in a
position of great doubt and difficulty.”
“I did; I did all that, I know I did; and, by pursuing that line of
conduct, I, at last, I presume, entirely forced you from the house.”
“That you did.”
“Flora fainted when I entered her chamber; and the moment I looked
upon her sweet countenance my heart smote me for what I was about; but
I solemnly aver, that my lips never touched her, and that, beyond the
fright, she suffered nothing from Varney, the vampyre.”
“And have you succeeded,” said Henry, “in your object now?”
“No; the treasure has yet to be found. Mortimore, the hangman, followed
me into the house, guessing my intention, and indulging a hope that
he would succeed in sharing with me its proceeds. But he, as well as
myself, was foiled, and nothing came of the toilsome and anxious search
but disappointment and bitterness.”
“Then it is supposed that the money is still concealed?”
“I hope so; I hope, as well, that it will be discovered by you and
yours; for surely none can have a better right to it than you, who have
suffered so much on its account.”
“And yet,” remarked Henry, “I cannot help thinking it is too securely
hidden from us. The picture has been repeatedly removed from its place,
and produced no results; so that I fear we have little to expect from
any further or more protracted research.”
“I think,” said Varney, “that you have everything to expect. The words
of the dying Marmaduke Bannerworth, you may depend, were not spoken in
vain; and I have every reason to believe that, sooner or later, you
must, without question, become the possessors of that sum.”
“But ought we rightly to hold it?”
“Who ought more rightly to hold it?” said Varney; “answer me that.”
“That’s a sensible enough idea of your’s,” said the admiral; “and
if you were twice over a vampyre, I would tell you so. It’s a very
sensible idea; I should like to know who has more right to it than
those who have had such a world of trouble about it.”
“Well, well,” said Henry, “we must not dispute, as yet, about a sum
of money that may really never come to hand. For my own part, I have
little to hope for in the matter; but, certainly, nothing shall be
spared, on my part, to effect such a thorough search of the Hall as
shall certainly bring it to light, if it be in existence.”
“I presume, Sir Francis Varney,” said Charles Holland, “that you have
now completed your narrative?”
“I have. After events are well known to you. And, now, I have but to
lie down and die, with the hope of finding that rest and consolation in
the tomb which has been denied me hitherto in this world. My life has
been a stormy one, and full of the results of angry passions. I do hope
now, that, for the short time I have to live, I shall know something
like serenity, and die in peace.”
“You may depend, Varney, that, as long as you have an asylum with
us,” said the admiral—“and that you may have as long as you like,—you
may be at peace. I consider that you have surrendered at discretion,
and, under such circumstances, an enemy always deserves honourable
treatment, and always gets it on board such a ship as this.”
“There you go again,” said Jack, “calling the house a ship.”
“What’s that to you, if I were to call it a bowsprit? Ain’t I your
captain, you lubber, and so, sure to be right, while you are wrong, in
the natural order of things? But you go and lay down, Master Varney,
and rest yourself, for you seem completely done up.”
Varney did look fearfully exhausted; and, with the assistance of Henry
and Charles, he went into another apartment, and laid down upon a
couch, showing great symptoms of debility and want of power.
And now it was a calm; Varney’s stay at the cottage of the Bannerworths
was productive of a different mood of mind than ever he had possessed
before. He looked upon them in a very different manner to what he had
been used to. He had, moreover, considerably altered prospects; there
could not be the same hopes and expectations that he once had. He was
an altered man. He saw in the Bannerworths those who had saved his
life, and who, without doubt, had possessed an opinion, not merely
obnoxious to him, but must have had some fearful misgivings concerning
his character, and that, too, of a nature that usually shuts out all
hope of being received into any family.
But, in the hour of his need, when his life was in danger, no one
else would have done what they had done for him, especially when so
relatively placed.
Moreover, he had been concealed, when to do so was both dangerous and
difficult; and then it was done by Flora Bannerworth herself.
Time flew by. The mode of passing time at the cottage was calm and
serene. Varney had seldom witnessed anything like it; but, at the
same time, he felt more at ease than ever he had; he was charmed
with the society of Flora—in fact, with the whole of the little knot
of individuals who there collected together; from what he saw he was
gratified in their society; and it seemed to alleviate his mental
disquiet, and the sense he must feel of his own peculiar position.
But Varney became ill. The state of mind and body he had been in for
some time past might be the cause of it. He had been much harassed,
and hunted from place to place. There was not a moment in which his
life was not in danger, and he had, moreover, in more than one case,
received some bodily injuries, bruises, and contusions of a desperate
character; and yet he would take no notice of them, but allow them to
get well again, as best they could.
His escapes and injuries had made a deep impression upon his mind, and
had no doubt a corresponding effect upon his body, and Varney became
very ill.
Flora Bannerworth did all that could be done for one in his painful
position, and this greatly added to the depth of thought that
occasionally beset him, and he could scarcely draw one limb after the
other.
He walked from room to room in the twilight, at which time he had more
liberty permitted him than at any other, because there was not the same
danger in his doing so; for, if once seen, there could be no manner of
doubt but he would have been pursued until he was destroyed, when no
other means of escape were at hand; and Varney himself felt that there
could be no chance of his again escaping from them, for his physical
powers were fast decaying; he was not, in fact, the same man.
He came out into the parlour from the room in which he had been seated
during the day. Flora and her mother were there, while Charles Holland
and Henry Bannerworth had both at that moment entered the apartment.
“Good evening, Miss Bannerworth,” said Sir Francis, bowing to her, and
then to her mother, Mrs. Bannerworth; “and you, Mr. Holland, I see,
have been out enjoying the free breeze that plays over the hot fields.
It must be refreshing.”
“It is so, sir,” said Charles. “I wish we could make you a partaker in
our walks.”
“I wish you could with all my heart,” said Varney.
“Sir Francis,” said Flora, “must be a prisoner for some short time
longer yet.”
“I ought not to consider it in any such light. It is not imprisonment.
I have taken sanctuary. It is the well spring of life to me,” said
Varney.
“I hope it may prove so; but how do you find yourself this evening, Sir
Francis Varney?”
“Really, it is difficult to say—I fluctuate. At times, I feel as though
I should drop insensible on the earth, and then I feel better than I
have done for some time previously.”
“Doctor Chillingworth will be here by-and-by, no doubt; and he must see
what he can do for you to relieve you of these symptoms,” said Flora.
“I am much beholden to you—much beholden to you; but I hope to be able
to do without the good doctor’s aid in this instance, though I must
admit I may appear ungrateful.”
“Not at all—not at all.”
“Have you heard any news abroad to-day?” inquired Varney.
“None, Sir Francis—none; there is nothing apparently stirring; and now,
go out when you would, you would find nothing but what was old, quiet,
and familiar.”
“We cannot wish to look upon anything with more charms for a mind at
ease, than we can see under such circumstances; but I fear there are
some few old and familiar features that I should find sad havoc in.”
“You would, certainly, for the burnings and razings to the ground of
some places, have made some dismal appearances; but time may efface
that, and then the evil may die away, and the future will become the
present, should we be able to allay popular feeling.”
“Yes,” said Sir Francis; “but popular prejudices, or justice, or
feeling, are things not easily assuaged. The people when once aroused
go on to commit all kinds of excess, and there is no one point at which
they will stop short of the complete extirpation of some one object or
other that they have taken a fancy to hunt.”
“The hubbub and excitement must subside.”
“The greater the ignorance the more persevering and the more brutal
they are,” said Sir Francis; “but I must not complain of what is the
necessary consequence of their state.”
“It might be otherwise.”
“So it might, and no mischief arise either; but as we cannot divert the
stream, we may as well bend to the force of a current too strong to
resist.”
“The moon is up,” said Flora, who wished to turn the conversation from
that to another topic. “I see it yonder through the trees; it rises red
and large—it is very beautiful—and yet there is not a cloud about to
give it the colour and appearance it now wears.”
“Exactly so,” said Sir Francis Varney; “but the reason is the air
is filled with a light, invisible vapour, that has the effect you
perceive. There has been much evaporation going on, and now it shows
itself in giving the moon that peculiar large appearance and deep
colour.”
“Ay, I see; it peeps through the trees, the branches of which cut it up
into various portions. It is singular, and yet beautiful, and yet the
earth below seems dark.”
“It is dark; you would be surprised to find it so if you walked about.
It will soon be lighter than it is at this present moment.”
“What sounds are those?” inquired Sir Francis Varney, as he listened
attentively.
“Sounds! What sounds?” returned Henry.
“The sounds of wheels and horses’ feet,” said Varney.
“I cannot even hear them, much less can I tell what they are,” said
Henry.
“Then listen. Now they come along the road. Cannot you hear them now?”
said Varney.
“Yes, I can,” said Charles Holland; “but I really don’t know what they
are, or what it can matter to us; we don’t expect any visitors.”
“Certainly, certainly,” said Varney. “I am somewhat apprehensive of
the approach of strange sounds.”
“You are not likely to be disturbed here,” said Charles.
“Indeed; I thought so when I had succeeded in getting into the house
near the town, and so far from believing it was likely I should be
discovered, that I sat on the house-top while the mob surrounded it.”
“Did you not hear them coming?”
“I did.”
“And yet you did not attempt to escape from them?”
“No, I could not persuade them I was not there save by my utter
silence. I allowed them to come too close to leave myself time to
escape—besides, I could hardly persuade myself there could be any
necessity for so doing.”
“It was fortunate it was as it happened afterwards, that you were able
to reach the wood, and get out of it unperceived by the mob.”
“I should have been in an unfortunate condition had I been in their
hands long. A man made of iron would not be able to resist the
brutality of those people.”
As they were speaking, a gig, with two men, drove up, followed by one
on horseback. They stopped at the garden-gate, and then tarried to
consult with each other, as they looked at the house.
“What can they want, I wonder?” inquired Henry; “I never saw them
before.”
“Nor I,” said Charles Holland.
“Do you not know them at all?” inquired Varney.
“No,” replied Flora; “I never saw them, neither can I imagine what is
their object in coming here.”
“Did you ever see them before?” inquired Henry of his mother, who held
up her hand to look more carefully at the strangers; then, shaking her
head, she declared she had never seen such persons as those.
“I dare say not,” said Charles Holland. “They certainly are not
gentlemen; but here they come; there is some mistake, I daresay—they
don’t want to come here.”
As they spoke, the two strangers got down; after picking up a top coat
they had let fall, they turned round, and deliberately put it into
the chaise again; they walked up the path to the door, at which they
knocked.
The door was opened by the old woman, when the two men entered.
“Does Francis Beauchamp live here?”
“Eh?” said the old woman, who was a little deaf, and she put her hand
behind her ear to catch the sounds more distinctly—“eh?—who did you
say?”
Sir Francis Varney started as the sounds came upon his ear, but he sat
still an attentive listener.
“Are there any strangers in the house?” inquired the other officer,
impatiently. “Who is here?”
“Strangers!” said the old woman; “you are the only strangers that I
have seen here.”
“Come,” said the officer to his companion, “come this way; there
are people in this parlour. Our business must be an apology for any
rudeness we may commit.”
As he spoke he stepped by the old woman, and laying his hand upon the
handle of the door, entered the apartment, at the same time looking
carefully around the room as if he expected some one.
“Ladies,” said the stranger, with an off-hand politeness that had
something repulsive in it, though it was meant to convey a notion that
civility was intended; “ladies, I beg pardon for intruding, but I am
looking for a gentleman.”
“You shall hear from me again soon,” said Sir Francis, in an almost
imperceptible whisper.
“What is the object of this intrusion?” demanded Henry Bannerworth,
rising and confronting the stranger. “This is a strange introduction.”
“Yes, but not an unusual one,” said the stranger, “in these cases—being
unavoidable, at the least.”
“Sir,” said Charles Holland, “if you cannot explain quickly your
business here, we will proceed to take those measures which will at
least rid ourselves of your company.”
“Softly, sir. I mean no offence—not the least; but I tell you I do not
come for any purpose that is at all consonant to my wishes. I am a
Bow-street officer in the execution of my duty—excuse me, therefore.”
“Whom do you want?”
“Francis Beauchamp; and, from the peculiarity of the appearance of
this individual here, I think I may safely request the pleasure of his
company.”
Varney now rose, and the officer made a rush at him, when he saw him do
so, saying,—
“Surrender in the king’s name.”
Varney, however, paid no attention to that, but rushed past, throwing
his chair down to impede the officer, who could not stay himself, but
fell over it, while Varney made a rush towards the window, which he
cleared at one bound, and crossing the road, was lost to sight in a few
seconds, in the trees and hedges on the other side.
[Illustration: The escape of Varney from Bannerworth’s cottage.]
“Accidents will happen,” said the officer, as he rose to his feet; “I
did not think the fellow would have taken the window in that manner;
but we have him in view, and that will be enough.”
“In heaven’s name,” said Henry, “explain all about this; we cannot
understand one word of it—I am at a loss to understand one word of it.”
“We will return and do so presently,” said the officer as he dashed out
of the house after the fugitive at a rapid and reckless speed, followed
by his companion.
The man who had been left with the chaise, however, was the first in
the chase; seeing an escape from the window, he immediately guessed
that he was the man wanted, and, but for an accident, he would have met
Varney at the gate, for, as he was getting out in a hurry, his foot
became entangled with the reins, and he fell to the ground, and Varney
at the same moment stepped over him.
“Curse his infernal impudence, and d—n these reins!” muttered the man
in a fury at the accident, and the aggravating circumstance of the
fugitive walking over him in such a manner, and so coolly too—it was
vexing.
The man, however, quickly released himself, and rushed after Varney
across the road, and kept on his track for some time. The moon was
still rising, and shed but a gloomy light around. Everything was almost
invisible until you came close to it. This was the reason why Varney
and his pursuer met with several severe accidents—tumbles and hard
knocks against impediments which the light and the rapid flight they
were taking did not admit of their avoiding very well.
They went on for some time, but it was evident Varney knew the place
best, and could avoid what the man could not, and that was the trees
and the natural impediments of the ground, which Varney was acquainted
with.
For instance, at full speed across a meadow, a hollow would suddenly
present itself, and to an accustomed eye the moonlight might enable
it to be distinguished at a glance what it was, while to one wholly
unaccustomed to it, the hollow would often look like a hillock by
such a light. This Varney would clear at a bound, which a less agile
and heavier person would step into, lifting up his leg to meet an
impediment, when he would find it come down suddenly some six or eight
inches lower than he anticipated, almost dislocating his leg and neck,
and producing a corresponding loss of breath, which was not regained by
the muttered curse upon such a country where the places were so uneven.
Having come to one of these places, which was a little more perceptible
than the others, he made a desperate jump, but he jumped into the
middle of the hole with such force that he sprained his ankle, besides
sinking into a small pond that was almost dry, being overgrown with
rushes and aquatic plants.
“Well?” said the other officer coming up—“well?”
“Well, indeed!” said the one who came first; “it’s anything but well.
D—n all country excursions say I.”
“Why, Bob, you don’t mean to say as how you are caught in a rat-trap?”
“Oh, you be d—d! I am, ain’t I?”
“Yes; but are you going to stop there, or coming out, eh? You’ll catch
cold.”
“I have sprained my ankle.”
“Well?”
“It ain’t well, I tell you; here have I a sprained foot, and my wind
broken for a month at least. Why were you not quicker? If you had been
sharper we should have had the gentleman, I’ll swear!”
“I tumbled down over the chair, and he got out of the window, and I
come out of the door.”
“Well, I got entangled in the reins; but I got off after him, only his
long legs carried him over everything. I tell you what, Wilkinson, if I
were to be born again, and intended to be a runner, I would bespeak a
pair of long legs.”
“Why?”
“Because I should be able to get along better. You have no idea of how
he skimmed along the ground; it was quite beautiful, only it wasn’t
good to follow it.”
“A regular sky scraper!”
“Yes, or something of that sort; he looked like a patent flying shadow.”
“Well, get up and lead the way; we’ll follow you.”
“I dare say you will—when I lead the way back there; for as to going
out yonder, it is quite out of the question. I want supper to-night and
breakfast to-morrow morning.”
“Well, what has that to do with it?”
“Just this much: if you follow any farther, you’ll get into the woods,
and there you’ll be, going round and round, like a squirrel in a cage,
without being able to get out, and you will there get none of the good
things included under the head of those meals.”
“I think so too,” said the third.
“Well, then, let’s go back; we needn’t run, though it might be as well
to do so.”
“It would be anything but well. I don’t gallop back, depend upon it.”
The three men now slowly returned from their useless chase, and re-trod
the way they had passed once in such a hurry that they could hardly
recognize it.
“What a dreadful bump I came against that pole standing there,” said
one.
“Yes, and I came against a hedge-stake, that was placed so as the moon
didn’t show any light on it. It came into the pit of my stomach. I
never recollect such a pain in my life; for all the world like a hot
coal being suddenly and forcibly intruded into your stomach.”
“Well, here’s the road. I must go up to the house where I started him
from. I promised them some explanation. I may as well go and give it to
them at once.”
“Do as you will. I will wait with the horse, else, perhaps, that
Beauchamp will again return and steal him.”
The officer who had first entered the house now returned to the
Bannerworths, saying,
“I promised you I would give you some explanation as to what you have
witnessed.”
“Yes,” said Henry; “we have been awaiting your return with some anxiety
and curiosity. What is the meaning of all this? I am, as we are all, in
perfect ignorance of the meaning of what took place.”
“I will tell you. The person whom you have had here, and goes by the
name of Varney, is named Francis Beauchamp.”
“Indeed! Are you assured of this?”
“Yes, perfectly assured of it; I have it in my warrant to apprehend him
by either name.”
“What crime had he been guilty of?”
“I will tell you: he has been _hanged_.”
“Hanged!” exclaimed all present.
“What do you mean by that?” added Henry; “I am at a loss to understand
what you can mean by saying he was hanged.”
“What I say is literally true.”
“Pray tell us all about it. We are much interested in the fact; go on,
sir.”
“Well, sir, then I believe it was for murder that Francis Beauchamp was
hanged—yes, hanged; a common execution, before a multitude of people,
collected to witness such an exhibition.”
“Good God!” exclaimed Henry Bannerworth. “And was—but that is
impossible. A dead man come to life again! You must be amusing yourself
at our expense.”
“Not I,” replied the officer. “Here is my warrant; they don’t make
these out in a joke.”
And, as he spoke, he produced the warrant, when it was evident the
officer spoke the truth.
“How was this?”
“I will tell you, sir. You see that this Varney was a regular scamp,
gamester, rogue, and murderer. He was hanged, and hung about the
usual time; he was cut down and the body was given to some one for
dissection, when a surgeon, with the hangman, one Montgomery, succeeded
in restoring the criminal to life.”
“But I always thought they broke the neck when they were hanged; the
weight of the body would alone do that.”
“Oh, dear, no, sir,” said the officer; “that is one of the common every
day mistakes; they don’t break the neck once in twenty times.”
“Indeed!”
“No; they die of suffocation only; this man, Beauchamp, was hanged
thus, but they contrived to restore him, and then he assumed a new
name, and left London.”
“But how came you to know all this?”
“Oh! it came to us, as many things usually do, in a very extraordinary
manner, and in a manner that appears most singular and out of the way;
but such it was.
“The executioner who was the means of his being restored, or one of
them, wished to turn him to account, and used to draw a yearly sum
of money from him, as hush money, to induce them to keep the secret;
else, the fact of his having escaped punishment would subject him to a
repetition of the same punishment; when, of course, a little more care
would be taken that he did not escape a second time.”
“I dare say not.”
“Well, you see, Varney, or rather Beauchamp, was to pay a heavy sum to
this man to keep him quiet, and to permit him to enjoy the life he had
so strangely become possessed of.”
“I see,” said Holland.
“Well, this man, Montgomery, had always some kind of suspicion that
Varney would murder him.”
“Murder him! and he the means of saving his life; surely he could not
be so bad as that.”
“Why, you see, sir, this hangman drew a heavy sum yearly from him; thus
making him only a mine of wealth to himself; this, no doubt, would
rankle in the other’s heart, to think he should be so beset, and hold
life upon such terms.”
“I see, now.”
“Yes; and then came the consideration that he did not do it from any
good motive, merely a selfish one, and he was consequently under no
obligation to him for what he had done; besides, self-preservation
might urge him on, and tell him to do the deed.
“However that may be, Montgomery dreaded it, and was resolved to punish
the deed if he could not prevent it. He, therefore, left general orders
with his wife, whenever he went on a journey to Varney, if he should
be gone beyond a certain time, she was to open a certain drawer, and
take out a sealed packet to the magistrate at the chief office, who
would attend to it.
“He has been missing, and his wife did as she was desired, and now we
have found what he there mentioned to be true; but, now, sir, I have
satisfied you and explained to you why we intruded upon you, we must
now leave and seek for him elsewhere.”
“It is most extraordinary, and that is the reason why his complexion is
so singular.”
“Very likely.”
They poured out some wine, which was handed to the officers, who
drank and then quitted the house, leaving the inmates in a state of
stupefaction, from surprise and amazement at what they had heard from
the officers.
There was a strange feeling came over them when they recollected the
many occurrences they had witnessed, and even the explanation of the
officers; it seemed as if some mist had enveloped objects and rendered
them indistinct, but which was fast rising, and they were becoming
plainer and more distinct every moment in which they were regarded.
There was a long pause, and Flora was about to speak, when suddenly
there came the sound of a footstep across the garden. It was slow but
unsteady, and paused between whiles until it came close beneath the
windows. They remained silent, and then some one was heard to climb up
the rails of the veranda, and then the curtains were thrust aside, but
not till after the person outside had paused to ascertain who was there.
Then the curtains were opened, and the visage of Sir Francis Varney
appeared, much altered; in fact, completely worn and exhausted.
It was useless to deny it, but he looked ghastly—terrific; his singular
visage was as pallid as death; his eyes almost protruding, his mouth
opened, and his breathing short, and laboured in the extreme.
He climbed over with much difficulty, and staggered into the room, and
would have spoken, but he could not; he fell senseless upon the floor,
utterly exhausted and motionless.
There was a long pause, and each one present looked at each other, and
then they gazed upon the inanimate body of Sir Francis Varney, which
lay supine and senseless in the middle of the floor.
• • • • •
The importance of the document, said to be on the dead body, was such
that it would admit of no delay before it was obtained, and the party
determined that it should be commenced instanter. Lost time would be an
object to them; too much haste could hardly be made; and now came the
question of, “should it be to-night, or not?”
“Certainly,” said Henry Bannerworth; “the sooner we can get it, the
sooner all doubt and distress will be at an end; and, considering the
turn of events, that will be desirable for all our sakes; besides, we
know not what unlucky accident may happen to deprive us of what is so
necessary.”
“There can be none,” said Mr. Chillingworth; “but there is this to be
said, this has been such an eventful history, that I cannot say what
might or what might not happen.”
“We may as well go this very night,” said Charles Holland. “I give my
vote for an immediate exhumation of the body. The night is somewhat
stormy, but nothing more; the moon is up, and there will be plenty of
light.”
“And rain,” said the doctor.
“Little or none,” said Charles Holland. “A few gusts of wind now and
then drive a few heavy plashes of rain against the windows, and that
gives a fearful sound, which is, in fact, nothing, when you have to
encounter it; but you will go, doctor?”
“Yes, most certainly. We must have some tools.”
“Those may be had from the garden,” said Henry. “Tools for the
exhumation, you mean?”
“Yes; pickaxe, mattocks, and a crowbar; a lantern, and so forth,” said
the doctor. “You see I am at home in this; the fact is, I have had
more than one affair of this kind on my hands before now, and whilst a
student I have had more than one adventure of a strange character.”
“I dare say, doctor,” said Charles Holland, “you have some sad pranks
to answer for; you don’t think of it then, only when you find them
accumulated in a heap, so that you shall not be able to escape them;
because they come over your senses when you sleep at night.”
“No, no,” said Chillingworth; “you are mistaken in that. I have long
since settled all my accounts of that nature; besides, I never took a
dead body out of a grave but in the name of science, and never for my
own profit, seeing I never sold one in my life, or got anything by it.”
“That is not the fact,” said Henry; “you know, doctor, you improved
your own talents and knowledge.”
“Yes, yes; I did.”
“Well, but you profited by such improvements?”
“Well, granted, I did. How much more did the public not benefit then,”
said the doctor, with a smile.
“Ah, well, we won’t argue the question,” said Charles; “only it strikes
me that the doctor could never have been a doctor if he had not
determined upon following a profession.”
“There may be a little truth in that,” said Chillingworth; “but now we
had better quit the house, and make the best of our way to the spot
where the unfortunate man lies buried in his unhallowed grave.”
“Come with me into the garden,” said Henry Bannerworth; “we shall there
be able to suit ourselves to what is required. I have a couple of
lanterns.”
“One is enough,” said Chillingworth; “we had better not burden
ourselves more than we are obliged to do; and we shall find enough to
do with the tools.”
“Yes, they are not light; and the distance is by far too great to make
walking agreeable and easy; the wind blows strong, and the rain appears
to be coming up afresh, and, by the time we have done, we shall find
the ground will become slippy, and bad for walking.”
“Can we have a conveyance?”
“No, no,” said the doctor; “we could, but we must trouble the turnpike
man; besides, there is a shorter way across some fields, which will be
better and safer.”
“Well, well,” said Charles Holland; “I do not mind which way it is, as
long as you are satisfied yourselves. The horse and cart would have
settled it all better, and done it quicker, besides carrying the tools.”
“Very true, very true,” said the doctor; “all that is not without its
weight, and you shall choose which way you would have it done; for my
part, I am persuaded the expedition on foot is to be preferred for two
reasons.”
“And what are they?”
“The first is, we cannot obtain a horse and cart without giving some
detail as to what you want it for, which is awkward, on account of the
hour. Moreover, you could not get one at this moment in time.”
“That ought to settle the argument,” said Henry Bannerworth; “an
impossibility, under the circumstances, at once is a clincher, and one
that may be allowed to have some weight.”
“You may say that,” said Charles.
“Besides which, you must go a greater distance, and that, too, along
the main road, which is objectionable.”
“Then we are agreed,” said Charles Holland, “and the sooner we are off
the better; the night grows more and more gloomy every hour, and more
inclement.”
“It will serve our purpose the better,” said Chillingworth. “What we
do, we may as well do now.”
“Come with me to the garden,” said Henry, “and we will take the tools.
We can go out the back way; that will preclude any observation being
made.”
They all now left the apartment, wrapped up in great overcoats, to
secure themselves against the weather, and also for the purpose of
concealing themselves from any chance passenger.
In the garden they found the tools they required, and having chosen
them, they took a lantern, with the mean of getting a light when they
got to their journey’s end, which they would do in less than an hour.
After having duly inspected the state of their efficiency, they started
away on their expedition.
The night had turned gloomy and windy; heavy driving masses of clouds
obscured the moon, which only now and then was to be seen, when the
clouds permitted her to peep out. At the same time, there were many
drifting showers, which lasted but a few minutes, and then the clouds
were carried forwards by some sudden gust of wind so that, altogether,
it was a most uncomfortable night as well could be imagined.
However, there was no time to lose, and, under all circumstances, they
could not have chosen a better night for their purpose than the one
they had; indeed, they could not desire another night to be out on such
a purpose.
They spoke not while they were within sight of the houses, though at
the distance of many yards, and, at the same time, there was a noise
through the trees that would have carried their voices past every
object, however close; but they would make assurance doubly sure.
“I think we are fairly away now,” said Henry, “from all fear of being
recognized.”
“To be sure you are. Who would recognize us now, if we were met?”
“No one.”
“I should think not; and, moreover, there would be but small chance of
any evil coming from it, even if it were to happen that we were to be
seen and known. Nobody knows what we are going to do, and, if they did,
there is no illegality in the question.”
“Certainly not; but we wish the matter to be quite secret, therefore,
we don’t wish to be seen by any one while upon this adventure.”
“Exactly,” said Chillingworth; “and, if you’ll follow my guidance, you
shall meet nobody.”
“We will trust you, most worthy doctor. What have you to say for our
confidence?”
“That you will find it is not misplaced.”
Just as the doctor had uttered the last sound, there came a hearty
laugh upon the air, which, indeed, sounded but a few paces in advance
of them. The wind blew towards them, and would, therefore, cause the
sounds to come to them, but not to go away in the direction they were
going.
The whole party came to a sudden stand still; there was something so
strange in hearing a laugh at that moment, especially as Chillingworth
was, at that moment, boasting of his knowledge of the ground and the
certainty of their meeting no one.
“What is that?” inquired Henry.
“Some one laughing, I think,” said Chillingworth.
“Of that there can be little or no doubt,” said Charles Holland; “and,
as people do not usually laugh by themselves so heartily, it may be
presumed there are, at least, two.”
“No doubt of it.”
“And, moreover, their purpose cannot be a very good one, at this hour
of the night, and of such a night, too. I think we had better be
cautious.”
“Hush! Follow me silently,” said Henry.
As he spoke, he moved cautiously from the spot where he stood, and, at
the same time, he was followed by the whole party, until they came to
the hedge which skirted a lane, in which were seated three men.
They had a sort of tent erected, and that was hung upon a part of the
hedge which was to windward of them, so that it sheltered them from
wind and rain.
Henry and Chillingworth both peeped over the bank, and saw them seated
beneath this kind of canopy. They were shabby, gipsy-looking men, who
might be something else—sheep-stealers, or horse-stealers, in fact,
anything, even to beggars.
“I say, Jack,” said one; “it’s no bottle to-night.”
“No; there’s nobody about these parts to-night. We are safe, and so are
they.”
“Exactly.”
“Besides, you see, those who do happen to be out are not worth talking
to.”
“No cash.”
“None, not enough to pay turnpike for a walking-stick, at the most.”
“Besides, it does us no good to take a few shillings from a poor
wretch, who has more in family than he has shillings in pocket.”
“Ay, you are right, quite right. I don’t like it myself, I don’t;
besides that, there’s fresh risk in every man you stop, and these poor
fellows will fight hard for a few shillings, and there is no knowing
what an unlucky blow may do for a man.”
“That is very true. Has anything been done to-night?”
“Nothing,” said one.
“Only three half crowns,” said the other; “that is the extent of the
common purse to-night.”
“And I,” said the third, “I have got a bottle of bad gin from the Cat
and Cabbage-stump.”
“How did you manage it?”
“Why, this way. I went in, and had some beer, and you know I can give
a long yarn when I want; but it wants only a little care to deceive
these knowing countrymen, so I talked and talked, until they got quite
chatty, and then I put the gin in my pocket.”
“Good.”
“Well, then, the loaf and beef I took out of the safe as I came by, and
I dare say they know they have lost it by this time.”
“Yes, and so do we. I expect the gin will help to digest the beef, so
we mustn’t complain of the goods.”
“No; give us another glass, Jim.”
Jim held the glass towards him, when the doctor, animated by the spirit
of mischief, took a good sized pebble, and threw it into the glass,
smashing it, and spilling the contents.
In a moment there was a change of scene; the men were all terrified,
and started to their feet, while a sudden gust of wind caused their
light to go out; at the same time their tent-cloth was thrown down by
the wind, and fell across their heads.
“Come along,” said the doctor.
There was no need of saying so, for in a moment the three were as if
animated by one spirit, and away they scudded across the fields, with
the speed of a race horse.
In a few minutes they were better than half a mile away from the spot.
“In absence of all authentic information,” said the doctor, speaking
as well as he could, and blowing prodigiously between each word, as
though he were fetching breath all the way from his heels, “I think we
may conclude we are safe from them. We ought to thank our stars we came
across them in the way we did.”
“But, doctor, what in the name of Heaven induced you to make such a
noise, to frighten them, in fact, and to tell them some one was about?”
“They were too much terrified to tell whether it was one, or fifty. By
this time they are out of the county; they knew what they were talking
about.”
“And perhaps we may meet them on the road where we are going, thinking
it a rare lonely spot where they can hide, and no chance of their
being found out.”
“No,” said the doctor; “they will not go to such a place; it has by far
too bad a name for even such men as those to go near, much less stop
in.”
“I can hardly think that,” said Charles Holland, “for these fellows are
too terrified for their personal safety, to think of the superstitious
fears with which a place may be regarded; and these men, in such a
place as the one you speak of, they will be at home.”
“Well, well, rather than be done, we must fight for it; and when you
come to consider we have one pick and two shovels, we shall be in full
force.”
“Well said, doctor; how far have we to go?”
“Not more than a quarter of a mile.”
They pursued their way through the fields, and under the hedgerows,
until they came to a gate, where they stopped awhile, and began to
consult and to listen.
“A few yards up here, on the left,” said the doctor; “I know the spot;
besides, there is a particular mark. Now, then, are you all ready?”
“Yes, all.”
“Here,” said the doctor, pointing out the marks by which the spot might
be recognized; “here is the spot, and I think we shall not be half a
foot out of our reckoning.”
“Then let us begin instanter,” said Henry, as he seized hold of the
pickaxe, and began to loosen the earth by means of the sharp end.
[Illustration: The 3 men uncovering the body.]
“That will do for the present,” said Chillingworth; “now let me and
Charles take a turn with our shovels, and you will get on again
presently. Throw the earth up on the bank in one heap, so that we can
put it on again without attracting any attention to the spot by its
being left in clods and uneven.”
“Exactly,” said Henry, “else the body will be discovered.”
They began to shovel away, and continued to do so, after it had been
picked up, working alternately, until at length Charles stuck his
pick-axe into something soft, and upon pulling it up, he found it was
the body.
A dreadful odour now arose from the spot, and they were at no loss to
tell where the body lay. The pick-axe had stuck into the deceased’s
ribs and clothing, and thus lifted it out of its place.
“Here it is,” said the doctor; “but I needn’t tell you that; the
charnel-house smell is enough to convince you of the fact of where it
is.”
“I think so; just show a light upon the subject, doctor, and then we
can see what we are about—do you mind, doctor—you have the management
of the lantern, you know?”
“Yes, yes,” said Chillingworth; “I see you have it—don’t be in a hurry,
but do things deliberately and coolly whatever you do—you will not be
so liable to make mistakes, or to leave anything undone.”
“There will be nothing of any use to you here, doctor, in the way of
dissection, for the flesh is one mass of decay. What a horrible sight,
to be sure!”
“It is; but hasten the search.”
“Well, I must; though, to confess the truth, I’d sooner handle anything
than this.”
“It is not the most pleasant thing in the world, for there is no
knowing what may be the result—what creeping thing has made a home of
it.”
“Don’t mention anything about it.”
Henry and Charles Holland now began to search the pockets of the
clothes of the dead body, in one of which was something hard, that felt
like a parcel.
“What have you got there?” said Chillingworth, as he held his lantern
up so that the light fell upon the ghastly object that they were
handling.
“I think it is the prize,” said Charles Holland; “but we have not got
it out yet, though I dare say it won’t be long first, if this wind will
but hold good for about five minutes, and keep the stench down.”
They now tore open the packet and pulled out the papers, which appeared
to have been secreted upon his person.
“Be sure there are none on any other part of the body,” said
Chillingworth, “because what you do now, you had better do well, and
leave nothing to after thought, because it is frequently impracticable.”
“The advice is good,” said Henry, who made a second search, but found
nothing.
“We had better re-bury him,” said the doctor; “it had better be done
cleanly. Well, it is a sad hole for a last resting-place, and yet I do
not know that it matters—it is all a matter of taste—the fashion of the
class, or the particular custom of the country.”
There was but little to be said against such an argument, though the
custom of the age had caused them to look upon it more as a matter of
feeling than in such a philosophical sense as that in which the doctor
had put it.
“Well, there he is now—shovel the earth in, Charles,” said Henry
Bannerworth, as he himself set the example, which was speedily and
vigorously followed by Charles Holland, when they were not long before
the earth was thrown in and covered up with care, and trodden down so
that it should not appear to be moved.
“This will do, I think,” said Henry.
“Yes; it is not quite the same, but I dare say no one will try to make
any discoveries in this place; besides, if the rain continues to come
down very heavy, why, it will wash much of it away, and it will make it
look all alike.”
There was little inducement to hover about the spot, but Henry could
not forbear holding up the papers to the light of the lantern to
ascertain what they were.
“Are they all right?” inquired the doctor.
“Yes,” replied Henry, “yes. The Dearbrook estate. Oh! yes; they are the
papers I am in want of.”
“It is singularly fortunate, at least, to be so successful in securing
them. I am very glad a living person has possession of them, else it
would have been very difficult to have obtained it from them.”
“So it would; but now homeward is the word, doctor; and on my word
there is reason to be glad, for the rain is coming on very fast now,
and there is no moon at all—we had better step out.”
They did, for the three walked as fast as the nature of the soil would
permit them, and the darkness of the night.
CHAPTER LXXXIX.
TELLS WHAT BECAME OF THE SECOND VAMPYRE WHO SOUGHT VARNEY.
We left the Hungarian nobleman swimming down the stream; he swam
slowly, and used but little exertion in doing so. He appeared to
use his hands only as a means of assistance. The stream carried him
onwards, and he aided himself so far that he kept the middle of the
stream, and floated along.
Where the stream was broad and shallow, it sometimes left him a moment
or two, without being strong enough to carry him onwards; then he
would pause, as if gaining strength, and finally he would, when he had
rested, and the water came a little faster, and lifted him, make a
desperate plunge, and swim forward, until he again came in deep water,
and then he went slowly along with the stream, as he supported himself.
It was strange thus to see a man going down slowly, and without any
effort whatever, passing through shade and through moonlight—now lost
in the shadow of the tall trees, and now emerging into that part of
the stream which ran through meadows and cornfields, until the stream
widened, and then, at length, a ferry-house was to be seen in the
distance.
Then came the ferryman out of his hut, to look upon the beautiful
moonlight scene. It was cold, but pure, and brilliantly light. The
chaste moon was sailing through the heavens, and the stars diminished
in their lustre by the power of the luminous goddess of night.
There was a small cottage—true, it was somewhat larger than was
generally supposed by any casual observer who might look at it. The
place was rambling, and built chiefly of wood; but in it lived the
ferryman, his wife, and family; among these was a young girl about
seventeen years of age, but, at the same time, very beautiful.
They had been preparing their supper, and the ferryman himself walked
out to look at the river and the shadows of the tall trees that stood
on the hill opposite.
While thus employed, he heard a plashing in the water, and on turning
towards the quarter whence the sound proceeded for a few yards, he came
to the spot where he saw the stranger struggling in the stream.
“Good God!” he muttered to himself, as he saw the struggle continued;
“good God! he will sink and drown.”
As he spoke, he jumped into his boat and pushed it off, for the purpose
of stopping the descent of the body down the stream, and in a moment or
two it came near to him. He muttered,—
“Come, come—he tries to swim; life is not gone yet—he will do now, if
I can catch hold of him. Swimming with one’s face under the stream
doesn’t say much for his skill, though it may account for the fact that
he don’t cry out.”
As the drowning man neared, the ferryman held on by the boat-hook, and
stooping down, he seized the drowning man by the hair of the head, and
then paused.
After a time, he lifted him up, and placed him across the edge of the
boat, and then, with some struggling of his own, he was rolled over
into the boat.
“You are safe now,” muttered the ferryman.
The stranger spoke not, but sat or leaned against the boat’s head,
sobbing and catching at his breath, and spitting off his stomach the
water it might be presumed he had swallowed.
The ferryman put back to the shore, when he paused, and secured his
boat, and then pulled the stranger out, saying,—
“Do you feel any better now?”
“Yes,” said the stranger; “I feel I am living—thanks to you, my good
friend; I owe you my life.”
“You are welcome to that,” replied the ferryman; “it costs me nothing;
and, as for my little trouble, I should be sorry to think of that, when
a fellow-being’s life was in danger.”
“You have behaved very well—very well, and I can do little more now
than thank you, for I have been robbed of all I possessed about me at
the moment.”
“Oh! you have been robbed?”
“Aye, truly, I have, and have been thrown into the water, and thus I
have been nearly murdered.”
“It is lucky you escaped from them without further injury,” said the
ferryman; “but come in doors, you must be unfit to stand here in the
cold.”
“Thank you; your hospitality is great, and, at this moment, of the
greatest importance to me.”
“Such as we have,” said the honest ferryman, “you shall be welcome to.
Come in—come in.”
He turned round and led the way to the house, which he entered,
saying—as he opened the small door that led into the main apartment,
where all the family were assembled, waiting for the almost only meal
they had had that day; for the ferryman had not the means, before the
sun had set, of sending for food, and then it was a long way before it
could be found, and then it was late before they could get it,—
“Wife, we have a stranger to sleep with us to-night, and for whom we
must prepare a bed.”
“A stranger!” echoed the wife—“a stranger, and we so poor!”
“Yes; one whose life I have saved, and who was nearly drowned. We
cannot refuse hospitality upon such an occasion as that, you know,
wife.”
The wife looked at the stranger as he entered the room, and sat down by
the fire.
“I am sorry,” he said, “to intrude upon you; but I will make you amends
for the interruption and inconvenience I may cause you; but it is too
late to apply elsewhere, and yet I am doubtful, if there were, whether
I could go any further.”
“No, no,” said the ferryman; “I am sure a man who has been beaten and
robbed, and thrown into a rapid and, in some parts, deep stream, is not
fit to travel at this time of night.”
“You are lonely about here,” said the stranger, as he shivered by the
fire.
“Yes, rather; but we are used to it.”
“You have a family, too; that must help to lighten the hours away, and
help you over the long evenings.”
“So you may think, stranger, and, at times, so it is; but when food
runs short, it is a long while to daylight, before any more money can
be had. To be sure, we have fish in the river, and we have what we can
grow in the garden; but these are not all the wants that we feel, and
those others are sometimes pinching. However, we are thankful for what
we have, and complain but little when we can get no more; but sometimes
we do repine—though I cannot say we ought—but I am merely relating the
fact, whether it be right or wrong.”
“Exactly. How old is your daughter?”
“She is seventeen come Allhallow’s eve.”
“That is not far hence,” said the stranger. “I hope I may be in this
part of the country—and I think I shall—I will on that eve pay you a
visit; not one on which I shall be a burden to you, but one more useful
to you, and more consonant to my character.”
“The future will tell us all about that,” said the ferryman; “at
present we will see what we can do, without complaining, or taxing
anybody.”
The stranger and the ferryman sat conversing for some time before the
fire, and then the latter pointed out to him which was his bed—one made
up near the fire, for the sake of its warmth; and then the ferryman
retired to the next room, a place which was merely divided by an
imperfect partition.
However, they all fell soundly asleep. The hours on that day had been
longer than usual; there was not that buoyancy of spirit; when they
retired, they fell off into a heavy, deep slumber.
From this they were suddenly aroused by loud cries and piercing screams
from one of the family.
So loud and shrill were the cries, that they all started up, terrified
and bewildered beyond measure, unable to apply their faculties to any
one object.
“Help—help, father!—help!” shrieked the voice of the young girl whom we
have before noticed.
The ferryman jumped up, and rushed to the spot where his daughter lay.
“Fanny,” he said—“Fanny, what ails thee—what ails thee? Tell me, my
dear child.”
“Oh!” she exclaimed, almost choked—“oh, father! are we all alone? I am
terrified.”
“What ails thee—what ails thee? Tell me what caused you to scream out
in such a manner?”
“I—I—that is I, father, thought—but no, I am sure it was reality. Where
is the stranger?”
“A light—a light!” shouted the fisherman.
In another moment a light was brought him, and he discovered the
stranger reclining in his bed, but awake, and looking around him, as if
in the utmost amazement.
“What has happened?” he said—“what has happened?”
“That is more than I know as yet,” the man replied. “Come, Fanny,” he
added, “tell me what it is you fear. What caused you to scream out in
that dreadful manner?”
“Oh, father—the vampyre!”
“Great God! what do you mean, Fanny, by that?”
“I hardly know, father. I was fast asleep, when I thought I felt
something at my throat; but being very sound asleep, I did not
immediately awake. Presently I felt the sharp pang of teeth being
driven into the flesh of my neck—I awoke, and found the vampyre at his
repast. Oh, God! oh, God! what shall I do?”
“Stay, my child, let us examine the wound,” said the fisherman, and he
held the candle to the spot where the vampyre’s teeth had been applied.
There, sure enough, were teeth marks, such as a human being’s would
make were they applied, but no blood had been drawn therefrom.
“Come, come, Fanny; so far, by divine Providence, you are not injured;
another moment, and the mischief would have been done entire and
complete, and you would have been his victim.”
Then turning to the stranger, he said,—
“You have had some hand in this. No human being but you could come into
this place. The cottage door is secured. You must be the vampyre.”
“I!”
“Yes; who else could?”
“I!—As Heaven’s my judge—but there, it’s useless to speak of it; I
have not been out of my bed. In this place, dark as it is, and less
used to darkness than you, I could not even find my way about.—It is
impossible.”
“Get out of your bed, and let me feel,” said the ferryman,
peremptorily—“get out, and I will soon tell.”
The stranger arose, and began to dress himself, and the ferryman
immediately felt the bed on which he had been lying; but it was ice
cold—so cold that he started upon his legs in an instant, exclaiming
with vehemence,—
“It is you, vile wretch! that has attempted to steal into the cottage
of the poor man, and then to rob him of his only child, and that child
of her heart’s blood, base ingrate!”
“My friend, you are wrong, entirely wrong. I am not the creature you
believe me. I have slept, and slept soundly, and awoke not until your
daughter screamed.”
“Scoundrel!—liar!—base wretch! you shall not remain alive to injure
those who have but one life to lose.”
As he spoke, the ferryman made a desperate rush at the vampyre, and
seized him by the throat, and a violent struggle ensued, in which
the superior strength of the ferryman prevailed, and he brought his
antagonist to the earth, at the same time bestowing upon him some
desperate blows.
“Thou shall go to the same element from which I took thee,” said the
ferryman, “and there swim or sink as thou wilt until some one shall
drag thee ashore, and when they do, may they have a better return than
I.”
As he spoke, he dragged along the stranger by main force until they
came to the bank of the river, and then pausing, to observe the deepest
part, he said,—
“Here, then, you shall go.”
The vampyre struggled, and endeavoured to speak, but he could not; the
grasp at his throat prevented all attempts at speech; and then, with a
sudden exertion of his strength, the ferryman lifted the stranger up,
and heaved him some distance into the river.
Then in deep water sank the body.
The ferryman watched for some moments, and farther down the stream he
saw the body again rise upon the current and struggling slightly, as
for life—now whirled around and around, and then carried forward with
the utmost velocity.
This continued as far as the moonlight enabled the ferryman to see, and
then, with a slow step and clouded brow, he returned to his cottage,
which he entered, and closed the door.
CHAPTER XC.
DR. CHILLINGWORTH AT THE HALL.—THE ENCOUNTER OF MYSTERY.—THE
CONFLICT.—THE RESCUE, AND THE PICTURE.
There have been many events that have passed rapidly in this our
narrative; but more have yet to come before we can arrive at that
point which will clear up much that appears to be most mysterious and
unaccountable.
Doctor Chillingworth, but ill satisfied with the events that had yet
taken place, determined once more upon visiting the Hall, and there to
attempt a discovery of something respecting the mysterious apartment in
which so much has already taken place.
He communicated his design to no one; he resolved to prosecute the
inquiry alone. He determined to go there and await whatever might turn
up in the shape of events. He would not for once take any companion;
such adventures were often best prosecuted alone—they were most easily
brought to something like an explanatory position; one person can
often consider matters more coolly than more. At all events, there is
more secrecy than under any other circumstances.
Perhaps this often is of greater consequence than many others; and,
moreover, when there is more than one, something is usually overdone.
Where one adventurous individual will rather draw back in a pursuit,
more than one would induce them to urge each other on.
In fact, one in such a case could act the part of a spy—a secret
observer; and in that case can catch people at times when they could
not under any other circumstances be caught or observed at all.
“I will go,” he muttered; “and should I be compelled to run away again,
why, nobody knows anything about it and nobody will laugh at me.”
This was all very well; but Mr. Chillingworth was not the man to run
away without sufficient cause. But there was so much mystery in all
this that he felt much interested in the issue of the affair. But this
issue he could not command; at the same time he was determined to sit
and watch, and thus become certain that either something or nothing was
to take place.
Even the knowledge of that much—that some inexplicable action was
still going on—was far preferable to the uncertainty of not knowing
whether what had once been going on was still so or not, because, if
it had ceased, it was probable that nothing more would ever be known
concerning it, and the mystery would still be a mystery to the end of
time.
“It shall be fathomed if there be any possibility of its being
discovered,” muttered Chillingworth. “Who would have thought that
so quiet and orderly a spot as this, our quiet village, would have
suffered so much commotion and disturbance? Far from every cause of
noise and strife, it is quite as great a matter of mystery as the
vampyre business itself.
“I have been so mixed up in this business that I must go through with
it. By the way, of the mysteries, the greatest that I have met with is
the fact of the vampyre having anything to do with so quiet a family as
the Bannerworths.”
Mr. Chillingworth pondered over the thought; but yet he could make
nothing of it. It in no way tended to elucidate anything connected with
the affair, and it was much too strange and singular in all its parts
to be submitted to any process of thought, with any hope of coming to
anything like a conclusion upon the subject—that must remain until
some facts were ascertained, and to obtain them Mr. Chillingworth now
determined to try.
This was precisely what was most desirable in the present state of
affairs; while things remained in the present state of uncertainty,
there would be much more of mystery than could ever be brought to light.
One or two circumstances cleared up, the minor ones would follow in the
same train, and they would be explained by the others; and if ever that
happy state of things were to come about, why, then there would be a
perfect calm in the town.
As Mr. Chillingworth was going along, he thought he observed two men
sitting inside a hedge, close to a hay-rick, and thinking neither
of them had any business there, he determined to listen to their
conversation, and ascertain if it had any evil tendency, or whether it
concerned the late event.
Having approached near the gate, and they being on the other side, he
got over without any noise, and, unperceived by either of them, crept
close up to them.
“So you haven’t long come from sea?”
“No; I have just landed.”
“How is it you have thrown aside your seaman’s clothes and taken to
these?”
“Just to escape being found out.”
“Found out! what do you mean by that? Have you been up to anything?”
“Yes, I have, Jack. I have been up to something, worse luck to me; but
I’m not to be blamed either.”
“What is it all about?” inquired his companion. “I always thought you
were such a steady-going old file that there was no going out of the
even path with you.”
“Nor would there have been, but for one simple circumstance.”
“What was that?”
“I will tell you, Jack—I will tell you; you will never betray me, I am
sure.”
“Never, by heavens!”
“Well, then, listen—it was this. I had been some time aboard our
vessel. I had sailed before, but the captain never showed any signs of
being a bad man, and I was willing enough to sail with him again.
“He knew I was engaged to a young woman in this country, and that I was
willing to work hard to save money to make up a comfortable home for us
both, and that I would not sail again, but that I intended to remain
ashore, and make up my mind to a shore life.”
“Well, you would have a house then?”
“Exactly; and that’s what I wished to do. Well, I made a small venture
in the cargo, and thought, by so doing, that I should have a chance of
realizing a sum of money that would put us both in a comfortable line
of business.
“Well, we went on very smoothly until we were coming back. We had
disposed of the cargo, and I had received some money, and this seemed
to cause our captain to hate me, because I had been successful; but I
thought there was something else in it than that, but I could not tell
what it was that made him so intolerably cross and tyrannous.
“Well, I found out, at length, he knew my intended wife. He knew her
very well, and at the same time he made every effort he could to induce
me to commit some act of disobedience and insubordination; but I would
not, for it seemed to me he was trying all he could to prevent my doing
my duty with anything like comfort.
“However, I learned the cause of all this afterwards. It was told me by
one of the crew.
“‘Bill,’ said my mate, ‘look out for yourself.’
“‘What’s in the wind?’ said I.
“‘Only the captain has made a dead set at you, and you’ll be a lucky
man if you escape.’
“‘What’s it all about?’ said I. ‘I cannot understand what he means. I
have done nothing wrong. I don’t see why I should suddenly be treated
in this way.’
“‘It’s all about your girl, Bill.’
“‘Indeed!’ said I. ‘What can that have to do with the captain? he knows
nothing of her.’
“‘Oh, yes, he does,’ he said. ‘If it were not for you he would have the
girl himself.’
“‘I see now,’ said I.
“‘Ay, and so can a blind man if you open his eyes; but he wants to make
you do wrong—to goad you on to do something that will give him the
power of disgracing you, and, perhaps, of punishing you.’
“‘He won’t do that,’ said I.
“‘I am glad to hear you say so, Bill; for, to my mind, he has made
up his mind to go the whole length against you. I can’t make it out,
unless he wishes you were dead.’
“‘I dare say he does,’ said I; ‘but I will take care I will live to
exact a reckoning when he comes ashore.’
“‘That is the best; and when we are paid off, Bill, if you will take it
out of him, and pay him off, why, I don’t care if I lend you a hand.’
“‘We’ll say more about that, Dick,’ said I, ‘when we get ashore and
are paid off. If we are overheard now, it will be said that we are
conspiring, or committing mutiny, or something of that sort.’
“‘You are right, Bill,’ he said—‘you are right. We’ll say no more about
this now, but you may reckon upon me when we are no longer under his
orders.’
“‘Then there’s no danger, you know.’
“Well, we said nothing about this, but I thought of it, and I had
cause enough, too, to think of it; for each day the captain grew
more and more tyrannous and brutal. I knew not what to do, but kept
my resolution of doing my duty in spite of all he could do, though I
don’t mind admitting I had more than one mind to kill him and myself
afterwards.
“However, I contrived to hold out for another week or two, and then we
came into port, and were released from his tyranny. I got paid off, and
then I met my messmate, and we had some talk about the matter.
“‘The worst of it is,’ said I, ‘we shall have some difficulty to catch
him; and, if we can, I’ll be sworn we shall give him enough to last him
for at least a voyage or two.’
“‘He ought to have it smart,’ said my messmate; ‘and I know where he is
to be found.’
“‘Do you?—at what hour?’
“‘Late at night, when he may be met with as he comes from a house where
he spends his evenings.”
“‘That will be the best time in the world, when we shall have less
interference than at any other time in the day. But we’ll have a turn
to-night if you will be with me, as he will be able to make too good a
defence to one. It will be a fight, and not a chastisement.’
“‘It will. I will be with you; you know where to meet me. I shall be at
the old spot at the usual time, and then we will go.’
“We parted; and, in the evening, we both went together, and sought the
place where we should find him out, and set upon him to advantage.
“He was nearly two hours before he came; but when he did come, we
saluted him with a rap on the head, that made him hold his tongue; and
then we set to, and gave him such a tremendous drubbing, that we left
him insensible; but he was soon taken away by some watchmen, and we
heard that he was doing well; but he was dreadfully beaten; indeed, it
would take him some weeks before he could be about in his duties.
“He was fearfully enraged, and offered fifty pounds reward to any one
who could give him information as to who it was that assaulted him.
“I believe he had a pretty good notion of who it was; but he could not
swear to me; but still, seeing he was busying himself too much about
me, I at once walked away, and went on my way to another part of the
country.”
“To get married?”
“Ay, and to get into business.”
“Then, things are not quite so bad as I thought for at first.”
“No—no, not so bad but what they might have been worse a great deal;
only I cannot go to sea any more, that’s quite certain.”
“You needn’t regret that.”
“I don’t know.”
“Why not know? Are you not going to be married?—ain’t that much better?”
“I can’t say,” replied the sailor; “there’s no knowing how my bargain
may turn out; if she does well, why, then the cruising is over; but
nothing short of that will satisfy me; for if my wife is at all not
what I wish her to be, why, I shall be off to sea.”
“I don’t blame you, either; I would do so too, if it were possible;
but you see, we can’t do so well on land as you do at sea; we can
be followed about from pillar to post, and no bounds set to our
persecution.”
“That’s true enough,” said the other; “we can cut and run when we have
had enough of it. However, I must get to the village, as I shall sleep
there to-night, if I find my quarters comfortable enough.”
“Come on, then, at once,” said his companion; “it’s getting dark now;
and you have no time to lose.”
These two now got up, and walked away towards the village; and
Chillingworth arose also, and pursued his way towards the Hall, while
he remarked to himself,—
“Well—well, they have nothing to do with that affair at all events.
By-the-bye, I wonder what amount of females are deserted in the navy;
they certainly have an advantage over landsmen, in the respect of being
tied to tiresome partners; they can, at least, for a season, get a
release from their troubles, and be free at sea.”
However, Mr. Chillingworth got to the Hall, and unobserved, for he had
been especially careful not to be seen; he had watched on all sides,
and no signs of a solitary human being had he seen, that could in any
way make the slightest observation upon him.
Indeed, he had sheltered himself from observation at every point of
his road, especially so when near Bannerworth Hall, where there were
plenty of corners to enable him to do so; and when he arrived there, he
entered at the usual spot, and then sat down a few moments in the bower.
“I will not sit here,” he muttered. “I will go and have a watch at that
mysterious picture; there is the centre of attraction, be it what it
may.”
As he spoke, he arose and walked into the house, and entered the same
apartment which has been so often mentioned to the reader.
Here he took a chair, and sat down full before the picture, and began
to contemplate it.
“Well, for a good likeness, I cannot say I ever saw anything more
unprepossessing. I am sure such a countenance as that could never
have won a female heart. Surely, it is more calculated to terrify the
imagination, than to soothe the affections of the timid and shrinking
female.
“However, I will have an inspection of the picture, and see if I can
make anything of it.”
As he spoke, he put his hand upon the picture with the intention of
removing it, when it suddenly was thrust open, and a man stepped down.
The doctor was for a moment completely staggered, it was so utterly
unexpected, and he stepped back a pace or two in the first emotion of
his surprise; but this soon passed by, and he prepared to close with
his antagonist, which he did without speaking a word.
There was a fair struggle for more than two or three minutes, during
which the doctor struggled and fought most manfully; but it was evident
that Mr. Chillingworth had met with a man who was his superior in
point of strength, for he not only withstood the utmost force that
Chillingworth could bring against him, but maintained himself, and
turned his strength against the doctor.
[Illustration: The struggle between the stranger and the doctor for the
picture.]
Chillingworth panted with exertion, and found himself gradually losing
ground, and was upon the point of being thrown down at the mercy of
his adversary, who appeared to be inclined to take all advantages of
him, when an occurrence happened that altered the state of affairs
altogether.
While they were struggling, the doctor borne partially to the earth—but
yet struggling, suddenly his antagonist released his hold, and
staggered back a few paces.
“There, you swab—take that; I am yard-arm and yard-arm with you, you
piratical-looking craft—you lubberly, buccaneering son of a fish-fag.”
Before, however, Jack Pringle, for it was he who came so opportunely
to the rescue of Doctor Chillingworth, could find time to finish the
sentence, he found himself assailed by the very man who, but a minute
before, he had, as he thought, placed _hors de combat_.
A desperate fight ensued, and the stranger made the greatest efforts
to escape with the picture, but found he could not get off without
a desperate struggle. He was, at length, compelled to relinquish the
hope of carrying that off, for both Mr. Chillingworth and Jack Pringle
were engaged hand to hand; but the stranger struck Jack so heavy a
blow on the head, that made him reel a few yards, and then he escaped
through the window, leaving Jack and Mr. Chillingworth masters of the
field, but by no means unscathed by the conflict in which they had been
engaged.
CHAPTER XCI.
THE GRAND CONSULTATION BROKEN UP BY MRS. CHILLINGWORTH, AND THE
DISAPPEARANCE OF VARNEY.
Remarkable was the change that had taken place in the circumstances of
the Bannerworth family. From a state of great despondency, and, indeed,
absolute poverty, they had suddenly risen to comfort and independence.
It seemed as if the clouds that had obscured their destiny, had now,
with one accord, dissipated, and that a brighter day was dawning. Not
only had the circumstances of mental terror which had surrounded them
given way in a great measure to the light of truth and reflection, but
those pecuniary distresses which had pressed upon them for a time, were
likewise passing away, and it seemed probable that they would be in a
prosperous condition.
The acquisition of the title deeds of the estate, which they thought
had passed away from the family for ever, became to them, in their
present circumstances, an immense acquisition, and brought to their
minds a feeling of great contentment.
Many persons in their situation would have been extremely satisfied at
having secured so strong an interest in the mind of the old admiral,
who was very wealthy, and who, from what he had already said and done,
no doubt fully intended to provide handsomely for the Bannerworth
family.
And not only had they this to look forward to, if they had chosen to
regard it as an advantage, but they knew that by the marriage of Flora
with Charles Holland she would have a fortune at her disposal, while he
(Charles) would be the last man in the world to demur at any reasonable
amount of it being lavished upon her mother and her brothers.
But all this did not suit the high and independent spirit of Henry
Bannerworth. He was one who would rather have eaten the crust that he
procured for himself by some meritorious exertion, than have feasted
on the most delicate viands placed before him from the resources of
another.
But now that he knew this small estate, the title deeds of which had
been so singularly obtained, had once really belonged to the family,
but had been risked and lost at the gaming-table, he had no earthly
scruple in calling such property again his own.
As to the large sum of money which Sir Francis Varney in his
confessions had declared to have found its way into the possession of
Marmaduke Bannerworth, Henry did not expect, and scarcely wished to
become possessed of wealth through so tainted a source.
“No,” he said to himself frequently; “no—I care not if that wealth be
never forthcoming, which was so badly got possession of. Let it sink
into the earth, if, indeed, it be buried there; or let it rot in some
unknown corner of the old mansion. I care not for it.”
In this view of the case he was not alone, for a family more unselfish,
or who cared so little for money, could scarcely have been found; but
Admiral Bell and Charles Holland argued now that they had a right to
the amount of money which Marmaduke Bannerworth had hidden somewhere,
and the old admiral reasoned upon it rather ingeniously, for he said,—
“I suppose you don’t mean to dispute that the money belongs to
somebody, and in that case I should like to know who else it belonged
to, if not to you? How do you get over that, master Henry?”
“I don’t attempt to get over it at all,” said Henry; “all I say is,
that I do dislike the whole circumstances connected with it, and
the manner in which it was come by; and, now that we have a small
independence, I hope it will not be found. But, admiral, we are
going to hold a family consultation as to what we shall do, and what
is to become of Varney. He has convinced me of his relationship to
our family, and, although his conduct has certainly been extremely
equivocal, he has made all the amends in his power; and now, as he
is getting old, I do not like to throw him upon the wide world for a
subsistence.”
“You don’t contemplate,” said the admiral, “letting him remain with
you, do you?”
“No; that would be objectionable for a variety of reasons; and I could
not think of it for a moment.”
“I should think not. The idea of sitting down to breakfast, dinner,
tea, and supper with a vampyre, and taking your grog with a fellow
that sucks other people’s blood!”
“Really, admiral, you do not really still cling to the idea that Sir
Francis Varney is a vampyre.”
“I really don’t know; he clings to it himself, that’s all I can say;
and I think, under those circumstances, I might as well give him the
benefit of his own proposition, and suppose that he is a vampyre.”
“Really, uncle,” said Charles Holland, “I did think that you had
discarded the notion.”
“Did you? I have been thinking of it, and it ain’t so desirable to be
a vampyre, I am sure, that any one should pretend to it who is not;
therefore, I take the fellow upon his own showing. He is a vampyre in
his own opinion, and so I don’t see, for the life of me, why he should
not be so in ours.”
“Well,” said Henry, “waving all that, what are we to do with him?
Circumstances seem to have thrown him completely at our mercy. What are
we to do with him, and what is to become of him for the future?”
“I’ll tell you what I’ll do,” said the admiral. “If he were ten times a
vampyre, there is some good in the fellow; and I will give him enough
to live upon if he will go to America and spend it. They will take
good care there that he sucks no blood out of them; for, although an
American would always rather lose a drop of blood than a dollar, they
keep a pretty sharp look out upon both.”
“The proposal can be made to him,” said Henry, “at all events. It is
one which I don’t dislike, and probably one that he would embrace at
once; because he seems, to me, to have completely done with ambition,
and to have abandoned those projects concerning which, at one time, he
took such a world of trouble.”
“Don’t you trust to that,” said the admiral. “What’s bred in the bone
don’t so easily get out of the flesh; and once or twice, when Master
Varney has been talking, I have seen those odd looking eyes of his
flash up for a moment, as if he were quite ready to begin his old
capers again, and alarm the whole country side.”
“I must confess,” said Charles Holland, “that I myself have had the
impression once or twice that Varney was only subdued for a time, and
that, with a proper amount of provocation, he would become again a very
serious fellow, and to the full as troublesome as he has been.”
“Do you doubt his sincerity?” said Henry.
“No, I do not do that, Henry. I think Varney fully means what he says;
but I think, at the same time, that he has for so long lead a strange,
wild, and reckless life, that he will find it very far from easy, if
indeed possible, to shake off his old habits and settle down quietly,
if not to say comfortably.”
“I regret,” said Henry, “that you have such an impression; but, while I
do so, I cannot help admitting that it is, to a considerable extent, no
more than a reasonable one; and perhaps, after all, my expectation that
Varney will give us no more trouble, only amounts to a hope that he
will not do so, and nothing more. But let us consider; there seems to
be some slight difference of opinion among us, as to whether we should
take up our residence at this new house of ours, which we did not know
we owned, at Dearbrook, or proceed to London, and there establish
ourselves, or again return to Bannerworth Hall, and, by a judicious
expenditure of some money, make that a more habitable place than it has
been for the last twenty years.”
“Now, I’ll tell you what,” said the admiral, “I would do. It’s quite
out of the question for any body to live long unless they see a ship;
don’t you think so, Miss Flora?”
“Why, how can you ask Flora such a question, uncle,” said Charles
Holland, “when you know she don’t care a straw about ships, and only
looks upon admirals as natural curiosities?”
“Excepting one,” said Flora, “and he is an admiral who is natural but
no curiosity, unless it be that you can call him such because he is so
just and generous, and, as for ships, who can help admiring them; and
if Admiral Bell proposes that we live in some pleasant, marine villa by
the sea-coast, he shall have my vote and interest for the proceeding.”
“Bravo! Huzza!” cried the admiral. “I tell you what it is, Master
Charley—you horse marine,—I have a great mind to cut you out, and have
Miss Flora myself.”
“Don’t, uncle,” said Charles; “that would be so very cruel, after she
has promised me so faithfully. How do you suppose I should like it;
come now, be merciful.”
At this moment, and before any one could make another remark, there
came rather a sharp ring at the garden-gate bell, and Henry exclaimed,—
“That’s Mr. Chillingworth, and I am glad he has come in time to join
our conference. His advice is always valuable; and, moreover, I rather
think he will bring us some news worth the hearing.”
The one servant who they had to wait upon them looked into the room,
and said,—
“If you please, here is Mrs. Chillingworth.”
“Mistress? you mean Mr.”
“No; it is Mrs. Chillingworth and her baby.”
“The devil!” said the admiral; “what can she want?”
“I’ll come and let you know,” said Mrs. Chillingworth, “what I want;”
and she darted into the room past the servant. “I’ll soon let you know,
you great sea crab. I want my husband; and what with your vampyre, and
one thing and another, I haven’t had him at home an hour for the past
three weeks. What am I to do? There is all his patients getting well
as fast as they can without him; and, when they find that out, do you
think they will take any more filthy physic? No, to be sure not; people
ain’t such fools as to do anything of the sort.”
“I’ll tell you what we will do, ma’am,” said the admiral; “we’ll all
get ill at once, on purpose to oblige ye; and I’ll begin by having the
measles.”
“You are an old porpoise, and I believe it all owing to you that my
husband neglects his wife and family. What’s vampyres to him, I should
like to know, that he should go troubling about them? I never heard of
vampyres taking draughts and pills.”
“No, nor any body else that had the sense of a goose,” said the
admiral; “but if it’s your husband you want, ma’am, it’s no use your
looking for him here, for here he is not.”
“Then where is he? He is running after some of your beastly vampyres
somewhere, I’ll be bound, and you know where to send for him.”
“Then you are mistaken; for, indeed, we don’t. We want him ourselves,
ma’am, and can’t find him—that’s the fact.”
“It’s all very well talking, sir, but if you were a married woman,
with a family about you, and the last at the breast, you’d feel very
different from what you do now.”
“I’m d——d if I don’t suppose I should,” said the admiral; “but as for
the last, ma’am, I’d soon settle that. I’d wring its neck, and shove it
overboard.”
“You would, you brute? It’s quite clear to me you never had a child of
your own.”
“Mrs. Chillingworth,” said Henry, “I think you have no right to
complain to us of your domestic affairs. Where your husband goes, and
what he does, is at his own will and pleasure, and, really, I don’t
see that we are to be made answerable as to whether he is at home or
abroad; to say nothing of the bad taste—and bad taste it most certainly
is, of talking of your private affairs to other people.”
“Oh, dear!” said Mrs. Chillingworth; “that’s your idea, is it, you
no-whiskered puppy?”
“Really, madam, I cannot see what my being destitute of whiskers has to
do with the affair; and I am inclined to think my opinion is quite as
good without them as with them.”
“I will speak,” said Flora, “to the doctor, when I see him.”
“Will you, Miss Doll’s-eyes? Oh, dear me! you’ll speak to the doctor,
will you?”
“What on earth do you want?” said Henry. “For your husband’s sake, whom
we all respect, we wish to treat you with every imaginable civility;
but we tell you, candidly, that he is not here, and, therefore, we
cannot conceive what more you can require of us.”
“Oh, it’s a row,” said the admiral; “that’s what she wants—woman
like. D——d a bit do they care what it’s about as long as there’s a
disturbance. And now, ma’am, will you sit down and have a glass of
grog?”
“No, I will not sit down; and all I can say is, that I look upon this
place as a den full of snakes and reptiles. That’s my opinion; so I’ll
not stay any longer; but, wishing that great judgments may some day
come home to you all, and that you may know what it is to be a mother,
with five babies, and one at the breast, I despise you all and leave
you.”
So saying, Mrs. Chillingworth walked from the place, feeling herself
highly hurt and offended at what had ensued; and they were compelled
to let her go just as she was, without giving her any information,
for they had a vivid recollection of the serious disturbance she had
created on a former occasion, when she had actually headed a mob,
for the purpose of hunting out Varney, the vampyre, from Bannerworth
Hall, and putting an end consequently, as she considered, to that set
of circumstances which kept the doctor so much from his house, to the
great detriment of a not very extensive practice.
“After all,” said Flora, “Mrs. Chillingworth, although she is not the
most refined person in the world, is to be pitied.”
“What!” cried the admiral; “Miss Doll’s-eyes, are you taking her part?”
“Oh, that’s nothing. She may call me what she likes.”
“I believe she is a good wife to the doctor,” said Henry,
“notwithstanding her little eccentricities; but suppose we now at once
make the proposal we were thinking of to Sir Francis Varney, and so
get him to leave England as quickly as possible and put an end to the
possibility of his being any more trouble to anybody.”
“Agreed—agreed. It’s the best thing that can be done, and it will be
something gained to get his consent at once.”
“I’ll run up stairs to him,” said Charles, “and call him down at once.
I scarcely doubt for a moment his acquiescence in the proposal.”
Charles Holland rose, and ran up the little staircase of the cottage
to the room which, by the kindness of the Bannerworth family, had been
devoted to the use of Varney. He had not been gone above two minutes,
when he returned, hastily, with a small scrap of paper in his hand,
which he laid before Henry, saying,—
“There, what think you of that?”
Henry, upon taking up the paper, saw written upon it the words,—
“_The Farewell of Varney the Vampyre_.”
“He is gone,” said Charles Holland. “The room is vacant. I saw at a
glance that he had removed his hat, and cloak, and all that belonged to
him. He’s off, and at so short a warning, and in so abrupt a manner,
that I fear the worst.”
“What can you fear?”
“I scarcely know what; but we have a right to fear everything and
anything from his most inexplicable being, whose whole conduct has
been of that mysterious nature, as to put him past all calculation
as regards his motives, his objects, or his actions. I must confess
that I would have hailed his departure from England with feelings of
satisfaction; but what he means now, by this strange manœuvre, Heaven,
and his own singular intellect, can alone divine.”
“I must confess,” said Flora, “I should not at all have thought this of
Varney. It seems to me as if something new must have occurred to him.
Altogether, I do not feel any alarm concerning his actions as regards
us. I am convinced of his sincerity, and, therefore, do not view with
sensations of uneasiness this new circumstance, which appears at
present so inexplicable, but for which we may yet get some explanation
that will be satisfactory to us all.”
“I cannot conceive,” said Henry, “what new circumstances could have
occurred to produce this effect upon Varney. Things remain just as they
were; and, after all, situated as he is, if any change had taken place
in matters out of doors, I do not see how he could become acquainted
with them, so that his leaving must have been a matter of mere
calculation, or of impulse at the moment—Heaven knows which—but can
have nothing to do with actual information, because it is quite evident
he could not get it.”
“It is rather strange,” said Charles Holland, “that just as we were
speculating upon the probability of his doing something of this sort,
he should suddenly do it, and in this singular manner too.”
“Oh,” said the old admiral, “I told you I saw his eye, that was enough
for me. I knew he would do something, as well as I know a mainmast from
a chain cable. He can’t help it; it’s in the nature of the beast, and
that’s all you can say about it.”
CHAPTER XCII.
THE MISADVENTURE OF THE DOCTOR WITH THE PICTURE.
The situation of Dr. Chillingworth and Jack Pringle was not of that
character that permitted much conversation or even congratulation.
They were victors it was true, and yet they had but little to boast of
besides the victory.
Victory is a great thing; it is like a gilded coat, it bewilders and
dazzles. Nobody can say much when you are victorious. What a sound! and
yet how much misery is there not hidden beneath it.
This victory of the worthy doctor and his aid amounted to this, they
were as they were before, without being any better, but much the worse,
seeing they were so much buffetted that they could hardly speak, but
sat for some moments opposite to each other, gasping for breath, and
staring each other in the face without speaking.
The moonlight came in through the window and fell upon the floor, and
there were no sounds that came to disturb the stillness of the scene,
nor any object that moved to cast a shadow upon the floor. All was
still and motionless, save the two victors, who were much distressed
and bruised.
“Well!” said Jack Pringle, with a hearty execration, as he wiped his
face with the back of his hand; “saving your presence, doctor, we are
masters of the field, doctor; but it’s plaguey like capturing an empty
bandbox after a hard fight.”
“But we have got the picture, Jack—we have got the picture, you see,
and that is something. I am sure we saved that.”
“Well, that may be; and a pretty d—d looking picture it is after all.
Why, it’s enough to frighten a lady into the sulks. I think it would be
a very good thing if it were burned.”
“Well,” said the doctor, “I would sooner see it burned than in the
hands of that——”
“What?” exclaimed Jack.
“I don’t know,” said Mr. Chillingworth; “but thief I should say, for it
was somewhat thief-like to break into another man’s house and carry off
the furniture.”
“A pirate—a regular land shark.”
“Something that is not the same as an honest man, Jack; but, at all
events, we have beaten him back this time.”
“Yes,” said Jack, “the ship’s cleared; no company is better than bad
company, doctor.”
“So it is, and yet it don’t seem clear in terms. But, Jack, if you
hadn’t come in time, I should have been but scurvily treated. He was
too powerful for me; I was as nigh being killed as ever I have been;
but you were just in time to save me.”
“Well, he was a large, ugly fellow, sure enough, and looked like an old
tree.”
“Did you see him?”
“Yes, to be sure I did.”
“Well, I could not catch a glimpse of his features. In fact, I was
too much employed to see anything, and it was much too dark to notice
anything particular, even if I had had leisure.”
“Why, you had as much to do as you could well manage, I must say that,
at all events. I didn’t see much of him myself; only he was a tall,
out-of-the-way sort of chap—a long-legged shark. He gave me such a dig
or two as I haven’t had for a long while, nor don’t want to get again;
though I don’t care if I face the devil himself. A man can’t do more
than do his best, doctor.”
“No, Jack; but there are very few who do do their best, and that’s the
truth. You have, and have done it to some purpose too. But I have had
enough for one day; he was almost strong enough to contend against us
both.”
“Yes, so he was.”
“And, besides that, he almost carried away the picture—that was a great
hindrance to him. Don’t you think we could have held him if we had not
been fighting over the picture?”
“Yes, to be sure we could; we could have gone at him bodily, and held
him. He would not have been able to use his hands. We could have hung
on him, and I am sure if I came to grapple yard-arm and yard-arm, he
would have told a different tale; however, that is neither here nor
there. How long had you been here?”
“Not very long,” replied the doctor, whose head was a little confused
by the blows which he had received. “I can’t now tell how long, but
only a short time, I think.”
“Where did he come from?” inquired Jack.
“Come from, Jack?”
“Yes, doctor, where did he came from?—the window, I suppose—the same
way he went out, I dare say—it’s most likely.”
“Oh, no, no; he come down from behind the picture. There’s some mystery
in that picture, I’ll swear to it; it’s very strange he should make
such a desperate attempt to carry it away.”
“Yes; one would think,” said Jack, “there was more in it than we can
see—that it is worth more than we can believe; perhaps somebody sets
particular store by it.”
“I don’t know,” said Mr. Chillingworth, shaking his head, “I don’t know
how that may be; but certain it is, the picture was the object of his
visit here—that is very certain.”
“It was; he was endeavouring to carry it off,” said Jack; “it would be
a very good ornament to the black hole at Calcutta.”
“The utility of putting it where it cannot be seen,” remarked Mr.
Chillingworth, “I cannot very well see; though I dare say it might be
all very well.”
“Yes—its ugly features would be no longer seen; so far, it would be a
good job. But are you going to remain here all night, and so make a
long watch of it, doctor?”
“Why, Jack,” said the doctor, “I did intend watching here; but now the
game is disturbed, it is of no use remaining here. We have secured the
picture, and now there will be no need of remaining in the house; in
fact, there is no fear of robbery now.”
“Not so long as we are here,” said Jack Pringle; “the smugglers won’t
show a head while the revenue cutter is on the look out.”
“Certainly not, Jack,” said Mr. Chillingworth; “I think we have scared
them away—the picture is safe.”
“Yes—so long as we are here.”
“And longer, too, I hope.”
Jack shook his head, as much as to intimate that he had many doubts
upon such a point, and couldn’t be hurried into any concession of
opinion of the safety of such a picture as that—much as he disliked it,
and as poor an opinion as he had of it.
“Don’t you think it will be safe?”
“No,” said Jack.
“And why not?” said Mr. Chillingworth, willing to hear what Jack could
advance against the opinion he had expressed, especially as he had
disturbed the marauder in the very act of robbery.
“Why, you’ll be watched by this very man; and when you are gone, he
will return in safety, and take this plaguey picture away with him.”
“Well, he might do so,” said Mr. Chillingworth, after some thought; “he
even endangered his own escape for the purpose of carrying it off.”
“He wants it,” said Jack.
“What, the picture?”
“Aye, to be sure; do you think anybody would have tried so hard to get
away with it? He wants it; and the long and the short of it is, he will
have it, despite all that can be done to prevent it; that’s my opinion.”
“Well, there is much truth in that; but what to do I don’t know.”
“Take it to the cottage,” suggested Jack. “The picture must be more
than we think for; suppose we carry it along.”
“That is no bad plan of yours, Jack,” said Mr. Chillingworth; “and,
though a little awkward, yet it is not the worst I have heard;
but—but—what will they say, when they see this frightful face in that
quiet, yet contented house?”
“Why, they’ll say you brought it,” said Jack; “I don’t see what else
they can say, but that you have done well; besides, when you come to
explain, you will make the matter all right to ’em.”
“Yes, yes,” said Chillingworth; “and, as the picture now seems to be
the incomprehensible object of attack, I will secure that, at all
events.”
“I’ll help you.”
“Thank you, Jack; your aid will be welcome; at least, it was so just
now.”
“All right, doctor,” said Jack. “I may be under your hands some day.”
“I’ll physic you for nothing,” said Mr. Chillingworth. “You saved my
life. One good turn deserves another; I’ll not forget.”
“Thank you,” said Jack, as he made a wry face. “I hope you won’t have
occasion. I’d sooner have a can of grog than any bottle of medicine you
can give me; I ain’t ungrateful, neither.”
“You needn’t name it; I am getting my breath again. I suppose we had
better leave this place, as soon as we conveniently can.”
“Exactly. The sooner the better; we can take it the more leisurely as
we go.”
The moon was up; there were no clouds now, but there was not a very
strong light, because the moon was on the wane. It was one of those
nights during which an imperceptible vapour arises, and renders the
moon somewhat obscure, or, at least, it robs the earth of her rays; and
then there were shadows cast by the moon, yet they grew fainter, and
those cast upon the floor of the apartment were less distinct than at
first.
There seemed scarce a breath of air stirring; everything was quiet
and still; no motion—no sound, save that of the breathing of the two
who sat in that mysterious apartment, who gazed alternately round the
place, and then in each other’s countenances. Suddenly, the silence of
the night was disturbed by a very slight, but distinct noise, which
struck upon them with peculiar distinctness; it was a gentle tap, tap,
at the window, as if some one was doing it with their fingernail.
They gazed on each other, for some moments, in amazement, and then at
the window, but they saw nothing; and yet, had there been anything,
they must have seen it, but there was not even a shadow.
“Well,” said Mr. Chillingworth, after he had listened to the tap, tap,
several times, without being able to find out or imagine what it could
arise from, “what on earth can it be?”
“Don’t know,” said Jack, very composedly, squinting up at the window.
“Can’t see anything.”
“Well, but it must be something,” persisted Mr. Chillingworth; “it must
be something.”
“I dare say it is; but I don’t see anything. I can’t think what it can
be, unless——”
“Unless what? Speak out,” said the doctor, impatiently.
“Why, unless it is Davy Jones himself, tapping with his long
finger-nails, a-telling us as how we’ve been too long already here.”
“Then, I presume, we may as well go; and yet I am more disposed to deem
it some device of the enemy to dislodge us from this place, for the
purpose of enabling them to effect some nefarious scheme or other they
have afloat.”
“It may be, and is, I dare say, a do of some sort or other,” said Jack;
“but what can it be?”
“There it is again,” said the doctor; “don’t you hear it? I can, as
plain as I can hear myself.”
“Yes,” said Jack; “I can hear it plain enough, and can see it, too; and
that is more. Yes, yes, I can tell all about it plain enough.”
“You can? Well, then, shew me,” said the doctor, as he strode up to the
window, before which Jack was standing gazing upon one particular spot
of the shattered window with much earnestness.
“Where is it?”
“Look there,” said Jack, pointing with his finger to a particular spot,
to which the doctor directed his attention, expecting to see a long,
skinny hand tapping against the glass; but he saw nothing.
“Where is it?”
“Do you see that twig of ivy, or something of the sort?” inquired Jack.
“Yes, I do.”
“Very well, watch that; and when the wind catches it—and there is but
very little—it lifts it up, and then, falling down again, it taps the
glass.”
Just as he spoke, there came a slight gust of wind; and it gave a
practical illustration to his words; for the tapping was heard as often
as the plant was moved by the wind.
“Well,” said Mr. Chillingworth, “however simple and unimportant the
matter may be, yet I cannot but say I am always well pleased to find
a practical explanation of it, so that there will be no part left in
doubt.”
“There is none about that,” said Jack.
“None. Well, we are not beset, then. We may as well consider of the
manner of our getting clear of this place. What sort of burthen this
picture may be I know not; but I will make the attempt to carry it.”
“Avast, there,” said Jack; “I will carry it; at all events, I’ll take
the first spell, and, if I can’t go on, we’ll turn and turn about.”
“We can divide the weight from the first, and then neither of us will
be tired at all.”
“Just as you please, sir,” said Jack Pringle. “I am willing to obey
orders; and, if we are to get in to-night before they are all a-bed, we
had better go at once; and then we shall not disturb them.”
“Good, Jack,” said Mr. Chillingworth; “very good; let us begin to beat
our retreat at once.”
“Very good,” said Jack.
They both rose and approached the picture, which stood up in one
corner, half reclining against the wall; the light, at least so much as
there was, fell upon it, and gave it a ghastly and deathly hue, which
made Mr. Chillingworth feel an emotion he could not at all understand;
but, as soon as he could, he withdrew his eyes from off the picture,
and they proceeded to secure it with some cord, so that they might
carry it between them the easier—with less trouble and more safety.
These preparations did not take long in making, and, when completed,
they gave another inquiring look round the chamber, and Mr.
Chillingworth again approached the window, and gazed out upon the
garden below, but saw nothing to attract his attention.
Turning away, he came to the picture, with which Jack Pringle had been
standing. They proceeded towards the stairs, adopting every precaution
they could take to prevent any surprise and any attempt upon the object
of their solicitude.
Then they came to the great hall, and, having opened the door, they
carried it out; then shutting the door, they both stood outside of
Bannerworth Hall; and, before taking the picture up in their hands,
they once more looked suspiciously around them.
There was nothing to be seen, and so, shouldering the ominous portrait,
they proceeded along the garden till they conveyed it into the roadway.
“Now,” said Jack, “we are off; we can scud along under press of sail,
you know.”
“I would rather not,” said the doctor, “for two reasons; one of which
is, I can’t do it myself, and the other is, we should run the risk of
injuring the picture; besides this, there is no reason for so doing.”
“Very well,” said Jack, “make it agreeable to yourself, doctor. See
you, Jack’s alive, and I am willing to do all I can to help you.”
“I am very glad of your aid,” said Mr. Chillingworth; “so we will
proceed slowly. I shall be glad when we are there; for there are few
things more awkward than this picture to carry.”
“It is not heavy,” said Jack, giving it a hitch up, that first pulled
the doctor back, and then pushed him forward again.
“No; but stop, don’t do that often, Jack, or else I shall be obliged to
let go, to save myself from falling,” said the doctor.
“Very sorry,” said Jack; “hope it didn’t inconvenience you; but I could
carry this by myself.”
“And so could I,” returned Mr. Chillingworth; “but the probability is
there would be some mischief done to it, and then we should be doing
more harm than good.”
“So we should,” said Jack.
They proceeded along with much care and caution. It was growing late
now, and no one was about—at least, they met none. People did not roam
about much after dark, especially since the reports of the vampyre
became current, for, notwithstanding all their bravery and violence
while in a body, yet to meet and contend with him singly, and unseen,
was not at all a popular notion among them; indeed, they would sooner
go a mile out of their way, or remain in doors, which they usually did.
The evening was not precisely dark, there was moonlight enough to
save it from that, but there was a mist hanging about, that rendered
objects, at a short distance, very indistinct.
Their walk was uninterrupted by any one, and they had got through half
the distance without any disturbance or interruption whatever.
When they arrived at the precincts of the village, Jack Pringle said to
Dr. Chillingworth, “Do you intend going through the village, doctor?”
“Why not? there will be nobody about, and if there should be, we shall
be safe enough from any molestation, seeing there are none here who
would dare to harm us; it is the shortest way, too.”
“Very good,” said Jack; “I am agreeable, and as for any one harming
me, they know better; but, at all events, there’s company, and there’s
less danger, you know, doctor; though I’m always company to myself, but
haven’t any objection to a messmate, now and then.”
They pursued their way in silence, for some distance, the doctor not
caring about continuing the talk of Jack, which amounted to nothing;
besides, he had too much to do, for, notwithstanding the lightness of
the picture, which Jack had endeavoured to persuade the doctor of, he
found it was heavy and ungainly; indeed, had he been by himself he
would have had some trouble to have got it away.
“We are nearly there,” said Jack, putting down his end of the picture,
which brought Doctor Chillingworth to a standstill.
“Yes, we are; but what made you stop?”
“Why, you see,” said Jack, giving his trowsers a hitch, “as I said
before, we are nearly there.”
“Well, what of that? we intended to go there, did we not?” inquired
Chillingworth.
“Yes, exactly; that is, you intended to do so, I know, but I didn’t.”
“What do you mean by that?” inquired Chillingworth; “you are a complete
riddle to-night, Jack; what is the matter with you?”
“Nothing; only, you see, I don’t want to go into the cottage, ’cause,
you see, the admiral and I have had what you may call a bit of a
growl, and I am in disgrace there a little, though I don’t know why,
or wherefore; I always did my duty by him, as I did by my country. The
ould man, however, takes fits into his head; at the same time I shall
take some too; Jack’s as good as his master, ashore, at all events.”
“Well, then, you object to go in?” said Chillingworth.
“That is the state of the case; not that I’m afraid, or have any
cause to be ashamed of myself; but I don’t want to make anybody else
uncomfortable, by causing black looks.”
“Very well, Jack,” said the doctor. “I am much obliged to you, and, if
you don’t like to come, I won’t press you against your inclination.”
“I understand, doctor. I will leave you here, if you can manage the
rest of the way by yourself; there are not two hundred yards now to go,
so you are all safe; so good bye.”
“Good bye, Jack,” said Doctor Chillingworth, who stood wiping his
forehead, whilst the picture was standing up against the poles.
“Do you want a hand up first?”
“No, thank you; I can get it up very well without any trouble—it’s not
so heavy.”
“Good bye, then,” said Jack; and, in a few moments more, Jack Pringle
was out of sight, and the doctor was alone with the ominous picture.
He had not far to go, and was within hail of the cottage; but it was
late, and yet he believed he should find them up, for the quietude and
calmness of the evening hour was that which most chimed with their
feelings. At such a time they could look out upon the face of nature,
and the freedom of thought appeared the greater, because there was no
human being to clash with the silence and stillness of the scene.
“Well,” muttered Chillingworth, “I’ll go at once to the cottage with my
burthen. How they will look at me, and wonder what could induce me to
bring this away. I can hardly help smiling at the thought of how they
will look at the apparition I shall make.”
Thus filled with notions that appeared to please him, the doctor
shouldered the picture, and walked slowly along until he reached the
dead wall that ran up to the entrance, or nearly so, of the gardens.
There was a plantation of young trees that overhung the path, and cast
a deep shadow below—a pleasant spot in hot weather.
The doctor had been carrying the picture, resting the side of it
on the small of his arm, and against his shoulder; but this was an
inconvenient posture, because the weight of the picture cut his arm so
much, that he was compelled to pause, and shift it more on his shoulder.
“There,” he muttered, “that will do for the present, and last until I
reach the cottage garden.”
He was proceeding along at a slow and steady pace, bestowing all his
care and attention to the manner of holding the picture, when he was
suddenly paralysed by the sound of a great shout of such a peculiar
character, that he involuntarily stopped, and the next moment,
something heavy came against him with great force, just as if a man had
jumped from the wall on to him.
[Illustration: The attacker leaps from the garden wall to the
doctor’s back.]
This was the truth, for, in another moment, and before he could recover
himself, he found that there was an attempt to deprive him of the
picture.
This at once aroused him, and he made an instant and a vigorous
defence; but he was compelled to let go his hold of the picture, and
turn to resist the infuriated attack that was now commenced upon
himself.
For some moments it was doubtful who would be the victor; but the wind
and strength of the doctor were not enough to resist the powerful
adversary against whom he had to contend, and the heavy blows that were
showered down upon him.
At first he was enabled to bear up against this attack; and then he
returned many of the blows with interest; but the stunning effect of
the blows he received himself, was such that he could not help himself,
and felt his senses gradually failing, his strength becoming less and
less.
In a short time, he received such a blow, that he was laid senseless on
the earth in an instant.
How long he remained thus he could not say; but it could not have been
long, for all around him seemed just as it was before he was attacked.
The moon had scarcely moved, and the shadows, such as they were, were
falling in the same direction as before.
“I have not been long here,” he muttered, after a few moments’
reflection; “but—but——”
He stopped short; for, on looking around him, he saw the object of his
solicitude was gone. The picture was nowhere to be seen. It had been
carried off the instant he had been vanquished.
“Gone!” he said, in a low, disconsolate tone; “and after all I have
done!”
He wiped his hand across his brow, and finding it cut, he looked at the
back of his hand, and saw by the deep colour that it was blood, indeed,
he could now feel it trickle down his face.
What to do he hardly knew; he could stand, and after having got upon
his feet, he staggered back against the wall, against which he leaned
for support, and afterwards he crept along with the aid of its support,
until he came to the door.
He was observed from the window, where Henry and Charles Holland,
seeing him come up with such an unsteady gait, rushed to the door to
ascertain what was the matter.
“What, doctor!” exclaimed Henry Bannerworth; “what is the matter?”
“I am almost dead, I think,” said Chillingworth. “Lend me your arm,
Henry.”
Henry and Charles Holland immediately stepped out, and took him between
them into the parlour, and placed him upon a couch.
“What on earth has happened, doctor?—have you got into disgrace with
the populace?”
“No, no; give me some drink—some water, I am very faint—very faint.”
“Give him some wine, or, what’s better, some grog,” said the admiral.
“Why, he’s been yard-arm with some pirate or other, and he’s damaged
about the figure-head. You ain’t hurt in your lower works, are you,
doctor?” said the admiral.
But the doctor took no notice of the inquiry; but eagerly sipped the
contents of a glass that Charles Holland had poured out of a bottle
containing some strong Hollands, and which appeared to nerve him much.
“There!” said the admiral, “that will do you good. How did all this
damage to your upper works come about, eh?”
“Let him wash his face and hands first; he will be better able to talk
afterwards.”
“Oh, thank you,” said Chillingworth. “I am much better; but I have had
some hard bruises.”
“How did it happen?”
“I went by myself to watch in the room where the picture was in
Bannerworth Hall.”
“Where the picture was!” said Henry; “where it is, you mean, do you
not, doctor?”
“No; where it was, and where it is not now.”
“Gone!”
“Yes, gone away; I’ll tell you all about it. I went there to watch,
but found nobody or nothing there; but suddenly a man stepped out from
behind the picture, and we had a fight over it; after which, just as I
was getting the worst of it, Jack Pringle came in.”
“The dog!” muttered the admiral.
“Yes, he came in just in time, I believe, to save my life; for the man,
whoever he was, would not have hesitated about it.”
“Well, Jack is a good man,” said the admiral; “there may be worse, at
least.”
“Well, we had a desperate encounter for some minutes, during which this
fellow wanted to carry off the picture.”
“Carry off the picture?”
“Yes; we had a struggle for that; but we could not capture him; he was
so violent that he broke away and got clear off.”
“With the picture?”
“No, he left the picture behind. Well, we were very tired and bruised,
and we sat down to recover ourselves from our fatigue, and to consider
what was best to be done; but we were some time before we could leave,
and then we determined that we would take the picture away with us, as
it seemed to be coveted by the robber, for what object we cannot tell.”
“Well, well—where is the picture?”
“You shall hear all about it in a minute, if you’ll let me take my
time. I am tired and sore. Well, we brought the picture out, and Jack
helped me carry it till he came within a couple of hundred yards of the
cottage, and there left me.”
“The lubber!” said the admiral, interjectionally.
“Well, I rested awhile, and then taking the picture on my shoulders, I
proceeded along with it until I came to the wall, when suddenly I heard
a great shout, and then down came something heavy upon me, just as if a
man had jumped down upon me.”
“And—and——”
“Yes,” said the doctor, “it was——”
“Was what?” inquired the admiral.
“Just what you all seemed to anticipate; you are all before me, but
that was it.”
“A man?”
“Yes; I had a struggle with him, and got nearly killed, for I am not
equal to him in strength. I was sadly knocked about, and finally all
the senses were knocked out of me, and I was, I suppose, left for dead.”
“And what became of the picture?”
“I don’t know; but I suppose it was taken away, as, when I came to
myself, it was gone; indeed, I have some faint recollection of seeing
him seize the portrait as I was falling.”
There was a pause of some moments, during which all the party appeared
to be employed with their own thoughts, and the whole were silent.
“Do you think it was the same man who attacked you in the house that
obtained the picture?” at last inquired Henry Bannerworth.
“I cannot say, but I think it most probable that it was the same;
indeed, the general appearance, as near as I could tell in the dark,
was the same; but what I look upon as much stronger is, the object
appears to be the same in both cases.”
“That is very true,” said Henry Bannerworth—“very true; and I think it
more than probable myself. But come, doctor, you will require rest and
nursing after your dangers.”
CHAPTER XCIII.
THE ALARM AT ANDERBURY.—THE SUSPICIONS OF THE BANNERWORTH FAMILY, AND
THE MYSTERIOUS COMMUNICATION.
About twenty miles to the southward of Bannerworth Hall was a
good-sized market-town, called Anderbury. It was an extensive and
flourishing place, and from the beauty of its situation, and its
contiguity to the southern coast of England, it was much admired; and,
in consequence, numerous mansions and villas of great pretension had
sprang up in its immediate neighbourhood.
Besides, there were some estates of great value, and one of these,
called Anderbury-on-the-Mount, in consequence of the mansion itself,
which was of an immense extent, being built upon an eminence, was to be
let, or sold.
This town of Anderbury was remarkable not only for the beauty of its
aspect, but likewise for the quiet serenity of its inhabitants, who
were a prosperous, thriving race, and depended very much upon their own
resources.
There were some peculiar circumstances why Anderbury-on-the-Mount was
to let. It had been for a great number of years in possession of a
family of the name of Milltown, who had resided there in great comfort
and respectability, until an epidemic disorder broke out, first among
the servants, and then spreading to the junior branches of the family,
and from them to their seniors, produced such devastation, that in the
course of three weeks there was but one young man left of the whole
family, and he, by native vigour of constitution, had baffled the
disorder, and found himself alone in his ancestral halls, the last of
his race.
Soon a settled melancholy took possession of him, and all that had
formerly delighted him now gave him pain, inasmuch as it brought to his
mind a host of recollections of the most agonising character.
In vain was it that the surrounding gentry paid him every possible
attention, and endeavoured to do all that was in their power to
alleviate the unhappy circumstances in which he was placed. If he
smiled, it was in a sad sort, and that was very seldom; and at length
he announced his intention of leaving the neighbourhood, and seeking
abroad, and in change of scene, for that solace which he could not
expect to find in his ancestral home, after what had occurred within
its ancient walls.
There was not a chamber but which reminded him of the past—there was
not a tree or a plant of any kind or description but which spoke to him
plainly of those who were now no more, and whose merry laughter had
within his own memory made that ancient place echo with glee, filling
the sunny air with the most gladsome shouts, such as come from the
lips of happy youth long before the world has robbed it of any of its
romance or its beauty.
There was a general feeling of regret when this young man announced the
fact of his departure to a foreign land; for he was much respected, and
the known calamities which he had suffered, and the grief under which
he laboured, invested his character with a great and painful interest.
An entertainment was given to him upon the eve of his departure, and
on the next day he was many miles from the place, and the estate of
Anderbury-on-the-Mount was understood to be sold or let.
The old mansion had remained, then, for a year or two vacant, for it
was a place of too much magnitude, and required by far too expensive an
establishment to keep it going, to enable any person whose means were
not very large to think of having anything to do with it.
So, therefore, it remained unlet, and wearing that gloomy aspect which
a large house, untenanted, so very quickly assumes.
It was quite a melancholy thing to look upon it, and to think what it
must have once been, and what it might be still, compared to what it
actually was; and the inhabitants of the neighbourhood had made up
their minds that Anderbury-on-the-Mount would remain untenanted for
many a year to come, and, perhaps, ultimately fall into ruin and decay.
But in this they were doomed to be disappointed, for, on the evening of
a dull and gloomy day, about one week after the events we have recorded
as taking place at Bannerworth Hall and its immediate neighbourhood, a
travelling carriage, with four horses and an out-rider, came dashing
into the place, and drew up at the principal inn in the town, which was
called the Anderbury Arms.
The appearance of such an equipage, although not the most unusual thing
in the world, in consequence of the many aristocratic families who
resided in the neighbourhood, caused, at all events, some sensation,
and, perhaps, the more so because it drove up to the inn instead of
to any of the mansions of the neighbourhood, thereby showing that the
stranger, whoever he was, came not as a visitor, but either merely
baited in the town, being on his road somewhere else, or had some
special business in it which would soon be learned.
The out-rider, who was in handsome livery, had gallopped on in advance
of the carriage a short distance, for the purpose of ordering the best
apartments in the inn to be immediately prepared for the reception of
his master.
“Who is he?” asked the landlord.
“It’s the Baron Stolmuyer Saltsburgh.”
“Bless my heart, I never heard of him before; where did he come
from—somewhere abroad I suppose?”
“I can’t tell you anything of him further than that he is immensely
rich, and is looking for a house. He has heard that there is one to let
in this immediate neighbourhood, and that’s what has brought him from
London, I suppose.”
“Yes, there is one; and it is called Anderbury-on-the-Mount.”
“Well, he will very likely speak to you about it himself, for here he
comes.”
By this time the carriage had halted at the door of the hotel, and, the
door being opened, and the steps lowered, there alighted from it a tall
man attired in a kind of pelisse, or cloak, trimmed with rich fur, the
body of it being composed of velvet. Upon his head he wore a travelling
cap, and his fingers, as he grasped the cloak around him, were seen to
be covered with rings of great value.
Such a personage, coming in such style, was, of course, likely to
be honoured in every possible way by the landlord of the inn, and
accordingly he was shown most obsequiously to the handsomest apartment
in the house, and the whole establishment was put upon the alert to
attend to any orders he might choose to give.
He had not been long in the place when he sent for the landlord,
who, hastily scrambling on his best coat, and getting his wife to
arrange the tie of his neckcloth, proceeded to obey the orders of his
illustrious guest, whatever they might chance to be.
He found the Baron Stolmuyer reclining upon a sofa, and having
thrown aside his velvet cloak, trimmed with rich fur, he showed that
underneath it he wore a costume of great richness and beauty, although,
certainly, the form it covered was not calculated to set it off to any
great advantage, for the baron was merely skin and bone, and looked
like a man who had just emerged from a long illness, for his face was
ghastly pale, and the landlord could not help observing that there was
a strange peculiarity about his eyes, the reason of which he could not
make out.
“You are the landlord of this inn, I presume,” said the baron, “and,
consequently, no doubt well acquainted with the neighbourhood?”
“I have the honour to be all that, sir. I have been here about sixteen
years, and in that time I certainly ought to know something of the
neighbourhood.”
“’Tis well; some one told me there was a little cottage sort of place
to let here, and as I am simple and retired in my habits I thought that
it might possibly suit me.”
“A little cottage, sir! There are certainly little cottages to let,
but not such as would suit you; and if I might have presumed, sir, to
think, I should have considered Anderbury-on-the-Mount, which is now
to let, would have been the place for you. It is a large place, sir,
and belonged to a good family, although they are now all dead and gone,
except one, and it’s he who wants to let the old place.”
“Anderbury-on-the-Mount,” said the baron, “was the name of the place
mentioned to me; but I understood it was a little place.”
“Oh! sir, that is quite a mistake; who told you so? It’s the largest
place about here; there are a matter of twenty-seven rooms in it, and
it stands altogether upon three hundred acres of ground.”
“And have you the assurance,” said the baron, “to call that anything
but a cottage, when the castle of the Stolmuyers, at Saltzburgh, has
one suite of reception rooms thirty in number, opening into each other,
and the total number of apartments in the whole building is two hundred
and sixty, it is surrounded by eight miles of territory.”
“The devil!” said the landlord. “I beg your pardon, sir, but when I am
astonished, I generally say the devil. They want eight hundred pounds a
year for Anderbury-on-the-Mount.”
“A mere trifle. I will sleep here to-night, and in the morning I will
go and look at the place. It is near the sea?”
“Half a mile, sir, exactly, from the beach; and one of the most curious
circumstances of all connected with it is, that there is a subterranean
passage from the grounds leading right away down to the sea-coast. A
most curious place, sir, partly cut out of the cliff, with cellars in
it for wine, and other matters, that in the height of summer are kept
as cool as in the deep winter time. It’s more for curiosity than use,
such a place; and the old couple, that now take care of the house, make
a pretty penny, I’ll be bound, though they won’t own it, by showing
that part of the place.”
“It may suit me, but I shall be able to give a decisive answer when
I see it on the morrow. You will let my attendants have what they
require, and see that my horses be well looked to.”
“Certainly, oh! certainly, sir, of course; you might go far, indeed,
sir, before you found an inn where everything would be done as things
are done here. Is there anything in particular, sir, you would like for
dinner?”
“How can I tell that, idiot, until the dinner time arrives?”
“Well, but, sir, in that case, you know, we scarcely know what to do,
because you see, sir, you understand——”
“It is very strange to me that you can neither see nor understand your
duty. I am accustomed to having the dinner tables spread with all that
money can procure; then I choose, but not before, what it suits me to
partake of.”
[Illustration: The baron meets with the landlord.]
“Well, sir, that is a very good way, and perhaps we ain’t quite so used
to that sort of thing as we ought to be in these parts; but another
time, sir, we shall know better what we are about, without a doubt, and
I only hope, sir, that we shall have you in the neighbourhood for a
long time; and so, sir, putting one thing to another, and then drawing
a conclusion from both of them, you see, sir, you will be able to
understand.”
“Peace! begone! what is the use of all this bellowing to me—I want it
not—I care not for it.”
The baron spoke these words so furiously, that the landlord was rather
terrified than otherwise, and left the room hastily, muttering to
himself that he had never come across such a tiger, and wondering where
the baron could have possibly come from, and what amount of wealth he
could be possessed of, that would enable him to live in such a princely
style as he mentioned.
If the Baron Stolmuyer of Saltzburgh had wished ever so much to impress
upon the minds of all persons in the neighbourhood the fact of his
wealth and importance, he could not have adopted a better plan to
accomplish that object than by first of all impressing such facts upon
the mind of the landlord of the Anderbury Arms, for in the course of
another hour it was tolerably well spread all over the town, that never
had there been such a guest at the Anderbury Arms; and that he called
Anderbury-on-the-Mount, with all its rooms—all its outbuildings, and
its three hundred acres of ground, a cottage.
This news spread like wildfire, awaking no end of speculation, and
giving rise to the most exaggerated rumours, so that a number of
persons came to the inn on purpose to endeavour to get a look at
the baron; but he did not stir from his apartments, so that these
wondermongers were disappointed, and even forced to go away as wise as
they came; but in the majority of cases they made up their minds that
in the morning they should surely be able to obtain a glimpse of him,
which was considered a great treat, for a man with an immense income is
looked upon in England as a natural curiosity.
The landlord took his guest at his word as regards the dinner, and
provided such a repast as seldom, indeed, graced the board at the
Anderbury Arms—a repast sufficient for twenty people, and certainly
which was a monstrous thing to set before one individual.
The baron, however, made no remark, but selected a portion from some
of the dishes, and those dishes that he did select from, were of the
simplest kind, and not such as the landlord expected him to take, so
that he really paid about one hundred times the amount he ought to have
done for what actually passed his lips.
And then what a fidget the landlord was in about his wines, for he
doubted not but such a guest would be extremely critical and hard to
please; but, to his great relief, the baron declined taking any wine,
merely washing down his repast with a tumbler of cool water; and then,
although the hour was very early, he retired at once to rest.
The landlord was not disposed to disregard the injunction which the
baron had given him to attend carefully on his servants and horses,
and after giving orders that nothing should be stinted as regarded
the latter, he himself looked to the creature-comforts of the former,
and he did this with a double motive, for not only was he anxious to
make the most he could out of the baron in the way of charges, but he
was positively panting with curiosity to know more about so singular
a personage, and he thought that surely the servants must be able to
furnish him with some particulars regarding their eccentric master.
In this, however, he was mistaken, for although they told him all they
knew, that amounted to so little as really not to be worth the learning.
They informed him that they had been engaged all in the last week, and
that they knew nothing of the baron whatever, or where he came from, or
what he was, excepting that he paid them most liberal wages, and was
not very exacting in the service he required of them.
This was very unsatisfactory, and when the landlord started on a
mission, which he considered himself bound to perform, to a Mr. Leek,
in the town, who had the letting of Anderbury-on-the-Mount, he was
quite vexed to think what a small amount of information he was able to
carry to him.
“I can tell him,” he said to himself as he went quickly towards the
agent’s residence; “I can tell him the baron’s name, and that in the
morning he wants to look at Anderbury-on-the-Mount; but that’s all I
know of him, except that he is a most extraordinary man—indeed, the
most extraordinary that I ever came near.”
Mr. Leek, the house agent, notwithstanding the deficiency of the facts
contained in the landlord’s statement, was well enough satisfied to
hear that any one of apparent wealth was inquiring after the large
premises to let, for, as he said truly to the landlord,—
“The commission on letting and receiving the rentals of such a property
is no joke to me.”
“Precisely,” said the landlord. “I thought it was better to come and
tell you at once, for there can be no doubt that he is enormously rich.”
“If that be satisfactorily proved, it’s of no consequence what he is,
or who he is, and you may depend I shall be round to the inn early in
the morning to attend upon him; and in that case, perhaps, if you have
any conversation with him, you will be so good as to mention that I
will show him over the premises at his own hour, and you shall not be
forgotten, you may depend, if any arrangement is actually come to. It
will be just as well for you to tell him what a nice property it is,
and that it is to be let for eight hundred a year, or sold outright for
eight thousand pounds.”
“I will, you may depend, Mr. Leek. A most extraordinary man you will
find him; not the handsomest in the world, I can tell you, but handsome
is as handsome does, say I; and, if he takes Anderbury-on-the-Mount, I
have no doubt but he will spend a lot of money in the neighbourhood,
and we shall all be the better of that, of course, as you well know,
sir.”
This then was thoroughly agreed upon between these high contracting
powers, and the landlord returned home very well satisfied, indeed,
with the position in which he had put the affair, and resolved upon
urging on the baron, as far as it lay within his power so to do,
to establish himself in the neighbourhood, and to allow him to be
purveyor-in-general to his household, which, if the baron continued in
his liberal humour, would be unquestionably a very pleasant post to
occupy.
CHAPTER XCIV.
THE VISITOR, AND THE DEATH IN THE SUBTERRANEAN PASSAGE.
About an hour and a half after the baron had retired to rest, and while
the landlord was still creeping about enjoining silence on the part of
the establishment, so that the slumbers of a wealthy and, no doubt,
illustrious personage should not be disturbed, there arrived a horseman
at the Anderbury Arms.
He was rather a singular-looking man, with a shifting, uneasy-looking
glance, as if he were afraid of being suddenly pounced upon and
surprised by some one; and although his apparel was plain, yet it
was good in quality, and his whole appearance was such as to induce
respectful attention.
The only singular circumstance was, that such a traveller, so well
mounted, should be alone; but that might have been his own fancy, so
that the absence of an attendant went for nothing. Doubtless, if the
whole inn had not been in such a commotion about the illustrious and
wealthy baron, this stranger would have received more consideration and
attention than he did.
Upon alighting, he walked at once into what is called the coffee-room
of the hotel, and after ordering some refreshments, of which he partook
but sparingly, he said, in a mild but solemn sort of tone, to the
waiter who attended upon him,—
“Tell the Baron Stolmuyer, of Saltzburgh, that there is one here who
wants to see him.”
“I beg your pardon, sir,” said the waiter, “but the baron is gone to
bed.”
“It matters not to me. If you nor no one else in this establishment
will deliver the message I charge you with, I must do so myself.”
“I’ll speak to my master, sir; but the baron is a very great gentleman
indeed, and I don’t think my master would like to have him disturbed.”
The stranger hesitated for a time, and then he said,—
“Show me the baron’s apartment. Perhaps I ought not to ask any one
person connected with this establishment to disturb him, when I am
quite willing to do so myself. Show me the way.”
“Well, but, sir, the baron may get in a rage, and say, very naturally,
that we had no business to let anybody walk up to his room and disturb
him, because we wouldn’t do so ourselves. So that you see, sir, when
you come to consider, it hardly seems the right sort of thing.”
“Since,” said the stranger, rising, “I cannot procure even the common
courtesy of being shown to the apartment of the person whom I seek, I
must find him myself.”
As he spoke he walked out of the room, and began ascending the
staircase, despite the remonstrances of the waiter, who called after
him repeatedly, but could not induce him to stop; and when he found
that such was the case, he made his way to the landlord, to give the
alarm that, for all he knew to the contrary, some one had gone up
stairs to murder the baron.
This information threw the landlord into such a fix, that he knew
not what to be at. At one moment he was for rushing up stairs and
endeavouring to interfere, and at another he thought the best plan
would be to pretend that he knew nothing about it.
While he was in this state of uncertainty, the stranger succeeded
in making his way up stairs to the floor from which proceeded the
bedrooms, and, apparently, having no fear whatever of the Baron
Stolmuyer’s indignation before his eyes, he opened door after door,
until he came to one which led him into the apartment occupied by that
illustrious individual.
The baron, half undressed only, lay in an uneasy slumber upon the
bed, and the stranger stood opposite to him for some minutes, as if
considering what he should do.
“It would be easy,” he said, “to kill him; but it will pay me better to
spare him. I may be wrong in supposing that he has the means which I
hope he has; but that I shall soon discover by his conversation.”
Stretching out his hand, he tapped the baron lightly on the shoulder,
who thereupon opened his eyes and sprang to his feet instantly,
glancing with fixed earnestness at the intruder, upon whose face shone
the light of a lamp which was burning in the apartment.
Then the baron shrunk back, and the stranger, folding his arms, said,—
“You know me. Let our interview be as brief as possible. There needs
no explanations between us, for we both know all that could be said. By
some accident you have become rich, while I continue quite otherwise.
It matters not how this has occurred, the fact is everything. I don’t
know the amount of your possessions; but, from your style of living,
they must be great, and therefore it is that I make no hesitation in
asking of you, as a price for not exposing who and what you are, a
moderate sum.”
“I thought that you were dead.”
“I know you did; but you behold me here, and, consequently, that
delusion vanishes.”
“What sum do you require, and what assurance can I have that, when you
get it, the demand will not be repeated on the first opportunity?”
“I can give you no such assurance, perhaps, that would satisfy you
entirely; but, for more reasons than I choose to enter into, I am
extremely anxious to leave England at once and forever. Give me the
power to do so that I require, and you will never hear of me again.”
The baron hesitated for some few seconds, during which he looked
scrutinizingly at his companion, and then he said, in a tone of voice
that seemed as if he were making the remark to himself rather than to
the other,—
“You look no older than you did when last we parted, and that was years
ago.”
“Why should I look older? You know as well as I that I need not. But,
to be brief, I do not wish to interfere with any plans or projects you
may have on hand. I do not wish to be a hindrance to you. Let me have
five thousand pounds, and I am off at once and forever, I tell you.”
“Five thousand! the man raves—five thousand pounds! Say one thousand,
and it is yours.”
“No; I have fixed my price; and if you do not consent, I now tell you
that I will blazon forth, even in this house, who and what you are;
and, let your schemes of ambition or of cupidity be what they may, you
may be assured that I will blast them all.”
“This is no place in which to argue such a point; come out into the
open air; ‘walls have ears;’ but come out, and I will give you such
special reasons why you should not now press your claim at all, that
you shall feel much beholden to me for them, and not regret your visit.”
“If that we come to terms, I no more desire than you can do that any
one should overhear our conversation. I prefer the open air for any
conference, be it whatever it may—much prefer it; and therefore most
willingly embrace your proposition. Come out.”
The baron put on his travelling cap, and the rich velvet cloak, edged
with fur, that he possessed, and leaving his chamber a few paces in
advance of his strange visitor, he descended the staircase, followed
by him. In the hall of the hotel they found the landlord and almost
the whole of the establishment assembled, in deep consultation as
to whether or not any one was to go up stairs and ascertain if the
stranger who had sought the baron’s chamber was really a friend or an
enemy.
But when they saw the two men coming down, at all events apparently
amicably, it was a great relief, and the landlord rushed forward and
opened the door, for which piece of service he got a very stately bow
from the baron, and a slight inclination of the head from his visitor,
and then they both passed out.
“I have ascertained,” said the man who came on horseback, “that for
the last week in London you have lived in a style of the most princely
magnificence, and that you came down here, attended as if you were one
of the first nobles of the land.”
“These things amuse the vulgar,” said the baron. “I do not mind
admitting to you that I contemplate residing on this spot, and perhaps
contracting a marriage.”
“Another marriage?”
“And why not? If wives will die suddenly, and no one knows why, who is
to help it. I do not pretend to control the fates.”
“This, between us, is idle talk indeed—most idle; for we know there are
certain circumstances which account for the strangest phenomena; but
what roaring sound is that which comes so regularly and steadily upon
the ear.”
“It is the sea washing upon the coast. The tide is no doubt advancing,
and, as the eddying surges roll in upon the pebbly shore, they make
what, to my mind, is this pleasant music.”
“I did not think we were so near the ocean. The moon is rising; let
us walk upon the beach, and as that sound is such pleasant music, you
shall hear it while I convince you what unpleasant consequences will
arise from a refusal of the modest and moderate terms I offer you.”
“We shall see, we shall see; but I must confess it does seem to me
most extraordinary that you ask of me a positive fortune, for fear you
should deprive me of a portion of one; but you cannot mean what you
say.”
While they were talking they reached a long strip of sand which was by
the seashore, at the base of some cliffs, through which was excavated
the passage from the coast into the grounds of Anderbury House, and
which had been so expatiated upon by the landlord of the inn, in his
description of the advantages attendant upon that property.
There were some rude steps, leading to a narrow arched door-way, which
constituted an entrance to this subterraneous region; and as the
moonlight streamed over the wide waste of waters, and fell upon this
little door-way in the face of the cliff, he became convinced that it
was the entrance to that excavation, and he eyed it curiously.
“What place is that?” said his companion.
“It is a private entrance to the grounds of a mansion in this
neighbourhood.”
“Private enough, I should presume; for if there be any other means of
reaching the house, surely no one would go through such a dismal hole
as that towards it; but come, make up your mind at once. There need
be no quarrelling upon the subject of our conference, but let it be a
plain matter of yes or no. Is it worth your while to be left alone in
peace, or is it not?”
“It is worth my while, but not at such a price as that you mentioned;
and I cannot help thinking that some cheaper mode of accomplishing the
same object will surely present itself very shortly.”
“I do not understand you; you talk ambiguously.”
“But my acts,” said the baron, “shall be clear and plain enough, as you
shall see. Could you believe it possible that I was the sort of person
to submit tamely to any amount of extortion you chose to practise
upon me. There was a time when I thought you possessed great sense
and judgment, when I thought that you were a man who weighed well the
chances of what you were about; but now I know to the contrary; and I
think for less than a thousand pounds I may succeed in ridding myself
of you.”
“I do not understand you; you had better beware how you tamper with me,
for I am not one who will be calmly disposed to put up with much. The
sense, tact, and worldly knowledge which you say you have before, from
time to time, given me credit for, belongs to me still, and I am not
likely easily to commit myself.”
“Indeed; do you think you bear such a charmed life that nothing can
shake it?”
“I think nothing of the sort; but I know what I can do—I am armed.”
“And I; and since it comes to this, take the reward of your villany;
for it was you who made me what I am, and would now seek to destroy my
every hope of satisfaction.”
As the baron spoke he drew from his breast a small pistol, which, with
the quickness of thought, he held full in the face of his companion,
and pulled the trigger.
There can be no doubt on earth that his intention was to commit
the murder, but the pistol missed fire, and he was defeated in his
intention at that moment. Then the stranger laughed scornfully, and
drawing a pistol from his pocket, he presented it at the baron’s head,
saying,—
“Do I not bear a charmed life? If I had not, should I have escaped
death from you now? No, I could not; but you perceive that even a
weapon that might not fail you upon another occasion is harmless
against me; and can you expect that I will hesitate now to take full
and ample revenge upon you for this dastardly attempt?”
These words were spoken with great volubility, so much so, indeed,
that they only occupied a few very brief seconds in delivering; and
then, perhaps, the baron’s career might have ended, for it seemed to be
fully the intention of the other to conclude what he said by firing the
pistol in his face; but the wily aspect of the baron’s countenance was,
after all, but a fair index of the mind, and, just as the last words
passed the lips of his irritated companion, he suddenly dropped in a
crouching position to the ground, and, seizing his legs, threw him over
his head in an instant.
The pistol was discharged, at the same moment, and then, with a shout
of rage and satisfaction, the baron sprang upon his foe, and, kneeling
upon his breast, he held aloft in his hand a glittering dagger, the
highly-polished blade of which caught the moonbeams, and reflected them
into the dazzled eyes of the conquered man, whose fate now appeared to
be certain.
“Fool!” said the baron, “you must needs, then, try conclusions with me,
and, not content with the safety of insignificance, you must be absurd
enough to think it possible you could extort from me whatever sums your
fancy dictated, or with any effect threaten me, if I complied not with
your desires.”
“Have mercy upon me. I meant not to take your life; and, therefore, why
should you take mine?”
“You would have taken it, and, therefore, you shall die. Know, too, as
this is your last moment, that, vampyre as you are, and as I, of all
men, best know you to be, I will take especial care that you shall be
placed in some position after death where the revivifying moonbeams may
not touch you, so that this shall truly be your end, and you shall rot
away, leaving no trace behind of your existence, sufficient to contain
the vital principle.”
“No—no! you cannot—will not. You will have mercy.”
“Ask the famished tiger for mercy, when you intrude upon his den.”
As he spoke the baron ground his teeth together with rage, and, in an
instant, buried the poniard in the throat of his victim. The blade went
through to the yellow sand beneath, and the murderer still knelt upon
the man’s chest, while he who had thus received so fatal a blow tossed
his arms about with agony, and tried in vain to shriek.
The nature of the wound, however, prevented him from uttering anything
but a low gurgling sound, for he was nearly choked with his own blood,
and soon his eyes became fixed and of a glassy appearance; he stretched
out his two arms, and dug his fingers deep into the sand.
The baron drew forth the poniard, and a gush of blood immediately
followed it, and then one deep groan testified to the fact, that the
spirit, if there be a spirit, had left its mortal habitation, and
winged its flight to other realms, if there be other realms for it to
wing its flight to.
“He is dead,” said the baron, and, at the same moment, a roll of the
advancing tide swept over the body, drenching the living, as well as
the dead, with the brine of the ocean.
The baron stooped and rinsed the dagger in the advancing tide from the
clotted blood which had clung to it, and then, wiping it carefully,
he returned it to its sheath, which was hidden within the folds of
his dress; and, rising from his kneeling posture upon the body, he
stood by its side, with folded arms, gazing upon it, for some minutes,
in silence, heedless of the still advancing water, which was already
considerably above his feet.
Then he spoke in his ordinary accents, and evidently caring nothing for
the fact that he had done such a deed.
“I must dispose of this carcass,” he said, “which now seems so
lifeless, for the moon is up, and if its beams fall upon it, I know,
from former experience, what will happen; it will rise again, and walk
the earth, seeking for vengeance upon me, and the thirst for that
vengeance will become such a part of its very nature, that it will
surely accomplish something, if not all that it desires.”
After a few moments’ consideration, he stooped, and, with more strength
than one would have thought it possible a man reduced almost, as he
was, to a skeleton could have exerted, he lifted the body, and carried
it rapidly up the beach towards the cliffs. He threw it down upon the
stone steps that led to the small door of the excavation in the cliff,
and it fell upon them with a sickening sound, as if some of the bones
were surely broken by the fall.
The object, then, of the baron seemed to be to get this door open, if
he possibly could; but that was an object easier to be desired than
carried into effect, for, although he exerted his utmost power, he did
not succeed in moving it an inch, and he began evidently to think that
it would be impossible to do so.
But yet he did not give up the attempt at once, but looking about
upon the beach, until he found a large heavy stone, he raised it in
his arms, and, approaching the door, he flung it against it with such
tremendous force, that it flew open instantly, disclosing within a dark
and narrow passage.
Apparently rejoiced that he had accomplished this much, he stepped
cautiously within the entrance, and then, taking from a concealed
pocket that was in the velvet cloak which he wore a little box, he
produced from it some wax-lights and some chemical matches, which, by
the slightest effort, he succeeded in igniting, and then, with one of
the lights in his hand to guide him on his way, he went on exploring
the passage, and treading with extreme caution as he went, for fear of
falling into any of the ice-wells which were reported to be in that
place.
After proceeding about twenty yards, and finding that there was no
danger, he became less cautious; but, in consequence of such less
caution, he very nearly sacrificed his life, for he came upon an
ice-well which seemed a considerable depth, and into which he had
nearly plunged headlong.
He started back with some degree of horror; but that soon left him, and
then, after a moment’s thought, he sought for some little nook in the
wall, in which he might place the candle, and soon finding one that
answered the purpose well, he there left it, having all the appearance
of a little shrine, while he proceeded again to the mouth of that
singular and cavernous-looking place. He had, evidently, quite made
up his mind what to do, for, without a moment’s hesitation, he lifted
the body again, and carried it within the entrance, walking boldly and
firmly, now that he knew there was no danger between him and the light,
which shed a gleam through the darkness of the place of a very faint
and flickering character.
He reached it rapidly, and when he got to the side of the well, he,
without a moment’s hesitation, flung it headlong down, and, listening
attentively, he heard it fall with a slight plash, as if there was some
water at the bottom of the pit.
It was an annoyance, however, for him to find that the distance was
not so deep as he had anticipated, and when he took the light from
the niche where he had placed it, and looked earnestly down, he could
see the livid, ghastly-looking face of the dead man, for the body had
accidentally fallen upon its back, which was a circumstance he had
not counted upon, and one which increased the chances greatly of its
being seen, should any one be exploring, from curiosity, that not very
inviting place.
This was annoyance, but how could it be prevented, unless, indeed, he
chose to descend, and make an alteration in the disposition of the
corpse? But this was evidently what he did not choose to do; so, after
muttering to himself a few words expressive of his intention to leave
it where it was, he replaced the candle, after extinguishing it, in
the box from whence he had taken it, and carefully walked out of the
dismal place.
The moonbeams were shining very brightly and beautifully upon the face
of the cliffs, when he emerged from the subterranean passage, so that
he could see the door, the steps, and every object quite distinctly;
and, to his gratification, he found that he had not destroyed any
fastening that was to the door, but that when it was slammed shut,
it struck so hard and fast, that the strength of one man could not
possibly move it, even the smallest fraction of an inch.
“I shall be shown all this to-morrow,” he said; “and if I take this
house I must have an alteration made in this door, so that it may open
with a lock, instead of by main violence, as at present; but if, in the
morning, when I view Anderbury House, I can avoid an entrance into this
region, I will do so, and at my leisure, if I become the possessor of
the estate, I can explore every nook and cranny of it.”
He then folded his cloak about him, after pulling the door as closely
as he could. He walked slowly and thoughtfully back to the inn. It was
quite evident that the idea of the murder he had committed did not
annoy him in the least, and that in his speculations upon the subject
he congratulated himself much upon having so far succeeded in getting
rid of certainly a most troublesome acquaintance.
“’Tis well, indeed,” he said, “that just at this juncture he should
throw himself in my way, and enable me so easy to feel certain that
I shall never more be troubled with him. Truly, I ran some risk, and
when my pistol missed fire, it seemed as if my evil star was in its
ascendant, and that I was doomed myself to become the victim of him
whom I have laid in so cold a grave. But I have been victorious, and I
am willing to accept the circumstance as an omen of the past—that my
fortunes are on the change. I think I shall be successful now, and with
the ample means which I now possess, surely, in this country, where
gold is loved so well, I shall be able to overcome all difficulties,
and to unite myself to some one, who—but no matter, her fate is an
after consideration.”
CHAPTER XCV.
THE MARRIAGE IN THE BANNERWORTH FAMILY ARRANGED.
After the adventure of the doctor with regard to the picture about
which such an air of mystery and interest has been thrown, the
Bannerworth family began to give up all hopes of ever finding a clue to
those circumstances concerning which they would certainly have liked to
have known the truth, but of which it was not likely they would ever
hear anything more.
Dr. Chillingworth now had no reserve, and when he had recovered
sufficiently to feel that he could converse without an effort, he took
an opportunity, while the whole of the family were present, to speak of
what had been his hopes and his expectations.
“You are all aware,” he said, “now, of the story of Marmaduke
Bannerworth, and what an excessively troublesome person he was, with
all deference, to you, Henry; first of all, as to spending all his
money at the gaming-table, and leaving his family destitute; and then,
when he did get a lump of money which might have done some good to
those he left behind him—hiding it somewhere where it could not be
found at all, and so leaving you all in great difficulty and distress,
when you might have been independent.”
“That’s true enough, doctor,” said Henry; “but you know the old
proverb,—that ill-gotten wealth never thrives; so that I don’t regret
not finding this money, for I am sure we should have been none the
happier with it, and perhaps not so happy.”
“Oh, bother the old proverb; thirty or forty thousand pounds is no
trifle to be talked lightly of, or the loss of which to be quietly put
up with, on account of a musty proverb. It’s a large sum, and I should
like to have placed it in your hands.”
“But as you cannot, doctor, there can be no good possibly done by
regretting it.”
“No, certainly; I don’t mean that; utter regret is always a very
foolish thing; but it’s questionable whether something might not be
done in the matter, after all, for you, as it appears, by all the
evidence we can collect, that it must have been Varney, after all, who
jumped down upon me from the garden-wall in so sudden a manner; and, if
the picture be valuable to him, it must be valuable to us.”
“But how are we to get it, and if we could, I do not see that it would
be of much good to anybody, for, after all, it is but a painting.”
“There you go again,” said the doctor, “depreciating what you know
nothing about; now, listen to me, Master Henry, and I will tell you.
That picture evidently had some sort of lining at the back, over the
original canvas; and do you think I would have taken such pains to
bring it away with me if that lining had not made me suspect that
between it and the original picture the money, in bank notes, was
deposited?”
“Had you any special reason for supposing such was the case?”
“Yes; most unquestionably I had; for when I got the picture fairly
down, I found various inequalities in the surface of the back, which
led me to believe that rolls of notes were deposited, and that the
great mistake we had all along made was in looking behind the picture,
instead of at the picture itself. I meant immediately to have cut it to
pieces when I reached here with it; but now it has got into the hands
of somebody else, who knows, I suspect, as much I do.”
“It is rather provoking.”
“Rather provoking! is that the way to talk of the loss of Heaven knows
how many thousands of pounds! I am quite aggravated myself at the idea
of the thing, and it puts me in a perfect fever to think of it, I can
assure you.”
“But what can we do?”
“Oh! I propose an immediate crusade against Varney, the vampyre, for
who but he could have made such an attack upon me, and force me to
deliver up such a valuable treasure?”
“Never heed it, doctor,” said Flora; “let it go; we have never had or
enjoyed that money, so it cannot matter, and it is not to be considered
as the loss of an actual possession, because we never did actually
possess it.”
“Yes,” chimed in the admiral; “bother the money! what do we care about
it; and, besides, Charley Holland is going to be very busy.”
“Busy!” said the doctor, “how do you mean?”
“Why, isn’t he going to be married directly to Flora, here, and am not
I going to settle the whole of my property upon him on condition that
he takes the name of Bell instead of Holland? for, you see, his mother
was my sister, and of course her name was Bell. As for his father
Holland, it can’t matter to him now what Charley is called; and if he
don’t take the name of Bell I shall be the last in the family, for I am
not likely to marry, and have any little Bells about me.”
“No,” said the doctor; “I should say not; and that’s the reason why you
want to ring the changes upon Charles Holland’s name. Do you see the
joke, admiral?”
“I can’t say I do—where is it? It’s all very well to talk of jokes,
but if I was like Charles, going to be married, I shouldn’t be in
any joking humour, I can tell you, but quite the reverse; and as for
you and your picture, if you want it, doctor, just run after Varney
yourself for it; or, stay—I have a better idea than that—get your wife
to go and ask him for it, and if she makes half such a clamour about
his ears that she did about ours, he will give it her in a minute, to
get rid of her.”
“My wife!—you don’t mean to say she has been here?”
“Yes, but she has though. And now, doctor, I can tell you I have seen a
good deal of service in all parts of the world, and, of course, picked
up a little experience; and, if I were you, some of these days, when
Mrs. Chillingworth ain’t very well, I’d give her a composing draught
that would make her quiet enough.”
“Ah! that’s not my style of practice, admiral; but I am sorry to hear
that Mrs. Chillingworth has annoyed you so much.”
“Pho, pho, man!—pho, pho! do you think she could annoy me? Why, I have
encountered storms and squalls in all latitudes, and it isn’t a woman’s
tongue now that can do anything of an annoying character, I can tell
you; far from it—very far from it; so don’t distress yourself upon that
head. But come, doctor, we are going to have the wedding the day after
to-morrow.”
“No, no,” said Flora; “the week after next, you mean.”
“Is it the week after next? I’ll be hanged if I didn’t think it was the
day after to-morrow; but of course you know best, as you have settled
it all among you. I have nothing to do with it.”
“Of course, I shall, with great pleasure,” returned the doctor,
“be present on the interesting occasion; but do you intend taking
possession of Bannerworth Hall again?”
“No, certainly not,” said Henry; “we propose going to the Dearbrook
estate, and there remaining for a time to see how we all like it. We
may, perchance, enjoy it very much, for I have heard it spoken of as an
attractive little property enough, and one that any one might fancy,
after being resident a short time upon it.”
“Well,” said the admiral; “that is, I believe, settled among us, but
I am sure we sha’n’t like it, on account of the want of the sea. Why,
I tell you, I have not seen a ship myself for this eighteen months;
there’s a state of things, you see, that won’t do to last, because one
would get dry-mouldy; it’s a shocking thing to see nothing but land,
land, wherever you go.”
From the preceding conversation may be gathered what were the designs
of the Bannerworth family, and what progress had been made in carrying
them out. From the moment they had discovered the title-deeds of the
Dearbrook property, they had ceased to care about the large sum of
money which Marmaduke Bannerworth had been supposed to have hidden in
some portion of Bannerworth Hall.
They had already passed through quite enough of the busy turmoils
of existence to be grateful for anything that promised ease and
competence, and that serenity of mind which is the dearest possession
which any one can compass.
Consequently was it, that, with one accord, they got rid of all
yearning after the large sum which the doctor was so anxious to
procure for them, and looked forward to a life of great happiness and
contentment. On the whole, too, when they came to talk the matter over
quietly among themselves, they were not sorry that Varney had taken
himself off in the way he had, for really it was a great release; and,
as he had couched his farewell in words which signified it was a final
one, they were inclined to think that he must have left England, and
that it was not likely they should ever again encounter him, under any
circumstances whatever.
It was to be considered quite as a whim of the old admiral’s, the
changing of Charles Holland’s name to Bell; but, as Charles himself
said when the subject was broached to him,—“I am so well content to be
called whatever those to whom I feel affection think proper, that I
give up my name of Holland without a pang, willingly adopting in its
stead one that has always been hallowed in my remembrance with the best
and kindest recollections.”
And thus this affair was settled, much to the satisfaction of Flora,
who was quite as well content to be called Mrs. Bell as to be called
Mrs. Holland, since the object of her attachment remained the same.
The wedding was really fixed for the week after that which followed
the conversation we have recorded; but the admiral was not at all
disposed to allow Flora and his nephew Charles to get through such an
important period of their lives without some greater demonstration and
show than could be made from the little cottage where they dwelt; and
consequently he wished that they should leave that and proceed at once
to a larger mansion, which he had his eye upon a few miles off, and
which was to be had furnished for a time, at the pleasure of any one.
“And we won’t shut ourselves up,” said the admiral; “but we will find
out all the Christian-like people in the neighbourhood, and invite them
to the wedding, and we will have a jolly good breakfast together, and
lots of music, and a famous lunch; and, after that, a dinner, and then
a dance, and all that sort of thing; so that there shall be no want of
fun.”
As may be well supposed, both Charles and Flora shrunk from so public
an affair; but, as the old man had evidently set his heart upon it,
they did not like to say they positively would not; so, after a vain
attempt to dissuade him from removing at all from the cottage until
they removed for good, they gave up the point to him, and he had it all
his own way.
He took the house, for one month, which had so taken his fancy, and
certainly a pretty enough place it was, although they found out
afterwards, that why it was he was so charmed with it consisted in the
fact that it bore the name of a vessel which he had once commanded; but
this they did not know until a long time afterwards, when it slipped
out by mere accident.
They stipulated with the admiral that there should not be more than
twenty guests at the breakfast which was to succeed the marriage
ceremony; and to that he acceded; but Henry whispered to Charles
Holland,—
“I know this public wedding to be distasteful to you, and most
particularly do I know it is distasteful to Flora; so, if you do not
mind playing a trick upon the old man, I can very easily put you in the
way of cheating him entirely.”
“Indeed; I should like to hear, and, what is more, I should like to
practise, if you think it will not so entirely offend him as to make
him implacable.”
“Not at all, not at all; he will laugh himself, when he comes to
know it, as much as any of us; the present difficulty will be to
procure Flora’s connivance; but that we must do the best way we can by
persuasion.”
What this scheme was will ultimately appear; but, certain it is, that
the old admiral had no suspicion of what was going on, and proceeded to
make all his arrangements accordingly.
From his first arrival in the market town—in the neighbourhood of which
was Bannerworth Hall—it will be recollected that he had taken a great
fancy to the lawyer, in whose name a forged letter had been sent him,
informing him of the fact that his nephew, Charles Holland, intended
marrying into a family of vampyres.
It was this letter, as the reader is aware, which brought the old
admiral and Jack Pringle into the neighbourhood of the Hall; and,
although it was a manœuvre to get rid of Charles Holland, which failed
most signally, there can be no doubt but that such a letter was
the production of Sir Francis Varney, and that he wrote it for the
express purpose of getting rid of Charles from the Hall, who had begun
materially to interfere with his plans and projects there.
After some conversation with himself, the admiral thought that this
lawyer would be just the man to recommend the proper sort of people
to be invited to the wedding of Charles and Flora; so he wrote to
him, inviting himself to dinner, and received back a very gracious
reply from the lawyer, who declared that the honour of entertaining
a gentleman whom he so much respected as Admiral Bell, was greater
than he had a right to expect by a great deal, and that he should feel
most grateful for his company, and await his coming with the greatest
impatience.
“A devilish civil fellow, that attorney,” said the admiral, as he put
the letter in his pocket, “and almost enough to put one in conceit of
lawyers.”
“Yes,” said Jack Pringle, who had overheard the admiral read the
letter. “Yes, we will honour him; and I only hope he will have plenty
of grog; because, you see, if he don’t——D—n it! what’s that? Can’t you
keep things to yourself?”
This latter exclamation arose from the fact that the admiral was so
indignant at Jack for listening to what he had been saying, as to throw
a leaden inkstand, that happened to be upon the table, at his head.
“You mutinous swab!” he said, “cannot a gentleman ask me to dinner, or
cannot I ask myself, without you putting your spoke in the windlass,
you vagabond?”
“Oh! well,” said Jack, “if you are out of temper about it, I had better
send my mark to the lawyer, and tell him that we won’t come, as it has
made some family differences.”
“Family, you thief!” said the admiral. “What do you mean? What family
do you think would own you? D—n me, if I don’t think you came over in
some strange ship. But, I tell you what it is, if you interfere in this
matter, I’ll be hanged if I don’t blow your brains out.”
“And you’ll be hanged if you do,” said Jack, as he walked out of the
room; “so it’s all one either way, old fizgig.”
“What!” roared the admiral, as he sprang up and ran after Jack. “Have I
lived all these years to be called names in my own ship—I mean my own
house? What does the infernal rascal mean by it?”
The admiral, no doubt, would have pursued Jack very closely, had not
Flora intercepted him, and, by gentle violence, got him back to the
room. No one else could have ventured to have stopped him, but the
affection he had for her was so great that she could really accomplish
almost anything with him; and, by listening quietly to his complaints
of Jack Pringle—which, however, involved a disclosure of the fact which
he had intended to keep to himself, that he had sought the lawyer’s
advice—she succeeded in soothing him completely, so that he forgot his
anger in a very short time.
But the old man’s anger, although easily aroused, never lasted very
long; and, upon the whole, it was really astonishing what he put up
with from Jack Pringle, in the way of taunts and sneers, of all sorts
and descriptions, and now and then not a little real abuse.
And, probably, he thought likewise that Jack Pringle did not mean what
he said, on the same principle that he (the admiral), when he called
Jack a mutinous swab and a marine, certainly did not mean that Jack was
those things, but merely used them as expletives to express a great
amount of indignation at the moment, because, as may be well supposed,
nothing in the world could be worse, in Admiral Bell’s estimation, than
to be a mutinous swab or a marine.
It was rather a wonder, though, that, in his anger some day, he did not
do Jack some mischief; for, as we have had occasion to notice in one or
two cases, the admiral was not extremely particular as to what sorts of
missiles he used when he considered it necessary to throw something at
Jack’s head.
It would not have been a surprising thing if Jack had really made some
communication to the lawyer; but he did stop short at that amount of
pleasantry, and, as he himself expressed it, for once in a way he let
the old man please himself.
The admiral soon forgot this little dispute, and then pleased himself
with the idea that he should pass a pleasant day with the attorney.
“Ah! well,” he said; “who would have thought that ever I should have
gone and taken dinner with a lawyer—and not only done that, but invited
myself too! It shows us all that there may be some good in all sorts
of men, lawyers included; and I am sure, after this, I ought to begin
to think what I never thought before, and that is, that a marine may
actually be a useful person. It shows that, as one gets older, one gets
wiser.”
It was an immense piece of liberality for a man brought up, as Admiral
Bell had been, in decidedly one of the most prejudiced branches of the
public service, to make any such admissions as these. A very great
thing it was, and showed a liberality of mind such as, even at the
present time, is not readily found.
It is astonishing, as well as amusing, to find how the mind assimilates
itself to the circumstances in which it is placed, and how society,
being cut up into small sections, imagines different things merely as
a consequence of their peculiar application. We shall find that even
people, living at different ends of a city, will look with a sort of
pity and contempt upon each other; and it is much to be regretted that
public writers are found who use what little ability they may possess
in pandering to their feelings.
It was as contemptible and silly as it was reprehensible for a late
celebrated novelist to pretend that he believed there was a place
called Bloomsbury-square, but he really did not know; because that was
merely done for the purpose of raising a silly laugh among persons who
were neither respectable on account of their abilities or their conduct.
But to return from this digression. The admiral, attired in his best
suit, which always consisted of a blue coat, the exact colour of the
navy uniform, an immense pale primrose coloured waistcoat, and white
kerseymere continuations, went to the lawyer’s as had been arranged.
If anything at all could flatter the old man’s vanity successfully, it
certainly would be the manner in which he was received at the lawyer’s
house, where everything was done that could give him satisfaction.
A very handsome repast was laid before him, and, when the cloth was
removed, the admiral broached the subject upon which he wished to ask
the advice of his professional friend. After telling him of the wedding
that was to come off, he said,—
“Now, I have bargained to invite twenty people; and, of course, as that
is exclusive of any of the family, and as I don’t know any people about
this neighbourhood except yourself, I want you and your family to come
to start with, and then I want you to find me out some more decent
people to make up the party.”
“I feel highly flattered,” said the attorney, “that, in such a case as
this, you should have come to me, and my only great fear is, that I
should not be able to give you satisfaction.”
“Oh! you needn’t be afraid of that; there is no fear on that head; so I
shall leave it all to you to invite the folks that you think proper.”
“I will endeavour, certainly, admiral, to do my best. Of course, living
in the town, as I have for many years, I know some very nice people as
well as some very queer ones.”
“Oh! we don’t want any of the queer ones; but let those who are invited
be frank, hearty, good-tempered people, such as one will be glad to
meet over and over again without any ceremony—none of your simpering
people, who are afraid to laugh for fear of opening their mouths too
wide, but who are so mighty genteel that they are afraid to enjoy
anything for fear it should be vulgar.”
“I understand you, admiral, perfectly, and shall endeavour to obey your
instructions to the very letter; but, if I should unfortunately invite
anybody you don’t like, you must excuse me for making such a mistake.”
“Oh, of course—of course. Never mind that; and, if any disagreeable
fellow comes, we will smother him in some way.”
“It would serve him right, for no one ought to make himself
disagreeable, after being honoured with an invitation from you; but I
will be most especially careful, and I hope that such a circumstance
will not occur.”
“Never mind. If it should, I’ll tell you what I’ll do; I’ll set Jack
Pringle upon him, and if he don’t worry his life out it will be a
strange thing to me.”
“Oh,” said the lawyer, “I am glad you have mentioned him, for it gives
me an opportunity of saying that I have done all in my power to make
him comfortable.”
“All in your power to make him comfortable! What do you mean?”
“I mean that I have placed such a dinner before him as will please him;
I told him to ask for just whatever he likes.”
The admiral looked at the lawyer with amazement, for a few moments, in
silence, and then he said,
“D—n it! why, you don’t mean to tell me, that that rascal is here.”
“Oh, yes; he came about ten minutes I before you arrived, and said you
were coming, and he has been down stairs feasting all the while since.”
“Stop a bit. Do you happen to have any loaded fire arms in the house?”
“We have got an old blunderbuss; but what for, admiral?”
“To shoot that scoundrel, Pringle. I’ll blow his brains out, as sure
as fate. The impudence of his coming here, directly against my orders,
too.”
“My dear sir, calm yourself, and think nothing of it; it’s of no
consequence whatever.”
“No consequence; where is that blunderbuss of yours? Do you mean to
tell me that mutiny is of no consequence? Give me the blunderbuss.”
“But, my dear sir, we only keep it _in terrorem_, and have no bullets.”
“Never mind that, we can cram in a handful of nails, or brass buttons,
or hammer up a few halfpence—anything of that sort will do to settle
his business with.”
“How do you get on, old Tarbarrel?” said Jack, putting his head in at
the door. “Are you making yourself comfortable? I’ll be hanged if I
don’t think you have a drop too much already, you look so precious red
about the gills. I have been getting on famous, and I thought I’d just
hop up for a minute to make your mind easy about me, and tell you so.”
It was quite evident that Jack had done justice to the good cheer
of the lawyer, for he was rather unsteady, and had to hold by
the door-post to support himself, while there was such a look of
contentment upon his countenance as contrasted with the indignation
that was manifest upon the admiral’s face that, as the saying is, it
would have made a cat laugh to see them.
“Be off with ye, Jack,” said the lawyer; “be off with ye. Go down
stairs again and enjoy yourself. Don’t you see that the admiral is
angry with you.”
“Oh, he be bothered,” said Jack; “I’ll soon settle him if he comes any
of his nonsense; and mind, Mr. Lawyer, whatever you do, don’t you give
him too much to drink.”
The lawyer ran to the door, and pushed Jack out, for he rightly enough
suspected that the quietness of the admiral was only that calm which
precedes a storm of more than usual amount and magnitude, so he was
anxious to part them at once.
He then set about appeasing, as well as he could, the admiral’s anger,
by attributing the perseverance of Jack, in following him wherever
he went, to his great affection for him, which, combined with his
ignorance, might make him often troublesome when he had really no
intention of being so.
This was certainly the best way of appeasing the old man; and, indeed,
the only way in which it could be done successfully, and the proof that
it was so, consisted in the fact, that the admiral did consent, at the
suggestion of the attorney, to forgive Jack once more for the offence
he had committed.
CHAPTER XCVI.
THE BARON TAKES ANDERBURY HOUSE, AND DECIDES UPON GIVING A GRAND
ENTERTAINMENT.
It was not considered anything extraordinary that, although the Baron
Stolmuyer of Saltzburgh went out with the mysterious stranger who had
arrived at the Anderbury Arms to see him, he should return without him
for certainly he was not bound to bring him back, by any means whatever.
Moreover, he entered the inn so quietly, and with such an appearance of
perfect composure, that no one could have suspected for a moment that
he had been guilty really of the terrific crime which had been laid to
his charge—a crime which few men could have committed in so entirely
unmoved and passionless a manner as he had done it.
But he seemed to consider the taking of a human life as a thing not of
the remotest consequence, and not to be considered at all as a matter
which was to put any one out of the way, but as a thing to be done when
necessity required, with all the ease in the world, without arousing
or awaking any of those feelings of remorse which one would suppose
ought to find a place in the heart of a man who had been guilty of such
monstrous behaviour.
He walked up to his own apartment again, and retired to rest with the
same feeling, apparently, of calmness, and the same ability to taste of
the sweets of repose as had before characterized him.
The stranger’s horse, which was a valuable and beautiful animal,
remained in the stable of the inn, and as, of course, that was
considered a guarantee for his return, the landlord, when he himself
retired to rest, left one of his establishment sitting up to let in the
man who now lay so motionless and so frightful in appearance in one of
the ice-wells of the mysterious passage leading from the base of the
cliff, to the grounds of Anderbury House.
But the night wore on, and the man who had been left to let the
stranger in, after making many efforts to keep himself awake, dropped
into sound repose, which he might just as well have done in the first
instance, inasmuch as, although he knew it not, he was engaged in the
vain task of waiting for the dead.
The morning was fresh and beautiful, and, at a far earlier hour than a
person of his quality was expected to make his appearance, the baron
descended from his chamber; for, somehow or other, by common consent,
it seems to be agreed that great personages must be late in rising, and
equally late in going to bed.
But the baron was evidently not so disposed to turn night into day, and
the landlord congratulated himself not a little upon the fact that he
was ready for his illustrious guest when he descended so unexpectedly
from his chamber as he did.
An ample breakfast was disposed of; that is to say, it was placed upon
the table, and charged to the baron, who selected from it what he
pleased; and when the meal was over the landlord ventured to enter the
apartment, and said to him, with all due humility,—
“If you please, sir, Mr. Leek, who has the letting of
Anderbury-on-the-Mount, that is, Anderbury House, as it is usually
called, is here, sir, and would be happy to take your orders as to when
you would be pleased to look at those premises?”
“I shall be ready to go in half a hour,” said the baron; “and, as the
distance is not great, I will walk from here to the mansion.”
This message was duly communicated to Mr. Leek, who thereupon
determined upon waiting until the baron should announce his readiness
to depart upon the expedition; and he was as good as his word, for,
in about half-an-hour afterwards, he descended to the hall, and then
Mr. Leek was summoned, who came out of the bar with such a grand rush,
that he fell over a mat that was before him, and saluted the baron by
digging his head into his stomach, and then falling sprawling at his
feet, and laying hold of his ankle.
This little incident was duly apologised for, and explained;
after which Mr. Leek walked on through the town, towards
Anderbury-on-the-Mount, followed by the illustrious personage whom he
sincerely hoped he should be able to induce to take it.
It was a curious thing to see how they traversed the streets together;
for while the baron walked right on, and with a solemn and measured
step, Mr. Leek managed to get along a few paces in front of him,
sideways, so that he could keep up a sort of conversation upon the
merits of Anderbury House, and the neighbourhood in general, without
much effort; to which remarks the baron made such suitable and
dignified replies as a baron would be supposed to make.
“You will find, sir,” said Mr. Leek, “that everything about Anderbury
is extremely select, and amazingly correct; and I am sure a more
delightful place to live in could not be found.”
“Ah!” said the baron; “very likely.”
“It’s lively, too,” continued Mr. Leek; “very lively; and there are two
chapels of ease, besides the church.”
“That’s a drawback,” said the baron.
“A drawback, sir! well, I am sorry I mentioned it; but perhaps you are
a Roman Catholic, sir, and, in that case, the chapels of ease have no
interest for you.”
“Not the slightest; but do not, sir, run away with any assumption
concerning my religious opinions, for I am not a Roman Catholic.”
“No, sir, no, sir; nor more am I; and, as far as I think, and my
opinion goes, I say, why shouldn’t a gentleman with a large fortune be
what he likes, or nothing, if he likes that better? but here we are,
sir, close to one of the entrances of Anderbury House. There are three
principal entrances, you understand, sir, on three sides of the estate,
and the fourth side faces the sea, where there is that mysterious
passage that leads down from the grounds to the beach, which, perhaps,
you have heard of, sir.”
“The landlord of the inn mentioned it.”
“We consider it a great curiosity, sir, I can assure you, in these
parts—a very great curiosity; and it’s an immense advantage to the
house, because, you see, sir, in extremely hot weather, all sorts
of provisions can be taken down there, and kept at such a very low
temperature as to be quite delightful.”
“That is an advantage.”
Mr. Leek rang the bell that hung over one of the entrances, and his
summons for admission was speedily answered by the old couple who had
charge of the premises, and then, with a view of impressing them with a
notion of the importance of the personage whom he had brought to look
at the place, he said, aloud,—
“The Baron Stoltmayor, of Saltsomething, has come to look at the
premises.”
This announcement was received with all due deference and respect, and
the task of showing the baron the premises at once fairly commenced.
“Here you have,” said Mr. Leek, assuming an oratorical attitude—“here
you have the umbrageous trees stooping down to dip their leaves in the
purling waters; here you have the sweet foliage lending a delicious
perfume to the balmy air; here you have the murmuring waterfalls
playing music of the spheres to the listening birds, who sit responsive
upon the dancing boughs; here you have all the fragrance of the briny
ocean, mingling with the scent of a bank of violets, and wrapping
the senses in Elysium; here you may never tire of an existence that
presents never-ending charms, and that, in the full enjoyment of which,
you may live far beyond the allotted span of man.”
“Enough—enough,” said the baron.
“Here you have the choicest exotics taking kindly to a soil gifted by
nature with the most extraordinary powers of production; and all that
can pamper the appetite, or yield delight to the senses, is scattered
around by nature with a liberal hand. It is quite impossible that
royalty should come near the favoured spot without visiting it as a
thing of course; and I forgot to mention that a revenue is derived from
some cottages, which, although small, is yet sufficient to pay the
tithe on the whole estate.”
“There, there—that will do.”
“Here you have purling rills and cascades, and fish-ponds so redundant
with the finny tribe, that you have but to wish for sport, and it
is yours; here you have in the mansion, chambers that vie with the
accommodation of a palace—ample dormitories and halls of ancient
grandeur; here you have——”
“Stop,” said the baron, “stop; I cannot be pestered in this way with
your description. I have no patience to listen to such mere words—show
me the house at once, and let me judge for myself.”
“Certainly, sir; oh! certainly; only I thought it right to give you a
slight description of the place as it really was; and now, sir, that we
have reached the house, I may remark that here we have——”
“Silence!” said the baron; “if you begin with here we have, I know not
when you will leave off. All I require of you is to show me the place,
and to answer any question which I may put to you concerning it. I will
draw my own conclusions, and nothing you can say, one way or another,
will affect my imagination.”
“Certainly, sir, certainly; I shall only be too happy to answer
any questions that may be put to me by a person of your lordship’s
great intelligence; and all I can remark is, that when you reach the
drawing-room floor, any person may truly say, here you have—I really
beg your pardon, sir—I had not the slightest intention of saying here
you have, I assure you; but the words came out quite unawares, I assure
you.”
“Peace—peace!” cried again the baron; “you disturb me by this incessant
clatter.”
Thus admonished, Mr. Leek was now quiet, and allowed the baron in his
own way to make what investigation he pleased concerning Anderbury
House.
The investigation was not one that could be gone over in ten minutes;
for the house was extremely extensive, and the estate altogether
presented so many features of beauty and interest, that it was
impossible not to linger over it for a considerable period of time.
The grounds were most extensive, and planted with such a regard to
order and regularity, everything being in its proper place, that it was
a pleasure to see an estate so well kept. And although the baron was
not a man who said much, it was quite evident, by what little he did
utter, that he was very well pleased with Anderbury-on-the-Mount.
“And now,” said Mr. Leek, “I will do myself the pleasure, sir, of
showing your grace the subterranean passage.”
At this moment a loud ring at one of the entrance gates was heard, and
upon the man who had charge of the house answering the summons for
admission, he found that it was a gentleman, who gave a card on which
was the name of Sir John Westlake, and who desired to see the premises.
“Sir John Westlake,” said Mr. Leek; “oh! I recollect he did call at my
office, and say that he thought of taking Anderbury-on-the-Mount. A
gentleman of great wealth and taste is Sir John, but I must tell him,
baron, that you have the preference if you choose to embrace it.”
At this moment the stranger advanced, and when he saw the baron, he
bowed courteously, upon which Mr. Leek said,—
“I regret, Sir John, that if you should take a fancy to the place, I am
compelled first of all to give this gentleman the refusal of it.”
“Certainly,” said Sir John Westlake; “do not let me interfere with any
one. I have nearly made up my mind, and came to look over the property
again; but of course, if this gentleman is beforehand with me, I must
be content. I wish particularly to go down to the subterranean passage
to the beach, if it is not too much trouble.”
“Trouble! certainly not, sir. Here, Davis, get some links, and we can
go at once; and as this gentleman likewise has seen everything but that
strange excavation, he will probably descend with us.”
“Certainly,” said the baron; “I shall have great pleasure;” and he
said it with so free and unembarrassed an air, that no one could have
believed for a moment in the possibility that such a subject of fearful
interest to him was there to be found.
The entrance from the grounds into this deep cavernous place was in
a small but neat building, that looked like a summer-house; and now,
torches being procured, and one lit, a door was opened, which conducted
at once into the commencement of the excavation; and Mr. Leek heading
the way, the distinguished party, as that gentleman loved afterwards
to call it in his accounts of the transaction, proceeded into the very
bowels of the earth, as it were, and quickly lost all traces of the
daylight.
The place did not descend by steps, but by a gentle slope, which it
required some caution to traverse, because, being cut in the chalk,
which in some places was worn very smooth, it was extremely slippery;
but this was a difficulty that a little practice soon overcame, and as
they went on the place became more interesting every minute.
Even the baron allowed Mr. Leek to make a speech upon the occasion, and
that gentleman said,—
“You will perceive that this excavation must have been made, at a great
expense, out of the solid cliff, and in making it some of the most
curious specimens of petrifaction and fossil remains were found. You
see that the roof is vaulted, and that it is only now and then a lump
of chalk has fallen in, or a great piece of flint; and now we come to
one of the ice-wells.”
They came to a deep excavation, down which they looked, and when the
man held the torch beneath its surface, they could dimly see the
bottom of it, where there was a number of large pieces of flint stone,
and, apparently, likewise, the remains of broken bottles.
“There used to be a windlass at the top of this,” said Mr. Leek, “and
the things were let down in a basket. They do say that ice will keep
for two years in one of these places.”
“And are there more of these excavations?” said the baron.
“Oh, dear, yes, sir; there are five or six of them for different
purposes; for when the family that used to live in Anderbury House had
grand entertainments, which they sometimes had in the summer season,
they always had a lot of men down here, cooling wines, and passing them
up from hand to hand to the house.”
From the gradual slope of this passage down to the cliffs, and the
zigzag character of it, it may be well supposed that it was of
considerable extent. Indeed, Mr. Leek asserted that it was half a mile
in actual measured length.
The baron was not at all anxious to run any risk of a discovery of the
dead body which he had cast into that ice-well which was nearest to the
opening on to the beach, so, as he went on, he negatived the different
proposals that were made to look down into the excavations, and
succeeded in putting a stop to that species of inquiry in the majority
of instances, but he could not wholly do so.
Perhaps it would have been better for his purpose if he had encouraged
a look into every one of the ice-wells; for, in that case, their
similarity of appearance might have tired out Sir John Westlake before
they got to the last one; but as it was, when they reached the one down
which the body had been precipitated, he had the mortification to hear
Mr. Leek say,—
“And now, Sir John, and you, my lord baron, as we have looked at the
first of these ice-wells and at none of the others, suppose we look at
the last.”
The baron was afraid to say anything; because, if the body were
discovered, and identified as that of the visitor at the inn, and who
had been seen last with him, any reluctance on his part to have that
ice-well examined, might easily afterwards be construed into a very
powerful piece of circumstantial evidence against him.
He therefore merely bowed his assent, thinking that the examination
would be but a superficial one, and that, in consequence, he should
escape easily from any disagreeable consequences.
But this the fates ordained otherwise; and there seemed no hope of that
ice-well in particular escaping such an investigation as was sure to
induce some uncomfortable results.
“Davis,” said Mr. Leek, “these places are not deep, you see, and I was
thinking that if you went down one of them, it would be as well; for
then you would be able to tell the gentlemen what the bottom was fairly
composed of, you understand.”
“Oh, I don’t mind, sir,” said Davis. “I have been down one of them
before to-day, I can tell you, sir.”
“I do not see the necessity,” said Sir John Westlake, “exactly, of such
a thing; but still if you please, and this gentleman wishes——”
“I have no wish upon the occasion,” said the baron; “and, like
yourself, cannot see the necessity.”
“Oh, there is no trouble,” said Mr. Leek; “and it’s better, now you are
here, that you see and understand all about it. How can you get down,
Davis?”
“Why, sir, it ain’t above fourteen feet altogether; so I sha’n’t have
any difficulty, for I can hang by my hands about half the distance, and
drop the remainder.”
As he spoke he took off his coat, and then stuck the link he carried
into a cleft of the rock, that was beside the brink of the excavation.
The baron now saw that there would be no such thing as avoiding a
discovery of the fact of the dead body being in that place, and his
only hope was, that in its descent it might have become so injured as
to defy identification.
But this was a faint hope, because he recollected that he had himself
seen the face, which was turned upwards, and the period after death was
by far too short for him to have any hope that decomposition could have
taken place even to the most limited extent.
The light, which was stuck in a niche, shed but a few inefficient rays
down into the pit, and, as the baron stood, with folded arms, looking
calmly on, he expected each moment a scene of surprise and terror would
ensue.
Nor was he wrong; for scarcely had the man plunged down into that deep
place, than he uttered a cry of alarm and terror, and shouted,—
“Murder! murder! Lift me out. There is a dead man down here, and I have
jumped upon him.”
“A dead man!” cried Mr. Leek and Sir John Westlake in a breath.
“How very strange!” said the baron.
“Lend me a hand,” cried Davis; “lend me a hand out; I cannot stand
this, you know. Lend me a hand out, I say, at once.”
This was easier to speak of than to do, and Mr. Davis began to discover
that it was easier by far to get into a deep pit, than to get out of
one, notwithstanding that his assertion of having been down into those
places was perfectly true; but then he had met with nothing alarming,
and had been able perfectly at his leisure to scramble out the best way
he could.
Now, however, his frantic efforts to release himself from a much more
uncomfortable situation than he had imagined it possible for him to get
into, were of so frantic a nature, that he only half buried himself in
pieces of chalk, which he kept pulling down with vehemence from the
sides of the pit, and succeeded in accomplishing nothing towards his
rescue.
“Oh! the fellow is only joking,” said the baron, “and amusing himself
at our expense.”
But the manner in which the man cried for help, and the marked terror
which was in every tone, was quite sufficient to prove that he was not
acting; for if he were, a more accomplished mimic could not have been
found on the stage than he was.
“This is serious,” said Sir John Westlake, “and cannot be allowed. Have
you any ropes here by which we can assist him from the pit? Don’t be
alarmed, my man, for if there be a dead body in the pit, it can’t harm
you. Take your time quietly and easily, and you will assuredly get out.”
“Aye,” said the baron, “the more haste, the worst speed, is an English
proverb, and in this case it will be fully exemplified. This man would
easily leave the pit, if he would have the patience, with care and
quietness, to clamber up its sides.”
It would appear that Davis felt the truth of these exhortations, for
although he trembled excessively, he did begin to make some progress in
his ascent, and get so high, that Mr. Leek was enabled to get hold of
his hand, and give him a little assistance, so that, in another minute
or so, he was rescued from his situation, which was not one of peril,
although it was certainly one of fright.
He trembled so excessively, and stuttered and stammered, that for some
minutes no one could understand very well what he said; but at length,
upon making himself intelligible, he exclaimed,—
“There has been a murder! there has been a murder committed, and the
body thrown into the ice pit. I felt that I jumped down upon something
soft, and when I put down my hand to feel what it was, it came across a
dead man’s face, and then, of course, I called out.”
“You certainly did call out.”
“Yes, and so would anybody, I think, under such circumstances. I
suppose I shall be hung now, because I had charge of the house?”
“That did not strike me until this moment,” said the baron; “but if
there be a dead body in that pit, it certainly places this man in a
very awkward position.”
“What the deuce do you mean?” said Davis; “I don’t know no more about
it than the child unborn. There is a dead man in the ice-well, and that
is all I know about it; but whether he has been there a long time,
or a short time, I don’t know any more than the moon, so it’s no use
bothering me about it.”
“My good man,” said the baron, “it would be very wrong indeed to impute
to you any amount of criminality in this business, since you may be
entirely innocent; and I, for one, believe that you are so, for I
cannot think that any guilty man would venture into the place where
he had put the body of his victim, in the way that you ventured into
that pit. I say I cannot believe it possible, and therefore I think you
innocent, and will take care to see that no injustice is done you; but
at the same time I cannot help adding, that I think, of course, you
will find yourself suspected in some way.”
“I am very much obliged to you, sir,” said Davis; “but as I happen to
be quite innocent, I am very easy about it, and don’t care one straw
what people say. I have not been in this excavation for Heaven knows
how long.”
“But what’s to be done?” said Mr. Leek. “I suppose it’s our duty to do
something, under such circumstances.”
“Unquestionably,” said the baron; “and the first thing to be done, is
to inform the police of what has happened, so that the body may be
got up; and as I have now seen enough of the estate to satisfy me as
regards its capabilities, I decide at once upon taking it, if I can
agree upon the conditions of the tenancy, and I will purchase it, if
the price be such as I think suitable.”
“Well,” said Mr. Leek, “if anything could reconcile me to the
extraordinary circumstance that has just occurred, it certainly is,
baron, the having so desirable a tenant for Anderbury-on-the-Mount as
yourself. But we need not traverse all this passage again, for it is
much nearer now to get out upon the sea-coast at once, as we are so
close to the other opening upon the beach. It seems to me that we ought
to proceed at once to the town, and give information to the authorities
of the discovery which we have made.”
“It is absolutely necessary,” said the baron, “so to do; so come along
at once. I shall proceed to my inn, and as, of course, I have seen
nothing more than yourselves, and consequently could only repeat your
evidence, I do not see that my presence is called for. Nevertheless,
of course, if the justices think it absolutely necessary that I should
appear, I can have no possible objection to so do.”
This was as straightforward as anything that could be desired, and,
moreover, it was rather artfully put together, for it seemed to
imply that he, Mr. Leek, would be slighted, if his evidence was not
considered sufficient.
“Of course,” said Mr. Leek; “I don’t see at all why, as you, sir, have
only the same thing to say as myself, I should not be sufficient.”
“Don’t call upon me on any account,” said Sir John Westlake.
“Oh! no, no,” cried Mr. Leek; “there is no occasion. I won’t, you may
depend, if it can be helped.”
Sir John, in rather a nervous and excited manner, bade them good day,
before they got quite into the town, and hurried off; while the baron,
with a dignified bow, when he reached the door of his hotel, said to
Mr. Leek,—
“Of course I do not like the trouble of judicial investigations more
than anybody else, and therefore, unless it is imperatively necessary
that I should appear, I shall take it as a favour to be released from
such a trouble.”
“My lord baron,” said Mr. Leek, “you may depend that I shall mention
that to the magistrates and the coroner, and all those sort of people;”
and then Mr. Leek walked away, but he muttered to himself, as he did
so, “They will have him, as sure as fate, just because he is a baron;
and his name will look well in the ‘County Chronicle.’”
Mr. Leek then repaired immediately to the house of one of the principal
magistrates, and related what had occurred, to the great surprise of
that gentleman, who suggested immediately the propriety of making the
fact known to the coroner of the district, as it was more his business,
than a magistrate’s, in the first instance, since nobody was accused of
the offence.
This suggestion was immediately followed, and that functionary directed
that the body should be removed from where it was to the nearest
public-house, and immediately issued his precept for an inquiry into
the case.
By this time the matter had begun to get bruited about in the town,
and of course it went from mouth to mouth with many exaggerations; and
although it by no means did follow that a murder had been committed
because a dead body had been found, yet, such was the universal
impression; and the matter began to be talked about as the murder in
the subterranean passage leading to Anderbury House, with all the gusto
which the full particulars of some deed of blood was calculated to
inspire. And how it spread about was thus:—
The fact was, that Mr. Leek was so anxious to let
Anderbury-on-the-Mount to the rich Baron Stolmuyer, of Saltzburgh,
that he got a friend of his to come and personate Sir John Westlake,
while he, the baron, was looking at the premises, in order to drive him
at once to a conclusion upon the matter; so that what made Sir John
so very anxious that he should not be called forward in the matter,
consisted in the simple fact that he was nothing else than plain Mr.
Brown, who kept a hatter’s shop in the town; but he could not keep his
own counsel, and, instead of holding his tongue, as he ought to have
done, about the matter, he told it to every one he met, so that in a
short time it was generally known that something serious and startling
had occurred in the subterranean passage to Anderbury House, and a
great mob of persons thronged the beach in anxious expectation of
getting more information on the matter.
The men, likewise, who had been ordered by the coroner to remove the
body, soon reached the spot, and they gave an increased impetus to the
proceedings, by opening the door of the subterranean passage, and then
looking earnestly along the beach as if in expectation of something or
somebody of importance.
When eagerly questioned by the mob, for the throng of persons now
assembled quite amounted to a mob, to know what they waited for, one of
them said,—
“A coffin was to have been brought down to take the body in.”
This announcement at once removed anything doubtful that might be in
the minds of any of them upon the subject, and at once proclaimed the
fact not only that there was a dead body, but that if they looked out
they would see it forthwith.
The throng thickened, and by the time two men were observed approaching
with a coffin on their shoulders, there was scarcely anybody left in
the town, except a few rare persons, indeed, who were not so curious as
their neighbours.
It was not an agreeable job, even to those men who were not the most
particular in the world, to be removing so loathsome a spectacle as
that which they were pretty sure to encounter in the ice-well; but they
did not shrink from it, and, by setting about it as a duty, they got
through it tolerably well.
They took with them several large torches, and then, one having
descended into the pit, fastened a rope under the arms of the dead
man, and so he was hauled out, and placed in the shell that was ready
to receive him.
[Illustration: The mob pulls the dead man from the pit.]
They were all surprised at the fresh and almost healthful appearance
of the countenance, and it was quite evident to everybody that if any
one had known him in life, they could not have the least possible
difficulty in recognising him now that he was no more.
And the only appearance of injury which he exhibited was in that
dreadful wound which had certainly proved his death, and which was
observable in his throat the moment they looked upon him.
The crush to obtain a sight of the body was tremendous at the moment
it was brought out, and a vast concourse of persons followed it in
procession to the town, where the greatest excitement prevailed. It was
easily discovered that no known person was missing, and some who had
caught a sight of the body, went so far as to assert that it must have
been in the ice-well for years, and that the extreme cold had preserved
it in all its original freshness.
The news, of course, came round, although not through the baron, for he
did not condescend to say one word about it at the inn, and it was the
landlord who first started the suggestion of—
“What suppose it is the gentleman who left his horse here?”
This idea had no sooner got possession of his brain, than it each
moment seemed to him to assume a more reasonable and tangible form, and
without saying any more to any one else about it, he at once started
off to where the body lay awaiting an inquest, to see if his suspicions
were correct.
When he arrived at the public-house and asked to see the body, he was
at once permitted to do so; for the landlord knew him, and was as
curious as he could be upon the subject by any possibility. One glance,
of course, was sufficient, and the landlord at once said,—
“Yes, I have seen him before, though I don’t know his name. He came to
my house last night, and left his horse there; and, although I only saw
him for a moment as he passed through the hall, I am certain I am not
mistaken. I dare say all my waiters will recognise him, as well as the
Baron Stolmuyer of Saltzburgh, who is staying with me, and who no doubt
knows very well who he is, for he went out with him late and came home
alone, and I ordered one of my men to wait up all night in order to let
in this very person who is now lying dead before us.”
“The deuce you did! But you don’t suppose the baron murdered him, do
you?”
“It’s a mystery to me altogether—quite a profound mystery. It’s very
unlikely, certainly; and what’s the most extraordinary part of the
whole affair is, how the deuce could he come into one of the ice-wells
belonging to Anderbury House. That’s what puzzles me altogether.”
“Well, it will all come out, I hope, at the inquest, which is to be
held at four o’clock to day. There must have been foul play somewhere,
but the mystery is where, and that Heaven only knows, perhaps.”
“I shall attend,” said the landlord, “of course, to identify him; and I
suppose, unless anybody claims the horse, I may as well keep possession
of it.”
“Don’t you flatter yourself that you will get the horse out of the
transaction. Don’t you know quite well that the government takes
possession of everything as don’t belong to nobody?”
“Yes; but I have got him, and possession, you know, is nine points of
the law.”
“It may be so; but their tenth point will get the better of you for all
that. You take my word for it, the horse will be claimed of you; but I
don’t mind, as an old acquaintance, putting you up to a dodge.”
“In what way?”
“Why, I’ll tell you what happened with a friend of mine; but don’t
think it was me, for if it was I would tell you at once, so don’t think
it. He kept a country public-house; and, one day, an elderly gentleman
came in, and appeared to be unwell. He just uttered a word or two, and
then dropped down dead. He happened to have in his fob a gold repeater,
that was worth, at least, a hundred guineas, and my friend, before
anybody came, took it out, and popped in, in its stead, an old watch
that he had, which was not worth a couple of pounds.”
“It was running a risk.”
“It was; but it turned out very well, because the old gentleman
happened to be a very eccentric person, and was living alone, so that
his friends really did not know what he had, or what he had not, but
took it for granted that any watch produced belonged to him. So, if I
were you in this case, when the gentleman’s horse is claimed. I’d get
the d—dest old screw I could, and let them have that.”
“You would?”
“Indeed would I, and glory in it, too, as the very best thing that
could be done. Now, a horse is of use to you?”
“I believe ye, it is.”
“Exactly; but what’s the use of it to government? and, what’s more,
if it went to the government, there might be some excuse; but the
government will know no more about it, and make not so much as I shall.
Some Jack-in-office will lay hold of it as a thing of course and a
perquisite, when you might just as well, and a great deal better, too,
keep it yourself, for it would do you some good, as you say, and none
to them.”
“I’ll do it; it is a good and a happy thought. There is no reason on
earth why I shouldn’t do it, and I will. I have made up my mind to it
now.”
“Well, I am glad you have. What do you think now the dead man’s horse
is worth?”
“Oh! fifty or sixty guineas value.”
“Then very good. Then, when the affair is all settled, I will trouble
you for twenty pounds.
“You?”
“Yes, to be sure. Who else do you suppose is going to interfere with
you? One is enough, ain’t it, at a time; and I think, after giving you
such advice as I have, that I am entitled, at all events, to something.”
“I tell you what,” said the landlord of the hotel, “taking all things
into consideration, I have altered my mind rather, and won’t do it.”
“Very good. You need not; only mind, if you do, I am down upon you like
a shot.”
The excitement contingent upon the inquest was very great; indeed,
the large room in the public-house, where it was held, was crowded
to suffocation with persons who were anxious to be present at the
proceedings. When the landlord reached home, of course he told his
guest, the baron, of the discovery he had made, that the murdered
man was the strange visitor of the previous night; for now, from the
frightful wound he had received in his throat, the belief that he was
murdered became too rational a one to admit of any doubts, and was that
which was universally adopted in preference to any other suggestion
upon the occasion; although, no doubt, people would be found who would
not scruple to aver that he had cut his own throat, after making his
way into the well belonging to Anderbury House.
The landlord had his own misgivings concerning his guest, the baron,
now that something had occurred of such an awful and mysterious a
nature to one who was evidently known to him. It did not seem to be a
pleasant thing to have such an intimate friend of a man who had been
murdered in one’s house, especially when it came to be considered that
he was the last person seen in his company, and that, consequently, he
was peculiarly called upon to give an explanation of how, and under
what circumstances, he had parted with him.
The baron was sitting smoking in the most unconcerned manner in the
world, when the landlord came to bring him this intelligence, and, when
he had heard him to an end, the remark he made was,—
“Really, you very much surprise me; but, perhaps, as you are better
acquainted with the town than I am, you can tell me who he was?”
“Why, sir, that is what we hoped you would be able to tell us.”
“How should I tell you? He introduced himself to me as a Mr. Mitchell,
a surveyor, and he said that, hearing I talked of purchasing or renting
Anderbury-on-the-Mount, he came to tell me that the principal side
wall, that you could see from the beach, was off the perpendicular.”
“Indeed, sir!”
“Yes; and as this was a very interesting circumstance to me,
considering that I really did contemplate such a purchase or renting,
and do so still, as it was a moonlight night, and he said he could
show me in a minute what he meant if I would accompany him, I did so;
but when we got there, and on the road, I heard quite enough of him to
convince me that he was a little out of his senses, and, consequently,
I paid no more attention to what he said, but walked home and left him
on the beach.”
“It’s a most extraordinary circumstance, sir; there is no such person,
I assure you, as Mitchell, a surveyor, in the town; so I can’t make it
out in the least.”
“But, I tell you, I consider the man out of his senses, and perhaps
that may account for the whole affair.”
“Oh, yes, sir, that would, certainly; but still, it’s a very odd thing,
because we don’t know of such a person at all, and it does seem so
extraordinary that he should have made his appearance, all of a sudden,
in this sort of way. I suppose, sir, that you will attend the inquest,
now, that’s to be held upon him?”
“Oh, yes; I have no objection whatever to that; indeed, I feel myself
bound to do so, because I suppose mine is the latest evidence that can
be at all produced concerning him.”
“Unquestionably, sir; our coroner is a very clever man, and you will
be glad to know him—very glad to know him, sir, and he will be glad to
know you, so I am sure it will be a mutual gratification. It’s at four
o’clock the inquest is to be, and I dare say, sir, if you are there by
half-past, it will be time enough.”
“No doubt of that; but I will be punctual.”
We have already said the room in which the inquest was to be held was
crowded almost to suffocation, and not only was that the case, but the
lower part of the house was crammed with people likewise; and there
can be very little doubt but the baron would have shrunk from such an
investigation from a number of curious eyes, if he could have done so;
while the landlord of the house would have had no objection, as far
as his profit was concerned in the sale of a great quantity of beer
and spirits, to have had such an occurrence every day in the week, if
possible.
The body lay still in the shell where it had been originally placed.
After it had been viewed by the jury, and almost every one had remarked
upon the extraordinary fresh appearance it wore, they proceeded at once
to the inquiry, and the first witness who appeared was Mr. Leek, who
deposed to have been in company with some gentlemen viewing Anderbury
House, and to have found the body in one of the ice-wells of that
establishment.
This evidence was corroborated by that of Davis, who had so
unexpectedly jumped into the well, without being aware that it
contained already so disagreeable a visitor as it did in the person
of the murdered man, regarding the cause of whose death the present
inquiry was instituted.
Then the landlord identified the body as that of a gentleman who had
come to his house on horseback, and who had afterwards walked out with
Baron Stolmuyer of Saltzburgh, who was one of his guests.
“Is that gentleman in attendance?” said the coroner.
“Yes, sir, he is; I told him about it, and he has kindly come forward
to give all the evidence in his power concerning it.”
There was a general expression of interest and curiosity when the baron
stepped forward, attired in his magnificent coat, trimmed with fur, and
tendered his evidence to the coroner, which, of course, was precisely
the same as the statement he had made to the landlord of the house;
for, as he had made up such a well connected story, he was not likely
to prevaricate or to depart from it in the smallest particular.
He was listened to with breathless attention, and, when he had
concluded, the coroner, with a preparatory hem! said to him,
“And you have reason to suppose, sir, that this person was out of his
senses?”
“It seemed to me so; he talked wildly and incoherently, and in such a
manner as to fully induce such a belief.”
“You left him on the beach?”
“I did. I found when I got there that it was only a very small portion,
indeed, of Anderbury House that was visible; and, although the moon
shone brightly, I must confess I did not see, myself, any signs of
deviation from the perpendicular; and, such being the case, I left the
spot at once, because I could have no further motive in staying; and,
moreover, it was not pleasant to be out at night with a man whom I
thought was deranged. I regretted, after making this discovery, that
I had come from home on such a fool’s errand; but as, when one is
going to invest a considerable sum of money in any enterprise, one is
naturally anxious to know all about it, I went, little suspecting that
the man was insane.”
“Did you see him after that?”
“Certainly not, until to-day, when I recognised in the body that has
been exhibited to me the same individual.”
“Gentlemen,” said the coroner to the jury, “it appears to me that this
is a most mysterious affair; the deceased person has a wound in his
throat, which, I have no doubt, you will hear from a medical witness
has been the cause of death; and the most singular part of the affair
is, how, if he inflicted it upon himself, he has managed to dispose of
the weapon with which he did the deed.”
“The last person seen in his company,” said one of the jury, “was the
baron, and I think he is bound to give some better explanation of the
affair.”
“I am yet to discover,” said the baron, “that the last person who
acknowledges to having been in the company of a man afterwards
murdered, must, of necessity, be the murderer?”
“Yes; but how do you account, sir, for there being no weapon found by
which the man could have done the deed himself?”
“I don’t account for it at all—how do you?”
“This is irregular,” said the coroner; “call the next witness.”
This was a medical man, who briefly stated that he had seen the
deceased, and that the wound in his throat was amply sufficient to
account for his death; that it was inflicted with a sharp instrument
having an edge on each side.
This, then, seemed to conclude the case, and the coroner remarked,—
“Gentlemen of the jury,—I think this is one of those peculiar cases
in which an open verdict is necessary, or else an adjournment without
date, so that the matter can be resumed at any time, if fresh evidence
can be procured concerning it. There is no one accused of the offence,
although it appears to me impossible that the unhappy man could have
committed the act himself. We have no reason to throw the least shade
of suspicion or doubt upon the evidence of the Baron Stolmuyer of
Saltzburgh; for as far as we know anything of the matter, the murdered
man may have been in the company of a dozen people after the baron left
him.”
A desultory conversation ensued, which ended in an adjournment of the
inquest, without any future day being mentioned for its re-assembling,
and so the Baron Stolmuyer entirely escaped from what might have been a
very serious affair to him.
It did not, however, appear to shake him in his resolution of taking
Anderbury-on-the-Mount, although Mr. Leek very much feared it would;
but he announced to that gentleman his intention fully of doing so, and
told him to get the necessary papers drawn up forthwith.
“I hope,” he said, “within a few weeks’ time to be fairly installed
in that mansion, and then I will trouble you, Mr. Leek, to give me a
list of the names of all the best families in the neighbourhood; for
I intend giving an entertainment on a grand scale in the mansion and
grounds.”
“Sir,” said Mr. Leek, “I shall, with the greatest pleasure, attend upon
you in every possible way in this affair. This is a very excellent
neighbourhood, and you will have no difficulty, I assure you, sir,
in getting together an extremely capital and creditable assemblage
of persons. There could not be a better plan devised for at once
introducing all the people who are worth knowing, to you.”
“I thank you,” said the baron; “I think the place will suit me well;
and, as the Baroness Stolmuyer of Saltzburgh is dead, I have some idea
of marrying again; and therefore it becomes necessary and desirable
that I should be well acquainted with the surrounding families of
distinction in this neighbourhood.”
This was a hint not at all likely to be thrown away upon Mr. Leek,
who was the grand gossip-monger of the place, and he treasured it up
in order to see if he could not make something of it which would be
advantageous to himself.
He knew quite enough of the select and fashionable families in that
neighbourhood, to be fully aware that neither the baron’s age nor his
ugliness would be any bar to his forming a matrimonial alliance.
“There is not one of them,” he said to himself, “who would not marry
the very devil himself and be called the Countess Lucifer, or any name
of the kind, always provided there was plenty of money; and that the
baron has without doubt, so it is equally without doubt he may pick and
choose where he pleases.”
This was quite correct of Mr. Leek, and showed his great knowledge of
human nature; and we entertain with him a candid opinion, that if the
Baron Stolmuyer of Saltzburgh had been ten times as ugly as he was, and
Heaven knows that was needless, he might pick and choose a wife almost
when he pleased.
This is a general rule; and as, of course, to all general rules
there are exceptions, this one cannot be supposed to be free from
them. Under all circumstances, and in all classes of society, there
are single-minded beings who consult the pure dictates of their own
hearts, and who, disdaining those things which make up the amount of
the ambition of meaner spirits, stand aloof as bright and memorable
examples to the rest of human nature.
Such a being was Flora Bannerworth. She would never have been found
to sacrifice herself to the fancied advantages of wealth and station,
but would have given her heart and hand to the true object of her
affection, although a sovereign prince had made the endeavour to wean
her from it.
CHAPTER XCVII.
THE ADMIRAL’S PREPARATIONS, AND THE VISIT TO DEARBROOK.
It was quite finally settled between the admiral and the Bannerworths
that he was to have the whole conducting of the marriage business,
and he even succeeded in getting a concession from Flora Bannerworth,
that he might invite more than twenty guests as had at first been
stipulated. Indeed, she told him that he might ask forty if he pleased.
The admiral had asked for this enlargement of his powers, because he
had received from the lawyer such a satisfactory list of people who
were eligible to be invited, that he found it extremely difficult
to draw any invidious distinction; and, accordingly, he felt fully
inclined, as far as he was concerned, to invite them all, which was a
piece of liberality he scarcely expected Flora would accede to.
When, however, he got leave to double the number, he considered that he
was all right, and he said to Jack Pringle, to whom, as usual, he had
got completely reconciled,—
“I say, Jack, my boy, we’ll have the whole ship’s crew, and no mistake;
for, at a wedding, the more the merrier, you know.”
“Ay, ay, sir,” said Jack, “that’s true. I have not been married more
than a dozen times myself, at the outside, and I always took care to
have lots of fun.”
“A dozen times, Jack! you don’t mean that?”
“I rather think I does. You know I was married at different ports of
India twice; and then wasn’t I married in Jamaky; and then after that
wasn’t I married in the South Seas, in one of the Friendly Islands?”
“A deuced deal too friendly, I should say. Why, confound you, Jack, you
must have the impudence of the very devil.”
“Yes, I believe ye I have. I look upon it that it’s our impudence has
got us on in the world.”
“How dare you say our, you vagabond? But, however, I won’t quarrel
with you now, at any rate, for I expect you to dance a hornpipe at
the wedding. But mind me now, Jack, I am serious—I won’t have any
drunkenness.”
“Well, it’s rather a hard thing that a fellow can’t get drunk at a
wedding; but I suppose I must put up with that deadly injury, and do
the best I can. And now, admiral, as you have looked over that little
affair of mine, in going to the lawyer’s when you didn’t want me, I’ll
make you a voluntary promise, and that is, that I’ll only take two
bottles all the day long.
“Two bottles of what?”
“Oh, rum, of course.”
“Well, that’s moderate; for as I have known you, I think, take about
five, of course I can’t very well say anything to two; so you may take
that much, Jack, for I really think you won’t be much the worse of it.”
“The worse of it! I should think not, sir. It rather strikes me that
two bottles of rum wouldn’t hurt a new-born baby. It’s just for all
the world like milk, you know; it has no effect upon me; and as far as
being fond of drink goes, I’d just as soon take pump water, if it had a
different taste, and was a d—d deal stronger.”
“Well, well, Jack, that’s a bargain, you know, so we need say nothing
more about it.”
“I suppose there will be a fiddle, and all that sort of thing?”
“Oh, don’t doubt that there shall be lots of fun.”
“Then I am your man. I’ll show them a thing or two that will make them
open their eyes a bit; and if so be as they wants anything in the shape
of a yarn, I’m the proper sort of individual to give it them, I rather
think, and no mistake. I’ll tell them how you ran away once, with a
female savage after you, with a long thing like a skewer, that she
called a spear, and how you called to all the ship’s crew to come and
help you, as if the very devil was at your heels.”
Jack very prudently did not wait for an answer to this; for he was
rather well aware that it was not the sort of thing that was exactly
pleasing to the admiral, who was just upon the point, of course, of
getting into one of his rages, which would have produced another
quarrel, only, as a matter of course, to end in another reconciliation.
The old man, however, was too well pleased with the unlimited
commission he had to do as he pleased regarding the marriage affair,
to allow himself to be put much out of the way in the matter, and he
bent all his mind and energies towards the completion of that piece
of business which he had in hand, and which was certainly the most
interesting to him that he had ever been permitted to engage in.
Passing as he did almost the whole of his life upon the ocean, he had
never married, and his affection for Charles Holland, who was the only
relative he had in the world, was of that concentrated nature which is
only to be found under such circumstances.
Charles’s mother had always had a large portion of the admiral’s
regards, and when upon returning home once from a cruise of three
years’ duration he found that she was dead, and had left behind her an
orphan child, he at once avowed his intention of filling the place of
a parent to it, and that he had both in the spirit and the letter kept
his word, we know that Charles Holland was always most ready to admit.
Perhaps the severest shock he ever experienced was when that letter
purporting to be from Charles, but which was really the production of
Marchdale and Varney, was produced, and which seemed at the first blush
to imply a dishonourable breaking of his contract with Flora; and if
anything could have increased his admiration of her, it certainly was
the generous and noble manner in which she repudiated that attempt to
injure Charles in her esteem, and at once declared her belief that the
letter was a forged document.
We may easily imagine, then, from these preceding circumstances, that
the marriage of Charles with one whom he so entirely approved of was
one of the most gratifying affairs in the old man’s life, and that he
viewed it with an extraordinary interest.
As we have before stated, he got possession for a month of the house on
which he had fixed his fancy, and an extremely handsome and commodious
place it was.
It was arranged that after they had remained there for some time they
should all move off to Dearbrook together, and as it was only in early
infancy that the Bannerworths had seen that estate, they purposed
paying it a visit before the marriage ceremony took place.
This was an idea of the old admiral’s, for he said truly enough, “You
can’t possibly know what state it is in till you go there, and it may
be necessary, for all we know, to do a great deal to it before it is
fit for occupation.”
Apart from this consideration, too, it seemed likely enough that
somebody might be in it; for of late it had changed hands, and, for all
they knew, the Bannerworth family might have to institute a suit at law
for its recovery.
The distance was sufficient to make it a whole day’s journey; but
it was a very pleasant one, for they went in a travelling carriage,
replete with every accommodation, and the road passed through one
of the most fertile and picturesque counties of England, being
interspersed with hill and dale most charmingly, and reminding the
younger branches of the Bannerworths of some of those delightful
continental excursions which they once had the means of making, but
which, for a long time, they had not had an opportunity of enjoying.
It was towards the close of a day of great beauty, for the season, that
they reached the village of Dearbrook, close to where the estate was
situated, and put up at the principal inn, to which they were directed.
The circumstances under which the Dearbrook property had been left for
a long time had been such, that there was likely to be some difficulty
concerning it.
In fact, it had been used by Marmaduke Bannerworth as a kind of
security from time to time for his gambling debts, so it was probable
that hardly any one had had it long enough to trouble himself about
rentals.
“If we find any one,” said Henry Bannerworth, “in possession, I shall
not trouble them to pay anything for the use of the house they have
had, provided they quietly give up possession, and leave the place in a
decent state.”
“Oh, that of course they will do,” said Charles Holland, “and be too
glad to escape arrears of rent; but it would be no bad thing to ask
the landlord of this house what is the state of the property; no doubt
he can not only let us know whether it be tenanted or not, but, if so,
what sort of people they are who occupy it.”
This suggestion was agreed to, and when the landlord was summoned, and
the question put, he said,—
“Oh, yes, I know the Dearbrook estate quite well; it’s a very handsome
little property, and is at present occupied by a Mr. Jeremiah Shepherd,
a Quaker—a very worthy gentleman indeed, I believe; but I suppose all
Quakers are worthy people, because, you see, sir, they wear broad
brimmed hats and no collars to their coats.”
“An excellent reason,” said the admiral; “but I had a friend who did
know something about Quakers, and he used to say that they had got such
a reputation for honesty that they could afford to be rogues for the
rest of their existence.”
“Well, well,” said Henry, “we can but call upon him. Do you think that
this would be a reasonable hour?”
“Oh, yes, sir,” said the landlord; “he is sure to be at home at this
hour if you have any business to transact with Mr. Shepherd. He is
a very respectable man, sir, and as it is his own property that he
lives upon, he is quite a gentleman, and never wears anything but drab
breeches and gaiters.”
Without waiting to enter into any further conversation with the
landlord, who had such extraordinary reasons for his opinions, Henry,
and Charles, and the admiral, leaving the rest of the party at the
inn, proceeded to Dearbrook Lodge, as it was called, and found as
they approached it that it exceeded in appearance their warmest
anticipations.
It was a substantial red brick house, of the Tudor style of
architecture, and had that air of dignified and quiet repose about it
which a magnificent lawn, of the greenest possible turf, in the front
always gives to a country mansion.
The grounds, too, seemed to be extensive, and, to take it for all in
all, the Bannerworth family had every reason to be well pleased with
this first view that they got of their acquired property.
“You will have some trouble,” said the admiral, “with the Quaker, you
may depend. They are a race that cry hold fast to anything in the shape
of pounds, shillings, and pence, and are not very easy to be dealt
with.”
“Oh, the man will not be so absurd, I should think,” said Charles. “It
can be proved that the estate was in the Bannerworth family for many
years, and your possession, Henry, of the title deeds will set the
question at rest. But see what a stately looking servant is coming in
answer to the ring which I have just given to the bell.”
A footman, most certainly having all the appearance of what is so
frequently advertised for as “a serious man servant,” advanced to the
gate, and, in answer to the inquiry if Mr. Shepherd was within, he
said,—
“Yes, truly is he; but he liketh not to be disturbed, for he is
at prayers—that is to say, at dinner, and is not accustomed to be
disturbed thereat.”
“I regret that we must disturb him,” said Henry, “for our business
happens to be important, and we must positively see him.”
Upon this remonstrance the servant unlocked the gate, and conducted
them up a path by the side of the lawn which led to the house, and the
more they saw of it the more pleased they were with the many natural
beauties with which it abounded, and Henry whispered to Charles,—
“I am quite sure that Flora will be delighted with this place, for,
if I know anything of her taste, it will just suit it agreeably and
comfortably, and I do sincerely hope that we shall be able to get
possession without the disagreeable necessity of a law suit.”
They were ushered into a handsome apartment, and then told that Mr.
Shepherd would be with them very shortly; and they were not sorry to
have a little leisure for studying the place before its reputed owner
made his appearance.
“I suppose,” said Henry, “the best way will be at once to state that
I am the owner of the place, and upon what conditions I am willing
to forego any claim that I might otherwise succeed in setting up for
arrears of rental during the time that he has been here.”
“Oh, yes,” said Charles; “you cannot be too explicit; but hush! here he
comes, and you will soon know what sort of an individual you have to
deal with in this matter.”
At this moment, the door opened, and Mr. Shepherd, the present
ostensible possessor of the Dearbrook estate, and whose appearance
spoke to the truth of the landlord’s word, make his appearance. But as
what he said was sufficiently important to deserve a new chapter, we
shall oblige him with one.
CHAPTER XCVIII.
THE INTERVIEW WITH THE QUAKER AT DEARBROOK.
The Quaker was a man of about middle age, and was duly attired in the
garb of the particular sect to which he belonged. There was about his
countenance all that affectation of calmness and abandonment of worldly
thoughts and desires which is mistaken by so many people for the
reality of self-denial, when, really, those who know this sect well,
are perfectly aware that there is not a more money-loving, grasping
people on the face of the earth.
After gravely motioning his visitors to be seated, Mr. Shepherd cast
his eyes up to the ceiling, as if he were muttering some prayer, and
then he said,—
“Verily, may I ask to what I am to attribute this visit from
individuals who, in this vale of unblessedness, are unknown to me.”
“Certainly, sir,” said Henry; “you are entitled, of course, at once,
to such an explanation of us. I have called upon you because I am
the proprietor of this estate, to know how it is that you became in
possession of it, and under what pretence you hold that possession?”
Mr. Shepherd slightly changed colour, and staggered back a pace or two
before he said,—
“The property is mine, but I naturally decline to produce my title to
any body who may ask for it. Thou mayest go, now; behind thee is the
door.”
“Mr. Shepherd,” said Henry, “I am fully in a condition, as to means
and evidence both, to prove my title to the estate, and an action of
ejectment will soon force you from it; but I am unwilling, under any
circumstances, to do what I fully may do if anything short of that will
answer my purpose. I therefore give you fair notice, that if, upon my
convincing you that I am the owner of the estate, you go out quietly
within fourteen days, I will make no inquiry as to how long you have
been here, and will say nothing whatever upon the subject of rental
owing to me on account of such occupation.”
“I defy thee, friend,” said the Quaker; “and if thou givest me any
trouble I shall put thee in Chancery, from whence thou wilt not get
out for the term of thy natural life; so I give thee due notice, and
thou mayest please thyself in the transaction; and again I tell thee
the door is exactly behind thee, out of which I beg to request thou
shouldest at once walk.”
“I tell you what, Mr. Quaker,” said the admiral, who had with
difficulty restrained himself thus far, “I look upon you as one of the
greatest humbugs ever I came across, and that’s saying a great deal,
for in my time I have come across some thumpers; and if we don’t make
you smart for this confounded obstinacy, you wolf in sheep’s clothing,
we will know the reason why. If it costs me a thousand pounds I will
make you suffer for it.”
“Thou mayest be damned, friend,” said the Quaker; “possession is
a great number of points of the law, and, as I have it, I mean to
keep it. I have a friend who is in the law, and who will put thee as
comfortably in Chancery, and with as little expense to me as possible.
This is a very charming estate, and I have not the slightest intention
of giving it up.”
“But you must,” said Charles, “give it up to the right owner. How can
you be so foolish as to run yourself to legal expenses for nothing?”
“Teach thy grandmother, young man, to suck eggs,” said the Quaker. “I
wish thee all a remarkably good day, and thou mayest all return from
whence thou camest, and hang thyselves, if thou pleasest, for all I
care; and having made up my mind to live and die on this very pleasant
property. I shall have to put thee all into Chancery.”
“Why, you canting thief!” said the admiral.
“Thou mayest be damned,” said the Quaker. “In speaking so to thee,
I use the language which I am perfectly well aware thou wilt best
understand; so I say unto thee again, thou mayest be damned. Obediah,
show these sinners off the premises; and, should they refuse to go
with that quickness that shall seem to be fitting and proper, thou
mayest urge them on with divers kicks on their hinder persons, and
thou mayest likewise call to thy aid, Towzer, the large dog, to bite
singularly great mouthfuls out of them.”
The Quaker turned, and was walking in a very stately manner out of the
room, when the admiral stepped forward, and exhilarated his movements
with such a kick, that away he went as if he had been shot out of a gun.
“There, friend,” said the admiral, “since you seem found of kicking, I
think that is a very good beginning. It strikes me you didn’t know who
you had to deal with; and now, Mr. Obediah, it’s your turn, and we’ll
manage Towzer when we get outside.”
“I thank thee all the same, friend,” said Obediah, “but would rather be
excused.”
“Perhaps you would like your nose pulled instead, then?”
“No, friend, it is quite long enough already; and I shall take myself
off to the lower regions of these premises forthwith.”
So saying, Obediah rushed from the room with great precipitancy,
leaving, most certainly, the admiral and his party masters of the
field; and although both Henry and Charles both disapproved of the
assault which the admiral had committed, they could not interfere for
laughing, and, as they left the house, which they did now of their own
accord, Charles said,—
“Uncle, you may depend you will be pulled up to the quarter session.”
“Damn the quarter session!” said the admiral. “Do you think I was going
to sit still, quietly, while that vagabond promised to kick me; but,
as it is, it’s all up with coming to Dearbrook to live for one while
to come; for, if he is really as good as his word, and puts the matter
into Chancery, there’s an end of it. I have heard it’s like ducking in
head foremost into a hollow tree, with a wasp’s nest at the bottom of
it; you may kick, but I’ll be damned if you can get out.”
“Well,” said Henry, “I believe that’s rather an apt illustration; but
we must do the best we can in such a case, and, in the meantime, seek
out some other place to reside in. Your friend, the little lawyer in
the town, shall have the case to conduct for us, and perhaps, after
all, we shall defeat the Quaker sooner than you imagine.”
“I long to see the day come,” said the admiral, “when that fellow will
have to troop out of the place; for, in all my life, I never did know
such confounded impudence as he treated us with.”
“Never mind, never mind,” said Charles; “the time must come, of course,
when this pleasant estate, to which we have taken such a fancy, will be
ours; and, until then, we shall have no difficulty whatever in finding
some sweet verdant spot, full of exquisite and natural beauties, which
we can make a home of well and easily, caring nothing for being a short
time only kept from possession of that which, of right, shall, in a
short time, belong to us; and there is one thing that I am rejoiced at,
which is, that Flora has not seen this place; so that she can have no
regret about it, because she don’t know of its existence farther than
by name, and it can hold no place in her imagination which could make
it a subject matter of regret.”
When they reached the inn, they informed Mrs. Bannerworth and Flora of
the ill success of their enterprise, and of the obstinacy of the tenant
of the house; and on that evening they had a good laugh with each other
about the little scene that had occurred between the admiral and the
Quaker; so that, upon the whole, perhaps, they were quite as happy—for
people can but laugh and be merry—as if they had at once got possession
of the Dearbrook estate without any trouble or difficulty whatever.
They determined upon staying there for that night, although they might
have got fresh horses and gone back, if it had pleased them so to
do; but there was much to tempt them in the romantic scenery, around
which they took a stroll, when it was lit up by the sweet moonlight,
and everything came out in silvery relief, looking so beautiful and
serene, so pensively quiet and so admirable, that it was calculated
to draw the mind entirely from all thought of earthly matters, and to
completely rid them of even the shadow of an annoyance connected with
that Dearbrook property which was so wrongfully detained from them.
“It is at such seasons as this,” said Flora, “that contentment steals
into the heart, and we really feel with how little we should be
satisfied, provided it be sufficient to insure those ordinary comforts
of existence which we all look for.”
“It is, indeed,” said Charles; “and you and I, Flora, would not repine
if our lot had been much more humble than it is, provided Heaven had
left us youth and love.”
“Those, indeed,” said Henry, “are dear possessions.”
“Well, then,” remarked the admiral, “you have got youth on your side,
and I once knew a worse looking fellow than even you are; so why don’t
you fall in love with somebody at once?”
“Don’t make so sure, uncle,” said Flora archly, “that he has not.”
The old admiral laughed—for he liked Flora to call him uncle, and said,—
“You shall tell me all about it, Flora, some day when we are alone; but
not now, while these chaps are listening to every word we utter.”
“I will,” said Flora; “it’s a grand secret of Henry’s, which I am
determined to tell.”
“That’s very unkind of you,” said Henry, “to say the least of it.”
“Not at all. If you had trusted me, Henry, it would be quite another
thing; but as I found it out from my own natural sagacity, I cannot see
that I am bound in the slightest to bestow upon you any consolation on
account of it, or to shew you any mercy on the subject.”
“And she hopes,” said Charles, “that that will be a lesson to you
to tell her upon another occasion everything whatever, without the
slightest stint or hindrance.”
“I stand convicted,” said Henry; “and my only consolation is, that I
don’t mind a straw the admiral knowing all about it, and I meant to
tell him myself, as a matter of course.”
“Did you?” said the admiral; “that’s a very good attempt to get out of
it; but it won’t answer exactly, Henry, with those who know better; so
say no more.”
In such light and pleasant conversation they passed some time, until
the chill night air, grateful and pleasant as it was to the senses,
made them think it prudent to retire to the inn again.
After they had partaken of the evening meal, and Flora and Mrs.
Bannerworth had retired to rest, the gentlemen sat up, at the express
desire of the admiral, to talk over the affair upon which they were all
in common so deeply interested.
A general feeling of anxiety evidently pervaded all their minds to
ascertain something of the whereabouts or the fate of Varney, who had
so very mysteriously taken himself off at a time when they least of all
expected he would have executed such a manœuvre.
“You all see,” said the admiral, “that what is bred in the bone, as I
told you, will never be out of the flesh; and this vampyre fellow could
not possibly be quiet, you see, for long, but he must be at his old
tricks.”
“I do not know,” said Charles Holland, “but I am rather inclined to
think that he has somehow become aware that he had become rather a
trouble to us, and so his pride, of which I think we have had evidence
enough that he has a large share of, took the alarm; and he went off as
quick as he could.”
“It may be so,” said Henry; “and, of course, in the absence of anything
to the contrary, I feel inclined to give even Varney, the Vampyre,
credit for as much purity of motive as I can.”
“That’s all very well, in its way,” said the admiral; “but you must
acknowledge that he did not leave in the most polite manner in the
world; and then I, for one, cannot exactly approve of his jumping upon
Dr. Chillingworth’s back, from off a garden wall, as a cat would upon a
mouse.”
“Be liberal, uncle,” said Charles, “and recollect that we are not quite
sure it was Varney, for the doctor declines to be positive upon the
subject, and he ought to know.”
“Stuff,” said the admiral; “the doctor knows well enough; but he is
like the man that threatened to kick the other for laughing at his
wife—he said he was sure he had done it, but if he had been d—d sure,
he would have kicked him into the middle of next week.”
“Certainly,” said Charles, “the doctor seems quite clearly of opinion,
that whoever committed that assault upon him, did so with a full
knowledge of the worth of the picture, which he believes contained
within its extra lining, bank notes to a large amount.”
“And which,” said Henry, “after all, is but a supposition, and Varney,
after such an attempt to possess himself of such a treasure, if it
was he that made it, may be actually now a houseless wanderer; but I
consider that such has been the notoriety of his proceedings, that if
he now attempts any vampyre tricks, he very soon will be discovered,
and we shall hear of him.”
“From his own account,” said Charles Holland, “he has not been the
most scrupulous person in the world with regard to the means by which
he has, from time to time, recruited an exhausted exchequer; and we
can easily imagine that this vampyre business of his would so terrify
and paralyse people, that he would have little difficulty in robbing a
house under such circumstances.”
“You may depend,” added Charles, “that he has done one of two things.
He has either commenced a much more reckless career than ever he has
yet attempted, or he has gone away completely into obscurity, and will
never be heard of again. I sincerely myself hope that the latter is the
case, for it will be better for him, and better for everybody connected
with him.”
“Hang the fellow,” said the admiral; “I should not like him to starve,
although he has given us so much trouble; and I hope that if anything
very queer happens to him, he will not scruple to let us know, and
he shall not positively want. But come, is it to be another tumbler
a-piece, or to bed?”
Bed was voted, for such they knew was the admiral’s wish, or he never
would have mentioned the alternative; and in the course of another half
hour the whole of these persons, in whose fate we profess to have so
profound an interest, were wrapped in repose.
We will now turn to a consideration of what this singular and
mysterious Baron Stolmuyer of Saltzburgh was about, for that he has
some ulterior objects in view, which, by no means, at present, shew
themselves, we cannot doubt; and, likewise, there can be no question
but that very shortly some of his views and projects will develop
themselves.
CHAPTER XCIX.
THE BARON BECOMES MASTER OF ANDERBURY-ON-THE-MOUNT, AND BEGINS TO
CONGRATULATE HIMSELF.—THE DREAM.
It was a wonderful relief to Mr. Leek to find that the fact of a dead
body having been found in the subterranean passage of Anderbury House,
was really no bar to the baron possessing himself of those premises.
Mr. Leek could not disguise from himself that, to many persons, it
would have been a serious impediment, and the very mystery in which
that affair was still wrapped up, would have made the impediment
greater, because people don’t so much think of a murder, which is all
found out, and for which the perpetrator suffers; but a murdered body
found, and yet no murderer, keeps public curiosity upon the stretch,
and is almost certain destruction to house property.
But now, whether the baron bought Anderbury House, or rented it, was
much the same to Mr. Leek; for, in the former case, he got his per
centage all at once; and, in the latter, acting as agent, he got more,
but he got it by degrees.
He waited, therefore, with some degree of feverish impatience to know
which way that illustrious individual would make up his mind; and when
he said, at length, in his strange calm way, that he would give £10,000
for Anderbury-on-the-Mount, Mr. Leek wrote off, in violent haste, to
the owner, advising him to accept the same without delay; and, as
the owner never intended again to set foot in Anderbury House, and,
moreover, wanted money, he wrote back again in as violent haste that he
would take £10,000 most certainly, and wished the transaction concluded
as quickly as it very well could be, promising Mr. Leek, which was a
very gratifying thing to that gentleman, not on account of the money,
as he himself said, “Oh, dear, no!” but as a matter of feeling, a
handsome bonus, in addition to his per centage, if he quickly got the
matter completed.
Armed with this authority, the agent showed an amount of generalship
which must, if he had been placed in the situation of Field Marshal the
Duke of Wellington, have won for him all the continental battles.
He went at once to the baron, and told him that he had received a
letter from the owner of Anderbury-on-the-Mount, asking £10,500 for the
estate, but leaving it at his, Mr. Leek’s option to take £10,000 if he
chose.
“Now, my lord baron,” said Mr. Leek, “business is business, and I may
as well put £250 in my pocket, and your lordship put £250 in yours, as
not.”
“That is to say,” said the baron, “that you are willing to sell your
employer’s interest to me.”
“Oh, why, it isn’t exactly that, you know, my lord; only you know, in
these transactions, everybody does the best he can for himself; and I
am sure I should be very sorry if you thought that—that——”
“Mr. Leek,” interrupted the baron, “you need have no delicacy with me,
whatever. I believe you to be as great a rogue as ever stepped; so you
need make no excuses, only, of course, you cannot expect me to assist
you in your villainy—that is quite out of the question; so you will
understand that I decline giving more than the £10,000 for Anderbury
House; and, if that is not accepted in one hour from this time, I will
not have it at all.”
“It’s accepted now at once,” groaned Mr. Leek, who found that the baron
was too many for him. “It’s accepted at once, my lord; and I beg that
you will bury the past in what do you call it—oblivion.”
“Very good,” said the baron. “I presume, if I give you a check for a
thousand pounds as a deposit, I may have possession at once, while the
deeds are preparing.”
“Certainly, my lord baron; oh! certainly.”
The baron then gave Mr. Leek, and took his acknowledgement for the
same, a check for a thousand pounds on one of the most eminent
banking-houses in London; and in two hours from that time, such was
the celerity and precision of his movements, he took possession of
Anderbury House, and engaged the man and woman who had been minding it
to be his temporary servants, until he could get up an establishment
suitable to his rank, and the place he inhabited.
It would have been a strange sight to Mr. Leek, and would have made him
open his eyes a little with wonder, if he could have seen the baron
traversing the apartments of Anderbury House alone.
“And am I at last settled?” he said to himself, as he stood in a large
saloon. “Am I at last settled in a home such as I can really call my
own?—and shall I not be hunted from it by my enemies? Let me consider—I
will be quick in giving such an entertainment here, that it shall be
talked of for many a day to come. It shall be such an entertainment as
shall present to me all of youth, beauty, rank, and wealth, that can
be found in the neighbourhood; and out of them I will choose some one
who shall be the baroness, and, for a time, pace the stately halls as
their mistress—for a time; yes, I have said only for a time. I wonder
if there be a family vault to this property, because, if there be, I
may want to use it.”
In this purchase of Anderbury-on-the-Mount, the ancient furniture of
the place had been all included; so that, in truth, the baron had but
to walk in and to find himself, if he could make himself so, quite at
home.
A costly bed-chamber was prepared for him; the bed-linen and furniture
of which was sent by Mr. Leek from his own house; and, no doubt, he
fully intended to be well paid for the same.
The baron, after about two hours spent in the examination of his house,
sat down in one of the principal apartments, and partook of a very
slight repast; and after that, folding his arms upon his bosom, he
seemed to give himself up to thought entirely; and from the smile that
occasionally showed itself on his remarkable physiognomy, it would seem
that those thoughts of his were of a pleasant and felicitous character.
Now and then, too, from a few and unsettled words that fell from his
lips, it would seem as if he were greatly felicitating himself upon
something which he had achieved that was of a character to give him
intense satisfaction.
Perhaps it was the death of this singular man who called upon him, that
gave him so much pleasure; and we are inclined to think that was the
case, for, after the commission of a murder such as that, one of two
feelings were pretty sure to possess him.
Remorse might take possession of him, and he might suffer much mental
anguish in consequence of the deed; or the object which he achieved by
that death might be of such a nature as to become quite a subject of
congratulation, so as, whenever he thought upon it, to give him the
pleasantest and most delightful feelings.
It looked very much as if this was the case as regarded the baron,
because it was as clear and evident as the sun at noon day, that he had
felt no degree of remorse or regret for that deed; and that, as regards
his conscience, certainly the murder he had committed sat as easy upon
it as anything well could.
The evening was now drawing on, and the large apartments of the ancient
house began to be enveloped in gloom; but, unlike the generality of
persons who have committed crimes, and whose consciences are charged
with injustice, the gathering gloom of night seemed to have no terror
whatever for the Baron Stolmuyer.
But at length, with something of a sense of weariness, he rose and rang
for attendance, desiring to be shown to the bedchamber which had been
prepared for his reception.
It was a strange thing; but it seemed to be customary with him not to
undress when he retired to rest; but, as he had done at the hotel, he
only took off a portion of his apparel, and then cast himself upon the
bed, and, in a few moments, it seemed as if a deep repose crept over
him.
We say seemed; but, in reality, it was a disturbed and anxious sleep
which the baron had; and soon he began to toss his arms to and fro
restlessly, and to utter deep groans, indicative of mental anguish.
Occasionally, likewise, a muttered word or two, scarcely articulately
pronounced, would come from his lips, such as—“Save me, save me! Not
yet, not yet—my doom—no—no—the moonlight—the moonlight—kill him—strike
him down!”
This state of mind continued for a considerable time, until with a
shrill cry he sprung to his feet, and stood in an attitude of horror,
trembling in every limb, and exhibiting a most horrible and frightful
picture of mental distress.
Then there came a loud knocking at his chamber-door, and the voice of
the man Davis, who had been alarmed at the strange shriek that had
come from the baron’s lips, fell upon his ears. The sound of any human
voice, at such a time, was like music to him.
“Are you ill, sir?” cried Davis; “are you ill?”
“No—no—it was nothing but a dream—only a dream;” and then he added to
himself, “but it was a dream of such absolute horror, that I shall
dread to close my eyes in rest again, lest once more so fearful a
vision should greet me. It was a dream of such frightful significance,
that it will live in my remembrance like a reality, and be dreamed of
again as such.”
He sat down, and wiped the cold perspiration from his brow; then
rising, he walked with unsteady steps towards the window, and throwing
aside the massive curtain which shut out the night without by making a
still deeper night within, a flood of beautiful and tender moonlight
fell into the apartment.
As the cold rays fell upon his face, he breathed more freely, and
seemed more to revive beneath their influence than as if he had
suddenly found the bright sunshine beaming upon him in all the
refulgence of its mid-day glory.
“I am better now,” he muttered; “I am much better now. What a fearful
vision that was which came across my heated fancy! Welcome, welcome,
beautiful moonbeams, welcome; for deep in my very heart I feel your
cheering influence now.”
The violent trembling which had seized him passed away, and once more
he resumed his wonted composure and calm hideousness of expression, if
we may be allowed the word.
Now, for some time, he sat in silence, and then, in a low deep tone, he
spoke.
“It was a strange dream! A dream made up of strange fancies and strange
impulses! I thought that I stood in a vaulted chamber, and that all
around me depicted nothing but gloom and desolation; but, as I there
stood, the chamber filled with hideous forms, coming from where I knew
not, but still crowding, crowding in, until the shadow of the merest
shade could not have found a place.
[Illustration: The vampyre’s dream.]
“And so they crushed me into the smallest possible space; and there I
stood, with a hundred grinning faces close around me, and in such a mad
paroxysm of terror, that I would have given the world for escape from
that dreadful thraldom.
“But they gibed at me, filling my ears with shrieking noises, and then
at once there was a proposition—a proposition yelled out with shrieking
vehemence by every voice. It was, to place me in the tomb even as I
was, a living man.
“‘Heap mountains of earth upon him,’ cried a voice. ‘Endow him with the
rare gift of immortality, and then let him lie buried for thousands of
years yet to come.’
“They seized upon me, those gaunt and terrific forms, and deep into the
bowels of the earth I was hurried—a depth beyond all calculation; and
when I thought my fate was sealed, a change came over me, and I found
myself in one of the ice-wells of this mansion, cold and death-like,
while a crowd of eager, curious faces, illumined by the light of
torches, gazed down upon me, but no one spoke; and then they began to
cast large fragments of the rocky cliff upon me.
“I called for aid, and asked for death; but still they proceeded to
fill up the pit, while I lay, incapable of anything but agonised
thought, at the bottom of it.
“Then it was, I presume, that in my despair I shook off that fearful
slumber and awakened.”
He was silent, and seemed again much to rejoice in the moonbeams, as
they fell upon his face; and, after a time, in order, it would appear,
that he might feel more of their influence, he opened the window, and
stepped out upon a balcony which was immediately in front of it.
The view that he now had was a beautiful one in the extreme, spreading
far over, in one direction, a beautiful tract of highly cultivated
country; and on the other, as far as the eye could reach, upon the
boundless ocean, on which the moonbeams fell with such beauty and
power, that, still and placid as the waters were on that particular
night, the sea looked like a sheet of radiant silver, broken into
gentle irregularities.
It was a scene upon which a poet or a painter—but painters should all
be poets, although poets may not be painters—might gaze with rapture
and delight.
Not the slightest breath of air stirred the gentlest leaf upon a forest
tree; but such a calmness and such a serenity reigned over all things,
that one might imagine oneself looking upon some new and beautiful
world, the harmony of which had never yet been disturbed by the jarring
sounds of elemental strife.
Strange thoughts and feelings seemed to come over the baron, as he then
looked upon that mild and placid scene without, and, after a time, he
spoke, saying,—
“And what do I struggle for now? What is it now but mere existence
that is the end and aim of all these anxious thoughts and feelings?
Nothing more, nothing more, but the mere liberty to breathe and to be
anxious—the capacity to endure pain. That is what I live for—nothing
else—nothing else in the wide world; for when and how can I expect that
calm contentment of the soul which man takes such pains to cast from
him, but which I know the full value of, can ever be mine?”
Once more he cast his eyes around him, upon the great extent of
cultivated country, and although he felt he could call the most of it,
that lay immediately beneath his observation, his own, it yet gave him
but little gratification to do so, and probably he looked with about as
much indifference upon his own possessions as any one possibly could.
“This is a new career,” he said, “and something tells me that it is
my last; so, while it continues, I will not shrink from it, but, on
the contrary, enjoy it; and I will endeavour to lose the recollection
of those stormy periods of my existence which have passed away in
a complete round and whirl of what the world calls enjoyments and
delights. I will spend large sums on brilliant entertainments, and this
house, which they tell me has been so long deserted by everything in
the shape of festivity and hilarity, shall once again ring with joyous
laughter, and I will make an endeavour to forget what I am.”
He evidently dreaded again to lie down to repose, for, after some time
further spent in thought, and in the expression of the feelings that
lay uppermost in his mind, he put on again that portion of his apparel
which he had taken off.
“In this soft and pleasant moonlight,” he said, “which is so grateful
to my senses, I will walk in the gardens of this mansion; and, should
a sense of weariness oppress me, I shall be able to find, no doubt,
some pleasant spot where I can lie down to rest, and I shall not fear
horrifying or anxious dreams when I can repose beneath the beams of the
moon, which cool my fevered brow.”
With a slow and stately step he moved across the long and beautiful
corridor from which his chamber opened, and then, descending the grand
staircase, and in that house a grand staircase it really was, he made
his way across the hall, and, undoing the fastening of a window which
opened into a large and handsome conservatory, he passed through that
again, and soon found himself in the extensive gardens of Anderbury.
Certainly, if there be any sight more chaste and beautiful than
another, it is a highly-cultivated and well-wooded garden by moonlight,
and we cannot but admire the taste of the Baron Stolmuyer in preferring
it even to the stately bed-chamber he had so recently left, and which,
notwithstanding all the advantages and beauties that art could bestow
upon it, could never hope to rival, or even to come near, the natural
beauties of that highly-cultivated piece of ground.
And there are some flowers, too, that give out their sweetest odours to
the night air, and some again that unfold their choicest beauties only
when the sun has set, and the cold moonbeams can but look down upon
them.
When he got fairly into the garden, he found that there was a light,
gentle breeze playing among the shorter shrubs and flowers, but that
it reached not high enough to stir the leaves of the trees; but it
is extremely doubtful if, completely taken up as this man was, no
doubt, with worldly pursuits, he did not, after the first few moments,
completely forget the world of natural beauties by which he was
surrounded.
Folding his arms, he walked along the stately avenues with a solemn
tread, and then, soon banishing from his mind those feelings of
melancholy sadness which had oppressed him, he began evidently to
indulge in dreams of felicity which, by the manner in which he spoke of
them, were evidently but dreams.
“What can I desire or want more than I have?” he said, “Immense
wealth—consequently, immense power. Golden opinions may always be
purchased with gold, and what is there then really to hinder me
pursuing to the full the career which I have marked out to myself?
Surely I can surround myself with all that is young, and delightful,
and beautiful? Can I not make these halls echo with such laughter,
that surely it must awaken, even in my breast, joyous emotions? Then
there is the wine cup; why should not that flow with rich abundance,
gladdening the hearts of all, and adding even to genius, for the time,
a new fire, and a more delightful expression of its thoughts and
feelings?
“And music, too; surely I can have abundance of music, to shed the
witchery of its charms about me; and, with these inducements and
allurements, I must and will succeed in banishing reflection, if I
achieve no more.”
As he now stood, and turned his eyes towards the east, he fancied he
saw that the morning light was beginning faintly to show itself in the
far off horizon.
“Another day is coming,” he said, “and how much, how very much might be
done in a day. I will, with the assistance of that man Leek, who, I can
readily perceive, is quite willing to bow down to any idol, provided it
be of gold, to commence the career of festivities that I have set my
heart upon, and we shall soon see how striking an alteration will take
place in the halls of Anderbury.”
He entered a small summer-house which was built in the garden, and
through the stained glass of which the moon shone with a variegated
light, and there he sat down, and, after a time, tasted of that repose
which, upon the bed of down that he had left, and surrounded by all the
costly litter of his handsome bedchamber he had courted in vain.
CHAPTER C.
MR. LEEK SPECULATES UPON THE BARON’S MATRIMONIAL INTENTIONS.
Mr. Leek pondered deeply over what the baron had said to him regarding
his intention to take unto himself a wife, and viewed the resolution
in all its bearings, with a view of discovering in what way such a
thing could be turned to account, and whether that account might not
be managed to his own advantage, which was a matter that Mr. Leek very
often considered of paramount importance to himself, as being the pivot
upon which things moved.
In Mr. Leek was certainly centered all those notions which usually
arise from a desire to benefit oneself, and causing, as far as in him
lay, all events to circle around him when they least appeared to do so.
“I must make this move of the baron’s matrimonial alliance redound to
my own advantage in some way or other, though I cannot precisely say in
what way; but, if I have any hand in it, there must be a way, of that
there can be no doubt; the only thing is to discover the way.”
Mr. Leek set himself steadily to consider the subject in all its
various bearings, determined he would not give up the chase until he
had discovered what was to be done.
“I have it—I have it!” he muttered—“I have it; who can suggest anything
better? I must have something to do in the suggestive style. I will
persuade the baron to invite some one with whom I can have a few words
in private. I will have some few words in the way of a bargain with
them.
“Yes, yes; I will do my best to make somebody else’s fortune; but at
the same time they must do something for me in return. I must have a
_quid_ for my _quo_, as the parsons say. They cannot preach the gospel
without they have a full stomach; for who can be pious and hungry at
the same moment? I can’t, my thoughts would be diverted; but the case
holds good in every relation in life; even those whom I would benefit
must benefit me, else I lose the natural desire I have to benefit them.
This reciprocity is the motto I like to apply in cases of this kind,
and very proper too.”
Thus did Mr. Leek argue the matter within his own mind, and then,
having thus made a resolution, his next step was to consider how he
should put it in practice—how he should be able to realise his hopes,
and give life and being to the suggestions of his inventive faculties,
which were usually of a practical nature.
“Well, well,” he muttered. “Let me see—it’s difficult to say who’s who
now-a-days; but that must not cause me to lose a chance, and I think I
can make pretty sure of my bargain. I think, if I undertake anything, I
can go through it and not fail. I will have so much of security as will
prove a bargain, and thus bring shame and disgrace upon them if they
refuse to make good the conditions.”
Thus Mr. Leek had an eye to the future, and the contingencies that
might, under different circumstances, arise by any possibility.
Men like Mr. Leek do not often fail in their endeavours when they take
a comprehensive view of any affair in which they might engage, and
thus, by contemplating it in all its various phases, insure, as much as
may be, success to all their schemes.
The next consideration that presented itself to Mr. Leek was the party.
It was all very well to chalk out a plan of action—the mode in which
a thing should be done; but it was another to adapt the tools to the
occasion, and make them subservient to the purpose he had in view.
He did not choose his tools first, and then adapt his work; no, he saw
his object and adapted the means to the end; and, in considering this
part of the affair, he came to the following resolution.
“I think I know who to pitch upon,” muttered Mr. Leek to himself, in
a thoughtful tone. “Aye, she has several children, and is a widow,
too. I know she is comparatively poor, and not too much troubled with
compunction, or any absurd notions of delicacy upon this matter. I can
tell her what I mean better than I could to a good many. Yes, I will go
and visit her. I can come to an understanding at once.”
This was satisfactory, and he arose to quit the house, and proceeded
to the residence of Mrs. Williams, the lady whose accommodating
disposition, and whose desire to see her daughters well provided for,
would cause her to bargain about matters that many would think too
serious and too much a matter of the affections to be permitted to be
looked upon in the light of a mere affair of pounds, shillings, and
pence.
Now, Mrs. Williams was a lady who possessed something very much like a
genteel independence, which is a very mysterious matter, and one which
puzzled many people to divine. No one can understand what a genteel
independence means.
It is one of those things that enables people to flit about,
apparently comfortable in circumstances, with genteel clothes, and
fingers on which no marks of toil are observable, but which are
white and soft, through often lean and attenuated, in consequence of
privations.
However, to return to Mrs. Williams. She was a widow, had several
marriageable daughters, and was most anxious that they should be
settled out in life, so that she might be sure of their future welfare.
She was a sharp-sighted, clever woman in some respects; and, in others,
she was as women usually are, which is not saying much.
The house the widow occupied was one a pattern of neatness and
gentility, and ornamented with woman’s work from one end to the other;
the ladies were accomplished and well educated, and possessed of some
personal charms; and they were not altogether unacquainted with the
fact.
“Yes, yes,” he muttered; “I will go to Mrs. Williams, and there we can
come to an immediate understanding. Helen Williams will, I think, stand
a very good chance indeed. I must go and have some conversation with
her, and learn her sentiments before I break ground with him; else she
may try something without my aid on her own account.”
This was a laudable object, and was but, as he said, merely putting
another person in the way of making a fortune, and putting something
into his own pocket at the same time; which was doing two good things
at once, charitable acts of the first class, because charity begins at
home, and then it gives to one’s neighbours when we have a surplus.
It did not take Mr. Leek very long to reach the widow’s house; and it
was not without some degree of confidence that he rang the bell for
admission; and, when a servant appeared, he said,—
“Is Mrs. Williams at home?”
“Yes, sir, she is,” answered the drudge; “do you want her?”
“I wish to see her, else I should not have come here,” replied Mr.
Leek. “Tell her Mr. Leek desires to speak with her.”
“Very well, sir,” said the girl, who left the hall, and then walked to
the parlour, in which Mrs. Williams was seated, and overheard all that
was said in the passage.
“Mr. Leek, ma’am,” said the girl.
“Tell Mr. Leek to walk in,” said the lady; and, in due form, Mr. Leek
did walk in, introduced by the servant, who soon departed, leaving the
two worthies in each other’s presence.
“Good morning, Mrs. Williams.”
“And good morning, Mr. Leek; this visit is unexpected, but valued. I am
happy to see you. Will you be seated?”
“Thank you,” said Leek, “I will. Unexpected incidents give rise to
other unexpected incidents; so, you see, one event gives rise to
another, and they follow each other in rapid succession.”
“So they do,” said Mrs. Williams.
“Well,” said Mr. Leek, as if greatly relieved in mind, giving sound to
something very much like a sigh, “and how do you find yourself this
variable weather—eh, Mrs. Williams?”
“As well as can be expected, you know, at my time of life.”
“Your time of life! Upon my word, you are a young woman; and, if I
might hazard an opinion, one with no small share of charms; indeed, you
are decidedly a beautiful woman, Mrs. Williams.”
“Ah! Mr. Leek, I though you were too much a man of business to be given
to flattery; but I am afraid of you.”
“There is no need, ma’am, I assure you. But how are your lovely
daughters?—in the enjoyment of good health and spirits?”
“Yes, they are very well, I thank you, Mr. Leek—very well indeed; they
usually are; they are considered to enjoy very good health.”
“That is a good thing, I am sure—a very good thing, upon my word; they
usually are well?”
“Yes; they have very little that ails them.”
“It will be a blessing to you when they are comfortably provisioned
off, under the protection of some one who will seek their future
happiness as his own,” said Mr. Leek.
“Why, as to that,” said Mrs. Williams, “I am not so anxious as many
might be. I love to see my children round about me; I love to be in
their company, and to know that no one can ill-use them.”
“That is very true,” said Mr. Leek.
“And yet, I have, I must say, at times, a wish that I might, before I
die, see them comfortably settled in life, and their future happiness
secured.”
“Certainly; it is quite a mother’s wish that it should be so; that her
children might enter the world, and that they might be provided for and
subject to none of the disagreeable contingencies of life.”
“Those are my feelings.”
“I thought as much, Mrs. Williams. Have you heard of the Kershaws
lately?” inquired Mr. Leek.
“Yes; I did hear there was a marriage in the family; pray is it true?”
“It is.”
“A good marriage?”
“Yes, I believe a very good marriage; one in which a great deal of
money is floating about from one to the other; indeed, I hear the
gentleman is very rich.”
“How did they become acquainted with such a man? I did not think they
had any friends who could have brought them into contact with such a
person.”
“A friend,” said Leek.
“Indeed! Why, as I said, I did not know they possessed such friends;
but still, I suppose, there was some drawback—either low-bred
contracted friendships, or some circumstances or other, that caused him
to settle there.”
“I believe not,” said Leek.
“And what is he then?” inquired Mrs. Williams.
“Why, he was a stranger in those parts; but he had an excellent
fortune, and was, according to all accounts, a very excellent match.”
“How came they to find him out? who introduced them to him? I should
like to know such a person.”
“Why, some friend.”
“How very disinterested of that friend,” said Mrs. Williams.
“Not quite. It was a mutual understanding, I believe.”
“How?”
“Why, thus; the friend wanted money, and the lady wanted a husband for
her daughter.”
“Well, I dare say she did, and I should have thought she was like to
have waited long enough.”
“And so she would; but an active man of business may have the means of
pushing a family’s fortune, if they will but make it worth his while;
it was in this manner the Kershaws have made their fortune.”
“And what did they do?”
“Why, they pushed a daughter into certain company into which she was
introduced by the man of business; not by himself, but he managed it so
that she was introduced, in a manner that made it appear as if they had
no connection, and then he could exert himself in another manner, and
so contrived to serve them by spreading favourable reports.”
“And that’s how Mary Kershaw got her husband, is it?” inquired Mrs.
Williams, with a serious air.
“Yes, it is, indeed.”
“How very immoral!”
“Eh?”
“How very immoral of a mother speculating in matrimonial matters for
her daughter. How could she expect that she could procure happiness for
her, when she uses such means?”
“What better could she use? You mistake the motive of the affair
altogether, Mrs. Williams; give me leave to say you do.”
“Indeed.”
“Yes, decidedly. Thus, you don’t attempt to buy a daughter’s happiness;
you only pay an agent; that is all. But it can be no crime that that
agent is engaged upon matters connected with the happiness of your
daughter, which is the great object of a mother’s care.”
“Certainly—certainly; how plain all that is,” said Mrs. Williams; “but
I can’t think it is exactly what I should do myself.”
“Perhaps not. But I have exactly such a chance, at this very moment.”
“You, Mr. Leek?”
“Yes, I. I have the means, I believe, of obtaining a good fortune for
the daughter of a very respectable person, of the first respectability,
and with natural advantages in her favour. Such a one, if it were worth
my while to lose time in carrying such an affair——”
“Why, then, the matter looks a little different to what it did, and
certainly who could object to do what was just and right?”
“Exactly. Now, if you were desirous of seeing your daughter Helen, for
instance, comfortably provided for, what would you give—making it a
suppositious case—what would you give to see your daughter happy and
comfortable for life, with a good home over her head?”
“A good deal.”
“What?”
“I cannot say; but, of course, that would depend much upon the value of
such a prize; but I would not hesitate at a trifle in such a matter as
that, come what may.”
“Well—well, that is really the best way to consider the affair in all
its various branches; you become more satisfied in the end. Now, do you
really think you would be able to tolerate such an attempt to benefit
yourself and daughter?”
“I do.”
“Will you enter into particulars?”
“Yes, Mr. Leek; whenever you please. I am willing to attend to your
proposal, and will be bound to anything I may say; for, in matters of
this kind, I must consider anything one may say or undertake, as a debt
of honour.”
“Exactly. But what we agree to now we must put in black and white,
because, by-and-bye, we may not think of it so well as we should when
we see it drawn up before one.”
“Agreed. But what of this person?”
“Why, I think, if we were to agree, you would find this gentleman very
rich and munificent, and living in a princely style; he is, in fact, a
man of rank—of title, in fact.”
“Is that so?”
“Yes, it is, I assure you, because I know him, and have had business
matters to do with him; and, though a correct man, he is not at all
nice about matters in which money is the chief ingredient. He pays
eight hundred a year for rent, so you may guess he is not at all
unlikely to give your daughter a handsome settlement.”
“If he will have her.”
“Exactly; if he have her; there is the contingency, of course, which,
however, cannot affect you.”
“Yes, it must, since my daughter does not obtain her husband.”
“And you pay no money. If the benefit is contingent to you, it is to me
also. I do not wish to bind you to anything that will cause you to be a
loser under any circumstances.”
“Very well,” said Mrs. Williams. “Say what you please; there is pen,
ink, and paper; make it out, and I will sign any memorandum you may
please, provided it be of the complexion you have mentioned.”
“I wish for no other.”
Mr. Leek, accordingly, sat down near a table, and produced an
agreement, which was, to give him a certain sum of money, provided
Helen Williams was married to the baron.
“And who is he, my dear Mr. Leek?” said the lady.
“There,” said Leek, “read that, and you will see his name.”
And, as he spoke, he pushed the memorandum towards her, and she took it
up and read it carefully over, and when she had so done, she signed it,
and returned it, saying,—
“So he is a baron.”
“Yes; I told you he was a man of rank and title.”
“You did; and where will he live?”
“At Anderbury House.”
“A fine place; I know it. A splendid and princely place it is, too. He
must have a large fortune there. It will be a splendid match for Helen.
I wonder if there be any prospect—success; it appears almost too great
a catch.”
“I should say there was every prospect of success.”
“But we must not let Helen know anything of our compact. I know
her feelings so well, that I am fully persuaded that she would not
acquiesce in the arrangement at all.”
“Certainly; it may for ever remain our own secret, with which no human
being need be acquainted.”
“That is precisely what I wish; but now how are we to manage the
introduction?”
“That will be easy enough.”
“I am glad of it; but how is it to be managed at all?”
“Thus: the baron will give grand entertainments, and as he knows I am
very well acquainted with the generality of the gentry about, he has
asked me to point out those whom he might safely invite to his splendid
banquets.”
“Then you will have the kindness to invite us,” said Mrs. Williams. “I
see through it now. Ay, a very good plan. Then you can say everything
that is necessary.”
“To be sure I can, and will,” said Leek.
“Well, I am glad you have called about this to-day, for we have
had some little scheme in view, but unknown to the principal party
concerned; however, as this one is in view, I shall prosecute no other.”
“It would be dangerous to attempt two such speculations at once, else
he would be unlikely to fulfil a promise even after he had gone some
way towards doing so.”
“I would run no risk in landing such a prize,” said Mrs. Williams, who
began to have a keen relish for the chance they had in view, such as
they had not yet heard of from any quarter.
“Then I may fully rely upon your putting Helen forward upon every
occasion that may present itself?”
“You may.”
“And in the meantime keep as much to yourself as you can. You must
profess to be unbounded in your admiration for all he says or does, and
then you will obtain a preference for companionship, and every little
is an aid in such matters.”
“I shall be careful.”
“And in the meantime I will bid you good day,” said Mr. Leek.
CHAPTER CI.
THE GRAND ENTERTAINMENT GIVEN BY THE BARON AT ANDERBURY HOUSE, AND HIS
ANNOUNCEMENT.
The baron made quick work of it, for in five days after the one on
which he took Anderbury House, he gave his first entertainment. Money
works wonders, and in the baron’s hands it seemed to have lost none of
its magical power; for Anderbury House in that time was furnished like
a palace; rich and costly were the decorations—the ornamental parts
were bold and florid.
The house and grounds were of a most magnificent character, though
they had been viewed as separate features; but when considered as one,
as that which was part and parcel of one great whole, it was truly
princely.
Great care, labour, and expense had been exerted to make the mansion
one befitting the habitation of a prince; and the baron himself was
looked upon as little less than a prince; his disregard of money, his
liberality, all concurred in making him looked upon as one of the most
popular men in that neighbourhood.
Indeed, none such as he had ever been seen or heard of in that quarter.
He was safe to be considered as one of the grandees of the day.
Anderbury House was now a theme of conversation with every one in the
whole town. His magnificence, liberality, and all things connected with
him, were all well calculated to cause a feeling of prejudice to be
made in his favour.
When people saw the men that were at work, the loads of articles
which were sent there, they were amazed, and could hardly credit their
senses. Then they all considered how very rich he must be to be able
to spend so much in furniture, in hangings, in beautifying, and in
ornamental work, which must have been very heavy.
The baron was fully determined to do all he had intended to do in the
way of opening his first grand entertainment with great eclat, and in a
manner that would take the whole country by surprise.
The day came; the house was furnished, decorated, filled with servants,
and everything that could make it appear as though it had been for
years in that state.
It is surprising how soon a place can be made to lose all signs of its
ever having been uninhabited, and the fact of human beings being in a
place soon wears away the look of desolation by which it is otherwise
enveloped; but how much easier must it have been, with ample means, for
a man like the baron to cause such a house as that of Anderbury House
to become what it was.
The great wonder being, not what was done with ample means, but the
short time in which it had all been collected together, which was done
with such celerity and such small signs of bustle and disturbance, that
it appeared as if performed by the wand of a magician, so sudden and so
quiet was it done, comparatively.
At the end of five days there was a number of invitations fairly
written out and directed, by order of the baron, to the principal
inhabitants and gentry of the place to visit Anderbury House, and
partake of a grand banquet given by the baron to them and his friends
on that occasion.
The day was named, and the information supplied by Mr. Leek to the
baron, was of a character that to that individual was extremely
valuable, and of which he freely availed himself.
It must not be imagined that the worthy Mr. Leek was in any way
oblivious of the promise or obligation into which he had entered with
Mrs. Williams, whose name he had taken very great care to insert in the
list of invitations that the baron had sent out.
The evening arrived, and the carriages drove up to Anderbury House in
rapid succession. There were few or none who knew the baron; they were
all, however, anxious, most anxious to see who and what the baron was,
who occupied the estate.
The title and name sounded well, and that was what dwelt upon people’s
minds, and made an impression upon them, and they freely accepted the
invitations, especially when they inquired among themselves what was
the extent of invitations that had been issued, and they were confined
wholly to the _elite_ of the place.
What was thought or said upon the occasion, it would be difficult to
say, because it was so various, and there were none who could in any
way form an opinion at all, that wore any appearance of probability
about it.
But there was a rumour spread about that he was a foreigner who had
immense riches, desirous of marrying an Englishwoman, and yet unable to
obtain introductions in the usual way, or else he was merely acting in
accordance with the customs and habits of his own country.
The carriage drive of Anderbury House was completely occupied by the
strings of carriages that had taken up and set down for two hours or
more, as rapidly as they could.
The fine apartments that Anderbury House contained, that were destined
to be used for the occasion, were indeed a splendid suit of rooms; but
they were now lit up with chandeliers, and adorned with glasses, and
mirrors, and pictures.
As for the ornamental part of the mansion, it was superb. Nothing had
been spared in expense, and by the way in which that was laid out,
it was evident the baron was a man of taste and judgment, and had
converted a nobleman’s residence into a palace.
• • • • •
The gentry came dashing up to the door. The place was crowded, and many
were announced, and met and welcomed by the baron, who gave them a
cordial and distinguished greeting.
There were many persons present; they were astonished at the display
of magnificence and wealth of the baron; they were delighted by his
reception of them—his conversation, and general manners; and many,
too, were much astonished by the splendid entertainment which he had
provided for them.
All that art or the season could produce was there—superb wines and
liqueurs—fruits—to an extent they had never before contemplated or
thought of.
Anderbury House was without a rival.
The wines were good, and they warmed the blood; and courtesies and
civilities of life were by the aid of the alchemy of old port, splendid
and sparkling champagne, sherries, Burgundies, and other wines, soon
turned into friendships and cordialities.
“Baron,” said one of the guests, “you have a superb place, and you
certainly are the proper individual to own such a place.”
“And why, my dear sir?” inquired the baron, blandly.
“Because you have the taste and heart to decorate and array the place
in a manner befitting its extent, and you have the hospitality of one
of the ancients of the east.”
“Ha! Ha! very good, my dear sir. You are kind, very kind; but I must
admit I do like to see neighbours act honestly, and in good faith with
each other; besides, I am of opinion that man is a social animal, and
one who lives only in society. I cannot be a hermit.”
“Right. If the world were all of your opinion—and I believe they are,
practice only is opposed—what a state of kindliness and comfort we
should all be in—I am sure of it.”
“Ay, so am I. Do you like music?”
“I do,” was the answer.
“Then you shall hear some. We shall have the dance presently, and then
there will be no heart that will not beat in unison with the harmonious
strain.”
“I think they deserve not to be here in the centre of happiness, if
they did not.”
“Ho! music, there!” said the baron, as he stamped on the floor of the
grand saloon, in which several hundred guests stood.
The call was answered by a loud crash of instrumental music, that came
suddenly and startlingly upon the ears of the guests; but then it was
followed by a lighter strain, with a pretty but marked melody, such a
one, that it instantly communicated to those present, the feeling of
being participators, and even actors, in the scene that was about to be
enacted upon the floor.
It required but very little exertion to form the dance, where every one
was willing and anxious to take their places. There was a slight degree
of excitement in the procuring of partners.
Here for a moment the baron was at fault; but, by some means that were
not at that moment explained, or even thought of, Mrs. Williams led
the beautiful Helen past the spot at the moment. He had spoken to her
before, and was well pleased with her. He perceived she was beautiful
and amiable. Her mother, too, was with her, and in another moment the
baron stepped forward, saying,—
“Madam, if the hand of your daughter is not already engaged, I beg
respectfully to claim it for the opening dance?”
Mrs. Williams curtseyed with condescension, saying, in reply,—
“Yes, my lord. My daughter is disengaged.”
“Miss Williams,” said the baron, with much deference, “may I request
the honour of your hand?”
Helen Williams curtseyed, and said she was not engaged, and accepted of
his offer with a smile, but with some diffidence.
The baron immediately led her to the top of the room, where, by this
time, there was a perfect lane for them to pass through, until they
reached the top.
All had taken their places by an instinctive sort of feeling that was
almost universal in the ball-room.
The signal was given, and then the baron led Helen down the first
dance, amidst the admiration of all, and the envy of not a few. The
giddy whirl of the dance, the throng of beauty, and the sweet but gay
notes of the bands, added to the _coup-d’œil_ of the scene—a scene of
so much happiness and gaiety, that there were few who could have looked
coldly upon It.
[Illustration: The baron dances with Helen.]
The baron, himself, appeared in the highest spirits, and with the
greatest hospitality he sought to administer to the wants of his
guests, every moment that he could abstract from the present leadership
of the dance.
He first visited one, and then the other, until he had made a fair
round, and then he found that the night was far advanced, and that, in
but a short time, he was convinced that daylight would come.
The guests were well pleased with the splendour of the entertainment,
and the profusion that was there. Nothing was wanting. All were well
pleased with the arrangements. Great care and great expense had been
gone to to gratify and pleasure them, and it had succeeded indeed; if
it had not, they would have been captious and ungrateful to an extreme.
The guests, however well pleased with their entertainment, were still
unable to bear up against the excitement and fatigue of pleasure for
hours, and the animal power fails.
Indeed, there is no one sense which may not be exhausted by an
overindulgence; even hearing will, as soon as any other, become
invariably tired by listening too long to music; ay, and even become
unable to distinguish between the different melodies; and the guests
began to flag, and to pay more attention to the side tables, and then
to look drowsy, while some few of the younger spirits appeared to have
the dance to themselves.
The baron now saw the proper moment had arrived for dismissing the
company; and, causing the music to cease, he advanced to the middle of
the room, and, waving his hand, said,—
“My honoured guests, the sun begins to peep over the hills, and the
bright car of Phœbus rapidly ascends the skies, telling us that another
day has begun. The happiest mortals must part, and so must we. Let me
thank you all for this kindness, for thus honouring my banquet with
your presence, and let me hope it may often be thus.
“Often, I say. Yes, fair ladies, your presence will always be a
distinguished honour. While I am a bachelor, I shall continue
these _fetes_ once a fortnight regularly, until somebody takes the
arrangement of such matters out of my hands, by legally assuming the
title of baroness.”
There was a long pause after this announcement, and then a sudden buzz
of admiration, which was heard on all sides; and the ladies looked
at each other, the baron, and the magnificent place they were in.
We cannot tell what passed in their minds, but a shrewd guess might
readily be formed, and to the performance of that task we leave the
reader. There were many courtesies before the separation was effected,
and an hour had passed before the Baron Stolmuyer of Saltzburgh found
himself alone.
CHAPTER CII.
THE WEDDING FEAST.—THE ADMIRAL’S DISAPPOINTMENT.
And now the day arrived, at length, when Charles Holland was to call
Flora Bannerworth his bride.
On this most auspicious event, as may be well imagined, the admiral was
in his glory, and he declared his intention of dancing, if any very
handsome young lady should ask him to be her partner at the ball, but
not otherwise; for it had been agreed to have a ball in the evening.
Jack Pringle, too, was restored completely to favour upon the occasion;
indeed, as far as the admiral was concerned, he seemed to have granted
a general amnesty to all offenders, because he was heard to say,—
“Well, I really should not mind if any poor devil of a Frenchman was to
come; he should know that good eating and drinking was for once in his
life; or even that vagabond, old Varney, the vampyre. What a fool he
was to take himself off before the wedding, to be sure.”
Henry Bannerworth had undertaken to take off the old man’s hand all the
trouble connected with the actual ceremony. That is to say, letting the
clergyman know, and so on; therefore he, the admiral, had nothing at
all upon his mind but the festivities that were to be gone into upon
the occasion.
The numerous guests recommended by the lawyer were invited to a
breakfast, which was to be at one o’clock; while a favoured few, which,
together with the family party, made up, altogether, about eighteen
persons, were to come to the wedding itself, and to be actually present
at the ceremony.
The admiral was rather annoyed at Jack Pringle, about ten o’clock,
looking very anxiously at the sky, and shaking his head in a manner
which seemed to indicate that he had something of importance on his
mind.
“What the deuce is in the wind, now?” said the admiral. “You are always
looking for foul weather, you are, and be hanged you!”
“Oh!” said Jack, “I was only a considering what they calls the blessed
aspect of the sky, and it seems to me there is a sort of kind of look
about things as says that there won’t be no marriage at all to-day.”
“No marriage!”
“No, not a bit of it; I’m tolerably sure there won’t. I was a going on
one of my numerous occasions to be married, and there was just that
there kind of look in the sky, and I wasn’t.”
“What kind of look, you lubber? I rather think, after living afloat a
matter of forty years and more, I ought to know the looks of the sky
rather, and I don’t see any thing unusual in it.”
“Don’t you? Then I does; and there won’t be no marriage.”
“Why you infernal croaking swab, you are drunk or out of your senses,
one of the two. I would bet my head to a bottle of rum, that there will
be a marriage.”
“I don’t mind,” said Jack, “betting one bottle to twenty that there
won’t.”
“Done, then—done; and, Jack, for once in a way, you will find yourself
regularly done, I can tell you. I know you have got some crotchet
or another in your head, by which you think you will get the better
of the old man; but it won’t do; for I won’t stand any quibbling or
lawyer-like sneaking out of it.”
“Oh! I won’t sneak out of it, you shall see. It shall be all plain
sailing and above board, I can tell you, admiral.”
The old man rather puzzled himself to think what Jack could mean; but
after a time he gave it up, and forgot it; for his mind began to be too
actively engaged upon what was going on to pay much attention to what
he considered was some joke of Jack’s, which would turn out to be a
mere quibble of words after all.
The admiral was right when he said there was no appearance of anything
in the weather to indicate that any stop would be put to the festivity
on that account; for a more pleasant, and a more genial, delightful day
for the occasion never shone out of the heavens.
Indeed, if anything could have been considered as a gratifying omen of
the future felicity which Charles Holland was likely to enjoy in the
society of Flora Bannerworth, it was the aspect of that day—a day so
replete with beauties that, had it been picked out specially for that
occasion, it could not have been more gratifying or delightful.
The house was a large and a handsome one which the admiral had taken,
and, since, of course, he considered it to be his own, he was from an
early hour in the morning in a perpetual fidget, and here, and there,
and everywhere, for the purpose of seeing that all the arrangements
were complete for the day’s proceedings.
As may be well supposed, he was a great hindrance to everybody, and
most especially the servants, whom he had temporarily engaged, wished
him at the very devil for his interference.
But, however, notwithstanding all these drawbacks, by ten o’clock
everything was in a tolerable state of readiness; and then the admiral
vociferously congratulated the first of the guests who arrived, for
that was a great merit in the old man’s eyes, and, although he did not
know the person a bit, he almost terrified him by the cordiality of his
greeting.
“That’s right,” he said; “take old Time by the forelock, and always
be too soon instead of too late. I’ll tell you some capital stories
some of these days about the advantage of being a little too soon—But,
hilloa! here comes somebody else. Egad! we shall have them all here
soon. Here, Jack Pringle! where are you?”
“Here!” cried Jack; “hard on to your larboard bow.”
“Pipe all hands among the flunkies!”
“Aye, aye, sir,” said Jack.
Producing then a boatswain’s whistle, he blew a shrill call, which
pleased the admiral, for, as he said, that was the proper way to begin
anything like an entertainment.
People know they must be punctual at weddings, and generally are
tolerably so, with the exception of those persons who are never
punctual at anything; so that, in a short time, nearly the whole of
those who had been invited to be present at the ceremony had arrived,
and the hour was fast getting on towards that when the marriage was to
take place.
The admiral would have been blind, indeed, if he had not perceived that
there was a great deal of whispering going on among the Bannerworth
family, and he got rather indignant and a little uneasy to know what it
could all be about; but, most of all, he began to be annoyed at Jack
Pringle, for that individual’s conduct was certainly of a peculiar and
extraordinary character.
Every now and then he would burst out into such an amazing roar of
laughter, apparently at nothing, that it became seriously annoying to
the old man; and, finally, taking up a pair of nut-crackers that were
upon the table, he gave Jack a hard rap upon the top of the head, as he
said,—
“Are you out of your senses? what are you going on about?”
“Oh, nothing,” said Jack; “I was only a thinking. Don’t you recollect
our wager?”
“Yes, I do; you have laid me one bottle of rum to twenty that Charles
and Flora won’t be married to-day.”
“Very good,” said Jack, “that’s quite correct, and mind, I hold you to
it.”
“Hold me to it—I’ll hold you to it. I know well enough it’s some stupid
joke you have got hold of.”
“Very good,” said Jack; “we shall see.”
The time crept on, and half-past eleven o’clock came, and the guests
were assembled in the drawing-room, where, by a special licence, the
ceremony was to have been performed; and on the mantle-shelf of which
there was a time-piece, indicating the rapid arrival of the hour named
for the ceremony.
“You know, Henry,” said the admiral, “I left everything to you. I hope
it’s all correct, now, and that you have not made any blunders.”
“None whatever, I assure you, admiral. I have arranged everything; but
Flora has just told me that she wants to speak to you.”
“Speak to me! then why the deuce doesn’t she speak? I suppose she can
speak to me without asking your leave?”
“Admiral,” said Flora, “I am extremely anxious to ask you if you will
forgive me for something which may possibly annoy you a little, and
which certainly I feel myself answerable for.”
“What is it?”
“You must promise to forgive me first.”
“Well, well, of course—of course I do; what is it?”
“Then, I must say, I would rather not be married to-day.”
“What!” cried the admiral.
“I told you so,” shouted Jack. “I saw it in the look of the clouds this
morning. I never knew anybody get married when there was a light breeze
blowing from the nor’-east.”
“You be quiet,” said the admiral; “I’ll be the death of you, presently.
What is the meaning of this, Flora? Is it not rather a cruel jest to
say such a thing to me now?”
“It is no jest, sir, but a fact; I must beg to be excused.”
“And I, uncle,” said Charles Holland, advancing, “am of the same mind;
and I join with Flora in begging that you will look over the little
disappointment this may occasion you.”
“Little disappointment!” cried the admiral; “am I awake—am I out of my
senses? Jack, you rascal, where am I?”
“Can’t say,” cried Jack; “but I think as how you are abut two points to
the south’ard.”
“Flora, speak again. You do not, cannot mean to tell me that any
foolish quarrel has interfered to prevent this union, upon which I have
set my heart? If you are not jesting, there must be some very special
reason for this alteration of intention.”
“There is,” said Flora, as she looked the old man kindly in the face;
“there is a very special reason, sir, and one which I will mention
to you at once; a reason which makes it next to impossible that the
ceremony should proceed. The real fact is——”
“Well, go on—go on.”
“That Charles and I were married a fortnight ago.”
“D—n me,” said the admiral, “if ever I was so taken in my life. A
fortnight ago! shiver my timbers——”
“Go on, old pepper-castor,” said Jack; “only remember you owe me twenty
bottles of rum.”
“I won’t look over it,” said the admiral; “I won’t and I can’t; it’s
treating me ill, Flora—I tell you, it is treating me ill.”
“But you know you have looked over it, admiral,” said Flora, “and I
have your positive promise to forgive me.”
“Besides,” said Jack, “she won’t do so no more; and, as far as I sees
of these ere things, it’s a deuced good thing as we ain’t bothered with
any parson coming here this morning, casting up his eyes like a dying
dolphin if one outs with so much as a natural d—n or two. I can’t stand
such rubbish, not I; and its my out and out opinion that we shall be
all the merrier; and as for the old man——”
Jack’s oratory was put a stop to by the admiral seizing a piece of
confectionery that was upon the table, and throwing it with such a
dab in his face that he was half choked and covered with currant
jam; and he made such a spluttering that the guests could keep their
countenances no longer, but burst into a roar of laughter consequent
upon that proceeding.
“And you, too, Henry,” said the admiral, “I suppose you were in the
plot?”
“Why yes,” said Henry, “I rather think I was. The fact is, that Flora
disliked the public marriage, although she looked forward with pleasure
to the meeting with this pleasant party on the present occasion; so,
among us, we all cast about for some means for securing the agreeable
without the disagreeable, and so, a fortnight ago, they were married
quietly and privately, and I plead guilty.”
“I thought as much,” said the admiral, “I’ll be hanged if I didn’t; but
now just answer me one question, Charles.”
“A hundred, if you please, uncle.”
“No, one will suffice. I want to know whether you were married in the
name of Bell, or in the name of Holland?”
“I took legal advice, uncle, as to the validity of my marriage in the
name of Bell; and as I found that a man’s marriage was quite legal, let
him call himself whatever he pleases, and as I knew that it was your
wish I should take the name of Bell, I was married in that name, and
Flora now calls herself Mrs. Bell.”
“Then I’ll say no more about it,” said the admiral, “but let it pass
so—let’s be as merry as possible; and first of all, we will have a
bumper all round to the bride.”
This affair, upon which Charles really had had some misgivings, being
thus agreeably settled, there was certainly nothing to interfere with
the hilarity of the meeting, and as there was an abundance of good
cheer, and the guests had been selected judiciously, and were persons
who could and would enjoy themselves, an extremely pleasant day was
passed.
For about an hour, perhaps, only, the admiral now and then exhibited
some symptoms of indignation, and shook his head occasionally at Flora;
but a smile from her soon restored him, and he did actually contrive
to get through a quadrille in some extraordinary manner, by almost
knocking every lady down, and ending by falling sprawling himself.
The only great interruption—and that lasted for nearly half an hour—to
the proceedings arose from that incorrigible Jack Pringle, who, as
usual, did not get a glass too much, but a whole bottle too much; and
then an obscure idea seized him that it was absolutely impossible for
him to avoid kissing all the ladies, as it was a wedding, or ought to
have been a wedding.
Blaming himself, therefore, very much for not having thought of it
before, he made a wild rush into the drawing-room, and commenced
operations.
[Illustration: Jack attempts to kiss all the ladies.]
A scene of confusion ensued which quite baffles description, and Jack
had to be carried out at last by main force, thinking himself a very
ill-used person, when he was only doing what was right and proper.
The admiral apologised to the ladies for Jack, calling their attention
to the fact that he wasn’t such a fool as he looked, and that, after
all, it wasn’t a bad notion of Jack’s, only that he had not set about
it in the right way.
“Howsomedever,” said the admiral, “I don’t mind showing you how he
ought to have done it.”
This, however, was universally declined, and that with so much
decision, too, that the admiral was forced to forego the generous
intention; but long before the parties separated for the night, he
admitted that it was just as well the marriage business had been all
settled before; and it was shrewdly suspected that, from the fact of
the admiral singing “Rule Britannia,” after he had gone to bed, he
had just slightly exceeded the bounds of that moderation which he was
always preaching to Jack.
CHAPTER CIII.
DR. CHILLINGWORTH MAKES URGENT INQUIRIES FOR THE VAMPYRE; AND THE
LAWYER GIVES SOME ADVICE CONCERNING THE QUAKER.
If the Bannerworth family and the admiral were inclined to put up
quietly with the loss of the large sum of money which Dr. Chillingworth
fully believed that Varney, the vampyre, had gone off with, he could
not fully divest himself of the idea that it was recoverable.
When he went home, he succeeded in silencing the clamours of his wife,
by assuring her that his practice for half-a-dozen years would not at
all be equal to what he should gain if he could successfully carry
out what he was aiming at; and as everything, to Mrs. Chillingworth,
resolved itself into a question of pounds, shillings, and pence, she
was tolerable well satisfied, and consented to remain quiet, more
especially as he gave her sufficient to keep the household comfortably
for some time while he again left home.
So thoroughly had he made up his mind not to let the matter rest, that
he carefully resolved the best means of setting about, systematically,
to inquire for Varney.
He thought it impossible that he could have left the cottage home of
the Bannerworths with such great secrecy that no one had observed him.
He was too remarkable a man, too, in personal appearance to escape
notice; and if any one saw him, with a grain of curiosity in their
composition, they would be sure to look after him with speculative eyes
as to who and what he was.
The cottage had not many dwellings near it, and the doctor thought it
highly possible that if he visited them all, and made proper inquiries,
some one among their inhabitants might be able to tell him that such a
man as Varney had been seen.
Accordingly he commenced his tour, and, as luck would have it, at the
very second cottage he went to, a woman stated that a tall, dark,
singular-looking man had asked leave to sit down for a few minutes, and
to be accommodated with a glass of water.
“Had he any parcel or bundle with him?” asked Mr. Chillingworth.
“No,” was the reply; “he certainly had nothing of the kind that I could
see, and only seemed very weary and exhausted indeed.”
“Do you know which direction he went in?”
“I watched him from my cottage door, and after looking about him for
some few minutes, he walked away slowly in the direction of the London
road.”
This was all the information that Dr. Chillingworth could obtain in
that quarter; but it strengthened him in his own opinion, that Varney
had left that part of the country, and proceeded to London; but with
what motives or intentions could not be guessed even, although probably
it was with an intention of finding a wider sphere of action.
“If,” thought the doctor, “he has gone on the London road, and walked,
he must have stopped, in the very weak state that he was, within a very
few miles for rest and refreshment; in which case I shall hear tidings
of him, if I take myself the same path.”
He pursued this plan, and walked on, inquiring at the different inns
that he passed, but all in vain, for such a man.
No one had seen anybody resembling Varney; and the doctor, with a sense
of great disappointment, was compelled, himself, to stop for rest at
a roadside inn, where the mails and stage coaches stopped to change
horses.
The landlord of the inn was a good-tempered, conversable man, and was
listening, with quiet complacency, to the rather long description of
the personal appearance of the individual he sought, that was given
by Dr. Chillingworth, when the mail coach from London, which was
proceeding to a very distant part of the country, stopped to change
horses, and the coachman came to the bar to take his usual glass of
refreshment.
While so engaged, he heard something of what Mr. Chillingworth was
saying, and he remarked to that gentleman,—
“Do you mean, sir, a long fellow, that looked as if he had been buried
a month and dug up again?”
“Well,” said the doctor, “he certainly had something of that
appearance; but the man I am inquiring about disappeared last Thursday.”
“The very day, sir; I was going up with the mail, when he hailed it,
and got up on the outside. It’s the very man, you many depend; I
remember well enough his getting up, but somehow or another when we got
to London he wasn’t to be found; and so he had his ride as far as it
went, and I have not the least idea of how far that was, for nothing.”
“I thank you for your information, and I have no doubt that it was
the man I seek for. Although he had a large sum of money with him, I
think, yet it was not in an available shape to use, and I dare say he
would not be very scrupulous about the means he adopted to avoid the
inconvenience of any detention.”
“Not he, sir, he wasn’t very particular. I dare say he got down
somewhere in London, most probably at Piccadilly, where there is always
a crowd, and I draw up for about five minutes. I don’t look to see who
gets down, or who stays up, so, as regards that, he might take himself
off easy enough, if he liked.”
“But you missed him?”
“Yes, I did, when it was too late. Can you tell me who, or what he is,
sir?”
“Yes,” said Dr. Chillingworth; “it was Varney, the vampyre, of whom, no
doubt, you have all heard so much, and who has made such a commotion in
the countryside.”
“The deuce it was!” said the coachman; “and I have actually had one
of these creatures upon my coach, have I! I only wish I had known it,
that’s all; I would have pretty soon got rid of such a customer, I can
tell him. They don’t suit me, those sort of gentry; but I’m off, now;
good day, sir. I hope you may catch him.”
The coachman got upon his box, and drove away; and Dr. Chillingworth
began to think that unless he took a journey to London, which he was
scarcely prepared to do, he must give up, for a time, the pursuit of
Varney.
Besides, he thought, and justly enough too, that even if he went to the
metropolis in search of him, its extent would baffle all inquiry, and
make it almost impossible that it could be set about with any prospect
of success; so he resolved, before he went any further in the matter,
to urge the admiral and the Bannerworths once more upon the subject.
He was firmly, himself, of opinion that something more, and that,
perhaps, too, of a very uncomfortable character regarding Varney, would
soon be heard, unless they could communicate to him in some manner, and
persuade him either to retire from England altogether, or to lead a
quiet life with a portion of the wealth he had acquired.
It will be seen with what great pertinacity the doctor clung to that
idea which to the Bannerworths appeared such a very doubtful one,
namely, that Varney had really got possession of all the money which
had been hidden by Marmaduke Bannerworth; but we must leave the
doctor for the present inactive, because he felt that, at the period
of Flora’s marriage, they would be too much occupied to give him the
attention he required, and, therefore, he determined to wait until that
ceremony, at all events, was completely over.
And now we may as well state at this juncture that the admiral was
quite as good as his word, as regarded taking the advice of his friend,
the lawyer, concerning the Quaker who still held possession of the
Dearbrook estate.
With all the indignation that he felt upon the matter, he laid it
before the man of law, explaining how liberally Henry had dealt with
him, and what a very uncourteous reception they had met with.
“I am afraid,” said the lawyer, “that he may keep you out of it for a
year or two, unless you compromise with him.”
“What do you mean by compromise?”
“Just this; he knows very well, of course, that he cannot hold
possession, and he wants to be paid out, that’s the whole of the
affair. He considers that you may take friendly advice, and that then
you will be told how much shorter, cheaper, and less vexatious a course
it is, to put up with almost any amount of imposition, than to get
involved in a law suit.”
“That’s all very fine,” said the admiral; “but do you think I’d let
that rascally Quaker have a farthing of my money? No, indeed; I should
think not. If he expects us to compromise he will be disappointed.”
“Well, then, if your determination is to proceed, I will, if you like,
take the necessary steps in the name or Mr. Henry Bannerworth. Do you
know if he administered to his father’s estate?”
“No; I know very little about it. But you had better see him.”
“Certainly,” said the lawyer; “that will be the best plan. I had better
see him, as you say, and I dare say,” added the lawyer to himself, “I
shall find him more reasonable that you are by a great deal.”
The lawyer did see Henry; for he called upon him and so strongly
advised him to compromise the matter with the Quaker, that Henry gave
him full instructions to do as he pleased.
“Your title is so clear,” said the lawyer, “that it cannot prejudice
you to make the offer, or, rather, to allow me to make it for you;
besides, I will take care it shall be made without prejudice, and
I dare say you will get possession pretty quickly of the Dearbrook
estate.”
The lawyer wrote to the Quaker, asking for the name of some solicitor
who would act in his behalf, and at once received an answer, referring
him to a Quaker attorney, who was tolerably notorious for sharp
practice, and who was about as great a rogue as could be found in a
profession somewhat notorious for such characters.
The shortest plan and the best was that which was at once adopted by
the admiral’s friend, the attorney; for he went to town and saw the
Quaker upon the subject.
The result of their conference was, that Mr. Shepherd wanted a sum
equivalent to two years’ rental of the premises he occupied, before
giving up possession of them; and in reply one year was offered, and
there the matter rested for mutual consideration of the principals.
Henry did not feel exactly disposed to do anything in the affair,
in actual defiance of the admiral, so he resolved upon trying, at
all events, to persuade him into the compromise, if possible; and
the principal argument he intended using was, that Flora had heard
sufficient of the Dearbrook property, and that it would be a thousand
pities, consequently, to keep her out of possession of it, since,
from what they had all seen of it, they felt that it would be a very
desirable residence indeed.
The admiral’s anger, however, had been so roused by the insolent
conduct of the Quaker, that it required great care and tact to
introduce the subject to him in such a shape, and Henry set about it
not without some fear of the result.
“I have seen, admiral,” he said, “your friend, the lawyer, about the
Dearbrook property, and we shall not have possession in our lifetimes.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“Oh, our ghosts may perhaps haunt its verdant shades; but we shall be
all dead long before the Court of Chancery decides in our favour; for,
owning to the manner of my father’s death, some difficulties may be
thrown in the way to protract time.”
“What! does he tell you so?”
“Yes, indeed he does, admiral; and then, you see, Heaven knows how many
claimants may arise for the estate, if it was known how recently we
came by the title-deeds.”
“The deuce they would! I can’t say but there is some reason in that,
after all; but what is to be done? You can’t say that the Quaker,
Shepherd, is to be allowed to retain possession of the Dearbrook
estate, just because there are some difficulties in the way of getting
it out of his clutches?”
“Certainly not; but the whole question resolves itself into what is the
best means of accomplishing that object, and the great difficulty seems
to be this; that he actually has possession, which you have heard, of
course, is nine points of the law, and puts a man in such a position
that he can give a deal of trouble to any one who is not so fortunately
situated.”
“Can he; then I tell you what I’ll do, Henry; I’ll pretty soon alter
that state of things.”
“But how can you, admiral?”
“By going and taking possession, to be sure; and if possession be
indeed nine points of the law, I don’t see why we shouldn’t have them.
I have taken a ship or two from an enemy when they have been under
their own batteries, and it ain’t the most likely thing in the world
that a Quaker, who, in the navy, we call a wooden gun, should stop me
taking possession of the house.”
“I am quite sure,” said Henry, “that if you were to set about it, you
would do it,—there can be no doubt whatever upon that head; but it’s
a very difficult thing to treat the law in that sort of way, and you
may depend there would be an amazing fuss made about it, so much so,
indeed, that some serious consequences might ensue, and we should
perhaps lose the estate altogether.”
“Hang the estate! it’s the Quaker I want to serve out.”
“But you have served him out. Don’t you recollect the kick you gave
him?”
“Why, yes; I certainly did give him a kick.”
“And a good one too.”
“You think it was a good one, do you, Henry? Well, I must say, I am
very glad of that—very glad of it. It’s some consolation, that’s quite
clear.”
“And I think then, after that, admiral—after feeling that you have
served him out in that kind of manner, and that he has put up with the
degradation of having been kicked by you, you might just as well forego
a little of your resentment, and allow me to ascertain if I cannot make
something like terms with him.”
“Terms with a vagabond like that!”
“Yes. What say you to giving him a trifle, and then let him go;
provided he clears out of the estate at once, and gives us no further
trouble?”
“I’d ten times rather kick him again.”
“Why, yes; and I must confess he deserves kicking most certainly. I
admit all that, that a greater scamp you could not find; but, after
all, you see, admiral, it comes to a question of pounds, shillings, and
pence. Nothing in the world makes a man like that suffer but touching
his pocket.”
“Very likely; but you propose to put something into his pocket.”
“Yes, at first; but it is to save more, as would easily be found; and,
besides, you see how he has been afraid to take any notice of your
kicking him.”
“To be sure he has; such fellows are always afraid. You didn’t expect
he would take any notice, did you? and, if you did, I knew better.
Afraid, indeed! Ah! to be sure; that’s just what he was likely to
be—afraid, as a matter of course.”
“If you please, sir,” said a servant, coming in to the admiral, “here
is a gentleman wants to speak to you.”
“To me? Who the deuce can that be, I wonder?”
“He says it’s on particular business, sir.”
“Well, well; show him in here.”
A mere youth was shown into the apartment, who, addressing the admiral,
said,
“Pray, sir, is your name Bell?”
“To be sure it is; and what of that?”
“Nothing particular, sir; only I have the honour of serving this upon
you.”
“And what the devil is it?”
Before this question was well out of the admiral’s lips the lad had
disappeared, and when the old man unfolded the paper, he found that it
was a notice of action from Shepherd, the Quaker, on account of the
assault which Admiral Bell had committed upon him.
“And this is the fellow,” cried the admiral, “that you want me to
compromise with. No, Master Henry, that won’t do; and, since he has had
the imprudence now to commence war with me, he shall not find that I am
backward in taking up the cudgels in my own defence, I’ll pretty soon
let him know that he has got rather an obstinate foe to deal with, and
we will see how long he will find it worth his while to persevere.”
Henry felt at once that this imprudent act of the Quaker, which, no
doubt, was intended to hasten and facilitate a compromise, placed it
further off than ever, and that, in the admiral’s present state of
mind, it was quite absurd to think of talking to him in anything like a
peaceable strain, for such could not be done.
The utmost that could be hoped was that he would not actually give way
to some act of violence, and that he would, at all events, do nothing
more than what the law allowed him to do in the matter.
This was what Henry did not feel quite sure of, and he only hoped it.
CHAPTER CIV.
THE BONE-HOUSE OF THE CHURCHYARD OF ANDERBURY.—THE RESUSCITATION.—THE
FIGHT, AND THE ESCAPE OF THE DEAD.—THE BOAT, AND THE VAIN PURSUIT.
The coroner, after the inquest was over, issued his precept for the
interment of the body of the man who was found in the ice-well of
Anderbury House, and whose body was deposited at the bone-house in
Anderbury churchyard.
There was an end now to these proceedings, though it was much too fresh
in people’s minds to enable them to forget it; yet, once the coroner’s
inquiry over, it usually happens that a feeling of satiety, arising
from excitement, in the first place, or following that excitement,
and induced by the knowledge that all is done that can be towards
unravelling the mystery that had caused such a sensation, takes place.
The town of Anderbury was first subsiding to its original quietude,
and the only indication of any excitement was that among a few old
topers, who met in the early part of the evening, to discuss anything
that there might be stirring to talk about, and to do that required
but little inducement, to talk being their principal, not to say only,
amusement; indeed, to have deprived them of that would have been to
have deprived them of nearly their only inducement to work and to live,
that they may indulge in their evening conversations at the alehouse.
There was a very general belief among such people that, as the whole
affair was unexplained, that it was mysterious, and the nods and winks
were numerous; indeed, it was thought that there was more than the
usual amount of mystery. However, this has its limit, and when all is
said that can be said, there must be an end to the discussion, which is
usually dropped for want of fuel to feed it.
• • • • •
That night the baron sat alone in his apartment, apparently buried in
deep thought; but, now and then, he might have been seen to lift up his
eyes towards the east, as if watching for something, and then he would
cast them towards a magnificent timepiece on the mantelpiece, and then
he would again relapse into thoughtfulness.
There were several such fits as these, that were broken in the same
manner as before, and, at length, the arose and took a small book off
one of the tables, and examined a certain page and a certain column,
and then he half-muttered to himself,
“Yes—yes; it is as I thought—the moon will rise in about an hour and a
half; that will do. I will now go to the bone-house, and there watch
the body, and ascertain if my fears are correct; if not, I shall be
well repaid for my trouble; and should they be, why, I must endeavour
to make the affair take the best turn I can. I must try and prevent the
completion of my own deed from being disturbed in its integrity. The
dead must remain so; and, if not, to that condition he must return, and
lie where no moon’s ray will reach him.”
He arose, and, wrapping his cloak around him, went to the door of his
apartment, and paused, as if listening.
“No one is stirring,” he muttered; “no one is about.”
He stole softly out of the apartment, and descended the stairs, making
his way towards a small private door, which opened into the garden,
which he secured behind him.
Then he walked rapidly but softly through the garden, which he quitted
by another private door, and which he also secured after him; and then
proceeded quickly and silently towards the church yard of Anderbury
church, which was but ill-qualified to keep intruders out of it, seeing
that there was but a low wall and a hedge for the purpose of a fence,
which could at various places be easily scaled; indeed, there are few
country churchyards that cannot be so entered; and it does not appear
usually the practice to endeavour to keep out human beings, but rather
to keep the yard clear of all brute intruders, for it was open to all
who should choose to come.
The scene was not very distinct; the moon was not yet risen, and
darkness reigned upon the earth; he could see but a short way, and he
cared but little for that.
“If darkness prevents my seeing, it also prevents others seeing me;
therefore, it is welcome. The moon will rise soon enough to aid
me in my watch, and if it rise not at all, it would be agreeably
satisfactory, seeing that there would be no probability of what I
suspect happening without her rays.”
He hurried onwards towards the churchyard. The sea was close by, and
the night breeze, as if swept across the face of the ocean, gave the
indistinct roar, which never ceases, but only increases and abates as
a storm or calm prevails at the time, and as the wind increases or
diminishes, thus increasing or diminishing the intensity of the roar;
but it never entirely ceases at any time.
The baron made his way towards the churchyard by an unfrequented path
that was well know to him; but as he was about to get over a stile into
a field, he thought he heard a voice speaking on the other side of the
hedge.
He paused a moment, and crept along the hedge, until he came to the
spot where the voice seemed to come from, and then he paused, until he
heard them speak again.
“I tell you what it is, Jack; it’s a very strange affair—a very strange
thing, indeed.”
“So it is.”
“And one I can’t understand at all, though I have endeavoured to do
all I can that way. I have thought the matter over very often; but it
always comes to this—that it is a very strange affair.”
“What can be the cause of it?”
“I don’t know.”
“Have you seen it?”
“I thought I did once,” said the second; “but it was misty and dark;
but I think I couldn’t be mistaken.”
“Nor I.”
“You have see it oftener than I; have you not?”
“Yes—yes—I have, several times.”
“How did you see it?”
“Why, thus: I was looking out for the lugger, and there away in the
east I saw something white coming across the sea. It came very steady
and slow, and looked small at first.”
“Yes—yes.”
“Well, then, after that it came closer and closer, until I saw it
changed its shape to a gigantic woman.”
“A woman!” exclaimed the other.
“Yes, or may be a man in a winding-sheet; that is most likely though,
after all.”
“I think so, too,” he replied; “as sure as there are dead bodies in
Anderbury churchyard, it forebodes some great evil—of that I am very
well persuaded.”
“What great evil do you think will happen?”
“How can I tell? I am no prophet. I cannot imagine in what shape it
should come; but come it will depend upon it; if it comes not now, when
it does come, remember my words.”
“I will.”
“And you will find them all true some day or other, if it don’t come
too soon to be pleasant; but I think something may happen to the
lugger.”
“She has not been seen these two days; and it is now past the time when
she ought to have been in. Thus it was with the other lugger that the
revenue cutter took.”
“Did you see the apparition?”
“No; but there was a token, I believe; but I was not in those parts at
that time.”
“Well; but how did it happen that they let the lugger be taken by the
king’s men?”
“Oh! they couldn’t well help it, you may depend upon that. She was
coming from Cherbourg, laden with brandy and with lace, a good cargo,
and worth something, I assure you.”
“She must have been worth something.”
“She was. Well, she had a very good run for a part of the way, when a
fog came on. Well, it wasn’t well understand what they were to do. Some
were for putting back; others for standing where they were, and some
few for running in shore.
“I shall run in shore,” said the captain. “I know every hole upon the
coast; and I know the exact spot where we are, and how to steer. I can
run the vessel to an inch.”
“And that inch may do the business for us all,” said one of the crew;
“but I’m ready.”
“And I, too,” said the captain; “and I will run her where there will be
no chance of any meeting with the preventive people; but the fact is,
we can neither see nor be seen; we are safe, boys. A good run on shore,
and a swift voyage home.”
“Huzza!” shouted the men; and the vessel was run towards the shore,
and, at the same time, they were going under an easy sail safe and
secure, and had no thought of any evil.
There was a look-out, at the same time we could not see two yards
beyond the vessel. The watch was alert, but he could see nothing; but
suddenly he called out,—
“Ship ahead! Port your helm!”
“What ship’s that?” inquired a voice, and, in another moment, they
found themselves alongside the revenue cutter, from whom they had so
long and so often escaped.
“Board!” shouted the officer on board, and then he called upon our
people to surrender; but the captain drew his sword, and called out to
the crew to do as he did, and defend the ship; and as he spoke, he cut
one man down, but was immediately met by a pistol-shot, which laid him
dead on the deck.
After that there was no resistance; the men didn’t want to endanger
their lives by resisting men who were doing their duty, and protected
by law; they were, moreover, out-numbered by the revenue people, and if
they resisted, they would be liable to hanging, whereas they could but
imprison them.
“They were all taken, and they were all imprisoned for different
crimes—all, however, getting free after a term.”
“Did that ruin the owners?”
“Oh! no; they calculated upon a loss now and then, and can well afford
it too.”
“Well, what do you think of the baron at Anderbury House?”
“Think! Why, think he’s a trump. What a glorious haul there would be
there, if we could get hold of it.”
“How do you mean?”
“Why, the plate and other things that are valuable. Look you now, if we
could load the lugger with the contents of the house, what would they
not fetch in Paris?”
“We should not get it if we were to take it there.”
“We should obtain a heavier profit than ever we should under any other
circumstances; and I think it will be a very good plan, indeed, to take
Anderbury House by storm. There’s some thousands of pounds’ worth of
plate and jewellery there.”
“So there is.”
“Well, what do you say to make the attempt? Attempt, I say; but I shall
not call it an attempt, for there will be no attempt at resistance—we
shall have only to walk in and frighten a few servants; there will be
nothing but to carry away what we can lay our hands on.”
“That will do—anything that will pay.”
The baron had been an attentive listener. He had, moreover, had some
thoughts in his own mind of jumping over the hedge, and seizing the two
men; but, upon second thoughts, he believed that this was the worst
that could be done.
“I will frighten them, and thus prevent them from putting their designs
into practice to my damage.”
The baron silently collected several large stones and clods of earth
into one space, and then he peeped through the hedge. He saw where they
lay, and took up two clods, pitched one on each of their heads, and
then he said, when they started up,—
“Miserable sinners! the eye of Heaven is upon you; go your ways and
repent while there is time.”
The men were for a moment horrified, and stood still, chained to the
spot; but suddenly they were released, and in a moment they rushed from
the spot with the fleetness of deer.
The baron watched them out of sight, and then he muttered to himself,—
“’Tis well; they are now out of sight; they are gone, and they will
make no attempt upon Anderbury House, I’ll warrant them they think
their design will be penetrated by others, and they will suffer for
it should they attempt it. I trust I can make a very good resistance;
however, it is worth thinking of.”
He paused a few moments longer, and then turned towards the churchyard.
He pursued his way, however, thoughtfully; every now and then, however,
he looked around to ascertain if any one were present, but he was
satisfied there was none, and thus he was quite and entirely alone in
his walk.
There was now light enough to enable him to distinguish objects at a
short distance, and he quickened his pace, as he thought of the moon’s
rising; but a few minutes brought him into view of the church of
Anderbury.
The old church was seen to advantage at such an hour, for as the sky
was cloudless, and the stars were out, the tapering spire looked like
some great and gigantic indication raised there for some purpose
pointing heavenward.
There was a deep gloom surrounding the whole place, for there was not a
shadow cast by any one object, neither had the church one side that was
lighter than the other.
In a very short time the baron reached the charnel-house, or the
bone-house, as it was more usually called. It was a small place,
attached to the church itself. The wants of the population were not
great; and, therefore, all these public places were built with the view
only of a limited use.
It was large enough for all purposes, and as large as it is usual for
them to be in such places; and the baron, before he attempted to enter
the place, took a walk all the way round, to ascertain if there was any
one lurking about; but finding none, he returned to the door of the
charnel-house with the full intention of going in.
However, there was no key, and he could not, therefore, enter it by the
usual way, and he must find some other.
“There is sure to be something or other,” he muttered, “to cause a
temporary stop to one’s career in some place or other; but I will not
be deterred by such a trifle—there is a place in the roof somewhere
here, I think, where I can get in with but little trouble.”
The baron looked about for a place that would enable him to climb up,
but he suddenly withdrew his hand, exclaiming,—
“Hilloa! what have we here?”
It was soon settled, and the baron held up between him and the light
the key of the charnel-house, which he had found as he put his fingers
into a niche to assist him in lifting himself up to the roof.
“This is lucky, and will save me much trouble; but I have not much time
to spare.”
He put the key into the lock, and found it fitted the lock, and he in
another moment opened the door of the charnel-house, and entered its
unwholesome precincts.
There were but few who would have entered that place at that hour,
knowing, too, that a man was lying dead that had died a violent death;
few, indeed, would have done so, but the baron was himself above such
considerations; and besides, he had an object in view, which was of
some importance.
He desired to watch the body of the murdered man—he desired to stay
there, and watch the effects of the moon’s rays upon it. He now smelt
where he was, for there was that fœtid smell of death, which always
hangs about the bone-house, which is a receptacle of all the mortal
remains of man, which have been once cast into the grave, for which
their friends have paid large fees—as well for the ceremony, as for
the quiet enjoyment of the home of death; but which bargain must be
continually violated, and the bones of a man’s ancestor, instead of
ornamenting some museum, or his carcass doing some good by way of
instruction, lie rotting in the grave-yard, till the sexton digs up
the same ground and takes fresh his fees, but burning the bones of the
former.
The baron entered the receptacle of the remains of mortality. One after
the other have men’s bones been thrown in here, or, perhaps they have
been mixed together, so that it would have puzzled an angel to have
separated them from each other.
What more could mortals expect? their bones, at least, will form a fuel
to be sure; but very indifferent fuel, too.
Here, however, the baron entered, and stepped lightly into the place.
It was an uncomfortable place at best—cold, cheerless, very bare, save
of such things as would remind one of the sexton’s duty, and of the
nature of the place in which he was.
The first thing the baron did, was to look towards the place where the
window was placed, but no light came in. He advanced to it, and gazed
out upon the night.
“Well, well,” he muttered, “the moon is just rising; there will be
time enough, and I can remain in this place as long as any of its rays
penetrate the windows.”
He paused a few moments, during which he looked out upon the country;
but all was wrapped up in gloom and darkness, save where some of the
moon’s beams fell, and then there could be seen some dark spots more
prominent than the rest; and then, after awhile, he could distinguish
between the different objects, though he could not always tell their
different parts.
“Well,” he muttered, “I am here now, and am housed. Faugh! how the
place smells. I shall never be able to remain here. I shall never get
the scent from my nostrils.”
He turned from the window, and examined the place. It was a square
room, with bare walls. A few shelves, and some odd lumber thrown into
one corner, a ladder, some tools, trestles, and a lot of rubbish in the
shape of old pieces of coffins, bones, and other matters that belonged
to a churchyard. There was very little in all this, to make the place
at all likely to become popular with anybody.
The shell in which the man had been placed was, from some cause or
other, upset from off the trestles, and the body had rolled out. It lay
in all its ghastly proportions at full length upon the ground, somewhat
on one side, and looking towards the window. The posture shewed the
body was deprived of life. It was still and motionless—not a sound or
motion escaped the lips of the baron, as he gazed upon the victim of
the ice-well.
Well did the baron mark the position of the body, and marvel at the
singularity of the accident which had exposed the body in the way in
which it laid.
“I wonder what could have been the cause of such an accident? Who could
have thought it would have happened? I am sure I never could have
expected it should have happened.”
He took one of the trestles that lay near the body, and placed it so
that he could gaze upon the corpse, and out at the window, alternately,
without any disturbance to himself.
“Here I can watch the progress of the moon,” he thought, “and the body,
too; and if I find my conjectures are right, I will soon prevent his
quitting this place, and put him in such a position as shall preclude
the possibility of the revivifying powers of the moon ever reaching him
again. He shall lie till corruption visits his body, and then a return
to life be impossible.”
Thus muttered the baron, as he gazed fixedly at the body of the man,
who had met his death in the manner related, and of whom the baron
entertained some singular suspicions.
The moon was rising above the horizon, and shed a soft light over the
fields and woods. It was strange and silent, save when the church clock
struck out the hours as they fled.
It was a strange sound, and almost startled the baron to hear the hour
come booming through the building, and gave such a sound, that it broke
the awful stillness of the night which reigned; the moon all the while
rising higher and higher in the heavens, until its beams came very near
the window.
The baron’s patience became somewhat impaired; he saw that the time
would soon arrive, when his curiosity must be satisfied, and when the
truth would at once break in upon him.
“Can it be,” he muttered, “that the dead should ever again rise
to communicate with the world, and live to lead a loathsome life?
Impossible! and yet ’tis said so by many, who assert they speak but the
evidence of their own senses; if it is to be depended upon at all, it
will be as well for me as they.
“Why should I not be satisfied as well as they are? I have, moreover,
more than ordinary motives for satisfaction. The human bloodsucker
shall not live. I am resolved upon that.”
The moonbeams now entered the window of the charnel-house. At first it
was but a pencil ray, so small and minute, that the baron himself could
scarce perceive it; but he did see it, and kept his eye intently fixed
upon it, watching its increase in size and change of position with
intense excitement.
There was the moon rising high in the heaven, with all its myriads of
stars, and black canopy, studding the vault with innumerable gems;
and as it rose, so it gave a far greater change to the aspect of the
landscape than would have been expected.
The whole side of the charnel-house was illuminated by the moon’s rays,
but they fell aslant and only entered the window in one direction,
which cast them on one side, near where the baron sat.
He could now see how the place was furnished; the significant
appurtenances of the charnel-house were easily discernible, and would
have given a melancholy turn to the thoughts of anybody who might have
examined them; but not so the baron—he was by far too excited to heed
them, though he honoured them with a passing glance.
They are used by the sexton in the prosecution of his business, in
the performance of his duties; therefore, there need be but little
attention paid to them; they cannot harm any one, but are the means of
frightening fools.
To frighten the baron was, however, something more than a mere matter
of course; his nerves were strung to the purpose with which he visited
the place, and they were not to be disturbed by any insignia whatever.
There were plenty of ghastly objects about; bones, legs, hands, arms,
and even skulls, were lying about in profusion, or rather they were
heaped up in one corner of the place, and there was an attempt to hide
them by heaping up old boards in front of them, as if it were done on
purpose to prevent the prying eye of man from peeping and seeing the
secrets of the charnel-house.
It is strange, but true, being accustomed to such scenes as these
causes a diminution of the awe and fear in which such things are
usually held. Soldiers and sailors care not much for death; they
are used to exposure, and the loss of life does not seem to them so
terrible as to those who have never faced danger.
So with the sexton: he turns up the remains of mortality, as if they
were so much rubbish, and never had been endowed with life; indeed, it
is only necessary to become familiar with the remains of man, and then
much of the awe and mystery attending them dies away.
What cares the grave-digger whether the burial service has been read
over the remains or not? What cares he if the ground in which they have
been placed is consecrated ground? He can’t tell the difference, and it
matters not to him; he is above such consideration, and so is he and
his patrons, as to whether the spot in which the remains lie, has been
bought and paid for long ago.
He has no objection to sell again that which has been sold, and that
which has been used as the resting-place of some one or other. No
matter, they say; the mystery, the freemasonry, and all, have been
instituted for the multitude, and not for those who are behind
the curtain, and pocket the fees; that is the great object of the
conspirators.
However, here they were, all lumped up together, on one side, or rather
in one corner, with a few boards thrown over them, as if to prevent
their being seen by any incidental intruder.
Here the baron sat, watching the moonlight in its slow progress towards
the dead body; and, as it crept towards the object, he felt more and
more excited, but yet remained perfectly immovable. He turned his eyes
sometimes from the body to the streak of moonlight that passed through
the small window, and then to the small window itself, from which he
could see the moon himself, but that was fast rising too high, and was
becoming invisible by changing its position, so that the baron could
not see it.
“The moon travels fast,” he muttered, “and a few more minutes will tell
me what I am to expect.”
As he spoke these words, he felt in his pocket, and appeared satisfied
with what he found there—possibly some weapon. The moon’s rays were
now within an inch or so of the body, an all was as still and silent
as the grave; no sound, no motion, not even a breath of air stirred to
interrupt the silence and stillness of the scene; even the breathing of
the baron himself was suppressed, and he strove to watch without motion.
The moonlight appeared to grow more brilliant, more beautifully white,
and cast, as he thought, a stronger and more sickly light than usual
into the charnel-house. There was nothing that he had ever before seen
like it, and he looked around him more than once to assure himself
that he was where he was, and that he was alone with the body in the
bone-house.
At such moments the fancy is apt to play us strange freaks, and, if
not a strong and nervous man—capable of throwing off any extraneous
influence, why he would soon be bowed down by the weight of mental
terror and agony—that is, nothing short of temporary madness, and which
probably would make a permanent impression, and leave the seeds of
mental disease for ever.
But the baron was not easily moved; he had not been brought up in
schools where the mind is bound, enchained from infancy by artificial
means, which seem to bind the powers of the mind in after years, and,
in moments of doubt and difficulty, to render it dependent upon any
extraneous circumstance, rather than itself.
However, there were few things thought of then by the baron, who sat
intently watching the progress of the moon’s beams towards the body,
which was now touched by them.
The light fell strong, it edged the white garments that were thrown
around the body; the baron watched more and more intently, and each
moment lessened the space of time when the truth would come out—when he
would be assured of the truth of his conjectures.
There was no ray on the body yet, but it slowly and slowly let the
light approach the body; the edge was illumined, and then the moonbeams
fell more and more upon it; gradually did they enlarge its surface till
the whole body was in the light of the moon.
The baron’s excitement and expectation were now at the highest, for the
whole body was illuminated.
“Now!” he exclaimed, in a muttered whisper; “now is the moment.”
No sooner was the whole of the body, the breast, and the face
illumined, than there was a perceptible quiver through that form.
“Ha!” exclaimed the baron, with a start.
The features presented a ghastly spectacle; there was a peculiar sickly
and horrible expression in the countenance, much of which was caused by
the peculiar position in which it was placed; the peculiar colour of
the moon’s rays and the additional horrors of the place, all seemed to
give an effect to an object peculiarly ghastly and horrible.
The body, after a few moments, as if awakening to life and
recollection, lifted up its head, and turned over upon one side towards
the moonlight; and then, after a moment, it looked up in the moon’s
rays, which seem to pour down upon the countenance that lifted up
towards it.
The baron rose softly and stealthily.
“You shall feel that this is your last hour. The newly awakened life
which feeds upon the blood of others, shall never exist to carry on its
disgusting career.”
As he muttered these thoughts to himself, he drew a short dagger from
his pocket; at the same moment the figure turned its face towards him.
[Illustration: The scene in the bone house.]
It gave a half unearthly scream, as its eyes met those of the baron’s,
who exclaimed,
“Now—now’s the time—death to the monster.”
As he spoke, he threw himself headlong on the prostrate form of the
vampyre, for such it was; which, as he did so, endeavoured to rise up
and escape. The baron, who had aimed a deadly blow at him, as he threw
himself upon him, caused him to fall back again; but the fearful being
had contrived to ward off the blow, either with its arms, or by means
of shifting its position, or something of the sort; the baron missed
the blow, and was now in a deadly struggle with the vampyre.
The struggle was fierce; no signs of shrinking on the part of the
baron, who carried it on with the full intention of its ending fatally
to his opponent, while he was exerting himself to escape the muscular
grasp of the baron.
The baron, however, was not a match for the more than superhuman
strength of the vampyre, who, endued with all the energy of love of
a newly-acquired life, struggled with a desperation scarcely to be
conceived.
Had any one looked in, from without, upon the struggle that was going
on within, they would have believed that some demons of the dead had
suddenly become endued with the power of appearing upon earth, and had
chosen that spot upon which they could exercise their malignity in
combat with each other.
Suddenly, however, the baron was thrown with great force upon the
ground, and he lay for a moment half stunned; then the vampyre,
disengaged as he was, stopped to cast a magnificent look of triumph
upon his fallen foe, and dashed out of the bone-house by the same
entrance as that which afforded ingress to the place to the baron.
In another moment the baron rose up and rushed after the flying
vampyre; his defeat by no means extinguishing his courage or ardour.
He soon caught sight of the vampyre as he was flying from the
bone-house; indeed, the moonlight was now so strong, that it seemed
almost day.
Every object, far or near, appeared distinct and observable; while the
waves of the ocean appeared every now and then to throw off the silvery
light, like a thousand moving mirrors.
Beautiful as the scene was, there was none there who stood to look upon
it. The only living and breathing persons present, were those who were
engaged in the chase. Not a soul, save these two, were about—none saw
them—none witnessed the fearful efforts of the two.
The place looked like some spot of earth spoken of by the enchanters;
all was motionless and still, save these two, and the ceaseless motion
of the ocean waves.
The vampyre made for the shore, with the baron a short distance behind
him. They strained every nerve; and the baron thought he should succeed
in securing him on the beach.
There were some boats that were secured on the beach, and towards these
the vampyre sped with the fleetness of the wind; and, no sooner did
he reach one, than seizing its head, he caused it to run through the
sand by the impetus he had acquired in running, and it was afloat in a
moment.
There was no time to lose, for just as he had pushed into deep water,
the baron had rushed down almost in time to seize the boat but missed
it.
He then made for the boats, and succeeded in reaching one that was
afloat, secured only by a rope.
In this he pushed out on the waves in pursuit of the object of his
search. Away they both went; the sea was comparatively smooth; they
both rowed with velocity, that promised much as regarded their
capability as rowers.
The spray of the water was thrown up by their oars and by the
boats’ heads. The baron, however, had the worst of it; he rowed to
disadvantage; because, every now and then, he had to turn his head to
see which way the object of his pursuit was rowing; and, therefore,
a loss of speed occurred; but yet he kept up well in the wake of the
vampyre.
There was, however, no attention paid as to where he was going; as long
as it was straight in the wake of the flying, he was satisfied. But he
saw nothing else, nor looked at aught else; indeed, the world might
have been there, and he would not have been aware of the fact. His
whole faculties were bound up in the object before him, to reach which,
he exerted his whole strength. However, upon looking up again, he could
nowhere see the vampyre. He looked long and steadily in all quarters,
but saw him not. He had eluded him.
CHAPTER CV.
THE BARON PROPOSES FOR HELEN WILLIAMS, AND IS DULY ACCEPTED, WITH A
COMPLIMENT ON HIS BEAUTY.
The baron had put out to sea in chase of the vampyre, without
considering that there was really great danger in so doing, inasmuch as
that the elements were not quite in a kindly disposed condition, and
there was a heavy sea.
Where he had obtained his skill as a seaman, Heaven only knows;
but certain it is he had obtained such knowledge somewhere, for
he commenced navigating the boat with the greatest skill, and soon
succeeded in getting close in shore.
The moment the keel grated upon the beach, a man rushed into the water,
and laid hold of the boat with one hand, and the baron with the other,
exclaiming,—
“You are my prisoner! You took my boat, and I don’t care who or what
you are, I will have justice.”
“How much money do you require?”
“More than you will like to pay. I sha’n’t let you off under a pound.”
“Here are five pounds.”
“Lor! Excuse me, your honour; I didn’t mean what I said; if so be as
your honour is such a gentleman as I now sees as your honour is, it
don’t make any matter in the world. I hopes as how your honour will
always take my boat when you wants one, and no mistake.”
The baron made no reply to all these compliments, but walked away at
once towards his own house on the cliffs.
“I have missed him,” he muttered, “and all my labour has been in vain.
I thought that at least I had got rid of that affliction; I thought
that he at least would have rotted in the tomb. Curse on the tardiness
that left him unburied until the moonbeams had rested upon him. After
that all was in vain, unless some new death had come over him.”
There was a flush of anger upon the baron’s face as he reached his own
house, and let himself into it by a garden-gate that he always kept the
key of, which would have effectually prevented any of his servants from
taking any notice of him, had they met him.
But at such an hour, it was not likely he should meet any one, nor did
he do so.
He at once sought his own chamber, where he remained for some time
immersed in deep thought. This thought was not wholly devoted to a
consideration of his annoyance at the escape of the vampyre; but he
took into his most serious thoughts the circumstances attending upon
his entertainment.
The question of to marry, or not to marry, was not one that had to be
settled by the baron. No, that he had done already; and he had not made
the announcement he had to Mr. Leek, of his matrimonial intention,
unadvisedly.
What the baron now considered was, whether he should propose to Miss
Helen Williams or not.
He certainly had been somewhat struck by the quiet beauty of the young
girl; and probably he was aware that he was not just the sort of person
to win a young maiden’s heart, and that if he achieved such a honour
at all, it would most probably be in consequence of acting upon the
cupidity of her relations.
As he was determined, therefore, to marry, it became necessary that he
should select some one for his victim who, in addition to the personal
charms which appeared to him to be a desideratum, should be of so
pliant and amiable a disposition as to give way to those solicitations
and incessant remonstrances which she was likely to be assailed with if
she resisted.
It was fortunate for Mr. Leek that the baron did fix his regards
upon Helen Williams; because, from what we know of Mrs. Williams,
we can well perceive that it is quite evident she will not let any
considerations of her daughter’s happiness stand in the way of an
equitable arrangement with that gentleman.
And although there might have been, and indeed were, persons at the
baron’s entertainment whom he would more gladly have called by the
name of bride than Helen Williams, yet he was not slow to perceive
that those parties had wills of their own, and, if their relatives had
pleased to do so, they would not themselves have admitted that they
were up for sale to the highest bidder.
The result of the baron’s considerations, therefore, was, that Helen
Williams would suit him very well, and that the poverty of her family
was just the circumstance of all others which insured his success.
“I will wed her,” he said, “although I cannot win her. She will be
mine, because I shall purchase her; which, to my mind, is a much more
admirable mode of embarking in a matrimonial career than the trouble of
a tedious courtship, with all its frivolities and follies.”
Whether or not the baron was used to matrimonial affairs, we cannot
say; but certain it is he did not seem to consider that the proposing
for a young lady and marrying her was a matter of very grave or serious
moment; but really, by the style in which he considered it, anybody
would have thought it one of the most ordinary concerns of life.
During his short stay at Anderbury, he had managed, by the magic power
of wealth, to procure everything he required in the shape of servants,
carriages, and horses; and now, on the morning after his most strange
and mysterious adventure with the corpse of the murdered man, he
ordered his carriage, and went out to pay a number of visits to the
parties who had been present at his entertainment.
Among those visits he included one to the Williams’s family, and by
about twelve o’clock in the day reached their residence, and was
received with such an extraordinary amount of bustle, that it was quite
ludicrous to see it; but still it suited him, because it showed how
they worshipped wealth, with the exception of Helen, and she did not
make her appearance at all.
Mrs. Williams was all smiles and sweetness, paying so many compliments
to the baron, that, although he knew nothing of the diplomatic
arrangement of Mr. Leek, he yet felt quite certain that he had her with
him most completely, and that none of her exertions would be wanting
for the purpose of securing his victim.
After these compliments had somewhat subsided, the baron said,—
“Madam, I hope I shall have the pleasure of seeing your daughter Helen,
who did me the honour of being at my poor entertainment the other
evening, and attracted while there the eyes of all beholders.”
“Oh, certainly, my lord baron. I have not the slightest doubt in my own
mind but that Helen is quite—quite panting, in a manner of speaking,
for the honour of seeing you again.”
“You are very obliging, madam; and I can assure you that one of the
most gratifying circumstances that have occurred to me during my short
residence in this neighbourhood, had consisted in the fact of my making
the acquaintance of you and your amiable family.”
“Will you excuse me for one moment?” said Mrs. Williams; and, after a
courteous bow from the baron, she left the apartment, and proceeded to
the room of her daughter Helen, whom she addressed, saying,—
“Helen, are you aware that the baron is here—the great baron, the Baron
Stolmuyer of Saltzburgh? Good God! how can you be so foolish? He has
actually asked for you, and you are not there; when you know as well as
I do, Helen, that such a man as that, to whom the expense is no object,
might pop in a moment.”
“He might what, mother?”
“Pop the question—propose, of course. Don’t tell me that you don’t
know what I mean. I have no patience with such nonsense. Only think
how rich he is. You know as well as I that it would be the making of
you and the whole family; and I can tell you, Helen, that, if you are
not a positive fool, in my opinion, he will pop, for there was quite a
particular expression upon his face when he asked for you.”
“But I fancy, mother, there is always a particular expression upon his
face—a particularly ugly one, I mean; for, beyond all question, he is
the most ordinary man I ever saw in my life.”
“Now, really, Helen, you are enough to vex a saint. What can a man’s
looks have to do with his property?”
“But what’s his property to me, mother?”
“Oh! good gracious! Have I lived to hear a child of mine ask what a
man’s property is to her, when he begins to be attentive! I did not
expect it—I will confess, I did not expect it. I did think there would
be a little consideration on the part of a child of my own, when she
knows I have to strive, and strive, and stretch our means like a thin
piece of Indian rubber, to make both ends meet.”
“But, mother, if I cannot love this man, wherefore should I for one
moment entertain the thought of making him my husband?”
“Self, self!” exclaimed Mrs. Williams, lifting up her hands; “nothing
but self.”
“I cannot suppose, mother, that it is an extraordinary act to decline
sacrificing one’s whole existence for the sake of marrying a man with
money, who can not only not love, but who is an object of positive
aversion as this man is to me.”
“Yes,” exclaimed Mrs. Williams; “that’s right. See me dragged to
prison, and see us all without shoes to our feet. That’s what you would
do, rather than give up your nonsensical notion about people’s looks.”
“But, why,” said Helen, “should these calamities, which have never yet
appeared, all suddenly come over us, because I do not feel inclined to
marry the Baron Stolmuyer of Saltzburgh?”
“And as for the man’s looks,” added Mrs. Williams, rather adroitly
shifting the argument, and declining to answer the rather home question
put by Helen—“as for the man’s looks, I am quite ashamed of any
daughter of mine talking about men’s looks—it’s indelicate, positively
indelicate.”
“I cannot see your argument, mother, and I implore you not to persecute
me about this man, whom I really cannot love.”
“Persecute, indeed! but I tell you what it is, Helen, you don’t seem
to be at all aware, first of all, that I am drowned in debt; secondly,
that I shall have to bring your brother Charles home from college to
make him a tailor, or a shoemaker, or something of that sort, and you
will have to go out as a daily governess, while I rot away by slow
degrees in a prison.”
“But, mother, if these evils are all about to fall upon us, cannot
some fair means be adopted of extrication from them. Your income, I
always understood, was a certain one, and surely it almost amounts to
criminality to live far beyond it.”
“Not at all, when you expect your daughter to be a reasonable
Christian, and to marry decently and respectably. Really, my dear, I
must say that I little expected such remarks as you make, from a child
of mine, I can tell you.”
Mrs. Williams was right enough there, for it was a wonder that such
remarks should come from a child of her’s, who could not be supposed to
have heard any such sentiments, but who must have, from the mere force
of a just and admirable disposition, given utterance to them.
“Mother,” she said, after a pause, “do not fancy that I would not
do much to relieve you from any burthens you may have; and, if
difficulties have arisen, they are to be remedied in the best way we
can, as well as regretted. But I pray you not to ask me to wed this
man, whom I cannot love.”
“Well, well. I’m sure you make a terrible fuss, and I don’t know what
about, for my part. It’s nothing, I rather suppose; and, after all, the
baron may not be going to propose at all for you, and I may be wrong.”
As Mrs. Williams thus admitted the possibility that she might be wrong,
she looked with an expression of countenance, as much as to say, “Did
you ever, in all your life, hear of such virtue as that, or such
self-denial?”
“Then what do you wish for me to do, mother?”
“To see him. You cannot put such a slight—indeed, I might almost say,
an insult upon him, as not to see him when he actually calls and asks
for you. He is, you know, after all, a gentleman.”
Helen found it difficult to say that she would not see the baron, so,
although it was done with great reluctance, she followed her mother
to the room in which that lady had left him, and where he did most
anxiously expect her. He felt that his cause was not quite so good as
it had been, and that the non-appearance of Helen got up some serious
doubts as to the complying disposition he thought she had.
When, however, he at length saw her, some of those fears were
dispelled, and he began to imagine that his suit did not look quite so
desperate.
There was certainly about the baron a rather courtly air and manner,
which, as Mrs. Williams said, shewed that he lived in the best society;
and Helen would not allow her aversion to the man to carry her so far
as not to behave to him with politeness, so that for some moments that
the conversation proceeded, any one would have thought that those three
persons were upon the most amicable of terms with each other.
But Mrs. Williams, like some skilful old general, was well versed in
matrimonial tactics, and, after making a few remarks, she deliberately
left the room, to poor Helen’s great chagrin; for, although she had
consented out of ordinary civility to see the baron, she had by no
means intended to have a _tete-a-tete_ with him.
That was quite another affair, and one may well suppose what a degree
of indignation she felt at being forced into such circumstances, and
by her mother, too, who, of all persons in the world, ought to have
protected her, and to whom she ought to have looked certainly for very
different things indeed.
It was a very awkward situation to be placed in for poor Helen,
inasmuch as she now really could not leave the baron completely alone
without great rudeness; and yet she much dreaded, in consequence of the
hints that her mother had thrown out, what the interview would be that
was about to ensue.
How devoutly and particularly she hoped that, after all, the
supposition of her mother that the baron had any matrimonial intentions
towards her was a mistake, and she felt that the first words he might
utter would be the means of chance letting her know if such really was
the case, or if she was to be what she could not help styling, the
victim of his addresses.
Of course the baron knew perfectly well that Mrs. Williams had taken
her departure for the express purpose of giving him an opportunity
of pressing his suit to her daughter, if he felt so disposed, and
as he did feel so disposed, he was not at all likely to neglect the
opportunity.
None but a man of great tact and discretion, however, could have made
so good use of such an opportunity as the baron; for although he
certainly did not succeed in removing from the mind of Helen Williams a
strong feeling that he was an uncommonly disagreeable man, he did not
add to that impression.
“Miss Williams,” he said, “I have not until now had an opportunity of
thanking you for the very great favour you did me, by making one at the
party at Anderbury House.”
“The obligation,” said Helen, “was on my side, sir, and I beg that
you will not pay me so empty a compliment as to endeavour to make it
otherwise.”
“You do yourself a great injustice. The grace which you lent to my
entertainment was to my mind its greatest charm. I feel, I assure you,
compelled to say so much, because it is the genuine truth, and not for
the purpose of paying to you an empty compliment, which I have too
much respect for you to do.”
Helen was silent, for she knew not very well what to reply to this
speech, inasmuch as it was one of those general ones that require no
reply, unless the persons to whom they are uttered choose to enter at
length into a civil complimentary kind of warfare, for the express
purpose of so doing.
The baron waited for some reply to be made, and then, as none came, he
spoke himself, saying, after at least two minutes’ pause,—
“Miss Williams, you may, or you may not, have heard that my principal
intention in settling in this neighbourhood—which I was informed,
and I find correctly so, is celebrated for the respectability of its
inhabitants—was to marry.”
“Sir,” said Helen, “I know nothing of that matter, nor do I think it is
one with which I ought to be in any way troubled.”
“Without explanation, certainly not, Miss Williams; but will you allow
me to add, that unless my speech had contained certainly something
more than a mere compliment, or a mere desire to give you a piece of
gossiping information, I should not have uttered it on any account;
but I have something to add to it, which does concern your private ear
most particularly, and which I do hope will meet with your favourable
consideration.”
He paused again, and, as Helen returned no answer, he after a time
continued, saying, in a still lower tone,—
“May I venture to hope that no preconceived prejudice will have the
effect of diminishing any expectations and hopes with which I have
pleased myself?”
It is said, and said most truly too, that there are none so blind as
those who won’t see, and the same rule may be most unquestionably
applied to those who won’t hear or understand; and although it was, of
course, impossible that Helen Williams could have any doubt as to what
the baron meant, she was resolved that he should speak out plainly, in
order that she might, without giving room for any ambiguity, likewise
speak as plainly to him, in answer to the proposition that was upon his
lips.
Perhaps the baron was wise enough to see that much, for he proceeded
now with much more clearness to declare what he meant, when he said,—
“I told you, Miss Williams, that my object in coming here was to
contract a matrimonial alliance, being tired of the solitary life I had
been leading for some years. I should not have troubled you with such a
communication, had it not been in my power to add to it another, that
will explain why I did so.”
Helen merely inclined her head, to signify that she heard him.
“That other communication,” he continued, “is to the effect that I have
found the person on whom I feel convinced that I can fix my affections,
without the possibility of their ever wandering again from the dear
object. Amid all the rank, beauty, and intelligence that graced my
halls on that occasion which will ever be hallowed in my imagination, I
had eyes but for one form, and ears but for one voice.”
Still Helen was silent.
“There may be many who, in the possession of much attraction and much
virtue, may make many happy homes; but the heart culls its own flower,
and will think that it presents the most delicate and most beautiful
tints to the eye. That flower, from amidst all the galaxy of beauty,
I think—nay, I know, that I have selected. Can you not now guess the
purport of my simple words, Helen?”
It was tolerably familiar to call her Helen upon so short an
acquaintance, and she drew back, looking some astonishment, which he
perceiving, and divining the cause—for no one could accuse the baron of
want of tact—replied to.
“Forgive me, if, in conversing with you, my heart seems to forget the
distance that is between us, and I think of you by that name which,
certainly, it is presumptuous on my part to call you by; but there are
persons in whose thoughts and feelings we so deeply sympathise, and
who, from the first moment that we see them, become bound to us by so
many mysterious links of feeling, that we seem as if we had known them
for ages, and as if, from that moment, we could be as familiar—ay, much
more so—than with many whom we may have met often in the great world.”
This was true, and, what is more, it happened to be a truth that
touched a right chord in the breast of Helen Williams; for she felt
what he said recall recollections of the past, when there was one whom
she had seen, and, from the first moment that she had seen him, had
felt that time and circumstances could effect no change in those first
dear and delightful impressions which had swept across her heart.
The baron saw the contemplative aspect of her face, and he added,—
“You feel the truth of what I utter?”
She started, for she had indeed felt the truth of the sentiment,
although her heart was far away, and for a moment she had completely
forgotten the existence of the baron, or that it was from his lips she
had heard the sentiment expressed.
It was a mortification to him to see this—for he did see it—and he
said,—
“Miss Williams, I hope I have said enough, at all events, to convince
you that I am not one of those cold, worldly-minded spirits who have
none of what may be truly called the higher and the nobler feelings of
humanity; but who can, and who do feel and think that there is much of
beauty and much of innocence in life, and that both are the dearest and
best gifts of Heaven.”
“I have nothing to say in contradiction to what you have uttered,” said
Helen; “but you will, I trust, now excuse me, sir, from continuing a
conversation which can have no good result, and which, between persons
who are nearly perfect strangers, is scarcely desirable.”
This was a speech which, if anything would, was calculated to bring the
baron to the point at once; and, as she rose while she uttered it; as
with an intention of leaving the room, he at once said,—
“Nay, as I am here, allow me to utter that which I came to speak, and
do not, I pray you, hastily decide upon a question of more importance
to yourself and to me than any which can be ordinarily asked. Let me
beg of you, Miss Williams, to be seated, and to believe that, in my
manner of putting this question to you, there shall be nothing which
can, in the slightest degree, prove offensive to you.”
Thus urged, it would have been something savouring of ill-manners, if
Helen Williams had refused to accede to his request; and, although
there was nothing she so devoutly wished as that that interview should
be over, and over quickly, she felt that perhaps the surest way of
accomplishing that object, was to listen quietly to what he had to say;
and accordingly she did so, reseating herself again on the chair she
had so recently occupied, and determined in her own mind to give him
a decisive answer. He then seemed rather in doubt as to how he should
commence, and, as he spoke, there was an air of hesitation and doubt
about him such as he, indeed, very seldom wore.
Probably, he felt that it was rather a climax that he had arrived at,
and that if he was to accomplish anything in the matrimonial way, it
was a very doubtful case as regarded his present application.
“I cannot but feel,” he said, “that what I am about to say sounds hasty
and premature, considering that we have known each other for so short
a space of time. It is not for me to enlarge upon circumstances which,
I fear, will have but little weight with you; but still it is my duty
to mention that I have a large fortune, and consequently can afford to
place the object of my affections in such a position in life as that
she shall feel surrounded with everything that can make her existence
pleasant and desirable.”
“Go on, sir,” said Helen; “I am staying to hear you, in order that I
might clearly and distinctly answer you.”
This was by no means encouraging; but still the baron proceeded:—
“I wish to make you an offer of my hand and heart; and, as the Baroness
Stolmuyer of Saltzburgh, I am quite certain that you will add a dignity
to that title, instead of receiving one from it.”
“Sir,” said Helen, “an offer of this kind from any gentleman is a
compliment which ought always to be appreciated, and I assure you it is
one which I feel highly; but as one’s future happiness in a marriage
is by far too important an affair to be trifled with, I must beg to
decline the honour you intend me.”
“Decline!” said the baron.
“Yes, sir, I said decline; and I trust that the justice of the Baron
Stolmuyer will effectually preserve me from anything in the shape of a
persecution for so declining.”
At this moment, and before the baron could make any answer to what was
said to him by Helen in this firm and determined manner, the door was
flung open, and Mrs. Williams rushed into the room.
“My dear sir,” she cried to the baron, “of course you understand
these matters perfectly well. Girls, you know, are always so very
unreasonable, that you can’t expect anything from them but a refusal at
first, although they may really mean quite the reverse.”
“Mother, is this just or fair?” said Helen, reproachfully.
“Oh, stuff—stuff! don’t speak to me about justice and fairness, indeed,
when you are so absurd as to behave in this dreadful manner towards the
baron.”
“But, madam,” said the baron, “I fear——”
“Fear nothing, my lord; but if you will have the kindness to step into
the next apartment for a few minutes, I will join you, and we can talk
this matter over.”
Mrs. Williams did not think it at all necessary to make any excuse for
having listened to the baron’s overtures; and perhaps, indeed, she
thought that it was not necessary to do so, and that her interest in
the affair was a sufficient extenuation of what certainly was a most
abominable proceeding.
Shame and disgust at her mother’s conduct now kept Helen silent; and
as the baron was perfectly willing to give himself all the chances he
could, he made a low bow, and left the apartment, in conformity with
the desires of Mrs. Williams, wondering much in his own mind by what
miracle she purposed influencing her daughter’s decision after the
extremely positive negative she had given to his proposal.
He waited with much impatience, as well as curiosity, and as our
readers may, as well as the baron, be a little curious to know what
arguments Mrs. Williams used, we shall proceed to give them a brief
outline of what she said.
“Are you mad?” was the first ejaculation. “Are you thoroughly and
entirely out of your senses, that you behave yourself in this
extraordinary manner?”
“In what extraordinary manner? A man asks me if I can wed him and
love him, and, as he asks me politely, I tell him as politely that I
cannot, which is the whole of the affair. Is there anything so very
extraordinary in such behaviour as that?”
“Indeed, I think there is something very extraordinary in it. I tell
you what it is, Helen, Mr. Leek is firmly of opinion that the baron’s
income must be at least ten thousand pounds a-year.”
“I do not think I shall marry a man for his income, if it were ten
times that amount.”
“This is insanity—positive insanity. Have you really the least idea of
what you are talking about? But I know what it is well enough; I know
very well what it is; of course it’s that fellow, James Anderson, that
comes between you and your wits. That’s the scamp that prevents you
from exercising a proper control over yourself, and you know it is; but
he is gone to sea, and it is to be hoped we shall never look upon him
again. I don’t wish to see him, and I am quite sure you need not, so
you had better make up your mind to marry the baron at once.”
“This is too cruel—much too cruel; and but that I see it with my own
eyes, I would not have believed it possible.”
She burst into tears as she spoke, and then for a brief moment—but it
was only for a moment—the heart of the mother was a little touched. The
love of money again assumed its sway, and the happiness of her child
sunk into insignificance compared with that worst of passions.
“Listen to me, Helen,” she said; “it’s all very well to make choice of
who you like, and to refuse who you like, when it can be done; but I
tell you that, in this case, it cannot be done, for we are all of us
on the brink of ruin, and, if you will not by this marriage rescue us
from that state, destruction must come upon us all. You can save me,
you can save your sisters, and you can save your brother, if you will.
Of course, if you will not, I cannot make you; and you will have the
consolation of knowing that, although you had it in your power to save
us all from destruction, you did not do it.”
“But why should I be placed in so cruel a situation as to be called
upon to sacrifice myself completely for my family? Would it not be
nobler to meet difficulties, if they have arisen, with a good spirit?”
“As you please—as you please; I can say no more.”
Mrs. Williams moved towards the door; but Helen called to her, saying,—
“Give me time to think—I only ask you to give me time to think.”
This was a grand concession, and Mrs. Williams at once acceded to the
proposition, that it was prudent to leave well enough alone in such a
case, and that, having once seen that persecution would do something,
it was highly desirable to leave it to work its way.
She accordingly at once left the room, and proceeded into the
adjoining apartment, to which the baron had retired; and where, from
his attitude, it seemed highly probable that he had taken example by
Mrs. Williams; and, as she had listened to his conversation with her
daughter, he had, in like manner, listened to her.
“I have the pleasure to inform you, baron,” she said, “that my
daughter, although at first taken a little by surprise as regards your
offer, now accepts it; and I can only add, for my own part, that it is
with great pleasure I contemplate having so handsome and distinguished
a son-in-law.”
“Madam, I highly esteem your compliment; and I must beg of you as a
favour, that you will fix the wedding-day as quickly as you please or
can; and that, as it must put you to some expense as well as your other
daughters, and as it would be very unjust that, on my account, you
should expend one penny piece, you will do me the favour of accepting
from me a £500 note to cover those expenses.”
Mrs. Williams quite instinctively held out her hand, but the baron
added, with a bow that damped her expectations a little—
“A sum which I shall have the pleasure of handing to you as soon as the
wedding-day is fixed.”
It would be doing great injustice to the acuteness of Mrs. Williams, if
we did not say she quite understood this to be a bribe for expediting
proceedings; and if anything was likely to clench the matter, and to
place the marriage of the baron with Helen beyond the shadow of a
doubt, it certainly was this fact, that £500 was offered to the mother
for what we cannot help calling the sale of her child.
But these kind of things are much more common in society than people
are at all aware; and one half the marriages that take place at all,
are most unquestionably matters of barter. When the highest bidder
obtains the prize, if prize that can be called, which generally
consists of a shallow, conceited heart, nurtured in all kinds of
selfishness, and full of feelings, not one of which can be considered
great or estimable.
It is sad, indeed, when, as in the case of Helen Williams, the victim
is made a victim on account of her better and nobler feelings, and
where it is not her own selfishness, but the selfishness of others,
which she is condemned to be victimised to. Whether she will or will
not consent, under the circumstances we have narrated, to become the
bride of the Baron Stolmuyer of Saltzburgh, we shall shortly discover;
but certain it is that he entertained a strong notion she would, and
that Mrs. Williams thoroughly made up her mind that she should.
Nothing can save Helen but a determination of character, which we fear
we cannot say she possesses.
Her correct reason makes her say things which, if she could carry
them out, would be as proper and as decisive as possible; but the
great fault of her character consists in a weakness of purpose, which
effectually prevents her from carrying out the suggestion presented to
her by her own superior intellect.
CHAPTER CVI.
THE PREPARATIONS FOR THE BARON’S MARRIAGE.—THE YOUNG LOVER, AND THE
REMONSTRANCE.
So it appeared that the baron was right, and that with all his
disqualifications he had succeeded in obtaining the promise of a wife,
because he had the one great qualification which outshone everything to
his disadvantage, namely, wealth.
And he was not so blind, or so foolish, as not fully to understand,
and to know, that it was to the relatives of the bride, and not to the
bride herself, that he was indebted for an answer in the affirmative to
his proposition.
Well he knew that although he had dazzled their eyes and awakened
their cupidity, he had produced no such an effect upon the young and
beautiful being who was about thus to be sacrificed upon the altar
of Mammon; and probably if anything could have added to his earnest
desire to make her his, it was that he saw she was untouched by the
power of his gold, and therefore he could not but respect, as well as
admire her; and he much preferred taking to his arms one for whom he
entertained a supreme and sovereign contempt.
She felt that she was a victim, and that if she consented to become
his, she must look upon herself as blighted and sacrificed for ever.
But he was too selfish to hesitate on such a ground as that. His
feelings were far from being so human as to stop short, because he knew
the alliance was viewed by her with hatred and horror. And that she
did view it with those feelings, spared him, at all events, as he told
himself, some trouble, for it took away from the necessity of keeping
up the constant shew and glitter of wealth, for that shew and glitter
affected her not, and therefore would have been presented to her
imagination in vain.
But far different was it regarded her friends and connections, who had
arrogated to themselves the power of deciding upon this matter of life
and death to her.
To them he felt that he must shew all the glitter of display that
belonged to his extensive means, or they would be disappointed, for
they not only wanted riches themselves, but they wanted the worldly
reputation contingent upon having so rich a relative.
Therefore was it that he determined that nothing should be wanting at
his approaching nuptials to make them most magnificent, and he racked
his imagination to discover a mode by which he could spend a large
sum of money, so as to get for it the greatest amount of display.
This was a matter which a man such as he was eminently calculated to
achieve; and, as he succeeded in fixing his nuptials to take place
in a fortnight from that time, he had ample time to make all such
preparations as he might consider requisite.
It so happened that on the following evening to that on which he
had obtained so strange a consent, through another party, to his
matrimonial speculation, that the sun sunk upon the coast with every
appearance of approaching stormy weather.
Scarcely had its disc sunk below the western horizon, when a furious
gale arose, and, for the first time since his residence at Anderbury
Hall, he felt what it was to hold an estate so near to the sea-coast.
The sea rose tempestuously, appearing to shake the mansion to its very
foundation, and more than one half of the excavation leading from the
grounds to the sea-coast was filled with water. The gale blew off
the sea, and one or two trees upon the Anderbury estate were torn up
by their roots, spreading destruction around them among the numerous
shrubs and flowers.
Some of the windows of the mansion were dashed in, and the wind came
roaring into the house, whistling up the staircases, opening and
shutting doors, and altogether producing a scene of devastation and
uproar which would have terrified most persons.
The baron, however, on the contrary, notwithstanding whatever damage
was done was of course done to his property, took the matter with the
greatest ease and composure in the world; and, in fact, rather seemed
to enjoy the fury of the elements than to be awed by them.
He remained out of doors the whole time and although the rain now and
then fell in torrents, and drenched him to the skin, he seemed scarcely
conscious of that circumstance, or, if he were, he evidently thought it
too trivial to take any notice of.
The servants looked at him in amazement, scarcely believing it possible
that any one in his senses could be so indifferent to the rage of the
elements that was proceeding; but they little knew the real character
of the man whom they had for a master, or they would have wondered at
nothing, and been surprised at nothing that they saw of him or heard of
him.
The storm continued until the night completely set in, and still it
showed no signs whatever of anything in the shape of an end; and it
seemed but too evident that it was likely to continue in all its wild
and ungovernable fury for many an hour to come.
He got as close as he could to the beach, so as not to leave his own
estate, and from there he listened attentively to the howling of the
blast, seeming rather pleased with the idea than otherwise, that much
mischief was being done by that most terrific storm.
A servant brought him a telescope, so that he could look out upon
the waste of waters, and see some of the struggling vessels that,
with might and main, were endeavouring to keep off the shore, but
which, despite all their efforts, were being hurried to destruction—a
destruction which they could not avoid, and which must present itself
in the most serious aspect, because it appears inevitable, and is
invested with all the misery of a protracted execution.
[Illustration: The baron observes the destruction of the ships.]
And in particular he remarked one vessel which was drifting onward to
certain and inevitable destruction.
He could see the rockets and the blue lights that they burnt now and
then through the storm; while, ever and anon, with a booming strange
sound over the waste of waters there would come the signal gun of
distress, with its awful reverberations, awakening feelings of sympathy
in the breast of every one but the baron, and he seemed impenetrable to
all human feeling, for he looked on with a strange calmness, a calmness
that one might suppose would set upon some man who had nothing to do
with human hopes, human thoughts, or human feelings, but not by any
means that calmness of a pure spirit looking upon things which it would
aid, if it could, but which are beyond its power of action.
He saw the anxious throng of persons on the beach precisely below his
own estate.
He saw them launch a boat, and, with a grim smile, he saw it swamped in
the surge, and the brave bold men, who had made the gallant endeavour
to save their fellows, met themselves, with but one exception, a watery
grave.
And then even the baron smiled, and muttered to himself,—
“What is all this to me? what have I to do with human hopes and
feelings? What is it to me whether they live or die, or whether yon
ship, that I now see struggling through the waste of waters, reaches
its destination, or is engulfed for ever in the foaming surge? What is
it to me, I repeat, whether these bold brave men live or die? Will they
not be the very persons to hunt me from the face of society? Will they
not be the very persons who would declare that I was unfit to live?
And shall I trouble myself with one thought as to whether they live or
die? Ah! they come nearer, nearer, nearer still, and I shall see such a
sight as may not often be observed by one such as I am, and on such a
coast as this.”
There was a strange, wild, wailing cry, and the ship, which was a large
one, struck heavily upon a rock about a mile distant from the shore,
and very close, indeed, to where the Anderbury estates commenced.
Now, as if seized with a sudden impulse, although we cannot and do not
think it was one of humanity, the baron descended by a large fissure
in the rock to the beach. This took him some time to accomplish, for
he had to walk completely through the grounds of Anderbury Hall, and
half-a-mile beyond, before he reached it, and then it took him some
time to walk down, because he had to do so with extreme caution,
inasmuch as the heavy rain that had fallen had made the ground so
slippery that it was with great difficulty he could at all keep his
feet.
When he arrived in sight of the beach, the ship was gone, but a
life-boat was being launched, amid the hurras of the multitude, for
the purpose of picking up some of the survivors of the wreck who were
noticed drifting upon portions of its hulk.
The baron had brought his telescope with him, and he placed it to his
eye, and took a long and steady look at the boat.
A muttered malediction came from his lips, and, having shut the
telescope, he turned, and hastily pursued his path again to Anderbury
House.
• • • • •
After the wedding, Jack Pringle really felt himself so upset by the
quantity of healths he had drunk, and the general manner in which he
had disposed of a quantity of rum, that he told the admiral he found
himself not quite so well as he ought to be, and that he thought it was
all owing to having been out of sight of water for so many months.
This was a plea which sounded very reasonable to the admiral, and when
Jack said,—
“You know it ain’t possible to live very long without a glimpse, at
least, of an arm of the sea, or something of that sort.”
The old man assented to the proposition at once, and replied,—
“Why, that’s true enough, Jack, and I shall have to go somewhere myself
soon, or else get musty; for, you may depend, it never was intended
that human beings should live all their lives on land.”
“I should think not,” said Jack, “and I what I was going to say was,
that you must try and take care of yourself, you old baby, for a day or
two, while I take a run to the coast. It ain’t above twenty-five miles;
and mind you don’t get into any mischief till I come back.”
“Confound your impudence! It’s a very odd thing that you can’t come
into my presence without a lie in your mouth. You know you have been as
much trouble to me as a cargo of monkeys in a storm. Be off with ye,
and if I never see your face again, it will be a good job.”
Jack considered that he had quite sufficiently announced his departure,
so he set off at once, and made his way towards the coast, not a little
pleased, as he neared it, to fancy that, every now and then, he kept
snuffing the sea air; and when the coach in which he went put him down
within about four miles of a little village inhabited by fishermen,
he walked that distance, although, sailor-like, it was an exercise he
was by no means fond of, and, to his great joy, once more stood upon
a sandy beach, and heard the murmur of the ocean, and saw the waves
curling at his feet.
He was quite delighted, and really felt, or fancied that he felt, which
was the same thing, wonderfully invigorated by the change, and quite
another thing to what he had been.
Under such circumstances, Jack was sure not to be long in picking up a
companion, so, in one of the cottages into which, with all the free and
easy manner of a sailor, he strolled, he found an old man-of-war’s man,
retired there to spend the remainder of his days along with his son and
daughter.
We feel that it would be quite impossible for us to do justice to
the meeting between those two worthies, for they soon found out the
capabilities of each.
Some grog, which Jack thought the sweetest he had tasted for a long
time, because it was drunk within sight of the ocean, was produced,
and then the tales they set to telling each other of their adventures
afloat, would have been enough to stun any one.
We have rather a fear, likewise, that in some cases, they were not so
strictly particular as they might have been had they been upon their
oaths, as regards truth; but they seemed to be upon the principle of
mutual forbearance, and the implied understanding of “You believe me,
and I’ll believe you.”
Whenever this kind of rivalry, however, commences between inveterate
story-tellers, there is no saying to what length they will go, and Jack
certainly related some extraordinary things.
They happened both to have been to the same latitude, but, of course,
they had not both seen the same sights exactly, or enjoyed the same
adventures; so what one did not know or could not invent, the other
pretty soon did; so that between them they made up a most entertaining
conversation, and one which really would, to any one who was willing to
be amused and not very particular about veracity, have had great charms.
“Ah,” said the old sailor, “when I was on the coast of Ingee, the hair
melted off my head.”
“Did it,” said Jack. “Oh! that’s nothing at all; we had a couple of men
roasted at the wheel with the heat, and they didn’t know it, till they
were both done brown.”
“You don’t say so?”
“Yes, I does, and, what’s more, we always had our meat cooked over
again upon one of the gun slides; and, after that, when we were a long
way southward, it was so cold not one of the crew shut his eyes for a
week.”
“Indeed! But you spoke of a man as you called Safety Jack; who was he?
I should like all for to know.”
“When I was on board the Fame, our captain was a know-nothing sort
of shore-going lubber, who had been guved a pair of swabs over
better men’s heads, and uncommon afeared he was of getting into any
danger. He’d always come on deck on a morning, and guving a kind of a
hurry-skurry skeared look all round him, he’d say, if so be as he seed
no land,—
“‘Where are we? Is there any danger?’
“Then our first luff he’d say,—
“‘No danger, sir; only a little fear.’
“Then the captain he’d say, all the while looking as skeared as a
marine in a squall,—
“‘Let us be safe—let us be safe, that’s all.’
“So we called him Safety Jack, in consekense o’ that peculiarity.
Well, you must know as we were running for the Cape, and Safety Jack
he wouldn’t be persuaded, but insisted upon hugging the coast of
Africa all the way, cos, as he said, it looked safer to see the land.
So, as it happened, when we neared the Cape, we got into a regular
north-westerly current, that set clear away south-east, or it might be
a few points more southerly. The wind, too, blew in the same direction,
and it seemed a bad job altogether. Our luff then says, says he to the
captain—that’s Safety Jack, you must understand,—
“‘It will take us some time to work into the bay with this wind and
current, but we can do it.’
“‘Is it safe?’ said Safety Jack.
“‘Oh, yes,’ said t’other; ‘though I have known a vessel of small
draught to be capsized hereaway.’
“Safety Jack at this turns very pale, and he says,—
“‘Well, run before the wind a few leagues to the south; it’s
safer—and—and the gale may go down, and we may get out of the
current—and—and—besides, it’s safer.’
“Well, everybody grumbled, but Safety Jack would have his own way, and
we went spanking along with the wind and current nearly due south.
“But instead of getting out of the current we got further into it,
and the gale increased to a hurricane. We went through the water at
such a rate that the men who stood facing the wind could not button
their jackets, or shut their eyes, and there was the mate and five
able-bodied men holding the captain’s hair on his head. The men’s
teeth, too, were all blown out of their mouths, and kept rattling among
the rigging like half-a-dozen old shot in a locker. On we went, faster
and faster, till all of a sudden we saw the sails flapping against the
masts, and the ship was evidently turning round in spite of the helm.
“‘We’re out of it now,’ mumbles Safety Jack.
“‘I think we’re in for it,’ cried the mate. ‘This is a whirlpool!’
“And so it was; round and round we flew like lightning, coming nearer
to one point at each turn. The men all fell down on the deck as giddy
as geese, and Safety Jack he begins screaming. Just to give you an idea
of how we went round, there was two of the crew as had a squabble about
a bottle of rum, and one on ’em says—‘If I can’t have it you sha’n’t,
and there it goes,’ shieing it behind him. Well, you’ll hardly believe
it—but the ship was going round so fast in a circle of about a mile,
that afore the bottle could drop the man as threw it was brought round
to it again, and it knocked his eye out. Well, presently the ship gives
a kind of shivering and stops for half a moment, and Safety Jack he
screams again. Then the water opened like a well-hole, and just for a
moment we could see it bubbling and lashing like a boiling cauldron.
Then down we went into the foaming surge like a lump of lead.”
“You don’t mean to swear to that?”
“Yes, I do; at any time and any day; I should think so, and rather
think I ought to know, as I was there.”
“And how did you get saved? That’s the question, my boy.”
“You ought to be satisfied about that, I should think,” said Jack, “by
seeing me here. If I had not escaped, I rather suppose I shouldn’t have
been here to have told you about it.”
“That’s all very well; but I ask you how you escaped?”
“Oh, that’s quite another thing. I floated about for eight weeks upon
an empty tar barrel.”
“Eight weeks, did you say?”
“Yes; eight weeks, two days, four hours, and three-quarters.”
“The deuce you did! How came you to be so mighty particular as to the
three-quarters?”
“Because I thought some fool would be sure to ask me.”
“Oh, that indeed; but the most odd thing that happened to me, I will
say, was when I was once wrecked on an island that we called Flee
Island.”
“Flee Island; what a rum name! What made you call it that, I should
like to know?”
“Oh, a trifling circumstance—there was nothing in it but flees, and
they were as big as elephants.”
“Very good,” said Jack; “I can believe that, because there is nothing
outrageous about it. I don’t consider myself at all difficult to
please, and so long as you stick to such things as that nobody can
doubt you will find it all right with me.”
“I am very much obliged—but should you happen ever to come across that
captain of yours again——”
“Yes, but it were a good while afterwards I was on board a whaler, and
I saw something floating that looked like a great lump of chalk, and
when we picked it up, who should it turn out to be but Safety Jack,
what they call putrefied, and turned to something like white coral.”
“You don’t mean that.”
“Yes, I do; we keep him out of curiosity for about a week lashed up to
the mainmast, but the men of the night watch were scared at him, and
threw him overboard, because they said, when the moonlight fell upon
him, he for all the world looked like a ghost, and they couldn’t keep
their eyes off him, which I dare say was somewhere about the truth.”
“You certainly have seen a little service; but mix yourself another
glass of grog, and I shall do the same, for I don’t mean to turn into
hammock to-night.”
“What for?”
“Because there is going to be a storm. I have not been looking at the
weather for so many years without being able to tell that before it
comes. There will be a storm before twenty-four hours are over, and
I think it will blow off the sea, so that there will be no end of
mischief.”
Jack Pringle went to the door of the fisherman’s hut, and, although
the evening had set in, he cast a scrutinizing glance at the heavens,
looked earnestly in the direction from whence the wind proceeded, and
when he came back again and sat down by the side of the old sailor, he
said,—
“You are right; there will not only be a storm, but such a one too as
they hav’n’t seen for some time; so I shall no more think of turning
in than you do. Who knows but that some vessel may be drifted in shore,
and then we who are seamen will be able to do more good than a score of
your shore-going fellows, who are afraid if the saltwater gets above
their ankles.”
“That’s true enough; when the wind does rise in this way, and blows a
strong gale, it is pretty clear that there will be something in the
shape of wreck to look at.”
The prognostications of Jack and the old sailor turned out, as we
know, to be tolerably correct, for the storm which they anticipated
was precisely that severe one which roused the Baron Stolmuyer of
Saltzburgh from his lethargy, and induced him to go down to the beach,
to see what was likely to be the fate of the vessel from which the
signals of distress had proceeded.
So soon as the wind began to howl, and the waves to dash upon the
shore, Jack Pringle and the old sailor left the cottage, and stood with
great anxiety upon the beach, anxious to render what assistance they
could to those who were suffering from the fury of the storm.
We have before mentioned that a boat that the Baron Stolmuyer saw
swamped, had ventured out to the assistance of the crew.
In that boat had been Jack Pringle; and he had refused to allow the old
sailor to accompany him, on account of his age.
“No, no,” said Jack; “this is a work for youngsters, and they and they
only ought to set about it. You remain where you are. We know well
enough that your will is good, and let that be sufficient; and now, my
lads, who will go with me?”
Jack soon got a few good volunteers, and started out on his chivalrous
expedition, to see what could be done towards rescuing some of the crew
of the distressed ship.
But, alas! what the baron had said about the fate of that boat was
true, although he was incorrect as regarded the consequences of its
swamping to all on board; for Jack Pringle, in consequence of being a
first-rate swimmer, and possessed likewise as he was of great coolness
and presence of mind, contrived to reach shore again, although he was
the only one of the ill-fated crew who really did so.
But, as Jack himself said, they died in a noble cause, and as everybody
must die some time in some sort of way, he didn’t see that they had
anything very particular to complain of in that respect.
It was on the second occasion, however, that Jack was going out with a
life-boat, that the baron reached the beach, and then, as if indignant
that such daring attempts should be made to save what he evidently
thought so little of, namely, human life, he retired in indignation
again to his home.
But not all the barons in the world would have stopped Jack in his
chivalrous enterprise, and so he proceeded at once to carry it out
to the best of his ability; and he did pick up a man who was nearly
exhausted, and clinging, with but a faint hope of deliverance, to a
portion of wreck.
CHAPTER CVII.
THE YOUNG SAILOR SAVED BY JACK PRINGLE TURNS OUT TO BE AN IMPORTANT
PERSONAGE.
It was not the least gratifying part by any means of Jack Pringle’s,
going to the sea-side, that, in consequence of that occurrence, he had
been instrumental in saving the life of a fellow-creature; and when
he returned to the cottage of the fisherman, bearing in his arms the
apparently lifeless remains of a young man, who had been clinging to a
portion of the wreck, the cheer that greeted him from the bystanders
was certainly the most grateful music that had ever greeted his ears.
[Illustration: Jack bearing in his arms the young man.]
He had a strong impression on his own mind, that the young man whom he
had removed from the wreck would recover, and that impression he was
wonderfully well pleased to find verified by the fact.
The care and assiduity of the family, upon whose hospitality the young
stranger was thus by the fury of the elements thrown, succeeded shortly
in restoring him to perfect consciousness.
He showed a disposition, then, to arise, but this Jack Pringle and the
old fisherman would not permit, for they both knew from experience in
such cases, how essential rest was; so they darkened the room in which
he lay, and left him to himself.
“Well,” said Jack, as they sat together; “what do you think of that
young fellow? I cannot, for my own part, make out very well what he is,
although I can say what he is not, and that’s a seaman.”
“No, he is no sailor, certainly; and he is more likely to have been a
passenger on board the merchantman, than anything else; and if so, it’s
an odd thing that he should have been the only one saved out of the
ship’s crew, when there much have been men used to such disasters, and
one would think capable of taking care of themselves.”
“It is an odd thing; but there is no accounting for it; we shall hear
all about it, though, when he recovers sufficiently to speak to us
without doing himself any mischief.”
“Certainly; and that will be after he has had a sleep, for then he will
be all right; for, mind you, I don’t think he was insensible on account
of having been in the water so much, as because he was so thoroughly
tired out, that he didn’t know what he was about.”
The stranger slept for about four hours; and then he awakened, greatly
refreshed by the slumber, and quite able to give some account of
himself without fatigue.
After expressing his most grateful thanks for the service that had
been rendered to him, to which Jack listened with great impatience,
because he really did not consider it a service at all, but one of the
most natural things in the world for a man to do, who saw another in
distress, he said,—
“I was captain’s clerk on board a king’s ship called the Undine, and
we had a smart affair with a nest of pirates on the African coast. We
were absolutely attacked by four or five of their vessels at once, and,
having sunk three and captured the remainder, during which, however,
we lost some officers and a number of men, our captain determined upon
sending home a dispatch of the transaction, which he entrusted to my
care.”
“Hang pirates!” said Jack. “They ought all to be hung up at the
yard-arm, without judge or jury; but, I suppose, they are by this time
pretty well settled.”
“I have no doubt of it, for it was the captain’s intention to steer
to the nearest port, and there be evidence against them, and get them
in due course executed. He put me on board a merchant vessel with my
dispatches, and a more prosperous and pleasant voyage we could not
have, until the storm which arose off the coast here, and proved the
destruction of our vessel.”
“Ah!” said Jack, “it’s always the case, if anything happens, it’s
within sight almost of the port you are bound to.”
“So it is,” said the old fisherman. “All is safe out in the blue
waters; but, when you least expect it, and things are looking quite
pleasant, and people a-brushing themselves up to go on shore, then,
all of a sudden, something will occur, and you will find yourselves a
wreck.”
“It would seem so,” said the young stranger; “and, at all events, that
was our evil fortune, whatever it may be any one else’s, for we were,
indeed, just congratulating ourselves upon being at home, or nearly so,
when this terrific storm arose, and, I suppose, I am the only survivor
out a crew of twenty-eight men.”
“The only one,” said Jack, “I am sorry to say. All had sunk before the
life-boat had reached you, and, what’s more, several brave fellows lost
their lives in the first attempt to pick up some of the crew; so it has
been a most disastrous matter altogether.”
“But cheer up,” said the fisherman; “it might have been worse, for I
have known cases when a ship has gone down, and not left one survivor
to say who or what she was; or tell the tale of her destruction.”
“And I too,” said Jack.
“On what part of the coast,” said the stranger, “am I? for, during the
night, we have drifted so far, and been so beaten about by the gale,
that whether we came twenty miles or a hundred I cannot tell.”
“Why, the town close at hand here is called Anderbury.”
“Anderbury!” exclaimed the young man. “Is it possible that my faculties
have been so confused by the danger I have been in, as not to know
this coast. This is the very place to which I should have proceeded
post-haste, directly I concluded my business in London at the
Admiralty.”
“Indeed. Then you had better stay here at once, and go to the Admiralty
afterwards; for, I dare say, that will answer the purpose just as well,
at all events. And, I suppose, you have lost your dispatches.”
“I have, indeed; but yet it is my duty to report myself, as soon
as possible. But, now that I am in Anderbury, I cannot resist the
opportunity of calling upon a dear friend, who resides in this town. Do
you happen to know a family of the name of Williams?”
“No,” said Jack; “I never heard of them, except you mean a Bill
Williams, that was once on board the Ocean frigate, as cook.”
“No, no. I mean a family residing here, one of the members of which is
dearer to me than life itself.”
“Well,” said Jack, “it’s good fortune that has cast you here, since
that is the case. It is not likely that I should know anything of the
people you speak of, because I am a stranger in the place myself, and
have come a distance of twenty-five miles, just to have a look at
the sea, and nothing else, and good fortune brought me here in time,
it appears, to save your life, and I only hope you will find your
sweetheart true to you.”
“I can have no doubt of that.”
“Well, it is a good thing to be confident; but, for my part, I always
had very serious doubts, and, when I came off a voyage, I frequently
found that my sweetheart had picked up with somebody else, in the
course of about a week after I was gone.”
“But, in this case,” said the young stranger, “I would stake my life
upon the fidelity of her whom I wish so much now to see.”
“Well,” said Jack, “of course you please yourself; but, before you make
a fool of yourself, by calling upon her, just satisfy yourself upon the
subject, that’s all, and get some friend to make an inquiry for you, or
else, perhaps, you will be served as I was once.”
“How was that?”
“Why, the fact is, when I was younger than I am now, I took a fancy
to a nice little creature, of the name of Jemima West, whom I fully
intended to marry, and so I told her, before I started upon one voyage
that I meant to be my last; for, you see, I had a pretty good stock of
prize money, and I meant to set up a public-house at Liverpool.”
“And did she prove false to you?”
“A little. When I came home, of course I walked off straight to where
she lived. Her father and mother were very respectable people, and
amused themselves with selling coals and potatoes. So, in I walked,
as I used to do, into the shop, and so on, bang into the parlour, and
there sat Jemima, much as usual, neither very clean, and neither very
dirty. Well, on the other side of the fire-place was a fellow smoking a
pipe, and, when I caught hold of her, and gave her half-a-dozen regular
kisses, he takes his pipe out of his mouth, and opens his eyes like an
old crocodile.
“‘Well, my girl,’ I said; ‘how are you?’
“‘Oh, I don’t know,’ she said; ‘I didn’t expect to see you any more.’
“‘No,’ said the fellow, with the pipe, ‘and I’m d—d if ever I expected
to see you at all. Who the devil are you?’
“‘Who the devil are you?’ says I; ‘but, however, that don’t much
matter, for be you whom you may, if you don’t pretty quick take
yourself off, I’ll kick you out.’
“‘That’s a good joke,’ says he, ‘to talk of kicking a man out of his
own house, after coming in and kissing his wife like a steam-engine. A
very good joke.’
“‘Wife!’ says I. ‘Do you say you are this fellow’s wife?’
“‘Yes,’ says she, and she pretended to wipe something out of the corner
of her eye with her apron. ‘Yes,’ says she; ‘I thought you were drowned
long ago, and so I thought I might as well be Mrs. Juggles.’
“Now you may guess, messmate, what a d—d fool I looked after that, and
how glad I was to back out; so, you see, I advise you to make some
inquiries just before you take upon yourself to be so positive about
your sweetheart.”
The young man laughed, as he said,—
“I think I’ll chance it; and, notwithstanding your misadventure, I have
some reason to believe that I shall not be so unfortunate; but at all
events I will take your advice and make some previous inquiries. It
shall not be said that I fell into any misadventure of that nature for
want of ordinary caution.”
“That’s right, don’t be above taking advice; and, do you know, I
sha’n’t be at all surprised, that you will find your sweetheart going
to be Mrs. Somebody else; but come, here’s dinner will be ready
directly.”
“Yes,” said the old man; “it will as soon as my son returns from
Anderbury, where he has gone to buy a bit of fresh meat for you, for
I thought you would be tired of fish, and we had nothing else in the
house.”
“I regret much giving you so much trouble; but I shall have my pay to
receive when I reach London, and will take care that you are amply
recompensed.”
“Oh, don’t mention that; and, by-the-bye, here he comes. Well, Tom,
what have you brought?”
“A leg of mutton,” said Tom; “I ain’t a judge of nothing else, but I
thought I might venture upon that, at all events. I think somebody told
me it was very good with shrimp sauce.”
“Rather an odd mixture, that, Tom, and not quite usual I should say.”
“Well, the fellow was on the grin that told me, on account of an old
woman that had been to them to ask for some more credit for a month or
two, because her daughter was going to be married to a baron somebody,
who they say has taken Anderbury-on-the-Mount, and is immensely rich.”
“Did you hear her name, Tom?”
“Oh, yes; I have seen her before in the town. It’s old Mother Williams,
and it’s her daughter Helen as is going to be married.”
“Well, I never!” cried Jack; “I say, messmate, didn’t I tell you? The
murder is out, now; that’s your sweetheart, ain’t it?”
The young man turned very pale, and for a few moments he did not speak;
but when he did so, he said,—
“There must be some mistake; I could stake my life upon her constancy.”
“Then a precious goose you would be,” said Jack, “to do any such thing,
for I wouldn’t stake my little finger upon any woman. Why, man, it’s
just what you ought to have expected. It’s the way with them all, out
of sight out of mind, and I am only surprised at a fellow of your sense
not knowing that, for you seem to be up to a thing or two.”
“It cannot be—it cannot be—I must go myself to seek Helen, and at once
put a stop to these rumours, which, I am convinced, arise from some
misconstruction, and probably a confusion of names. I know that Mrs.
Williams is a selfish woman, and it is possible that she might not
hesitate in sacrificing one of her daughters to gold, but that one
cannot be Helen, who has pledged her faith to me.”
“Well,” said Jack, “take advantage of any doubt you can, but it would
be very absurd for you to go interfering in the matter yourself. You
leave it to me to make the necessary inquiries, whilst you remain here
snug and unknown, and I promise you, on the word of a British seaman,
that I’ll bring you exact news all about it.”
“I accept your offer gratefully, for if she be faithless to me, I wish
never to encounter her again, but to leave her to enjoy what happiness
she can with that other for whom she has broken her faith with me.”
“Good,” said Jack; “that’s the wisest plan, for, after all, you see, in
these affairs who’s to blame but the girl herself? and you can’t very
well give her a thrashing, you know; for, as regards the fellow, of
course, she don’t say anything to him about you, and he can’t tell but
what she is a regular free trader.”
“True—true—and the best thing, therefore, I can do, to make certain of
controlling my temper in the transaction, is not to see her, unless I
can make certain that she is faithful to the vows she has plighted to
me; but let me beg of you, as quickly as possible, to end my state of
suspense and doubt.”
“I believe you,” said Jack; “I’ll go at once to find it all out. You
sha’n’t be in doubt much longer, and, of course, I hope that things
will turn out to your satisfaction; although I can’t say I expect they
will.”
“The hope that they will, is life itself to me, and I shall wait here
with an impatience bordering upon positive agony for your report.”
CHAPTER CVIII.
THE DECISION AGAINST THE DOCTOR, AND MORE NEWS OF VARNEY, THE VAMPYRE.
It will be remembered that Dr. Chillingworth, although he had, without
doubt, ascertained that Varney had proceeded to London, hesitated about
following him there without the full connivance and consent of the
Bannerworths; and now, at the very first opportunity he had, when he
found the admiral and Henry together, he introduced the subject.
He detailed what he had already done in the way of tracing Varney from
place to place, and ended by declaring his conviction the he was to be
found in London.
“It is not only of importance,” he said, “to discover Varney on account
of the property which I think he has taken with him, but it really
amounts almost to a public duty to do so, when we consider the evil he
has succeeded in bringing upon us, and that some other family may be
soon suffering from similar machinations.”
“But, doctor,” said Henry, “I presume you have no disinclination to
admit that the principal view you take of this subject, is as regards
its connexion with the supposed sum of money which Varney has taken
with him?”
“I freely own,” said the doctor, “that I should like to place that
money in your hands, because I think you are entitled to it; and,
perhaps, that is my principal motive, but it certainly is not my only
one; for, as I consider Varney quite a curiosity in a medical point of
view, I certainly wish to follow him up, and should be extremely sorry
to lose sight of him altogether.”
“But you must be aware, doctor,” said Henry, “that there really is
something like positive danger in following such a man up; and,
although he feels himself under such great obligations to you, that
I do not think he would willingly do you an injury, yet there is no
knowing what so strange and irascible a temper might not be goaded to.”
“I have no dread of danger.”
“I dare say you have not,” said the admiral; “but I give my vote
against having anything further to do with Varney.”
“And,” said Henry, “although I cannot withhold an expression of
admiration for the doctor’s perseverance, I beg him to think that we
oppose his pilgrimage in search of the vampyre, because we feel more
for his personal safety than we fear any of the machinations of Varney.”
“Well, gentlemen,” said the doctor, “since I am in a minority, of
course I must give in, and say no more about it. I should certainly
have liked to find the fellow; for it is my impression that he
certainly has a good many thousands of your money in his possession.
But, as it is, I will say no more about it; although I shall retain my
opinion that you are ill-advised in not following him up.”
“Oh,” said the admiral, “it wouldn’t do to follow people up always.”
“I don’t know that. There’s that Quaker, for instance, who has got
possession of Dearbrook.”
“The Quaker!” shouted the admiral. “D—n the Quaker! I’ll follow him up
while I have a guinea left, or a leg to stand on. What the deuce made
you mention him? for you know the very sound of his name is enough to
put me in a fever. The Quaker be hanged, an infernal thief as he is!”
It was well known to both Henry and the doctor, and, in fact, to all
the family now, that the mention of the Quaker was always enough to
drive the admiral nearly frantic; so that we are inclined to think
Dr. Chillingworth was actuated by a little spirit of vengeance when
he made that remark, and that, on the whole, he was so vexed at the
non-participation of the Bannerworths and the admiral in his views
concerning Sir Francis Varney, that, on the irritation of the moment,
he did not scruple to say something which he thought would be annoying;
but his downright good feeling so got the better of anything of that
sort, that, turning to the admiral, he said,—
“I do apologise—I ought to apologise for my calling to your attention
anything of a disagreeable character; for I have no right whatever to
do so; and it was only upon the impulse of a moment, I assure you, that
I uttered the words.”
“Doctor,” said the admiral, “I know all that as well as you can tell
me; so just say no more about it, if you please, for I don’t want to
hear one word upon such a subject.”
“Well, then,” said the doctor, “now that I stand acquitted of doing or
saying anything of a doubtful or disagreeable character, I can only
tell you that I shall persevere in my opinion, and that it is just
possible, though not very likely, that I may, upon my own account, do
something in the matter.”
“All of which,” said Henry, “I am very sorry to hear you say, doctor.”
“But why are you sorry?”
“Because I cannot help anticipating danger. I feel almost certain that
it will ensue, and, in that case, no one will more bitterly regret that
you mixed yourself up in the affair than I shall.”
“Oh, do not presume any such thing,” said the doctor, jestingly. “You
may depend Varney and I understand each other too well for there to be
much danger in my intercourse with him. There is something about the
fellow yet that will not permit him to do any deliberate wrong to me;
and, strange as the feeling may appear, I cannot help acknowledging
that I like him in some things, and that, having been the means of
restoring him to life, I feel, somehow or another, as if I were bound
to look after him.”
“Well, that is rather absurd,” said the admiral, “I must confess. But,
however, doctor, if you have any such feeling, by all means carry it
out—I won’t say nay; but by any means find him out, if you like, and if
you can make him a decent member of society, in Heaven’s name do so.”
“I do not expect that,” said the doctor; “and if I only keep him out
of mischief, I shall be sufficiently satisfied, for that would be
accomplishing a great deal with such a man.”
“Promise me one thing,” said Henry, “in connection with this affair.”
“What may that be?”
“It is that you will not take any step in the matter without letting
us know. Of course, you are a free-agent in the transaction, and have
as much right as anybody to say or to do anything as regards Varney,
the vampyre; but still, knowing so much of him as we do, I, for
one, certainly would be glad to be made aware of anything you were
attempting concerning him.”
“That I will promise you, so you need be under no possible apprehension
on such a score, but feel completely at your ease that nothing is being
done unless you know of it.”
At this juncture, a servant entered the room with a letter, which was
addressed to Henry Bannerworth, and, upon opening it, he uttered a
sudden exclamation of surprise.
“What is it?” said the admiral; “you seem astonished, Henry.”
“I am, indeed, astonished, and I may be. Who do you suppose, admiral,
this letter is from?”
“I can’t possibly take upon myself to say.”
“Why, from no other person than Varney, the vampyre.”
“Indeed!” cried Dr. Chillingworth; “and does he offer restitution?—does
he offer to return the money he so wrongfully has got possession
of?—tell me that.”
“I cannot answer you, for I have not read one word of the epistle; I
only see by the signature that it is his; but as it is impossible that
there can be any secrets between myself and Varney, I shall read it to
you aloud, and you shall both of you be able to judge concerning it.”
The admiral and the doctor assumed attitudes of attention, while Henry,
after glancing his eyes slightly down the contents of the letter,
commenced reading it as follows:—
“To Henry Bannerworth.
“Sir,—Probably the last person in the world from whom you might expect
to receive a communication, is he who now pens this epistle; but as it
is penned with a good feeling towards you and yours, I hope and trust
it will be received in a kindly spirit.
“Admitting that the circumstances under which I left the protection of
your house were such as to require some explanation from me, it is that
explanation which I now proceed to give.
“Circumstances made it imperatively necessary that I should adopt a
course of conduct that should no longer make me a burden to those
who had more cause to wish me dead, than to assist me in maintaining
existence.
“Without, then, the least sinister motive towards you or any one
belonging to you, I left your home secretly, and at once, not being
willing to listen to remonstrances that I knew would be spoken kindly,
but which I knew at the same time could not be very serious, inasmuch
as my presence cannot possibly be otherwise than a severe tax upon your
kindness and your patience.
“I cannot be so besotted as to think for a moment, that you can forget,
although a generosity of temper, for which I give you full credit,
might enable you to forgive, the injuries you have received from me;
but I could not make up my mind to reside under your roof on such
terms; and since my recovery from the violence of a lawless mob, the
question in my mind has been, not whether I should leave you or not,
but how I should leave you, and where I should betake myself to.
“At length, finding it impossible to come to any rational conclusion
upon these points, and that time was rapidly wearing, so that it
became necessary, if I came to a conclusion at all, I should come to
it quickly, I resolved to leave without giving you any notice of the
fact, and set up my staff, as it were, in the wilderness, and proceed
in whatever direction chance might point out to me.
“This, I say, was my resolve, and I have carried it into execution. All
I ask of you is, to forget me, and not to waste any thought upon the
man who will never do any injury to you, or to any one belonging to
you, and who hopes you will make no inquiry for him; but, should you
meet him ever, you will pass him by as if you knew him not.
“These few words come from him who was
“+Varney, the Vampyre+.”
There was a dead silence when this epistle was concluded, and all
seemed busy with their own opinions as regarded this communication,
which certainly was one of a singular nature, and highly calculated to
excite their surprise.
Upon the whole, though, there was one extremely evident conclusion to
be drawn from it, and that was, that Varney was extremely anxious not
to be interfered with.
“Can anything be more transparent?” exclaimed the doctor; “it is just
as I say, Varney wants to try some new scheme, and is very much afraid
that he may come across us in some way, and be baulked in it, by our
exposing what his real character is; and, if anything could give me a
stronger impulse than another to follow him and see what he is about,
it would certainly be that letter.”
“I do not think you need be afraid,” said Henry; “for the letter,
bearing as it does that signification, is such a one as induces me to
believe he is fearful that some circumstances may throw him in our way,
and in that case, that we may spoil his sport; and of the likelihood
of such a thing occurring, he is, of course, a much better judge than
we can be. So I should say, let him alone, and see if anything really
turns up concerning him; if it does, we have a fair principle of
action before us, for we have no occasion, merely because he has asked
us, to be quiet and peaceable, if we find him playing any pranks, or
attempting to play any pranks.”
“That’s my opinion, too,” said the admiral; “be quiet and take no
notice, and it will be an odd thing to me, then, if you don’t soon hear
something of Master Varney, and that may be a something, too, that may
astonish us.”
“It that all the letter?” said Dr. Chillingworth.
“Yes, with the exception of these words in a postscript,—
“Any communication addressed to V. V., General Post-office, London,
will reach my hands promptly.”
“Ah! then there’s the gist of the matter,” said the doctor; “the
vagabond wants to be assured that we shall not interfere with him; and
then he has got some rascality in hand, you may depend, which he would
set to work about in real earnest.”
“I shall not write to him,” said Henry, “but shall pursue quite a
different course of policy, and wait patiently for what may happen,
for I am convinced that is the only plan to pursue with any chance of
benefit or success.”
“And you will bear in mind, doctor,” said the admiral, “that the fellow
in this letter talks of giving us an explanation, and yet not one word
does he say about jumping upon your back from the garden-wall. The
deuce a bit does he explain that.”
“No,” said the doctor; “nor did I expect he would. Such a man as Varney
is not likely to criminate himself; and, while there is a doubt about
whether he is that person or not, you may depend he will not be the man
to take any pains to dispel it.”
“Of course not—of course not.”
“Well,” said the doctor, “I can only tell you all one thing, and that
is, that, whatever you may think or flatter yourselves, this affair is
very far indeed from being over, and sooner or later, something yet
very serious will occur in connection with Varney, the vampyre. Do not
fancy that you have got rid of him, for, most certainly, you have not.”
The doctor spoke these words so oracularly, that they sounded extremely
like one of those predictions founded upon such a firm basis, that they
are sure to be carried out by future facts, and both Henry and the
admiral felt as if they had heard truth from some one who knew well!
what he was uttering, and was not likely to be mistaken.
CHAPTER CIX.
THE PREPARATIONS FOR THE WEDDING OF THE BARON STOLMUYER OF SALTZBURGH.
There is a common adage which inculcates the necessity of striking
while the iron is hot, and this was an adage which, to judge from her
conduct, seemed to have made a great impression upon the mind of Mrs.
Williams, and she thought that, as regarded her daughter’s feelings,
the iron was hot, and that, if she struck now, she might be able to
wring from her a consent, no matter how reluctant, to call the Baron
Stolmuyer her husband.
The objects which Mrs. Williams felt certain she should succeed in
achieving by such an union in her family, were far too weighty to be
easily dispensed with. They not only comprehended the five hundred
pounds which the baron had so judiciously promised her upon the wedding
day being fixed, but she had an eye to after circumstances, and
considered that the son-in-law who could spare five hundred pounds, as
a mere bribe to her, would be an endless source, from whence she could
draw her pecuniary supplies.
“And then,” thought Mrs. Williams, “there are the other girls to get
off, too, and what a famous opportunity it will be to do that, when
they can be at all the grand parties the baron will give at Anderbury
House.”
To an intriguing woman, such as Mrs. Williams was in reality, all these
advantages appeared in full force; and, if ever she made up her mind
thoroughly and entirely about anything in the world, she certainly did
that her daughter Helen should be the Baroness Stolmuyer of Saltzburgh.
She certainly wished, in her own heart, that the baron had chosen one
of her other daughters, because then she knew that she would not have
had to encounter the opposition she had done, and, perhaps, had still
to encounter, in the case of Helen; but, as it was, that part of the
business could not be helped, and she, Helen, was to be sacrificed.
If the baron had thought for twelve-months over the matter, he could
not have come to a better conclusion, as to the best means of making
Mrs. Williams a zealous partisan of his, than by distinctly naming a
sum of money that she should have, and when she should have it, for
now she considered that each moment’s delay was a piece of actual
criminality on the part of Helen, inasmuch as it was keeping her, Mrs.
Williams, out of a large sum of money.
There was one thing, however, which she did at once; and that was to go
to the different tradespeople who had had the awful insolence to stop
the supplies, and tell them that her daughter Helen was about to become
the Baroness Stolmuyer, and that, if they continued to execute orders,
and to wait with patience, they would all get paid within one month.
This positive announcement staggered some of them, for they would
hardly have thought it possible that she would have made it, if there
had not been some great foundation for truth in it, of some sort, and
it was one of these announcements which, as the reader is aware, had
been overheard by Tom, the son of the old sailor, and which, when
reported, had created so much consternation in the mind of the young
man who had been saved by Jack Pringle from the wreck.
On the following morning, the lady received a laconic note from the
baron, in which were the words:—
Madam,—Have you settled with your daughter the day and hour of my
nuptials with her? I have drawn a cheque in your favour, and only wait
your further proceeding in the affair to sign it, and send it to you.
“I have the honour to be, madam, yours truly,
+“Stolmuyer+.
“Mrs. Williams.”
This note put Mrs. Williams into a perfect fury of impatience. The
idea, that actually a cheque for five hundred pounds should be drawn
in her favour, and only awaiting the signature of the baron, and that,
by one word, her daughter Helen could procure that signature, was
absolutely maddening.
She rushed, at once, to Helen’s room.
• • • • •
Poor Helen knew enough of her mother to feel convinced, from the first,
that no possible exertion would be spared for the purpose of forcing
her into that marriage, which had no charms, alas, for her, but which,
on the contrary, presented itself to her in the most hideous of all
possible aspects.
From the first moment that her mother had broached it, it had seemed
in its remembrance to lie at her heart like a lump of lead. She seemed
already to feel that, after an unavailing resistance, she would have to
yield, and then that her future existence would involve in it all the
pangs of despair and regret.
“Alas—alas!” she said; “under what fatal planet was I born, that I
should be so unhappy as I now am? What will become of me, and how shall
I gather resolution enough either to bear with seeming patience the
fate that afflicts me, or to resist the machinations of my mother, who
would force me to wed this man whom I cannot love.”
The long absence of her lover was so perplexing a source of woe and
reflection to her, that already it had sapped much of the joy of her
young existence.
“He surely ought,” she said, “and might have found some means of
communicating to me long ere this. He might well know, and must know,
that suspense is, of all feelings, the worst to bear. Oh! why am I thus
deserted by all, and left to the mercy of the worst of circumstances?”
With her sisters, poor Helen could have no sympathies in common;
either of them would have been delighted to change places with her, as
regarded the fact of becoming the Baroness of Saltzburgh, and they had
towards her a tolerably cordial ill-will, on account of her superior
charms, which made her so much admired, while they were left to “pine
in maiden meditation fancy free.”
But to Helen Williams, this gift of beauty was what it truly has often
been described—a most dangerous one, and she would have given the world
to have been able to wear an appearance that would have repelled,
instead of attracted, the Baron Stolmuyer.
She was in this desponding state of mind, revolving in her mind her
dismal prospects, if she should consent to wed the baron, and her
equally dismal ones if she should refuse—for well she knew how painful
a position with her family such a refusal would place her in—when her
mother entered the room.
Mrs. Williams had so thoroughly determined that this marriage should
take place, that she could not be said to have now sought her daughter
to persuade her to it; but, on the contrary, to insist upon it. The
sisters, too, with whom this unnatural mother—or rather, perhaps,
we ought to say, too natural, but too common mother—had held a
conversation upon the subject, were anxious, despite their jealousy
upon the occasion, that the affair should proceed, because certainly
the next best thing to themselves making such an alliance was to
succeed in getting it made by some other of the family, and they fully
intended making Anderbury-on-the-Mount their home.
“What, Helen!” exclaimed Mrs. Williams—“in tears as usual!”
“Have I not cause for weeping, mother?”
“Well, well; I cannot say much to you beyond the few words I have come
to say. I have, I fear, as regarded this affair of the offer that was
made to you by the Baron Stolmuyer, behaved precipitately.”
“Oh, mother,” cried Helen, with renewed hope, “I am rejoiced to hear
you say so. Then you will not now ask me to sacrifice myself to a man
whom I can never love? Say no more of the past. It is sufficient that
you have awakened to better resolves now, dear mother, and I shall be
happy.”
[Illustration: Helen implores her mother.]
Such words as these ought to have softened the mother’s heart; but such
a woman had no heart to soften; and, after a pause, she proceeded in
her plan of operations.
“Well my dear, perhaps it is all for the best.”
“It must be for the best, mother, because it never can be for good that
I should have consented to plight my vows to one whom, of all others, I
cannot look upon with the least affectionate regard. Indeed, mother, so
much as I can absolutely dislike any one, I dislike that man.”
“There’s no occasion to say anything more about it, my dear. I have
come to bid you farewell, and Heaven only knows when we may meet again.”
“What do you mean, mother?”
“I mean, my dear, just what I say; I am going now at once to a prison.”
“A prison?”
“Yes. It certainly is not an agreeable idea; but, as I told you, I was
too sanguine, and built too much upon your consenting to marry the
baron, so I borrowed a sum of money to pay some pressing debts; but
as I have not been able to repay it, I am arrested, and have now only
persuaded the man to go away upon giving him my solemn promise that I
will, in half-an-hour’s time, be at the gates of the town gaol.”
Helen heard this declaration with a feeling of perfect horror. She
was too little acquainted with the usages of society to see what a
transparent lie it really was, and, to her mind, it did not appear
improbable that a man who came to arrest anybody should take their word
to come to the gaol in half-an-hour.
“Oh! mother, mother,” she sobbed, “can this be?”
“I don’t know,” said Mrs. Williams, “if it can be or not. All I
know is, that it is so, and that I am perfectly willing to pass the
remainder of my days in a dungeon.”
Helen’s ideas of prisons were all procured from romances, and she
was not at all surprised, consequently, to hear her mother talk of a
dungeon; and if she had added something about chains, and bread and
water, and a heap of straw merely for a bed, it would have found a
ready credence with poor Helen.
No wonder, therefore, that the idea of such a catastrophe presented
itself to her in the most terrific colours; and she saw at once all her
recent congratulations upon an escape from a marriage with the Baron
Stolmuyer of Saltzburgh scattered to the winds of Heaven.
She was so petrified with astonishment and grief, that for some moments
she could not speak, and Mrs. Williams took care to improve upon that
silence by adding,—
“I am sure I should be the last person in the world to ask any daughter
of mine to make a sacrifice; but as I have been so foolish, because I
took a pride in my family, as to go into expenses I cannot stand, why,
of course, I must take the consequences.”
“Oh! no, no.”
“Oh! it’s all very well to say, ‘Oh! no, no,’ but it’s oh! yes, yes;
and all I have to ask of you now is, to say that business has compelled
me to leave this part of the country, and after that, the best way will
be to say that I am dead.”
“Heaven help me!”
“And then, of course,” continued Mrs. Williams, in the most martyr-like
and self-denying tone in all the world; “and then, of course, people
will leave off making any inquiries about me, and you may all of you in
time manage to forget me likewise.”
“Mother, mother, is not this cruel?”
“My dear, I really cannot say that I think it is. I am, and have been,
mistaken, and perhaps I did push the affair of your marriage with the
Baron Stolmuyer of Saltzburgh a little too far, and too much counted
upon it. I know I am apt to be too sanguine—I am well aware of that.
It’s a little peculiarity of mine, but I cannot help it; and when we
have those little peculiarities, all we can do, is to put up with it as
best we may.”
“But, mother——.”
“Oh! it’s no use talking.”
“Is the creditor so very inexorable?”
“Yes, and only on one account; he thinks I have deceived him, that’s
the fact; and having asked me to give a decided answer if the
wedding-day was fixed between you and the baron, for nothing else
would satisfy him, and as of course I could not say that, he got
quite furious, and at once threatened me with law proceedings, which
I did not think he really meant; but it appears he did, for here I am
arrested.”
“But can nothing be done?”
“Not that I see. The baron, when he made the proposal, was anxious for
an immediate reply, and then he would have made some very handsome
settlement, which would have been soon known, and anybody would have
trusted me. But as it is, the only thing that can save you all, will be
for me to go to prison at once, and so disappear.”
Helen wept bitterly.
“And therefore, my dear, I beg you won’t think anything of it. I am
quite willing to go at once, without any more fuss about it. But I have
not yet said anything to your sisters, because I thought that the first
explanation was due to you in the affair, since you were the most mixed
up with it.”
“Oh! this is too dreadful—much too dreadful!”
“Farewell—farewell. We may meet again, or we may not. I wish you all
manner of happiness.”
Mrs. Williams moved towards the door, but before she reached it, Helen
sprung after her, and detaining her, cried,—
“No, no. It must not be. If there is an imperative necessity for some
victim, let me be it. Oh! let me be it.”
“What do you mean, Helen?” asked Mrs. Williams, in pretended surprise.
“I—I mean, mother, that—that I will, to save you, give up all hopes of
happiness in this world, and that although I would far rather go at
once to my grave, I will, since my destiny seems to point out that it
must be so, consent.”
“Consent to become the Baroness Stolmuyer of Saltzburgh, &c., &c. Do I
hear aright?”
“Yes, yes. Heaven help me! I feel that I have no other hope. The
dreadful alternative that is presented to me, leaves me no other course
to pursue. I must, and I do consent, if it will at once save you from
the prison.”
“It will, my dear, if I can succeed in convincing my importunate
creditor that you have really consented, and that it is not a scheme of
mine merely to escape a prison. But if you write a few words signifying
your consent, that will be quite sufficient.”
This was an artful proceeding on the part of Mrs. Williams, for
although she by no means intended to put the baron in possession of
such a document, yet she considered that by having it, she completely
protected herself from any reproaches which he might otherwise cast
upon her, should any hitch arise in the proceedings, or anything go
wrong with the affair, even at the last moment.
The few words in writing, which sufficed, as Mrs. Williams thought,
fully to commit poor Helen to the marriage, were freely written, for
there was no duplicity in the character of Helen, and what she said she
would consent to, she was quite willing to write.
“Well, my dear,” said Mrs. Williams, “although you don’t feel happy
just now about the marriage, you may depend upon it you will enjoy your
existence very much; for when you get a little older, you will find
that it is, after all, the possession of ample means that is the most
important thing to look to.”
Helen shook her head, but she made no reply. She did not at all agree
with what her mother said, but she felt by far too much depressed to
argue the point with her just then.
“You will all your life,” added Mrs. Williams, as she left the room,
“have the great consolation of knowing that you saved me from a prison,
and in so doing, absolutely saved my life, for although I did not say
before, I am quite sure I should have died.”
CHAPTER CX.
JACK PRINGLE CALLS UPON MRS. WILLIAMS, AND TELLS HER A PIECE OF HIS
MIND UPON AFFAIRS IN GENERAL.
Jack Pringle never promised anything without an intention of performing
it, whether he could succeed or not; and accordingly, when he promised
that he would make due and diligent inquiry, for the purpose of
ascertaining if Helen Williams was indeed faithless, he proceeded at
once to do so in the most direct manner in the world, viz. by calling
upon no less a personage than Mrs. Williams herself, and popping the
question to her in a manner which almost precluded the possibility of
her returning anything but a direct answer.
This was a measure which few persons would have attempted; but having,
as it had, all the characteristics of boldness about it, it was not one
that he was likely to fail in, but, upon the contrary, calculated in
every respect to be eminently successful.
He proceeded to the town in perfect ignorance of its locality, or
even of the abode of Mrs. Williams, except so far as a very involved
description had been given to him of the route to her house by the old
sailor’s son, Tom, who certainly was not the best hand in the world at
a direction.
But Jack was never at a loss, for, some how or another, by the force
of a good-tempered manner that he had, he contrived to make friends
wherever he went, and among them he soon found one who was willing in
every respect to take pains with him, and to walk with him to the door
of Mrs. Williams.
“Thank ye, messmate,” said Jack; “and if ever I meet you again you
may make up your mind that you have met a friend. And so this is Mrs.
Williams’s is it?”
“Yes,” said the man; “this is Mrs. Williams’s.”
“And what sort of a creature is she?”
“Oh, why, as to that, she is not the sort of woman I like; but there
is no accounting for tastes, you know, and other people might like her
very well.”
“You are a sensible fellow,” said Jack; “and I should say you have
quite wit enough about you, that if you fell into the fire you would
get out again as soon as you could.”
The man hardly knew whether to take this as a compliment or not; but at
all events he bade Jack good-day civilly enough, and took no notice of
it.
Jack then boldly knocked at the door, and when the one miserable
servant of the Williamses made her appearance, and asked him what he
wanted, he replied,—
“Why, I have principally called to tell you what a remarkably fine girl
you are, and after that I should like to see mother Williams.”
“Go along with ye,” said the girl; “you are only joking, and I can tell
you that missis would just as soon give you to a constable as look at
you.”
“Oh, no, she wouldn’t,” said Jack; “for good-looking fellows are
scarce, and I dare say she knows that as well as possible, and she
would much rather keep me herself than give me to anybody.”
“Well, I’m sure!” said the girl. “You are like all the rest of the men,
and have a pretty good opinion of yourself; but, if you really want to
see missis, I may as well tell her at once.”
“To be sure,” said Jack.
Mrs. Williams, from a room on the ground floor, had heard that some
sort of conversation was going on at the street door, and she called
out—
“Susan, Susan; how dare you be talking there to anybody! Who is that,
I say—tell me who that is immediately?”
“It is me, ma’am,” cried Jack.
“And who is me?”
“Why, ma’am, I have come on a delicate mission; I have got something to
say to you as is rather particular.”
Mrs. Williams’s curiosity was excited, and perhaps some of her fears,
for when she had told Helen that she was drowned in debt, she had,
hyperbolically speaking, not far exceeded the truth, and therefore she
dreaded refusing seeing any one who came to ask for her, lest, smarting
under the aggravation of such a proceeding, the party, be he whom he
might, should leave some message that it would not be quite pleasant to
her for Susan to hear.
This was the respect, then, which placed Mrs. Williams positively at
the mercy of any one who chose to call upon her, and which induced
her to give an audience even to Jack Pringle, who, under ordinary
circumstances, she would, as Susan had correctly observed, have not
scrupled to place in the hands of some guardian of the public peace as
an intruder into her house.
When Jack was shown into the apartment where the lady waited to receive
him, he made what he considered a highly fashionable and elegant bow,
which consisted in laying hold of a lock of his hair in front, and
giving it a jerking pull at the same moment that he kicked out his foot
behind and upset a chair.
[Illustration: Jack Pringle meets Mrs. Williams.]
“How do you do, ma’am?” said Jack.
“You have the advantage of me,” said Mrs. Williams.
“I rather think I have,” said Jack, “and I mean to keep it, and an-out
and out thing it would be if I hadn’t, seeing the many voyages I have
had, when I dare say you was never out of sight of land in all your
life.”
“I certainly never was,” said Mrs. Williams; “and I hope I am speaking
to some officer, and not to anybody common.”
“Oh, yes, ma’am,” said Jack; “I’m a rear-admiral of the green, and
what I come to ask you, is, if there is going to be a marriage in your
family?”
“Rather an eccentric character,” thought Mrs. Williams; “but anybody
may see in a moment he is a gentleman, or else he would not be an
admiral of the green; I know there are admirals of all sorts of
colours—and so I have no doubt he is quite correct. Yes, sir, there is
going to be a marriage in my family, I am proud to say, for my daughter
Helen is going to marry what might be called quite a foreign potentate.”
“A foreign potato. None of your gammon—don’t be poking your fun at me.”
“A foreign potentate, I said, sir—a kind of monarch—a potentate, you
know.”
“Oh, I understands; I dare say them fellows lives on potatoes, and
that’s why they calls them such. But are you sure it’s your daughter
Helen, because I was thinking of proposing for her myself?”
“Really, then, Admiral Green, I am very sorry, but she is going to be
married to the Baron Stolmuyer, of Saltzburgh.”
“The baron what? did you say? Stonemason and Saltpot? What a d—d odd
name, to be sure.”
“Dear me, what an eccentric character!” thought Mrs. Williams; “but
quite the gentleman. Admiral Green, it’s Stolmuyer of Saltzburgh is the
baron’s name.”
“Oh, I knew it was something about salt; but, however, it don’t matter;
and when is the ceremony to come off, ma’am?”
“It is left to me, sir, to fix the day, and I shall do so, of course,
at my convenience; and I can only express my great regret, Admiral
Green, that you should have been too late; but, you see, the baron’s
offer was so unexceptionable, and he is really quite a wealthy
individual—which his offering me a cheque for five hundred pounds, is a
convincing proof—that I really could not think of refusing him.”
“What! five hundred pounds?”
“Yes; I assure you, Admiral Green, that he had pressed upon my
acceptance five hundred pounds.”
“The stingy devil.”
“Stingy!”
“Rather. Why, I meant to have asked you to accept of a couple of
thousands, and a large estate that I have got, which brings in as much
every year, and that I really don’t want.”
“Two thousand pounds and a estate! Gracious Providence! I don’t know
what to say to that; really Admiral Green, you are so very liberal,
that, upon my word, I am quite puzzled. Two thousand pounds, and an
estate worth two thousand pounds a year!—did you really mean that,
Admiral Green?”
“To be sure I did. What else could I mean? but I don’t want to
interfere with a foreign potato and a Baron Saltbox.”
“Well, but, my dear sir, stop a moment—let me think.”
“No, ma’am,” said Jack, “I ain’t quite such a humbug as you takes me
for. I say nothing, but it’s very likely that your baron will turn out
to be some half-starved swindler who is going to wind up his affairs by
doing you, and sarves you right, too—I wishes you good morning, ma’am.”
So saying, Jack, despite the remonstrances of Mrs. Williams, whose
cupidity was so strongly excited by what he had said, that she would
gladly have thrown overboard the baron, and who now began to look with
something like contempt upon the five hundred pounds which she had
before thought was quite a large sum.
“How odd it is,” she exclaimed, when she was alone; “how odd it is,
that after I have been looking about, I don’t know how long, for a
decent match for some of the girls, all the men should come at once,
and want Helen—it’s an extraordinary thing to me, very extraordinary.
Dear me, if I could but have secured Admiral Green for Juliana, and so
got her married on the same day with Helen, there would have been two
thousand five hundred pounds for me at once. What a capital thing! I
would not have spoken of it to anybody, but I would have paid all the
tradespeople about here eightpence in the pound as a composition, and
then I could have gone and lived in London quite comfortably.
Thus is it ever with such schemers as Mrs. Williams—success brings with
it quite as many evils and distressful feelings as failure, and now the
agony of what she thought she had lost, much more than counterbalanced
any satisfaction she might have had in procuring her daughter’s consent
to the marriage with the baron.
This consent, although we know how it was wrung from Helen, we
certainly much blame her for giving, because no human power could
really force her to marry any one who was not her choice, and the mere
fact that her mother represented how deeply she was in debt, ought not
to have been sufficient to induce Helen to consent.
She might and ought to have taken a much higher view of the subject—a
view which should have excluded a consideration of James Anderson:
that view should have been a refusal to commit the perjury of solemnly
vowing before Heaven to love and honour a man for whom she entertained
such opposite feelings.
But Helen was not a close reasoner, and although all the argument was
upon her side, and all the propriety, and all the justice, we grieve to
say that she did not avail herself of either to the extent she ought to
have done; but, on the contrary, gave up those moments to regret which
should have been far better employed in resistance.
When the consent which we have recorded had been wrung from her,
she gave herself up to the most melancholy reflections, weeping
incessantly, and calling upon Heaven to help her from the pressure of
circumstances which she was quite competent to relieve herself from, if
she could have persuaded herself to make the necessary efforts.
At last it seemed to her that she had hit upon a plan which might
afford her some relief, but in projecting it, she little knew the real
character of the man she had to deal with.
This scheme was to tell the baron candidly that she loved another, and,
whether that other was living of dead, his remembrance would so cling
to her, that she could never love another, and that, in making her his
wife, he, the baron, would be laying up for himself a source of regret
and disquietude, in the feeling that he possessed one whose affections
he could never hope to obtain.
“Surely,” thought Helen, “if he be at all human, and if he have any of
the natural pride of manhood about him, he will shrink from attempting
to continue a suit that must be mortifying in every one of its stages,
and which cannot confer upon him even the shadow of happiness.”
CHAPTER CXI.
THE WEDDING-DAY FIXED, AND THE GUESTS INVITED.
When she was to receive so handsome a reward for the intelligence that
she had wrung a reluctant consent from Helen to be the baron’s bride,
it was not likely that Mrs. Williams would let a long time elapse
before she communicated that fact to him, and, accordingly, she started
to do so personally.
It would appear that the baron fully expected her, for he made no
remark at all expressive of surprise, but received her with that
courtly grace which Mrs. Williams attributed to his intercourse with
the highest and the noblest.
He did not seem so impatient as any one would have supposed a very
ardent lover would have been, and, before he would allow Mrs. Williams
at all to enter into the object of her visit, he requested her to be
seated, and would insist upon placing before her some of the very
choicest refreshment.
Indeed, as often as she then attempted to enter into the subject-matter
which had brought her there, he interrupted her with some remark of a
different nature, so that she found it very difficult to say anything
regarding it.
At length, however, when he had satisfied the claims of hospitality, he
said,—
“I presume that I shall have the pleasure of listening to something
particularly pleasant and delightful to me, inasmuch as it will convey
to me the realisation of my dearest hopes.”
“Why, my lord baron, I must confess,” said Mrs. Williams, “that
notwithstanding the extremely liberal offers of Admiral Green——”
“Admiral Green, madam? This is the first moment I have heard of such a
personage.”
“No doubt—no doubt; but for all that, since we have had the honour of
your offer for the hand of Helen, Admiral Green has made one, and such
a liberal one that it’s quite distressing to refuse him.”
“Then allow me to say, madam, that I hope you won’t distress yourself
about it, but accept of Admiral Green at once. I should be very sorry
indeed to stand in the way of any advantageous arrangement, and,
therefore, I beg you will close with Admiral Green.”
The adage about coming to the ground between two stools forcibly
presented itself to the memory of Mrs. Williams, and she replied, in a
great hurry,—
“Oh, no, baron, certainly not—certainly not. I have refused the admiral
on your account. I told him, most distinctly, I could not think of
entertaining his offer for a moment, and I refused him at once.”
“Then why trouble me about him, madam?”
“Oh, I thought I would only merely mention it, because the admiral said
he would have great pleasure—which, of course, was a very liberal thing
of him—in handing me a cheque for two thousand pounds.”
“Oh, now I understand,” said the baron. “I give you credit, madam, for
having a good reason for making this report to me. You think that I
may be induced to emulate the munificence of Admiral Green; but when I
assure you that I have not the remotest intention of so doing, probably
you will think that it would have been just as well if the matter had
never been mentioned.”
The baron was right; for Mrs. Williams did think so; and she felt
all that bitterness of disappointment which wonderfully clever
people do feel when they find that some pet scheme has most signally
failed, leaving behind it all the consequences of a failure; and,
whatever people may say to the contrary, failures do always have bad
consequences, and never leave the circumstances exactly where they were.
There was rather an awkward pause of some moments’ duration, and then
Mrs. Williams thought she would get over the baron completely, for she
put on the most amiable smile she could, and said,—
“My dear baron, I am sure we shall all be the most happy and united
family that can possibly be imagined; and it is the greatest pleasure
to me to be able to give you the intelligence that my daughter has
consented to become yours.”
“Madam, I am much obliged.”
“And, although Admiral Green did say that if I would bring him similar
intelligence he would there and then, on the spot, without any further
delay, hand me two thousand pounds, I said to him,—‘Admiral Green, I am
only to get five hundred pounds from the Baron Stolmuyer of Saltzburgh,
and that five hundred pounds he has likewise promised to pay me down.’
Down—you understand, baron?”
“Madam, I am not deaf.”
“But you understand—down?”
“Oh, I begin to see; you want the money. Why could you not say so at
once? It’s of no use hinting things to me; but if you had said to me at
once,—‘Baron, I have brought you the consent to the marriage, and now
I expect at once the five hundred pounds that I am to receive for so
doing,’ I should have understood you, and said at once,—‘Oh, certainly,
madam; here is the money,’—as I do now. You will find that check drawn
for the amount.”
“What a charming thing it is,” said Mrs. Williams; “what a charming
thing it is to do business in such a real business sort of way; but
there are so few people, baron, with your habits, and upon whom one can
so thoroughly depend, as one can upon you.”
“Madam, you do me too much honour. Of course, having promised you this
insignificant sum of money, it was not likely that I should but keep my
word; and now let me ask, when is to be the happy day?”
“If this day week will suit you, baron.”
“Wonderfully well, madam—wonderfully well.”
“Then, we will consider that as settled. I suppose you will have a
public marriage?”
“No—no, strictly private. I am resolved, madam, not to have more
than one hundred and fifty people, and to keep the expenses within
a thousand pounds; so you see, I am going to do it in the plainest
possible manner, and make no fuss at all about it.”
“Gracious Providence!” thought Mrs. Williams; “what would he call a
public marriage, if he considers a thousand pounds expense, and one
hundred and fifty guests, a private one, and making no fuss about it.”
“On one of my former marriages——” said the baron, with an air of
abstraction.
“One of them?” said Mrs. Williams; “may I presume to ask how often you
have been married, my lord?”
“Oh, certainly. Let me see; I think eleven times.”
“Eleven! and pray, sir, what became of your wives?”
“Why, really, madam, I cannot say. I hope the majority of them went to
Heaven; but there were one or two I most heartily wished at the other
place.”
“My gracious!” thought Mrs. Williams, “he is quite a bluebeard; but,
however, things have gone too far now; and I am not going to give up
my cheque if he had twenty wives; and, after all, it shows he must be
a man of great experience, and of great wealth, too, or so many women
would not have had him; but, if that little fact about all his wives
should come to the ears of Helen, I am really afraid she wouldn’t have
him, so I must caution him about it.”
“My lord baron.”
“Yes, madam.”
“I think, between you and I, my lord baron, that it would be quite as
well to say nothing to my daughter about her being the twelfth wife;
but just let her quietly think she is the first, because, you know, my
lord, young people have prejudices upon those subjects, and she might
not exactly like the idea.”
“Oh, certainly, madam, I shall not mention the little affairs that
have preceded her’s. I assure you I am quite aware that it is likely
there should be a prejudice against a man who has had eleven wives; and
people will think that he smothered a few of them.”
“Good gracious!” said Mrs. Williams; “you don’t mean that, my lord
baron. I hope that nobody ever accused you of such a thing.”
“Nay,” said the baron; “how are the best of us to escape censure? You
know as well as I, Mrs. Williams, what a bad world it is we live in;
and how dreadfully selfish people are.”
“Yes,” said Mrs. Williams, “that’s remarkably true; but it ain’t often,
my lord baron, that one man has eleven wives.”
“No; and it ain’t often that such a man would exactly like to venture
upon a twelfth.”
“Well, no, there is something in that; but I will now, my lord, take
my leave, entertaining no doubt whatever, but that this will be an
extremely happy marriage, and in every respect just what we might all
of us desire.”
Mrs. Williams left the baron with these words; but, to say that she
believed them, would be to make by far too powerful an experiment upon
the credulity of our readers.
When he was alone, the baron smiled a strange and ghastly smile.
“That woman,” he said, “is so fond of gold, that she sells her child
without hesitation to me. If, upon hearing of my pretended marriages,
she had given me back my money, I should have thought some good of her;
but no, that she could not do. Money is her idol, and when once in her
possession, she could not dream of parting with it. But what is it to
me? Have I not made up my mind to this affair, let the consequences be
what they may? Have I not resolved upon it in every possible shape?
Henceforward I will cast aside all feelings of regret, and live for
myself alone; for what have I now to hope, and what have I now to fear,
from mankind?”
“Hope! did I say I had nothing to hope? I was wrong; I have something
to hope; and it is a something I will have—it is revenge. Yes, it is
revenge—revenge! which I must and will have against society, that has
made me what I am; and the time shall yet come when my name shall be a
greater terror than it is, and that to some were needless, for it is
such a terror already, that but to mention it, would cause a commotion
of frightful inquietude.”
He looked from one of the windows of his house, and he saw Mrs.
Williams, as she proceeded down one of the garden walks, take his
cheque from out her reticule, where she had placed it, and look at it
attentively.
“Ah!” he said, “now she is worshipping her divinity, gold. She knows
that that piece of paper carries weight with it, and that, flimsy as it
looks, it is sufficient to purchase her. Fool! fool! and she thinks she
is buying contentment.”
CHAPTER CXII.
THE SINGULAR INVITATION TO THE BARON’S WEDDING.
About three days after the transactions which we have just recorded,
the admiral received a call from his friend, the attorney, and that
call had a double object.
In the first place, the man of law wanted to tell him how he was
proceeding, as regarded the Quaker, and there they had a great tussle
about what was to be done, for, when the attorney said to him,
“Now, admiral, as regards this assault upon Mr. Shepperd, all that can
be done is to let him prove his case, and then come up for judgment,
and move in the court in mitigation. I dare say, you will dragged up to
Westminster Hall for judgment, and I should not at all wonder, but you
will get off with a fine of six-and-eightpence.”
“What do you mean,” said the admiral, “by letting him do what he likes?”
“In effect, it is the same thing as pleading guilty, you know, to a
charge brought against you, and, by so doing, you, to a great extent,
disarm justice.”
“Guilty!” roared the admiral; “guilty! You will be a long time, indeed,
in convincing me that there is any guilt in kicking a Quaker, and
especially such a Quaker as Mr. Shepperd. Why, I’ll do it again, and
think it, as I do now, a meritorious action.”
“Yes; but you misunderstand me. It’s called guilt, you know, in law, to
do anything contrary to law; and, by pleading guilty, you do no more
than just admit the fact that you have kicked the Quaker.”
“That’s quite another thing. I have no objection to the fact, whatever,
but don’t call it being guilty, for that’s all moonshine, and I won’t
have it, at any price. Guilty be hanged! I think I see it. Guilty of
kicking a Quaker, indeed; I have half a mind to go and kick him again,
just on purpose; and I don’t know but what I may do it yet.”
“Well, well, admiral, now that we have settled that knotty point, I
have got something else to tell you, of a more agreeable nature.”
“Out with it—out with it.”
“It is this. You recollect that, upon the marriage of Miss Flora
Bannerworth with your nephew, Mr. Charles Holland——”
“The marriage feast, you mean, for, as far as the marriage was
concerned, they all got the better of the old man.”
“Yes; the marriage feast. You recollect that, upon that occasion, you
gave me leave to invite a number of persons, all of whom were very
grateful, and thought very highly of you and the honour of coming into
your company.”
“A devil of a sensible fellow this lawyer is,” thought the admiral.
“It’s enough to make one take to lawyers, I’ll be hanged if it ain’t.
Go on—go on; what of all that? I am sure I was as well pleased to see
them all as they were to see me.”
“Well, sir, it appears that some of these persons, and especially a
family of the name of Clark, have been exceedingly anxious to bestow
some civility upon you in return; and, as they have been invited to a
wedding, they wish to prevail upon you to go with them, as it will be a
very stylish affair.”
“Well, I don’t mind,” said the admiral. “Where is it?”
“It’s as far as twenty miles off, at a place called Anderbury, and it
is wished that you should bring anybody you like with you, upon the
occasion.”
“Well, it’s civil, at all events, and I don’t mind, if Henry and
Charles and Flora like it, going. But, when you mention Anderbury,
I’ll be hanged if I don’t think it’s the very place that Jack Pringle
has gone to, to get a sight of the salt water, for the benefit of his
health.”
“Well, sir, it will have none the less recommendation to you, I dare
say, that it is close to the sea.”
“You are right there, and, I can tell you, I was thinking of going
myself, because you know, what suits Jack, in those respects, is pretty
well sure to suit me; and I thought, as that vagabond was enjoying
himself down by the sea coast, I might as well go and do so likewise.”
“Well, sir, then I may consider I have your full consent to the
arrangement, and I am sure it will be received by the parties with a
great deal of satisfaction, indeed.”
“Well, well, somehow or another, you talk me over to things, so I’ll
go, without making any more fuss about it; and I will take Henry with
me, and Charles, and Flora, and I’d take old Varney, the Vampyre, too,
if we had him here. It would be a good bit of fun to take such a fellow
as that to a wedding.”
“He would not be the most welcome guest in the world.”
“No; I should think not. But who are our invitations to come from?”
“They will come from the bride’s mother, as the people I have told you
are so anxious to take you with them are friends of hers.”
“Very good—very good; so, as it’s all right, I will speak to Henry
about it, and Flora, and, I dare say, we shall all manage to get there
comfortably enough. Let me see; it’s just two stages for post-horses.
Well, well, lawyer, you may look upon it as decided; it is to be, and
there is an end of it.”
In due course, on the following day, there came a note to Admiral Bell,
enclosing a card, on which was said,
“Mrs. Williams requests the honour of Admiral Bell’s company, with
his party, to breakfast, on the 10th instant, at two o’clock, on the
occasion of the celebration of the nuptials of Miss Helen Fedora
Williams with the Baron Stolmuyer of Saltzburgh, &c., &c., at
Anderbury-on-the-Mount.”
“The devil!” said the admiral. “This is an odd affair—something
slashing, and out of the way, I should say. Breakfast at two o’clock!
that’s the d—dest piece of humbug in the whole affair. Who the devil is
to wait for their breakfast till two o’clock? I never heard anything
better than that; but I suppose there will be something to eat, so I
shall take the liberty of having my breakfast at seven in the morning,
and calling that my dinner, and my lunch I will manage to get at some
inn on the road.”
With this card of invitation in his hand, the admiral went to Flora,
and laid it before her, saying,—
“Here will be fine fun, Flora, for you. This is the invitation I spoke
to you of, and they are going to have breakfast at two o’clock, lunch,
I suppose, at five, dinner at nine, a cup of coffee at about twelve,
supper at four o’clock in the morning, and I suppose they will get to
bed at about daybreak.”
Flora laughed as she perused the card, and then she said,—
“It certainly promises to be quite a fine affair, uncle; and, at all
events, as we are only guests, we shall be able fully to enter into the
amusement of the affair, if there be any, and I am inclined to think
there will be, by the rather pompous reading of the card of invitation
which has been so civilly sent to us.”
“If they are ridiculous people,” said the admiral, “we will laugh at
them, and they cannot expect but that we should; and if they should
turn out to be otherwise, they may become very pleasant acquaintances,
you know.”
“Assuredly; and it will not do to judge of people always by such a
trivial piece of evidence as a card of invitation can afford to one;
so I will endeavour to go to the wedding with an impression that they
are agreeable people—an impression which, considering the complimentary
manner in which they have invited us, we ought to cultivate.”
“Very good; and do you speak to Charles about it, for I have not had an
opportunity of so doing; and as the people have invited us handsomely,
I think we ought to go in a manner so as to do them as much credit as
possible; and, therefore, I should say that a coach and four, with
postillions, will be the plan, and look rather stylish.”
“Oh, uncle, you will be mistaken for the bridegroom.”
“Shall I? Very well, I am quite willing that I should be, always
provided I may chance to admire the bride; but if I do not, you may be
sure that I shall take pretty good care to explain the error.”
CHAPTER CXIII.
JAMES ANDERSON SEEKS AND OBTAINS AN INTERVIEW WITH MRS. WILLIAMS.
The report which, in accordance with what he had heard from Mrs.
Williams, Jack Pringle felt himself compelled to make to the young man
whom he had saved from the wreck, but too surely convinced him that all
his hopes were dashed to the ground, and that it was indeed but too
true that Helen had consented to become the wife of another.
There could be no mistake in the affair, or the slightest loophole for
escaping an entire and complete conviction of the faithlessness of her
in whom he had so deeply confided for his future happiness.
The blow appeared to fall upon him with a stunning effect, and for some
time he seemed to be quite incapable of thought or action. But Jack
Pringle rallied him upon this state of things, and tried hard to induce
him to view the matter with the same kind of philosophy that he would
have brought to bear upon it.
“Come, come,” he said, “don’t be downhearted about a woman. Cheer up,
my lad; there’s many a better fish in the sea than has ever yet been
got out of it, you may depend upon that.”
“I could have staked my life upon her good faith.”
“Likely enough, and so can we all upon the good faith of the woman
we happen to love and admire; but what is there in the whole world
so common as being jilted by a wench, and when it does happen, a man
should whistle her down the wind, and forget her all at once, and for
ever.”
“I have no doubt,” said James Anderson, “that such is good philosophy;
but it’s a hard thing to tear away from the heart at once an image that
has lain enshrined in its inmost recesses for many a month.”
“Perhaps it is. But the best remedy in all the world, is to look about
for another, I know that from experience in these matters. You do so,
and you will soon be able to forget the girl who has jilted you.”
James Anderson shook his head, and smiled faintly, as he said,—
“I fear I should never love another as I have loved her. The heart,
when once it has loved as I have loved, can never know another feeling.
I cannot with any hopes of success undertake such a mode of cure as
that which you point out to me.”
“Oh! you will think differently in a little while, I can tell you. Time
does wonders in these cases, and before you are a month older, you will
be in quite a different frame of mind to what you are now.”
“I must confess I should not like to be all my life the subject of
never-ending regret; but at the same time I do feel, that let what
chances may befall me, I shall never feel another disappointment so
bitter as this.”
James Anderson, upon making these few remarks, shewed a disposition to
drop the subject, and as it was one which certainly concerned himself
more than any one else, Jack Pringle and the fisherman both agreed to
say no more about it, and it rested.
But although he said nothing, the matter was far indeed from being
absent from the mind of James Anderson, for it occupied him wholly,
and engaged his attention to that extent, that all other thoughts were
excluded therefrom most entirely and completely.
Those who had afforded him so kindly a shelter, were not unobservant
spectators of this state of his mind, and Jack Pringle strove to move
him from it, by calling his attention to his obligations and duties in
other respects.
“Come, messmate,” he said, “ain’t it time you should think of going to
London to make your report of how you lost the dispatches that your
captain committed to your care?”
“It is so,” said James Anderson, “and I shall start this evening.”
“That’s right, and the best thing you can possibly do, I can tell you.
You will get some new appointment, and in the bustle of life you will
soon forget all disappointments whatever. If you go regularly into the
service, you are young enough yet to rise in it, and you may yet live
to have a pair of swabs upon your shoulders, I can tell you.”
“At all events,” said Anderson, “I can have the comfort of knowing that
I have, by being wrecked here, made some acquaintance, which I hope I
may always have the pleasure to retain. I feel myself now quite well
enough to walk, and I will go into the town and make some preparations
for getting on to London, which I am, by your liberality, Mr. Pringle,
enabled to do.”
Jack made a wry face, as he said,—
“Whatever you do, messmate, don’t call me Mr. Pringle—my name’s Jack
Pringle. It always has been Jack Pringle, and it always will be. I
begin to think as something must be the matter when anybody calls me
Mr. Pringle, and I don’t like it a bit.”
“I won’t again then offend you by calling you Mr., but you shall be
Jack Pringle, if you like, to me; and I can only say that a more
esteemed friend than yourself, it is not likely I shall ever encounter
in this world.”
Jack was always much more easy under censure, let it come from where
it might, than under praise, and consequently he fidgeted about in a
most alarming manner, while James Anderson was professing to him his
grateful feeling, and at length he said,—
“Belay there, belay there, old fellow—that will do. I don’t want any
more of that, I can tell you. It’s a d—d hard thing that a man cannot
save a fellow man’s life, without it being at all sorts of odd times
thrown in his teeth in this way. Don’t say any more about it, I ain’t
used to being _parsecuted_.”
This was no affectation in Jack Pringle. On the contrary, it really was
to him a positive persecution to be praised; and, as James Anderson
now felt fully convinced that such was the case, he determined upon
avoiding such for the future.
Towards the dusk of the evening, having attired himself as respectably
as the wardrobe of the old seaman and his son would permit him, for
his own clothing had been completely spoiled by the salt water, he
proceeded to the town of Anderbury.
By so proceeding, Jack Pringle considered that his principal business
would be to get some means of quick conveyance to London; but James
Anderson had another motive in his walk to the town, which he
communicated to no one.
That motive was a strong desire to see Helen Williams, if he possibly
could, before he left, in order that he might hear from her own lips
what it was that prevented her continuing her plighted faith towards
him; for he could not, from all he knew of her character, bring himself
to believe that it was the wealth of her new suitor that had had any
effect upon her.
“No, no,” he said; “I know her far better than for one half instant
to do her such an injustice; she must have been imposed upon with
some account of my death; or some artful and well-arranged tale of,
perhaps, faithlessness upon my part has hurried her into the acceptance
of the first offer that has been made to her. If I could but obtain
an interview with her for a few brief moments, I should know all, and
either be able to take her to my heart again, or to find ample reason
for forgetting her.”
He knew the way well to that house where he had frequently watched
Helen enter and emerge from; but how to send any message to her was a
matter which required great consideration.
He had been absent long enough, no doubt, for some changes to have been
made in Mrs. Williams’s household; so that, although there had been in
old times a servant who was favourable to him, and who would not only
have taken his message to Helen, but would have told him all the news
of the family, she, no doubt, had long since left.
After thinking over the matter for some time, so as to come to a
conclusion that the difficulty about getting any message or note
delivered to Helen almost amounted to an impossibility, he saw a boy
come out of the house, apparently to go on some errand, and with a
feeling more of desperation than reflection, he spoke to him, saying,—
“I think you came out of Mrs. Williams’s house, my lad.”
“Yes, I did,” said the boy; “what of that—hit one of your own size; I
haven’t done nothing to you.”
“You mistake altogether, my boy; I am not going to touch you, you may
depend; but, on the contrary, I will reward you if you will answer me
what questions I shall propose to you, and I assure you they are all
such as you may honestly answer.”
“Well, I don’t know. How much?”
“One shilling for every question.”
“That’s a rum way of doing business, but it ain’t so bad either. Ask
away, and you’ll soon see how I’ll earn the shillings.”
“Is Miss Helen going to be married?”
“Yes—a shilling.”
“Who to?”
“To the Baron Stollandmare and a Salt Bug—two shillings.”
“Will you take a note from me to her if I reward you extra for so
doing.”
“Oh, I begin to smell a rat. Yes, I will. You is some other lover, you
is—three shillings.”
“I am—one shilling.”
“What do you mean?”
“Why, my young friend, if I pay you a shilling a question, I don’t see
why I should not charge you at the same rate; so don’t ask me anything,
and then you will get all the shillings to yourself, you understand.”
“Oh, I doesn’t see any joke in that; I don’t want to ask any
questions—not I.—What will you give me for taking the note? I think I
ought to have half-a-crown, between you and me and the post; because,
you see, if old Mother Williams was to cotch me, she would serve me out
pretty tidy.”
“You shall have your own price of half-a-crown, and here is the note,
which I charge you mind to deliver into no hands but those of Helen
herself.”
[Illustration: James gives Caleb the note for Helen.]
“Oh, I’ll do it; and what shall I get if I bring you an answer back?”
“Another half-crown; so, you see, you will make a very good evening’s
work of it, indeed, if you are clever and faithful.”
“Give me the note; I’ll do it. You may always trust me, when there’s
anything to be got by it. My father brought me up to get my living, and
he used to say to me, ‘Caleb,’ says he, ‘always do your duty, Caleb,
to those who employ you when you go out to service in a family, unless
somebody offers you something more not to do it.’”
“Quite a philosophical maxim,” said James Anderson; “I suppose you are
in the service of Mrs. Williams?”
“Yes, I am page of all work, I am; I do a little of everything, and
make myself generally useful. Where will you wait for me?”
“At this corner; and, with a due regard to performing your part well,
be as quick as you can on your mission, for I am rather impatient to
see its results.”
Caleb, the page of all work, duly promised to be quick, and after
completing an errand that he had been sent upon by Mrs. Williams, he
returned to that lady’s house.
We cannot help thinking that after the principles in which Caleb had
announced he had been brought up, it was rather an indiscreet thing
of Anderson to trust him with the note that he had already prepared
for Helen, in case an opportunity should present itself of getting
it delivered to her; but he was desperate, and, perhaps, did not so
accurately weigh the pros and cons of the affair, as he undoubtedly
ought to have done.
As it was, however, he had a faith in his messenger, which we are
sorry to say was most decidedly misplaced, for Caleb did shew that he
had not forgotten the lessons of his paternal relative, but that, on
the contrary, he was disposed to carry them out with great tack and
perseverance.
Whether or not he would, of his own accord, have set about scheming
in the matter we cannot say, but, at all events he was spared that
trouble, for Mrs. Williams had seen, from one of the windows of her own
house, his interview with one who was a stranger to her; for, although
she had once, before he went to sea, seen James Anderson, he was much
altered, and she did not recognise him; and when Caleb came in she
called him into the parlour and shut the door.
“Caleb,” she said, “I insist upon knowing immediately who you were
talking to just now in the street, and who gave you a note.”
Caleb was rather staggered at this home question, for he did not think
that Mrs. Williams had seen him, and, after a moment’s pause, he said,—
“What will you give, missus, to know?”
“Give—give! How dare you ask me such a question?”
“It’s no use, missus, getting in a passion about it. I’ve got an
opportunity of earning eight shillings snugly and comfortably. If you
will give me sixteen shillings I will tell you all about it; and I
don’t mind saying, beforehand, that I know, missus, as you won’t think
it dear at that price; no, nor at three times as much, if you could
only guess what it was.”
“Sixteen shillings! It must be something wonderful, in the way of news,
that I would give you such a sum for.”
“That’s just what it is, missus. Come, now, is it a bargain? because
I’m in a hurry, and have got never such a load of things to do.”
“Well, well, Caleb; tell me what it is, and give me the note.”
“Not till I haves the money, missus. Oh, no; I knows better than that.
I’ve got a hold on the fellow as you saw me with, but I haven’t on
you. Oh, no; the deuce a bit. I must have the cash first, and then you
shall have the information; and, I tell you again, that it ain’t dear
at the price, as you will own yourself.”
The curiosity, as well as the suspicions, of Mrs. Williams were
strongly excited; for she began to suspect that something or another
was going on in which her interests were involved; inasmuch as, upon
mature consideration, she had come to a conclusion, that there was more
in the visit of Admiral Green than quite met the eye.
“Well, well,” she said, “I have only gold in my purse; but you shall
have the amount, you may depend, Caleb, if I promise you.”
“I haven’t a doubt in the world,” said Caleb; “but there is nothing
like ready money, missus; so just hand us a sovereign, and here is four
shillings change; which will be right, you know, all the world over.”
This was vexatious; but, as it was quite clear that Caleb had
thoroughly made up his mind not to part with his information without
the cash, Mrs. Williams was compelled to hand the amount to him, which
she did not do with the best grace in the world, and then she said,—
“Now, I expect you to tell me all.”
“So I means, missus. You don’t suppose I’d take sixteen shillings of
you, and not tell you all as I have to tell you. No, missus; I’d scorn
the action.”
“Well, well, don’t keep me in suspense; but go on at once.”
“I will. There’s a chap at the corner of the street, as wants me to
give this here letter to Miss Helen, and bring him back an answer.”
“A letter to Helen! This is news, indeed. And who was he?”
“That I don’t know. I was going to ask him, but, somehow or another,
I found out it was a great deal better left alone. But I should not
wonder, missus, but you will find out who he his, if you read the note.
People, you know, usually put their blessed names at the end of their
letters, unless they sends what is called a _synonymous_ one.”
This was a good suggestion of Caleb’s, and Mrs. Williams, without
the smallest scruple as to the fact of opening a letter addressed to
another person, tore asunder the envelope that covered young Anderson’s
epistle, and read as follows, in a sufficiently audible tone to enable
Caleb to hear every word of it; for, in her intense eagerness, she
forgot the fact of his presence:—
“Dearest Helen,—I can still address you as such, because I have not yet
heard from your own lips, although I have from the lips of others, that
you have forgotten me. Can it be true, that you are about, in the face
of Heaven, to plight those vows to another which were to be mine, and
mine only?
“I ask of you but to meet me, and tell me yourself that such is the
case, and you will meet with neither persecutions or reproaches from
me. Tell me that you are oppressed, and you know well that in me you
have a defender. Name your own time and place of meeting me; and by the
boy who will deliver this to you, let me beg of you, by the memory of
our old affection, to send me an answer.
“Yours ever,
+“James Anderson.”+
“I say, missus, that’s pitching it rather strong,” said Caleb.
CHAPTER CXIV.
MRS. WILLIAMS’S MANŒUVRE TO GET RID OF ANDERSON.
This exclamation from Caleb informed Mrs. Williams of the fact of his
presence; and duly indignant was she at that circumstance; for, in her
anger, she immediately rose to execute upon him some vengeance; and,
had he not adroitly eluded her, by leaving the room, there is no doubt
she would have well made him remember indulging in such a piece of
impertinent curiosity.
“That wretch,” she exclaimed, “has overheard me; and who knows, now,
that he may actually go and tell the other. If he would betray him, he
would betray me; and what redress should I get for such a circumstance?”
This was a mental suggestion which made it necessary Mrs. Williams
should not only look over the fact of Caleb having stayed to listen to
the letter, but likewise see him, and hold out some other inducements
to him to be faithful to her, however he might chose to behave himself
to other persons.
“Caleb,” she said, when she had summoned him again into her presence;
“Caleb, you may depend I will make it well worth your while to attend
to me in this affair, and to no one else. I can, and will, pay you
well; and, when the baron marries Miss Helen, I dare say, if you would
like it, I should be able to get you some great place at Anderbury
House.”
“Well, missus,” said Caleb, “I looks upon myself as put up to auction,
and the highest bidder always has me. I don’t mean to say but what you
have done the right thing, as regards the sixteen shillings; so what
would you like me to do next, missus?”
“I want you to take a note back, in answer to that which you have
brought me; but, of course, the young man who gave it must suppose that
it came from my daughter Helen.”
“How much?”
“What do you mean by how much?”
“How much am I to get, I mean.”
“Oh, I understand you. How much do you expect for such a piece of
service?”
“Something handsome, I should say. What do you think of ten shillings
and sixpence, missus?”
“I think it rather high, Caleb; but, nevertheless, I shall not stop at
a trifle in rewarding you, provided always I may depend upon you.”
“Money down,” said Caleb; “you know, short reckonings make long
friends, missus; besides, it’s always better not to let these things
accumulate; for, if we goes on doing business in this here sort of way,
it would come to a good bit in a short time, and then you would think
it was too much, and wouldn’t like to pay it.”
With a bad grace—for Mrs. Williams never liked parting with her
money—she produced the sum which Caleb required for this new service,
remarking, as she did,—
“Well, Caleb, you will soon grow rich, if you go on this way.”
“Likely enough, ma’am,” said Caleb; “I likes to be paid, and I don’t
see why I shouldn’t.”
Mrs. Williams soon handed him the note, which merely contained the
words,
“Come at eight o’clock, and ring the door bell.”
These words she wrote as much as possible in her daughter Helen’s hand,
and, having sealed up this extremely laconic epistle, she handed it to
Caleb, directing him to go at once and deliver it to the party who was
expecting him, and we must say, that this lad appeared to be one of the
most thoroughly selfish rascals the world had ever produced, for he was
now quite willing for money to betray Mrs. Williams to James Anderson,
if there was any likelihood of his accomplishing such a purpose with
safety.
But here some difficulties presented themselves, which Caleb’s natural
acuteness enabled him very well to see. In the first place, James
Anderson, he shrewdly suspected, was not the sort of individual to be
trafficked with, as Mrs. Williams was, and, considering that he had
already committed an immense breach of trust, in giving the letter to
Mrs. Williams, instead of to Helen, he thought, and, we are inclined to
think, correctly enough, that it would be rather a hazardous thing to
say anything to him about it.
“No, no,” he said; “I’ll just give him missus’s letter, and then back
out of the whole affair, for I don’t half begin to like it. That young
fellow looks a chap that wouldn’t mind wringing one’s neck for one—for
half a pin; so I’ll just leave him alone, and say nothing more about
it.”
James Anderson waited round the corner with considerable impatience,
for, in consequence of the proceedings that had taken place at Mrs.
Williams’s, Caleb had been considerably delayed.
When, however, he saw him coming, hope again sprung up in his bosom,
and he felt all the agitation of extreme pleasure, as he saw that Caleb
had in his hand what was undoubtedly a letter.
When the boy reached him, he advanced to meet him, eagerly exclaiming,
as he did so,—
“You have the letter—you have seen her, and you have her answer?”
Now, as Caleb had made up his mind to commit himself but as little as
he possibly could with the young stranger, he went upon the good old
adage of the least said being the soonest mended, and, accordingly,
instead of making any remark which might, at a future occasion, be
thrown at his teeth, he satisfied himself by placing his finger by the
side of his nose and nodding his head sagaciously.
He then handed to James Anderson the letter, in the contents of which
that individual became too much absorbed, short as they were, to pay
any further attention to the messenger.
Caleb thought this a good opportunity of being off at once, before any
troublesome questions should be asked him, so he made a retreat, with
all the expedition that was in his power.
James Anderson, when he looked up from the perusal of the one sentence
which the letter contained, was astonished to find his messenger gone,
considering how very eager he had before been on the subject of the
reward which he was to get for that service.
“What can have become of the boy?” he said; “I had a hundred questions
to ask him.”
So well had Mrs. Williams succeeded in imitating the handwriting of her
daughter Helen, that James Anderson was fully convinced the letter was
written by the chosen object of his heart.
He certainly did think that it was cold and distant, and that there
might have been a word or two of affection, at all events, in it,
especially considering how long he had been absent, and with what an
untiring affection he had ever thought of her.
“She might have told me that her heart was the same,” he murmured to
himself, “or else she should have let me known at once that it was so
altered I should not know it for the same. But still it is something to
look forward to an interview with her. She may not have had the time
to write more, or, perhaps, she may have doubted the messenger, and
thought it unsafe to utter anything concerning her real feelings in
this epistle.”
Thus hoping, and trying to persuade himself of the best, did James
Anderson anxiously expect the hour when, by the note that had been
sent him, he expected once again to look upon the face of her, the
remembrance of whom had cheered him in many a solitary hour, and
enabled him to bear up against evils and misfortunes which otherwise
had been insurmountable.
It wanted but a very short time to eight o’clock, and, at five minutes
before that hour, James Anderson walked, with trembling eagerness, up
the steps of Mrs. Williams’s house door. His hand shook, as he placed
it upon the bell-handle, and told himself that the time was come when
all his doubts would be resolved, and he should really know what he had
to hope, or expect, or to fear.
There was certainly a something weighing heavily upon his heart, an
undefined dread that all was not well, and, during the interval between
his ringing and the opening of the door, he felt all that sickening
sensation which is ever the accompaniment of intense anxiety, and which
renders it so fearfully painful a feeling.
The door was opened by a female servant, who had received her
instructions from Mrs. Williams, so that she knew exactly what to say,
and, without waiting for the visitor to announce himself, she said,
“Are you Mr. Anderson, sir?”
“Yes—yes,” he said.
“Then I am ordered to ask you to step into the back parlour.”
“All is right,” thought James Anderson; “she expects me, and has
prepared for my reception.”
He followed his guide implicitly, for he fully believed, as who would
not, under the circumstances, that she was in Helen’s confidence, and
so could be safely trusted.
She led him into the back parlour, where there was no one, and then she
said,—
“If you will be seated for a few minutes, sir, my mistress will come to
you.”
“Her young mistress, she means,” thought James; and he prepared himself
to wait, with what patience he could assume, and that, under the
circumstances, was by no means a large amount; for he had been kept in
such a constant worry by what had occurred, that suspense became one of
the most agonizing feelings that he could possibly endure, now that his
fate was about so nearly to be decided.
It was no part of Mrs. Williams’s plan to keep him waiting, for she
certainly had no fancy for retaining such a customer in the house as
James Anderson; for, playing the double part that she was, she knew not
what sudden accident might happen to derange her plans, and, probably,
render them completely abortive.
For all she could tell, Helen herself might actually descend the
stairs, and enter that very room where she hoped a short conference
would suffice to get rid of the troublesome claims of James Anderson
for ever.
She was in the front parlour when he was shown into the back, for they
communicated by folding doors. She had but to open these doors, and at
once show herself to the astonished Anderson, who little expected on
that occasion to behold the mother instead of the daughter.
He gave a sudden and violent start of surprise; but, as Mrs. Williams
had determined to do the dignified, and to call herself quite an
injured person, she took no notice of the evident agitation of his
manner, but said, with an assurance that only she could have aspired
to,—
“May I ask, sir, under what pretence you write notes to my daughter, at
such a time as this?—notes which appear to me to be highly calculated
to do her some serious injury, and, consequently, which I cannot but
think are intended for that precise purpose.”
“Mrs. Williams,” said James Anderson, “since it appears that I have
been betrayed, and that the messenger I perhaps foolishly trusted, has
delivered to you, instead of your daughter, the note I addressed to
her, I have only to say ——”
“I beg your pardon, sir,” said Mrs. Williams, interrupting him; “but as
it was from my daughter I received your note, you may spare yourself
the trouble of blaming the lad whom you had to seduce from his duty by
bribes and corruption.”
“From your daughter?”
“Yes, sir; from my daughter; and I flatter myself that there is too
good an understanding between my daughter and me, for her to keep as a
secret such a circumstance.”
This was a very unexpected blow to James Anderson—a blow, indeed, which
he was totally unprepared for; and yet, although he doubted, he had no
means of disproving what Mrs. Williams chose to assert in the matter;
and she quickly saw the victory she had gained over him, and the
difficulty in which he found himself.
“Sir,” she said, “if you have anything more to add to what you have
already said, my daughter desires that you should inform me of it, and
if it consists of such matter as she can properly take notice of, she
will reply to it by letter; but she most unhesitatingly declines an
interview, which she considers cannot be productive of anything but
unpleasantness to all parties, and most of all to her, considering
her peculiar situation, and that she is so soon about to alter her
condition, and become the wife of the Baron Stolmuyer, of Saltzburgh.”
“I’ll not believe it,” said James Anderson, “unless I hear it from her
own lips.”
“I suppose, sir, when you see it announced in the ‘County Chronicle,’
you will believe it?”
“That,” said James Anderson, “it never will be; for I cannot, will not,
dare not think that one whom I have loved so well could be so false.”
“False, sir! What do you mean by that? I shall really have to speak to
the baron, if you use such expressions towards his intended wife.”
“I’ll speak to the baron,” said James, “and that in a language he shall
understand, too, if I come across him.”
“If you threaten, it will be my duty to inform the baron, so that he
may take such legal steps as he may be advised.”
“I repeat to you, Mrs. Williams, that I will not believe it; and since
you force me to such a declaration, I have no hesitation in saying
that I think you are quite capable of selling your daughter to the
highest bidder, and that the baron you mention probably occupies that
unenviable position—a position which no gentleman would, for a moment,
wish to occupy, and which he perhaps is not fully aware of. I will see
him, and explain to him that there are prior claims to the hand as well
as to the affections of your daughter.”
This threat rather alarmed Mrs. Williams; for she thought it possible
that, if the baron really found there had been a former lover in the
case, probably much encouraged by the lady, he might think his chances
of happiness rather slender, and decline keeping the engagement which
she considered was so auspiciously commenced.
This might or might not be the result; but at all events it was worth
consideration, and placed the matter in rather a serious light.
Therefore was it, then, that Mrs. Williams determined to have recourse
to her last expedient, and that was the production of the written
promise to marry the baron, which it will be recollected, in the
excitement and impulse of the moment, she had succeeded in procuring
from Helen.
“Well, sir,” she said, “since you will not be convinced by any ordinary
arguments, and since you doubt my word in this matter, I shall be under
the necessity of adopting some means of explaining to you the matter
fully, and of showing you that there is abundance of proof of what I
have asserted.”
“Proof, madam! Nothing but an assurance from Helen herself can come to
me in the character of proof in such an affair as this. Let me see her;
for the mere fact that you sedulously keep her from me, involves the
affair in a general aspect of suspicion.”
“Read that, sir, and if you know anything of the handwriting of her
whom you affect so much to admire, it ought to resolve your doubts.”
James Anderson took the paper in his hand, and glanced upon it, and by
the sudden change that came across his countenance as he did so, Mrs.
Williams saw that it was having all its effect.
He could not doubt it. He knew that signature too well. He had it to
some affectionate documents, which he felt would remain by him to the
latest day of his existence.
It was indeed a horrible confirmation of all that had been told
him—such a confirmation as he had never expected to see, and which, at
one blow, dashed all doubt to the ground.
“Now, sir,” said Mrs. Williams, with a triumphant air, “I trust that
you are satisfied—at all events, of one fact, and that is, that my
daughter had consented to become the Baroness Stolmuyer, of Saltzburgh;
and without at all entering into the question of anything which may
have passed between you and her upon other occasions, I think you
ought, as a gentleman, to perceive that the sooner you go away the
better.”
“It is enough,” said James Anderson. “Falsehood, thy name is woman.”
“I really can’t see, sir, what you have got to complain of, for people
have a right to alter their minds upon the little affairs of life, and
I don’t see, then, wherefore they should not have a similar privilege
as regards things of more importance.”
“Enough, madam—enough. What steps I may hereafter take, upon a due
consideration of these affairs, I know not; but now I bid you farewell.”
Mrs. Williams was very glad to hear these words, or rather the last
of them, because she was in perpetual dread, during the whole of the
interview, that something would occur by which a meeting would take
place between James Anderson and Helen herself, at which some very
disagreeable explanation might take place.
It was a wonderful relief to her when he had left the house, and she
heard the street-door close behind him, and she drew a long breath when
such was the case, as she said to herself,—
“Well, thank the fates, that job is over, and a good thing it is. There
is no knowing what mischief might have been the end of it, if it hadn’t
been stopped as it has. He is not a bad-looking young man, and if he
had had a few thousands a year, I certainly should not have made any
objections to his being my son-in-law; but I possibly cannot, and will
not, have poor people in the family. There is no end of trouble and
bother with them; and instead of getting your daughters off hand, it’s
just taking on hand, in addition, some man for their amusement.”
James Anderson went sorrowfully enough back to the fisherman’s cottage,
where he related to the sympathising old seaman what had occurred; for
Jack Pringle was not there, and if he had been, James Anderson knew
very well he would have got no sympathy from him on account of the
circumstance; for the frailties of the softer sex did not seem to have
any material effect upon Jack Pringle or his sympathies, since, by his
own account, he had been jilted so often, that he now thought nothing
at all of it.
CHAPTER CXV.
THE RETURN OF THE RESUSCITATED MAN, AND THE ROBBERY AT ANDERBURY HOUSE.
The morning after the occurrences that took place in the bone-house
of Anderbury, broke dimly and obscurely over the ocean in the
neighbourhood of that town. For leagues away, as far as the eye could
reach, there was a haziness in the atmosphere which the fresh wind that
blew did not dissipate.
There was a white light rising in the horizon, which did not cast the
warm glow over the bosom of the ocean as it sometimes does; it was
dull, cold, and cheerless; there was nothing that could be called
beautiful.
The waves dashed about, and came tumbling over each other, their crests
now and then covered with foam, which was swept off by the fresh breeze
that blew over the ocean. It was just daylight.
There was nought in the landscape save the water and the sky—nothing
else to be seen for miles. Yes, there was one object, and that was
a boat washed to and fro by the waves as it sat on the bosom of the
sea, wafted hither and thither, as the waves impelled the boat, which
appeared to be empty, for no oar was used, and no human form was
visible.
But that boat, so lonely, and left to its own guidance, or rather that
of the waves, contained a living being; it was he who had striven so
hard to escape from the baron on the preceding evening.
He sat alone in the bottom of the boat; he was fatigued—he was
shivering from the cold. The great exertions he had undergone were
followed by a reaction; but he knew not where he was, or in which
direction to pull, or where the shore lay.
How long he lay in this helpless condition it is not known; but he
occasionally lifted his eyes upwards and across the sea, to watch which
way the vessels sailed, and if any should come in sight.
The scene was one of singular desolation and dreariness, in which
nothing could be seen that could cheer the eye or gladden the mind of
man. Now and then, to be sure, a gleam of sunlight would cross the
dreary water, but it seemed to enliven only a small spot, and that but
for a very short time, for it soon again became obscure.
There was the dreary ocean with its leaden-coloured sky, and then the
boat at the mercy and direction of the wind and waves, both of which
seemed in no placid humour, though not absolutely squally.
• • • • •
A vessel from Cherbourg, with brandies, for the port of London, was
sailing direct for the mouth of the Thames, making for the Foreland,
where it would have to round the point, and then enter the mouth of the
river.
There were three or four men and a couple of boys on board; when they
came near the boat,—
“Boat, ahoy!” shouted the man on the look out; “boat ahoy!”
No answer was returned to the shout, and the men on board shouted too,
and crowded to the side of the vessel to see what was going on, and who
was in the boat. The captain came up; he had been in the cabin, but
hearing the shout, he came on deck to see what was the matter.
“What is the matter?” inquired the captain, looking around.
“Boat on the starboard,” said one of the men; “nobody in it, I think;
she seems to be drifting.”
The captain looked at the boat for some minutes attentively, when one
of the men said,—
“Perhaps some wreck, and the boat has been swept away by the waves, or
the crew hadn’t time to get into her, or something of the sort.”
“No,” said the captain, “she’s not a ship’s boat—a shore boat, that’s
what it is, lads. She’s got washed out, or somebody’s drowned, upset,
or rolled out.”
“Something of the sort, I dare say, sir.”
“Well, we needn’t heave to for her—she’s no service to us, and we can’t
spare time.”
“I think there’s some one in her.”
“But the boat’s drifting,” said the captain; “but she’s coming this
way, and that will be the easiest way to ascertain the truth of our
conjectures.”
They steered the vessel so as to meet the boat, which the sea was
beating towards them; and in about twenty minutes or half an hour,
they came within a couple of score yards of the boat, when they could
plainly perceive that some one was sitting in the bottom of the boat.
“Hilloa!” shouted the captain; “boat ahoy!—ahoy!”
The man who was in the boat looked up, and seeing the vessel, he
answered the cheer.
“Throw him a rope,” said the captain to one of the men who were
standing by.
A rope was made fast to the vessel, and then it was thrown by a strong
arm to the boat, and came right athwart it, and was immediately made
fast by the man who was in it.
He then began immediately to haul up the rope, and so draw his boat up
alongside of the vessel, and then he came on deck.
“How now, shipmate, what do you do out at sea in such a cockle-shell as
that?”
“Nothing,” replied the other.
“Nothing! Well, you have come a long way to do that. What induced you
to come to sea, or were you driven out, or how was it you came here?”
“I was driven out against my will,” replied the man; “I was rowing
about shore, when I fell asleep, thinking myself safe, having secured
the boat, as I believed, safely enough.”
“Ay, ay,” said the captain; “and so you found out, when you awoke, your
mistake?”
“I did. My moorings had broken away, which was only a boat-hook and a
rope; the tide coming up, lifted the boat hook out, and I have been out
to sea ever since, and don’t know where I am.”
“Why that must have been last night,” said the captain.
“Last night it was,” said the stranger.
“You have been to sea all night then?” added the captain, taking a long
gaze at the stranger.
“Indeed, I have, and I am quite cold and hungry. I had nothing with me.
I rowed some time in hopes of getting in shore again, but unfortunately
didn’t succeed. I suppose I got further out to sea, rather than nearer
in shore.”
“Well, that is about the fact; you must be about fifteen miles out at
sea,” said the captain; “you are a long pull away from shore, I can
tell you, and how you will get back again, I don’t know; but, at all
events, you are a very queer-looking fish, and I suppose your being
out at sea all night, and no stores, makes you look as you do; though,
upon my soul, I don’t know what to make of you; but you mustn’t starve.
Here, lad, bring up some coffee and boiled pork. Can you eat any?”
“Thank you,” said the unfortunate being, “I can. I have been out for
many hours.”
“Well, sit down, or rather go below, and eat; when you have done, come
up, and we will tell you where the land lies, though I don’t know how
you will keep it in sight for the life of me.”
The man then went below, where there was some coffee royal made for
him—that is, coffee and brandy—and some salt pork was given to him,
of which he partook most plentifully, apparently, while the captain
muttered to himself,—
“Well, of all the odd-complexioned shore-going sharks as ever I saw,
you are the oddest! D—d if I should think he was wholesome—there’s a
great deal of the churchyard about him.”
“There isn’t a very agreeable look about him,” said one of the men;
“but I suppose he has been so much frightened, that he looks more like
a vampyre than anything else.”
“Aye; or a revivified corpse.”
“Yes, sir.”
“But that arises from his being so terrified and starved, as well as
fatigued; exposure all night, all added together, has almost changed
the current of his blood.”
The man came up now, having had sufficient provisions below, and had
expressed himself much gratified with the coffee-royal to the cook,
who, in his own mind, thereupon declared that he must be a Christian
after all, though he had obtained by some means the complexion of a
white negro.
“And now,” said the captain, “if you like to go with us to London, you
shall go with us, for, as I said before, we cannot run into any port
before we get there, for the wind is favourable and strong.”
“I would sooner get back by means of my boat,” replied the man, “if I
were sure of making land.”
“You might, if you could keep in a straight course, but there is the
difficulty; you cannot do so very well without a compass, and that you
have not got.”
“No, indeed, I have not—though with it I have no doubt of being able to
reach the land.”
“I have,” said the captain, “a small one below, a pocket compass; you
shall have that, and see what can be done; and if you get ashore, it
will have done some service at all events.”
“I shall be greatly obliged to you for your kindness,” said the
stranger; “but I am wholly at a loss to know how I shall ever be able
to repay your kindness.”
“Say nothing about that; we who get our bread upon the sea, know well
the risks we all run, and therefore do not mind lending a hand to each
other when in distress and trouble.”
“I will endeavour to save some one else in your line of life, if I
cannot you,” replied the stranger, “and so, if it be possible, make
some return.”
“Aye, that will do mate; do a Christian’s charity to any one whom you
may cross, and I shall be well paid for my trouble.”
The boat was now brought up alongside the vessel, and, before the
stranger embarked, the captain said to him, as he held the compass in
his hand,—
“You must place this compass on one of the thwarts of your boat,
shipmate.”
“I will.”
“A precious vessel she is, for a voyage out of sight of land; but,
never mind, you are safe enough, unless a sea was to come and roll over
you—but that’s neither here nor there. Mind you keep your boat’s head
to the north-west, and, by so doing, you’ll make land at the nearest
point from where we are now.”
“Thank you,” said the man.
“Moreover, you must pull so as to keep her head in the direction I tell
you. It will be too long a pull for you to get there by rowing—you
would get too tired to keep your seat, and you are unused to it, too.”
“I am obliged to you,” said the man; “if I get to shore safe, I shall
be under great obligations to you. You will have saved my life.”
“I have ordered enough biscuit, and grog, and cold beef, to last you
till night—you will get to shore before that time, I have every reason
to believe. In five or six hours you ought to get there; but, in case
of accidents, there is enough to last till night.”
“You have loaded me with obligations.”
“Say no more; be off with you and pull away from the vessel as quickly
as you can; for we have slackened our speed for you.”
“Farewell; a pleasant voyage to you,” said the man.
“Good bye, and good luck go with you,” replied the captain. “Keep to
the north-west, and all will be well; push off, and keep your eye on
the compass.”
The man did as he was desired; laid the compass on one of the thwarts;
took the oars in his hands, and began to row away with good will.
The crew of the vessel crowded to the side and witnessed the departure
of the boat, and when she was a few hundred yards off, the sails were
spread, and the vessel ploughed through the waves, leaving the boat
behind, a mere speck on the sea, diminishing each moment.
But yet while the boat was within hailing distance, the captain said to
the crew,—
“Give him a cheer—he may meet with a score of accidents before he
reaches shore, any one of which will be sufficient to destroy him.”
The crew obeyed, and gave a loud shout to the boat, and the captain
added his own voice; the cheering huzzah reached the boat, for the
occupant elevated his oar, and returned it. The solitary cheer was
borne to the vessel faintly but distinctly; however, they gave him one
cheer more, and then pursued their way over the trackless waters.
[Illustration: The man returns the cheer from his boat.]
• • • • •
The boat pursued its course for some distance, until it was too far
from the vessel to be seen, and then, slackening his pace, he contented
himself with merely keeping the boat’s head in the direction which he
had been told, and in which he knew the land lay.
There was no hurry and desire to reach the land, but merely to keep
where he was; and when any vessel hove in sight, he pulled so as to
keep clear of her and out of hail; and there were a great many who
passed near him, and would have aided him had he required any; but that
did not seem to be his object.
Midday was passed, and the sun began to decline towards the west, when
the boat was gradually brought nearer and nearer in shore.
Not only was the shore visible, but the very houses might be counted,
and yet he would not come ashore, but appeared to be awaiting the
sinking of the sun before the boat chose to seek the protection of the
land.
It was about sun-set that the provisions, which were given by the
captain of the vessel, were now consumed, and that while they were
being eaten, the occupant of the boat sat still with his eyes
fixed upon the town, which was every moment becoming hidden in the
approaching denseness of the night; and, at length, could not be
distinguished, save by the existence of numerous lights, that shewed
the precise position in which it lay.
Darkness now came on, and nothing was to be seen on the ocean whatever,
and he remained yet longer at sea; but at length there was no danger of
being noticed; he gradually rowed his boat in shore and secured it.
Then jumping ashore, he wandered about the town from one place to
another, and, finally, he determined to make his way to Anderbury House.
“There is, at least, plenty of everything there,” he muttered; “and,
though there are plenty of servants, yet, in so large a place, there is
ample room to secret oneself, and plenty to be had for the trouble of
taking it.”
He came to a small public-house, which he entered, with the view of
resting a short time, and of ascertaining what was going on in the town.
There were several people seated in the public-room, and he now seated
himself up in one corner of the room, unobserved by anybody.
“Well, well,” said one; “there is more than one strange thing of
late that has happened. The baron has given some very handsome
entertainments.”
“Aye, so he has,” said one.
“And more than that, they say he’s going to keep ’em up till he gets a
wife; though I cannot tell why he should leave them off then, because
women like that sort of thing too well to make any objection to its
being carried on after marriage.”
“The baron is very right; if he carried it on then, he would be watched
by his wife, who would take good care to rate him for any attention
he might pay to any of the ladies; and, therefore, it would only be
keeping up the means for being scolded to keep up the balls.”
“Ay, it would only be getting into hot water, and keeping the kettle
boiling on purpose.”
“He would,” said another man, “merely be keeping the entertainments
on for the purpose of showing off his wife and her self-will, as well
as her power over him, and showing them all how she could rule a
man—a very favourite pastime with married women, who, when they have
a partner who don’t like fighting and quarrelling, and who does love
peace and quietness, know how to give it him.”
“I think better of the baron, who, I think, is a man who wouldn’t stand
much of that.”
“Ah, you don’t know what an upas-tree a woman can become, when she
pleases.”
“Well,” said another, “the strangest thing that I know of is the loss
of Bill Wright’s boat.”
“Oh! what was that? I have heard something about it, though I can’t say
I have heard the rights of it yet. What was it all about, eh?”
“Why, he says, when he went to bed, he left his boat safe enough moored
to other boats and afloat. Bill says he’ll swear she couldn’t get clear
without help; but she did get clear, and there is nothing to be seen of
it now, at all events, and poor Bill is in a devil of a way about it,
too, I can tell you, and good reason enough.”
“Yes. Bill will scarce be able to get another boat, unless some good
friend should give him one, and that is scarce likely, I think as times
go.”
“There’s no ball at Anderbury House, to-night, I believe,” said one of
the visitors.
“None, that I know of.”
“No, there is none,” said another, “because I know of several who have
got leave of absence; so they are short-handed there, and they would
not be so if they had anything particular going on, for the baron does
the thing handsomely.”
“So he does.”
The stranger listened to all this conversation very quietly, for some
time, muttering to himself,—
“That is well. It will suit my purpose very well. I will go and see
how the land lies in that quarter. I have objects in view, and some of
the valuables to be found there, at all events, will aid my projects,
and assist in my comfort, and I may as well have them from there as
anywhere else; besides, I know more of that place. It suits my taste to
do so, and will be somewhat in the shape of revenge.”
• • • • •
Calling for his reckoning, which he paid, he left the house, and
proceeded towards Anderbury House.
It was now nine o’clock or a little later. No one was about, or
scarcely any, and those few the moving figure endeavoured to avoid.
He turned out of the usual paths, and walked over the fields and
unfrequented ways, keeping near the hedge-rows, until he came to the
bounds of the grounds of Anderbury House.
Here he paused, and bethought himself of the best means of entering
the house unseen and unsuspected by any one, else his object would be
defeated.
However, after a few moments’ thought, he determined to proceed, and,
for that purpose, he made for a spot where the fence was low, and ran
by some trees that had been cut down and grew bushy.
Having reached there, he, by aid of the branches, contrived to get over
into the grounds, and then made his way swiftly towards a plantation
that ran up close to the house, and by means of which he hoped to reach
the house, and perhaps to enter it.
Silently he made his way into the plantation, and just as he reached
it, he saw the moon rise in the east; it was just rising above the
horizon.
“Thanks,” he muttered, looking towards the luminary, “thanks you did
not appear before; but now you are welcome, for I can keep under
cover of the trees, and the deeper the shadow, the safer I am from
observation.”
This was right enough.
The moon rose full, but not bright, for some clouds seemed to
intervene, or rather some thin vapours, which gave her a strange
colour, and, at the same time, increased her apparent size; but she
rose rapidly, and as she rose that would wear off, and she would resume
her silvery appearance and usual diameter.
He was now safe in the plantation, but, at the same time, it would
require some caution not to be discovered, for, at times, even the
plantations formed beautiful evening walks, in which many of the
inhabitants of Anderbury House had indulged at various times, and
especially when there was what was termed a family party.
On a moonlight night, when there were several members of the family
who knew the grounds well, then they would find ample amusement in
wandering about.
However, there was no such parties on this evening, and as it followed,
he ran no danger. Lightly, therefore, he crept forward, making no
sounds save such as it was impossible to avoid.
The foot fall upon dried leaves—the cracking of sticks, and the
rustling of the smaller under-growth, when he came in contact with it.
“How I shall be able to pass the open spaces, I know not,” he muttered;
“but I have passed worse spots than this, and I may be pretty confident
I shall succeed in escaping detection on this occasion; however, it
shall be tried. There are few who are about—all is quiet and still—the
very watch dogs are quiet and asleep.”
He crept onward now until he came within some hundred and fifty yards
of the house itself, when he paused and listened, but hearing nothing,
he again came forward and approached to within a few score yards of the
house, when he was suddenly arrested by the sound of voices.
He paused and listened; it was a female voice spoke near; she was
evidently speaking to a man.
“Now, William,” she said, “do you really believe you can get in without
making any noise?”
“I am sure of it, providing you leave the window open, and the rope
there.”
“Yes, yes, I will. Well, that room is empty; pull off your shoes, and
creep out of the door; don’t let it bang together, or it may alarm some
one.”
“Yes, yes; I’ll take care.”
“Well, then, remain in the passage or room until I come to you; but
should you be disturbed, you can hide yourself in any of the closets,
or go up stairs, which will bring you to the floor on which is my room.”
“I’ll take care; but don’t forget the rope, and to leave the window
open.”
“I’ll not forget. I’ll throw the rope on one side, so as to hang
among the vine leaves, so that it will not be detected by any one
accidentally coming this way, though that is very unlike, indeed.”
“I understand; for the matter of that, I think the vine is strong
enough to bear me without the rope.”
“I would not have you make the attempt lest you fall, and are killed,
William; be sure you do not make the trial; what a thing it would be if
you were discovered, and all were to come out—I should be ruined.”
“Never fear that; I will take care, both for your sake as well as my
own.”
“Then good bye.”
Some words were then uttered in a whisper, the import of which he did
not hear, but it continued for a minute or two, and then the female
said,—
“Wait here a few minutes, and you will see me come to yon window, and
let down the rope; and then begone as quickly as you can.”
“Never fear for me; I will wait here until I see you at the window, and
then I will leave.”
The female figure he saw glide quickly away, and he watched it until
she was out of sight, and then he watched for the signal also. He could
see the form of the male figure, who stood within about three or four
yards from the spot where he was concealed.
Then, after a time, he saw the female figure come to the window
indicated by her, and then throw the rope out of it, and cause it to
hang down by the side, or among the leaves of the vine, so that it
could not be seen, except it were looked for.
When this was done, and the figure saw the female had withdrawn,
he turned from the spot, and walked hastily away further in the
plantation, and when he was quite out of hearing, and the stranger
could no longer hear his footsteps among the dried rubbish in the wood,
he walked cautiously forward to the edge of the grounds, and then gazed
up at the house, and listened carefully to ascertain if there was any
sound at all indicative of the vicinity of any human being.
Hearing none, he assumed another attitude, and prepared to make a dart
forward to the window, as he muttered,—
“The coast is clear, and it will be hard, indeed, if I do not now
succeed. Once in the house, I will soon secure myself, and the contents
of some of the baron’s drawers—some of his gold will be mine.”
Again taking a cautious survey, and, being perfectly satisfied that he
was unobserved, he dashed across towards the root of the vine, and,
in a moment more, he had seized the end of the rope; but he heard the
sound of footsteps. What to do he could not tell, but sprang up a few
feet, and buried himself among the leaves of the vine, which were very
luxuriant.
The footsteps were heard closer and closer, until he could perceive the
very female who had thrown the rope out of the window stop within a few
inches of him, and then seize hold of the very rope he had been about
to seize.
Her object was to ascertain if the rope was low enough to be reached;
and, when she had adjusted it to her mind, she exclaimed, in a low
voice, to herself,—
“Ah! that will do; he will easily find it, I dare say; and it will be
all right. Nobody will see it.”
Having satisfied herself of that, she left the spot, and returned the
same way she came. It was an awkward situation as anyone could well
indulge in without discovery.
“It was a very narrow escape,” he muttered. “I had no idea of her
coming back in that way; I never dreamed of such a thing. But no
matter; I believe I am quite safe now; if not, I shall have some other
escape. She must have been next to blind not to see me.”
However, he got down, and then pulled down the rope straight; and, by
the help of that and the vine, he then pulled himself up to the window,
into which he speedily got, and found himself in an empty room.
Here he paused, to ascertain if he could hear any one moving about; but
he heard nothing, and at once proceeded to feel his way, cautiously,
along to the door, which he approached with a cat-like step.
Opening the door, he paused to listen, before he ventured into the
landing to which it opened; but, finding the coast clear, he went
through that, and then into the next room, which was apparently a
store room, being filled with a variety of things of a miscellaneous
character, and which were only of occasional use in the house.
This he closed, and went up stairs, where he came to a suite of
servants’ bed-rooms, and thence he walked about from room to room,
until he came to a portion of the house he recognised, and then he made
direct for the baron’s own room.
“There,” he muttered, “I am likely to meet with what I want; and the
carpets are soft, and give no noise. I can sleep for a short time, if I
will.”
He made at once for the baron’s sleeping room, which he opened and
entered. It was empty, and he at once closed the door; then he made an
instant search about for a place of concealment; and, having found one,
he began to make a search for some other matters, that were not of the
same, but a more valuable character in the market.
However, he found out the drawers and depositories; but he was unable
to open them, because they were locked; and he must wait until the
baron had gone to sleep, and then, taking his keys, he would be able to
help himself, without any difficulty, to what he most desired.
He had scarcely made this determination, before he was alarmed by the
footsteps of the baron, as he ascended the stairs. This produced a
necessity for instant concealment; and he immediately flew to the spot
which he had chosen; and, scarcely had he done so, before the room-door
was opened, and in walked the baron himself, who brought in a light
with him.
He remained walking about some time, examining a variety of matters,
but appeared as though he never intended to go to sleep. There was
every probability of his discovering the place of concealment; which
was easily done, had he but turned his head, or moved his hand, under
certain circumstances; but, as fortune willed it, the baron did not.
It was near an hour before the baron sought the repose he might have
taken, but for the dominion of the spirit of restlessness; and it was
even then some time before he fell into a sound slumber, apparently
being engaged in deep thought.
However, he did fall asleep, and the tongue of Morpheus spoke
loudly—like some human beings, through the nose; and then it was the
hero of Anderbury church-yard stole from his concealment, and began to
examine the chamber.
“Where are his keys, I wonder?” he thought. “He must carry them about
him; but he must have left them somewhere in his clothes; and if I can
obtain, and use them, without making any noise, it will be fortunate.”
He found the keys, though not without making a slight jingle with them,
but that caused no motion on the part of the baron, who lay snoring in
his bed.
He stole to the drawers, and the key fitted; he quietly unlocked it and
drew it open.
“Fortune befriends me,” he muttered.
At that moment the baron turned in his bed and heaved a deep sigh, and
appeared for a minute or two restless, and as if on the point of waking
up.
The intruder, however, stopped short in his depredations, and paused,
and then crouched down, lest the sleeper might open his eyes, and, by a
momentary glance, detect him.
Suddenly he spoke, but indistinctly—very indistinctly, and yet loudly
enough. The stranger started—he thought himself detected; but he found
that the baron was only dreaming. He drew nearer to him, and listened
to what he said.
“Ha!” sighed the baron; “she is very beautiful—very beautiful. Ha! her
form and face are perfection!”
He paused, and again went on, but too indistinctly. A word or two was
heard plain enough now and then, but it was impossible to form any
sense of them—they had no connection with one another.
“She is very beautiful,” again muttered the baron in his sleep. “She is
lovely—amiable—what a wife!”
Then he again fell into a train of half-mumblings, from which nothing
could be gathered.
“Heavens, what a prize!” exclaimed the baron, and again he relapsed,
but appeared more composed and quiet.
“I would he were nine fathoms deep below the level of the sea,”
muttered the robber; “and then I should not be bothered by him. Sleep,
or let it alone,” he exclaimed, between his teeth. “It would almost be
safest to kill——and yet, one cry might bring the whole household upon
me.”
Turning to the door, he ascertained that it was locked. He turned the
key, and, in doing so, made a noise with the lock which had the effect
of causing the baron to start in his sleep.
“What was that?” he muttered, in sleepy accents. “I thought I heard the
door go; but it can’t. I locked it—I remember very well I locked it.”
After this speech he fell fast asleep.
“Another escape,” muttered the intruder, who rose from his crouching
posture, and setting the door open, so that he could, in case of an
accident, make his escape from the room.
Then he again turned towards the drawers, and began to help himself
to the contents, when he accidentally struck the keys, which fell
with a clash to the floor. In an instant the baron started up on his
elbow, and pulled aside the curtain, to see what was the cause of the
disturbance.
In a moment the light was put out, and the intruder had assumed a
motionless posture; but it was too late to escape the quick eye of the
baron, who instantly jumped up, exclaiming, as he laid his hand upon a
pistol, which he had under his pillow, and cocked it,—
“Ah! robber—assassin! Stand, or I fire!”
The sound of the cocking of the pistol was quite enough. It came
distinctly to the ear, and suggested the idea of more than ordinary
danger with it; and he dashed past, heedless of the command of the
baron, who called upon him to stand.
The baron fired, and in an instant the house was filled with a stunning
report, which echoed and re-echoed from room to room, filling the
inmates with wonder and alarm.
[Illustration: The baron fires upon the intruder.]
The sensation produced by the sound was of that description that
can hardly be described. To be awaked from a sound sleep by such a
dreadful, stunning report, which carried such a sense of danger with
it, that they remained in an alarming stupor for nearly the space of a
minute, until, indeed, they were aroused by the shouts of the baron,
was rather terrifying.
Hardly had the stunning and deafening report died away, when the baron
leaped from his bed to ascertain if his shot had taken effect.
The intruder heeded not the commands or the shot of the baron, for he
dashed out of the room at his utmost speed, making his way towards the
lower portion of the house, that offering greater facilities for escape.
The baron, as soon as he had recovered from his first surprise, jumped
out, and seizing a heavy cane that was lying across one of the chairs,
he rushed after the flying figure, shouting and calling to his people
to get up.
“Robbers! thieves!” he shouted. “Here, help—help to secure the robbers
who are in the house.”
The intruder made for the lower stairs, but was closely followed by the
baron, who could just see the dusky form of the object of his pursuit
before him; but now, in the lower rooms, where there was no light at
all, the shutters being up, he missed him.
The robber had taken advantage of the darkness, and doubled upon his
pursuer, and hastened up stairs with the view of reaching the place
where he entered.
In doing this, however, he was met by one of the men who was coming
down. There was no time for deliberation, and he dashed up, regardless
of the blow the man aimed at him, who said,—
“Here you are. Here goes for one on ’em.”
As, however, the battle is said not always to be with the strong, so
in this instance he was unable to accomplish his object, for the blow,
by the agility of the robber, was evaded, and the result was, that the
serving man was suddenly whirled down the stairs, and being once on the
descent, he did not stop until he got to the bottom.
“Murder! murder!” shouted the unhappy individual, as he rolled down
stair after stair, until his cries were stilled by a violent concussion
of the head.
In the meantime the stranger rushed up stairs at a headlong speed,
until he attained the landing which led to the room at the window of
which he entered. Securing the door behind him, and then getting out
of the window, and seizing the rope, he began to descend very rapidly,
fearing he would be intercepted by those below.
He slipped down the rope rather than let himself down, and before he
had got half way down, he met with an impediment, which, however,
quickly gave way, and they both came down plump to the earth together.
“My God! my God!” exclaimed a man’s voice, in great terror and
tribulation. “What’s that? what’s that? Mercy—mercy! I didn’t mean to
do any wrong.”
The stranger heeded not the words of the terrified swain, who, it
would appear, had begun to ascend to reach the dormitory of his fair
but frail one, when his flame was so unceremoniously quenched in the
way we have related, but dashed away from the spot, and was speedily
lost in the plantation, whither the unfortunate individual when he
had sufficiently recovered his senses, and released his head from the
imprisonment of his hat, soon after betook himself, thankful the affair
was no worse.
CHAPTER CXVI.
JACK PRINGLE FALLS IN LOVE, AND HAS RATHER AN UNHAPPY ADVENTURE WITH A
BOLD DRAGOON.
Jack Pringle, like other men, was subject to the vicissitudes of the
passions, which placed him under a certain string of circumstances
that produce results quite at variance with those which are usually
anticipated when an individual enters upon the pursuits of the tender
passion.
Indeed, Jack could see nothing at all unhappy, or in the least degree
unfortunate, in the black eyes and rosy lips of Susan, who was most
certainly the “maid of the inn,” though not in precisely the same rank
as the one alluded to by the song.
He had taken up his residence at the inn, had Jack. Indeed, he was
partial to inns in general—there was usually a greater latitude
permitted there than elsewhere; not only each one being allowed to
accommodate himself as he pleased, but he could have what ’baccy and
grog he chose to order, as long as there was a shot in the locker.
This being the state of affairs, Jack found another inducement to stay
where he was, and that was the existence of the before-mentioned Susan,
who appeared to be as kind as she was good-natured.
She never refused to answer Jack’s call; and when she came, she always
said,—
“What did you please to want, Mr. Pringle?”
“Mr. Pringle,” thought Jack. “Well, that sounds pretty from such a pair
of lips.”
Jack scratched his head, and turning his quid in his mouth, was often
lost in admiration, and forgot all his wants at that moment, and it was
not until the question was more than once repeated, that Jack was aware
that he really did not want anything, especially as his grog was not
all gone.
“Well,” exclaimed Jack, looking at the glass, “I forgot; but never
mind, Susan, I’ll have another can while this is going—so I sha’n’t
hurry you. I wouldn’t hurry you, Susan—no, that I wouldn’t.”
The course of true love never did run smooth—that is, we know, a rule
that is as old as the hills—but then it is of constant recurrence,
and one that it may fairly be presumed always will, to the end of the
world, and possibly after.
However that may be, Jack was not without a rival, and one of a very
formidable character; not that Jack valued him a piece of rotten yarn.
No; he never did think anything of a landsman, especially a soldier,
for it was to that class this rival belonged.
“Susan,” said Jack, as he sat in the kitchen, watching the various
evolutions to which the hands of Susan were applied, in the performance
of her multitudinous duties.
“Well, Mr. Pringle,” said Susan.
“Ah!” said Jack; and then there was a pause, during which Jack forgot
even to chaw his quid, and was quite abstracted in manner and thought.
He had intended to say something, but it had quite escaped him; and it
was difficult for Jack to hold his thoughts, as it is for countrymen to
hold a pig by the tail when this latter member was well greased, and
when it was of that description usually denominated a “bob-tail,” a
common occurrence.
“What did you say, Mr. Pringle?” said Susan, bustling about. “I am sure
you were about to say something.”
“Well, I suppose I was,” said Jack; “but I don’t know what it was now;
but perhaps you do.”
“How should I know? I can’t tell what you are thinking about. What made
you think that?”
“Because your black eyes seems to go through me, Susan, like a
forty-two pounder. I tell you what, you ought to know what I want to
say, because I’m always thinking of you.”
“Are you, though?”
“Yes, I am,” said Jack; “you’re a light craft—a rare pretty figure-head
you’d make.”
“Lor! Mr. Pringle,” said Susan.
“Well, you would, though; and I’ll take three dozen and never wink, if
there’s one to be found half as handsome in the whole British navy, or
in any other.”
“To think,” said Susan, “that I should be called a figure-head! Well,
I declare, I never heard the like. Why, what will you not say next? I
never thought that of you.”
“Why,” said Jack, who was very much bewildered, and didn’t know
precisely what to say—the turn the compliment had taken was one
he couldn’t understand—“why, you see, Susan, the figure-head is
the beautifulest part of the ship, except may be her rigging, her
port-holes, her sides, and her trim; but then, you see, them things
ain’t no manner of likeness to anything human, especially you, Susan.”
“Ain’t they, Mr. Pringle? Well, you know best; but I dare say it’s all
right, for you must know best. But my cousin says I am more like the
Venus day Meditchy, than anything else.”
Jack stared.
“Who?” he inquired, with his eyes opening very wide.
“The Venus day Meditchy,” said Susan, speaking in a very slow, emphatic
manner, for Jack’s behoof.
“Don’t know her,” said Jack. “I’ll go bail there ain’t such a ship in
the navy. There never was such a thing heard of, unless some of them
d—d French craft; but your cousin ought to be well cobbed for saying
you were like anything French. Why, you are true blue, and no French
about you—is there, Susan?”
“I don’t know; but I never heard there was, and I don’t know if there
is; but that’s what he said, and he’s been a long way.”
“Who is _he?_” said Jack, laying emphasis upon the last word, to
indicate that the sound was displeasing.
“Oh! my cousin.”
“Well, but who is your cousin?” inquired Jack. “Have you see him very
lately?”
“Yes, I saw him this morning; his regiment is quartered only a few
miles from this place.”
“Oh!” said Jack, “he’s a soldier, then?”
“Yes, he is—a horse-soldier,” added Susan.
“A horse-marine. Ah! I know ’em afore to-day; they are a rare lot to
lie and gallop away. But lord bless you, they never lay alongside an
enemy till you’ve beaten him. No—no—they can’t do that.”
“He’ll be here to-night,” said Susan. “You shall see him, Mr. Pringle;
he’s coming all this way to see me.”
“To see you!” said Jack Pringle, who was much displeased with this
piece of particular attention in the cousin, and he could not help
saying so.
“But he is my cousin,” said Susan; “and you know one cannot refuse to
see one’s friends and relations; besides, he has been at all times very
kind and good-natured to me, so that I cannot do otherwise than receive
him kindly.”
“Oh, to be sure,” said Jack; “by all manner of means; only we must
understand each other, Susan; there can’t be more than one captain
aboard at a time.”
“How very odd you do talk, Mr. Pringle. My cousin will ask you what you
mean.”
“Will he now?” said Jack. “Well, he may do so, if he like; but my lingo
will be as good as his, I am sure; but we shall see him, however; but,
Susan, you don’t care anything about him, you know.”
“Not a bit, Mr. Pringle; only as a cousin, you know.”
“Oh! very well,” said Jack; “I don’t care about that a bit; but if so
be you’re going to carry on any games, you know, why, I won’t stand it.”
“Oh, honour,” said Susan, looking tenderly at Jack; “honour, you know.
Do you think I could be capable of doing so? No, I never do anything
unbeknown to a person. No, I say, let all be fair and no preference.”
“Well,” said Jack, “but I want all fair, but I should have no objection
to a little preference, too. Don’t you give no preference to me over a
soldier, Susan?”
“Don’t know,” said Susan; but she gave a look towards Jack that made
him suspend the libation he was about to pour down his throat.
“Oh! I see how it is with you, Susy,” said Jack, becoming more familiar
and pleased, for Susan’s black eye had a magical effect upon Jack, and
he felt as if Susan must love him as much as he loved Susan; her eyes
told him more than her tongue; Jack was quite sure of that.
“When is he coming?” said Jack.
“To-night,” said Susan; “and you must promise me you will be very quiet
and civil, and then you shall see him; only you won’t take any notice
of what he says or does.”
“No, no,” said Jack; “it’s all right; I understand. I won’t quarrel
with him; no, not even if he were to—but splinter my mainmast, if I
could stand that!”
“Stand what?” inquired Susan, demurely.
“Kissing of you,” said Jack, striking the table with his fist, so as
to make the glasses that happened to be there tremble; “I couldn’t; I
could stand the cat first.”
“Lor, Mr. Pringle! who asked you to do so? I am sure, I would not do
such a thing.”
“What?” said Jack.
“Why to let him kiss me, to be sure.”
Jack looked, perhaps felt, electrified, and, after a moment’s pause,
took his quid out of his mouth, hitched up his trousers, and then
seized Susan by the waist, and gave her a kiss. It was a kiss; such a
one only as a man-of-war’s man could give; it went off like the report
of a pistol.
“Lor, Mr. Pringle!” said Susan, “I thought you were quite another sort
of a man. What would my cousin, the dragoon, have said, if he had seen
you? Dear me! you must have alarmed the whole house; I didn’t think you
were going to make so much noise, though.”
A footstep approached, and the landlady thrust her head in; but Susan
was busy, and Jack was chewing his quid as grand as an admiral.
“Susan.”
“Yes, ma’am,” replied Susan.
“What’s the matter?”
“Don’t know, ma’am. Didn’t know there was anything wrong at all, ma’am.”
“I thought I heard a plate smash just now. Are you sure you haven’t
broken anything.”
“Yes; quite, ma’am.”
“Oh!” said the landlady. “I certainly thought I heard a smash; but, I
suppose, it was a mistake altogether, However I am glad of it.”
“There!” said Susan, when she had gone; “I told you how you had alarmed
the place.”
“Well,” said Jack, who felt much abashed at what had happened, “I
didn’t make so much noise, either. But never mind; I’ll take more care
another time.”
• • • • •
The evening came round, and with it came the dragoon, as fine a
specimen of military dress, discipline, and riotism as can well be let
loose upon a decent community, and Susan met him in the passage.
“Ah! my pretty Susan,” said the son of Mars, “the star of my destiny,
and the hope of my heart. While I wear spurs, I will love you, ever
dearest.”
“Oh! come, none of that nonsense, you know, Robert; it won’t do; you
say too many fine things, you know.”
“Of course I do; but can I say them without occasion. No; as well might
you want day without daylight—the moon without moonlight. You inspire
me, you see, and without you I couldn’t say anything.”
“I dare say not,” replied Susan; “you are such a man, that you make one
believe what you say.”
“You ought, since I speak the truth, and nothing else; but, come, come,
we’ll go in. I want to talk to you, Susan; I came on purpose to see
you. There’s the barmaid at the Plough and Gooseberry-bush, quite sulky
because I didn’t stop there; but I know I promised you I would come,
and so I would be as good as my word.”
“Are you sure she was sulky?”
“Certain, because she did would not say good bye.”
“Well, but now I want to speak to you about something I want to
explain.”
“Explain, my dear. I’ll explain anything that can be explained—I don’t
mind what it is. You’ll never find me backward in coming forward with
any amount of explanation that you can by any possibility require.”
“That is not what I want. I have a cousin here.”
“Aye; I’m not particular. I will pay her every kind of attention. I am
sure you will acknowledge I am not wanting in any attentions to you.”
“Oh! dear, no; but it is not a female cousin that I want to speak to
you about.”
“Indeed! I can’t tolerate another.”
“Yes, but you must. He’s just come from sea, and is a very odd man, but
an uncommonly good-hearted man, so don’t take any particular notice of
what he says or does.”
“I don’t mind him a bit—not the value of a pinch of snuff.”
“Yes, but you must do that, only don’t do anything to vex him. You can
be pleasant company when you please, I know.”
“And so I will.”
“To please me you will; for though I don’t care anything for him more
than if he were my brother, yet he’s very fond of me.”
“That’s no recommendation to me,” said the dragoon; “a spoony anchor
buttons, I suppose.”
“You must be civil to him, or I will never see you any more.”
“Well, then, my charmer, I will say anything you like to this
salt-water fish of yours; but he mustn’t lay hands upon you; if he
should do so, why, I should be obliged to chastise him.”
“But he’s a man-of-war’s man.”
“And I am a man of war myself, my dear.”
“Lor!” said Susan.
Upon which she turned her eyes and face towards the dragoon, who could
not let such an opportunity slip, and he immediately saluted her in
true military style, but he did not commit the same offence that Jack
Pringle did, for the former told no tale by the report—it was all
quiet; and he followed Susan until they came to the room in which Jack
was sitting.
“This is Mr. John Pringle,” she said.
“Aye, aye,” said Jack; “here am I—Jack Pringle—afloat or on shore, all
the same.”
“And this,” continued Susan, “is Mr. Robert Swabbem.”
“How d’ye do,” said Jack, “Mr. Swabbem? I dare say it is so; but since
we are to be shipmates, we may as well be friends—how d’ye do?”
“Pretty well, I thank you, Mr. Pringle—very well, indeed. Hope I see
you quite well, and at home?”
“Yes, quite so—both ways; well, and at home.”
“The devil!”
“Yes, we call him Davy Jones; but, then, I suppose, you have one on
purpose, in your line?”
“Why, there’s a little of the devil in us—that is pretty well admitted
on all hands; and that’s as much as we have any wish to have in the way
of connection with the gentleman whom you name.”
“Aye, aye; maybe you’ll know more on him afore you are done; but no
matter—sit down, messmate, we can discuss a can of grog, I reckon.”
“Yes, easily. I can do my duty in any point, friend, you may best
please. Facing an enemy, drinking a can, or kissing a lass. What more
can you say?”
“I can do the same myself as some I know can testify, if they chose
to speak,” said Jack, who gave a sly look at Susan; but at the same
time she nearly fell a laughing, when reminded of Jack’s tremendous
smack, which the landlady mistook for a smashing of crockery; “but,
howsomever,” cried Jack, who had relapsed into a grim smile, “we’ll
have a can together.”
“Very well; Susan, will you do what is needful for us? If the landlady
would allow me, I’d wait upon you and do all your work.”
“And a pretty bobbery,” said Susan, “she would make of it; you would
soon get discharged for tasting the grog on its way from the bar to the
parlour.”
“Ah! well, I might get into trouble if I did that. What do you say,
friend Jingle?”
“Pringle,” said Jack.
“Oh, ah! Ringle. I have it now distinctly.”
“Why, you swab,” said Jack in a rage, “I ain’t got no such kickshaw
names as them—mine’s quite different altogether, so say what you like.”
“My name,” said the soldier, “ain’t Swab—but Swabbem, at your service.”
“Ah,” said Jack, “whether Swab or Swabbem, it don’t much matter—we all
must fill our place—some are luckier than others, though they might be
cousins.”
“Cousins! curse cousins, say I.”
“Same here,” said Jack; and then they both stared at each other,
believing each other cousins to Susan, though not to each other.
“I am glad you are here,” said Susan; “I have the grog for you; it is
extra strong. I know, because I put some more into it; I turned the tap
on into each, and she didn’t see me do it.”
“Ah, Susan, I see you have a great regard for me; but it is not more
than you ought, when you come to consider how I respect you,” said the
soldier.
“The same here,” said Jack, who thought this pretty good for a cousin;
“I admire Susan—she’s got such eyes, and such cheeks——”
“So she has—they are like diamonds set in roses; that they are.”
“Yes,” said Jack, “and as soft as velvet.”
“Damme,” said the soldier, “you beat me hollow. I say, messmate, where
did you learn to fire your great guns off in that manner, eh?”
“Where!” said Jack, putting the can down; “why, where there were men to
fire into us again. I’ll warrant you it was none of your field days,
where people are tearing their hearts out to look fine—no, no; the lee
scuppers ran with blood, and every heart was a true British sailor’s.”
“Well, that was good; but when I served on foreign service, there was
no getting out of the way of danger, behind a wall, stone, brick, or
wooden.”
“No, nor even laying on the ground—we had not even that; for as we
fought, we destroyed the very building which supported us, and we had
the spirits of the sea to contend against, as well as the dangers of
the fight.”
“Oh, it’s all very well,” said the soldier, “but danger’s danger, and
there’s an end of the matter; only I wish there was no such thing as
bad grog.”
“That’s a great evil. Why, what d’ye think we did at Portsmouth the day
after we landed? The landlord gave us bad grog, and how do you think we
served him? Why, we made him drink till he was so drunk he couldn’t lay
down without being afraid of falling, and then we cut his hair all off.”
“Well, I recollect a place in Portugal where they brought us some wine
which we couldn’t drink. It was horribly thin and sour. We had in vain
asked for better, but none was to be had at our bidding; indeed, we
felt sure there was better, and we determined to have it.
“We called our landlord and told him we were resolved to ruin him if he
didn’t bring it up—we would have better wine; but he protested he had
not got any.
“Now, we were resolved to search, and accordingly we did search until
we came upon some beautiful wine—some of the best port ever I tasted,
and we made free with it. At all events, we drank as much as we could
drink, and then fell fast asleep, and forgot to punish our landlord for
the rascality; but I suppose he was well aware of what he deserved, for
he endeavoured to excite some of the peasantry about to murder us while
we slept, and when we awoke, we found ourselves surrounded by a dozen
men.
“There was but three of us, but we were armed, and the peasants had
nothing but a miscellaneous description of weapons—old guns, swords,
and clubs; but they were not the men we were.
“Well, it came to a hard fight; more blows were struck, however, than
did any mischief, because we could make use of our tools, and fought so
hard, that they were glad to leave us victors.”
“Lor!” said Susan; “you don’t mean that—do you?”
“I do, indeed; but that was nothing. I frightened a whole regiment of
the enemy.”
“Eh?” said Jack; “what, a whole ship’s compliment, eh? Well, that will
do; go a-head; you beat all the cousins as ever I heard of, if you
don’t never mind me, that is all about it; a good yarn, well spun, is
worth a glass of grog at any time.”
“Well, I’ll tell you all about it; it’s sooner told than done, I can
tell you; but never mind, Susan, don’t be frightened; it’s all past
now, though it was true; but the best things must have an end some time
or other, and this had one too.
“I was serving in Spain. I fought against the French then; and though I
say so, you may depend upon it I took my chance as well as another man.
However, I had many inclinations to go a step or two beyond my strict
duty, and do more than I was obliged; but what of it? If you succeed,
you are sure to be rewarded; and I wanted, if I could, to capture a
pair of colours, which would give me a step in my regiment.
“‘Charge, my brave boys!’ shouted the colonel, as the enemy appeared
coming down upon us.
“They were three or four to one, besides a reserve at a short distance.
But we thought nothing of that; we had every reason to believe we were
outnumbered; but that was all; and we drove hard at them.
“It was a glorious sight to see us full tear at the heavy-armed
cavalry, in squadrons; but they had the advantage of weight and number
of men; yet our shock was so great, that many of the enemy were thrown
out of their saddles, and many more were killed; we hewed and hacked at
each other for some time, until, in fact, the enemy began to give way.
“As soon as we began to find out that, we urged our horses on, and
ourselves to strain our utmost, and we forced them back, and they began
to turn about in right earnest, and show us their heels.
“Unfortunately for us there were no other troops at hand to support
us. I say unfortunately, for while we were engaged in beating a larger
force than our own, and which even then outnumbered us, we were taken
in the rear by the reserve, and many men were cut down before our men
could be called off.
“Among those who were taken prisoners was myself. I had received one
or two severe wounds, which were, indeed, considered mortal; but which
were not so dangerous as they were believed.
“However, as I kept my saddle, I was taken prisoner; indeed, I was
unable to offer any resistance; my eyes were filled with blood—”
“Lor! how dreadful,” said Susan.
“It was dreadful to think of it, then; but I did not; I was too much
occupied with my desire to do my duty, so heated and excited, to think
anything about it. I was dragged away.
“Then what became of me, I don’t know; but I have some recollection of
having a cloak thrown over me; and I rode away in company with them.
I know we went away very fast, for they dreaded another charge of our
men; and they had succeeded in escaping and reforming, and they were
hovering, reinforced, upon our march.
“Well, that night, as I was deemed too badly wounded to give them any
trouble, or attempting to make an escape, they let me lie in a stable.
“I fainted away; and, after several attempts to restore me, they left
me as a hopeless case; but it was no matter to them, they didn’t
grieve. I wondered in my own mind, as to the reason of their doing
so much; but I suppose it was that prisoners were at a premium with
them at that time; and they were anxious to return as large a number
of prisoners as possible; and, upon the principle which induced the
elderly dame to attempt emptying the sea with a tea-spoon, that every
little was a help, they thought that if I lived I should be one more,
and where the numbers were small, one was of importance.
“They gave me up as a bad job altogether, and after they had racked up
their horses, they sat down for the evening to their meat and their
wine. They had been all conversing together, but they were about to lie
down and have some sleep, when suddenly I awoke from my trance, and
walked out without at all knowing what I did.
“The men stared at me, and shook like so many aspens, but did not stir,
till one of them said,—
“A ghost—a ghost!”
“This had the effect of clearing the place, for they all jumped up and
ran away from the spot, leaving me master of the place; and judging
that I was alone, I very soon made my way back to the quarters of the
English, and got to the quarters of my old regiment, where I was kindly
received, my comrades having given me up as lost.”
“Well,” said Jack Pringle, “you were very nearly gone certainly,
though you warn’t quite a ghost; but that ain’t half so bad as a
fire-ship—especially in towing a fire-ship among the enemy. I was once
on an expedition of that sort when I was in the Mediterranean.”
“Lor, a fire-ship! What’s that?” inquired Susan.
“A ship-load of fire, with lots of combustibles,” said Jack. “It’s a
thing that won’t do for a plaything.
“Well, the enemy had several, and, as we came up to them, we found they
had the wind in their favour, and the first thing they did was to put
out several of these fire-ships. But the wind was not direct for them,
it was shifting. Well, we were ordered to man the boats, and tow the
fire-ships back again amongst the enemy.
“Well, you may be sure they didn’t like that, especially when the
fire-ships blew up. They did so with a dreadful explosion, setting fire
to friend and enemy, and blowing them out of the water.
“This we did, and, as we towed the vessels along, we were fired at at
a pretty smart rate, I can tell you; why, the very sea seemed to boil
around us.”
“Lor!” said Susan, “how dreadful! Why it’s horrible here when the pot
boils, and Heaven knows what it must have been there. Why, I am sure, I
wonder how you escaped being scalded to death.”
“Why, some on ’em did get killed,” said Jack. “My starboard man was
shot through the head, and one or two more went on an errand to Davy
Jones.”
“It was lucky for them,” said Susan, “that they were sent out of the
way when there was so much danger going on around you. I am sure I
should have been glad.”
“May be so,” said Jack, turning his quid; “but I know this, them as
was sent upon that errand never came back any more; they stayed away
altogether; many of them becoming food for the sharks. However, we
towed away, and, the breeze shifting, we got pretty well among them,
and then we left the fire-ships where they ought to be, among the enemy.
“Well, we had a hard pull to get back, there being five or six ships
firing broadside after broadside at us; but they never hit the boat.
The other boat they did hit, and a shot went clean through her, and she
went down in deep water.”
“And what became of the poor men that were in it?” inquired Susan,
horrified at the detail.
“Some on ’em were drowned, and some we saved,” said Jack; “but we had
scarcely reached our own vessel, when the fire-ships blew up, setting
fire to and damaging several of the enemy, who were near at hand, and
covering the sea with bits of burning timber, and many fell into the
ships, setting fire to their rigging, and knocking men on the head, and
doing a world of mischief besides.”
“Goodness me!” said Susan, “what a dreadful thing, to be sure. I should
not like to be near a fire-ship. At all events, missus is quite a
fire-ship here.”
There were but few observations to make. Jack thought he had quieted
the dragoon, and had given him a dose of salt water; and, moreover,
Jack ogled the “maid of the inn” in such a way that speedily brought
the military hero to a sense of his danger, so, curling his moustache
with his finger, he said,—
“Well, it’s all very well talking of the dangers of the sea, but it’s
nothing to a storming party.”
“A storming party! what’s that?” inquired Susan.
“Why, I’ll tell you, my dear, and then you’ll know all about it. You
see, we were at the siege of Bangpowder.”
“Never heard of such a place,” interposed Jack; “what’s the bearing of
that outlandish place?”
“Oh, never there, eh?” said the dragoon, contemptuously; “then you
don’t know it. Talk of danger, you should have been there, and you
would have known what danger was. However, I’ll enlighten your
ignorance.
“You must see, Susan, my dear, that at Bangpowder we were very little
use in the way of assisting the siege, except that we acted as
outposts—foraging parties—and kept off the light troops of the enemy
when they shewed themselves, while the infantry set to work in the
trenches to work the guns.
[Illustration: Jack Pringle and the dragoon swap tall tales to impress
Susan.]
“They did work them above a bit, too. For weeks together there was
firing day and night, on our side and on theirs, so the air was never
without a strong smell of gunpowder, which you might smell for twelve
leagues quite strong.”
“Lor!” said Susan.
“Smash my timbers,” said Jack Pringle, “if you ain’t a coming it strong
this time.”
“Well,” continued the dragoon, taking no notice of what was said;
“well, that was nothing—that was a mere trifle. After some weeks’
firing, we made a hole in the wall, which increased day after day until
big enough for a man to enter.
“After that, a storming party was ordered; but, after more than
one attempt, our men gave it up as a bad job. Our captain, being a
dare-devil sort of fellow, and not liking to see men beaten back, said
the breach was practicable, and could be entered.
“This was denied by the officers and men who had been defeated, and he
said if his own troop would volunteer, he would undertake to enter the
place.
“This was told us, and we all at once volunteered to follow him to the
devil, if he chose to go.
“He at once informed the commander-in-chief, and we were ordered to
mount the breech. To do this we of course dismounted, and went on foot.
“There was some little excitement upon this matter, but we were cheered
as we passed, and when we arrived within a few yards of the walls, we
were met by a tremendous fire of all arms.
“This, however, did not daunt us, though it thinned our ranks, and we
were less in number; but up the breech we went, one man at a time. Six
of them, one after another, were knocked over dead as herrings. Well,
the men began to look blue over this; they wouldn’t have minded rushing
on in a body, and giving and taking till they all died; but to get on
the top of a brick wall, one at a time, to be shot at, why it was more
than they liked, especially as they had not struck one blow, or fired a
single shot in return.
“‘Hurrah, lads!’ said I; ‘I’ll have a shy, now; come on, and follow me
quick.’
“I jumped up and cleared the wall, though a thousand bullets were
fired, and got over clear without a shot, save one, that shaved some of
my whisker off.
“We all got over, and soon after we were followed by some of the other
regiments, and the place was our own; but we were nearly stripped
naked.”
“Oh, lor! how was that?” inquired Susan, interested.
“Why, we had so many narrow escapes, that our clothes were all shot to
shreds.”
“Goodness!”
“Oh, but it is true,” said the dragoon rising, and going out of the
kitchen.
In a few moments afterwards Susan left it also, and Jack, after turning
his quid, and squirting the tobacco juice on the floor, rose, and
hitching up his trousers with a preliminary “damme!” left the kitchen
also; but he hadn’t got far, when, oh, horror! he perceived Susan in
the arms of the dragoon, whose moustachioed lips more than once met
hers.
“Sink the ship,” muttered Jack, “here’s a pretty go—the black-looking
piratical thief.”
But Jack’s peace was soon held, and he listened to an assignation which
Jack was determined he would keep himself, to the discomfiture of the
dragoon.
Having made up his mind upon this point, he returned to the kitchen,
and Susan also in a very few moments; but Jack pretended to be asleep,
and wouldn’t speak to her, because he thought she hadn’t behaved
well in this affair of the dragoon; he was resolved, however, in
substituting himself for the soldier, or, at all events, of making a
row.
The time came and Jack stationed himself upon a position where he
could with ease lift the dragoon into the water-butt below, in case he
offered any opposition to the substitution before named.
The moment came round, and the dragoon was seen slowly and cautiously
mounting the way to the window of Susan. It was a kind of leads just
above the water-butt, accessible by means of some wooden steps.
“Avast, there,” said Jack, when he got up to the level with the top.
“What do you do there?”
“What is that to you?” inquired the dragoon.
“A great deal,” replied Jack; “but you don’t come here—I heard all
about it; but I tell you what, you ain’t a coming here, at all events.”
“But I am.”
“Don’t attempt, or I’ll sink you. I will, by all that’s good—so keep
back, and go away.”
“I’ll see you d—d first,” said the dragoon. “I have mounted a worse
breach than this before to-day; but I suspect there isn’t much danger
here.”
He ran up, and soon faced Jack, who seized him round the waist, would
have lifted him up in his arms, and could have thrown him into the
water-butt, only Jack’s foot suddenly slipped, and he fell down, the
soldier upon him, who in an instant regained his feet, and rolled Jack
over and over, until he came to the water-butt.
Into this Jack went, head first, and kicked and floundered about; and
if the water-butt had not been very rotten, and gave way, letting all
the water escape, it is very doubtful if Jack would not have found a
watery grave in the confined space of a water-butt.
As it was, he was more than blind and breathless, and sat down in the
midst of the water on the stones, to recover himself from the immersion
he had undergone.
CHAPTER CXVII.
THE PROPOSAL OF JACK PRINGLE TO TAKE ANDERSON TO THE WEDDING.
A circumstance now occurred which soon enabled Jack Pringle to console
himself for the misadventure he had had, which he was delighted
to think was not known to any of those persons with whom he came
ordinarily into contact.
The pleasant circumstance to which we allude, was the reception of a
letter from the admiral, and by the mere fact of his writing such an
epistle to Jack, it would seem to be perfectly true that he really felt
unhappy without the companionship of that worthy.
The letter was to the following effect:—
“Jack, you mutinous rascal, your leave of absence has expired, and you
know you ought to have a round dozen when you come back to your ship;
but as it turns out you may stay where you are, for a reason that I am
going to tell you.
“There is to be a wedding at the very place where you are staying,
between some odd fish, a Baron Something, I don’t know who; but as we
have been all invited, we are coming down the whole lot of us, and
shall arrive on Thursday, so that you may look out from the mast-head
as soon as you like, and you will see us coming with all sails set.
“No more at present from, you vagabond, you know who.”
“What an affectionate letter,” said Jack; “I knew the old fellow
couldn’t do without me long—he is quite an old baby, that’s what he
is; and if I wasn’t to take a little notice of him, he would be as
miserable as possible. Hilloa! What cheer? have you come back?”
These last words were addressed to James Anderson, who at that moment
made his appearance in the cottage of the old seaman, he having just
left the house of the Williamses, after the painful interview which we
have recorded took place between him and Mrs. Williams, during which
she had succeeded in convincing him that all his hopes, as regarded
Helen, were crushed completely.
The appearance of deep dejection that was upon his countenance was
such, as to convince Jack Pringle the nature of the business he had
been upon, and he cried,—
“Come, come—cheer up, man. I guess, now, you have been looking after
that sweetheart of yours, who is no better than she should be.”
“I have, indeed,” said James Anderson, “been to extinguish all
hope—nothing now lives in my breast but despair. I shall proceed to
London at once, to make my report to the Admiralty, as it is my duty to
do so; and, after that, I care not what becomes of me.”
“Stuff, stuff,” said Jack; “I have got some news for you. My old
admiral, that I take care of, has had an invitation to the very
wedding, as I take it to be, of your old sweetheart.”
“What! is it possible—do you mean an invitation to Helen Williams’s
wedding with the Baron Stolmuyer of Saltzburgh?”
“Yes, I do; that’s just what I do mean, and no mistake. Here is his
letter which he has written to me to go, and I think I shall let the
old fellow, for it will amuse him. Just read that.”
Jack handed the admiral’s letter to James Anderson, which he read with
a great deal of interest, and when he had concluded, he said,—
“Mr. Pringle, a sudden thought strikes me——”
“About ship,” said Jack, “and begin again. I told you before not to
call me Mr. Pringle—I cannot stand it. Call me Jack, and then go on
telling me what your sudden thought is.”
“Well, then, Jack, my sudden thought is this, that your friend the
admiral might be induced, upon your representation, to let me join
his party, and I would take care to conceal my features and general
appearance so that I should not be known, while I had the mournful
satisfaction of taking a last look upon that occasion of her who I have
loved, before she becomes irrecoverably the wife of another.”
“If you wish it,” said Jack, “it shall be done. I’ll undertake there
shall be no objection on the part of the admiral; and as for the
Bannerworths, they are good sort of people, and would do all they can
for anybody, I am sure.”
“I should take it as a peculiar favour; for although I feel now that my
hopes are blasted, and I can have no possible expectation of beholding
her with eyes of pleasure, I still wish to look upon her, that I may
see if anything of regret is upon her countenance, or if she has quite
forgotten the past.”
“Say no more,” said Jack, “but consider it as done. I’d take care
though, if I were you, that she did not find me out; for I wouldn’t let
the finest woman that ever breathed—no, not if she was seven feet high,
and as big as a hogshead—fancy that I cared so much for her as to go
to her wedding after she had jilted me.”
“She shall not see me,” said James Anderson; “she shall not see me,
you may depend; for, without doubt, the guests will be very numerous,
so that I can easily keep myself in the back-ground, and look upon her
face without her being at all aware of the presence of such a person at
the ceremony.”
“Yes, you can manage that; and, if I were you, just as I was going
away, I’d give the baron a jolly good kick, and tell him you wished him
joy of his bargain. I wouldn’t do anything violent, you know, but a
little quiet thing like that would just show them all what you thought
of the business.”
“A sense of my wrongs,” said James Anderson, “should not extinguish a
sense of justice; and I have no means of knowing that the baron is at
all in fault in this matter.”
“Oh, you are too nice by one half. If a fellow takes away my
sweetheart, hang me if I care who is at fault.”
“Oh, but it is necessary that we should be just at all events; but
still, Jack, accept my sincerest thanks for placing me in the way of
looking upon Helen. I’d rather see that she was happy and contented
with her lot, than I would observe evidences upon her face of any
passionate regret. The former would reconcile me, by making me think
I had made a great mistake in the object of my attachment; while the
latter would leave in my heart a never ceasing pain.”
“Gammon,” said Jack.
“I fear I tax your patience, Jack Pringle, when I talk in such a strain
as this.”
“I’ll be hanged if you don’t. What do you mean by it? There is lots
of women in the world. I have no patience with a fellow that, because
one girl uses him ill, goes snivelling and crying about his feelings,
and his agony, and his chest, and all that sort of thing. I should
recommend a bottle of rum.”
“Well, well, Jack, it may happen some day with even you, and then you
may feel some of the mental agony of knowing that another has possessed
himself of her whom you thought all your own.”
This was hitting Jack rather hard, although James Anderson did not know
it; so he said,—
“Ah, well, to be sure, there is something in that, after all, and I
don’t mean to say there ain’t; but, however, keep up your heart, my
boy, and there is no saying what may happen yet.”
“Alas! there can nothing happen that can give me pleasure; all is lost
now, and the only hope I can have, is to forget.”
Jack would have written a letter back to the admiral in reply to the
one which he had received, only that somehow or other he was not a
first-rate penman; and as he said it was such a bother to know where
to begin, and when you did begin, it was such a bother to know where
to leave off, that, taking all things into consideration, he rather on
the whole declined writing at all; and, as the appointed day was near
at hand, on which the wedding was to take place, he thought it would do
quite as well if he kept the look out which the admiral had suggested
for the arrival of the Bannerworths.
As for the scheme of James Anderson to be present at the wedding, the
more Jack thought of it, the more he liked it, because he considered
that it afforded a chance, at all events, if not a good prospect, of as
general a disturbance as any that had ever existed.
“Lor! what fun,” he said, “if he would but kick the baron, and then
if the baron would but fall foul of him, and the girl scream, and old
mother Williams go into hysterics. That would be a lark, and no doubt
about it; shouldn’t I enjoy it above a bit. I’d give them a helping
hand somehow or another; and then, who knows but the girl may have been
regularly badgered by the old cat of a mother into the match, and may
wish for all the world to get out of it.”
There can be no doubt but that if Helen Williams, even at that last
moment, chose to make any appeal, it would not be made in vain to Jack
Pringle, who, with all his faults, and they were numerous enough, had
in his heart a chivalrous love of right, and a hatred of anything in
the shape of oppression, which nothing could subdue; and such qualities
as these surely are amply sufficient to atone for a multitude of minor
errors, which were more those of habit and defective education, than
anything else.
It very much delighted him to think that the admiral and the
Bannerworths were coming down to Anderbury, because such a fact not
only prolonged his stay there, which he was pleased it should do,
because he was really very much delighted with the place, but it at the
same time threw him again into the company he so much liked; and his
attachment to the Bannerworth family had really become quite a strong
feeling.
He waited quite with impatience until the Thursday came on which the
admiral had announced his arrival; and instead of being in the town,
or on the outskirts, to watch for him, which would have been but a
tiresome operation, Jack walked boldly on to meet them by the high
road, which he knew they must traverse.
After he had gone about four miles, he had the satisfaction of seeing,
in the distance, a travelling-carriage, manned, as he called it, with
four horses, rapidly approaching, and Jack immediately produced a large
silk handkerchief that he had purchased, which was a representation of
the national flag of Great Britain. This he fastened to the end of a
stick, and commenced waving it about as a signal to the admiral of his
presence in the road.
At this moment, too, it happened, fortunately for Jack Pringle, as he
considered, that a man came across a stile in the immediate vicinity
where he was with a gun in his hand.
“Hilloa, friend,” said Jack Pringle, “just let me look at that gun a
minute.”
“I’ll see you further first,” said the man; “you seem to me as if you
were out of your mind.”
So saying, he levelled the piece at some birds which were flying
over-head, and fired first one barrel and then the other in rapid
succession.
“Thank ye,” said Jack, “that was all I wanted; and it will answer my
purpose exactly; there is nothing like, when you display your flag,
firing a gun or two. It’s all right—he sees me, he sees me.”
The admiral had actually been looking from the window of the carriage,
although he had not expected to see Jack quite so soon; but the
appearance of the handkerchief, which was made so much to resemble
a flag, convinced him of the fact that Jack had come that distance
to meet them; and when he heard the gun fired twice, he was quite
delighted, and leaning back in the carriage, he cried,—
“Ah, Flora, my dear, it is a great pity that Jack is so given to rum,
for he is a remarkably clever fellow. You would hardly believe it, now,
but he has contrived to hoist a flag just because he sees me coming.”
“Indeed, uncle.”
“Yes, my dear, he has; and didn’t you hear that he actually managed to
fire a couple of guns, some way or another?”
“I certainly did hear the report, but had no idea that we were indebted
to Jack Pringle’s management for them.”
“Oh, yes, I can see him a short distance ahead. He is lying to, now;
and, if the wind wasn’t against us, we should be up to him in a few
minutes, but don’t you feel it blowing in your face?”
Notwithstanding the admiral considered, which he certainly did, that
the wind was a real impediment to the progress of the carriage, they
did in a few moments reach to where Jack Pringle was waiting, when the
admiral called out from the window in a loud voice,—
“Hilloa! what ship, and where are you bound to?”
“The Jack Pringle,” was the reply, “from Anderbury, and to fall in with
the Admiral Bell, convoy of the pretty Flora.”
“There now,” said the admiral; “didn’t I tell you what a clever fellow
Jack was? What shore-going humbug, who had never been to sea, would
have thought of such a thing?”
“Well,” said Jack, as he walked up to the coach window, for the
postillions had been ordered to halt, or, as the admiral had expressed
it, “to heave to,” “well, here you are, all of you.”
“Yes, Jack,” said the admiral; “and I was just saying I thought you a
very clever fellow.”
“I am sorry I can’t return the compliment, you poor old creature,” said
Jack; “I hope you haven’t got yourself into any trouble since I have
been away from you. What a miserable old hulk you do look, to be sure.
There you go, again; now you are getting into a passion, as usual; what
a dreadful thing temper is, to be sure, when you can’t manage it.”
Jack scrambled up behind into the rumble before the admiral could make
any reply to him, for indignation stopped his utterance a moment or
two; and, when he did speak, it was to Flora he addressed himself more
particularly, saying,—
“Now, did you ever know a more ungrateful son-of-a-gun than that? After
I had just told him that I thought him a clever fellow, for him to
burst out abusing me at that rate! Now I have done with him.”
“Oh, you may depend, Admiral Bell,” said Flora, “that he don’t at all
mean what he says; and I am convinced that he entertains for you the
highest possible respect, and that he is only jesting when he uses
those expressions which would seem as if it were otherwise.”
“Let’s just wait,” said the admiral, “till the wedding is over, and
then I’ll let him know whether a boatswain is to make a joke of an
admiral of the fleet.
CHAPTER CXVIII.
THE BARON’S PREPARATIONS FOR THE MARRIAGE, AND THE WEDDING MORNING.
During this time neither Mrs. Williams nor the Baron Stolmuyer were
idle spectators of the progress of the hours; but, on the contrary,
they made the best possible use of the week which was to elapse before
the marriage ceremony took place after Helen had given her consent to
it.
Five hundred pounds in the hands of such a person as Mrs. Williams,
will go a long way, and produce an amazing amount of show and glitter;
so that she managed, before the day on which the ceremony was to be
performed arrived, to make quite certain that herself and her daughters
would present a most dazzling appearance; and she thought it not at all
improbable that even at the very church some meritorious individual
might be dazzled into thinking of matrimony with one of her other
daughters, upon seeing what a brilliant appearance they managed to
present upon the marriage of Helen.
“I am quite sure that no harm can come of it,” she said, “if no
good does; and, at all events if no good is done at the church, the
baron will soon be giving parties enough to bring out the dear girls
to perfection, particularly as I fully intend we shall all live at
Anderbury House.”
Mrs. Williams considered this as a settled point, whether the baron
liked it or not; and, knowing as she did the gentle and quiet
disposition of Helen, she did not doubt for a moment of being permitted
to rule completely over the domestic affairs of her establishment. All
this was amazingly satisfactory to such a lady as Mrs. Williams, and
the very thing of all others she would have liked, had she been looking
out for what would please her in the marriage of her daughter.
We shall shortly see how these views and opinions were verified by the
fact.
All the other preparations were left to the baron; and when he wrote
a letter to Mrs. Williams, saying, that he would be ready by ten
o’clock on the morning which had been named for the nuptials, and would
send one of his carriages for the bride, Mrs. Williams was perfectly
satisfied that all was quite correct.
There was no very good excuse for calling at Anderbury House; but, if
she had then called, she certainly would have been astonished at the
preparations which the baron was making for that day which was so near
at hand.
It was quite terrific the expense he went to; and the gorgeous manner
in which he fitted up one of the largest apartments in the house for a
dance looked really like expenditure of the most reckless character,
and such as indeed it must have required an immense fortune to
withstand.
The walls of that apartment were hung with crimson draperies of a rich
texture, and such beauty of design that they were the admiration of the
very workmen themselves who were employed upon the premises.
Then the magnificent order he gave for a feast upon the occasion,
and the wines he laid in, really almost exceeded belief; and such
proceedings were indeed highly calculated to give people most
exaggerated versions regarding his wealth.
He had indeed mentioned to Mrs. Williams, that he had silver mines
on some of his estates abroad; and that fact to her mind was quite
sufficient to account for any amount of money he might possess,
because, to her ideas of geology and mineralogy, the discovery of a
silver mine meant, finding a hole of immense width and depth, crammed
with the precious metal.
But be this as it may, and whether the Baron Stolmuyer, of Saltzburgh,
owed his wealth to silver mines, or to other sources, one thing was
quite clear, and that was, that he had it.
And that was the grand point; for in a highly civilised and evangelical
country like this, the question of how a man got his money is not
near so often asked, as, has he got it; and it is quite amazing what
liberality of feeling and sentiment is immediately infused into people
by the fact of successful speculation of any kind; while failure
immediately incurs the greatest of opprobrium and contempt.
And now the day was so close at hand, that Mrs. Williams got into a
terrible flutter of spirits, and began really to wish it over; for she
was completely ready, and each minute became an hour of impatience to
her.
She was continually bothering the baron with notes and messages upon
different subjects, and he had the urbanity to answer two or three of
them; but he soon left that off, and the last half dozen, at the least,
were, to Mrs. Williams’s great mortification, taken no notice of at all.
Some of these notes were upon the most nonsensical points, and several
of them, although they did not actually ask it, pretty strongly hinted
that more money would be a very desirable thing.
The baron would not understand any hint, however, upon the subject; so
Mrs. Williams became fully convinced that she must make the best of it
she could, and put up for the present with the five hundred pounds she
had already received.
But when the day had actually dawned on when the auspicious event was
to come off, and, upon looking around her, she found herself surrounded
by gay apparel and jewellery, she almost dreaded that even yet it
would turn out to be some delusion, or a dream, for she could scarcely
believe in the reality of such glory and magnificence belonging to her.
But facts are stubborn things, and, whether for good or for evil, are
not likely to be got over; so, when she looked out of the windows
and saw that a bright morning’s sun was shining, and that the life,
animation, and bustle of the day was commencing, she told herself that
it was, indeed, real, and that she had reached very nearly the summit
of her desires and expectations.
“Yes,” she exclaimed; “I shall be mother-in-law to a baron; and I dare
say I shall have at least twenty servants in Anderbury House to command
and control continually.”
A more gratifying reflection than this could not possibly have
presented itself to Mrs. Williams; for if any one thing could be more
delightful than another, it certainly was that kind of petty power
which gives an individual a control over a large establishment.
After she had arisen on that eventful morning, she did not allow her
establishment many minutes’ repose; but, in the course of half-an-hour,
all was bustle, excitement, and no small share of confusion.
And while she was thus energetically pushing on her preparations, let
us see what the Bannerworths are about, now that they have fairly
arrived at Anderbury, and are in readiness, probably, to be present at
the ceremony.
By Flora’s intercession, a peace was established between Jack and
the admiral; and the former took the latter down to the old seaman’s
cottage, in order to introduce him to James Anderson; and on the road
he made him acquainted with the particulars of the young man’s story;
at the same time informing him of the wish that Anderson had expressed
to be permitted to join their party.
“Oh, certainly,” said the admiral, “certainly; let him come by all
means, although I must say that he ought to leave for London, at once,
with his despatches, or at all events with the news that he had lost
them. However, I am not on active service; and, therefore, have no
right to do anything more than advise him in the matter.”
“Oh, he will go,” said Jack, “as soon as he has seen his sweetheart,
and perhaps kicked the baron; for though he said he wouldn’t, I live in
hopes yet that he will be aggravated enough to do it.”
The admiral liked James Anderson so much, that he not only promised
him he should go to the wedding under cover of the general invitation
which he, the admiral, had received, but he proposed, likewise,
that he should come home with him at once and be introduced to the
Bannerworths; and by home he meant the inn at Anderbury, where they
were staying.
The young man expressed himself highly gratified at this invitation,
and at once accepted it, so that they walked towards the inn together,
and began to make preparations for their appearance at Anderbury House.
Flora and the Bannerworths, as well as Charles, received young Anderson
very graciously, and they each expressed to him their sympathy for the
painful situation in which the baron’s marriage was placing him.
Flora and Charles Holland, as may be well supposed, could both feel,
and feel acutely too for any one crossed in his affection, as poor
James Anderson was; and it certainly much damped the satisfaction they
had in going to what everybody told them would certainly be the most
brilliant wedding that had taken place in that part of the country for
many a year.
“Let us hope,” said Henry Bannerworth, “that you will find some other,
Mr. Anderson, who will be more worthy of your esteem, than she who has
treated so lightly your affection and her own faith.”
“I know not,” said Anderson, “whether to accuse her not; for who knows
but after all she may be the victim of treachery, notwithstanding the
apparent powerful evidence that has been given to me by her mother?”
The Bannerworth family were determined, and so was the admiral, that
they would bestow what credit they could upon those who had so kindly
invited them; and, accordingly, when they started for the Hall in
the handsome carriage which had brought them down to Anderbury, they
certainly presented a rather showy and attractive appearance.
But still when they reached the entrance to Anderbury House, they found
that their’s was by no means the only equipage of the kind that was
there to be seen; for although both the entrances were open for the
reception of guests, they had to wait a considerable time before they
could get up to either of them.
One hundred and fifty guests, sixty or eighty of whom kept equipages,
were calculated to make some little degree of confusion; but when the
Bannerworth family fairly got within the house, everything else was
forgotten in their admiration of the brilliant arrangements within.
The richest carpets were laid down that money could purchase, and
servants in gorgeous liveries ushered the guests into an immense
hall, in which the marriage ceremony was to take place, and which was
decorated with a splendour that was perfectly regal.
And here a new set of domestics glided noiselessly about with various
refreshments upon silver salvers, and the place began rapidly to fill
with such an assemblage of wealth, and beauty, and rank, as perhaps
scarcely ever had been congregated in one place before.
But among those whose beauty attracted much attention, we may need well
reckon our friend, Flora Bell, as she was now properly called, and
whose sweet countenance was the cause of many a passing observation,
couched in the most flattering terms.
It wanted yet an hour to the time of the ceremony being performed, and
the Bannerworths, as they saw that their companion, young Anderson, was
in a painful state of excitement, all sat down in the deep recess of a
large window to wait the coming of the bride and bridegroom.
“I don’t think, Mr. Anderson,” said Henry, “that your coming here at
all was a well advised step; but since you are here, you should muster
up resolution enough not to betray any feeling.”
“I will not betray it, although I feel it,” said Anderson. “Rely upon
it, that I shall look much firmer, and act much firmer when she whom
I wish to see is actually here, than I do at present—I am enduring
suspense now, and that is the worst of all.”
“I do wish,” interposed Flora, “that you had seen her whom you love
before this ceremony, for in that case, although you might have endured
the pang of finding that she was willing to call herself another’s, you
would have been spared the pain of this day’s proceeding.”
“I wish to Heaven I had seen her; but I knew not how to arrange such
a meeting; and when I was shewn, in her own handwriting—which I knew
too well to doubt—a consent to be the wife of another, I no longer
had the spirit and the perseverance to ask to see her; and it was an
afterthought that made me wish to look upon her face once more before I
left her for ever.”
“What,” said Jack Pringle, suddenly making his appearance, “is he
gammoning you with his feelings?”
“Oh! so you have got in, have you?” said the admiral.
“So I have got in—why, what do you mean by that? Of course I have got
in; wasn’t I invited? I do think you get a little stupider every day;
and, in course of time, you won’t know what you are about. I should not
be surprised to see you take out your handkerchief to blow your eye
instead of your nose.”
Latterly, Jack, when he made one of these speeches, always walked
away very quickly, leaving the admiral’s anger to evaporate as best
it might; so that he escaped the retort which otherwise he might have
received.
CHAPTER CXIX.
A RATHER STRANGE CIRCUMSTANCE AT THE BARON’S WEDDING.
At length, the hour came, so anxiously looked for and expected by all
the Baron Stolmuyer’s guests; and the great clock which was in one of
the turrets of Anderbury House proclaimed that the minute had arrived
when all was presumed to be ready for the union.
All eyes were directed to a large table that was placed at one
extremity of the hall, and covered with crimson velvet, and at which
the ceremony was to be performed.
The Bannerworths were a little forward, so that they commanded a
good view of everything, and James Anderson was completely hidden
from observation behind the bulky form of the admiral. Now, a small
door opened, and an archdeacon somebody—who had been engaged, as you
would engage a celebrated performer, at some theatre, to perform
the ceremony—made his appearance, accompanied by several ladies and
gentlemen, whom he had brought with him to partake of some of the
baron’s good things.
In a few moments, from another doorway, came the bride, accompanied
by six bridesmaids, but she was covered with such a massive lace
veil from her head to her feet, that not the slightest vestige of her
countenance was visible.
But, still, Flora thought that, as the bride first came in, she heard
from beneath that veil a deep and agonised sob; and she remarked the
circumstance to Charles, who confirmed her opinion by at once saying,—
“It was so, and I don’t think it at all likely that we should both be
mistaken.”
There was a slight murmur of applause and admiration among the
assembled guests as the bride took her seat by the table; for although
there were many there who had never seen her face, there were likewise
many who had; and even those who had not, could not but perceive, by
her graceful movements and the delicate outline of her figure, that
they were looking upon a creature of rare beauty and worth.
It was astonishing that the bridegroom should be late, and the audience
who were present began to be indignant at such a fact, and whispered
together concerning it in language not very flattering to the baronet,
who, had he heard it, would have found that he must mind what he was
about, or his rapidly-acquired popularity would soon be at a discount.
Minute after minute thus passed, and Mrs. Williams, who was attired in
a richly-flowing garment of white silk, embroidered with flowers, began
to be in a most particular fidget.
“Where could be the baron—good God! where is the baron?” and some one
or two said, “D—n the baron!” When suddenly the door at which the bride
had entered was again flung open, and two servants in rich liveries
made their appearance, one standing on each side of it. Then there was
heard approaching a slow and measured footstep, and presently, attired
in a court suit of rich velvet, the Baron Stolmuyer of Saltzburgh
appeared in the hall, and marched up to the table.
He had but just time to execute half a bow to the assembled multitude,
when Admiral Bell called out in a voice that awakened every echo in the
place,—
“It’s Varney, the vampyre, by G—d!”
[Illustration: Admiral Bell identifies the baron as Varney, the
vampyre.]
• • • • •
Yes, it was Varney—the bold, reckless, audacious Varney, who had thus
come out in a new character, and, with vast pecuniary resources,
acquired Heavens knows how or where, was seeking to ally himself to one
so young and beautiful as Helen Williams.
We do absolutely and positively despair of giving an adequate idea to
the reader of the scene that followed.
Ladies shrieked—the bride fainted—Mrs. Williams went into strong
hysterics, and kicked everybody—Jack Pringle shouted until he was
hoarse; while Varney turned and made a dash to escape through the door
at which he had just entered.
James Anderson, however, by springing over a table, succeeded in
clutching him by the collar behind; but Varney turned on the instant,
and lifting him from the ground as if he had been a child, he flung him
among a tray of confectionery and wine, and from thence he rolled into
Mrs. Williams’s lap.
Following close, however, upon the footsteps of Anderson in pursuit of
Varney had been Henry Bannerworth; but he accomplished nothing, except
to strike his head violently against the door through which Varney
escaped, and which was dashed in his face, and immediately bolted on
the other side.
“He is a vampyre,” shouted the admiral—“I tell you all he is a
vampyre—Varney, the vampyre, and no more a baron than I am a
broomstick. Stop that d—d old woman from making such a noise.”
“It’s the bride’s mother,” said somebody.
“What’s that to me?” roared the admiral; “it don’t make her a bit less
of a nuisance. I offer a hundred pounds reward for Varney, the vampyre;
and there must be some people here that know the house well enough to
catch him.”
“Do you mean a hundred pounds for master, sir?” said a great footman,
with yellow plush breeches.
“Yes, I do, you hog in armour,” said the admiral.
The footman rushed through another doorway in a moment, and then Jack
Pringle jumped upon a chair, and, waving his hat, cried,—
“Hurra, hurra, hurra! Three cheers for old Varney! I’ll tell you what
it is, messmates, he is the meanest fellow as ever you see; and as for
you ladies who have been disappointed of the marriage, I’ll come and
kiss you all in a minute, and we’ll drink up old Varney’s wine, and
eat up his dinner like bricks. My eye, what a game we will have, to be
sure. I am coming——”
At this moment the admiral gave such a kick to one of the hind legs
of the chair, that down came Jack as quickly as if he had disappeared
through some trap-door.
“Hold your noise, will you,” said the admiral, “you great brawling
brute!”
“I’ll settle him,” said Mrs. Williams, who had suddenly recovered;
and had not Jack suddenly made his escape, it is highly probable she
would have make him a regular scape-goat in the affair, and that he
alone—for Anderson had pretty quickly escaped her—would have felt the
consequences of her deep disappointment.
The confusion now became, if anything, worse than at first, for many
of the guests who had looked on apparently quite stunned and paralyzed
at what had taken place, now recovered, and joined their voices to the
general clamour.
Some, to rush out of the place, took the opportunity of going through
the different rooms; while a number, who had heard of the wide-spread
fame of Varney, the vampyre, and who were utterly astonished to find
him and the baron one and the same person, joined in the pursuit, with
the hope of taking prisoner so alarming a personage.
No one knew for some time what had become of the clergyman, until Jack
Pringle saw a human foot sticking out from under the table, upon which
he took hold of it, and with a pull dragged the archdeacon somebody
fairly out, to the great horror of some very religious old ladies who
were present, who considered that an archdeacon must be somebody very
wonderful indeed.
“Hilloa! Mr. Parson,” said Jack; “I suppose you thought it was your
old friend the devil come for you before your time; but cheer up, I
know him; it’s only a vampyre, and that’s nothing when you’re used to
it.”
Jack did not seem at all to think that it was necessary he should
assist in the capture of Varney, and probably the real fact was, he did
not care whether Varney was captured or not, so he walked to one of the
tables which were loaded with refreshments, and knocking the neck off a
bottle of champagne, he gave a nod to Mrs. Williams, saying,—
“Come, old girl, take something to drink. That red nose of yours looks
as if you knew something of the bottle. It’s only me, so you needn’t be
shy. Ah, it’s devilish good wine, though. I do give old Varney credit
for getting up the thing decently, which he certainly has, and no
mistake.”
“Who has seen my daughter? Where is my daughter?” cried Mrs. Williams,
as she looked about her in vain for Helen.
“You needn’t trouble yourself, ma’am,” said the admiral; “she has just
walked off with a little fellow of the name of Anderson, who, although
he was no match for Varney, the vampyre, I think will turn out to be
one for your daughter.”
Mrs. Williams was thoroughly thunderstricken, and she sat down in a
chair, and commenced wringing her hands, muttering as she did so,—
“Oh, that I should have lived to see this day. Oh, that I should have
existed to be so—so——”
“Jolly well humbugged, ma’am,” said Jack Pringle, “with a vampyre,
instead of a baron; why, lord bless you, ma’am, nobody in their
senses would have taken old Varney for a baron; why, he is a regular
old blood-sucker, he is, and a nice family you would have had; but,
however, if you are fond of him, you can marry him yourself, you know,
now; and I shouldn’t at all wonder, but he will consent, for a man will
put up with any d—d old cat, when he finds he can’t get a better.”
“Good God,” said Mrs. Williams, “I think I know your voice now; ain’t
you Admiral Green?”
“Avast, there,” said Jack; “I ain’t anything of the kind; they calls me
Colonel Bluebottle, of the horse-marines.”
“The what?”
“The horse-marines. Didn’t you never hear of them, ma’am?”
“I certainly never did. But don’t try to deceive me, sir; you are
Admiral Green and if you will, my dear sir, spare me a few minutes of
your valuable time, I shall be able to explain to you——”
“What?” said Jack.
“Why, that really—you will scarcely believe it—but really, Admiral
Green, my daughter Julia is, although I say it, one of the best of
girls.”
“Oh, I dare say she is, ma’am; but I don’t know as that much matters to
me.”
“Excuse me, Admiral Green, but it really does, and you must know—of
course it’s quite between ourselves this—that she happened to see you
when you did me the honour of calling upon me.”
“Did she really?”
“Yes, my dear admiral; and, do you know, ever since then she has been
positively raving about you; and as you were good enough to say, the
baron should not stand in the way of your affections, allow me to
recommend Julia to you.”
“Oh, that’s it, is it!” said Jack. “Well, ma’am, I should not have said
no, only that you ain’t half particular enough for me!”
“Not particular! Oh, good God.”
“No, ma’am, you ain’t. Here you would have married one of your
daughters to a vampyre, and how do I know what other sort of odd fish
you might bring into the family.”
“But, my dear Admiral——”
“Oh! gammon. I tell you what, now, I will do—I don’t mind standing
something devilish handsome, if you will marry old Varney yourself.”
“What! the baron that was, and the vampyre that is? I marry him! Oh,
dear, no, I really could not—that is to say, how much would you give,
Admiral Green?”
“Ah!” said Jack, “I knew it. Who says, after this, that women won’t
marry the very devil himself, if they only have the chance. And now,
Mother Williams, I’ll just tell you what you have done. The fact is, I
took a fancy to you myself, and that’s why I came here at all to-day.
I meant to have proposed to you, and if you had only said you would
not have the Baron Vampyre for any money, d—n it, I would have had you
myself, and settled a matter of £15,000 a-year upon you.”
“Oh, gracious Providence! what do I hear?”
“Just what I says. I’m a man of my word, ma’am, and would have done it.”
Mrs. Williams was so affected at the chance she had lost, that she
quite forgot to look after Helen, but was actually compelled to indulge
herself with a glass or two of something strong and powerful, which she
said was sherry, but which somebody else said was brandy, in order to
recover from the faint feeling that would come over her.
After this, Jack thought he had had about the bitterest revenge upon
Mrs. Williams that it was possible to achieve, and he was quite right
as far as that went. The old admiral, too, who overheard some part of
the colloquy, was quite delighted with it, and again told himself what
a clever fellow Jack was, and quite a wonderful character in his way.
“Ah!” he said, “one would have to sail a tolerable lot of voyages
before finding anybody as was exactly Jack’s equal; and I’ll be hanged
if I don’t forgive him for the next piece of mutinous conduct he is
guilty of, on account of the way he has served out that horrid old
Mother Williams; for in all my life I never saw a woman I disliked
more. Stop, what am I saying? Did I really forget Mrs. Chillingworth,
the doctor’s wife? That was too bad.”
CHAPTER CXX.
THE HUNT FOR THE VAMPYRE IN THE SUBTERRANEAN PASSAGE.
The information that had been given to Mrs. Williams respecting her
daughter and James Anderson having together left the great hall of
Anderbury House, was perfectly correct.
The voice of Anderson, whispering words of affection in the ear of
Helen, was sufficient to arouse her from the state of syncope into
which she had fallen; and when she recovered and looked in his face,
the expression of joy which her countenance wore, at once dispelled all
his doubts.
“Helen, dear Helen!” he whispered; “are you, indeed, still, in heart,
mine?”
“Still, as ever,” she replied.
“Come with me; I have much to tell you; and we need not heed the
thoughts and feelings of the throng that is here. If you can walk,
place your arm in mine, and lean upon me, and we will get out of all
this trouble and confusion.”
Helen was but too glad to avail herself of such an offer, and she
accordingly at once did so; and leaning for support upon that arm,
which, of all others, she most loved to bear upon, they together passed
out of the great hall, through one of the numerous doorways leading
from it.
Being both of them quite ignorant of what may be called the topography
of Anderbury House, they went on till they came to a small but
very elegant apartment, in which a table was laid with wines, and
some costly refreshments, which, from the fact of an extremely
clerical-looking shovel hat being upon one of the chairs, there was
no great difficulty in coming to the conclusion that this had been a
reception-room, got up purposely for the reverend gentleman who was to
perform the ceremony of marriage between the baron and Miss Williams,
and in which he had refreshed himself prior to the performance of that
dreadfully arduous task, for which, no doubt, as all persons are, he
was so very insufficiently paid.
A glass of wine, which James Anderson poured out for Helen, tended much
to recover her; and then he said to her in accents of the greatest
affection,—
“Helen—Helen! is it possible that you really so far forgot me, as to
promise your hand to another?”
She burst into tears as she clung to his arm, saying,—
“I know you cannot, you ought not to forgive me. I did promise; but I
did not forget you; and if you know the cruel persecution to which I
have been subjected, you would pity, perhaps, as much as you condemn
me.”
“You did not know that some days since I wrote you a note.”
“Me a note? Oh, heavens! no—no. What became of it? To whom did you
entrust it? Oh! James, had I but thought you were near me, do you think
that for one moment I would have yielded, even to the representations
which were made to me?”
“I see it all,” he said. “Your mother has carried on this matter with
more tact than candour and honesty of purpose. I do not condemn you,
dear Helen; and no one shall ever disturb you in your possession of a
heart which is wholly yours.”
“And can you forget——”
“All but that I love you I can and will forget, Helen.”
“I do not deserve this noble generosity, for I ought not to have
yielded, James. I feel that I ought to have clung to the remembrance of
your affection, and found in that an abundant consolation, as well as
abundant strength, to resist the whole world.”
“Say no more, dearest, upon that head; but let us, to the full, enjoy
the happiness of this meeting, without the drawback of a single doubt.”
“We will never part again.”
“Never—never.”
“But, James, what was the meaning of that sudden exclamation, from one
of the guests, as regarded the baron?”
“You allude to Admiral Bell proclaiming him to be a vampyre; and, I
must say, it fills me with quite as much astonishment as it can you. I
did hear a strange story of that sort from a sailor a short time ago,
but I looked upon it as a mere superstition and paid no attention to
it. You know what it means, I presume, and that a vampyre is supposed
to be a half-supernatural creature who supports a spurious and horrible
existence, by feeding upon the blood of any one whom he can make his
victim.”
“If this horrible superstition,” said Helen, with a shudder, “be true,
what a dreadful fate have I escaped!”
“It surely must be some error of judgement; but still, dear one, you
have escaped a dreadful fate, a fate worse than any vampyre would have
inflicted upon you—the fate of being united to one whom you cannot
love.”
“Yes,” said Helen; “that is, indeed, an escape; but how came you, of
all persons in the world, a guest here?”
“I came, Helen, under cover of a general invitation, with a most worthy
family, to whose kindness I feel myself much indebted, and which
empowered them to bring with them whom they pleased. My wish and object
was to take one last look at the face I had loved so well before I left
you for ever.”
“Oh, Heavens!” said Helen, “and I was so near being sacrificed while
you were by. Even now I shudder at the dreadful chasm; I feel that you
ought not to forgive me.”
“Say no more—say no more; all that, Helen, is now past and
forgotten, and I can well imagine how your mother would torture you
with supplications, because she believed this man to be rich, and
consequently the sort of person, above all others, as most desirable
for her to have as a son-in-law. We will only consider that a great
anxiety and a great danger has passed away, and we will not stop to ask
ourselves what it was.”
“Ever good, and ever generous,” resumed Helen, as her head reposed upon
her lover’s breast.
“Oh,” said Jack Pringle, as he popped his head in at the door; “I beg
your pardon, you are better engaged; but we are going to have a grand
vampyre hunt through the house, and I thought you would like to join in
it, perhaps.”
“Stay a moment, stay,” cried Anderson. “Do you mean to tell me, really,
that this is the person who gave your friends, the Bannerworths, so
much trouble and inconvenience?”
“Yes, I do,” said Jack; “lor bless you, he is quite an old acquaintance
of ours, is old Varney; sometimes he hunts us, sometimes we hunt him.
He is rather a troublesome acquaintance, notwithstanding, and I think
there are a good many people in the world, a jolly right worse vampyres
than Varney.”
“I have no cause to hunt him,” said Anderson, “and so, therefore, I
feel certainly more inclined to decline, than otherwise, engaging in
such a transaction.”
“Don’t mention it,” said Jack; “you are a deuced deal better engaged,
and there needs no excuses.”
Jack was quite correct as regarded the projected hunt for the
unfortunate Varney in Anderbury House; for the liberal offer of reward
which the admiral had made to any one who would secure him, was
calculated to stimulate every possible exertion that people could make
upon the occasion; so much so, indeed, that the Bannerworths, after a
brief consultation among themselves, thought that for the protection
of Varney it would be much better that they should find him, than
now leave him with the character that had been given him as such a
dangerous member of society.
The servants, and some of the guests, even, had gone very
systematically to work for the purpose of taking Varney prisoner; for,
in the first instance, they had secured all the outlets from the house,
so that, as the footman with the yellow plush continuations remarked,
he must jump over the cliff if he wanted to get away.
The admiral and Henry agreed with each other that they would be
foremost in the search, in order to protect Varney from any violence;
for although this conduct of his might be considered as very bad,
and an outrage upon society in passing himself off as a baron, and
endeavouring to effect an alliance with a young and innocent girl, yet
they, the Bannerworths, had nothing to complain of in the transaction
whatever.
Consequently was it that they felt an inclination to defend Varney from
personal violence.
And this was, to a certain extent, to be dreaded, because Anderbury
being so short a distance from Bannerworth, it was not to be supposed
but that some news of the mysterious appearance of the vampyre had
reached the ears of almost every one who happened to be present at the
baron’s wedding.
And although these persons might be supposed to belong to a class
of society not likely to commit acts of violence, yet there was no
knowing what, in the excitement of the moment, might be done.
While the search went on, Flora was introduced to Helen Williams, and
remained with her, commencing a friendship which lasted afterwards, to
the great advantage of Helen, for many a year.
The Bannerworths would have been pleased and interested at going over
Anderbury House, under any other circumstances than the present one,
for truly the baron had made it a most magnificent abode.
By judicious additions to the antique furniture which had belonged to
it when he took it, he had made some of the apartments look gorgeous
in the extreme; and while he had not disturbed the character of the
decorations, he had certainly shown a very fine taste in adding to them.
But their minds were by far too much occupied with considerations
connected with Varney to pay much attention to his house; and, as they
traversed room after room in search of him without finding him, they
began to think that, with his usual good fortune, he had contrived
entirely to escape.
The servants, who knew the place well, perhaps better than Varney did
himself, searched for him in almost impossible places, until it began
to be the general opinion that he must have escaped.
They were standing by a large bay-window, which commanded a view of the
gardens, when one of the servants suddenly exclaimed,
“I see him—I see him; there he goes,” and pointed into the garden,
where, for one instant, Henry Bannerworth, as well as the admiral,
saw Varney, in his rich suit of wedding apparel, dart from among the
bushes, towards a summer-house that was in the garden near at hand.
“’Tis he, indeed,” said Henry. “Let us get down instantly, or he may
yet effect his escape.”
“No, no,” cried one of the servants, “he cannot do that; the garden
wall is too high, and the men are stationed at the gate. It’s quite
clear to me what he is about. Look at him; he is going towards the old
passage that leads to the sea shore.”
“Then he will escape, of course,” said Henry, “for no one can hope to
overtake him.”
“Don’t you be afraid of that, sir,” cried the servant; “one of my mates
has gone round to the beach to watch, and he won’t let the door be
opened that leads out on to the sands, so he cannot get away by that
mode.”
“In that case, then, we have him completely entrapped, and, as you say,
he cannot escape. It must be the madness of positive desperation that
induces him to go to that place.”
“Let us be off at once after him,” said the admiral; “that is our only
plan. Come on at once. The sooner we get hold of him the better, for
his own sake as well as for ours.”
Thus urged, they all proceeded towards the garden, in which was the
mysterious, well-like entrance to the subterraneous passage, which
formed so great a feature in the estate of Anderbury, on the moment,
and which, at the time that Varney had taken the mansion, had evidently
formed to him one of its principal attractions.
To the admiral and his party, as well as to several of the guests, who
joined from motives of curiosity in the pursuit for Varney, this place
was perfectly new, and it certainly, to look down it, did not present
by any means an inviting prospect; for although it sloped sufficiently
to take off the absolute appearance of being a downright hole in
the earth, yet, beyond a few feet in depth, the gloom had something
positively terrific about it.
“Well,” said the admiral, “I’ve been into the hold of many a ship, but
never one that looked half so gloomy as this, I can say. What do you
say to it, Jack?”
“It’s no use saying anything to such places,” said Jack. “The only way,
if we want to catch old Varney, which I suppose we do, is to pop down
it at once and done with it; so come along, I won’t flinch if it was
ten times worse. Come on, admiral, let’s go down after the enemy.”
“I cannot say it’s exactly the kind of place I admire,” said the
admiral; “but, howsomedever, if one must go down it, who shall say that
Admiral Bell flinched from it? Come on, all of you. Let all who will
follow.”
The passage did not look a very inviting one; and it was found that the
courage of the guests began to cool down wonderfully when, instead of
rushing from apartment to apartment, in search of Varney, the vampyre,
they found that they had to encounter the gloom and darkness of that
underground abode.
Out of the positive throng which had been pursuing Varney, only four,
in addition to the admiral and the male portion of his party, ventured
to descend into that black-looking place.
[Illustration: The pursuit of Varney through the subterranean passages.]
“What!” cried Jack, “have we got such a lot of skulkers whenever we
come to close quarters with the enemy? Well, shiver my timbers, if I
didn’t expect as much from a lot of land lubbers, who don’t know what
they are about any more than a marine in a squall. But who cares? Come
along, admiral; and, if we do have all the fighting, we shall, at all
events, have all the glory.”
“I hope there will be nothing of the one, at all events,” said Henry;
“for my intention is rather to save Varney from injury than to injure
him.
“We must have lights,” said the admiral. “I don’t mind going down into
a queer place to look for Varney, but I must have the means of seeing
what I am about when I get there.”
“They will be here, sir, directly,” said the big footman, who from the
first had made himself conspicuous in the pursuit of Varney; that is to
say, ever since the reward of £100 had been offered by the admiral to
any one who would take him prisoner.
And in a few moments, some of the links, which were always kept in the
kitchen of Anderbury House, for the express purpose of descending into
the subterraneous passages with, were produced and lighted. By this
time, too, the four guests had decreased to three, and two of those
seemed to hang back rather a little; while one of them seemed disposed
to make up as much as possible for any deficiency of courage on the
part of the others, by declaring his intention of ferreting out Varney,
let him be hidden where he might.
“I am with you, sir,” he said to the admiral, “let this place lead
where it may; for I have heard so much about vampyres, and really am so
curious to know more about them.”
“You don’t believe in them, do you?”
“I cannot say that I do, sir. But, at the same time, when we hear
such well authenticated cases brought forward about them, it is very
difficult, indeed, to say at once, that one has no belief in such
things.”
“Well, you are right enough there; and if you knew as much about
Varney, the vampyre, as we do, I think you would be a little puzzled to
know what to say about him; for I’ll be hanged if he don’t puzzle me
above a bit, and I don’t know now what to think of him.”
CHAPTER CXXI.
THE DEATH OF THE INQUISITIVE GUEST.—THE ESCAPE OF SIR FRANCIS VARNEY.
The guest who was so valorous, and so very impatient for the capture
of Varney, would have preceded everybody in descending to the passage
cut in the cliff, but Henry Bannerworth thought not only was it more
particularly his concern to do so, but that as he knew Varney better,
it was desirable that he should go first.
He thought there would less likelihood of any mischief by adopting
such a kind of procedure, for he did not anticipate that Varney would
willingly do him any injury; while, as regarded what he might do if any
stranger should attempt to seize him, that was quite another affair.
“You do not know him as we know him,” said Henry, to the guest. “He is
a dangerous man, and in all respects such an one as your prudence might
well induce you to keep clear of. Allow me to precede you, therefore,
for the sake of preventing the probability of the most unpleasant
consequences.”
This argument appeared to have its effect and to damp a little the
ardour of this individual, which it might well enough do, without
casting any imputation upon his courage whatever; for, after all, he
could have no strong motive in the pursuit of Varney, since he was in
a line of life which would have prevented him, even if he had been the
sole captor of Varney, from taking the reward which the admiral had
offered for his apprehension.
The sudden change from the daylight, and all the noise and bustle which
had animated the scene above, to the silence, the darkness, and the
strange atmosphere which reigned in the underground region, could not
fail of having some effect upon the imagination of every one present.
This effect would, of course, vary in different individuals, being
the greatest in those of a highly excitable and imaginative turn of
mind, and the less in those who were of a more matter-of-fact kind of
intellect. Probably, Henry Bannerworth felt more acutely than any one
else the full effect which such a scene was likely to produce, and he
was profoundly silent upon the occasion for some time.
Under even the most extraordinary circumstances, the descent into
such a place must have affected the mind to some extent, for it seems
like leaving the world altogether for a time, and bidding farewell to
everything which we have been in the habit of enjoying and thinking
beautiful.
No one ever thought of accusing Admiral Bell of being very imaginative;
but, upon this occasion, although he was the first to speak, what he
did say, showed that he had felt some of those sensations to which we
have alluded.
“How do you feel, Henry?” he said. “I’ll be hanged if I don’t seem as
if I were going into my grave before my time.”
“And I, too,” said Henry; “but I rather like the solemn feeling which
such a place as this inspires.”
“Gentlemen,” said the tall footman with the yellow plush
what-do-you-call-em’s, “gentlemen, I think, after all, that I somehow
will go back again. I don’t seem, actually, in a manner of speaking,
to care to catch the baron, somehow; so, if you please, gentlemen, I
rather think I’ll go back.”
“Why don’t you say you are afraid, at once, John?” said the admiral.
“Who, me, sir? I afraid? Oh, dear, no, sir. It would take a trifle,
indeed, to frighten me, I rather think. Oh! no, no, sir you mistake me.
It’s my feelings—it’s my feelings, sir.”
“Why, what the deuce have your feelings to do with it?”
“Everything in the world, sir. Haven’t I drank his beer, sir, and
haven’t I eat his beef, and his bread, and his _tatoes_, sir, and
shall I now hunt him up among his own ice-wells? No; perish the
thought—perish the blessed idea. Perish the—the—the—good bye,
gentlemen.”
With these words, the chivalrous footman gave up all idea of continuing
the chase for Varney, the vampyre, and turning quickly, so as to stop
the possibility of his hearing any further remonstrance, he went from
the place with great speed.
Still, however, with the departure of this individual, whose courage
from the first had had about it a very suspicious colour, they were
in quite sufficient strength to have accomplished the capture of the
vampyre, if they could get hold of him, and always provided he was not
sufficiently armed with powers of mischief to their number, by taking
perchance the life of some one of them.
There was one circumstance connected with a search for anybody in that
strange region, which spoke much in favour of a successful result,
and that was that the passage was narrow, and that there were no
hiding-places except the ice-wells, to explore which, at all events,
could not be a very difficult task; and as they proceeded, they felt
certain that they must be driving Varney before them.
Before they had got very far, Henry Bannerworth thought it would be
advisable to announce to Varney the precise intentions of himself and
the admiral, always provided he were equally peaceably inclined, and
within hearing of what was said to him.
He accordingly raised his voice, inquiring,—
“Sir Francis Varney, you no doubt recognise, by my tones, that it
is Henry Bannerworth who speaks to you; and therefore you may feel
convinced that no harm is intended you; but you are implored to come
forth and meet your friends, who, from former circumstances, you ought
to know you can trust.”
There was no reply whatever to this appeal, and when the echoes of
Henry’s voice had died away, the same death-like stillness reigned in
the place that had before characterised it.
“He will not answer,” said the admiral; “and yet, if the other end of
this passage be guarded as it is said to be, he must be here. Let us
come on at once—I have no wish of my own to stay in this damp, chalky
hole a moment longer than may be absolutely necessary.”
“Nor I,” remarked Henry; “so let us proceed, and it will be necessary
that we keep an accurate watch upon our progress, for I am told that
there are ice-wells here of great depth, down which you may fall and
come by an awful death when you least expect, unless you are very
cautious in looking where you tread.”
“There’s no doubt of that, sir,” said one of his guests. “This place is
considered to be one of the most curious that Anderbury can boast of,
and I have been told that there are ice-houses, in which all kinds of
provisions may be kept with ease and safety in the most violent heat of
the summer months.”
After a few moments they came upon one of the ice-wells, which
yawned terrifically before them, and had they not been very careful
and watchful upon the occasion, one or more of them might have been
precipitated down the well, and the loss of life must have been the
result.
“I scarcely think,” said Henry, “that ordinary caution has been used in
the construction of these places, or they never would have been left
in such a state as they are now in. The ice-well, you perceive, lies
directly in the very pathway?”
“Yes,” said the admiral, “it does seem so, Master Henry; but if you
look a little closer you will perceive that at one time there has been
a wooden bridge exactly over this chasm.”
“Ah, I do, indeed, now perceive such has been the case.”
“Yes, and that made the place both safe and convenient; for no doubt
there was a means of lowering down any baskets of wine or other matters
that required a low temperature.”
The admiral was perfectly right in his supposition, for that was just
the way in which the ice-wells of Anderbury House were constructed;
and now, since the bridge had been broken down, there was but a very
narrow pathway, indeed, by which the well could be passed, unless it
was jumped over, which might be done by any active person.
They would not pass this ice well without an examination of it, and
that was accomplished by lying down upon the rough pathway of the
passage, and holding a light at arm’s-length down it, when the bottom
was clearly visible.
“He is not there,” said Henry, who was the person who made the
experiment; “he is not there, so we must pass on.”
They accordingly did so, until they came to another such ice-well,
and then the guest which had shown such eagerness in the chase, and
accompanied them so far, went through the process of stooping down
the chasm to ascertain if it contained anything unusual beyond the
debris of broken bottles, old flint-stones, &c., which might fairly be
expected to be there.
“Do you see anything?” inquired Henry, as the guest seemed to be
looking very intently over the precipice.
He was about to reply something, for some sound came from his lips,
when he suddenly, as if he had been impelled to do by some unseen
power, toppled over the edge and disappeared, torch and all, into the
abyss below.
[Illustration: The guest topples into the ice-well.]
“Good God!” cried Henry, “he has fallen.”
“Good night,” said the admiral, with characteristic coolness; “I
suspect, my friend, that your career is at an end.”
“Listen! for God’s sake, listen!” cried Henry; “does he speak?”
There was a strange scuffling noise, and then a low deep groan from the
bottom of the ice-pit, and then all was still; and from the character
of the sound, Henry was of opinion that this well was of much greater
depth than the former one, which he had so successfully examined.
“He has met with his death,” said Henry.
“Don’t be too sure,” said the admiral; “we must have a good stout rope,
and somebody must go down; if nobody likes the job, I will go myself.”
“If ropes are wanted,” said one of the other two persons who were
present, “I can show you where they may be found, for I was at the
inquest on the body of the man who was found dead in this place some
time ago, and I marked that the ropes by which his body had been got
out of one of the ice-wells were left where they had been used.”
“That, then,” said the other, “is further on, and nearer the beach.”
“Yes; lend me the light, and I will get the rope as quickly as I can;
for I don’t think, as well as I can remember, that there is another
well between this one and that which is nearer the beach entrance.”
This was done, and for a few moments Henry and the admiral were left in
darkness while the ropes were being searched for. It was a darkness so
total and complete, that it did indeed seem like that darkness which
it requires but a little stretch of the imagination to fancy it can be
felt.
“Henry,” said the admiral—“Henry!”
“Yes; I am here.”
“Were you ever in such a confounded dark hole in all your life?”
“Scarcely, I think, ever. It is certainly tremendous, and it is a
grievous thing to think that a life had been sacrificed, as no doubt it
has, in this adventure.”
“Ah, well! we must all go to Davy Jones’s locker some day, you——But—but
don’t lay hold of me so!”
“I lay hold of you! I am not near you, sir.”
“D—n it! who is it, then? Somebody has got hold of me as if I were in a
vice. Stand off, I say! Who are you?”
“Varney, the vampyre,” said a deep sepulchral voice; “who warns you,
and all others, that there is abundance of danger in visiting here, and
nothing to be gained.”
Almost as these words were spoken, Henry suddenly found himself whirled
round with such force, that it was only by a great effort that he
succeeded in keeping his feet, and he felt convinced that some one had
passed him. Who could that one be but Sir Francis Varney, the much
dreaded vampyre?
In the next moment the light glanced again upon the walls of the
subterranean passage, and the admiral cried,—
“He has escaped, unless some one stops him above. But let us think of
nothing else at present, but to find out if the poor fellow who fell
down here be alive or dead.”
Henry descended by the assistance of the ropes, and found the
adventurous guest quite dead. They raised the body from the well, and
conveying it, as best they could, among them, they arrived, after some
troubles on account of their burden, in the gardens, and, finally, in
the great hall of Anderbury House, on a table in which they laid the
corpse.
It was quite evident now to the admiral and to the Bannerworths that
Varney had escaped, so they could have no desire to remain at the
house, over which Mr. Leek was running like a madman, wondering what
he should do. Flora had invited Helen Williams to accompany her to the
inn, so that the whole party of the Bannerworths went away together,
with the one addition to it of that poor girl who had so narrow an
escape of becoming the vampyre’s bride. Horrible destiny!
CHAPTER CXXII.
MRS. WILLIAMS VISITS THE BANNERWORTHS AT THE INN.—THE MARRIAGE OF
JAMES ANDERSON WITH HELEN.
Let us fancy now, after all these singular circumstances had taken
place, the Bannerworth family, with James Anderson and Helen Williams,
seated in a comfortable room at the inn at Anderbury, where they had
put up when they came to that place, in pursuance of the invitation
they had received from Mrs. Williams.
And that lady, probably could she have foreseen what was about to
occur, would have taken most especial pains to prevent such an
invitation from ever reaching such a destination; but she had fallen a
victim to her own love of display, and not being content with inviting
people whom she did know, she must, forsooth, give them a _carte
blanche_ to bring with them people whom she did not know at all.
And thus it was that she had been horrified by what had taken place,
and had had all her brightest visions of the future levelled with the
dust.
When Jack Pringle told Mrs. Williams that he believed she would quite
willingly have sold her daughter to a vampyre, he was right; for she
would have done so, always provided that the vampyre, as aforesaid, had
a good property, and was able to convince her of that most important
fact.
The only person of all the little party that was assembled at the inn,
who looked pale and anxious, was poor Helen, and she certainly did look
so; for when we come to consider her novel position we shall not wonder
at it.
She had thrown herself completely upon the consideration of strangers,
and was severed from all those natural ties which ought to have for
ever held her in their gentle bondage. But this conduct, or rather the
conduct of that one who ought to have protected her though all trouble
and anxieties—her mother—had been such as to deprive her of the feeling
that she had a home at all.
Flora saw that her guest, as indeed she considered Helen, looked sad
and dejected, and she made every effort within her power to rescue her
from such a state of things.
“Do not despair of much happiness,” she whispered to her; “but rather
thank good fortune, which, at the last moment, rescued you from one
whom you could not love. Be assured that now you will enjoy the
protection of those who will soon be able to prevail upon your mother
to look with a favourable eye upon any new arrangement.”
“I am much beholden to you,” said Helen—“very much beholden to you,
and I feel that I ought to congratulate myself upon my escape. But my
heart does feel sad, because the state of things, to avoid which I made
myself a sacrifice, may now ensue in all their terrors.”
“My dear,” said the admiral, who overheard her, “don’t you believe
any such rubbish as all that. I have no doubt you have been regularly
persecuted into the match with the supposed baron, and you would,
perhaps, have found out afterwards that one-half of the things you were
told, to induce you to consent, had no foundation but in somebody’s
active imagination.”
“Do you think so, sir?”
“Do I think so! To be sure I do. Now, I dare say you were told how, if
you married the Baron What’s-his-name, you would be doing something
wonderful for all your family.”
“Yes—yes.”
“Oh, of course; I can see through all that clearly enough; and I tell
you, my lass, that you have had a most fortunate escape, and that there
is, and shall be, no reason on the face of the earth why you should
not be married to the man of your choice. He has been to sea, and so,
of course, he has finished what may be called his education. If he had
been on shore all his life, you might have doubted about the prudence
of having him; but, as it is, it’s quite another matter.”
“Sir, I thank you for your kind advocacy of my cause,” said James
Anderson; “and I shall ever consider, as one of the most fortunate
accidents of my life, the meeting with Admiral Bell.”
“Oh, don’t say anything about that. I know some of the people at the
Admiralty, and when you go to make the report of how you have been
shipwrecked, and how you lost your despatches, I will give you a letter
of introduction, which, I dare say, won’t do you any harm.”
“Indeed, sir, this is more kindness than I ought to expect.”
“Not at all, my boy—not at all. Don’t put yourself out of the way about
that. Only I tell you what I would do. You need not take my advice
unless you like; but, if I were you, I’d be hanged if I moved an inch
anywhere till I had made Helen Williams my wife.”
“Can you suppose,” cried James Anderson, while his eyes sparkled with
delight—“can you suppose, my dear sir, that such advice could be other
than most welcome to me?”
“And what do you say, Helen, to it?” whispered Flora.
“What can I say?”
“You can say yes, I suppose?” said the admiral.
Helen was silent.
“Very good,” added the admiral. “When a girl don’t say no, of course
she means yes; and you can make sure of your prize now you have got
her, Master Anderson. Let’s see; you manage these affairs with what you
call a special license, don’t you?”
“Yes, uncle,” said Flora; “that is the way. You seem to know all about
it, and I almost suspect you really must have had some experience in
those matters.”
“I experience, you little gypsy!—what do you mean? I never was married
in all my life, and I don’t intend to be.”
“Don’t make too sure, uncle. But, despite all that, no one could more
warmly second your advice to Mr. Anderson than myself.”
“Very good. For that speech I forgive you. And now, Mr. Anderson, just
come along with me, for I want to say a few words to you which nobody
else has anything to do with.”
When the admiral got James Anderson alone, he said to him,—
“Of course you are without funds, so it’s no use making any fuss of
delicacy about it. I have no doubt but that, with my interest, I shall
be able to get you into an appointment of some sort; but, in the
meantime, I beg that you will not cross me in my desire to serve you;
and mind, I take your word of honour to repay me, so, you see, there is
no obligation.”
“Sir, this noble generosity——”
“There, there—that’s quite enough; for the fact is, it ain’t noble
generosity at all, so hold your tongue about it, and be so good as to
let me consider that as settled. Here are fifty pounds for you, which
will enable you to go to London like a gentleman, and to conduct your
marriage either here or there, as you may yourself think proper, and as
your bride may consent.”
“Sir, I would fain make Helen my own here.”
“Very good. I don’t pretend to understand how to manage these things:
but set about it as quickly as you can, and don’t be deterred by
anybody.”
This short but, to James Anderson, deeply interesting conversation,
because it relieved his mind from a load of anxiety, took place a
few paces from the inn door only, so that they returned at once; but
scarcely had they joined the rest of the party, and were considering
what they should order for dinner, when one of the waiters of the
establishment came to say,
“If you please, there’s a lady who wants to come in. I asked her her
name, but she won’t give it; but she says she must see everybody.”
“The deuce she must!” cried the admiral. “What sort of a craft is she?”
“Sort of a what, sir?”
“My fears tell me,” sobbed Helen, “that it is my mother.”
The admiral whistled, and then he said,—
“I suppose we shall have a breeze; but the sooner it’s over the better.
Let the lady come in; and don’t you be afraid of anything, my lass.
Why, you look as pale as if you expected—here she is.”
The door was flung open, and Mrs. Williams made her appearance. Anger
was upon her face, and it required but a small amount of penetration
to perceive that she came fully charged with all sorts of reproaches.
Helen trembled and shrunk back for she had an habitual fear of her
mother, which the imperious conduct of that individual had induced in
the mind of so gentle a creature as Helen from her very childhood.
“Well, madam,” said Henry, stepping forward; “to what are we indebted
for the honour of this visit from one who has not the courtesy to wait
for an invitation?”
“Oh! I expected this,” said Mrs. Williams, with a shivering toss of
her head; “I quite expected this, I can assure you—of course. But I’ll
pretty soon let you know, sir, what I came about. I have come for my
daughter, sir. What have you got to say against that?”
“Nothing, madam; if your daughter chooses to comply with your request.”
“Helen!” screamed Mrs. Williams. “Helen! I command you to come home
this moment!”
“Mother, hear me!” said Helen. “Consent to my happiness with one whom I
can love, with the same readiness that you would have seen me the bride
of one for whom I never could hope to feel anything in the shape of
affection, and I will accompany you home at once.”
“Oh, dear, yes—of course. Consent to ruin—consent to nonsense! Consent
to your marrying a scapegrace who cannot even keep himself—far less a
wife! No, Helen; you cannot expect that I should ever consent to your
marrying such a poor wretch.”
“But don’t you think,” said Henry, “that any poor wretch is better than
a vampyre?”
“No; I do not.”
“Oh! very good, then,” said the admiral; “if that’s the lady’s opinion,
what can we say to her? And, as for commanding Miss Helen, here, to go
home, I command her to stay.”
“You command her?”
“Yes, to be sure. Ain’t I an admiral? What have you got to say against
that, I should like to know? I shall take good care that James Anderson
is no poor wretch by getting him some good appointment; and, as your
daughter is of age, old girl, and so can choose for herself, you may as
well weigh anchor, and be off at once, for nobody wants to be bothered
with you.”
“Do you mean to say you are a real admiral, and have nothing to do with
the horse-marines?”
“Nothing whatever, ma’am. Good day to you—we are all waiting for our
dinners, and don’t feel disposed to talk any more; so be off with you.”
Mrs. Williams seemed to be considering for a moment, and then she said,—
“Oh, gracious! a mother’s feelings must always be excused. I almost
think that—just to please you, admiral—I will consent.”
“You will, mother?” exclaimed Helen.
“Why, in a manner of speaking,” said Mrs. Williams, “I should not mind;
but it’s quite, you see, a dreadful thing to think of, when we consider
what an expense I have gone to in all these matters, and that I have
not had so much as one farthing from the baron, although he did say he
would pay all the cost I might be put to.”
“From resources which, in course of time, industry may procure me,”
said James Anderson, eagerly, “you shall be repaid all that you can
possibly say has been expended for Helen.”
“Ah! well, then, if Admiral Bell, here, will say that he will see me
paid, I consent.”
“Very well,” said the admiral; “I’ll see you paid. If you had acted
generously in the matter, you should have been a gainer; but, as it is,
you shall be paid, and we decline your acquaintance.”
Mrs. Williams began, from the tone and manner of her daughter’s new
friends, to suspect that it would have been more prudent on her part if
she had behaved in a very different manner towards them, and complied
with a good grace with their wishes; for, as regarded the baron,
anything in the shape of a more extended connexion with him was clearly
out of the question.
But she had gone almost too far for reconciliation, and, although there
was no such thing as denying the genius of the lady, she was, for a few
minutes, puzzled to know what to do. At length, however, she thought
it would not be a bad plan to be suddenly quite overcome with her
feelings, and make a desperate scene.
Accordingly, to the surprise of every one, and the consternation of the
admiral, she suddenly uttered a piercing scream, and commenced a good
exhibition of hysterics.
“D—n it!” cried the admiral; “what does she mean by that? Come, come, I
say, Mother Williams, we cannot stand all that noise, you know; it is
quite out of the question!”
“Let us all leave the room,” said Henry, “and send Jack Pringle to her.
I have heard him say that he has some mode of recovering ladies from
hysterics by throwing a pail-full of salt water over them, and then
biting their thumb-nails off.”
“The wretch!” exclaimed Mrs. Williams, suddenly recovering. “The
wretch! I’d let him know soon enough what it was to interfere with my
nails!”
“Oh! you are better, are you?” said the admiral.
“What’s that to you?” shrieked Mrs. Williams. “I’ll go at once to a
lawyer, and see what can be done with you. I look upon you all with
odium and contempt!”
“Ah! words easily spoken,” said the admiral; “and just like young
chickens, they commonly go home to roost.”
Mrs. Williams darted an angry look at the whole party, which she
intended should be expressive at once of the immense contempt in which
she held them, and of her determination to have vengeance upon their
heads, which double-dealing look, however, had no effect upon them of
an intimidating character, and then she bounced from the room.
“My dear,” said the admiral, turning to Helen, who he saw was affected
at the proceeding. “My dear, don’t you fret yourself. Your mother
cannot make us angry; and, as far as regards her own anger, it will
all subside, and then we will forget that she has said anything at
all uncivil to us. So don’t you fret yourself about what is of no
consequence at all.”
“You may depend,” said Henry, “that such will be the fact, and that
in a very short time you will find that your mother has completely
recovered from her anger, and will be as pleasant with us all as
possible. I grieve to say so to you, but the fact is, what you must
perceive, namely, that, as regards your mother, your marriage is merely
a matter of pounds, shillings, and pence, and when she finds that the
baron’s fortune cannot be had, she will content herself with reflecting
upon the prospects of Mr. James Anderson, who, if he do well, will soon
be quite a favourite.”
It was humiliating to poor Helen to be forced to confess that this was
the correct view to take of the question, but she could not help doing
so at all; and, after a time, she did not regret having sufficient
moral courage to resist the command of her mother to return home.
In the society of him whom she loved, and upheld and encouraged, too,
as she was by Flora, who was just about the best and kindest companion
such a person as Helen could have had, the minutes began to fly past
upon rosy pinions, and the remainder of that day she confessed, even to
the admiral, was the happiest she had known for many a weary month.
The Bannerworths and James Anderson fully expected another visit from
Mrs. Williams on the morrow, but she did not come; and, although they
had expected her to do so, her not coming was no disappointment, but,
on the contrary, a matter for some congratulation.
But no time was lost; and, as James Anderson was really most anxious
to get to London to report himself at the Admiralty, and as that was
an anxiety in which the admiral much encouraged him, so that as it was
quite an understood thing among them all that the marriage of the fair
Helen should take place before he again left her, a special license
was procured, and the ceremony arranged to take place at nine o’clock
in the morning, on the second morning after the strange and exciting
occurrences at Anderbury House.
This marriage was conducted in the most private manner possible;
because, as it had been so well known throughout the whole of Anderbury
that Helen Williams was the chosen of the great and rich Baron
Stolmuyer of Saltzburgh, who had turned out to be such an equivocal
character, the news of her marriage with any one else would have been
sure to have created a vast amount of pubic curiosity.
All this they escaped by fixing the hour at which the ceremony was to
be performed at an early hour in the morning, and trusting no one out
of their own party with the secret.
Of course, from what the reader knows of the gentle and timid
disposition of Helen Williams, he may well suppose how glad she would
have been to have had the countenance of her mother at her marriage,
notwithstanding the conduct of that mother was certainly not what
should have entitled her to the esteem of any one whatever, not
excepting her own child.
But this was a feeling which, when she came to consider the new tie she
was forming, was likely soon to wear away; and, although, while she
pronounced those words which were irrevocably to make her another’s,
the tears gushed to her eyes, they were far different from those
bitter drops she had shed when she considered that, beyond all hope of
redemption, she was condemned to become the bride of the baron.
When the ceremony was over, they all went back very quietly and
comfortably to the inn, and, after a good breakfast, and many healths
had been drank to the bride, James Anderson, according to arrangement,
took his departure for London, leaving Helen in the care of the
Bannerworths until he should come back to claim her, as he now could
do, despite all the plots and machinations of Mrs. Williams, who,
as yet, was in a state of blessed ignorance as to the fact of her
daughter’s wedding, and who had not quite made up her mind as to what
she should do next in so delicate and troublesome a transaction.
CHAPTER CXXIII.
MRS. WILLIAMS TAKES THE INITIATIVE, AND NEARLY CATCHES AN ADMIRAL.
Mrs. Williams, when she reached home after what must be called her very
unsuccessful attempt to make a disturbance, and to do the grand at the
inn where the Bannerworths were, set herself seriously to think what
would be the best course for her to adopt in the rather perplexing
aspect of her affairs.
The few words she had used at the inn, indicative of her censure of all
the proceedings, had been of rather a strong and energetic character,
so that she had a very uncomfortable suspicion upon her mind that she
would find it rather a difficult task to pacify her daughter’s new
friends.
The offer which the admiral had made to repay to her any expense she
had been at, impressed her with a belief that he surely must be in
possession of what, to her, was the most delightful thing in the world,
and comprehended all sorts of virtue, namely, money; and of course her
feelings became instantly most wonderfully ameliorated.
“I’m very much afraid I have been too precipitate,” she said. “I really
am afraid I have, and that ain’t a pleasant reflection by any means.
What can I do to get good friends with them all, and particularly the
dear old gentleman who promised to pay me?”
This was the problem which Mrs. Williams presented to her mind, for
the captivating idea of actually having been paid £500 by the baron,
and thus sending in a bill of the same amount to the admiral, took
wonderful and complete possession of her.
This was, indeed, she considered, a masterstroke of policy, and all she
had now to consider was, the means of getting on such good terms with
the admiral that he should neither question items nor amount of the
account she intended to send him in.
“If he only pays the £500 as well as the baron has paid his, I shall
not come out of the transaction so badly,” said Mrs. Williams.
While she was in this state of perplexity, she was sitting by the
window of her dining-room, which commanded a view of the street, and,
as she sat there, she was much surprised to see Jack Pringle, who she
still had a lingering suspicion might, notwithstanding his disclaimer
of the title, be Admiral Green, on the other side of the way, making
various significant movements of his hands and head, as if he had
something of an exceedingly secret and strange mysterious nature to
communicate to her, Mrs. Williams.
This was quite sufficient to call for that lady’s most serious
attention, and accordingly she walked graciously so close to the window
that her aristocratic nose touched the glass, and nodded to Jack, after
which she beckoned him across the way, after the manner of the ghost in
Hamlet, upon which Jack, with a nod, came across the way forthwith.
In another moment Mrs. Williams opened the street-door herself, and
said,—
“Mr. What’s-your-name, have you got anything to say to me?”
“Rather,” said Jack.
“What is it, then—pray what is it, Mr. What’s-your-name?”
“Don’t call me What’s-your-name, ma’am, any longer; my name is Jack
Pringle.”
“Mr. John Pringle, I suppose?”
“No such thing; nothing but plain Jack, ma’am; so you see you are
mistaken. But I have got something to say to you, ma’am, as you ought
to know.”
Any one who had known Jack would have seen, by a certain mischievous
twinkling of the eyes, that he had on hand what he considered one
of the most excellent of jokes in all the world, and was about to
perpetrate what he thought some famous piece of jollity. What it was,
we shall quickly perceive, from his communication with Mrs. Williams.
“Well, ma’am,” he added, “you know Admiral Bell, I believe?”
“Oh, yes—yes; certainly, I do.”
“Well, I don’t know as I ought to tell you, Mrs. W., what I’m going to
tell you; but, first of all, the old admiral, what with prize money,
pay, and one thing and another, is so immensely rich, that he really
don’t know what to do with his money.”
“How dreadful!” said Mrs. Williams; “I think I could really suggest to
him some few things to do.”
“Oh, he is so desperately obstinate, he will listen to nobody; and, you
see, as he never married, who as he got to leave it to? At least that’s
what we have been all wondering, for I don’t know how long; but now
what do you think we have found out, Mrs. Williams?”
“Well, that’s very difficult, of course, for me to say. Perhaps you
will be so good as to tell me.”
“You ought to know. He has fallen in love, ma’am—actually in love, for
the first time in his life. Yes, he has actually fallen in love, Mrs.
Williams; there’s a go.”
“And with one of my daughters! It’s with Julia—I did mention her to
him, and I thought I saw a curious expression come across his face.
Of course, I’m quite delighted to hear it; for, with the feelings of
a mother, I like to get my girls off hand as well as I can; and, as
Admiral Bell is so very respectable a person, I can have no sort of
objection in the world.”
“There you go, again,” said Jack; “you are quite mistaken, I can tell
you. You never made a greater blunder than that in all your life,
Mother Williams—excuse me, ma’am, but that’s my way.”
“Oh, don’t mention it—but where’s the mistake, my dear sir?”
“Why, just here, ma’am—just here. The admiral is not so young as he
was twenty-five years ago, and he ain’t quite such a fool as to think
that a young girl can care anything for him. But he is in love, for all
that. Only you see, ma’am, it happens to be with somebody else.”
“Good gracious! Who is it?—and why do you come to me about it?”
“Because it’s you.”
“Me! me! oh, gracious Providence, you don’t mean that! In love with
me! The rich old admiral—he cannot live long. How much money, take it
altogether, do you really think he has got? I declare you have taken me
so by surprise, that I don’t know what I am saying. Of course he will
propose a very handsome settlement.”
“You may depend upon all that,” said Jack; “but the odd thing is, you
see, ma’am, that although he is quite over head and ears in love, he
won’t own it, but walks about like a bear with a bad place on his back,
doing nothing but growl, growl, from morning till night.”
“Then how can you tell,” said Mrs. Williams, “if he never said so?”
“Oh, he does say so. He mumbles it out to himself, and we have heard
him say,—
“‘Damn it all! that Mrs. Williams is the craft for my money; but what’s
the use of me bothering her about it?—she wouldn’t have an old hulk
like me, so I won’t say anything about it to anybody.’”
“What an amiable idea!”
“Very, ma’am, very; and what I have come to you for now is to say, that
if you have no objection to the match, you might as well make the old
man happy, by letting him know, in some sort of way, that you wouldn’t
be so hard-hearted as he thinks, but would have him if he would say the
word.”
“How can I express how much obliged I am to you, Mr. Wingle!”
“Pringle, if you please, ma’am, is my name; and as to being obliged to
me, you ain’t at all, and I’ll tell you how; you see, I and the admiral
have sailed with each other many a voyage, and I have a sort of feeling
for the old man that makes me, when I see that he has a fancy, try my
best to gratify him; and, without thinking of anybody but him, I’ve
come to you just to tell you what I know about the affair, and I must
leave it to you to do what you like.”
“Still I am very much obliged to you. What if I were to call and ask
for a private interview with the old man?”
“A good idea,” said Jack. “It was only the other day I heard him say
you was his pearl, and the main chain of his heart, I can tell you, and
ever such a load more. He will be taking his dinner at four to-day,
and after that he usually takes a sleep in an arm chair, in a room by
himself, and if you like to come then, you will catch him.”
“Be assured, my dear sir, I shall be there punctually to the minute.
You will be so good as to receive me, and introduce me to him, and,
perhaps, it would remove some of his timidity if I were to let him know
that I was aware that he had called me his pearl, and the main chain of
his heart.”
“Of course it would,” said Jack. “You put him in mind of it, ma’am, and
if you find him back’erd a little, don’t you mind about giving him a
little encouragement, because you know all the while he really means
it, so you need not care about it.”
“Well, Mr.—a—a—Bingle, all I can say is, that I feel very much obliged
to you indeed, for letting me know this matter; and my great respect
for you and for the old admiral will, I assure you, induce me to
consent to what you propose.—A-hem! of course I have many offers, as
you may well suppose, Mr. Cringle.”
“Damn it,” said Jack, “I’ve told you before that my name is Pringle,
and if you can’t recollect that, just call me Jack, and have done with
it—you won’t forget Jack, I’ll be bound. Call me that, and I sha’n’t
quarrel with you about it, ma’am; but don’t be inventing all sorts of
odd names for me.”
“Pray excuse me, my dear sir, I certainly will do no such thing; and
at three o’clock, I hope I shall have the pleasure of seeing you. I
believe it’s the Red Lion where you are staying?”
“Yes, the Red Lion Inn; and at three I shall be on the look out for
you, ma’am, you may depend; and I only hope you won’t mistake the
admiral’s bashfulness for anything else, because, I assure you, he is
mad in love with you, but don’t like to own it, ma’am; so just you
bring him out a little, and don’t you mind what he says.”
Mrs. Williams duly promised she would not mind what the old man said,
and, from what we know of that lady, we are quite inclined, for once
in a way, to give her credit for sincerity in that matter, and the
greatest possible amount of candour.
As for Jack, when he left her house, and had got fairly round the
corner and out of sight, he laughed to that excess that several
passers-by stopped to look at him in wonder, and had he not ceased,
he certainly would have had a crowd round him in a very few minutes
longer, that would have perhaps thought him out of his senses.
But after a few minutes, the explosion of his bottled-up mirth had
subsided, and after giving a boy, who was the nearest to him of the
admiring spectators, a good rap on the head, he walked to the inn.
Jack would have been glad to have told some one of the capital joke
he was playing off at the admiral’s expense, but he was afraid of
being betrayed; so he wisely kept the secret of the forthcoming jest
all to himself; although Henry Bannerworth and Charles Holland might
both, after such a thing happened, or even during its progress, have
a good laugh at it, it is not to be supposed, entertaining as they
did so great a respect for the old admiral, that they would have lent
themselves to the perpetration of such a joke.
As may be supposed, Mrs. Williams was all flutter and expectation, and
the idea of at length mending her decayed fortune by an union with the
old man, who was reported to be immensely rich, and who had already
reached an age when his life could not be depended upon one week from
another, was one of the most gratifying circumstances on record to her.
No possible plan could have been devised which was so likely to chime
in with her humour as this, and if she had been asked in which way she
would like to make money, it would have been that which she would have
undoubtedly chosen.
“Now,” she thought, “I shall, after all, make an admirable thing of
this affair, there can be no doubt. I shall, of course, soon be a widow
again, for the old sea monster cannot live long. I shall insist upon
a very liberal settlement indeed, and then I suppose, while he does
live, I must keep him in a good humour, so that he may leave me, at all
events, the bulk of his property when he dies, and then I can live in
the style I like, and make everybody die of envy.”
To excite an extraordinary amount of envy was the very height of
felicity to Mrs. Williams, as, indeed, it is to many people of far
greater pretensions than that lady; and we cannot help thinking, when
we see gaudy equipages and all the glittering and costly paraphernalia
of _parvenu_ wealth, that the great object of it is to excite envy far
more than admiration and pleasure.
“There are the Narrowidges, and the Staples, and the Jenkinses,”
thought Mrs. Williams. “Oh! I know they will all be ready to eat their
very heads off, when they hear that I am married, and that, too, so
well. Oh! they will die of spite, and particularly Mrs. Jenkins. I am
quite sure she will have a serious illness.”
These were the kind of triumphs upon which Mrs. Williams felicitated
herself, and pictured to her imagination as the result of her marriage
with the admiral, which she now looked upon as quite a settled thing;
because, if he were willing, she felt perfectly sure that she was; and,
therefore, what was to prevent the union from taking place?
What pleasant anticipations these were! Really, we can almost
consider them, while they lasted, as sufficient to counterbalance any
disappointment which was likely afterwards to take place; and the hour
or two which Mrs. Williams devoted to the gorgeous dream of wealth she
so fully expected to enjoy, were probably the most delightful she had
ever passed. And certainly so far she had to thank Jack Pringle for
giving her so much satisfaction, although, as will be seen, she did
not feel towards him any great amount of gratitude on the momentous
occasion.
Mrs. Williams, no doubt, still thought herself quite a fascinating
woman; and when she had failed in guessing that it was to herself that
the admiral was, according to Jack’s account, devoted, it was not that
she entertained a modest and quiet opinion of her own attractions,
but from the force of habit, seeing that so long a period had elapsed
without her having an admirer, that she could not believe she had one
then, until actually assured in plain language of the fact.
And now, about half an hour before the appointed time, the lady arrayed
herself in what she considered an extremely becoming and fashionable
costume, and started to keep her appointment with Jack Pringle, who, in
her affections, now held quite a pleasant place, and towards whom she
considered herself so much indebted for the kind information she had
received at his hands.
The distance from any house in Anderbury to any other, was but short,
so that Mrs. Williams was within the time mentioned, when she reached
the door of the Red Lion; but she was gratified to find that Jack
Pringle was there, apparently on the look out for her, because it
showed that nothing had happened to alter the aspect of affairs, but
that the chances of her becoming Mrs. Admiral Bell were as strong as
ever.
“I’m glad you have come,” said Jack. “They got over their dinner rather
quick, and that’s a fact; and the old man is fast asleep as usual, so
you can commence operations at once.”
“A thousand thanks—a thousand thanks, my good friend, and you may
depend upon my gratitude.”
“Hush! never mind that,” said Jack; “I don’t want nothing. This
way—this way, ma’am, if you please.”
CHAPTER CXXVI.
THE ADMIRAL IN A BREEZE.—A GENERAL COMMOTION, AND JACK PRINGLE MUCH
WANTED, BUT NOT TO BE FOUND.
To say that Mrs. Williams was on the tiptoe of expectation, is to say
very little that can convey a good idea of what was her real condition,
nervously speaking, as she followed Jack Pringle up, not the principal,
but a back staircase of the inn, toward the room where the admiral took
his nap, which was
“His custom always of an afternoon.”
The fact is, that Jack had a great dread of Mrs. Williams being seen by
any of the Bannerworth family, because they all knew her; and the nice
little plot he had got up for the purpose of holding out the admiral to
ridicule, while at the same time he enjoyed the immense satisfaction of
having some revenge upon Mrs. Williams.
Hence was it, that, like many a great politician, he went up the
back staircase instead of the front, in order to avoid unnecessary
observation and remark.
By good fortune, as well as good management, Jack met nobody, but
succeeded in reaching the room door, within which the admiral was
sleeping, in perfect safety.
“Now, ma’am,” said Jack, “don’t you be back’erd in going for’erd, cos,
as I tell you, the old man is dying by inches for you, and I don’t see
why you shouldn’t have his half a million of money, as well as anybody
else. Ah! and a good deal better, too, when one comes to consider all
things.”
“Thank you, Mr. Pringle, thank you. I really don’t know how to
express my obligations to you, upon my word. You are so very kind and
considerate in all you say.”
“Oh! don’t mention it, ma’am. Walk in, and there you will find the old
baby. I shouldn’t wonder but he’s disturbing his old brains by dreaming
of you now.”
Jack opened the door, and Mrs. Williams glided noiselessly into an
apartment, where, seated, sure enough, in an easy chair, with a silk
handkerchief over his face, sat the admiral, fast asleep, enjoying that
comfortable siesta, which he never for one moment imagined would be
disturbed in the manner it was about to be.
“Well,” said Mrs. Williams, “there he is, to be sure, just as Jack
Pringle said,—asleep, and no doubt dreaming of me. I must make sure of
the old fool in one interview, or he may slip through my fingers, and
that would not be at all pleasant after counting upon him, and taking
some trouble in the matter.”
But although she made up her mind that nothing should be wanting, upon
her part, to make sure of him, yet she debated whether she ought to
awaken him or not; for she well knew that many old people, especially
men, were very irascible if they are awakened suddenly, and from what
she had already seen of the admiral, she could very well imagine that
such might be the case with him.
This was getting rather a quandary, out of which Mrs. Williams did
not exactly see her way; and yet the proposition that the admiral was
to be, and must be, awakened in some way, remained as firmly as ever
fixed in her mind. And then, too, the idea—a very natural one under the
circumstances—came across her that each minute was fraught with danger,
and that, for all she knew, the yea or nay of the whole affair might
depend upon the promptitude with which it was concluded.
What, if, she asked herself, some of the odious Bannerworth people were
to come in and find her there—of course they would awaken the admiral
at once, and in consequence of their presence, she would lose all
opportunity of exercising those little blandishments which she meant to
bring to bear upon him.
This was positively alarming. The idea of all being lost, prompted
her at all events to attempt something; so Mrs. Williams thought that
the mildest way of awakening the admiral was by a loud sneeze, which
she executed without producing the least effect, as might have been
expected; for the man who had many a time slept soundly in the wildest
fury of the elements, was not likely to awaken because somebody sneezed.
“Dear me, how sound he sleeps. A—hem!—hem! A—_chew!_—a—a—hem!—A
_chewaway!_”
The admiral was proof against all this, and Mrs. Williams might just
as well have spared herself the trouble of exciting such an amount of
artificial sneezes, for the admiral slept on, and it was quite clear
that something much more sonorous would be required for the purpose of
awaking him.
“How vexatious,” she thought; “how very vexatious. But there’s no help
for it. Awakened he must be, that’s quite clear; and if fair means
won’t do it, why, foul must.”
Acting upon this resolve, Mrs. Williams hesitated no longer, but,
approaching the sleeping admiral, she dragged the handkerchief off his
face, and its passage over his nose, no doubt, produced the tickling
sensation that induced him to give that organ a very hard rub, indeed,
and start wide awake with an exclamation that was much more forcible
than elegant, and that consequently we need not transfer to our pages
at all.
“Oh! admiral,” said Mrs. Williams, assuming a look that ought at once
to have melted a heart of stone; “oh! admiral, can you, indeed, forgive
me?”
“The devil!” said the admiral.
“Can you, indeed, look over the fact, that in my anxiety to see that
face, I took from before it the envious, and yet fortunate handkerchief
that covered it? It was my act, and upon my head fall all the censure,
my dear, good, kind admiral.”
The old man rubbed his eyes very hard with his knuckles, as he said,—
“I suppose I’m awake.”
“You are awake, my dear sir. It is, indeed, no dream, let me assure
you, that disturbs you, but a living reality. You are awake, my dear
sir.”
“Why—why, what do you mean? I begin to think I am awake, with a
vengeance; but who are you? Hang me if I don’t think you are old Mother
Williams!”
“Oh! my dear admiral, you are so facetious—so very facetious; but can
you for one moment fancy, my dear sir, that I am insensible to your
merit? Can you fancy that I could look with other than indulgent eyes
upon a Bell?”
“Upon a what?”
“A Bell—an Admiral Bell. Indeed, I may say—with a slight but pardonable
alteration of a word—an admirable Bell. My dear sir, your pearl speaks
to you.”
The admiral was so amazed at this address, accompanied as it was by
most languishing looks, that, with his mouth wide open, and his eyes
preternaturally distended, he gazed upon Mrs. Williams without saying a
word; from which she inferred that he was beginning to see that she was
aware of his attachment to her, and was thinking of how he could best
express his gratitude for her taking the initiative in the matter.
Thus encouraged, then, she spoke again, saying, as she advanced close
to him,—
“Oh, my dear sir, what a thing the human heart is. Only to think
now, that from the first moment I saw you, I should whisper to
myself—there—yes, there is the only human being for whose sake I could
again enter into that holy state from which the death of Mr. Williams
released me.”
“Why, good God!” said the admiral, “the woman’s mad!”
“Oh! no—no. The world—the horrid, low, work-a-day world, may make
invidious remarks about us, but your pearl will recompense you for all
that, and, in the sweet concord of domestic life, we shall never sigh
for more than we shall have, which will be, of course, if I understand
rightly, a large income—I don’t know how much a year, and if I ask, it
is only out of curiosity, my dear sir, and nothing else. Love—absolute
and beautiful love, is all I ask.”
“Hilloa!” roared the admiral; “Charles! Henry! Jack! Where the devil
are you all? D—n it, you are all ready enough when I don’t want you;
but now, when I am going to be boarded by a mad woman, you can’t come
one of you. Hilloa! help! Charles! Jack, you lubber, where the deuce
have you taken yourself to, and why don’t you tumble up when you are
sent for?”
“But, my dear sir, why need you trouble yourself to call so many
witnesses to our happiness? Let us be privately married in some rural
church.”
“Privately d—d first, I’d be,” said the old admiral.
“Oh, then, it shall be a public alliance, if you wish it,” exclaimed
Mrs. Williams, as she made up her mind to clinch the affair at once
by a _coup de main_; and advancing to the admiral, she flung her arms
around his neck just as a door at the other end of the apartment
opened, and Charles and Henry, with Flora, made their appearance, and
looked with the most intense astonishment at the scene before them.
“Well, uncle,” said Charles, “I certainly should not have expected this
of you. I am astonished, I must confess.”
“Nor I,” said Henry; “why, admiral, I had no idea you were so dangerous
a personage.”
Mrs. Williams, when she saw what arrivals had taken place, gave a faint
scream, and released the admiral, and then she added,—
“Oh, admiral, how could you hold me so when you hear somebody coming?
How shall I ever survive such a scene as this? My character will be
gone for ever, unless I am immediately married to you, and I have no
doubt but that all your friends will at once see the propriety of such
a step.”
“I do,” said Charles.
“And I,” said Henry.
“And I,” of course, said Flora.
Mrs. Williams burst into tears when she saw this unanimity of opinion;
but the admiral’s face got the colour of a piece of beet-root, and he
was only silent for a moment or two, while he was made the subject of
these cruel remarks, until he could sufficiently recover to speak with
the energy that did characterise him when he really began.
We are not exactly in the vein to transfer to our pages the violent
expletives with which he garnished his outburst of passion, and our
readers, if they recall to their minds a large amount of nautical
oaths, can have no difficulty in supposing that the admiral uttered
every one of them with a volubility that was perfectly alarming.
“D—n it! do you mean to kill me, all of you, or to drive me mad? (Five
oaths in a string came in here.) Do you want to cut me up, you——?
(Three horrible epithets.) What do you mean by setting this old woman
upon me? Whose precious idea was this, I should like to know, to put an
elderly she-dragon upon me, whom I hate and be —— (ten oaths at least)
when I was enjoying a comfortable nap?”
“Hate!” exclaimed Mrs. Williams; “did you say hate, you old seducing
villain! when you knew you said I was your pearl, you hoary-headed
ruffian!”
“That’s a thundering crammer,” cried the admiral; “you said it
yourself; and as for hating you, d—n it, if I don’t do that with all my
heart.”
“And is this the way I’m to be treated before people? Oh! you wicked
old sinner, I understand you now. Your intentions were not honourable,
and now you find that my virtue is proof against your horrid old
fascinations, you want to pretend that it’s all a mistake.”
“Really,” said Charles, “we must confess, uncle, that we found Mrs.
Williams and you—ahem!—rather loving, you know; and the gentleman on
these occasions is usually asked to account for such things, I take it.”
“Of course,” said Mrs. Williams; “I’ll bring an action against the
admiral, and I shall call upon you all to be witnesses for me. Oh! you
old sinner, I’ll make you pay for this!”
“We certainly can all be witnesses,” said Flora, “that the admiral
called for help; and when we came we found Mrs. Williams holding him
fast round the neck, to which he seemed to have the greatest possible
repugnance.”
“That’s right! hurrah! That’s the truth, Flora, my dear. That’s just
how it was. This horrid old woman come all of a sudden and laid hold of
me after awakening me, and then I called for help. That’s how it was.”
“But these gentlemen,” said Mrs. Williams, appealing to Henry and
Charles, “will swear quite different.”
“Oh, I beg your pardon, Mrs. Williams,” said Charles; “if we are
brought forward to swear anything, we must be correct; and, therefore,
we shall have to say just what this lady has stated; and perhaps your
best plan will be to go away and say no more about it; but consider
that you have made a mistake.”
“A mistake!” screamed Mrs. Williams; “how could I make a mistake, when
Mr. John Pringle, who knows the admiral so well, told me that he was
dying to see me, and in love with me to never such an extent, only
that he was afraid I would not have anything to say to him on such a
subject.”
The admiral drew a long breath and sat down. Then, clenching his hand,
he shook it above his head, saying, in a voice of deep and concentrated
anger,—
“I thought as much. D—n it, if I did not. It’s all that infernal
scoundrel Jack Pringle’s doings, I find. It’s one of that lubberly,
mutinous thief’s tricks, and it’s the last one he shall ever play me.”
“A trick!” screamed Mrs. Williams; “a trick! You don’t mean that! Ah,
me! what compensation shall I get for the dreadful circumstance which
has made me confess the secret of my heart! What shall I do—oh, what
shall I do? When shall I hope for consolation! What sum of money, even
if you, my dear admiral, were to offer it to me, would be a sufficient
balm now to my wounded heart?”
“Madam,” said Henry, “it seems that you have been imposed upon, and
made the victim of a practical joke, which we nor the admiral can have
nothing to do with; and the only consolation we can offer to your
wounded heart, is, that we will keep the secret of your attachment most
inviolate.”
“What compensation is that to me? I’ll bring my action for breach of
promise of marriage, if I don’t get something, and that something very
handsome too. It’s all very fine to talk to me about your mistakes;
I’ll be paid—ah, and paid well, too, or I’ll make the whole country
ring again with the matter.”
“Madam,” said Charles, “I dare say the admiral don’t care one straw
whether the country rings again or not, and you can do just as you
please; but since you have commenced threatening, you will, I hope, see
the obvious propriety of at once leaving his place.”
“I will leave this place, but it shall be to go direct to my solicitor,
and see what he will say to a lone woman being treated in this way.
I’ll swear that he called me his pearl—and if that don’t get me a
verdict and most exemplary damages, I don’t know what will. We shall
see what we shall see, and, in the meantime, you wretches, I leave you
all to contempt. Yes, contempt.”
“Stop a bit, ma’am,” said the admiral. “It’s quite plain to me that you
don’t mind how you earn a trifle, so that you do get it; and now I’ll
tell you, that if you find out that rascal, Jack Pringle, and give him
a good trouncing for his share in the business, you may come to me for
a reward.”
Mrs. Williams, whatever might have been her personal feelings on this
head, did not deign to make the least reply to this intimation, but
suddenly cried—
“I want to see my daughter.”
“She is not here at present,” said Flora; “and, if she were, she is
Mrs. Anderson now, and therefore would of course decline accompanying
you to your home—and she is only waiting some arrangements of her
husband’s, prior, most probably, to going to London with him.”
This speech brought to the recollection of Mrs. Williams, that the
admiral had promised her all the expenses that she had been at
contingent upon the broken-off marriage of her daughter with the baron,
and she began to consider that her action for breach of promise of
marriage against him might fail, and that, if it succeeded, it might
not bring in half so much as the amount of the bill she could by fair
means get out of him.
These considerations were of great pith and amount, and they had their
full effect upon Mrs. Williams; so, instead of bursting out with any
further reproaches, she sat down and commenced a softening process by a
copious flood of tears which she had always at command.
“Oh,” said the old admiral, “you may well cry over it, old girl. I
suppose you really thought you had hooked the old man at last, eh? But
never do you mind, you may make a good thing of it yet, if you get hold
of that scoundrel, Pringle, and serve him out well. I’ll pay for that
job more willingly than for anything else I know of just at present.”
“Don’t speak to me of that brute, my dear sir,” sobbed Mrs. Williams.
“It’s a very cruel thing, of course, to be used in this way, and, as
it’s all a mistake on my part, I hope you will excuse and look over
what has happened. I am sure I should be the last person in the world
to trouble anybody with visits who did not want to see me; and so, I
dare say, we shall only meet once again in this world.”
“Once again, madam! What is the use of our ever meeting again?”
“It would look decidedly disrespectful on my part, if I were not to
hand you the bill myself for the little matters that you were kind
enough to say you would pay for on account of what I had expended on
Helen’s projected marriage with the vampyre baron, you know, admiral.”
“Oh, ah! I recollect now. Well, well; I don’t want to go back from my
word, and as I did promise you, why, I will pay you; but as I don’t
want, on any account, the pleasure of your company again, you will
be so kind, ma’am, as to take this twenty-pounds note, and keep the
change.”
This the admiral thought liberal enough; for his idea of matrimonial
preparations consisted of a new dress or two, or so, and which twenty
pounds ought fairly enough to cover; and he thought he would do well
enough by overpaying Mrs. Williams, as he believed, with that amount.
When Mrs. Williams recovered from her surprise, not unmingled with
indignation, into which this most audacious and, to her, extraordinary
offer threw her, she spoke with a kind of scream, that made the old
admiral jump again, as she shouted in his ears,—
“What! twenty pounds? Are you in your senses? Twenty pounds! Why, my
bill will be, at least, five hundred pounds.”
“What?” roared the admiral. “Are you in your senses? D—n it, ma’am! you
may swallow your bill; and you had better do so, for all the good it is
likely to do you; for, if I pay a farthing more, may I be hung up at
my own yard-arm. Why, you must think that a British admiral is another
name for a fool.”
“Then I tell you what,” said Mrs. Williams—“I tell you what, you
stupid, old, atrocious sinner—I tell you, I will bring my action
against you for breach of promise of marriage; and I’ll swear that,
before your gang of people here came in—who, of course, will swear
black is white, and white is crimson for you, because, I believe, you
are the father of them all—that you first asked me to live with you,
and when I refused, you said you would marry me by special licence
to-morrow.”
“Madam,” said Charles, “now that you think proper entirely to forget
that you are a lady, allow me to beg of you to retire; because it is
quite impossible, after what has happened, that I should hold any
further conversation with you.”
“Yes, Mrs. Williams,” said Henry, “I hope you will perceive the
propriety of at once leaving.”
At this moment a note was handed to Henry, who, upon opening it, read
aloud,—
“The Baron Stolmuyer, of Salzburgh, presents his compliments to Mr.
Bannerworth, and begs to state that Mrs. Williams has received from
him the sum of five hundred pounds for expenses to be incurred on
account of the wedding of her daughter; and he hereby fully empowers
Mr. Bannerworth to demand of Mrs. Williams that sum, and to devote it
to the service and uses of Mr. James Anderson, of whose existence the
baron was not aware when he made his proposal to Mrs. Williams for her
daughter, whom she sold to him, the baron, for that sum.”
“Hilloa!” cried the admiral; “what do you think of that, Mrs. Williams?
I don’t know what you will say to it; but I know very well that I
should consider it a shot between wind and water.”
“I trust,” said Henry, “that you will now still further see the
propriety of leaving here, and of letting this matter completely rest;
because it strikes me that the more you investigate it, madam, the more
it will turn out greatly to your disadvantage.”
“I don’t care a pin’s head for any of you, nor half a farthing,” cried
Mrs. Williams. “The baron gave me the money, and he has no power to get
it back again, as you know well enough. I’ll bring my action, and my
principal witness shall be Mr. Pringle, who came to my house, and who,
if put upon his oath, will be obliged to swear——”
“That it was all a lark,” said Jack, popping his head just within
the amazingly short distance that he opened the door, and then he
disappeared before a word could be said to him.
Mrs. Williams who, notwithstanding all her threats, seemed to have a
lingering impression that she was victimised in the transaction, had
all the ire of her nature aroused at once by the sight of Jack, and she
at once rushed after him, leaving the admiral and the Bannerworths not
at all lamenting her loss.
Jack had no idea that he would be followed by anybody but the admiral,
and to distance him he knew there was no occasion to run; so, when he
had got down to the hall of the hotel, he subsided into a walk, until
he heard a tremendous scuffling of feet behind him, and, upon looking
round, saw Mrs. Williams in full chase, and with an expression upon her
countenance which plainly enough indicated that her intentions were not
at all of a jocular character.
“The devil!” said Jack; “if here ain’t Mother Williams coming full
sail, and at fourteen knots an hour, too, with a fair wind, I’ll be
bound. Never mind—a stern chase is a long chase, so here goes.”
As Jack uttered these remarks, he dashed onwards at tremendous speed;
but the sight of him again, had inflamed Mrs. Williams’s wrath to
madness, and she made the most incredible exertion to come up with him,
so that it was really wonderful to see her.
But Jack, being less encumbered by apparel than the lady, would have
distanced her, but for an unlucky accident, that gave her a temporary
mastery. The fates would have it, that a baker with a tray upon his
head, containing sundry pies, was coming up the street, and as people
do sometimes, when they are mutually anxious to pass each other without
coming in contact, they dodged from side to side for a few seconds, and
then, of course, ran against each other as if they really meant it,
with such force, that down came Jack, and baker, and pies, in one grand
smash.
In another moment the enraged Mrs. Williams reached the spot.
To snatch up the only whole pie there was left, was to the lady the
work of a moment, and to reverse it upon Jack’s face, was the work
of another moment; and then, in the vindictiveness of her rage, she
stamped upon the bottom of the dish until his head was embedded in
damsons, and he was nearly smothered.
From the window of the inn the Bannerworths and the admiral saw all
this take place, and the delight of the old man was of the most
extravagant character, exceeding all bounds, while the Bannerworths,
for the life of them, could not help laughing most heartily.
“Now, you wretch!” said Mrs. Williams, “I hope this will be a lesson to
you. Take that—and that—and that, you sea-snake! you odious tar-barrel!”
[Illustration: Mrs. Williams smashes a pie dish on Jack’s head.]
As she spoke, she hammered on the dish till it broke, and that was for
Jack the best thing that could have happened, for it gave him a little
air, and by a frantic effort he scrambled to a sitting posture, and
commenced dragging the damsons out of his eyes and mouth. Mrs. Williams
then thought it was high time to leave, and so muttering threats, to
the immense amusement of a crowd of persons who had assembled, she
walked away, leaving Jack by no means delighted with the end of the
adventure, and to settle with the infuriated baker as best he might.
It was no small additional mortification to Jack to look up and see the
admiral and the Bannerworths at the window of the hotel, enjoying his
discomfiture, and laughing most heartily at his expense.
CHAPTER CXXVII.
A CHANGE OF SCENE AND CIRCUMSTANCES.—AN EVENT IN LONDON.
The recent events which followed each other so rapidly, were strangely
concluded by the sudden and mysterious disappearance of Sir Francis
Varney. That he should thus have eluded all, was aggravating to a very
large class of people, who seemed to insist that he should have come to
some notable catastrophe.
“Had he only been killed,” they argued, “we should have known the last
of him.”
Of the truth of this there could be no doubt. When a man is dead and
buried, you do, as far as human nature serves, know the end of him; but
this great fact does not always come within the knowledge of men, who
sometimes, contrary to expectation, drop off themselves, and instead of
knowing the end of somebody else, why, somebody else knows the end of
them.
It is a well known fact, that as some die before others, that it does
sometimes happen that those who wish to see another out, may be seen
out themselves; besides, taking the question of longevity aside, it
does not follow, because we so wish to come to the conclusion of an
affair, that its author may but change the scene, and transport it
elsewhere, and the good and curious lieges become defrauded of their
self-satisfying knowledge, viz., the end of the affair.
Of course it was an aggravation, to know that there was an interesting
and highly exciting affair gone off, and they were not allowed to peep
into that mystery, the future; but so it was—they were not gratified.
Some were of the opinion that he had departed this life in a mysterious
and unsatisfactory, because secret manner, and that was why nobody
could tell anything about it.
But there were other opinions afloat, and among others, that of the
admiral, which was pretty general, which was, that he had very likely
disappeared from that part of the world, to seek in some other place
the renovation his system required, by means that were natural to him,
but hideous in others to contemplate or think of.
This was generally the received opinion, for it was universally
admitted by the wise people thereabouts, that he must at certain times
recruit himself.
The opinion thus entertained by all who lived thereabouts, became less
and less absorbing; other matters began to be thought of, things began
to flow into their usual channel, and a subsidence took place in the
turmoil and excitement consequent upon the presence of the vampyre.
About this period, while these parts were regaining their original
serenity and calmness, and while the vampyre was looked upon as an
awful and fearful episode in the life of those who lived there, there
happened in London a circumstance that it is necessary to relate to the
reader, inasmuch as it is very important, and bears strongly on our
story.
Not far from Bloomsbury-square, which, at the period of our story, was
a very fashionable place, and in one of the first streets thereabout,
was the house of a widow, whose name was Meredith. She had been the
wife of a man in good circumstances, but at his death she was left with
a house filled with furniture, some little loose cash, and several
daughters, marriageable and unmarriageable, this being all Mr. Meredith
had to leave.
There could be but one way of obtaining a living—at least, but one that
suggested itself to her, which was to turn lodging-house keeper of the
better sort. Her children had been well educated, that is, sufficiently
so, to pass off in life, in decent society, without any particular
remark.
As she was well calculated for the object she had in view, it was no
wonder that she succeeded in her undertaking, and appeared to do very
well.
About this time an arrival occurred at an hotel not very far from
this spot, which caused a communication to pass to Mrs. Meredith, who
had been recommended lodgers from the hotel, when any of the inmates
desired to be accommodated, and wished for a place with all the
comforts of a home, and domestic attention.
“Mrs. Meredith,” said the head waiter of the hotel, “I wish to have a
word in private with you.”
“With greatest pleasure, Mr. Jones,” said Mrs. Meredith, who was
extremely civil to the waiter; “will you be pleased to sit down.”
“I have not the time, I thank you—I have not time; but I have run over
to you to inform you we have an old invalid colonel at our place, who
seems as if he did not know what he wanted; he wants some kind of
lodging—he don’t like the hotel—whether there is some genteel family,
whose kind attentions would soothe his disorders, and, I suppose, his
temper.”
“Oh, poor gentleman,” said Mrs. Meredith; “how unfortunate he should
suffer—is he rich?”
“Yes, I believe so—very rich, he’s a colonel in the India service; he’s
been a fine man, but he has had some hard knocks. I have seen more
rickety matters than he before to-day, and he will do very well. I told
him I knew where there was a lady who occasionally admitted an inmate
to her house, which was a large one, but she must be satisfied that her
lodger is a gentleman.
“‘Has she any family?’ he inquired; ‘because I hate to go where there’s
nobody but the lady of the house, because she can’t always attend upon
me, read to me, and the like of that.’”
“Goodness me, what an odd man!”
“Yes, but he pays well; a retired colonel—large fortune. You know that
these East Indians expect I don’t know what; they are even fed by
beautiful young black virgins.”
“The wretch!”
“Oh, dear, no; it’s the custom of the country; so, you see, he’s been
humoured, and it will be necessary yet to humour him, if you mean to
have him for your lodger. I expect he’ll only be troublesome; but, when
they pay for trouble, why, it’s all profit.”
“Very true,” replied Mrs. Meredith; “is he a single man?”
“Yes, oh, yes; I believe he has never been married; has had so much to
do in India, that he had nothing to do with marriages.”
“Where does he come from?”
“India. I believe he had a very fine palace of his own, at
Puttytherapore, so I’m told. Lord, he seems to think nothing of these
parts—but he’s an odd man; however, as he pays well, he’ll make a good
lodger anywhere.”
“Well, you may tell him, Mr. Jones, that we have a fine suite of rooms
for his accommodation on the first floor, and bed rooms—every attention
he can wish. You know our terms, Mr. Jones, I think—but I may as well
tell you—five guineas a-week.”
“Five guineas a-week, eh?”
“Yes; that is moderate, when you come to consider what a trouble and an
expense it will be to get such things as will please the palate of an
Indian.”
“It is a trouble, certainly.”
“And, besides that, he will have such a place and furniture as he
seldom meets with in London; besides, from what you say, there will be
little trouble in attending to him by myself and daughters, and you
know I have several.”
“Exactly—exactly; that is the thing he seems to desire; you will,
therefore, have a preference over any one else who may have anything
that he wants—a kind of domestic hearth; he has none of his own, you
see.”
“Has he no friends?”
“None living, I dare say; besides, he would hardly like to trust
himself along with relations, who would poison him for the sake of his
money; and, if he have any living, he may know nothing of them, where
they are, or anything else, and they would be as strangers to him,
for he would not be able to recognise them—but I must go now. Five
guineas—that includes all?”
“Yes; all, except wines and liquors, you know.”
“Very well, I’ll let him know; and, perhaps, you’ll be in the way, in
case he should come round this evening to examine the place.”
“Do you think there is any chance of his coming in to-night.”
“Really, I cannot tell; he may, or may not, just as he pleases—he is an
odd fish; but, good Mrs. Meredith, I will talk to him.”
The waiter left; and Mrs. Meredith sat in her parlour, which was her
own private apartment, which she and her daughters usually retired to
and received their own friends. Here they remained, in some degree kept
in continual expectation; nothing was said, for some time, by either
mother or daughter, for there was but one at home at that time.
“Do you know, Margaret,” she said, “we are likely to have a new lodger?”
“Indeed, ma?”
“Yes, my dear; he is a fidgetty old man, a colonel from India; he
is vastly rich, I am given to understand, and will require all the
attentions of a relative. He will pay very handsomely; in fact, my
dear, he will keep us all with a little care and management.”
“Well, ma, the men ought to do so, the creatures!—what are they for,
if they don’t. I’m sure, if ever I come to marry, which I am sure
I sha’n’t, and if I found that he didn’t find me in all I wanted,
wouldn’t I lead him a life!—I rather think I would,” said the amiable
child; “I’d never let him know peace night nor day. It would be
useless for him to tell me misfortune had deprived him of means; that
wouldn’t do for me. Oh, dear, no; a married man has no right to meet
misfortunes; indeed, he deserves to be punished for having a wife at
all under such circumstances.”
“A very proper spirit, my dear; but you must never let such a thing as
that pass your lips, because it would be very likely to cause you to
lose a chance; the men are so fastidious now a-days, and they think
they win us, when we angle for, and catch them.”
“And this lodger, ma?”
“Oh, he’s, as I told you, a rich old East Indian.”
At this moment, a coach drove up to the door, and a tremendous
double rap was played off upon the door, as if it had been committed
by a steam-engine; so loud and so long was the application for the
admittance, that both mother and daughter started.
“Dear me, that must be him,” said the mother; “yes, a coach and
all—there—there, I declare.”
“What, ma?”
“Why, look at that girl next door out in the balcony; there’s Miss
Smith—that girl is always trying to attract some person or other; and
the men affect to believe that she is beautiful; for my part, I think a
girl of seventeen ought to have more modesty.”
“The hussy!” said the young lady, contemptuously.
The servant now entered to inform her that a gentleman had called about
the apartments.
“Ask him up stairs,” said Mrs. Meredith; and she prepared to follow the
colonel so soon as she heard he was ascending the stairs, which was a
slow job to him, as he walked lame, with a gold headed cane.
When Mrs. Meredith came to the room, she saw a tall gentleman; his
height was lost, on account of him stooping; he wore a green shade
over one eye, and he had one arm in a sling; besides which, as we have
before related, he was rather lame.
“Not so bad as I thought for,” muttered Mrs. Meredith, to herself, as
she curtseyed to his salute.
“I have been recommended to seek here a lodging, ma’am. I do not know
if I am correct in believing you have such as I want.”
“This, sir, is the sitting-room; it is a very handsome one, and above
what is usually offered at a lodging-house. The fact is, sir, the house
was never furnished for letting, but for our own private occupation;
therefore, it has all of the comforts of a private residence.”
“That is what I chiefly want. You see, I do not care to undertake the
trouble of setting up an establishment myself. I am alone, I may say;
therefore it is I seek such a lodging as comes nearest to what I should
myself choose if I were to make a home of my own.”
“Precisely, sir. There is the back drawing-room, and a bed room
up-stairs.”
“Oh, very good; I need, I presume, make no inquiry as to what kind of
table you keep; the best, I dare say. I was informed of the price you
asked.”
“Yes; we consider that quite moderate, sir.”
“I dare say,” said the Indian, looking about the place with an air of
curiosity; “I dare say.”
“Yes, sir, you see the advantages we offer are much above the usual
run. Besides, you are an invalid, and will require extra attention.”
“Yes; there is much truth in that; I have been used to it, and
therefore you will see that I bargain for it; but, at the same time,
you will not find me difficult to please, I flatter myself; but we
shall know more of each other the longer we are together.”
“Certainly, sir. I can assure you, that should you take the apartments,
nothing on my part, or my daughters’, will be wanting to make your stay
agreeable.”
The stranger examined the appearance of the room, and the others,
and then, after much conversation with them, he agreed to take the
lodgings, and to come into them on the morrow, as he was extremely
particular as to well-aired beds, and should require them all to be
re-aired.
“And now, madam, before I finally agree to come in, will you show me
the means of escape, if any, in case of fire. I am anxious about that;
I have read so many calamities arising from that cause of late in
London that I am somewhat nervous about it, though I am so much of an
invalid that I should hardly be able to avail myself of it.”
“You shall see, sir,” said Mrs. Meredith; “we have ample and safe
accommodation in that respect. You see, here is a pair of broad steps
that lead up to that door—a trap-door; and here is another, that opens
upon the leads at the top of the house.”
The colonel made shift to walk up, and to look over the house-tops;
there was a sea of chimneys and pantiles, at the same time they were
all easy of access on this side of the street; so there was no danger
from fire, and each house there was similarly provided.
“Well, madam, I think I may say that this affair is concluded. I will
leave you my card, and, if you think proper, you can obtain what
information you desire of me at the hotel.”
“I am quite satisfied, sir,” said the landlady, as she took the card
that was proffered her, and also a bank-note which he offered her, in
token of his taking possession of the lodgings.
Mrs. Meredith curtseyed, and the colonel left the apartment, and
descended the staircase with great deliberation, for he could not go
very swiftly; he was lame, and one arm was up in a sling, and therefore
he had not the free use of his limbs.
As he came down the stairs, and when near the mat, Margaret, the
eldest daughter, came out and passed into the back parlour, for no
other ostensible purpose than that of seeing the stranger, whose
eye was instantly, but only momentarily, fixed upon her; but it was
enough; they both saw each other, and had a glance at the features, and
Margaret disappeared.
The stranger stepped into the coach, and, as the door was being shut,
he looked up to the windows of the next house, where the young lady,
nothing daunted, still sat at the window; and so little was she
interested with her neighbour’s affairs, that she barely bestowed a
momentary glance upon the coach or its occupant, whose solitary optic
took notice of her, and then the Jehu drove away with his rumbling
vehicle.
“Well, I never saw such impudence, in my life!” said Mrs. Meredith, as
she came to the parlour-windows, which happened to bow outwards, and
gave her a better opportunity of watching her neighbours to the right
and left of her.
“What is the matter, ma’?” inquired her daughter.
“Why, there’s that minx still up yonder. I declare if she didn’t stare
at the colonel; he saw her, and noticed her, too. Well, I wouldn’t have
had her there to-day for a trifle; he will think he has got into a bad
neighbourhood, seeing her so bold. Really, now, she lays herself open
to all kinds of imputations. I do not mean to say any evil of her; but,
really, if she will do that now, what will she not do by-and-bye? I am
sorry she has no one to advise her better.”
“I am sure she is old enough to know better,” rejoined the daughter.
“I am quite sure she’s no beauty, and, if she wants to catch any of
the men, she won’t be successful in that manner; unless, indeed, she
doesn’t care whom she picks up with.”
“Oh, that is, I fear, too often the case with young girls with weak
intellects. But did you see our new lodger, my dear?”
“Yes, ma’.”
“And what did you think of him?” inquired Mrs. Meredith, with an
amiable whine, and a gentle rubbing of hands.
“Think, ma’, think—what can I think of a man whom I have hardly seen,
ma’? He only passed me; I could not recollect him again if I tried.”
“Ah, well, my dear, you know best. I can always recollect people whom
I have once seen? He is a very fine man—at least, he has been; he has
lost much of his height, for he is lame, and stoops much; but still he
has been a handsome man.”
“One eye, only, ma’, I think.”
“Yes, my dear, one eye, as you say; but I think a remarkably keen one,
too. He’s quite the gentleman, too; he’s been used to command, you can
see that. These military men have an air about them that you cannot
mistake; and even this gentleman, though, you see, wounded and lame,
yet he has the air of an officer about him.”
“He may have, ma’; but, you know, if he have the air of a general, with
nothing else, it would buy a very poor dinner.”
“So it would, my dear. You certainly are an extraordinary girl,
Margaret, a very extraordinary girl, and will be the making of your
family. Only suppose you should marry this rich colonel, what then,
eh?—I only say, suppose you were to marry him?—because it isn’t
certain, yet—well, wouldn’t that minx next door think you were lucky?
She would bite her nails in anger.”
“Yes, she would, ma’; but it may never happen. But, if she thinks
to get a beau that way, she’s much mistaken. I am sure she will get
insulted.”
“No wonder. But, Margaret, my dear, you must do your best to please
this gentleman; he wants to have people about him just as if he had his
own home. He has no friends or relatives; who knows what may happen
yet?”
“No, ma’; we don’t know what may happen, and I will do my best to
please him; but I sha’n’t court him, you know, ma’; he must do that.”
“Yes, certainly, my child, he must. No; you mustn’t appear anxious
about it; but merely say you are pleased to have his good opinion, and
you must be a little coy of everything else; for there are times when
such old gentlemen are easily entrapped. But I must set about having
things aired and put into order for his arrival to-morrow.”
CHAPTER CXXVIII.
THE NEW LODGER.—A NIGHT ALARM.—A MYSTERIOUS CIRCUMSTANCE.
It was not until late the next day that Mrs. Meredith heard anything
of her new lodger. All she had heard was that he would be there during
the day, but whether to breakfast, dinner, or tea, she could not tell
which, and now she was waiting with expectation, if not anxiety; but,
at the same time, she knew she was quite sure of her lodger, because
she held his bank-note.
It had been a dull day; there are many such in London, and therefore
that was no singular circumstance. It was one of those dull,
leaden-coloured days of which you can predict nothing with certainty,
or even a chance of being right; it was rather squally at times, and at
others a west wind blew; not cold—at least, not particularly so; but,
yet, notwithstanding the heavy appearance of the sky, there was a clear
white light that made every object look more disagreeable than ordinary.
The landlady and her daughter were both on the _qui vive_, as it is
called, looking out for their new lodger, whom they expected the more
immediately as the evening drew on, for there was less likelihood of
his coming in the middle of the day than towards the evening, and less
after evening had set in than before, for he was an invalid.
It was, they thought, just about the time when he must arrive, when
there could only be the uncertainty of a few minutes. The whole house
was in order; nothing was left to chance; Mrs. Meredith herself had
gone over the whole place, and took especial pains to find all sorts of
fault with the unfortunate drudge who did the work, of course, aided by
the mother and daughter; but such aid was distressing, because she had
to wait upon both, and do her own work as well.
However, all was in readiness, and they were looking out at every coach
from between the blinds. The sound of wheels was enough to cause them
to start, when suddenly a coach drove up to the door, upon which had
been carefully packed several leather boxes and portmanteaus.
“Here he is,” said the daughter; “here he is.”
“Yes; and, as I am alive,” said Mrs. Meredith, as she cast her eye
upwards towards the next house, “as I am alive, there is that girl
again. I do believe that she does it on purpose. It is done to
aggravate me, and to attract attention from the men. The hussy!”
There was now no time to lose, the knocker at the door giving pretty
clear indication that instant attention upon their part was requisite,
and up jumped Mrs. Meredith and her daughter Margaret. Immediately the
servant opened the door into the passage, the coach door was opened,
the steps let clattering down, and Colonel Deverill entered the house.
“Will you walk into the parlour, colonel,” inquired Mrs. Meredith,
“until your boxes are all in, and you see they are all correct? There
is a good fire.”
“Thank you, madam,” said the colonel, with some difficulty walking
along. “I am scarcely so well able to walk as I was yesterday.”
“Ah! colonel, you must have suffered much. But I am glad the parlour
is so handy—it will save you the walk up stairs at present, until you
are quite recovered from your fatigue. Pray be seated, colonel, by the
fire. The man shall bring them in, and lay them before the door.”
“Thank you,” said the colonel, and he sat down in a large easy chair,
having first dropped his cloak, which was a large blue military cloak,
lined with white, with a fur collar, and looked extremely rich and
handsome; beneath which he wore an officer’s undress frock, covered
over with a profusion of braid.
The boxes and portmanteaus were brought in and laid down so that the
colonel could see them; and, when that was done, the coachman made his
demand, which excited an exclamation of horror from Mrs. Meredith,
and a declaration that she thought hackney coachmen were the greatest
impostors and extortioners under the sun. There never was such a set as
hackney coachmen—never!
“Saving lodging house keepers, ma’am—axing your pardon for saying so.
Not that I means any offence, only I lived in one once, and ought to
know summat.”
The colonel, however, made no remark, but, pulling out an embroidered
purse, which appeared to full of gold, he paid the man his demand.
“Thank yer honour; you are one of the right sort, and no mistake.” So
saying, the coachman walked away, jinking the money as he walked along
the passage, until he came to the door where the girl was standing, and
then, giving her a knowing wink, and jerking his head backwards, he
said,—
“They are a scaley lot here, ain’t they, Mary?”
“Mary!” screamed Margaret.
“Yes, miss.”
“Shut the door, and come away from that insolent fellow.”
Slam went the door, and then the servant went down stairs, and the
parlour-door was immediately closed, and the colonel was given into the
tender mercies of the lodging-house keeper; for, though she pretended
that she merely offered a genteel and presentable home for such as
desired it, and could afford to pay for it, she was, in every sense of
the word, a lodging-house keeper.
The colonel, however, sat very composedly in his chair, and gazed at
the fire in silence; and from time to time he gazed at the mother
and daughter with his one eye; he had not lost the entire use of the
other, but had a green silk shade over it. He watched what went on,
and replied cautiously to what was said to him, but appeared inclined
to silence, and occasionally abrupt in his conversation; but this
they attributed to the habit he must have been in, when abroad, of
commanding.
“Will you take tea at once, colonel, or at what hour do you choose to
have it?”
“I will take it at once. I am tired.”
“What will you take, sir?” inquired Margaret, at one end of the table;
and, placing herself in an enticing posture, she awaited the answer,
expecting to be looked at.
“Coffee,” said the colonel, abruptly.
There was a pause; but Margaret said nothing more, and set about doing
such little matters as appeared to be an employment. But it was a mere
deception—it was all done; nothing had been left undone; they had taken
care of that, as the servant knew full well.
However, there was little that passed of any peculiar character on that
occasion, for the evening passed off very calmly and comfortable, the
colonel giving his opinion somewhat dogmatically; but that, of course
was submitted to, as he was a military man and had much experience,
and, moreover, he was a rich man—quite a nabob.
It is astonishing, as a general rule, what people will submit to when
it comes from those who have riches at command. That fact alone seems
to stamp all that is foolish and absurd, coming from such a quarter,
with sense and worth.
It is in vain for any one not blessed with property to talk; his
talking is nothing in comparison with what falls from the lips of the
man who has property. You are talked down, and if you are obstinate,
and won’t be talked down, why, you are a disagreeable fellow, a
dissatisfied man, and your neighbours ought to set their faces against
you.
Thus, through life, he who does not submit to the wealthy, is always
run down, and there is every disposition, if possible, of running him
off the road altogether, no matter how great the injustice against him,
and the enormity of the conduct of others; they are, as they think,
justified, because he is not a genteel person; in fact, he is not
evangelical.
The evening passed over, as we have said, in calmness and quiet, and
Mrs. Meredith appeared to be well pleased with her lodger; and, at a
moderately early hour, they separated and went to bed. The colonel
retired, after taking leave of them, to his own room, complaining he
was in great pain, and scarce able to walk, and so cold, he was nearly
benumbed.
“This climate,” he said, “is so cold, so moist, and altogether so
uncomfortable, that I cannot understand how it is people ever endure
it. Indeed,” he continued to Mrs. Meredith, “there must be some great
difference between rich and poor in their conformation, else they
couldn’t stand it.”
Of course, Mrs. Meredith assented to the proposition, as she would have
done to any other, no matter what proposition, that had been so urged
by such a person.
Thus it was with the colonel, who appeared very well satisfied with his
lodgings; and all parties, for so short a time, were well pleased with
each other.
• • • • •
The night was dark, that is to say, it was one of those nights in which
neither moon nor stars showed themselves; no sound was heard through
the streets, save the heavy step of the guardian of the night, or the
midnight reveller, who might be finding his way homeward boisterously,
and with scarce enough sense to enable him to take the right path.
There were clouds enough to have intercepted the moon, but there was a
kind of light that was spread through them that you saw when you looked
up, but which aided not the traveller below; but, then, there were
countless lamps that illumined the streets.
At that time there was a man creeping over the house-tops. He had
gained the housetop of Mr. Smith, the house in which resided Miss
Smith, who had given so much offence to Mrs. Meredith by sitting
so much out in the balcony. He stooped in the gutter, and looked
cautiously around; no human being was within sight; he was alone, and
no soul saw him.
Cautiously he crept towards the trap-door—it was bolted; but that was
soon obviated—no sound, however, could be heard. The soft, but rotten,
wood gave way under the steady pressure exerted upon the door, which at
length opened.
He paused a moment or two, and listened carefully for several minutes.
Then he entered the loft slowly and noiselessly, keeping as low as
possible, so that he might run no risk of being observed by any one who
might be passing the house, or who might be up by accident in any of
the opposite houses, in consequence of illness, or any other cause.
There was a lower trap-door through which the figure passed. There
could be no difficulty in passing, because that was always kept open,
as it was considered to assist in ventilating the house; and then the
intruder stood within the house.
He then drew himself up to his full height, and paused for some
moments, as if considering the next step he would take; but then he
descended to the second floor, on which were placed what are called the
best bedrooms. He paused at one, gently tried the handle, and finding
it turn, and the door open, he gave one look towards the stairs that he
had just descended, and then he entered the apartment.
All was yet still; no sound met his ear, save the breathing of
the sleeper within, who lay in a sweet sleep, and was as calm and
unconscious as the blessed; perfect rest and forgetfulness had steeped
the senses of the young girl, who lay in ambrosial sleep. One arm
was thrown outside the clothes, and revealed, in all its symmetry, a
snow-white bosom, heaving gently to the throbbing of the heart.
The intruder gazed at the young girl for some moments, and clasped his
hands with trembling eagerness, and a ghastly smile played upon his
terrible features, while a fearful fire shot from the eyes of one who
thus disturbed the slumbers of the living.
He approached the bed, and took the hand within his own, and then the
sleeper awoke. It would be impossible to describe the look of terror
and horror that sat on the young girl’s face.
She could not scream, she could not utter a sound; her whole faculties
appeared to have been bound up for a short time. She could not even
shrink from the horrible being who approached her, she was so perfectly
horror-stricken with that truly horrible countenance, the glance of
which seemed as if it would destroy the power of speech for ever. She
shrank now, but could not move.
The creature crept closer. It seized her hand, and held it within its
own; but even that could not awake her from the trance she was in. She
felt a horrible sinking feeling, as though she must sink through the
very flooring of the house, and yet she could not stir.
It appeared as though, so long as the hideous face was opposed to
her’s, so long she was unable to move; it was a species of fascination;
however great the horror felt, yet there was no help for it. She could
not ever shut her eyes; that boon was denied her.
What she saw cannot be described. It is by far too horrible for pen to
describe. The wild horrible insanity that appeared in the eyes of the
creature, with their peculiar cast, was indescribable; the only light
that entered the room, at that moment, came from a lamp below, and
illumined only the upper part of the room above the window sills.
The creature then stood in relief against this light, a horrible dark
object, whose glaring eyeballs were too terrible ever to be forgotten.
Then, again, while he with one hand held her’s, he passed his other
hand up her arm, and then felt along the soft, white flesh with its
cold, clammy fingers, as if it were feeling for something, or greedy of
the velvet-like substance.
Still keeping the eyes fixed upon the hapless and helpless girl, he
drew the arm towards him, and, leaning upon the bed, suddenly plunged
his face on the arm, and held and seized it near the middle with its
teeth, and then it made an attempt to suck the wound.
This, however, broke the charm, horrible and complete as it was; for
the creature’s hideous countenance was lost to her sight, as he plunged
his face to her arm.
Shriek followed shriek in quick and rapid succession. The whole house
was alarmed by the terrible shrieks that came from the apartment. She
struggled, and by a sudden effort, she disengaged herself from the
grasp of the fiend, and rolled, wrapped up in the bed-clothes, to the
other side of the floor.
The monster still pursued her with greedy thirst for blood, and had
picked her up, and again placed her on the bed, with more than mere
human strength, and again sought the arm he had been deprived of by the
sudden effort of the young girl.
“Help! help! Mother! father! help! help!”
The shouts rang through the house, awaking the affrighted sleepers from
their repose, in a manner that may be called distressing.
It is distressing in the midst of a large city to be awoke, in the
dead of the night, by loud and urgent cries of distress. It is such a
contrast to the dead stillness that reigns around, and when the first
cries are heard, it creates a terror and surprise that takes away all
power of action.
It was not till the cries had been heard a second time that the inmates
aroused themselves; the fact was, they were fearful of fire. The moment
that idea floated across their minds, then, indeed, they started up,
and the father of the young girl, hearing the fall, at once rushed to
the room of his daughter. He arrived but in time; the hideous monster,
being affrighted by the footsteps approaching him, turned from his
blood-stained feast, and hid himself beneath the drapery, as the father
entered the room.
“Mary,” he said, “Mary! Mary! what means this—what can be the
matter—are you hurt—how come you in this disorder?”
“Oh, God! that thing from the grave has been sucking my blood from my
veins. See—see yonder—he moves! Watch him—note him, father!”
Believing she raved, her father paid no attention to what she did say,
but continued to regard her with sorrow and regret, for he believed it
to be a sudden attack of mania; but seeing the curtains move, he turned
his head, and at once divined it to be the cause of his daughter’s
alarm.
The glance was but momentary; but he saw the figure of a man who was
escaping from the apartment by the door by which he had at that moment
entered.
[Illustration: The flight of the vampyre from the young lady’s chamber.]
“Help!” he shouted—“help—thieves—murder!”
And as he shouted, he rushed after the figure that was flying towards
the top of the house. By this time the house was filled with people,
and the noise up stairs had caused the servants below to rise confused
and thoroughly terrified by the sounds they heard, and the cries of
their master.
At that moment, one of those watchful guardians of the night passed by
the house, and was immediately hailed by the unfortunate people below,
who were afraid to go up stairs to offer any assistance, lest they
might be knocked back again, which fear stopped all aid from below.
“Hilloa! what’s the matter now?” inquired the worthy guardian of the
night.
“Oh, I don’t know—goodness knows. You had better go up and see. I’ll
come up after you. Don’t be afraid; I’ll come up after you, if you’ll
go first.”
“Stop a moment while I spring my rattle,” said the worthy functionary;
who thereupon gave an alarming peal upon his instrument, and then he
entered the house, with instructions to the servant to run down stairs
and let any of his party in that might come up.
Then the guardian of the night hastened up stairs with all the haste
he could, and came up just in time to pick Mr. Smith up, who was lying
stunned at the foot of the stairs.
The fact was, Mr. Smith had pursued his adversary too quickly, and
finding he could not get off, he turned round and felled him to the
earth, like an ox. It was just at this juncture when the charley came
up stairs, and in another moment Mr. Smith recovered.
“What’s the matter?” inquired the watchman; “is the house on fire.”
“No, no; the vampyre—the vampyre!”
“Eh—what? Never heard on ’im afore—never seed him.”
“Quick—quick! he has gone up stairs. Quick—after him!” said Mr. Smith,
as he ran up the stairs, and was quickly followed by the watchman and
some others who now crowded about, having had time to dress themselves
and come to Mr. Smith’s aid; and they now crowded to the house-top,
for they saw the trap-door was unfastened, though it had been hastily
pushed to. This they opened, and then looked on the house-top, first
one way, and then another.
“He ain’t here,” said the watchman, “and we mustn’t expect to find him
here; he wouldn’t wait for us, you may depend upon that. We had better
search along the house-tops till we see him, or find some of the other
traps open, and then you may guess where he has gone.”
“The difficulty is, which way did he go?” said Mr. Smith.
“Oh, I saw him go that way,” said another watchman, who came up stairs,
having been first attracted by the sounds of the rattle, and then,
looking up at the house, he saw the figure of a man stealing, with
great rapidity of motion, across the house-tops.
“There I lost him, then,” he said. “I didn’t see him after that spot;
but he may have gone further, for all I can say to the contrary. But we
shall soon see.”
“This trap-door is open,” said the other watchman, as he pulled aside
Mrs. Meredith’s trap-door, which had only been pushed to. “We had
better go in here, and see if he isn’t gone somewhere into the house,
and hiding himself until all is quiet, and then he will make off if
left alone.”
CHAPTER CXXIX.
THE UNSUCCESSFUL PURSUIT.—MR. SMITH’S DISAPPOINTMENT, AND THE
TESTIMONY OF MRS. MEREDITH.
Mrs. Meredith and her daughters had long sunk into deep sleep before
the events just narrated took place in her neighbour’s house. There was
a perfect stillness; the whole house appeared as though there were no
living soul within it, all was so still and quiet.
Presently, however, there was a terrific sound; it was like that of a
human being falling and bumping down stairs, and then there was a great
deal of shouting and calling, and Mrs. Meredith opened her eyes and
trembled in her bed, while her daughter Margaret, who upon the occasion
slept with her, was likewise as frightened.
“What is th—that?” she stammered, with some difficulty.
“Oh, hear, I cannot think. Thieves—murderers, I dare say. Oh, merciful
Heaven! what shall we do—where shall I go? We shall be murdered!”
Both females trembled in their beds, and were quite unable to move,
breaking out in a profuse sweat from fear; and yet the noise came
nearer and nearer, and there were many persons evidently in the house;
their numbers were so numerous that they evidently didn’t care to
conceal themselves.
The fact was this: when Mr. Smith and his party found the trap-door
open, they descended into the house, the watchman leading the way; but
in going down the ladder, his foot slipped, and he came with a dreadful
thump on the landing, and fortunately he rolled up against the servant
girl’s door, instead of down stairs. The door flew open, and the girl
was too terrified to speak for some moments.
At length the watchman having got up, he made for the bed, upon which
the girl jumped up, and began to scream out for help in piteous tones.
“Come, come—don’t be frightened,” said the watchman; “get up and show
us over the house.”
“Well, I’m sure!” said the girl, who had recovered some of her
assurance, for the coat, stick, and lantern of the watchman at once
assured her that she was in no immediate danger whatever. “Well, I’m
sure! to think of coming in a female’s room in this manner. You ought
to be ashamed of yourself, you old wretch, you ought!”
“No names. If you don’t get up and show us over, and call your master——”
“I ain’t got a master.”
“Well, your mistress, then—we will go ourselves, and we’ll soon make
short work of it. Come, come, no nonsense. We will dress you ourselves.”
“You monster! Go out of the room, can’t you? Have you no decency left
you? I’ll get up; but I’ll lay a complaint before the lord mayor, and
he shall tell you a different tale to this. I’m ashamed of you, and so
you ought to be of yourselves.”
However, during this energetic remonstrance, she contrived to shuffle
on some things, and when she was ready, she came down to her mistress’s
door, and then began to hammer and kick at it, saying,—
“Oh, Mrs. Meredith, here’s sich a lot of men in the house. Do come out,
mem. I don’t know what’s the matter; but they’ll break into your room,
as they broke into mine.”
“What do they want, Mary?”
“Don’t know, mem.”
“There is some one escaped into your house that has broken into the
next house, and your trap-doors on the roof were open.”
“Gracious me!” said Mrs. Meredith—“gracious me! Show them over the
place, Mary. We will get up in a few moments, and come to you.
Margaret, my dear, get up; some housebreakers have got into the house,
and we shall all be murdered in our sleep if we don’t find them. Oh,
dear, dear! what will become of us? What will our new lodger say to
this disturbance?”
Margaret made no reply, but began to dress herself, while the party
began their search; and Mr. Smith hastened back to his daughter, to
understand the nature of the attack that had been made upon her, and
whether she were any better than she was when he left her.
However, when he came to hear what was the real cause of her terror, to
find the marks on her arm, and the certainty that nothing had been lost
or moved, he was perfectly staggered, and hastened back after the party
he had left, to make some further attempt to follow the miscreant, and
to discover, if possible, his retreat, and bring him to justice for
the vile attack he had made.
When he returned, he met Mrs. Meredith coming out of her room, she
having hastily dressed herself, followed by her daughter.
“Oh! Mr. Smith—Mr. Smith, what is the meaning of all this disturbance?
Here are a number of strange men, who have forced themselves into my
house, and whether their object is our property or our lives, we cannot
tell. What can I do, Mr. Smith?”
“You have nothing to fear, ma’am.”
“Nothing to fear, sir! Why, is not such an occurrence something to be
feared for its own sake alone?”
“Yes, ma’am, it is very disagreeable, I am willing to admit; but I
presume you would not give refuge to a vampyre?”
“A what, sir?”
“A vampyre, madam. I know not how to explain it to you, but I have to
assure you my daughter has been attacked in her sleep by the midnight
blood-sucker from the graves. Oh! God, that such a thing should happen
in my family. I would not have believed it, had the same been related
to me from anybody else.”
“It must have been the night mare,” suggested Mrs. Meredith.
“Would to Heaven it had been so; but I came to her assistance, and saw
him as he fled from my daughter’s bedside, and I followed him to the
roof, and he was lost on your house, and your trap-door was open, and
we presumed he went in here.”
“The door was bolted when we went to bed last night,” said Margaret.
“Yes,” responded her mother; “we always have that bolted every night,
for it is our only protection from that side of the house; but no one
can be here; we have no man in the house save our lodger, an invalid
and quite a gentleman.”
“Can we see him?”
“I should think not, because he is an invalid; he’s a colonel in
the East India service, and will, no doubt, be very angry at such a
disturbance, and much more so when he finds he is wanted. I am really
much shocked at this disturbance, which is the more unfortunate as it
is the first night he has slept here.”
“I must see him.”
“Must, Mr. Smith—must! I cannot permit anything of the kind to be said
in my house. I give you permission to look for him over the house, but
I can’t give any such permission with what my lodgers possess—it is not
in my power to do so if I had the inclination.”
While this was going on, the house had been rummaged over and over, and
then a party of them, with Mr. Smith, came to the colonel’s bedroom; a
close travelling cap and a dressing-gown were found on the mat before
the door.
“Oh!” said Mr. Smith, as he picked it up, “this appears very much like
what I saw the figure was dressed up in—something like robes, and this
would serve the purpose.”
“Ah!” said the watchman, “we shall have him now.”
“But the gentleman is an invalid; he can hardly walk up stairs, much
less can he be scrambling over house-tops,” said Mrs. Meredith. “You
must surely all have been dreaming. Something has disagreed with you,
and the result has been visions of which you can of course find no
trace.”
“Not quite that, either,” said one of the watchmen, “for we saw him
getting away, and he made for your trap-door, where I missed him. I
could not see any more of him among the chimneys, or something of that
sort, but I thought he came in here, and found your door open.”
“And you saw him come in?” said Mrs. Meredith.
“I can’t say I saw him come in,” said the man; “I couldn’t see through
a brick-wall and a stack of chimneys which were in the way, but I felt
certain he must have come in here.”
“Well, this is very strange—very singular.”
“The dressing-gown, too,” said Mr. Smith, “is dusty and dirty all
over—at least in places where it appears to have come in contact with
anything dirty—possibly the roof of the house; certainly something of
that sort has happened. It looks very much like it.”
“And the cap sits close to the head; that is dirty.”
“But it is dry dirt,” said Mr. Smith, “and of the same character; we
had better see this lodger of yours, Mrs. Meredith, and with your
permission I will knock.”
As Mr. Smith spoke he gave two or three loud knocks at the door, which
were not answered for some time. But they were speedily repeated, and
then a peremptory voice exclaimed,—
“In the name of goodness, what is the meaning of all this disturbance?
Is the house broken into, or is it a resort for thieves? Be it as it
may, if I am disturbed in this way, and you don’t instantly get out of
the way and make less noise, I’ll fire through the door. I have loaded
pistols by my side, and I will not submit to this shameful disturbance.”
At the sound of these words, the two watchmen were much disturbed,
and immediately stepped back so hastily as nearly to overthrow
Mrs. Meredith and her daughter; but Mr. Smith, after a step or two
backwards, resumed his place by the door, and exclaimed,—
“I have not come here, sir, to be frightened; some strange
circumstances have just happened, and I must beg you’ll open your door
to explain them.”
“And who the devil are you?”
“My name is Smith, sir. I live next door, and my daughter has been
attacked by a vampyre. I know not what nature the creature must
possess, but it has shocking propensities—there are evidences at your
door which make it appear he has got into your room.”
“It would be very foolish in him to so anything of the sort,” said the
colonel, “for, in the first place, I will not suffer annoyance in any
shape; and besides, I have loaded pistols for his reception. Wait till
I am dressed, and then I will come out to you.”
“I am sure the colonel will be very much offended by this conduct,
which is very shameful; people’s houses broken open and entered in
this manner, and people’s rest broken so. I am quite ashamed of my
neighbours—quite.”
“Really we have strong suspicions—strong grounds of suspicion, too,
against that lodger of yours; look at that dressing-gown and cap, the
open trap-door, and all—really I can’t help thinking there is something
very suspicious in all this.”
“Yes,” said the watchman; “I know there’s nobody else in the house.
I’ve been all over it, and it’s very strange to me if he ain’t the man.”
“Well,” said Margaret Meredith, “it seems as if you are most willing
to accuse those who are quite incapable of doing what you accuse them
of. This gentleman was barely able to get up stairs without assistance;
besides, he could not have gone up stairs without some one being awoke
by the noise. It’s my opinion that it is a piece of impertinence
altogether.”
“So I think, my dear,” said Mrs. Meredith.
“I am a father, Mrs. Meredith,” said Mr. Smith, “and I have my
daughter’s safety and happiness at heart. I am sure there’s much, too,
very suspicious. You wouldn’t like your daughter’s blood sucked out of
her arms. I am sure I don’t, nor does she.”
“Oh, botheration!” said Margaret; “who ever heard of such stuff? I’m
sure I never did, except in some book of improbabilities, and nothing
more; but here is Colonel Deverill.”
At that moment Colonel Deverill opened the door, and then retired a
little into his room, saying as he did so, in a very angry voice, but,
at the same time, endeavouring to be courteous,—
“You can come in, now; but I am quite at a loss to understand the
nature of this disturbance; the house don’t appear to be on fire;
and that is the only contingency in my mind that will justify such a
disturbance. What is the matter, Mrs. Meredith?”
“I can hardly tell you, sir. I have been disturbed by finding a party
of people in my house; it is most amazing to me how they came in.”
“I will tell you, sir,” said Mr. Smith. “My daughter has been terrified
by the appearance of some one in her bed-room, who attempted to suck
her blood from the veins of her arm. I don’t know what to say about it.”
“I am sure I don’t,” said Colonel Deverill; “but I must say it’s a most
unpleasant affair for those who have nothing to do with it. It is a
pity your domestic afflictions should call you out in this manner; take
my advice, sir; go home, else you’ll catch cold.”
“You may repent making a jest of this——”
“I never repent anything, sir. I regret I am so unnecessarily
disturbed; and it appears to me, your intrusion here is most
unwarrantable.”
“Is this your dressing-gown, sir?”
“Yes, it is.”
“Well, then, how did it come here, and in this state?” inquired Mr.
Smith, triumphantly.
“I don’t know—I didn’t put it there; but I suppose it must have fallen
accidentally; it would not have been thrown there willingly,” said the
colonel, deliberately.
“Well, I don’t know,” said Mr. Smith, “but it strikes me you’ve been on
the tiles this evening.”
“My good sir, if you don’t leave my apartment, it may happen I may
forget my pains and lameness, and fling you out of the window. If
this had happened in India instead of here, you would have had a
particularly sharp knife inserted between your ribs, or have been
thrown into a well. But I know nothing of this matter, which appears
so strange, as to be beyond all reason; neither experience nor common
sense at all throw any light upon the matter; be advised, sir, and
retire, and allow honest people and invalids to sleep the night out.”
Mr. Smith looked very blank, and, unable to comprehend all that had
passed, he could not tell what to think; he could not urge the matter
further, for he was met by real contempt and perfect self-assurance on
the part of the colonel, who moved about the room very lame, while his
hand was in a sling, and a green shade was placed over his eyes.
“You see,” said Mrs. Meredith, “you must be very entirely mistaken.
Colonel Deverill, we are sure, is quite unable to run about over
house-tops, even had he the inclination to do so, which is really
absurd. It must be at least a great mistake on your part.”
“Yes, I am sure, too, Colonel Deverill could not have left the house
without our knowing it; indeed, it is a very silly affair, and has been
a great nuisance, to say the least of it. I wonder Mr. Smith doesn’t
know better than to break into peaceable people’s houses.”
“But I did not do so.”
“How came you here, then?”
“I followed some one else; the place was open; and yet you say it was
shut at night, and you usually kept it so. How do you account for that?”
“I cannot do so, unless some neglect took place, or else you must have
forced it open.”
“Oh, no, ma’am,” said the watchman; “I can swear Muster Smith didn’t do
that; it was open, and I found it so, so there’s that to be accounted
for; and then there’s the togs a lying outside here, that’s to be
accounted for; so, you see, it’s a werry suspicious case.”
“You are a very stupid fellow,” said the colonel, “a very idiot, if
you imagine people are to be held responsible because a dressing-gown
happens to fall down. I do not know but I shall proceed with this
matter myself; it seems to me you have committed a trespass, to say the
least of it. I can pledge my word, as a man of honour and a soldier,
I have not left my room; indeed, these ladies know I could not do so;
and their testimony would be ample in a court of justice, and to a
gentleman.”
“Yes, that is no more than the truth,” said Mrs. Meredith, who was by
no means pleased with the disturbance; and because she had no sympathy
for the young lady who sat in the balcony to the annoyance of herself
and daughter.
“And I can bear witness to the same,” said Miss Meredith. “I think it
is quite time Mr. Smith returned to his own place, and see what is the
matter there; perhaps the person he saw may have passed him, and gone
back again into his own house.”
Mr. Smith lingered, looked wistfully, as if his doubts were not
cleared off; but yet the testimony was so clear and so strong, that
he could not dispute it; and, however unwillingly he was compelled to
acknowledge, there were some matters that he could not dispute, though
he was unable to solve them; and he and those with him returned from
their unsatisfactory search.
CHAPTER CXXX.
A BREAKFAST SCENE.—A MATCH-MAKING MOTHER.
The next day there was some anxiety on the part of Mrs. Meredith, to
ascertain how far her new lodger might have been disturbed by this
event; and in what temper of mind he felt upon the occasion. It is
usual in all lodgings, to have some little regard to the lodger’s
comforts for some days, perhaps a week or two, and then things are
allowed to take their chance; and if the lodger complains, he gets
for an answer, that they take a vast deal of pains to oblige him, and
intimate that he is a peculiarly lucky man for having become a lodger
at that place; and you would have been worse off if you had gone
elsewhere, which, of course, you don’t believe, though they tell you so.
It is an old and favourite saying, that a new broom sweeps clean;
and, in time, an old one becomes very nearly useless. So it is with
lodging-house keepers; the longer you remain, the more inattentive they
become, until you get wearied, and are compelled to leave, and then you
get some scurvy insolence, and your landlady eventually believes she is
an ill-used woman.
But, in the present instance, Mrs. Meredith had other hopes and fears
than those of a mere lodging-house keeper. Not that she had formed any
plan in her own mind; but she had some floating idea that there was
seldom such a chance turned up, because the colonel had evidently no
relations; and who could tell what, in the chapter of accidents, might
happen?
“I am quite grieved,” she said to her daughter, “it should have
happened this night. What could be the meaning of the disturbance, I
can’t think. Now, it’s very tiresome things will happen so cross as
this, that I don’t know what to think of it.”
“It really appears as if it was done on purpose.”
“It does; but I am sorry for it, because it would seem as though
we were liable to some kind of interruption at all times, for they
generally expect attention at the first, if at no other time; and he
may think this is a bad beginning, at all events.”
“But we shall convince him that we shall not treat him neglectfully,
ma’.”
“No, my dear; but these Indians are strange-tempered people, and when
they once take a fancy, there is no knowing what they may do; and there
is no knowing what a dislike taken at such an occurrence might produce,
and likes and dislikes are taken without rhyme or reason.”
“Yes, ma’, so they are; and that is the reason why you took such a
dislike to young Willis, for he was as nice a young man as I have seen.”
“Nice, my dear—nice! I don’t see why he was nice, unless it was because
he was presumptuous, and had no money,” said the amiable parent.
“He was not rich, ma’——”
“He was positively poor, Margaret,” interrupted the mother, “and
therefore it was absolutely necessary to discourage such persons; for,
if they do no good, they are sure to be productive of mischief; for
their hanging about, you know, deters others from coming forward who
have means.”
“He was very handsome.”
“‘Handsome is as handsome does,’ my dear. You’ll find that is a motto
through life, that will carry weight at any time. All the good looks
in the world would never put a gown on your back, or a sixpence in your
purse, recollect; besides, he was not handsome.”
“You are prejudiced against the young man. Not that I care anything
about him, though he was a very agreeable and nice young man; so it’s
no use in saying that he wasn’t.”
“Well, my dear, it doesn’t much matter; this is a matter of opinion.
What do you think of our colonel? He is a fine man, and a rich one
besides.”
“He is tall, I admit, but stoops a great deal; is very lame; one eye
much worse than the other, and one arm in a sling. Well, I can’t see
much beauty in all that; much out of repair, you must admit, ma’.”
“Yes; Colonel Deverill has seen some service, and his misfortunes are
so many points of honour; they are like so many medals which speak of
his worth. Besides that, he is a most gentlemanly and pleasant man. I
don’t know that I ever spoke to a more fascinating man.”
“That might be at times; but then that was evidently a constraint upon
his natural temper, because he every now and then broke out abruptly
about something or other, which proves that he has an abrupt and
imperious temper, not to say savage and snappish.”
“There you are clearly unjustifiable, my dear Margaret. The colonel,
you see, is a military man, and used to command, and therefore it is a
very usual occurrence, and not a matter of disposition at all; but what
can that matter when you come to consider his wealth?”
“There is certainly room for congratulation there,” said Margaret.
“Indeed, my child, there is room for congratulation; and I am convinced
there is happiness where there is a fortune, for that will obtain all
you want, and, when you obtain all you want, what can you be otherwise
than entirely happy?—therefore, riches are happiness.”
“Yes; there is much truth in all that, ma’,” said Margaret; “and
all I hope is, that I might obtain a fortune; then I would make you
comfortable, ma’.”
“I am sure you would, Margaret. My whole life has been spent in shifts
to maintain you and bring you up in a manner that would enable you to
become a fortune; which, thanks to my care, example, and precept, you
are fully equal to at any moment it may become your lot.”
“Yes, ma’; I feel that I was born to command, and the lady of a colonel
would not be a bit too high in rank for my ambition or deserts.”
“Indeed, it would not, my dear; but now listen to me. You know, my
dear, I never plan anything but what is for your benefit. Now, I am
given to understand that Colonel Deverill has no relatives at all, and
I think hardly any friends, and we can make ourselves quite necessary
to him—in fact, perfect friends to him. He will look upon us as his
nearest relatives, and he may take a fancy to you, as you may easily
induce him. Old men like flattery, there is no doubt, and that kind of
flattery which is called attention. Wait upon him most assiduously, and
read to him, and all that kind of thing, my dear.”
“Yes; I know, ma’.”
“And then, dear, if you mind what you are about, the colonel and all
his wealth may be yours before six months are over, or I am no witch.”
“Hush! I hear him stirring.”
“He’s coming down stairs; there he is in the drawing-room; I hear him
over head. Go up stairs, my dear, and inquire when he will choose to
have his breakfast.”
“Yes, ma’,” said the young lady, who betrayed an extraordinary desire
to obey her parent, a matter not equally to be said of all young
ladies, nor of this one upon many occasions; but, then, this was one
that was quite agreeable to her own feelings, which explains the secret.
Colonel Deverill had, indeed, descended, and was seated in the
drawing-room, with his feet on the fender and his head leaning on his
hand, and his elbow on the table, when Margaret entered. He appeared to
be thoughtful and unwell; he had, perhaps, passed a bad night, or the
interruption had robbed him of his sleep, which to an invalid was the
more severely felt.
“Good morning, colonel,” said Margaret, advancing. “I hope the
disturbance that so inopportunely took place, did not have the effect
of destroying your night’s rest.”
“Indeed, it did do so to a very great extent,” replied the colonel,
“though not entirely; but still it makes one very poorly, gives one the
headache, and causes a sense of lassitude and fatigue to oppress the
body, which, added to the weariness incident to such cases, makes one
very uncomfortable.”
“I am sorry you have been so discomposed, and so is my ma’. She really
is grieved; but you see, sir, it was a matter so entirely beyond any
control, that she cannot be blamed for it, though it happened, most
unfortunately, at a time when it was least wanted, or most to be
avoided.”
“True—very true. I can imagine all that. I am not unjust enough to
blame you for it. I could no more help it than you could, and I dare
say you were none the better for such a disagreeable disturbance; I am
not, I am very certain.
“No, sir, I am not. When would you please to breakfast?”
“As soon as I can have it,” replied the colonel.
“You can have it at once.”
“Then be pleased to let me have it. I have the use of but one arm
entirely; may I beg your aid in making tea for me?”
“With pleasure, sir.”
Margaret immediately left the room, and informed her mother of what
had passed upon the occasion; and when the breakfast was laid, and
all things ready, Margaret Meredith sat down with Colonel Deverill to
breakfast. Before, however, they had gone far, he inquired if she had
breakfasted.
“No, I have not.”
“And your mother—has she breakfasted?”
“No, sir, she has not.”
“Then give her my compliments, and I shall be glad to take breakfast
in her company too; for I am very poorly this morning, and company is
agreeable.”
This was soon effected, and in a few minutes more they all sat down,
the colonel being duly waited upon by Margaret and her mother; the
latter being employed in aiding the former to pay great attention to
their host; for they breakfasted at his expense, as a matter of course.
“It was really a most unfortunate occurrence, that of last night,” said
Mrs. Meredith; “very unfortunate; because some people have a difficulty
in sleeping in a strange bed; and when once awake, they cannot easily,
if at all, get asleep again, and that I had great fears might have been
your case.”
“Not precisely,” said the colonel; “but the fact is, I have seen so
much hard service, that I can sleep anywhere without any effort of
mine; but when one has suffered from wounds, the heats of climate, and
the terrors of imprisonments in Indian prisons, one’s health becomes so
shattered, that one’s rest is not so good as it ought to be—but that is
no one’s fault.”
“It is a grievous misfortune,” said Mrs. Meredith.
“Yes,” added Margaret; “and I think there is not enough gratitude in
the country towards those who so nobly defend us in our homes; to do
which they must not only brave danger and death in the field of battle,
but all the evils that spring from climate, insidious diseases, brought
on by the exposures and hardships of a soldier’s life; and then when
they see them return to their own country, with wounds that ought to
bring honour, glory, and sure profit, they are omitted and neglected.”
The colonel sighed deeply, but said nothing.
“My dear Miss Meredith, will you fetch me my keys?—I left them in the
bureau.”
“Yes, sir,” said the amiable young lady, who arose, and left the room.
“Your daughter is an amiable girl, Mrs. Meredith,” said Colonel
Deverill. “She reminds me of one who is now dead, and at whose decease
I left England for India; the country became insupportable to me at
that time, but she now recalls all the feelings and aspirations of
youth.”
“Ah! she is an amiable and good girl—though I am her mother; yet I
must not do her less than justice, because it is usual to consider
it partial or silly of a parent praising her own child; but she does
deserve all that can be said of her.”
“It is a blessing. There was the same class of beauty, and the same
amiable and sensible deportment. Oh, dear! those days are gone by,
indeed!”
“Who knows but they may return?”
“It is doubtful; more than doubtful—certain. I am an old man, now, Mrs.
Meredith,—an old man. Yes; I have deserved some thanks at the hands of
my country; and I am rich—yes, Mrs. Meredith, I am rich—very rich, I
believe I may say.”
“That is some reward.”
“It is. But I cannot recall the past—I am no longer young—I have no
young wife by my side—to soothe my pillow—to attend to my wants. No; I
am an old man, as I said before, and cannot expect the attention of the
young and beautiful.”
“But, Colonel Deverill, you are not an old man; and as for your wounds,
they are honourable.”
“But my shattered constitution——”
“May be mended by care and attention, doubtless; and I am sure, while
you are here, you shall want no attention we can possibly bestow.”
“I thank you, Mrs. Meredith—I thank you,” said the colonel.
“I only regret the disturbance you suffered last night,” said Mrs.
Meredith. “I am afraid want of proper rest has made you melancholy. I
knew not of such a thing, neither was I at all aware of the fact of the
trap-door being open—indeed, I can’t understand it.”
“Nor I, ma’am. I do not clearly understand what they said; they talked
of some young lady being strangled or assaulted in her sleep.”
“Yes, colonel. It was in her sleep, and I cannot help thinking it must
have been a dream; however, if it were not, I do not know what to think
of it.”
“Nor I,” said the colonel, thoughtfully.
“They talked about a vampyre, and said Miss Smith had been seized by
the arm; and the creature had attempted to suck the blood from the
veins.”
“Dear me, what a strange affair.”
“Very, sir; but I never heard of such things only in books; but,
goodness help us from such strange unearthly beings—have you seen any
in your travels, Colonel Deverill? You have travelled in hot countries,
and have seen them, I should imagine.”
“Not I, Mrs. Meredith; I have seen strange things, but I never saw a
vampyre, though I have heard of such things; indeed, there are many
disgusting things in creation, and that is one of them. But what could
be the reason they should come to that young lady above any other, I
cannot conceive.”
“Nor I, sir.”
At this moment Margaret returned, having recovered the keys, which were
not wanted; only the watchful mamma thought there was an opportunity
for a little tender gag relative to the amiability of the young lady,
and, therefore, it ought not to be omitted.
Moreover, she saw there was no necessity for leaving them alone yet;
there would be plenty of time yet for that, and she felt assured
there would be ample opportunity for the progress of the suit she now
confidently anticipated must take place; for she saw, however prompt
and ready the colonel might be from habit, yet there was a good deal of
the willing mood about him.
“His health and weakness,” she thought, “causes that; and now, while
his health lasts this way, he may be secured; or, at least, the
foundation laid upon which we may build our hopes. He shall want no aid
of mine to help him on that way.”
“Have you been long in England, colonel?” she inquired.
“Not very long.”
“The voyage homeward must have been very tedious.”
“It would have been, but I did not come that way. I crossed into Egypt,
and came to the Mediterranean, and thence to Italy; so I varied the
scene, and travelled at leisure, and got here a month before the vessel
I was to have come by.”
“Oh, that was much more pleasant.”
“Decidedly so; and then I came to the hotel; not that I had not all
proper attention paid me—but then there is no sociality there; men only
surround you with whom you can hold no converse whatever.”
“Certainly not, they are menials.”
“And of the lowest class. However, I sought out such a place as this,
where I wished to have some of the domestic comforts around me, that I
might have had, had I a home of my own; some one to whom I could speak
more seriously; for I am debarred the affectionate regard of near and
dear female relatives.”
“You must look upon us in that light, Colonel Deverill; as persons who
are anxious and desirous of causing you to forget these wants by our
assiduity and attention. I can speak for my daughter as myself; she
will do all in her power to render your stay comfortable.”
“She is young and beautiful.”
“Ahem!”
“And doubtless will change such occupations to those of a more
endearing character. Well, it is as it should be, and I am selfish to
feel jealous. I wish I was young myself—but, enough of this. I have to
express my obligation to you for the ready manner in which you came
forward to speak of my being in my room last night, when that man was
here and the watchmen.”
“Mr. Smith?”
“Yes, that was the man; they would not have taken my word for it;
however, I hope to be able to remain here until I find myself sinking
to the grave; and those who act as you have began to act for me, I must
and will remember at my death and afterwards.”
“I do not act with such a motive, Colonel Deverill.”
“No, no; I am well aware of that; but that renders it a duty in me.
However, we will say no more now; I am even wearied out.”
CHAPTER CXXXI.
MRS. MEREDITH’S FRIEND.—EXCHANGE OF SERVICES, AND COMPACT.
There could be no doubt in the minds of both mother and daughter that
there was something much resembling a moral certainty concerning the
fate of the retired colonel. That he must marry was evident—he was to
all intents and purposes resolved to do so. He talked of a home and
domestic comfort, and all that kind of thing; therefore it would be
easy to entangle him in the meshes of love; the snares of passion might
be successfully set, and they would be sure to be productive of some
sport, and even a stray colonel might be caught, one who, having had
enough of the wars of man, might now be considered to become a fair
object of attack in those of Venus.
However, there appeared much in the colonel’s circumstances and
disposition that laid him open to the attacks of designing matrons and
maidens. He seemed to appreciate female company—was particularly well
pleased with female attentions; perhaps his health required their aid
more than that of any other; and he had evidently been in love, and
lost the object of his earliest affections.
One great thing in Margaret Meredith’s favour was, the colonel had
taken it into his head that she much resembled this lady, whoever she
was; and this fact, no doubt, had opened his heart towards her; and he
felt a kindly, and perhaps a warmer feeling, towards her. This, they
calculated, would greatly assist them in their efforts to circumvent
the colonel, and cause him to capitulate upon matrimonial conditions.
“There never was so good a chance,” said Mrs. Meredith, in the course
of a day or two after the above scene; “there never was such a chance
as the one you now have.”
“What, with the colonel, ma’?”
“Yes, my love, you may depend upon it, that is a very safe speculation.
Why, he must be immensely rich. I am sure that some of the jewels I
have seen on his fingers must be worth thousands of pounds. He is a
very rich man, there can be no doubt.”
“Yes, ma’, he is very rich.”
“And you will have many fine things that you have never dreamed of.
Why, you will have a carriage; I should think he would never refuse you
that trifle.”
“He has not one now.”
“Yes, that is true; he would never use it himself; and that accounts
for it. But when he has a wife it is quite another matter; and one
which you can easily manage when you are a wife; you can do more then
than you can now. Besides, you’ll see how the money is spent; and it
must all go through your hands, you know; that can’t be helped.”
“No, I dare say not; but, ma’ don’t you think, when he dies, there will
be a loss of the pension? and that would be a serious loss.”
“It would; but then you will have a pension as an officer’s widow,
besides all his vast property, without any trouble whatever—with nobody
to contradict you; that is, if he were to die; but I think he will
not do that; he does not, at times, appear so old as one would think;
and yet, he is very pale; but that, I suppose, is caused by his long
residence abroad in hot climates, and being exposed to the weather of
all kinds, attended by wounds and sickness.”
“No doubt he has suffered much; but he has obtained a handsome fortune,
which pays for a great deal, you know,” said Margaret.
“Undoubtedly, my dear; by-the-bye, have you heard how that affair of
Miss Smith was ended, and why they came in here in such a manner?”
“Oh, it was a very shocking affair; there were some marks in her arm,
which I cannot understand; it does seem very extraordinary to me, but
she says she was awoke in the night by some monster sucking her blood.”
“Dear me! who ever heard of such nonsense?”
“I cannot but think there must have been something in it; and, yet,
what could have been the reason for them all to utter a falsehood, I
don’t know. There was, you know, the father, then the watchmen, all of
whom said they saw it; at all events, they appeared to have some idea
that it must have been done by some one in our house; the dressing gown
and that appeared to bewilder them.”
“Did they say they thought so still?”
“No; they did not do that, we spoke so positive; and I saw when I went
in to see her, she was much terrified at what had occurred, and could
not get up; she had a physician to attend her, who will not hear of
anything that she says.”
“Well, I think he is right.”
“But the whole family appear to side with her, and insist that it was
no robber who made the attempt; for nothing was gone, nothing was
attempted in the shape of robbery; nothing was touched nor moved;
therefore, there could be no common motive, they said. Well, at all
events, they have made somebody very disagreeable in the family, and
they had better have been quiet, but they are a disagreeable set, and I
shall not go in again.”
“You are quite right, my dear; they would be glad to push that minx of
theirs in here, and get an acquaintance with the colonel. No, it will
be safest to keep them apart; we will have as few female visitors, my
dear, as possible; not that I think you run any chance of rivalry, but,
you know, men are such uncertain things.”
“To be sure they are, ma’,” replied Margaret.
“Well, then, if we have no female acquaintances, you see we cannot
possibly run any risk, and the matter will not be so protracted,
because everything depends upon things being smooth and uninterrupted;
he will be the more ready to propose and push the matter to a point.”
“Do you think him a likely man, ma’, to marry?”
“Certain of it, my dear, quite certain of it. I know a marrying man as
soon as I see him; the colonel is decidedly a marrying man, he talks
of home, domestic comfort, and all that kind of thing; and when men do
that, you may be sure, if you are cautious, to catch such an one.”
“Well, I will try.”
“Do, my dear; it will be worth your while, it will make all our
fortunes. I wonder what his money is invested in.”
“I should like to know that,” said Margaret.
“And so should I. Do you know, I have been thinking of that myself
more than once. It will be necessary to find it out, and yet it is so
delicate a matter, that I think you had better make no attempt to work
it out of him. Let the affair take its own course at present.”
“But I can hear all.”
“Then you will act wisely, my dear, very wisely, prudently; but do no
more—hear and see all, and say nothing—of course, I mean upon that
subject alone. Now, if we proceed cautiously, we shall be sure to gain
our object; I will take some method of obtaining the information I want
at some future time, because it will be well to have him caught before
we begin to pull tight the line; or, at least, before we begin to make
any inquiries respecting his means he must give us some cause to do so.”
“I dare say we shall know something by accident some of these days;
perhaps, at the hotel where he comes from, something may be learned by
inquiry.”
“Possibly there may, my dear; but I do not like to go there. At all
events, they can know but little, for he has not been long in England,
and would hold but little communication with such people. We must
have some better plan than that to go upon, else we shall never be
successful, except at the cost of some cross in our hopes we would
rather have avoided.”
“Well, ma’, you shall do as you like in this affair. I am sure you will
do what is right and best for the occasion; besides, one plan is better
than two.”
“You are right, my dear. I am, however, resolved to have a visitor.”
“A visitor, ma’?”
“Yes, my dear; only Mr. Twissel, the attorney.”
“Oh, I know who you mean now; but why do you have him? He is a very
funny sort of an acquaintance, especially if he is to meet the colonel.”
“I wish him to meet him, my dear, for that reason. He will be able to
get out of him, by some means, what he has got his money locked up in.
A hint will serve him, and he can make inquiries, and learn it all,
and then he will, if we are successful, have a good thing of marriage
settlements, and so forth. Besides, I will make an agreement with him
that he shall have a sum of money for his trouble.”
“That will be a very good plan, certainly.”
“Exactly, and you needn’t be seen in it at all; so I think we shall
be all very fairly put in the way of doing well. I shall go out this
morning, and call upon Mr. Twissel, and have some conversation with
him. He used to have some business of your father’s to do, and has had
much of his money, as well as a good word now and then.”
“Dear me, who is that? There is a double knock at the door, ma’. How
vexing it will be to have any one come here. I shall hate the sight of
any one coming in now.”
“Can’t you see from the window who it is, my dear?”
“No, ma’.”
“Then we must wait until the servant comes in.”
The words had hardly been uttered, before the servant entered, and said
that Mr. Twissel wanted to speak to Mrs. Meredith, if she was at home.
“God bless me!—send him in,” said Mrs. Meredith, after the first
surprise was over; and then, turning to her daughter, she said, “Talk
of what’s-his-name, and you are sure to see some of his friends. If I
had wanted him to come, he would not have been here.”
“Very likely, ma’; and yet you do, and he is here.”
At this moment Mr. Twissel made his appearance, and entered the
parlour. Having saluted the ladies, he proceeded to lay his hat and
cane on the table, saying,—
“Mrs. Meredith, I dare say you are surprised to see me, after so long
an absence.”
“My surprise is not greater than my pleasure, Mr. Twissel. I am very
glad to see an old friend of my husband’s. Pray sit down, sir.”
“Thank you, I will. I am glad to see you look so well. I need not ask
how you are, and your amiable daughter too; she appears charming.”
“Yes, Mr. Twissel, we are in tolerable good health; not often better.”
“Do not let me disturb you, Miss Margaret,” said Mr. Twissel, as she
rose to leave the room.
“Oh, no, sir, not at all. I have something to attend to, if you will
excuse me.”
“Certainly, certainly. I hope I shall not be any cause of putting you
to any constraint and inconvenience; at the same time, I shall not
detain Mrs. Meredith long.”
“Oh, we don’t intend to lose you suddenly,” said Mrs. Meredith.
“Anything I can oblige you in I shall be very happy to do so, if you
point out the how.”
“Then I will proceed to do so at once,” said Mr. Twissel; “I will do so
at once. You see, when your late husband died, or before, he gave me
several debts to collect.”
“So I understood,” said Mrs. Meredith.
“Exactly; I see you understand me. Now, those debts I was to collect
myself for my own benefit, he having, when he died, owed me a
considerable sum of money. He assigned them to me, and I accepted them
as payment of his debt due to me.”
“I understood such to be the case, and at that point the matter was
considered as settled; was it not, Mr. Twissel?” said Mrs. Meredith.
“It was so, and is so now, as far as I know now; but I want some few
papers which it is possible may be somewhere in your possession, to
enable me to secure the payment of them; and without those papers I
shall not be able to enforce attention. Now, I want to know if you
will oblige me with them if you have them by you?”
“I will certainly look and make any search I can for them, and if I
find them you shall have them, certainly. But, now I have disposed of
that, will you do me a favour?”
“Certainly, with pleasure.”
“Well, then, Mr. Twissel, you see, there is a certain rich lodger of
mine who pays certain attentions to my daughter Margaret,” said Mrs.
Meredith.
“I see,” said Mr. Twissel.
“Well, then, he had made no positive offer yet; but we have certain
expectations, you see, and in case those expectations become realised,
I want to be in such a situation as to know at once what I shall do in
such a case—what ought to be done.”
“Very good, my dear madam; very good.”
“Now, we only know from report, and from appearances, that he is rich;
we feel quite convinced of that—he could not well be otherwise,” said
Mrs. Meredith; “but we are anxious to know in what kind of stock or
property he is likely to have invested it.”
“Yes, I see. Well, then, all you have to do is to learn what you can
from himself or his friends, and then make inquiries respecting the
truth of what you hear. I should be very happy in assisting to make
such inquiries, or in any way you may point out.”
“I am very much obliged to you; but, Mr. Twissel, it is a very delicate
subject for females to touch upon, and, moreover, it is worse,
considering how my daughter is likely to be in connection with him.”
“It is a delicate matter, certainly.”
“Well, now, what I wanted was this; if you would on some occasion—I
would let you know beforehand,—call in and take some tea, or whatever
meal happened to be at hand, and get into conversation with the
colonel, and get this matter from him——”
“Oh, he is a colonel in the army, then?”
“Yes; but returned, in bad health, from the Indies. He has come only
recently.”
“Aye, aye, I see; you have a nabob, I see. That will be a very
handsome settlement for your daughter, my dear madam; a very handsome
settlement.”
“Yes, it will.”
“Well, it is handsome; but there are drawbacks, you see.”
“Oh, age, and ill health.”
“Exactly; they are drawbacks, you see, that are not always to a young
female’s taste.”
“No, no; but, then, my daughter is a reasonable young woman, Mr.
Twissel, and would not object to a good fortune because there was a
kind, though, perhaps, elderly, gentleman for a husband. Oh, dear,
no, sir, I have no apprehensions of that character; she will be good
and obedient, especially when she knows that it is all for her good;
besides that, you see, the colonel, though an invalid, is not so very
old, and is a most pleasant, and, I might say, fascinating gentleman
to converse with; so that she can have no personal objection; and,
besides, from what I can observe, I have reason to believe that the
colonel is by no means disagreeable to her.”
“Then I am sure it is a very handsome prospect for her, and one that
might have been long in happening to one who had a better fortune to
aid her.”
“Yes, indeed, it might.”
“Well, then, if I can aid you, command my services.”
“In this respect you may do me much good, but I do not, as it will be
some little loss of time to you, desire you should do so for nothing.
If we succeed, and all is comfortable, you shall have a hundred pounds
soon after the marriage—say three months.”
“Very well. I am quite willing to accept the terms, and should I be
wanted at any time, perhaps you will let me know as long before as
possible.”
“I will do so.”
“And then, when I next come, perhaps you’ll be able to hand me the
papers, and be ready to sign some agreement which I will get ready for
the purpose.”
“Very well, I will do it.”
“I am much obliged to you,” said Mr. Twissel; “however, I suppose, when
I am introduced to the colonel, I am only to come in as an old friend
of the family?”
“Exactly so; that will be by far the best character to assume, because
you may be anything; besides which, when matters come to a point proper
for interference, you can do so the more easily, and with more effect,
and he also will be less inclined to quarrel; and at the same time he
can have less objection to do so, which, you see, is a little better.”
“I see,” said the attorney, rising; “and now, as we have settled this
business so far, I will bid you good afternoon, as I have some business
elsewhere this evening, which I must get finished.”
After exchanging greetings, the attorney quitted the house of Mrs.
Meredith without further remark.
CHAPTER CXXXII.
THE EXPLANATION, AND THE PROPOSAL.—A TETE-A-TETE.
A week or more had passed away since the visit of the attorney to Mrs.
Meredith, and yet the latter saw not a sufficient reason why she should
send for her friend. Things were not ripe yet; the colonel had, it was
true, been melting gradually; but then to progress ever so little, was
a great point in anything—no matter what it is—something gained.
Mrs. Meredith, however, by no means lost sight of her object; she had
that steadily in view, and worked for it every day; and her daughter
was no less assiduous—she was attentive and humble, waited upon Colonel
Deverill with the affectionate assiduity of a daughter; while, on his
part, he sighed and said, what a happy man he must be, who should have
her for a wife.
It was arranged one day, when he appeared to be more than usually
tender, that the mother should be out that evening, and see some of
her friends, and break the news a little to some of them; a pardonable
vanity in the lady, for it was not in accordance with her position in
society that her daughter could expect such an offer as the one she
daily expected.
The lady did as she had agreed, and left the house, while Margaret went
to the colonel’s sitting-room when his bell rang, and hoped he’d excuse
the absence of her mother, as she had gone out to see some friends whom
she had not seen for some time.
“I am happy having you attend to me, Miss Margaret. I cannot be
attended to better. I am afraid, as it is, I am a terrible annoyance to
you.”
“Annoyance, colonel! far from it—very far from it; and I do hope you do
not mean what you say, else I shall fear I have unwillingly given you
some cause for your opinion, which I shall the more regret, as you are
yourself so kind. I assure you it gives me great pleasure when I know I
can do aught to alleviate the misfortunes, or satisfy the wishes of any
of my friends.”
“And do you reckon me one, Miss Margaret?”
“I hope Colonel Deverill will not consider me too presumptuous in
looking upon him as something more than a mere casual friend or
acquaintance.”
“Casual acquaintance, Miss Margaret—casual acquaintance!”
“Well, friendship, if you allow me to say so.”
“Friendship!” repeated the colonel, with a deep drawn sigh; “I would
I could claim a yet warmer title than a friend. I could then hope for
some of those pleasures which are denied a solitary man like me—I
should then have those whom I loved to soothe my death-bed, and whom I
could benefit by worldly wealth, could I, Margaret, think I could claim
a feeling stronger than that of friendship.”
“Oh! Colonel Deverill, how can you talk in this strain? Indeed, you—you
are too good—dear me, I do not know what I was about to say.”
“Miss Meredith,” said the colonel, taking her hand with gentleness,
and tenderly pressing it, “I am seen to a great disadvantage; I have
been many years fighting for my country, and I have not had time to
cultivate those sweet and tender emotions such as I feel at this
moment.”
[Illustration: The colonel takes Margaret’s hand.]
“Yes, you must have suffered much,” said Margaret.
“And now, when I return again, I am somewhat the worse in appearance;
but my heart is as warm as ever it was, and I am more than ever alive
to the charm of female society. It is that unreserved interchange of
thought and good offices which attaches me to life, and makes me live
even with hope. Do not dispel this day-dream of mine, Margaret.”
The colonel paused and pressed her hand to his lips, while she appeared
confused and irresolute, and was unable to withdraw her hand from his,
but at length she sank trembling into a chair.
“My charming creature, may I suppose this emotion is caused by excess
of feeling—that—that—in short, I am not wholly indifferent to you?”
“Oh, colonel! I’m really unable to speak!”
“My beloved girl, I am loved; yes, I see it—oh, happiness!”
Midst these broken sentences, the colonel contrived to slip his hand
round the young lady’s waist, and he pressed her close to him. For a
moment she forgot his proximity, and remained passive; but suddenly and
quietly disengaging herself, she said,—
“Pardon, me, Colonel Deverill; I had forgotten—I was unconscious—a
weakness came over me, and——”
“You love me!”
“If you have become acquainted with that which was a secret, sir, you
must use it as such; but you must not talk in this strain to me;
promise me, colonel, and—and—I will see about the tea immediately.”
“May I speak to your mother?”
“Colonel Deverill can do as he pleases. I have no secrets from my dear
mamma.”
“I will—I will, and Heaven bless you for saying so much. I may say you
are not averse to me, and that, with her consent, I shall not despair.”
“We will say no more, Colonel Deverill,” said the cautious maiden.
“You shall command me—you are the arbitress of my fate,” said the
colonel, who had become warmer and eulogistic to a degree.
Much more, however, passed between them; the ice was broken, and they
conversed more freely; for when they began the tea, much was said
that did not partake of so warm a character as that which had already
passed; but it, nevertheless, partook of the same purpose.
“When I am married,” said the colonel, “I should like a carriage. I
have no use for one now, as I could but very seldom ride; but when I
had a wife, then I should wish for her accommodation as well as my own;
but which do you prefer, country or town life?”
“There is much of comfort and quiet in a country life,” said Margaret;
“and yet I am not entirely wedded to country life—there is much of
pleasure in London.”
“So there is; and where you have no resources of your own, or in your
own house, it is preferable; but when such is the case, London loses
all its charms, or a great part of them.”
“So it does,” said Margaret.
“However, I am partial to both. I should like a partial town and
country life.”
“That, indeed, would be the very greatest delight one could experience;
to live sometimes in one place, and sometimes in another.”
“So it would.”
“By the way, if we kept a carriage, which I would do,” said the
colonel, after a pause, “it would be a very excellent thing to enable
us to travel about in.”
“Perhaps you have been to some parts, and like them better than others.”
“Yes, I have been to a good many parts; but I cannot at this moment
speak of them; but we would look out for some place that would be more
agreeable than others.”
“Perhaps you have some place of your own you would like to live in?”
“No,—not exactly; these things are not of one’s own choice, and not
empty; and, therefore, are useless as residences.”
“Certainly. Besides, you must be near enough to come to town for
business purposes.”
“Yes, I must, but that needn’t be often,” replied the colonel; “but
where there is plenty of means, there is no fear of not getting what we
want.”
“No, indeed, there is not.”
“And one thing alone would repay me for the hardships I have endured,
the misery I have suffered, and the misfortunes I have experienced in
all my marchings and counter-marchings; my sleeping in the open air by
night, and scorched by the sun by day.”
“And what may that be, colonel?”
“Why, the power it gives me of conferring happiness and wealth upon
you; for, in the natural course of events, you will outlive me.”
“Oh, for mercy’s sake, don’t talk of that, sir.”
“But it is a matter that I can think of calmly enough; and, as a
soldier, I have ample occasion, I can assure you.”
“Indeed! I dare say you must have.”
“I can remember, on one occasion, especially, which I will relate to
you, if I do not weary,” said Colonel Deverill.
“Oh, no—no! I cannot be weary,” said Margaret.
“Then I will tell you. I was ordered to march some troops to attack the
stockade of Puttythempoor, a very strong place.”
“Was it a town?”
“No, merely a place of strength, where the enemy had gathered together
in great numbers; and here we were determined to attack them. The
stockade was a very strong place; and there were strong and high timber
fences, with large mounds of earth and bags of sand, all tending to
make the place one of great strength,” said the colonel.
“What a place it must have been!”
“Yes; it was very strong. Well, my party did not amount to more than
fifteen hundred men strong, while the enemy, with the advantages of the
defence, were more than three thousand, giving them a vast superiority
over us; but we were not to be daunted by that; we were determined to
make a dash, and, from the character of the men I commanded, I had no
fear of the result. We were sure to make our way among them, and then
we were sure of the result.”
“How dreadful!”
“Well, the men were divided into three bodies—five hundred each—and
these into divisions of one hundred each, the one to support the other.
We had no guns, and were therefore compelled to depend entirely upon
our luck in the assault.”
“Goodness me! I wonder how you could think of it with anything like
ease or comfort. It would make me all of a freeze!”
“Oh, Margaret! when the soldier is in the field of battle, he must get
the better of all feelings, save those of honour.”
“It is too true!” said Margaret, with a sigh.
“And then,” said Colonel Deverill, “we, having arranged our plans, and
settled who was to take the command, if I had the mischance to fall——”
“Good Heavens!”
“Well, I say, having done all this, we were resolved to make a dash
at the point, and take the place by assault. To do this the more
effectually, we were resolved to make the attempt in three different
places at once, so as to divert the enemy’s attention, and to place
them in a cross fire, and thus take them the more easily.
“This plan was carried out to the letter, and we made the attack; but
the enemy defended their stockade so vigorously, and what with the
strength of the place, and the determination of the enemy, we were for
some time repulsed—at least, held at bay.
“This would never do, I thought. I must mount the breach myself;
for, if my division was held at bay, I had fears of the rest; they
might meet repulses also, which would occasion the loss of our whole
party, which would have been sure destruction; not defeat alone, but
imprisonment, and possibly death from ill-usage, or from malignant
disorders.”
“What fearful scenes!”
“I ordered my men to keep close and follow me. We made a dash at the
stockade three abreast, and up we went. By Jove, it was fine work—a
brave sight—a sight I can never forget while I have remembrance left
me. We got up the stockade Heaven knows how, and were over it in the
space of a minute; but the impetuosity of those who came first was not
seconded by those who came after; it was easy enough to get down among
the Indians, but it was very hard to get up; and while our friends were
getting up, we were exposed to the strength of hundreds—only four men
to as many hundreds for several minutes.”
[Illustration: The colonel attacks the stockade.]
“Goodness, how dreadful! Were you not all killed?”
“Except for myself, they were all killed. Each received a dozen wounds,
and I should have met with the same fate, but for an Indian officer,
who, seeing me surrounded and thrown down, saved my life from the fury
of his men; but, in a minute after, I was free—my own men came down by
dozens, and the blacks were swept off by the hundred.
“At that moment, too, there were our other parties just appearing over
the other parts of the stockade, so we had now plenty of assistance.
“The blacks now on all sides fell in numbers before the fire, and the
place was our own; and a hearty cheer was given that made the woods
re-echo again.”
“Were you not glad the danger was over?”
“The danger was not over, though we thought it was; for suddenly the
earth heaved up with a tremendous explosion, and many of our poor
fellows were blown up into the air, and I myself was completely knocked
over and smothered in dirt; however, it was dry, and we were soon put
to rights again. I was picked up, and nothing more happened.”
“What was the cause of your disaster?”
“Oh, a mine the scamps had sprung as they were retiring, hoping to do
us more mischief than they did; however, we beat them off, and they
lost many men on that occasion, and did not show themselves again, but
made the best of their way through the woods and jungle by some paths
that we did not know, and hence we did not follow them further.”
“It must have been dreadfully dangerous.”
“Yes, life was the game we played for, and it was won and lost often
enough, during that war; but we must expect it should be so.”
“But you are now safe.”
“Yes, I am now safe, and, I may say, happy. I have had some knocks, and
am none the better for them bodily; but then I have had them well paid
for, so I must not complain. I have now but one object to attain before
I die.”
“And what may that be, colonel, if it be no secret?”
“It is not to you, Miss Meredith,” said the colonel; “it is an early
day—a day on which I may claim you as my own; then, indeed, I shall
have lived and accomplished something; an object worth living for, and,
may I say so, worth dying for.”
“Ah, I hope you may live many years yet, colonel—many years of life and
happiness, to enjoy the fortune you have so gallantly won. Indeed, I
think no fortune ought to give so much joy as the soldier’s.”
“And why, Miss Meredith?”
“Because there is none so arduously won; won often with bloodshed, and
even life; it ought, indeed, to give great and lasting happiness.”
“If I obtain my wishes, I shall be the happiest man in the universe;
and I would go through all I have gone through over—aye, twice over,
and that is no little—to have such a reward as the one I now seek—it is
the crowning happiness of my life.”
“You are very kind to say all this——”
“Aye, but I mean it. It is no common compliment,” said the colonel; “I
mean what I say, most earnestly. Do you believe what I say? I am not
used to the pretty speeches of young men who make love—perhaps I ought;
but I am an old soldier, and am but little used to these ways; however,
I have spoken my mind, and I hope you will not allow any one else to
injure my cause.”
“Anything you have said, Colonel Deverill, has been of too serious a
nature for me to think of anything save the object itself. Your conduct
has been that of a gentleman, and I should be wanting in respect to
myself, and courtesy to you, to think otherwise than seriously of it,”
was the wily reply of Margaret.
“You have my own thoughts,” said the colonel.
“There is my ma’,” said Margaret, as the knocker and bell sounded.
“You will do your utmost with Mrs. Meredith for me, and I will beseech
her myself,” said the colonel; “I hope she will take things in a
favourable light.”
CHAPTER CXXXIII.
MRS. MEREDITH’S CONSULTATION WITH MR. TWISSEL, AND HER RESOLVE.
Mrs. Meredith’s arrival was very opportune, for it broke off the
interview; and Margaret descended to the parlour, where her mother
she knew would repair the moment she had freed herself from her
dress. Margaret was now left alone for a few moments. She felt all
the exultation of success in a strategy, and all the exhilaration of
spirits that such a prospect of wealth and riches floating before her
eyes, and all the natural consequence upon such possessions would give
rise to.
“I shall be rich,” she thought. “Aye, I shall not only be rich, but
very rich—I know I shall. Well, he is old—no matter; better be an old
man’s darling, than a young man’s slave. Yes; I shall know how to use
wealth. I shall be able to spend a little of his countless hoards, and
he will not thwart me, I am sure. He will be too fond—too doting, by
far. I shall be indulged like a spoiled child, I am sure.”
Margaret smiled at the thought of what length the colonel might not be
induced to carry his fondness for her.
“He will not set any value upon what will give me pleasure. I am sure
he will give me all I ask. I have but to ask him for what I want, and
he must comply. I am sure he is too easy—too quiet and generous to make
a moment’s hesitation.”
The colonel, too, was left to his reflections, but as to what they were
we know not. He sat long, silently gazing at the fire.
Mrs. Meredith now entered the apartment, and, looking at her daughter,
she said,—
“Eh? something been said, Margaret? I can see by your eye that the
colonel has said something to you. Am I not right, my dear?”
“Yes, ma’; you are right.”
“Well, my love, and what did he say? I am dying with curiosity.”
“It will be quite impossible to do that; but he has been quite explicit
enough, without any hesitation at all, or any reserve—quite candid and
open.”
“He has offered?”
“Yes; he wishes for your consent; for I told him I could not possibly
decide without your consent and countenance. He did not disapprove of
that, only he wished to propitiate you in his favour, and begged me to
let him have the satisfaction of knowing that he had my good wishes,
and that I could look upon him in a warmer light than a mere friend.”
“Which I hope you did?”
“Yes, ma’. I let him imagine that I was not indifferent to his good
opinion; but, at the same time, I would not commit myself, but left him
to infer a good deal. I think I know, ma’, how to manage such an affair
well—I may say, very well.”
“Exactly, my love. I was sure you would.”
“Yes, ma’; I should think I did. For when I found he had proceeded a
certain distance, I was resolved that he should speak out plump at
once; and when I found he paused, I paused too, and he was compelled to
explain; but he betrayed no unwillingness, or anything like hesitation
at all, but he has fairly proposed himself to me.”
“And you have not committed yourself?”
“Not in the least.”
“Very well. I must be cautious, too not to do so; because I must have
some conversation with Mr. Twissel, so that we may proceed in a safe
manner, and not commit ourselves in any way as we shall repent of
afterwards.”
“How do you mean?”
“Why, child, you would not marry the colonel if he was not a rich man.”
“Not exactly; though I must admit, ma’, he is a very nice man—a very
nice man, and I should be entitled to a widow’s pension, if nothing
more, and that I might not have under some circumstances; even you
yourself have been left worse off, you see.”
“Yes, my child; but circumstances alter cases. I had a better prospect
when I first married, else I would not have done so, you may depend
upon it. However, we can always retrace our steps, and he cannot. But I
will get Mr. Twissel to come and see into matters a bit for us.”
“Well, ma’, you shall do as you think fit—only, take care not to throw
away a good chance because you have greater hopes.”
“Has he said anything about his property?”
“Not a word, except it was to intimate it was large, and he had won it
very hardly, with great danger; but he did not say what it consisted
of. Of course I could not ask.”
“Oh, dear, no.”
“But he intimated he would keep a carriage, and a country house, as
well as a town house, besides several other matters, which makes it
plain enough he has been used to plenty; besides, as he spoke to me in
describing some scenes in India, he appeared so much animated that I am
sure he must be what he appears to be, and what he says he is.”
“Ah, well, I think myself it is all quite right, and that we shall have
nothing to repent there; but we will let all go on but the naming of
the day—that must not be named, for, if we do, we shall not be able to
retract.”
“Oh, no, we shall not have any occasion to do that, I think; but I
dare say he will speak to you to-night, as there is time at supper
especially.”
“No doubt. You may as well retire early, so that you may be absent, and
that will give us greater liberty to talk than if you were present, my
dear. I wish Mr. Twissel were here; but it can’t be helped; and when he
does come, I must have some conversation with him, and I must, in the
meantime, learn what I can for him to inquire about afterwards.”
Thus resolved, Margaret went to bed early, leaving her mother to attend
upon the colonel, who sat looking at the fire without any change of
posture since the last time he was seen by the girl; but Mrs. Meredith
caused him to break the steady gaze and deep thought he was indulging
in.
“I hope you have been quite well, colonel, since I left?”
“Yes, quite well, Mrs. Meredith.”
“What would you choose for supper?”
“Margaret——”
“Eh?” said Mrs. Meredith, amazed.
“I beg your pardon; I did not know you were near—at least, I did not
know I spoke at the moment; but, pray, what did you desire to know?”
“What you would have for supper, sir?”
“Oh, whatever you have at hand; some of what we had for dinner—I
think I should like it as soon as you feel disposed to have it. I am
ready—quite ready.”
“Then it shall be had at once, sir,” said Mrs. Meredith; “I will order
it up immediately, for it is later than I intended to have stopped
out; but the hours so soon ran away, and there were so many motives to
forget the time that was flying so fast.”
The supper was soon laid, and the colonel and Mrs. Meredith alone sat
down to it, at his earnest request. Indeed, they used to have meals
much in common; for the colonel professed to be very fond of female
company, and was desirous of their company, which they translated into
a desire for the presence of Margaret herself.
The supper was laid and over before the colonel said anything; but
appeared to be absorbed in deep thought, from which it was difficult to
arouse himself. But at length, after looking around once or twice, and
not seeing Margaret at table, he said to Mrs. Meredith,—
“I hope I have not driven your daughter away.”
“Oh, no, sir; she complains of headache, and has gone to bed somewhat
earlier than usual.”
“I fear I must lay the blame on myself.”
“She did not say you were the cause,” replied Mrs. Meredith, “of her
ailment; and, therefore, I think you must be free from blame; for she
would have said so, if it had so happened. She generally speaks the
truth in such matters, at least, and, I believe, in every other.”
“No doubt; but I have been speaking upon a subject that concerns my
own happiness to her, and perhaps the excitement may have caused her
some evil of that sort. She would not, perhaps, name it to you, Mrs.
Meredith; but I will. You have been a wife yourself, and know that
a few candid words are better, and more to the purpose, than a long
desultory courtship.”
“Yes, sir; it certainly is so.”
“There is some difference, too, in our ages,” said the colonel. “I have
not overlooked that matter, at all events; but I hope that will be no
cause of impediment or objection.”
“It cannot be, sir, in such a case as your own, for instance.”
“Well, then, I have proposed for her husband. I wish to make her my
wife. I am yet hale and hearty, and have some few years yet which I
could wish to pass in happiness, and which I will use to make her
happy. And if I die early, I have ample means of providing for her—of
leaving her a most handsome and ample fortune. Not more than she
deserves; but possibly more than she might have thought of seeking.”
“Certainly, sir.”
“Then I wish for your consent to our future happiness.”
“You may have my good wishes,” said Mrs. Meredith.
“You are very good,” said the colonel; “and I trust your daughter will
live long to make you happy by making her own apparent to you.”
“Of course,” said Mrs. Meredith, “this is rather a sudden affair; you
will not think of hurrying it to a conclusion, but permit her to become
acquainted with you, and to know her own mind.”
“Certainly, I do wish it pushed on to a conclusion; but not so much so
as to cause any dissatisfaction. I am anxious to call her wife. My
feelings are those of an ardent lover.”
“I do not dispute it.”
“Still you and she must be the best judges of all this. You will not,
I hope, punish me by compelling me to a longer probation than you are
compelled to put me to. I am not like a young man who has a fortune, or
rather a living to earn; but I have one ready, a handsome one, and my
wife will be a lady of fortune when I die.”
“Do not think of dying at such a moment, sir.”
“Why, it is not desirable,” said the colonel, who did not deem it
necessary to carry the conversation on any further that night;
thinking, possibly, enough had been said for the first occasion of
revealing his passion, and he, no doubt, considered his success signal.
The supper then passed off in the usual style, and Mrs. Meredith left
the colonel, and wished him good night, with feelings somewhat akin to
triumph, and returned to her own daughter’s room, there to cogitate and
sleep upon what had that evening taken place.
• • • • •
The next day she determined to send to Mr. Twissel, and arrange the
meeting she desired; and, at the same time, she resolved that she would
not push matters to the extremity, of making a point of knowing what
his property were, for she might lose all; she was convinced that the
colonel must be a man of large property; how could such a man live if
he were not.
That was a speculation she could not help indulging in. She knew that
a man in Colonel Deverill’s line of life was quite able to support
himself; besides, the jewels he had about him were worth a large sum
of money; putting all things together, she considered it was not worth
while to lose so good, so excellent an opportunity as the present for
making a brilliant, at least, an excellent settlement for her daughter,
and a home for herself.
“There can be no fear,” she muttered; “there can be no fear; her
widow’s pension will be a better support to her than the livelihood of
some.”
Mr. Twissel was sent for; and, the papers she desired to find for
him, she was fortunate enough to discover, and laid them by at once.
The attorney came willingly enough, and was well pleased when he was
informed of the success of the search after the papers, and produced
the bond, by which she agreed to give him one hundred pounds for his
assistance in the marriage affair.
However, he did not seem to agree with her, that she should not be over
particular about the colonel’s property; he thought that there must be
some inquiries made respecting it, to ascertain if there were any or
none.
“But,” suggested Mrs. Meredith, “the colonel is a kind, but a proud
man, and he would, probably, take great and deep offence at any inquiry
being made into his pecuniary affairs.”
“Hardly, my dear madam; don’t you see, love would be strong enough to
counterbalance that; he would make some allowance for paternal anxiety
and love.”
“There is much reason in all that; yet I have heard so much of these
nabobs, that one is afraid to lose a good chance by inadvertently
touching their weak points; for, the kind of society and company they
have, theirs is so different to what they find here.”
“Yes, that is very true; but we should like to know that it is true.
What service has he been in—I think, though, you said in the East India
Service?”
“Yes.”
“Well, then, I will make some inquiries at the house; they will answer
my inquiries, and no one will even be the wiser for it; they will, at
least, tell me if there is such a person in the service, and, perhaps,
I can learn something more.”
“Very well, that may be done. Will you come round with me to tea this
evening, as I will contrive to bring you in the presence of Colonel
Deverill, whom you will then see and converse with? I am not sure of
it, but I will try to do so.”
“I will be here,” said the attorney; “and, in the mean time, I will
make the necessary inquiries.”
They parted upon this mutual good understanding; and the attorney,
in high spirits, for the papers were of great value to him, and the
promised reward was a stimulus to a greater exertion on behalf of
Mrs. Meredith and her daughter, for he thought he could do business
for the Colonel, after this affair was settled—such an opportunity of
increasing his connection did not offer every day.
Mrs. Meredith redoubled her assiduity about the person of Colonel
Deverill; and, at the same time, lost no opportunity of putting her
daughter forward; nor was that daughter a bit disinclined to take such
opportunity as was offered her, of making the most of herself on this
occasion, to appear amiable, and in some new and languishing position,
or to perform some new service for the colonel.
CHAPTER CXXXIV.
THE INTRODUCTION.—THE ATTORNEY’S FIRST FEELER.
When the attorney had left the house he proceeded upon some business of
his own, and then he proceeded to the India House for the purpose of
making inquiries after the colonel, for his friend Mrs. Meredith. In
the course of the day he did go to the India House, and, upon making
some inquiries, he was sent to a particular department of the house
where he saw two gentlemen.
“Pray, sir,” said one, “what do you want?”
“I wish to make some inquiries concerning a Colonel Deverill, who is
employed, or was serving, in the Honourable East India service.”
“In what part was he serving?”
“In India,” said the attorney.
“But, to what presidency did he belong?”
“That I do not even know. He has been many years away from England, I
understand, and some of his friends have not heard from him for many
years, and they are desirous of finding out whether he is dead or
alive; and if so, where he is.”
“There is a Colonel Deverill returned this year from India.”
“Indeed! Do you know anything of him?”
“Nothing more than he has retired from the service on his half pay,
some time before he came home, on account of his wounds.”
“Is he rich?”
“I can answer no such question.”
“I am a solicitor, and do not ask the question from an improper motive.”
“You may not, sir, but we cannot answer such a question. We have no
inquisitorial knowledge of the private circumstances of those gentlemen
who have served in the company’s army; but, you put it to your won
sagacity to consider how far it would be probable for a man so placed,
as regards rank and opportunity, in India, without making money.”
“I see; certainly—he must.”
“And yet, you know, there are means of getting rid of money.”
“To be sure. I see.”
“Not that I have any idea that such can be the case; indeed, I should
be disposed to believe the contrary, seeing the colonel must have been
wounded long since, for the last engagement must have been some few
years since.”
“Thank you. I will report what I have learned. You do not know where he
can be found at this time?”
“No, indeed; we have no information.”
This being all he could learn, he left the India House, and as it was
now about time to return to Mrs. Meredith, he at once went back, and
having seen all his business transacted, he had now leisure to go
there, and in a short time he arrived, and at once related to her all
that he had heard respecting the colonel, from the first to the last
word of it.
“Well,” said Mrs. Meredith, “that, at all events, is very satisfactory.”
“Yes, it is something,” said the attorney, “to know your man; but, as
the clerk said, he might have spent it, that is to say, dissipated it.”
“Oh, it’s impossible; he’s been an invalid a long while now.”
“Ah! there’s no knowing what might be done in these cases. Who knows
what he may have done—gambled and diced it away, and entered into
extravagant speculations, which may have turned out ruinous bubbles.”
“Well, well, Mr. Twissel, we won’t say much about what might be,” said
Mrs. Meredith; “we won’t care about them; but I am very much obliged to
you for this trouble. It is, however, a very satisfactory thing to know
he is what he represented himself to be.”
“Yes, that is a very great point gained.”
“His veracity having been found unimpeachable in one point, may be
presumed to be so in another,” said Margaret. “It appeared to me to be
extremely probable, if not quite certain, he is what he appears to be,
I am glad that all is so far good.”
“Be that as it may, it will be more satisfactory to know what his
property really consists of, and how much there is about it.”
“No doubt; but it would not be worth while to risk anything on that
account; he might imagine we were mercenary, and that would disgust him
altogether.”
“That’s what I am fearful of,” said the mother.
“We may not yet have occasion to ask him any question, or to make any
inquiries of him at all, for we may be able to worm it all out of him.”
“That is true,” said Mrs. Meredith. “Dear me, there is the bell. Go,
Margaret, and say we have an old friend come to tea; perhaps he will
excuse you—he may give the invitation we desire.”
Margaret at once departed, and proceeded to the colonel’s room, and
began to wait upon him as usual; but he saw there was but one cup
placed.
“Are you not going to take tea with me, Margaret?” he said. “Am I to be
a prisoner, and put in solitary confinement for the evening?”
“Why, colonel, Mr. Twissel has called to take tea with my mother, and
as he was a very old and particular acquaintance of my father’s, I do
not like to put a slight upon him.”
“He is a gentleman, I presume?”
“Oh, yes, colonel, he is a member of the profession of the law.”
“Oh! Well, will you ask him to tea with me? As we shall be both united,
I hope your friends will soon be mine; there can be no great objection
to our acquaintance beginning earlier. I am not fond of being entirely
alone.”
“If we shall not be intruding upon you, sir,” said Margaret, “I dare
say my mother will. I will tell her of your kindness immediately.”
In a few moments Margaret returned to her mother and the attorney, to
whom she related the invitation she had received from the colonel, and
instantly clutched at the idea of going to the colonel to tea, the
thing, of all others, she most desired to do, and, at the same time,
she had calculated upon it; for the colonel appeared to be wholly
dependant upon them for society, which he appeared to be passionately
fond of there, especially Margaret.
“That is just fortunate. Now, Mr. Twissel,” said Mrs. Meredith, “you
will be cautious, and do not make any open attempt to discover what may
be the peculiar species of property he holds; it may do much mischief,
you know.”
“I am at your mercy,” said the lawyer; “if you say so, I will not make
any attempt, though I must tell you, Mrs. Meredith, that you will be to
blame if you allow your daughter to marry without some inquiry being
made; and if he mean well, he will take no offence.”
“You may do what you can without broaching the subject to him. Still I
think we have heard enough to set all doubts at rest;
“I’m a professional man, my dear madam, and know what the world is, and
have had much experience in these matters; however, as I think there
is much probability in all he says, why, you shall see I will not do
anything that will offend the nicest delicacy.”
“That will be all we want, Mr. Twissel; and now come up stairs.”
“Mr. Twissel, Colonel Deverill—Colonel Deverill, Mr. Twissel, an old
and dear friend of my late husband, sir, who has called to visit us.”
“I am very happy to see the gentleman,” said the colonel, but with the
air of a man who is conscious of his own superiority, and that he is
committing a condescending act. “Will you please to be seated. Excuse
my rising, sir; I am an invalid, and am lame; but you are welcome.”
“I am much obliged,” returned the attorney, bowing. “My good friend
Mrs. Meredith has made me intrude upon you, else I had not done so.”
“You are welcome, sir,” again repeated Colonel Deverill. “Pray be
seated; I have seen but little company, and am glad now and then to
converse with any one. Will you oblige me, Mrs. Meredith, with making
tea for us? Your services are really invaluable.”
“Ah, Colonel! you are really too good.”
“Not at all. I’m afraid I’m too much in the rear of the march of
courtesy since I left England, as our habits and manners in the East
are very different to what they are here.”
“Ah! I dare say they live in a style of regal magnificence and
splendour,” said the attorney.
“Yes; more so than you may at first imagine, and more so than in
appearance; so much so that it is difficult for the law at all times to
take its course. It becomes a mere dead letter, and the matter usually
ends in some indignity being offered to its servants.”
“Indeed, sir! that was dangerous.”
“Not at all. It was an attorney, who having deputed some one to serve a
process, and finding that he could not, imagined that it was the fault
of the process server, and he determined to make the attempt himself,
being well assured that he could succeed. However, he found himself
mistaken, for, after several disasters, that he was led into purposely,
he was well pumped upon by some slaves, and thought himself lucky in
escaping with life.”
“That would never have been permitted here,” said the attorney.
“No, possibly not; but there are not the distinctions between classes
here that there are there, and things are not on the same scale, either
living or attendance.”
“And yet, people who have passed their lives there, come to this
country at last, they do not like it well enough to remain there. They
come back to the land of their birth, where none of these things exist
to fascinate them.”
“Yes; they many live and die there—very many; but, at the same
time, those who do return, do so because it is the land of their
birth—because they love the country, and because they go there merely
to make fortunes to come here and spend them.”
“They don’t like the kind of investments, perhaps?”
“They usually do so, and it fetches a high price—a very high price, and
is considered equal to the stocks of the Bank of England.”
“That is first-rate stock, and on dividend days the place is usually
surrounded with strangers, who come to town for the purpose of
receiving their incomes; indeed, it is quite an interesting sight to
strangers. Have you ever witnessed it? It is well worth the while to go
and see it.”
“I never trouble myself anything about it,” said the colonel; “but I
must be going there, by the way, to-morrow. I must have a coach.”
“Do you know the routine of the banking business? It is confusing to
one not used to it.”
“I know enough for my own purpose.”
“Didn’t you find London much altered,” inquired Margaret, anxious
to give a turn to the conversation, as she thought this attorney’s
conversation would appear as if it were much too pointed—“when you
first returned to England, and came to live here again?”
“I cannot say much about that,” said the colonel; “because I was not in
a condition to twist about like many men; I am lame.”
“Exactly; that must have deprived you of much of the pleasure one feels
in surveying old places and well remembered spots.”
“It was,” replied the colonel; “but in a place like London, alterations
and additions are not so extensive as to cause any alteration in
general features, so as to make it perceivable at once. It is only
when you come to examine localities that you notice it. You improve
and alter parts, but the town is the same, and there is no doubt this
appears the work of steady growth, and not any one of sudden effort;
indeed, the very additions to it have a character which stamp it as
being London.”
“There is much truth about that,” said the attorney.
“It is the same all over the world, and only in those places where the
extent is but small, than any great alteration makes a conspicuous and
general change, and gives a new character to the place.”
As this conversation passed between them, the attorney making one or
two delicate allusions to property, and asking his advice respecting
some purchases he wished to make. To all which the colonel made but
short and direct answers, and of such character, that it was difficult
to carry on the conversation upon that topic, at least, and both mother
and daughter looked beseechingly at him, so that he was compelled to
resist, and found himself completely baffled by what appeared the
colonel’s pride.
• • • • •
“Well, Mrs. Meredith,” said Mr. Twissel; “I have done my utmost with
this Colonel Deverill, and I can make nothing of him—nothing at all, I
assure you.”
“You cannot form a bad opinion of him?”
“No—no. He is at one moment one of the most agreeable men to converse
with, and the next moment he is frigid and severe; perhaps pain, or
perhaps contempt for any one else, may induce the alteration in his
manner, and no allusion to himself does he make.”
“Don’t you think he is quite the gentleman, and a man used to good
society?”
“Yes, I cannot doubt—he has the air of all that he says; but he
is going to the bank to-morrow; now, I wonder if it is to receive
dividends.”
“I dare say it is,” said Mrs. Meredith; “I have very little doubt of
that, and yet I should very much like to know; it would settle one’s
mind—not that I would run any risk about the matter. I would not have
him offended for the world; it would be wilfully destroying a chance
that is so good, that we never can expect it to again occur, therefore
we must not lose it.”
“Certainly not; I will undertake the matter myself,” said the attorney,
“so that there shall not be any risk in a miscarriage, whatever. I will
take care that nothing shall be done that will be at all likely to
reach his ears, or that will be displeasing to him.”
“We will trust to your prudence, Mr. Twissel.”
“You may do so safely, and depend upon my caution in this matter. Now
I will be at hand in the morning. If I am not here before he goes out,
send for me, and let me know the hour; if there is not time to reach
here send me the number of the coach; I will post off to the bank and
there await until I see him come there.”
“I will send to you, then,” said Mrs. Meredith; “I think that a very
good plan.”
“But what will it do for you if you do see him enter the bank, that
will tell you nothing, and I cannot see the utility of it,” said
Margaret; “many people go into the Bank of England, who do not go there
to receive any money for themselves; so that would be inconclusive.”
“It would,” said the attorney; “but you must remember, I can enter
too, and ascertain to what portion of the building he goes, and I can
learn how much he received, if any—but I must bid you good-by; for the
present; do not forget to send to me at the first blush of the affair,
and then much subsequent trouble may be saved.”
CHAPTER CXXXV.
MR. TWISSEL’S MISADVENTURES.—THE CONSEQUENCES OF BEING FOUND IN THE
BANK WITHOUT GIVING A SATISFACTORY ACCOUNT OF YOUR BUSINESS THERE.—AN
UNPLEASANT DILEMMA.
The peculiar position of Mrs. Meredith and her daughter Margaret, in
some measure, and to a great degree, tied their hands, and caused a
corresponding desire to know more than was told them; at the same
time, they were fearful of giving any offence to their new and wealthy
lodger. They were both avaricious and designing. To make a good
settlement was the grand object of their lives, and to that object
they would sacrifice themselves—at least, sacrifice Margaret, who,
by-the-bye, would consider it no sacrifice at all, but a great stroke
of good luck.
However, they could do nothing of themselves; they saw there was a
great, and glorious chance for the future; they felt they had entangled
the colonel; they felt he had become a victim to their snares, and they
were unwilling that they should run any risk of a failure of their
plans.
“If we offend him, he may consider us avaricious and designing,” they
argued; “and that might prove too strong an antidote to even an old
man’s love, and the prize might be snatched out of our hands, and we
might not only lose a rich husband, but a good lodger also.”
These considerations induced them to act more warily and cautious than
the attorney, Mr. Twissel, who was anxious at once to seize the bull
by the horns, and come to an explanation, and thus save himself much
labour and time, for the sooner there was an explanation the better;
and he did not apprehend the result that they did; he believed it would
only appear proper caution on the part of a mother.
They had different opinions; and, between the two, there was an
indecisive policy adopted, which occasioned delay and uncertainty.
There was no doubt but the colonel meant matrimony; his infirmities
were of no consequence. It was not the man, but the money, that was
wanted, and which was sought with perseverance and constancy. They
appeared negligent of money matters before the colonel; and, when he
paid them, which he did regularly, he always appeared to have money
about him, which, of course, increased their respect, and gave them
increased confidence in him.
“It is all very well, ma,” said Margaret, “but Mr. Twissel must not
offend Colonel Deverill; he is evidently a man much above him; his
actions and manner are such, that at once stamp him immeasurably his
superior; now, as regards this property, there can be no doubt but he
must have enough.”
“I think so, too, my dear; but it would be a dreadful thing if it
should turn out otherwise in the end; it would really be very dreadful;
I should never survive it.”
“Nor I mother.”
“What is to be done?—I declare I am at my wits’ end.”
“There is no fear, ma; do you not remember that Mr. Twissel himself has
found out that he is Colonel Deverill, and that he has retired from the
army of the Company?”
“Indeed, my dear, that is correct; I had forgotten that—quite forgotten
it; but it may so happen he has no money at all; he may have spent it.”
“He does not appear to be extravagant,” said Margaret; “he has retired
upon his half-pay, which you know must be a very good living, and I am
sure of a widow’s pension, if nothing more; and, besides, I am sure,
from what he has said, there must be money.”
“Well, I think so, too, my dear,” said Mrs. Meredith; “and I think it
will be better that things should go on as the colonel desires; to lose
him would be horribly aggravating.”
“So it will, ma, because I am sure he will do justice. It is not like
as if we had money, too, and were as willing to have our affairs
investigated, as we are to investigate his.”
“That is very true, my dear, very true; and Mr. Twissel does not seem
to know that; that I will tell him when I see him; by the way, I must
send to him, to tell him the colonel is going out in about an hour. If
he can find out anything, without compromising us in the affair, why,
he may do so, and welcome; for, you must acknowledge, it will be all
the more satisfactory.”
“Yes, yes, I admit that; but I would not wilfully lose a good
opportunity.”
“I must now send off to him. Mary must go, and that, too, as quickly as
she can; for I shall want her back again very soon, so she must run.”
“Then, the sooner she goes the better,” said Margaret.
Mary was sent to Mr. Twissel, who happened to be at home at the time,
and judging that Mary had been a good time on the road, that there
would be no time to go to Mrs. Meredith’s house, and then follow the
coach, so he determined to go to the bank at once, so that he would be
there in time to see the colonel descend and enter the bank, into which
he would follow him.
He sent word back to Mrs. Meredith that he would go on, and see her as
soon after as he could; and then he made the best of his way towards
the bank, where he arrived in good time—indeed, half-an-hour before the
colonel, who did not set out so soon as he intended.
“Now,” thought Twissel, “if he were to turn out all right, why, I shall
be in good fortune; but if bad, it would be laid upon my shoulders.
They shall not say that I have not given them attention enough for
their money; and if I don’t do something, they will say I haven’t
earned my money; and though I can enforce payment of the bond, yet it
may hurt my future prospects with regard to my future connection with
the family, which I hope to make a profitable one in the long run.”
Filled with these thoughts, he determined to watch with due caution for
the arrival of the colonel, on the other side of the way.
It was some time before the coach drove up, which it did after a
considerable lapse of time, and then Mr. Twissel crossed over, and
placed himself in a position by the lamp-post where he could obtain a
good view of any one passing in and out of the coach.
“’Tis he,” he muttered, as he saw the colonel step out of the carriage,
and walk into the bank very leisurely and quietly, leaning upon his
stick, and walking lame. He watched him into the bank—he saw him go
some distance down the passage, and then he muttered,—
“Now, I will follow him up closely.”
And, after a moment’s pause to permit some one to pass him, he then
darted down the passage into a kind of yard; but no, he could not see
him; he was not there; and yet he was so lame, he could not have got
out of sight so soon as all that.
“He’s gone to the dividend-office,” he muttered; “I shall find him
there,” and away he posted to that department; but he could not find
him, he was—he was not there. Then what could have become of him? That
was a point he could not solve.
“Well, this is very odd,” he muttered; “very odd.”
He paused to think over the matter; but that did not aid him. He was
in the dark, but thought it was no use in waiting in any one place, so
wandered about from office to office, until he came to the body of the
place, when he waited until some one came up to him, and touched him on
the shoulder. He turned round, and at once perceived it was an officer.
“What do you want with me?” inquired Twissel.
“What is your business here?” returned the officer, by way of reply.
“I am here upon my own business. I am at a loss to understand what you
mean by asking me such a question in a public place. What can you mean
by it? I was never asked such a question before, and cannot see why you
should do so now.”
“Excuse me, sir, I have ample warrant for what I am doing.”
“Have you? Then state it.”
“Easily. I have followed you about this last half-hour, and you have
been wandering about the place for some time, and looking about you in
a manner that has excited a good deal of suspicion, to say the least of
it; and I must have some satisfactory explanation.”
“You can have that,” replied Mr. Twissel, very much annoyed; “you can
have any explanation you can require. I am very sure I came here on my
own affairs; what other explanation can you require?”
“Your affairs may be ours also, and the explanation you have given will
be just enough to justify my taking you into custody—so if you have no
more to say, I must request the favour of your company; that’s my card
of invitation; do you hear, sir?”
“Yes, I do; I am an attorney-at-law, and you may depend upon it I will
not be content without punishing you for this indignity—I came in here
because I saw a friend call, to whom I wanted to speak.”
“Where is he?”
“I don’t know,” said Twissel; “I have missed him.”
“Very likely, and your friend will miss you for a short time; for you
must come with me;—you have been found here without being able to give
any account of yourself.”
“I tell you I came in here to see Colonel Deverill.”
“Well, what do we know of Colonel Deverill? We don’t know anything
about him, nor you either; you must come with me. We are obligated to
be very particular when we see strangers walking about with no object
whatever in view—it is very suspicious.”
“But I tell you I am a respectable attorney—a professional man. I had
no bad object in view.”
“That may be as you say; but you must come with me.”
Seeing there no help for it, Mr. Twissel resigned himself into the
officer’s hands, and followed him to the station-house, where he was
examined by the inspector, at the place where he was taken.
“Well, sir,” said the inspector, “this may be all very true, but we
must have some proof of what you assert; then we can let you go.”
“I’ll have a complaint against you.”
“You may; but you must prove not only that what you say is true, but
that there was no cause for suspicion, and that you were not loitering
about the bank, as the officer asserts you were.”
The attorney thought that it would be quite unnecessary to get into the
public prints, because it would not do for him to make use of Colonel
Deverill’s name; and that he had already done. What was he to do? he
had got into a very disagreeable scrape, out of which he must now get
in the best manner possible, and which he could not see his way clear
to do.
“What do you want me to do?”
“Give us some proof that you are the person whom you represent yourself
to be,” he replied, “and then we can let you go at once.”
“Then I will give you my card,” said Twissel, producing his card-case.
“That is no proof,” said the constable. “A man might have robbed you
of your card-case, and you would have some one passing himself off for
yourself.”
“What shall I do, then?” inquired Twissel.
“Send for some one who knows you, or send for your own clerk—that will
do.”
“That I can do at once,” replied Twissel; and he at once wrote a note
to his clerk, and gave it unsealed into the hands of the constable, and
asked if there was any one who would go with it.
“You can send a messenger; there are many who will do that if you pay
them for it,” replied the constable; and in another minute, for the sum
of half-a-crown, a messenger agreed to take the letter to his office,
and deliver it to his clerk, and wait for him.
This was done, and until that time he was locked up in a cell, where he
had a light certainly, but in which he had no other comfort at all; but
in about an hour and a half there was the prospect of a relief; for he
saw his clerk come into the station-house, and with him the messenger,
who came to the constable and said that was Mr. Twissel’s clerk.
“Do you know Mr. Twissel?” inquired the constable.
“Yes, I do; he is my employer.”
“Then point him out,” said the constable.
At that moment, Mr. Twissel was brought in, and he at once pointed him
out to the satisfaction of the constable, who, with an admonition,
consented to the enlargement of Mr. Twissel, and in answer to his
threat of future investigation, said to him,—
“You see, sir, the bank is such a place, that we are compelled to keep
all persons out who have no business there, and it must not be a place
where people meet who have no particular bank business to transact; do
not wait about, then, for the future, sir, else you may run the same
danger.”
Mr. Twissel left the station-house with a feeling very much akin to
anger, and he walked home with a very disagreeable feeling. He felt
that he had been baffled, and had been also much ill-used, and very
much affronted.
“Where could he have got to?” he murmured. “He must have turned in some
of the offices—confound him! I wish he had taken it into his head to
tumble. I am sure he ain’t no good; if he were, I should not have been
placed in such an unpleasant position.”
Suddenly he recollected that there was no necessity for his going home,
unless there had been anything happened since his departure; and upon
being informed that such was not the case, he determined to alter his
course, and proceed to Mrs. Meredith, and relate the misfortunes that
had befallen him.
“And if that don’t satisfy her I have her interest at heart, why,
nothing will.”
And he left his clerk, after giving him some directions, and then
turned off towards Bloomsbury-square, where he arrived just before tea
time.
CHAPTER CXXXVI.
AN EVENING WITH COLONEL DEVERILL.—THE STRATAGEM OF MRS. MEREDITH.
Mr. Twissel seated himself by Mrs. Meredith’s fire, not at all pleased
with what he had anticipated and expected on that day, and yet well
pleased that there was an end to it; but, at the same time, he had
conceived a dislike for the colonel, of which the reader can easily
guess the reason. The colonel had received him rather haughtily, and he
was annoyed at it, and he was resolved that he would do him no service;
and now, the indignity he had received was so vexing, that he knew not
on whom to wreak his anger—at all events, it gave him a great dislike
to the colonel, which would require a considerable time to overcome.
He sat there, waiting for Mrs. Meredith, who was then engaged
somewhere else; but it was not long before she entered the apartment in
which Mr. Twissel sat meditating upon his misadventure, and considering
in his own mind what would be the best course to pursue.
“Oh, Mr. Twissel!” she said, “I hope you have not been waiting long for
me.”
“Not long, ma’am.”
“And how have you got on to-day, Mr. Twissel?”
“Rather indifferently indeed,” said Twissel, with a groan; “I may say
very indifferently indeed. I have had plenty of incident—I may say of
adventure—I ought to say misadventure, which appears to have dogged me
step by step in this affair.”
“Indeed! I am amazed at that,” said Mrs. Meredith.
“You would be more so if you knew all.”
“Tell me what has happened, Mr. Twissel,” said Mrs. Meredith. “I am
anxious to hear what can have happened to you of this character. I hope
it did not happen in consequence of your doing anything in this affair
of Colonel Deverill’s.”
“Indeed it did, Mrs. Meredith,” said the attorney, solemnly. “I have
been sedulously engaged in this affair, and I have been seriously
inconvenienced by it.”
“I regret it very much.”
“But you could not have helped it, Mrs. Meredith,” said Twissel. “You
could not have helped it at all. I know that very well, therefore
there is no blame attached to you. You are free; but I have suffered,
nevertheless. I have suffered.”
“Dear me, how sorry I am, to be sure.”
“Yes, ma’am, but it can’t be helped. I was taken into custody as a
suspicious person, and had some difficulty in getting my release from
custody.”
Mrs. Meredith lifted her hands and her eyes to express the amount of
astonishment she felt.
“Yes, Mrs. Meredith. I followed the colonel into the Bank of England,
and there I saw him enter, but by some wonderful means he suddenly
disappeared. I missed him, and could not again obtain the slightest
clue to him. I did not again set eye upon him, and while endeavouring
to regain the track, I was taken into custody for loitering about.”
“Indeed. Then you have learned nothing about the colonel?”
“Nothing at all. I missed him. I saw him going into the bank, and that
was all.”
“Well, he has come back, and appears to have received money. I should
think there could be doubt as to where he got it from.”
“It is a mystery.”
“Indeed. I should hardly think it possible, as you saw him go in.
What would he go there for but for money matters? It seems clear
enough to me. I have no doubt in my own mind—everything appears to be
straightforward and plain.”
“Indeed,” muttered the attorney; “there is much truth in that. I
have had a straightforward intimation that I have been considered a
suspicious person.”
“I regret it very much; but here’s Margaret.”
At that moment Margaret entered the apartment in which her mother and
Mr. Twissel were seated. There was an air of triumph in her eye when
she entered, and her mother at once divined the cause; but she said
nothing, and waited until Margaret spoke.
“Ma,” she said, “it is tea-time, and the colonel expects you up stairs;
and if you had any friends, he hoped you would not deprive him of
your company on that account, but bring them up stairs to tea. He is
particularly good-humoured to night.”
“Curse him,” involuntarily exclaimed the attorney, as he heard of the
good-humour the colonel was in, and he had so much cause to be vexed
himself.
“Will you come with us, Mr. Twissel?”
“I will, thank you, ma’am. I am very tired,” said Twissel, as he
thought it would afford him some opportunity of discovering something
that would enable him to be revenged, and at the same time do a seeming
service to the other party.
“At all events,” he muttered, “it will give me a chance of making a
more intimate and useful acquaintance with him. I must do something or
other, and I may as well make a good thing of it as well as a bad one.
That wouldn’t be bad policy.”
“Then you had better come up at once,” said Margaret, “for the tea is
waiting.”
Thus urged, Mrs. Meredith and Mr. Twissel followed Margaret, and walked
up to the drawing-room, where the colonel was, as before, seated in
an easy chair, with the green shade still over one eye, and his arm
carried in a sling, though he did not appear to have lost the entire
use of it, and by his side was his stick, a valuable Malacca cane, with
which he walked, and his lame foot was supported by an ottoman.
“Well, sir,” said the colonel, “I have the extreme felicity of meeting
you again; be seated. It is a very charming day, the most comfortable
that I recollect since I have returned to England.”
“It is remarkably fine,” said the attorney, shrugging his shoulders,
and giving a suspicious glance towards the colonel, as if he thought
there was a latent smile lurking upon the colonel’s countenance; but he
could not detect it, and yet he felt very much aggravated.
“There is, even in this climate,” continued the colonel, “some decent
weather; but then, when matters go on happily and cheerfully, then the
climate appears more genial and kind.”
“Strange that it should be so,” said Mr. Twissel; “but I can’t help
thinking he looks more provoking than ever I saw in my life.”
As he muttered, the colonel said,—
“What did you say, sir?”
“I merely said that we, who are used to it, look upon it in some other
light than that of a merely negative character; that is, we look upon
some of it as positively good—nay, we are apt to call it beautiful,
especially when it continues fine.”
“Continues fine!” said the colonel; “does it really continue fine in
this climate?”
“Why, one would think, colonel, you have never been in this country
before, to hear you talk; and yet you are a native of this country.”
“Yes, I am; that is, I believe so; but I have spent so many years in
Asia, that I am more a native of India than this country. However, I
believe what you say to be correct; but, you see, the slightest change
of weather affects my wounds, when you could not believe any change
that had taken place; or, at all events, the change would be so slight
as to cause no difference to you, and yet, even before that comes, I
feel the approaching change.”
“I day say you do, sir; but it must be unpleasant in the extreme.”
“It certainly is; and I have found it so. Mrs. Meredith, I hope you
enjoyed your walk; did you go far?”
“No, Colonel, I did not; else I had not been back so soon. By the way,
how do you feel after your walk, or, rather, ride? I had not time to
ask you before.”
“Oh, I am very well; I enjoyed it much; but I must take another the
day after to-morrow,” said the colonel. “That is, another ride; for I
cannot walk far.”
“Do you intend going far?”
“To the South Sea House,” replied the colonel.
“To the South Sea house,” repeated the attorney to himself, as he
sipped his tea; “he has some of the stock on his hands. Well, I dare
say that is likely; people belonging to these companies generally
prefer them to any other stock. However, I will follow him there, and
see if I can’t do better. I will tread upon his heels but what I will
find out something this time, at all events.”
“Are you acquainted with that stock?” he inquired, after a pause.
“What, the South Sea stock?” inquired the colonel.
“Yes.”
“Not much; but I believe it to be a good, steady stock—a very good
investment; it will pay you a better interest than the funds.”
“But is it as secure?”
“Well, that is a very difficult thing to answer,” said the colonel;
“but I think is safe enough. I have that opinion of it that I do not
object to hold it.”
“That, of course, is the best answer one can have to its presumed
security.”
“Yes, I have a good opinion of it, and do not object holding it, as I
said before; and that is the best opinion that can well be offered.
Have you any?”
“None, sir; but I have a friend, who wanted to purchase stock of some
kind, or to place money out to advantage, and I wished to learn a
little more concerning it.”
“I do not mean to say there is no better; but when you have once
invested your money, you do not like to change the stock.”
“Certainly not; it is unadvisable,” said the attorney, “unless you have
some specific reason for so doing at the best of times. You are the
loser by the expenses.”
“Well,” said Mrs. Meredith, “I am very glad to see you are so well
after your journey.”
“Journey, do you call it? Why ma’am, I cannot call anything less than
some few hundred miles a journey; anything less is a mere bagatelle.”
“Dear me, colonel; what journeys you must have travelled.”
“Indeed I have, madam; some of them beautiful and romantic, and some
of them dreary, and some terrible, from the obstacles that opposed us,
and others, from the nature of the ground that we had to go over, and
the dangers attendant from fatigue, climate, and the enemy.”
“It must be a terrible thing; females in those parts are out of the
question.”
“Oh! dear, no; there are ladies, and English ladies, too, who live
there for years, and who follow their husbands’ movements with the
camp, and who undergo all the dangers and fatigues merrily and
cheerfully, and even put some of the best of us to the blush for
fortitude.”
“Well, I am glad we have a good character, even so far off as India.”
“It cannot but be expected but the mothers of such men can bear fatigue
and hardship, else their sons could never be what they are. However,
we have many examples of heroism in India, not of men only, but women
also.”
“Then there are many interesting points for us to hear explanation
about India,” said Margaret; “I love to hear such things, especially
from those who have been there, and mixed up among the people who live
here, and who have had much experience with them.”
“I hope we shall have ample time to talk over many such matters,”
returned the colonel, “for to me it is pleasant to speak of the past,
and relate all I have seen, known, and taken part in, in a place so
distant from us all, as our Eastern empire.”
“Indeed, I love to hear them,” said Margaret.
“I am afraid she will keep you pretty constantly employed in relating
all that you have ever seen, colonel,” said Mrs. Meredith; “she’s a
strange girl, and has many fancies that way; she is fond of the wild,
irregular life that you describe; she would have made an excellent
soldier’s wife, I am sure; she’s so fond of that kind of thing.”
“I hope she will do so now, madam; and that she will have less of
the fatigue and danger that fall to the lot of a good many, for I
candidly tell you it is one thing to hear these things talked of, and
another to bear with them. Plains of burning sand, and want of water,
mountainous regions covered with snow, and no means to obtain warmth
and shelter,—these are things exciting enough in a narrative, and yet
heartbreaking to experience.”
“Oh!” said the attorney; “there can be no doubt it’s much better in
perspective, than it is to experience. I can easily imagine when you
hear of battles and sieges, how they wish they had been there; and how
much would have been done by our individual exertions. But, dear me,
that’s as different from being shot in the beginning, and so seeing
none of the fun that was to follow. Lord bless my heart, being put out
of the way in that manner, positively makes me nervous, I do believe. I
could be hanged before I marched up to the breach.”
“Fortunately, all men are not of that opinion, else we might all of
us be murdered in our beds, and no one to protect us,” said Margaret,
contemptuously.
“It is necessary,” said the colonel, “that some men should be born for
one purpose, and some another. Some are poltroons from their birth, and
require better men to take care of them, while others win honour and
profit on the field of death and danger, and snatch triumph from the
hands of death.”
“Exactly,” said the attorney; “half a loaf is better than no bread;
and half a man is better than no man at all; and I believe that many of
them leave the field of battle, leave it in a very little better state.
Now, I should not care for life upon such terms; it must be such as is
worth living for, and such I do not consider life, when one is rendered
a cripple all one’s life.”
“Well,” said the colonel, “we all have our different ideas upon that
subject; but I rather think the state would be nothing without the
profession of arms, and the lawyers would grace the lamp-posts, if I
might judge from popular opinion.”
“Popular opinion is nothing in this country upon such matters,” said
Twissel, contemptuously.
“It amounts to something,” retorted the colonel; “and you would say so,
I imagine, if you felt it clinging to your throat in the shape of a
halter, administered by the _canaille_.”
“Why,” said Mrs. Meredith, “I dare say it isn’t always expressed so
forcibly, and Mr. Twissel does not hold it of any importance, so long
as it is not expressed so loudly as that.”
“Certainly, Mrs. Meredith; that is my meaning; for an illegal act
committed by a contemptible portion of the population becomes of
importance.”
“So it does,” said the colonel; “that is easily verified.”
“But still we may be thankful to those who bravely fight and die, that
we may be here in ease and quiet, and free from danger, and able to
enjoy our lives and homes in peace.”
“That is true,” said the attorney; “the one part of a nation cannot do
without another; all are necessary, and produce a powerful kingdom, and
not only powerful, but rich and intelligent.”
“No doubt of that,” said the colonel.
Tea was now cleared away, and some wine was placed upon the table, and
the colonel took a few glasses of some rare wine, of which he offered
the attorney to drink, and the latter willingly accepted, and found
it some of the best he had tasted; and he continued to taste it until
he got quite talkative, and, to the pain and mortification of Mrs.
Meredith, began to talk in a strain that would in a short time have
done them much discredit and mischief.
Mrs. Meredith, however, always full of expedient, soon devised on that
had the effect of putting an end to a scene she feared would come to an
unpleasant act, if continued in; and therefore, left the room for a few
minutes, and then when she returned, she said,—
“Mr. Twissel, you have been sent for; you are wanted immediately.”
“I—I sent for?”
“Yes, sir, you are wanted.”
“Nobody knew I was here. Oh, yes, I told my clerk as I came along,
confound him! Just as I was so comfortable, too.”
“We can finish this another time,” said the colonel, pointing to the
bottle.
“Yes, thank you. Good night, Colonel Deverill.”
“Good evening, Mr. Twissel.”
Mr. Twissel quitted the drawing-room, vowing vengeance to himself
against the brute of a clerk of his, who should dare to come and
interrupt such an agreeable evening. It was most horribly provoking. He
could have called down the vengeance of the universe upon the head of
the offending mortal who had come for him, and in this mood of mind he
entered the parlour.
“Where is he—where is he?”
“Where is who?” inquired Mrs. Meredith.
“My clerk—the man who came for me.”
“Listen, Mr. Twissel,” said Mrs. Meredith; “I have called you out. No
one has been for you; but I had no other means of calling you out, as I
wanted to speak to you.”
“Well,” said Mr. Twissel, half surprised and half vexed, “what do you
want to say to me now I am here.”
“I want to impress upon you the fact, that the habits of the colonel
lead him to retire about this time, and I feared you, not knowing this,
might stop beyond the proper moment, and so took this method of telling
you what I am sure you would like to know.”
Mr. Twissel could not object; there was something reasonable in it, and
yet he was at heart vexed, and could not help saying,—
“I should have thought the colonel would not have been so pleasant and
so talkative; if he had not been comfortable, he would have said so.”
“Oh, dear, no, he would not have done that, even if you had remained
till daylight; he has too much courtesy towards a stranger to do so.”
“Very well,” said Twissel, “I will be gone. However, I will take care
and not forget the South Sea House the day after to-morrow. You must
make the best of it you can, and let me know when he is likely to go,
so that I may not lose any chance.”
“Certainly not. I’ll do as I did before,” said the lady.
“Do so.”
“And I hope you will meet with better luck than you met with before.”
“I hope so too,” said the attorney, gravely. “However, here I am, and
I’ll do all that I can do for you. Good by, Mrs. Meredith—good day—good
night.”
“Good night,” said Mrs. Meredith, and the attorney left the house, to
their inexpressible relief, for he was growing very talkative and very
troublesome too, for the misfortune was, he more than once touched upon
forbidden topics.
CHAPTER CXXXVII.
THE DIFFICULTIES TO BE ENCOUNTERED IN THE CHOICE OF A BRIDESMAID.
“Well, Margaret,” said Mrs. Meredith, when they were alone in their own
apartment—“well, and how have you got on with the colonel?”
“Oh, very well indeed, ma’.”
“I am glad of it. Has he proposed anything new to you, my dear, or has
he said anything more to you of a particular character? Has he said
anything respecting property? That is what we want to know pretty well,
and that is the only point that can be more than usually interesting to
us.”
“No, ma’, nothing about property. I could not expect he would say
anything to me, and I hardly expect he would to any one at all. You
see, he is no doubt a rich man.”
“Well, and he would not consider it at all necessary to say anything
about it to any one; that it is so peculiarly private, and has nothing
to do with any one; and he does not imagine that we require anything of
the kind. I am sure if the thought entered his mind, he would at once
satisfy us upon the subject. I cannot speak to him about it, because,
having none, I am really not entitled to do so. That’s my opinion upon
the subject, though Mr. Twissel, I dare say, has a different one to me;
indeed, he generally has one of his own.”
“Yes, you may depend upon that; but I have been thinking the matter
over, and I am sure he is what he says he is. But what did he say, my
dear?”
“Why, he insists that I shall name an early day.”
“Insists! my child. What does he mean?”
“Merely in a goodnatured, though urgent manner. Indeed, he wishes me
to make up my mind and have him at once. If I’ll consent to have him,
he’ll obtain a special licence to solemnise the marriage here in this
house, or at church, which I like best. Which shall I consent to, ma’?”
“Well, my dear, I think you may as well be married at home; it will be
so much more fashionable than going to church.”
“It will be much more trouble, and will hardly seem like a marriage, I
think, if it is not done at a church. What do you think?”
“It will make more noise,” said Mrs. Meredith, “if it is done at home;
and yet nobody can say a word about it if it takes place at church.”
“So I think, now; so I think.”
“Well, what did you decide?”
“I did not decide upon anything,” said Margaret; “I declined to do
so upon the moment, but said I would think about it, and after a few
words, I promised I would let him know the next time he spoke to me
about it, which should not be before to-morrow afternoon.”
“Very well, my dear. A becoming reluctance will never hurt your cause;
you have done quite right, and I have no doubt but he will feel more
pleased with you than if you had at once consented upon his first
asking.”
“So I thought, ma,” sad Margaret.
“But you must not carry that too far, or it may defeat its own
object, when next he asked you, you must affect a great deal of
emotion—trembling and blushing, and all that kind of thing, which you
can do very well; or if you should distrust yourself, you can practice
it a bit before a glass. I did it when I was your age, and I did it
well.”
“Yes, ma’, I can manage all that well enough; but what time shall I
name?”
“Well, that must in some measure depend upon the humour you find him
in. If he be very pressing, you may shorten the period; if he appear
distant, lengthen it; but if there is any danger, take him at his word
at once, and have no delay. It will not do to lose a chance; he must
not be allowed to get off in that manner; and you must declare your
confusion to be so great that you hardly know what you say, but, as he
is so very pressing, you will give in to his wishes, and you may name
any day you like best; and then he is caught, you see.”
“I understand that clearly; but what time would you, as a medium
time, give, which I out to lengthen or shorten as occasion may seem to
require?”
“Well, my dear, about a fortnight.”
“Ah, that was on my own tongue, too. Well, then, I should not have done
wrong in naming three weeks or a month, which I felt disposed to say at
first.”
“No, no, but you need not make it more than three weeks, unless you
see any fitting occasion, or any necessity for so doing,” said Mrs.
Meredith.
After an amiable council the mother and daughter held, having for its
object the entanglement and speedy marrying of the unfortunate East
Indian colonel, they both indulged in balmy sleep, and slept till morn.
The colonel himself said no more about the object of the previous day’s
conversation, when the amiable mother left the daughter alone with the
colonel, who appeared as if actuated by clock-work; when the hour of
his forbearance had passed, he again spoke of the matter.
“Miss Meredith,” he said, “my impatience will, I hope, be excused, on
the score that my love is ardent; and I have already waited as long as
I promised. You know to what I allude.”
“I am afraid I must say I do, Colonel Deverill,” said Margaret; “but
will you not grant me more time to consider this matter over? Remember,
it is a serious matter.”
“Of that there is no doubt,” said the colonel; “but I do not feel
the same doubts you do, for I only feel how much I can do for your
happiness, and how willingly I will do it.”
“Of that I can have no fear.”
“Then why not consent at once? Consent to have the man who loves you,
who dotes upon you, and who will do all that an ample fortune can
enable him to do for your welfare, and your future prosperity and
comfort. Consider all that.”
“I have considered much; I don’t know that I need consider more than my
present happiness; the future will take care of itself; at all events,
we can do no more than to deserve to do well, and to succeed in all our
undertakings—to deserve to be happy.”
“And do more you cannot; and who is there that can do as much?”
“We all endeavour to do so.”
“I hope we do so, though I am sure there are many who might do better;
but, to return to my hopes, when will you consent to become mine—say
the day on which I am to be made happy; and, if you really love me,
make it as short as you can.”
Margaret appeared to hesitate, and hung her head, trembled, and the
blushes mounted her cheek; the colonel caught her in his arms—and
pressing her to his bosom, he said,—
“Come, come, my own Margaret say when shall I be made happy.”
“Oh! Deverill,” she sighed, as she hid her face; “what shall I say—you
are so urgent; shall I say a—a fortnight; and yet that is,—too—too
soon.”
“No—no, not at all—not at all; thank you, dear Margaret, thank you.”
“I—I—I fear I have said too much; forgive me—”
“Nay, nay, no more about it; I will be content; to-morrow I will go to
the city, and then I will purchase the wedding-ring. I will obtain
a licence, and then we shall be ready against any contingencies; and
on our wedding morning, I will have some jewels ready for you. I have
given them some orders, but they take a long while in getting ready.”
“Oh, you are too good.”
“Not a bit—only just,” said the colonel; and he appeared as though he
were quite satisfied with his conquest, and looked very well pleased
with the success he had met with in the prosecution of his suit. It was
a settled thing now, and he was, or professed to be, in ecstacies.
• • • • •
“Mother,” said Margaret as she entered the room, “it is all settled at
last; I have given my consent, and the day is named.”
“Indeed! I am glad of it. When will the day arrive—what day is it?”
“This day fortnight.”
“This day fortnight! well—well, that will be a very good time—very good
time, indeed; we shall have a very busy time of it, for we must make
the most of our arrangements between this and then; for we must get you
in a fit-out; but if you have a dress to appear in, that is as much as
I shall be able to afford you, for my means are so short.”
“I know all that; but he has promised me jewels, which he has ordered,
but which will take some time in making; but he expects them to be
ready by our wedding-day. Come, now, this seems to me to be a very
handsome provision.”
“Very, my dear; very fortunate, too, because you see the furniture
was becoming somewhat less new and fine that it was; that would have
compelled me to lessen my terms; so we should have gone gradually back,
and, perhaps, been obliged to seek some other mode of living.”
“But you have some money by you?”
“That was reserved in case of extreme misfortunes, and I cannot realise
that immediately; however, it would only put off the evil day; but
we are saved that, now—we have caught a rare good fish—we have only
to land him, that is, get some little to be done before we pull him
ashore. We must keep up the farce; but, I tell you, we must not be
guided by Mr. Twissel, though he is of great use.”
“No, ma’, we must not; I have thought on that.”
“And yet I do not like to give up the idea of finding out first what
he may have in the shape of property, though I am sure it would do
no good; yet, to have one’s curiosity satisfied is something gained.
Still, I am not so curious that I must be satisfied at the expense of
our prospects.”
“No, ma’; I am sure I want badly enough to know all about it, but I
will restrain my curiosity until I find out by means and at a time when
no offence can be taken; or, if it be, why it’s of no consequence, and
I don’t care anything about it, because I shall have a right to speak
for myself.”
“Certainly, my dear, that is a very proper spirit—a very proper spirit,
indeed; but then he won’t interfere with you much, except it is to want
you to be always at his elbow.”
“Ah, I won’t mind that, because, you see, he may make a will; but I’ll
take pretty good care that nobody comes in between him and me.”
“Exactly; you have no relatives on his side to tease you, or give you
any trouble; therefore you have all plain sailing before you.”
“I have; and now, I suppose, it will not be too much to speak to one’s
bridesmaids?”
“Ah! my dear,” said Mrs. Meredith, with a shake of the head.
“What’s the matter, ma’?”
“Ah! my dear, there is the difficulty; you know how easy the colonel
has fallen in love with you; how sudden that has all come about, and
how short a time the courtship has continued.”
“So much the better, ma’.”
“Certainly, my love; but it should make you cautious—very cautious, how
you act with bridesmaids, because you don’t know what may happen with
such old people as the colonel—they are dreadful sometimes, and you
don’t know what they will do. They will fall in love with anybody; it
is quite shocking to think of it; but it don’t so much matter, only you
see he may take a violent fancy to some one, and then you may lose by
the whole affair.”
“How so, ma?”
“Why, suppose he takes a fancy to one of the bridesmaids?—you don’t
know what may pass between them.”
“Certainly not.”
“Very well; then he may make a will to reward her, as he would call it,
and then you lose so much, which is a clear robbery, as I call it.”
“So it would be, ma’; and yet, after all’s said and done, I cannot tell
what else we are to do; some female friends we must have; and the only
precaution we can take will be to get some one as ugly as I can, and
then keep her away as much as possible.”
“The latter is the only effectual method, for ugliness is not always a
safeguard, for men have got such tastes, and what we think extremely
plain, they, by a perversity of taste, will persist in believing to be
interesting, at least, if not pretty. I have known so many instances;
besides, I do know that even ugliness itself is no safeguard.”
“Indeed, ma’!”
“No; I had an instance of that—I may say two—even with your father, who
took a fancy to two of the servants, one after the other. I am sure
there was nothing in the hussies to attract any attention; but then men
will be men, and you can’t help it.”
“We must get rid of them.”
“Yes, that is all you can do; but whom did you think of having?”
“There are the two Miss Stewards—”
“They are called pretty. I heard a gentleman say so at the last party
we went to, so that I think decidedly bad policy. I know the men’s
taste very well, my dear, but it is different to what we call taste; I
don’t know why, but it is so.”
“Well, ma’, if the Misses Steward won’t do, what do you say to the
Misses Brown? They are anything but even passable; besides, they are
pitted with the small-pox, and very light hair, almost carroty—they are
anything but fascinating.”
“That may be all very true, my dear, but you know the Misses Brown
sing, they are called good figures, and dashing young women, and they
are very bold, which might tempt many people, especially when they are
looking about for sweethearts.”
“Yes, that is very true; then there are the Misses Smith—they are very
young—much too young to be at all likely to cause men to have any fancy
for them.”
“There, my dear innocent girl, you are entirely wrong—most entirely
wrong.”
“Indeed, ma’?”
“Yes, my dear, you are innocence itself, because you have been brought
up at home; but, look here, men are the nastiest creatures alive—why,
some of them would fall in love with a girl sixteen or seventeen years
old. Aye, more than that,—I have seen some of them married at that age.”
“Oh! I am shocked,” said Margaret, as she lifted up her hands in
amazement at this description of the vices of men. “Ah! well they may
say at church, ‘And there is no good in us.’”
“Indeed, my dear, you are quite right, and so is the Prayer-book—but
it is as I tell you; beside, men never forget these things; they will
remember faces they have seen for a year or two, and then they will
begin their games.”
“Dear me, ma’, what shall I do?”
“That is the difficulty, my dear. I would not have unfolded this book
of vice before you, had it not been necessary for your happiness.”
“Oh! fiddle de dee ma’—it’s the money that I care for; it ain’t the
colonel, poor old cripple. He may do as he pleases, as long as I get
the gold.”
“Well, my dear,” said the careful mother, who felt the sedative effects
of this speech, “well, my dear, but you know they do waste their means
in these affairs, and that most outrageously, sometimes, to cause a
ruinous effect upon their home.”
“Oh! but he’s too much of an invalid.”
“Do you know, Margaret, I think the colonel is more of an invalid from
habit than reality. Sometimes, when nobody’s looking, he can walk and
use both feet alike, and even use his left hand without any trouble at
all.”
“Do you really think so?”
“Yes, but I don’t mean to say it is all sham. Oh, dear, no, but long
habit, and the laziness of these rich Indians is so great, that there
is no knowing its extent. I don’t believe they would eat, if it wasn’t
for their being hungry.”
“What is to be done?”
“I will tell you, my dear. Have Miss Twissel and her friend.”
“Miss Twissel and Martha Briggs,” exclaimed Miss Meredith with a
giggle. “What a fright!”
“So much the better, my dear—so much the better. It is just what you
want—the very thing above all others. Have a fool and a fright, and you
can drop their acquaintance whenever you like, and I think there can be
no danger of the colonels falling in love with them. At least,” added
Mrs. Meredith, with emphasis,—“at least, upon such an occasion.”
“Very well, ma’. Let it be Miss Twissel and Martha Briggs. Goodness me,
how I shall be attended upon this occasion—it will be quite laughable.
I mustn’t let the colonel see them before the morning arrives, else he
will be sure to laugh at them.”
“Ha! ha! ha!” laughed both mother and daughter at the idea of the
two frights, as they called them, being bridesmaids; and in high
good humour they both retired to rest for the night, to dream of the
forthcoming occasion.
CHAPTER CXXXVIII.
MR. TWISSEL’S MISFORTUNES, AND HIS RESOLUTION NEVER TO GIVE IN.
The next day after that on which the conversation respecting the choice
of a bridesmaid took place, was the day on which the colonel was to
visit the South Sea House.
Early that morning he ordered a coach to be in attendance, and left the
house, saying that he would be back in time for tea; that he had to
make several purchases, and transact some necessary business that would
occupy him until that time. He kissed Margaret, and whispered in her
ear that he should call and see about the jewels, and urge the jeweller
to get them ready.
“These people are so dilatory,” he said, “that, unless I worry them,
they will disappoint me of them; and I would not be without them on
the occasion of our marriage for a trifle.”
“We must not set our happiness upon such things,” said Margaret.
“Ah, what self-denial you can exert!” said the colonel, playfully.
“No; my happiness is not fixed upon such objects as those, and,
therefore, it is no trouble to renounce them when it is necessary to do
so.”
“I hope there will be no need. I believe there will be none; but good
bye till tea-time, and then we shall pass a pleasant evening together.”
The colonel left the house, and no sooner had he done so, than Mrs.
Meredith wrote a short note to Mr. Twissel, informing him of the
colonel’s departure at a much earlier hour than she had anticipated.
“Here, Mary,” she said to the drudge.
“Yes, ma’am,” replied the domestic.
“Just run as fast as you can to Mr. Twissel with this note, and don’t
let the grass grow under your feet. Do you hear?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Away went the drudge as fast as she could to the man of law, and
arrived there out of breath; and having gone there fast, according to
orders, she thought herself at liberty to take her own time in going
back, which she performed to perfection.
Mr. Twissel cursed himself for this unexpected departure; but there
was no time for deliberation. He crushed on his hat, took a coach, and
drove as hard as the mysteriously-kept-up cattle could carry it, and
was fortunate enough to see the colonel go by in another. He jumped
out, paid the jarvey, and then made a rush after the colonel, whom he
saw going up the steps.
Determined that he would not be outdone this time, he rushed through
a crowd of men who were near at hand, and jostled them so, that they
gave him more oaths than was consistent with courtesy, and one of them
desired to know if he were running after himself or anybody else.
Heedless of this, he pushed on, and trod upon a bricklayer’s foot so
hard, that the man gave a great shout, and, by way of retaliation,
brought his heavy hand down so hard upon the attorney’s hat, that the
article of wearing apparel was forced below his chin, much to the
detriment of his vision, which was totally eclipsed.
In an instant he was struggling with his hat, and yet was unable to
release himself from the durance in which his head was held; but he
found this was not all he had to contend with, for he felt himself
pushed and hustled about in a strange manner, till he was thrown on a
door step, and then he was suddenly left to himself, with no soul near
him.
“Upon my word, this must be done on purpose, I do verily believe,” said
Mr. Twissel, as he at length succeeded in wrenching his hat off his
head, after many violent efforts; but even then it was at the expense
of the lining and skin off his nose, which was a very disagreeable
affair, after all.
Mr. Twissel, for a moment or two, stared round him, and wondered where
he was, until, at length, upon some examination, he found himself round
the corner.
“Oh, I must have got hustled round the corner—yes, yes, I see how it
is; it’s a downright conspiracy of theirs—there can’t be two minds.”
But then, again, he thought what conspiracy could there be necessary to
marry a girl without money? If she had money, he could have understood
it, but not as the matter stood—that was quite impossible. It was an
impenetrable mystery.
As these thoughts passed through his mind, he was sitting on the step
of a door, and, seeing the blood trickle off his nose in vermilion
drops upon the pavement, he felt for his handkerchief to wipe the
injured feature, and stop the bleeding.
But, alas! it was not in this pocket, nor in that; it was not in his
hat—he never carried it there; if he had, his head would never have
reached the crown of his hat—that was quite certain; it would have been
better had he done so.
But, as it was not about him, where could it be? He knew that he had
had it before he left home on this errand; the truth, however, was not
long before it came across his mind like a flash of light. He had got
among a gang of London thieves, who had hustled and robbed him of his
handkerchief.
[Illustration: Mr. Twissel robbed by a gang of London thieves]
This was suggestive of other matters, and he, in consequence, put his
hand to his watch-fob, but also that was gone, too. He gasped—felt his
breeches pocket, and then he sank back, for he found his garments had
been slit open by some sharp instrument, and his purse had fled.
“D——n!” said the attorney, in a fury; but this subsided in a moment.
The loss he had felt, and the pushing about he had experienced, was too
much; he felt weakened and disheartened, and paused to think upon what
he should do, and which way he should go.
“It’s no use giving in,” he muttered; “no use at all. I must go on. And
yet, I had better go and see if the coach is gone, for if it is still
there—and it can’t have gone away yet—I’ll yet go in and see if I can
find him.”
He walked round the corner, much shaken with what he had received in
the way of knocks and kicks, but when he did get round, he saw the
coach was gone. There was, however, a ticket-porter at hand, and he
determined to go and ask him a few questions.
“My friend,” he said, feeling in his pocket; “do you know a Colonel
Deverill?”
“No,” said the man; “never heard of him—where does he live?”
“He came in here just now.”
“Ah, did he?” replied the man, kicking a piece of orange peel off the
pavement; “I don’t know him.”
“Do you recollect a hackney-coach coming up to the door just now, with
a lame gentleman, who got out?”
“Yes; with a green shade over his eye.”
“Yes—that was the man.”
“Oh, well, I never seed him afore—I don’t know him—he didn’t stop a
minute.”
“Oh!” said Mr. Twissel, and then he turned away, and walked towards his
own house. However, he felt in his pocket for some money; a small sum
in silver was loose in his pockets, and this he had saved, perhaps,
because it it had not been looked for; and he determined to treat
himself to some brandy-and-water, for he was really much knocked about,
and terrified and nervous, so he went into the first public-house he
came to.
This was a low house, the parlour of which was situated a long way
back, and he walked in and threw himself into a seat.
“Well, well; here I am. This is disaster the second. Well, who would
have believed I should have met with such misadventures as those I have
just gone through? There’s a fate in it. I am sure this is an unlucky
business altogether—of that I am certain. I got into the watchhouse on
the first occasion, but now I am worse than that; I have been knocked
about and robbed of money and goods—fifteen pounds in my purse—confound
Colonel Deverill, I say.”
“What will you take, sir?”
“Eh?” inquired the bewildered attorney, who forgot that he had entered
a public-house, and the waiter was desiring to know what he wished to
have.
“What will you like to take, sir?” inquired the waiter, again.
“A glass of brandy-and-water, and a biscuit.”
The man left the room, and Twissel retired within himself to
contemplate the evils he had suffered, and those he was likely to
endure.
“Well, I never thought I was in such a thing as this. Who would ever
have believed it? None, I am sure—no one could. Confound them! I’ll
give it up as a bad job, and a bad job it has been for me, I am quite
confident of that.”
“Brandy-and-water, and a biscuit,” said the waiter, laying down the
articles enumerated, and Twissel gave the necessary cash, accompanied
by the customary gratuity, which ranges from ten to twenty-five per
cent upon the money paid for the articles purchased.
We have often thought this a most exorbitant tax upon those who require
accommodation. If people cannot pay their own servants, they ought not
to keep them; to be sure, you are told you need not pay anything—it is
entirely voluntary, and that they do not wish it; but you only obtain
a flippant answer, so as to attract every one’s eyes in the place,
and the end of it is, if there is much business, you don’t get any
attention at all.
“Well, I won’t give in,” said Mr. Twissel, with a thump on the table;
but he had drank nearly two-thirds of the brandy-and-water.
“No, I won’t give in.”
He swallowed down the remainder, finished the biscuit, and leaned back
in his seat, and then he began to talk to himself.
“I will not give in; after all that has passed, it would be a shame to
be done, robbed, beaten, and kicked; and then give in—nonsense! I will
go through the whole affair, and that shall repay me in the end. I’ll
lay it on the thicker for this.”
This was a comfortable resolution on the part of Mr. Twissel, and which
appeared to please him well, for he smiled quietly, and then rose much
refreshed and left the house.
This last allusion of Twissel’s was consolatory, and had an intimate
connection with certain imaginary charges he would make to the Deverill
family when he got the business; but as that was a matter buried in the
womb of futurity, we will not follow him in his speculations.
“I won’t give in,” he said, as he walked on, and thrust his hand into
the slit that had been cut in his trousers to extract his purse; but
this only confirmed him in his resolution, and he uttered again and
again, “I won’t give in.”
“I won’t give in,” he murmured, as he sought the knocker of Mrs.
Meredith’s door. “I won’t give in—I’m not a man whose resolution is
easily shaken. Oh, dear, no; I’ll tell my good friend, Mrs. Meredith,
all my troubles, and then ask her what she thinks of me—if I ain’t an
indefatigable friend, one who will never sink under difficulties.”
CHAPTER CXXXIX.
MRS. MEREDITH HAS A CONVERSATION WITH MR. TWISSEL.—THE ANNOUNCEMENT,
AND THE INVITATION.
When the servant answered the knock, Mr. Twissel learned, to his severe
disappointment, that Mrs. Meredith was from home; and he was about to
turn from the door, after leaving his name, when the girl said that
her mistress had left a message, the purport of which was, that if he,
Mr. Twissel, was to call, she would feel obliged by his awaiting her
return, as her absence would be but short, and the subject upon which
she wished to see him was one of particular importance.
Mr. Twissel was shown into the parlour much about the same as usual;
but he himself was somewhat of a different state. He himself was
considerably disgusted with his share of the business; but, as we have
before stated, he was resolved never to give in; no, he was resolved to
carry it on to the end.
“It must come to a wind-up somehow or other, and at some time or other;
but, at the same time, as I have taken so much interest in that I am
resolved to see it out, I won’t lose all I have lost for nothing; it
shall be with me a neck or nothing affair; and, however aggravating it
may be, you will have a greater chance in the long run of coming off
victorious.”
Several minutes passed away, and still Mrs. Meredith came not. At
length the attorney began to grow somewhat impatient, and he looked
around the apartment, as if to find some object to pass away the time
until her arrival. On a table in the centre of the room lay several
books, and he opened one or two of them for the purpose of ascertaining
the nature of the contents. The title of one of them attracted his
attention; it consisted of a collection of tales of the supernatural,
and he opened it upon a legend called “The Dead Not Dead.” It possessed
considerable interest, and Twissel was soon lost in its details. It ran
as follows:—
The moon, with her train of glittering satellites following with silent
grandeur in her wake, is sailing, in lustrous glory, through the
heavens, and shedding such a flood of light over the face of nature,
that the mountains and trees look as if some mighty hand had tinted
them with silver.
Our scene is a rocky pass amidst the stupendous Apennines—one of the
wildest, and yet most beautiful of that romantic region.
At the foot of a tree, and on a spot on which the rays of the moon fall
with all their power, sits a young man, who is evidently watching over
what appears to be a dead body that lies prostrate at his feet. His
head is resting on his hand, and he is regarding the form before him
with mingled fear and determination.
Hark! he speaks! What are his words?
“For full an hour have the rays of yonder luminary poured their
radiance upon the ghastly features of my dead master, and yet there
is no effect visible. Surely he must have been labouring under some
fearful delusion of mind, and the dreadful compact of which he has
spoken had existence but in his imagination. I certainly had some
little faith in the existence of those scourges to mankind—vampyres,
but now, I am inclined to think, my faith will be terribly shaken. In
God’s name, I hope it may.”
The moon rose higher and higher, until, as she reached her zenith,
everything was so bathed in her gentle light, that scarcely a shadow
was thrown around, save by the tall pines that were scattered here and
there upon the face of the rocks.
Suddenly there was a movement in the form of the dead man—a spasmodic
jerk of the whole muscles of the frame, as if a galvanic battery had
been applied to it; and then the eyes slowly opened, though at first
there was but little or no expression in them.
The young man started to his feet with an exclamation of horror, and
stood glaring upon the form with fixed and protruding eyes, his limbs
trembling, and every feature distorted with mental agony.
“Holy mother of God!” he murmured, in a low tone, “he moves! he moves!
The terrible compact is too true.”
At this moment, though there was not the slightest appearance of a
cloud in the whole heavens, mutterings of thunder were heard, and the
lightning was seen playing around the tree-tops with a pale and sickly
glare. The young man, so intensely was his attention fixed upon the
corpse at the foot of the tree, did not notice this phenomena; and he
was at length horrified at beholding a ball of blue fire dart from the
air, and glide into the ground immediately at the head of him whom he
had named as his master. Then there was a loud explosion, and a glare
of light so broad and strong that the watcher of the dead was obliged
to veil his eyes with his hands, and he could scarcely tell for some
moments whether he were deprived of his sight or not.
When he opened his eyes again, it was with a start of surprise, for,
before him, with his arms folded on his breast, and regarding him
with a calm and untroubled countenance, stood his master; while the
moonlight streamed out upon the landscape, and as great a silence as
when he lay in death upon the ground reigned around.
“Oh, signor,” he at length stammered, in broken tones—“my vigil has
been one of the most terrible——”
“Silence, Spalatro,” said the resuscitated one, in a deep and hollow
voice—“silence. Not a word, now or henceforth, must pass your lips
respecting what you have seen to night. Breathe but a syllable of what
I am to a human being, and naught on earth shall hide you from my
vengeance.”
Spalatro bowed before his master in obedience, while his frame gave a
shudder of horror, as he regarded the deathly appearance that still
lingered in the signor’s features.
“Spalatro,” resumed the signor, after a slight pause, “you have
rendered me great and faithful service, and your reward has been
proportionate; but there is yet another service which I would seek at
your hands. The Lady Oriana, for the possession of whom the Signor
Fracati and I have fought, and for whose sake I received the wound
which deprived me for a time of life, is at Florence, and at present
ignorant of the mishap that befell me. The Signor Fracati and yourself
are the only persons who are aware of it. He will carry to Florence the
news of my death; and, on my re-appearance before the Lady Oriana, what
tale can I invent to satisfy her? No, no—he must not reach Florence—he
must never look upon the Lady Oriana again. You, Spalatro, wear a
poniard, you have a powerful hand—and you know well where to strike.
Rid me of this hated rival, and wealth shall be yours.”
Spalatro stood rooted to the spot while the signor spoke, and an
expression of mingled horror and disgust crossed his countenance as the
latter proceeded. When the signor had concluded, he stepped a pace or
two back, and in a tone full of indignation, said,—
“Signor Waldeberg, I am no assassin; my poniard is yet guiltless of
shedding human blood. I saw you receive what was thought to be a mortal
wound in honourable combat with the Signor Fracati, and in these arms I
beheld you sink in death. You had extorted from me a promise that after
a certain lapse of time I would convey your body to this vast solitude,
and lay it where the moonbeams should fall upon it; for that then life
should once more revisit you. All this I have done, and faithfully; I
feared to fail in my promise, for I knew the penalty you would pay if
you failed to fulfil the conditions of your compact. But, signor, I
am now no longer bound to you; you have commenced a fresh existence,
which you would baptise with blood; you have passed the portals of
death, and I will no longer serve you. I will seek another service and
another master, who will require less at my hands, though his pay may
be lighter. Farewell, signor, and better thoughts to you.
Spalatro turned upon his heel as he spoke, and with a hasty wave of his
hand was leaving the spot, when the signor drew a pistol from a belt
that was fastened round his waist, and, exclaiming, “He knows too much
respecting me to be suffered to live,” fired it full at the head of the
young man. The latter uttered a yell of agony which echoed loudly amid
the awful silence, and fell lifeless on the earth. When the smoke from
the pistol had cleared away, that lonely spot was deserted save by the
body of Spalatro, whose blood, streaming upon the ground, reflected the
moonbeams with a dull red glare.
[Illustration: Signor Waldeberg shoots Spalatro in the head.]
• • • • •
When the morning sun broke over the mountain tops, its rays fell upon
the form of the still insensible Spalatro. It was but seldom that any
footsteps, save those of the wolf or the goat, left their impress
on those rocks, and it was almost a miracle that the body of the
unfortunate man was not left a prey to the former.
About an hour after daybreak, the bells of a string of mules were heard
in the distance, accompanied by the cheerful song of the muleteer.
A short time sufficed to bring the cavalcade to the spot, where lay
the body of Spalatro, and the muleteer, with a cry of alarm, brought
his train to a stop. Finding that life still remained, the humane
mountaineer raised him from the ground, placed him across one of the
mules, and then hastened forward to the next inn, which, however, was
at some miles distance.
On arriving there, he found that the only apartment was occupied by
a signor and his daughter, who, however, when the condition of the
wounded man was made known to them, instantly relinquished it to him,
and, after seeing his wounds looked to, ascertained that no mortal
result was to be feared, and giving orders that he should want for no
attention that money could procure, they pursued their journey.
It was many weeks before Spalatro recovered, and when he did regain
his strength, he learned, with a feeling of deep gratitude, that the
lady who had been so instrumental in his recovery was no other than the
Signora Oriana. In an instant a vow was upon his lips that he would
save her from the power of the fearful monster, whose only mission
now on earth, seemed but to destroy the most beautiful of nature’s
creation. With this purpose fixed in his mind, he one morning bid adieu
to the residents of the little inn, and set off on his self-imposed
errand.
• • • • •
Some days after the scene we have described as occurring on that lonely
mountain pass, a report reached Florence, where the Signora Oriana
was then staying with her father, that the Signor Fracati had met his
death at the hands of a bravo, and that his body had been discovered
stabbed in innumerable places. The grief of Oriana was intense, for she
held the signor in great estimation, and she would have had but little
hesitation in bestowing upon him her hand, if her father’s consent
could but have been gained to the union. Signor Vivaldi, however,
had been captivated by the great wealth, personal appearance, and
captivating manners of the Signor Waldeberg, and he had fixed his mind
upon him becoming the husband of his daughter.
Weeks passed away, and the memory of the murdered Fracati was gradually
fading from the mind of Oriana. The respectful yet warm attentions of
Waldeberg won upon a young and innocent heart that had always felt a
slight esteem for him, and as she knew that her father’s happiness in a
great measure depended upon her consent to the union, it was at length
given with a freedom that brought joy to the old man’s heart.
It was arranged that the ceremony should take place at a chateau
belonging to Waldeberg, in the neighbourhood of Lucca, whither it was
resolved at once to proceed; and for this purpose Signor Vivaldi and
his daughter, accompanied by Waldeberg, left Florence for that city.
As they were passing through the gates, a monk, with his cowl
drawing carefully over his face, stepped hastily up to the carriage
window, and, thrusting a letter into the hands of Oriana, as hastily
disappeared.
[Illustration: A cowled monk thrusts a letter into the hands of Oriana
in the carriage.]
With some surprise, she opened it and read it, and then a paleness
overspread her countenance, and she sank back in her seat almost
insensible. Her father snatched the paper from her trembling hand, and
hastily glancing over its contents, with a look of anger, handed it to
the Signor Waldeberg.
“See, signor, what some meddling fool, envious of your happiness,
has done to alarm my daughter’s fears. Does he deem us so grossly
superstitious as to believe in such children’s tales?”
The signor took the paper, which he found to run thus:—
“+Signora+,—A grateful heart warns you. Wed not the murderer of
Fracati—wed not him who, once returned from death to life, seeks but
your hand to provide a victim for the purpose of prolonging a hateful
existence. If you despise this warning, at any rate, postpone the
ceremony but for seven days from hence, and then his power of injuring
you will have departed from him.”
“Do you know the writer, signor?” asked Vivaldi.
“It is evidently the handwriting of a servant of mine, whom I dismissed
for insolence some few weeks since,” returned Waldeberg, a shade of
vexation evidently passing across his brow; “and he now takes this
means of endeavouring to obtain his revenge. But I will take means of
having him punished.”
They now endeavoured to soothe the agitation of Oriana, but the
incident seemed to have taken a firm hold upon her imagination, and, in
spite of all their efforts, she found it impossible to shake off the
effect it had upon her.
The chateau, the place of their destination, was at length reached;
preparations were instantly commenced for the celebration of the
marriage, which was to take place, by the Signor Waldeberg’s express
desire, on the sixth day from that on which they had left Florence.
As the day drew near, the spirits of Oriana grew gradually depressed,
and a slight feeling of dread seemed to steal over her, whenever she
found herself in the presence of her lover. Her father questioned her
as to its cause, and then she confessed that the mysterious warning she
had received preyed deeply on her mind. It might be a superstitious
weakness, but she could not repress it; and she requested her father,
however reluctant he might be, to consent to put it off for at least
another day.
The entreaties of his daughter, though he laughed at her fears,
prevailed upon the old man, and he gave his consent to her request;
but when he mentioned the alteration in the time to Waldeberg, the
countenance of the latter underwent a complete change to the hue of
death. No prayer, however, could prevail upon the old man to recall his
consent to his daughter’s wish, and the signor departed evidently in a
state of the greatest despair.
That night the Signora Oriana was missing from her chamber, and though
the strictest search was made for her, not the least trace of her
presence could be found. The grief of the father and the lover knew no
bounds, and there seemed to be no hope of consolation for them.
• • • • •
It is the night of the sixth day—that day against which Oriana had been
so mysteriously warned. In a large vault, far beneath the chateau,
and lighted by innumerable torches, that threw a red and smoky glare
around, stood the beautiful Oriana and the Signor Waldeberg. The former
was pale as marble, and an expression of the most intense despair was
upon her countenance.
The signor, resolved that she should become his wife before the
expiration of the six days, had torn her from her chamber, and immured
her in that fearful place, with the hope of forcing her to become his
bride; but Oriana revolted at such usage, and feeling more convinced
than ever that the warning she had received had its foundation in
truth, had resisted alike his persuasions and his threats.
The hour of midnight was fast approaching, and before an altar that
stood at one end of the vault, was an old and venerable priest,
with an open book in his hand. Waldeberg drew Oriana towards him,
and forced her to kneel at the foot of the altar. She entreated—she
supplicated—she appealed to the priest; his only answer was a solemn
shake of the head, and then he proceeded to read the marriage ceremony.
Waldeberg took her hand—but she suddenly flung it from her, and uttered
the most piercing screams that echoed fearfully amidst those cavernous
places. Still the priest read on, and despite her emotion and her agony
of terror, Waldeberg regarded her with a cold and determined gaze.
“Faster! faster!” he muttered to the priest, “or all will be lost!” and
he glanced anxiously around the vault.
At the moment, striking fearfully on the silence, came the sound of
the turret clock telling the hour of midnight. On the first stroke,
the most fearful sounds the human ear ever listened to filled the
place—strange indefinite shadows flitted around, filling the air with
a rushing sound, as if of mighty wings—the altar changed to a heap
of human bones—the priest to a ghastly skeleton. Then came darkness,
terrible and distinct; and Oriana swooned upon the damp floor.
When she recovered, she found the day had broken, and the sunlight was
streaming upon her face; while her father and the young man whom she
had seen wounded at the inn on the mountains were stooping over her in
alarm.
The inhabitants of the chateau had been alarmed in the dead of the
night by a terrific storm, which had thrown into ruins a part of the
castle, and a vast chasm had been made in the foundations, disclosing
the vaults, the existence of which had been until then unknown.
Beneath the rich vestments of Waldeberg, and lying in a heap on the
ground, were the remains of a human skeleton—all that was now left of
the guilty being who had thus paid the penalty for failing in complying
with the conditions of the fearful compact into which he had entered
with the unholy powers of darkness.
It was many months before the mind of Oriana recovered its strength,
and when it did, she entered a convent of Ursuline nuns, and
endeavoured to forget, in the consolations of religion, the fearful
trial she had undergone.
• • • • •
Twissel laid down the book which he had been reading, and fell into a
strange kind of musing, in which the vampyre, Waldeberg, and the East
India colonel were strangely mixed up together. From this reverie he
was awakened by a rap at the street-door, and then, in a few minutes
afterwards, Mrs. Meredith entered the room, exclaiming,—
“Well, Mr. Twissel, you always come in luck’s way.”
“Indeed!” said Mr. Twissel, involuntarily thinking of what he had that
morning undergone, as well as what he went through a day or two before;
and, for the life of him, he saw not what might be called luck, unless
it was that species known as ill-luck.
“Yes, Mr. Twissel, you are; you’ve just come in time to hear the news.”
“What news, ma’am—what news? If you’ll be pleased to enlighten me upon
that subject, I shall be better able to understand what you allude to.”
“Why, you see, the colonel has been so pressing, that my daughter has
been induced to name the day. Yes, Mr. Twissel, she has named the
day—not a distant day either. He begged and entreated you don’t know
how hard, which, at least, shows how much he meant it.”
“Well, truly, it is news, Mrs. Meredith,” said the attorney; “but, at
the same time, it is what I expected, though not just at this juncture.
The fact is, there is but little can be said against Colonel Deverill;
but, at the same time, there will be but little said for him. I am by
no means sure that there will be any property found. If he were a man
of money, he would not hesitate to lay his circumstances open.”
“He is too proud a man for that.”
“Well, it may be all very well to attribute it to that cause. However
that may be, there can be no doubt you have a right to do as you
please, and I bow to your decision; but, still, I do so, having
expressed my opinion to the contrary, being very suspicious of him.
But, as I said before, you are entitled to do what you please in the
affair; I have no right to do more.”
“My daughter and I have been considering the matter over and over
again, and we have come to the conclusion that it should take place,
and she has consented that it should take place in about ten days’
time, when we shall expect to have your company, Mr. Twissel.”
“I am obliged to you, and assure you my opinions upon this matter are
not at all personal. I will meet the colonel, and I will be present
with you all on that happy occasion with much pleasure; and I hope it
will be a fortunate and happy marriage.”
“I hope so, too,” said Mrs. Meredith; “and I have every reason to
believe so.”
“That is good,” said the attorney.
“And now, Mr. Twissel,” said Mrs. Meredith, “what did you do this
morning at the South Sea House? I could not send to you so early as I
could have wished, as I did not know he was going till the coach was
ordered, and he went away almost immediately. I then sent Mary to you;
I don’t know at what time she came to you, but at all events she was
not back here until late.”
“She must have got to my place in good time, if she only started after
the colonel had left this house,” said the attorney.
“I am very glad of that, at all events; but what success did you have?”
“Success, indeed,” said Mr. Twissel, with a shrug of mortification. “I
have only succeeded in getting myself into a very serious difficulty,
and the colonel has eluded me again. I can’t understand it all. I don’t
know what to think; but I am sure of this, that I have been in a series
of disasters ever since I undertook to follow him about, and I have
discovered nothing concerning him.”
“What has happened to you to-day, then?” inquired Mrs. Meredith.
“Oh! as for that, what seems to be but natural in itself; and,
therefore, it may be said not to be connected with him; indeed, though
that were really the case, yet there is so much concurrent action, I
cannot divest myself of the idea that it is a fatal affair, as far as
regards looking after him.”
“Then don’t do so any more, Mr. Twissel.”
“I’ll never give in,” said Twissel.
“Well, but what need you trouble yourself more about the affair? I
assure you we’re all well satisfied that Colonel Deverill is Colonel
Deverill, and that he has property; that being the case, I am sure you
have nothing to trouble yourself about, or to blame yourself for.”
“I am conscious of that,” said the attorney, rubbing his knee. “I have
done all I can; and I have given my advice—I hope I have done my part.”
“Yes, you have,” said Mrs. Meredith. “I am quite satisfied; but what
has happened to you?”
“I will tell you, my dear madam—I will tell you. I have been assaulted,
knocked about, robbed, and my faculties all confused, and no use to
me. I have lost my handkerchief, watch, and purse; and I have had
my trowsers ripped open; and I can’t tell what besides. I am safe,
however.”
“Well, that is right, at all events; but it is most annoying to me that
you should be subject to those terrible accidents. I can’t understand
the meaning of it.”
“I can’t,” said the attorney.
“But why should you, more than any one else, be subject to these
misfortunes? I can’t understand it at all, Mr. Twissel. Perhaps you do
something or other unusual on such occasions, which had been the cause
of such terrible trouble.”
“Not that I am aware of,” said Twissel; “but the fact is, I don’t
know of anything peculiar in my appearance or behaviour, that should
cause this disaster. But I am sure of this, that there is nothing more
singular about me, than what there usually is; and why it should only
attract notice on these occasions and no other, I cannot tell.”
“Nor I. Well, I suppose it must have been there was some other
circumstance, independent alike of him and you, that has caused this
disagreeable affair.”
“Perhaps there might be.”
“Well, now, Mr. Twissel, there’s another affair I wish to speak to you
about; or, rather, it’s a thing my daughter Margaret should speak to
your daughter Elizabeth and Miss Martha about. You see, as they are not
very often together, I thought it right to speak to you first.”
“Yes, ma’am—go on, pray.”
“Well, my Margaret is to be married in a few days, Now, we don’t want
relatives at all; and I was advising her to beg your permission to have
the two young ladies whom I have named, as bridesmaids, and who will be
of essential service to my daughter.”
“I have no doubt but they will feel very much gratified with the
proposal; and one could not have been better devised than this one to
please them.”
“Then, will you invite them to come here, and spend the evening with
Margaret and yourself, Mr. Twissel, the first evening you find leisure
and inclination?”
“Well, I have destroyed to-day, so far as a business day, by drinking
brandy-and-water early, and I may as well finish it in an agreeable
manner.”
“That is very good; we shall expect you to tea this evening.”
“You may,” said Mr. Twissel; “if you are not otherwise engaged. I
may as well do all that is necessary, so as to have as little to do,
by-and-bye, as possible. Has the colonel come home?”
“No, not yet; I did not expect him to come home so soon as this, but he
will be back in a very short time, now, I dare say.”
“Then I will bid you good bye, for it will be unnecessary to meet him
in this plight; indeed, he might think I paid him no respect to do so;
and besides it will be better, altogether, that he should not see me
so soon, lest he should have caught sight of me in the city; which,
indeed, I think wholly impossible, for I only had a distant glimpse of
him.”
“Then, good bye, sir; I shall see you and the young ladies.”
“Both—my daughter, and her young friend, Martha.”
Mr. Twissel arose, and left the house to return to his own house, and
get his daughter prepared for the visit, and her friend also, while
Mrs. Meredith and her daughter, Margaret, consulted together, as to
what would be the best method of doing honour to the occasion of the
forthcoming marriage.
“You see, my dear,” said Mrs. Meredith, “we cannot very well invite
our own friends, because they are such a greedy, rapacious set; they
would sooner spoil a good chance for us than let us have it unmolested;
they are by far too greedy—no, no, they must not come—they will think
themselves injured if they cannot share the harvest.”
“And all will be lost.”
“To be sure; and, moreover, we could not shake them off when we wanted,
and which we must do very soon, for the colonel will never abide them.”
“No, ma’ I think not, indeed—they are decidedly low people, who are
genteel only of a Sunday; it will never do to have such people about
us.”
“Oh, dear, no.”
“Here is the colonel come back; see if that girl has got the water
hot, he will like his tea early; I am quite sure she hasn’t got it
ready—what a provoking girl that is, to be sure. She does nothing all
day; I must get rid of her.”
“Yes; but she is very ugly.”
“That is one great recommendation in her favour,” said Mrs. Meredith;
“one very great recommendation; it ensures domestic peace, to say the
least of it, and there’s not so many followers usually. Now, however,
we must do the best until we have more; but here he is.”
At that moment the colonel entered the house, and proceeded at once to
the drawing-room, having first divested himself of his hat and cloak in
the passage. Up stairs was a good fire and an easy chair, with ottomans
for his feet, and a comfortable well furnished apartment it was.
Mrs. Meredith followed him up and entered the room after him, to
inquire what he would like done next; and with her assistance, he took
his boots off and put on a pair of splendid slippers, and reposed with
a groan of satisfaction on the chair.
“I think, Mrs. Meredith,” he said, “that the best thing I can have will
be some tea. Where is Margaret? when she is at liberty, I wish to see
and speak to her.”
“She will be here in a few moments, colonel,” said Mrs. Meredith; “I
will send her to you.”
“No hurry for a few moments,” said the colonel.
“Something about the jewels, I’ll be sworn,” said Mrs. Meredith, to
herself; “I wonder what he has in that parcel; a present, I dare say.”
Mrs. Meredith sought Margaret, and related what the colonel said, with
his desire to see her, and that young lady at once proceeded to the
drawing-room.
“Oh, my dear Margaret,” said Colonel Deverill, “I see you are pleased
to see I have returned; your very eyes tell me so. Come here to me,
dearest.”
“Ah, my looks, I am afraid, say too much.”
“Not at all—not at all,” said the colonel; “I love to see them,
especially when I know they are sincere, when they come from the heart,
you know; I love to see innocent and heartfelt satisfaction beaming
from such a face as yours.”
“Oh, colonel, you are really too complimentary; not that I think you
don’t mean what you say, but your partiality is too great to allow you
to judge as a stranger would.”
“I do not desire to judge as a stranger would; it does not give me any
satisfaction. To look upon you with the eyes of a lover, is a privilege
I most desire, and very soon with those of a husband; then my happiness
will be complete. How I long for the days and the hours to fly by—they
cannot go too fast now; by and bye they may pass as slowly as you
please—that done, then I am quite content, because I shall pass them
happily, rapturously.”
“Ah, you are so kind-hearted, so good, that I can never repay you.”
“Do not seek to do so, you will only make me the heavier in debt; but
come, there is a small parcel, with a few trinkets I have purchased;
the jewels I spoke of are in hand, and they will be ready in time for
our marriage.”
“Nay, do not think about them—not to disturb yourself, colonel; I am
quite content if I am dressed as befits the occasion; but I am really
obliged to you for your present, whatever it may be; and I may as well
tell you I have thought—indeed, I have said as much—I should like to
have a couple of female friends to visit me on that occasion.”
“Yes, my dear, you may depend upon it. I shall be the more happy when I
know you are so too; but no matter, ask whom you please; as far as I am
able, I will make them welcome and happy. I suppose, however, you are
alluding to your bridesmaids.”
“I am,” said Margaret.
“I shall be most happy to see them, or any friend you may desire,”
added the colonel.
“And will you have no one on the occasion?” inquired Margaret; “won’t
you have somebody to keep you in countenance upon the occasion?”
“No,” said the colonel, “I shall not; I have no friends with whom I
am intimate enough, that I know of, at this present moment; there may
be people in London, with whom I have been, in India, intimate with,
but I do not know for certain; but time and accident will turn up old
friends, and I have not the desire to seek for them; but if we must
have some one, I do not know whether Mr. Twissel would not do quite as
well, if he would come, and your mother had no objection.”
“I am sure she would not. Mr. Twissel was an old friend of my father’s,
and, consequently, he would be no stranger at all to the family;
besides, it is his daughter, and her friend, Martha, that I have
invited upon this occasion; have I done wrong?”
“Not at all, it could not have happened better; I am sure they must be
very worthy people, and any one whom you please, or they know, that
you feel disposed to invite, do so, with the confidence that whatever
pleases you on the occasion, will please me.”
At that moment there was an alarming rapping at the door, which caused
them to pause a few moments; then they continued their conversation
until the servant announced to Miss Meredith, that Miss Twissel, her
papa, and her friend, Martha, were come.
CHAPTER CXL.
A PLEASANT EVENING.—THE BRIDESMAIDS.
“I know how that is,” said Margaret, before she left the drawing-room;
“that was through my ma’. I dare say she has invited them to take tea
with her to-night. I should not at all wonder about that. I have not
seen them for some time. They keep a great deal at home, and visit but
little. They are playful, homely girls, but good-hearted, and that is
why I prefer them to more fashionable friends, whose goodness of heart
I cannot rely upon. They are insincere.”
“You are very right; but you will, I hope, let me see your friends, and
unless you have family matters to speak of, perhaps you will take tea
up here with me. I shall be all alone if you do not; so, you see, I am
speaking from selfish motives; but do not think I shall be at all hurt
if you do not see fit to accept the invitation for them.”
“I will accept it for them cheerfully, and shall be much surprised if
they do not do so too,” said Margaret, as she walked towards the door,
and then left the apartment, to proceed first to her own room, and
there to examine her present, before she sought the visitors to give
them their invitation.
The parcel contained some handsome laces and other matters, beautiful
and expensive, such things as she could wear, and excite the envy
of others; which was, of all things, and usually is of women in
general, the most enchanting thing in all the world, and gives intense
gratification.
After admiring for a moment or two the beauties of the laces, she could
not help involuntarily exclaiming,—
“This will be beautiful, so very becoming, and so much above anything
else that can be brought by my bridesmaids. I shall be a queen amongst
them; indeed, they will but set me off to the utmost advantage. I shall
be the glory of the occasion.”
Having secured her new acquisition from inquisitive eyes, by locking
it up in her drawers, she returned down stairs, and then entered the
parlour, where, truly enough, as she had imagined, there was Mr.
Twissel, Miss Twissel, and Miss Martha, all of whom were dressed out
for the occasion.
There was some truth in what Margaret had said to her mother, that the
two intended bridesmaids were not likely to induce any one to fall in
love with them. They were oddities of the first water. Miss Twissel
had light brown hair, bushy eyebrows, a straight masculine nose, a
mouth that turned up on one side, and one of her eyes had a gentle
inclination to gaze at her nose, while her complexion was increased by
a vast quantity of sun freckles.
Then, as for Miss Martha, she was another beauty of a similar class;
hooked nose, with one eye paying undue attention to the auricular
organ, while the other was somewhat injured by a blank appearance; her
hair was red, and she was pitted by the small-pox to a fearful extent.
Such were the two friends whom Miss Meredith had chosen for
bridesmaids, with the laudable view of putting no temptation in the
way of the colonel, which Mrs. Meredith, her mother, most strenuously
advised, as she had experience of the men.
“My dear Miss Twissel, and you, Martha!”
“Ah! Margaret, God bless me, who could have imagined, above all things,
what I have come about. What can you be thinking and doing? here you’ve
no friends to help you. I see you have done it all yourself. What can
you think of people? you have no mercy.”
“Aye,” said Martha, “there’s no doing anything while you are about. No
one else has a chance, but you must tell us all about it.”
“Yes, yes, I will tell you all about it; and more than that, you shall
see the colonel if you please.”
“That is what we should like, above all things.”
“Oh! it is a colonel, then—a rich Indian colonel. Upon my word, you
will have to be presented at court next.”
“He! he! you are joking me now. Well, never mind, I shall joke you some
of these days. You may depend upon that; my turn will come next, and
then I won’t forget you. But seriously, there are more unlikely things
may come to pass than that.”
“Well, now; I dare say. Who would have thought of that, now? But then
you are so lucky, you see; only think what might have been the case if
the colonel had been a young man! why he might become as great a man as
the Marquis of Granby. Why, you’d have been a marchioness then. Well,
bless my heart, how things do come about!”
“Well, you had better come up to the drawing-room,” said Margaret, “and
see the colonel, who is waiting tea for us all. Come, ma’.”
“Yes, my dear, I am ready. Mr. Twissel, will you come?”
“If you please,” said Mr. Twissel, “if you please. We shall now soon
have the pleasure of seeing an end to this affair; for, as it is to
come off, why, when it is over, it will be all the better. Expectation
is always a time of uncertainty and anxiety—at least, to most people.”
“So it is, Mr. Twissel, so it is; and I am not without my share of it;
for, in the first place, human life is short, and circumstances may
alter cases; so I am anxious to see it over, and offer no impediment in
the way of the completion of the marriage.”
“Certainly, you are quite right; having made up your mind to permit the
marriage to take place, why, the sooner the better.”
They were all now introduced to the colonel, who was very polite and
courtly, which in some degree embarrassed the young ladies, who were
compelled to put on, as they expressed it, their best behaviour, and
so did not become quite so familiar. However, that did not spoil the
harmony of the meeting, for the young ladies considered there was
more respect paid to them, and the less they were able to appreciate
the politeness with which they were treated, the more they believed
themselves honoured.
They were well enough pleased, and the conversation turned upon various
matters, while Mr. Twissel was uncommonly attentive to the colonel;
indeed, he watched him most narrowly, every turn and every expression,
as if he were resolved to ascertain, by constant surveillance, whether
there was any foundation for his half-inspired doubts respecting him;
and also as to whether it were possible that he could have had any hand
in the disasters which he had on two several occasions suffered.
But yet he could see nothing—nothing at all that gave him the slightest
pretext for persisting in his suspicion. He appeared the same easy,
careless individual, who would not trouble himself to consider whether
he was watched or not, or whether his actions were the subject of other
people’s thoughts, or whether they were unnoticed, it mattered nothing
to him.
“It is singular,” he muttered to himself, “very singular, how it could
all happen by accident, and only at moments when I was watching him. I
can’t tell; and yet the occurrences were of that character, to another
they would seem wholly unconnected, and I am unable to connect them,
save by fancy; but he looks not a very old man, but rather like one
who has the full use of his faculties. He is singularly pale, to be
sure, and yet, at times, he does not appear so old, nor does his arm
and leg seem quite so bad at others; perhaps it varies, according to
circumstance, weather, the moon, or unforeseen changes.”
He remained cogitating very quietly by himself; he was thoughtful, and
could by no means divest himself of the idea that there was something
more than common about the colonel.
“He don’t seem so blind with that eye as he might be,” he muttered;
“but there is no use calculating about an Indian; they have got such
luxurious habits and fancies, that if he fancies one of his eyes is in
any degree weak, he will wear a shade for its preservation. Well, he
is entitled to do so, but he ain’t so old as they imagine. And that
will be no detriment to him or to them; so much the better, unless
they reckon upon the colonel’s death, which would hardly be an object
to them, seeing that it could bring them no more; indeed, it would
diminish their income. But he is a tall man now, and, if he did not
stoop so much, would yet be a fine man.”
These thoughts passed through his mind, time after time, during the
whole evening; while the colonel himself was at times conversing in the
most refined and courtly language, and doing much towards amusing them
with anecdotes of the places he had seen, and the battles he had fought.
“You would be surprised,” he said, “to hear that, in India, there are
places so cold that they more resemble the Polar regions than central
Asia, of which we only used to think of as being one of the hottest
regions in the world, filled with wild animals and numerous serpents.”
“Certainly, we hear more of that than anything else—the yellow fever,
the cholera, and all these kinds of things, caused by exposure to the
heat.”
“So they are; but it is only in the plains, and not on the high table
lands and mountains, where you gradually meet with more temperate
climates, many of which equal northern Europe for salubrity; and,
further up, you come to frozen regions.”
“Indeed! that is a phenomenon.”
“Oh, dear, no; the altitude of the plain, and the exposure, make the
sole difference. I remember once, I was sent with some other regiments
to chastise some of the hill tribes.”
“Under whom was that?” inquired the attorney.
“General Walker,” returned the colonel; “he was a very able general,
and we performed some extraordinary marches under him, as well as some
service.”
“Oh, indeed!” said the attorney; “what might have taken place?”
“I will tell you an incident that did take place; and not relate more
scenes of carnage that we passed through in the execution of our duty
than shall be actually necessary. We had, on one occasion, to storm a
city; on another, a fortified town; it was strong, and well protected
by nature and art.
Well, we arrived there, and the gates were closed against us; guns were
brought to bear, and men appeared on the walls. We expected, of course,
a sharp time of it, and being only the advance guard, we halted for the
main body to come up with us; and, after having summoned the garrison
to surrender, we put posts and watchers for the night, not expecting
to do anything upon that occasion; nor did we expect the main body up
with us till the middle of the next day, they having sent word on to
me that they would not be up in consequence of some accident to some
part of the train, which would have to be repaired; but a portion of
the troops would advance a stage nearer to me, in case of an accident,
upon which I could retire for support, or send to them to come up as
the exigencies of the moment should most require; but they did not
anticipate any movement at all. Nor did we; the fact was, we had made a
forced march of it; and had got over more ground than we had expected,
and our main body did not think we should have been so near the scene
of action as we were.
However, a counsel of war was held amongst the officers; and it was
resolved that we should attempt nothing without the assistance of our
comrades, as the place was very strong, as I have before told you.
Well, sir, half the night was over, and we lay fast asleep, having had
a hard—very hard day’s work of it,—so hard that we could sleep sound
on the bare earth; we were all suddenly awakened by a loud explosion,
which shook the very earth under us; and, upon starting up, and rushing
out of our tents, we saw the earth and air illumined by the explosion
of, as we afterwards learned, and guessed at the moment, one of the
enemy’s powder magazines.
In another minute we found there were plenty of falling missiles, with
the debris of the magazine, and the mangled corpses of the men who were
near it.
There was an instant order to muster the men; everybody knew what was
meant. They were all ready in a few moments—indeed, we slept by our
arms—fully accoutred, so it did not take long to be ready for action.
We were ordered to form in divisions and bodies, and as there was ample
breach made by the explosion there, I was ordered to mount the breach,
and enter the town for the purpose of assault.
We did this. We marched down upon the breach after some difficulties,
and were fairly in it; but had our commanding officer known any of the
difficulties; he would not have incurred the responsibility of ordering
us to advance, for the ruins we had to scramble over were dreadful,
and, had there been light, we could every one have been picked off by
the enemy.
Darkness was our friend, and we got into the town with a comparatively
trifling loss, and when our men got together they began to tell a tale,
for their volleys were well directed upon the enemy, who were drawn up
in masses, and whose fire directed ours. We were not completely exposed
to their fire, for the same objects that exposed our men, as they were
surmounted before reaching the enemy, protected them from immense
volleys of musketry.
However, we carried the point, and at that moment another explosion
took place in some other part of the town, which illumined all around
for a moment or two, and then came masses of bricks, and stones, and
timber, killing friend and foe. For a while we were staggered; we
did not know what to think of this affair. We knew not whether we
had an enemy to fight, or even where he was. We were completely at a
standstill.
But this did not last long. The defenders fled, and left us masters of
the field. We remained under arms all that night, till daylight.
“Glad were we, indeed, when daylight came; we were fatigued, so much
so that our men could scarcely stand in the ranks. Then parties were
sent out to look after the wounded, who had been left in all imaginable
situations. It was at such a moment that I was discovered; my leg was
shattered by a musket bullet.”
“And you lay bleeding all night?”
“Yes. Not exactly bleeding, for I had sense left me to bind a ligature
over the wound to stop the effusion of blood, which would have killed
me in a very short time. However, there was no necessity to lose my
leg, but it has made me permanently lame.”
“I see you are so, sir,” said Twissel; “but do you never feel it worse
at some times than at others?”
“Yes, I do. There are times when I do not know that I have received a
hurt at all; but sometimes I suffer a little, and am a little more lame
in consequence.”
“It was fortunate,” said Twissel, “it was your leg, for it might have
been your head, you know, and that would have been a death-blow to your
fortune.”
“Yes,” said the colonel, mildly; “I might have been killed, as you
observe; but at the same time I should have done my duty, which in
these cases is all we looked to. I might have saved a better man, who
had a wife and family—I had none.”
Conversation now ran on the forthcoming event, and Mr. Twissel was
invited by the colonel, and the whole party were well satisfied with
each other, and parted very good friends, with the promise of meeting
again before the propitious morning which was to unite the fates of
Margaret Meredith and Colonel Deverill.
CHAPTER CXLI.
A NEW CHARACTER.—MISS TWISSEL’S VISITOR.—THE INVITATIONS.
Nothing could exceed the smoothness and easiness of the course of
things in the wooing of Margaret Meredith; all things appeared so well
ordered. People were all of one mind; and it is needless to say that
the young lady was elated. She was elated, and we might not be out of
the way in saying she was elated overmuch, and knew not how to keep the
exhibition of her joy within proper bounds; she could not help showing
she was to be the lady of a colonel.
Mrs. Meredith, too, was well pleased. What could she do but feel proud
at the change that was about to take place? She would go to watering
places in the summer, and remain in town during the winter; they would
lead a very fashionable life—they would be of the elite, and all their
acquaintances they would be compelled to cut, or, at the most, only
speak to them when they were unseen by any others.
It is astonishing how a change of circumstances produces a change in
our habits and feelings; how it happens that those who were considered
respectable acquaintances suddenly become the objects of our aversion,
and we begin to devise all sorts of methods for evading recognition, or
of speaking to them when we can avoid it.
This arises merely from the change in one’s circumstances, which
causes us to look for something much beyond what we have been used to;
but, unfortunately, it brings ingratitude often in the train of its
consequences.
“My dear,” said Mrs. Meredith to her daughter Margaret, “we really
cannot know the people at the corner house over the way, who invited us
to their parties.”
“Oh, dear, no, we cannot think of it; but we must get rid of them the
best way we can. You see they will not be quite the thing for us when
we come to have our change of circumstances, you may depend upon it; it
will become necessary to weed one’s acquaintance.”
“Yes, that must be done.” said Mrs. Meredith.
“And the sooner we set about it the better; for the more intimate we
continue now, the more trouble will there be of getting rid of them
afterwards.”
“Certainly; we need not accept of their invitation for to-night.”
“Oh, dear, no; I have dismissed the whole affair from my mind, and
there is no need even of thinking of it any more. I shall not even
think of sending them an answer; the consequence will be, they will be
angry, and expect we shall go and apologise, and when they find we
don’t, but that we try to get rid of them, they will be baffled, and
the whole affair is settled.”
“That is a very good plan, my dear. Then, you know, there are the
Morgans; we must positively get rid of them. It will never do to have
those young men hanging about; the colonel would do something dreadful,
to say the least of it. Why, he would shoot them, and perhaps have a
separation, who knows?”
“But then I should be entitled to a maintenance.”
“You would, my dear; but unfortunately you well know you have no
property, an that, added to an early separation, would put it in his
power to offer you and compel your acceptance of a very small sum,
which he may pay as he pleases—weekly, monthly, or quarterly.”
“I see, ma; but we will run no risk of that kind of thing. Moreover,
there would be those girls, they would be a nuisance hanging about the
colonel.”
“No doubt, and the cause of unhappiness in the extreme. Better to leave
all such people; you are a great deal better without them. Why, I tell
you what, you will be at no loss of company or acquaintances, you will
find they will be sure to spring up; property is sure to enable you to
choose those whom you will have, and whom you will not—the reason is
obvious enough. Moreover, like loves like, you know, and people with
means soon find out people who have none.”
“Yes, ma, and those who have plenty; besides, a colonel, and a man
of rank and standing—and everybody knows that a colonel in the India
service is a rich man—and that would bring us all into the best of
society. Only think of my going to Bath, Bristol, and Brighton, in
their seasons. Of course we couldn’t keep company with people who can’t
afford to go to some fashionable place at least once in a year.”
“Oh, dear, no; certainly not, my dear; but there is no need of our
troubling ourselves about that matter; we shall only go when the
colonel goes, and we shan’t be seen without him, and he’ll be a
constraint upon them; and, therefore, where they find themselves
uncomfortable, they will not come again.”
“That will be a very good plan, for it will appear as their own faults;
but, at the same time, I do not trust to that upon all occasions; it
might fail, and then we should have to take some unpleasant steps to
get rid of them, which is certainly easily done, but unpleasant.”
“Yes, yes, certainly,” replied the mother; and then suddenly, as a
knock and ring came upon the door, Margaret said, “Dear me, who is
that?—I hope none of these people whom I have been speaking about—it
will be a dreadful nuisance to all; especially when I am to be married
in three days more.”
“You needn’t be seen, Margaret; I’ll see them.”
“Do, ma; and I’ll go up stairs. But let’s hear who it is first, who
comes to-day.”
At that moment she heard the door open, and her own name pronounced,
and at once knew the speaker, and she said to her mother,—
“Oh, ma, ’tis Miss Twissel, my bridesmaid; what an infliction! but,
then, I must see her. She has come, I suppose, to consult me about some
new gown, or the way in which she and her friend will have their hair
done up on the occasion—nothing more important, I dare say.”
“Very well, my dear; they had better come in—send them in pray,” she
added to the servant. “Oh, Miss Twissel, how glad we are to see you.”
“Now, really,” said Miss Twissel; “how kind you are, for I am sure you
speak the truth. Oh, Margaret, don’t you feel all of a flutter?”
“I don’t, indeed; I am very comfortable. I hope you are all quite
well—don’t put yourself out of the way on this occasion; you need not,
I assure you.”
“Oh, I have got my pa to give us new gowns, and some lace; but I did
not mean to tell you that—I and Martha had agreed that that should be a
secret between us; that we should not say anything about it to any one;
but surprise you on your wedding morning.”
“Ah, you have been at a great deal of trouble and expense about this
affair, I am sure. You really must not think I wish you to do all this;
I really don’t know how to scold you enough, for I shall be dressed
very plainly indeed.”
“Oh, but then you are the bride—we ain’t, you know, and that makes the
difference; besides which, we have a visitor come up to London to see
us.”
“Indeed! some young gentleman, I suppose, whose heart you want to run
away with, and so have another wedding, and upon your own account this
time; and, perhaps, you are helping Miss Martha to a husband. What is
he—a physician or a divine?”
“Neither—but, I will tell you, he is only an old man.”
“An old man! What a sweetheart you have chosen, to be sure! but, I dare
say you have your reason as well as other people. But have you known
him long?”
“No, we haven’t done so; but, the fact is, pa’ and he have had some
business together, and they are very much in each others company. He’s
a man, however, of great rank, though a very odd man to talk to, I
assure you, but a man of rank and property.”
“Indeed! Oh, tell me what he is—a lord?”
“Well, he is not much short of it; and he is higher than a great many
lords, I assure you. Why, he’s no less than an admiral—only, I wasn’t
to say anything about it.”
“Oh, will he be with you when my marriage takes place?”
“Yes, he will; and I wanted to know, as he will be much with my father,
and as a visitor, shall we be intruding to bring him here to grace your
wedding?”
“Oh, yes; by all means,” said Margaret, who thought the presence of an
old man could in no way interfere with any of her schemes; besides, a
man of rank, such as an admiral, would greatly increase the noise of
her marriage. Indeed, here was probably a new acquaintance with whom
she could be intimate; besides, it was some one of consequence on her
side that the great man was to come, and would, she thought, add some
lustre to herself.
“Well, then, I would not ask him until I had seen you, because it might
turn out you would be displeased; and, as I have not done so, I cannot
tell you whether he will come or not. He’s a strange man, and I won’t
ask him until the night before.”
“Very well; we shall be quite happy to see him. I dare say he’ll come,
if you tell him who’s going to be married. Indeed, if he’s likely to
come, I’ll invite a few friends to meet him; but I won’t say anything
to anybody about it.”
“No; let it be a surprise to them all; and let nobody know whom they
are going to meet.”
“That will be delightful, certainly—very delightful. What a surprise
it will be to them to be introduced to colonel this and admiral that.
I declare I long for the day on account of the confusion that some
persons will be in.”
“I must now bid you good bye; for I’ve got to call upon my dressmaker,
to give her some orders.”
“You will stop and take tea with us? Surely you won’t run away.”
“Oh, but I must,” said Miss Twissel, and so said Miss Martha, and after
much pressing and refusing, they parted, and left Margaret filled by
other thoughts than those she had so recently held.
“Ma’,” said she, after a long pause, “do you know what I have been
thinking of?”
“No, my dear, I do not.”
“Well, then, it is this, that after all, we may as well make a bit of
a figure for the last time. That we will have some friends who will
figure upon that occasion and no other.”
“What makes you think so, my dear Margaret?”
“Why, you see, ma’, we are likely to have a distinguished visitor, and
we may as well have as many as we can; their number and dresses will
look well, and as we shall leave town immediately, I don’t see that we
shall be at any future time annoyed by their visits. Indeed, it will be
retiring from their society after giving them a feast.”
“Well, to be sure, I never thought of that,” said her mother—“I never
thought of it. What shall we do now—how can we provide for so many?”
“Send an order to a pastry cook to provide breakfast for so many,
whether they come or not, and then we need trouble ourselves very
little about giving them time. If we tell them about the day before,
they will have all in readiness for us.”
“Well, well—and as for the expense, it will be of no consequence.”
“None,” said Margaret. “I shall be able to pay that and others, if we
owe any. But now comes the job of inviting visitors, and we must only
invite those who will make up a show, dress well, and pass off on the
occasion for fashionable people.”
“Oh, as for that, there are many people who never had a penny in their
lives to call their own, may be very fashionable-looking people, and
pass for men of a thousand a year, to say nothing of a lord looking
like a workman, and the like, which is common enough.”
“Then we’ll settle it at that point, ma’, and you had better
superintend the invitations and the other affair—the breakfast, I mean.”
“Very well, my dear; you know that I have no objection. I have seen
such occasions before, and I well know what they ought to be; therefore
you may safely rely upon my judgment in such an affair as that at
least.”
“And about the selection of friends—visitors, I mean.”
“That you may also leave to me,” said Mrs. Meredith; “and, depend upon
it, I will not invite one party whom we shall have cause to say we are
sorry they came; though, you know, every allowance would be made for
them by the colonel or admiral, if he come. By the way, I would not
tell the colonel a word about it, for sometimes the land service hates
the sea service, and the latter often laugh at the former; so it will
be safest to say nothing.”
“No, ma, I won’t—I didn’t intend to do so.”
Thus both mother and daughter had suddenly changed their views of what
was to take place on the day of the intended marriage. They were now
resolved they would have as many of their old friends as they could
get together upon the occasion, to cause the affair to go off with all
the _eclat_ that it was possible; it would be the last ball of the
season—that is, it would be the last she ever intended to give them,
and that would be the last occasion upon which they would meet.
Her respect for Miss Twissel was augmented by the knowledge that she
had an admiral for a friend or a visitor, it didn’t matter which. Who
could tell what might happen? Mightn’t Miss Twissel marry an admiral,
as ugly as she was, as well as she should a colonel? but there were
many reasons why she should. She, too, might have had some means of
entangling his heart; perhaps, after all, she only came there with him
for the purpose of showing him off.
“At all events,” said Margaret, to herself; “at all events, he is one
that we can keep on terms with; and it will look well to be acquainted
with some person of rank. I am, at all events, well pleased it has
happened as it has.”
Mrs. Meredith, on the other hand, appeared to think her daughter’s
marriage with a colonel, ought to be celebrated by no common
rejoicings; that, indeed, the marriage ought to go off with as much
disturbance to the whole neighbourhood, as it was possible to make.
This could not be better effected than in the manner we have referred
to; namely, inviting a number of persons to come and be present at the
ceremony, and to take a late breakfast, and to wish the bride joy, to
see her depart, and then to lose sight of her, as she hoped, for ever.
This purpose Mrs. Meredith ably carried out, and she succeeded in
inviting about two or three-and-twenty persons together; and any person
who had a carriage and would come in it, was sure of an invitation—that
was a passport to the marriage feast.
“Well,” she muttered to herself, as she reckoned up the number of
persons whom she expected to be present upon the occasion—“well, I
don’t think I have omitted any one who ought to be present, nor have I
invited any one who ought not to be here. I shall have a busy day of
it—very busy day; but the result is everything; so long as the marriage
takes place, and we are really married to an East Indian colonel, why
we shall do, there can be no doubt of it.”
This was a consolatory reflection. There was but little else, indeed,
that could be done—little, indeed. The cook had the orders for the
entertainment the next day; they had but little to do in the household
with that; indeed, they had extra hands, lest there should be any need
of them, as she would not have anything go wrong upon such an occasion,
for worlds.
But there was one thing that gave her some satisfaction, and that
was, Mr. Twissel had not been to them lately to give any doubtful
counsels; ever since she had announced her intention of permitting the
marriage to take place, he had not been to express any doubts about the
matter; but had been a mere spectator, doing all that was necessary.
He had forgotten all objection, and never made one. He was perfectly
quiescent; but would now and then look very hard at the colonel, but
that was all; he never discovered anything, and all was smooth and
pleasant.
CHAPTER CXLII.
THE WEDDING MORNING.—DISRUPTION OF HARMONY, AND THE NEW
ACQUAINTANCE.—THE CONCLUSION.
Accident, strange to say, had taken our old acquaintance, Admiral Bell,
to the house of a lawyer, there to transact some business, as well as
to lodge at his house. The fact was, the old admiral hearing that a
brother officer was in trouble—one who had shared with him the dangers
of the sea and the fight—he came to town to see, himself, what could
be done; and finding the affair beyond his comprehension, or, at least
beyond his power of personal interference; that, in fact, it required
the aid of a third party, and that third person must, of necessity, be
a lawyer, he determined to employ the man who happened to be conversant
with the circumstances of the case, and this was no other than Mrs.
Meredith’s friend, Twissel.
However, the admiral’s good will towards the race who follow the law,
not being so great as his philanthropy, he determined to watch every
stage of the proceedings, and to permit nothing to be done without his
knowledge, and to see that nothing was neglected.
Hearing from Mr. Twissel the affair that was to take place, a sudden
crotchet entered his head, that he should like to be present at the
ceremony, and he broached it to Mr. Twissel, who turned to his daughter
to ascertain if it were at all possible.
That young lady was desirous of shining among her acquaintances, as
one who could introduce an admiral, and who did not like the idea of
Margaret Meredith being so fine a lady as she now attempted to make
herself appear; indeed, she would have been willing to have assisted
in raising her some species of mortification; she felt more than true
pleasure in the disaster that would be the cause of such feelings.
There was a very general dislike to Miss Margaret Meredith, and the
truth was, she was much more than usually arrogant and proud, and took
all imaginable methods of vexing and mortifying those around her.
But there is little to be said about that; the consent was brought back
to the attorney, who felt somewhat elated at it, and communicated it to
the admiral, with some remarks upon the kindness and condescension of
the persons who had done him so much honour.
This, however, only had the effect of drawing from the admiral, the
word, swab, and then he became silent and did not appear to be at
all taken aback by the knowledge that an East India colonel was the
bridegroom on the occasion, and one of very large property and singular
behaviour.
The evening before the marriage was a busy one. The young ladies had to
arrange and to re-arrange all their finery; and the bride herself had
the task of seeing how she became her bridal dress, to do an infinity
of other little matters, and to contemplate the change that was about
to take place in so short a period. A few hours more, and she would
become a wife.
The colonel, himself, did not in the least fall off in his ardour; he
was particularly anxious it should, on no account, be delayed after the
day fixed. A later day he appeared to have the utmost objection to;
indeed, he declared he would do anything if it came but a day or two
earlier.
However, this was considered impossible, and the young lady was
permitted to have her way, though it was expressly stipulated that it
should not be an hour after the appointed time, for he declared himself
dying with impatience to call her his own.
“Now, ma,” said Margaret, as she sat talking to her mother the night
before; “now, ma, I hope you will not give any of these people
countenance when I am gone, and throw off their acquaintance; you will
be firm on this point for my sake.”
“I will, my dear,” said Mrs. Meredith, “I will.”
“Then, when I come back, I shall know more of the colonel’s mind
about where we shall live, and how we shall live. He must let me have
something handsome; I have no doubt but what he will; he does not
appear to be a close-handed man, quite the reverse; and, all things
considered, we shall be able to make a very agreeable living out of it.”
“Why, yes, my dear, I cannot doubt it; he is, no doubt, a man of
property and can well afford us enough, and some sum as pin-money;
indeed, he is too liberal now to be otherwise by and bye; perhaps
he will keep on this house, and pay for proper domestics, and
keep a carriage. What a change it will be for us all, and how the
neighbourhood will stare!”
“Yes, ma, they will; but suppose we were to reside out of town, we
should have our carriage driving into town, as a matter of course, and
now and then sleep in town when we made up a party, or went to the
theatre.”
“Yes, my dear. What time shall you see the colonel in the morning?”
“Not before I am ready to go.”
“To church? Well, but you will have some breakfast with him?”
“No, he will be in his own room, I dare say, till late; he will scarce
present himself before the time has come to start; you know his
habits, he does not get up very early, and I do not expect to see much
alteration. At eleven o’clock we are to be at church. We breakfast at
nine, you know, so we shall have time.”
“Oh, he is sure to be down to breakfast, there can be no doubt about
that; indeed, he must be called for the purpose; of course, there must
be some deviation from a regular rule upon extraordinary occasions like
the present.”
“Well, well, there may be; but have you given all the invitations you
intended to give?—and have you got any answers to them so as to ensure
their attendance?”
“Oh, yes, that is all safe and fixed; we shall have a good many here by
half-past eight in the morning, at the latest; but you must contrive
to let me have money very soon, or to send me some up, as I am getting
very short, for I have laid out a great deal of money lately, and much
more than I could, under other circumstances, spare or afford.”
“Of course, ma, you will not lose anything by this; I shall take care
of you; not a penny that you have laid out but what shall be repaid,
and with a handsome return; but do not think about this, it grows late
and I must to sleep.”
“Do, my dear, and I’ll wake you in time in the morning.”
• • • • •
The morning came, and some of them were about early. Mrs. Meredith
was up, and so was Margaret. She could not lie so late as usual. She
had done much, and yet she had so much to do still. It was really
astonishing to see what there was to do—no one would have believed it,
and even Margaret became surprised.
The morning was now fairly come; the servants were about in the house,
and the neighbours were up and about; she could hear her mother chiding
and scolding; she could hear the sound of her voice, and she began to
believe there was now no time to lose.
The hour of nine was now gone. The knocker and the guests had been
heard for the last half hour at the door, and she could hear the
voices of the guests below, some of whom spoke audibly enough; then
they soon after descended to the breakfast-room, which, by the way, was
the drawing-room, as there was not enough room below.
The colonel, at the same moment, entered the room, and a vast number of
congratulations were given and received, from side to side, with the
utmost urbanity and good will. The colonel, for the first time, had
thrown on one side the green shade which he usually wore, but he looked
remarkably pale, though he had still the looks of a hearty and healthy
man.
The paleness, which seemed to be constitutional, was very
extraordinary; but that was explained by the colonel saying, that he
had been so ever since he had the yellow fever, which had had that
effect upon his complexion.
There was much rejoicing at the occurrences that were now in progress;
everybody praised the viands; everything was of the best and first-rate
quality, and there were many attendants, which made it so much the
better and the more comfortable, as everybody had an abundance of
everything.
Mrs. Meredith now shone in the greatest triumph; there was none so
great and grand. She patronized everybody, and appeared remarkably
condescending, considering she was the mother of a daughter who was
about to marry a retired East India service colonel. There were few who
did not understand fully the nature of the condescension of the lady
herself; besides, she was the presiding goddess of the feast.
Among those who had been invited was the Miss Smith and Mr. Smith. This
was the young lady who had been so terrified at the attack that had
been made upon her the first night that Colonel Deverill lodged there,
and on that night he was so terribly vexed and disturbed.
Mrs. Meredith had invited them, because they were people of means,
and Miss Smith could not now do any mischief, because the colonel was
pledged to Margaret too far to retract; and as there were several
young females, why, the more the better, because it would divert his
attention.
Miss Smith, however, came out of curiosity, and because it was a
wedding party, which is the delight and admiration of all young
females, and Miss Smith was no exception. Mr. Smith was civil and
polite, and hid his internal dislike to the colonel, which he felt and
could not account for it; neither did his daughter—she had a great
aversion to him, but at the same time suppressed it.
The colonel was courtly and complimentary, and made civil speeches
to such as spoke to him; indeed, he never for a moment lost his
self-possession; he stood in a less stooping posture than usual, and he
was considered a tall, handsome man—a fine man.
“Mr. Twissel,” said the colonel, “I am happy to see you—especially
gratified to see you—you will be witness of my happiness to-day—you
will mark my progress in this affair, and learn what lesson it may
teach. That is the way we should pass through life, Mr. Twissel, is it
not? Gain knowledge by experience, and become, in old age, a wise man.”
“Why, yes; oh, yes,” said Twissel, who felt there was something in the
remark that touched him to the quick, and he winced under the smart;
but he thought it might have been accidentally given, and the colonel
was quite ignorant of his disasters; and yet it was a very home thrust,
without any previous introduction to it, that made it all the more
uncomfortable, and he merely replied,—
“I am happy to see you, Colonel Deverill, and to see you so happy, and
the young lady, who, I am sure, deserves to be happy; in fact, I think
you both deserve happiness; I am sure, I wish you every imaginable joy,
and it gives me great pleasure in seeing it.”
“I am sure you do, sir; but you do not seem to eat and enjoy yourself.”
“I am so occupied in witnessing the felicity of others, that I had
forgotten it; moreover, I expect a friend to be present who happens to
be late; he is quite a stranger to all present, and therefore I wished
to countenance him as much as I could on that account.”
“Then I will not press you now; perhaps you’ll do me the favour of
introducing your friend to me when he comes, yourself, and I shall be
most happy to receive him.”
“Thank you, colonel, you do me much honour; I will accept of your great
kindness, and do myself the pleasure of presenting him to you, and to
Miss Meredith, whom I hope to see soon changed in name.”
“I hope the time will now be very short. What hour is it?”
“Half-past nine,” said the attorney, consulting his watch.
“At eleven we must be at the church. Well, if we leave at half-past
ten, then we shall be there in ample time; I would it were over and
that we were on our journey.”
“Ah! you are impatient, colonel,” said Margaret, as she came up to him.
“My dear angel!” replied Deverill, bowing, “how could I be otherwise
when you are the object of my affections? It is not impatience to leave
this good company—quite the reverse. But it is because the change of
scene, travelling, and change of air will do you much good, and is, I
can see, quite necessary for you.”
“I think it will do me no harm,” said Margaret; “but here comes ma, who
really looks tired.”
“Well, my dear, I am a little fatigued, but you know I shall have ample
time to recover myself. I shall have nothing to disturb my repose.”
“Indeed, Mrs. Meredith!” said the colonel; “I am sure we must alter
that; we must find some other kind of employment for you, and not
suffer you to remain hidden at home. You have catered so well for us
this morning, that I am sure you are a most valuable acquisition to
a household; with such a superintendence as yours, we should have
everything in the utmost plenty, and at the proper moment.”
“Ah, colonel! you are flattering—you are.”
“We shall soon show that we are not flattering, I hope,” said the
colonel. “My dear madam, you are the life and soul of the whole
company. What should we have done without you? I hope all our friends
here are happy and comfortable. I do not know them well enough to pay
them all that attention and respect they deserve.”
“Exactly, colonel; they all know that well enough, and are fully alive
to the honour you do them in being present in the midst of them.”
“Who is that young lady who was looking here just now?” inquired the
colonel.
“Who? the young lady with the elderly gentleman by her side?”
“Yes; I should like to be introduced to her,” said the colonel.
“Oh! certainly,” said Mrs. Meredith, vexed in her own heart that she
had invited her and her father, now, for she had no wish that any one
present should be future acquaintances; but there was no help for
it; she must introduce them, and accordingly she went up, with the
best grace she could put on, to them both, to request they would be
introduced to the colonel, who desired the honour of their acquaintance.
There was no hesitation, of course, and they at once advanced to meet
him, and were introduced to the colonel as Miss and Mr. Smith.
“I am most happy to see you, sir,” said the colonel; “and the young
lady here is your daughter, I can see, by the family likeness she bears
to you.”
Miss Smith, however, could not repress a convulsive shudder as she
looked upon the colonel. It might have been his complexion, or it might
have been that his features brought some terrible recollections to her
mind; but she could not, for a moment or so, speak.
“The young lady is ill!” said the colonel, who noticed the emotion.
“What is the matter, Clara, my dear?” said Mr. Smith; “what’s the
matter—you are ill?”
“No, no,” said Miss Smith; “it was a—a—sudden—sudden dizziness that
came across me. I dare say I shall be better by and bye. I am sorry it
should have come upon me now.”
“Ah! my dear young lady,” said Colonel Deverill, drawing himself up
to his full height, and looking gravely, but speaking with the utmost
courtesy, “you have nothing to regret respecting the occasion; the
illness itself is a matter of regret to us all, I am sure; however, let
us hope it will be but temporary, and that you will be able to wish me
joy, and my beautiful bride.”
“You see, Colonel Deverill, ever since the night she was disturbed by
the strange attack of what she believes to have been a vampyre, or
something that had the form of a man, and a taste for blood, she has
been affected thus.”
“Dear me!” said the colonel; “what a shocking thing—a very shocking
affair! I think perhaps, the young lady is subject to illness,” and he
touched his forehead, as much as to intimate an insinuation that the
young lady might be somewhat affected in her intellects.
“No, sir; quite the reverse,” said her father. “I myself saw a tall,
gaunt figure gliding away, which felled me in an instant, and I lay
half a minute stunned.”
“God bless me!” said the colonel; “this affair is quite romantic! If a
German writer had such material by him, what would he not make of it?”
There had been a loud knocking at the door, and some one announced; but
nobody took any notice of it. Colonel Deverill did not hear it, but
stood talking to Mr. Smith; while Admiral Bell was introduced by Mr.
Twissel, who led him towards the group, explaining what had happened.
“By G—d!” said the admiral; “d’ye see how they are crowding about the
poor girl? Why, they’d extinguish a fire—if there was one! Why don’t
you give the young woman air? If you don’t stand on one side, I’ll put
a whole broadside into you, as I would into a Frenchman!”
This singular address produced an immediate sensation, and many moved
away.
“Colonel Deverill,” said Mr. Twissel, “allow me to introduce
my friend Admiral Bell to you. Admiral Bell, this is Colonel
Deverill.—Eh?—oh!—eh?”
These latter exclamations were uttered in consequence of the extreme
surprise depicted on the countenances of both parties. Admiral Bell’s
surprise was nothing out of the way; but that of Colonel Deverill was a
matter of consternation to many of them. He stepped back a pace or two,
and then his lips parted, as though he would speak, but he could not;
he panted—his eye glared, and his nostrils dilated.
“Shatter my mainmast—upset the cabouse—turn my state-cabin into a
cockpit, and the quarter-deck to a gambling-booth to the whole ship’s
company!”
“What’s all this about?” exclaimed Mrs. Meredith.
“Oh, that odious man!—who is he?—what is——”
“Why, ma’am, I’m old Admiral Bell; very well known for having beaten
the French, and the terror of all vampyres. Why, look at the swab—but
you ain’t going to get off this time!”
“What is the matter, dear colonel?” said Margaret. “You are
ill—speak—what is the matter?”
“Ah!” said the admiral; “let him speak, and he’ll tell you he’s no
colonel, and his name ain’t Deverill, or, if it be, it ain’t his only
name; he is Varney the vampyre!”
“A vampyre!” said Miss Smith, starting up with a shriek; “a vampyre!
Good heavens! I was not mistaken, then; that must be the man!” and she
sank back in her father’s arms.
“What! has he been at any of his tricks again!” exclaimed the admiral,
and he made a stride towards, him; but Varney—for it was he—avoided him
by stepping aside, and placing some other person between himself and
the admiral, and then he said,—
“What this madman will say you will not listen to—you——.”
“Madman! well, I’m hanged; call me mad!” said the admiral. “I wish I
had my sword by my side, and I would teach you how a madman can fight;
but you are not going; I have something to say to you first. If he’s
going to marry that young lady, all I can say is, she will be food for
him—she’ll never live till to-morrow; her blood will make his pale face
ruddy!”
Varney stood no longer; but seeing many around him who appeared to have
an inclination to stop his passage, he suddenly made to the door, which
he secured for a moment on the outside, and then in another he was
clear of the house.
This was no sooner done, than all present, who were staring at each
other in mute amazement, and unable to account for what had happened,
looked at the new comer, the admiral, who immediately began to relate
enough of Varney that made it apparent to all present that he was not
what he represented himself to be.
• • • • •
Amid the commiserations of their friends, and their jeers, Mrs.
Meredith sold all her furniture, and, with her daughter, retired
to some little place, where they opened a small shop, to eke out a
living by such means. They were unable even to pay many debts they
had contracted on account of this marriage, and they were, moreover,
ashamed to be seen by their former acquaintance.
CHAPTER CXLIII.
A SCENE IN WINCHESTER CATHEDRAL.—THE CATHEDRAL ROBBERS.—A STORM.—THE
VAULTS BENEATH THE AISLE.—THE FLIGHT OF THE ROBBERS, AND THE
RESUSCITATED CORPSE.
The sun had long deserted the horizon, and the good city of Winchester
had been buried in darkness many hours; while the moon, though high
in her course, was obscured by the hazy clouds that drifted from the
south-west. The gusty winds whistled round the walls of the cathedral
church, producing an unpleasant sensation, with a foreboding of a
coming storm.
The inhabitants of the quiet, orderly town, were steeped in repose,
and a stranger who might by chance have wandered at such an untoward
hour abroad, would not have found one single ray from any window; save,
perhaps, at one or two hotels, which merely keep open till the London
mail passed through, lest any passengers should make their stay at
Winchester.
Save at these places, all were reposing peaceably in their beds; and
the tower of the cathedral frowned majestically upon the tombstones
below, and upon the surrounding buildings, which appeared to peep
upon the limits of the grave-yard; while the fir trees that were yet
standing bent beneath the blast, as it swept across the low walls, by
which the cathedral on one side is bounded.
But the solitary churchyard was not without its occupants, living or
dead; for its sanctity is invaded by the presence of three men, who
emerge from the narrow streets and courts situated between it and the
cross, and then crossing beneath the shade of some object, they stood
beneath the low wall which surrounded the churchyard.
They paused for several moments, and gazed around them in every
direction, and up at the houses that were nearest to them; but there
was no sign of light or anything stirring in any of the houses adjacent.
“I think all is right to-night,” said one of the men to his companions.
“Ay, right enough; there will be nobody near us to-night.”
“No,” replied a third; “and if the signs of the weather are good
for anything, why, we shall have a rough night; and though that is
unpleasant, yet it makes interruptions less likely, and success more
certain.”
“You are right, Josh; we shall have a good job this time.”
“There, then, that will do until we are safe; it’s no use talking here;
if the old watchman comes round, we may have to book it, and then we
may not have a chance.”
“Ha, ha, ha! as for the old watchman, he is not the fool you take him
to be, if you imagine him at all likely to disturb himself on such a
night as this; he’ll sleep in his box till he wakes and finds it is
fine.”
“Well, be that as it may,” said the other, impatiently, “it is all
right now.”
“Yes, all right.”
“Then just help me over, and I’ll get down on the other side, while one
of you can get up on the wall and hand the tools down to me.”
“Can’t you throw them over?”
“I could, but it is not worth while to make any noise, even though
we felt sure that it will not be heard. There have been most strange
things done in our time, you know, and there is no telling what may
happen.”
“Ah, the dead may come to life, Josh.”
“So they might; and a pig might fly, but, as they say, it is a very
unlikely bird.”
“Well, then, up with you.”
As he spoke, one of the men gave one of his companions a lift up, and
with this aid he got on the wall, and then quietly slipping down into
the burial-ground, he awaited his companions, one of whom immediately
mounted the wall in the same manner, and who received a bag, which he
handed down to his comrade, who was in the graveyard belonging to the
cathedral.
“Well, is all right?” he said.
“Yes, all right; don’t stay up there like a cat on a wall; come down,
or you may by chance be seen.”
The other two men immediately came over the wall, and they all three
collected round a monument that stood up, and here a short consultation
took place.
“Now, how shall we proceed?”
“We must get into the vaults somehow or other, if we dig our way in,
which I think is much the most easily done.”
“What! undermine the building?”
“Scarcely so much as that.”
“Well, but we can get into the body of the cathedral, and then into the
vaults that way. There is a door.”
“Yes, there is a door, but it is so close to the verger’s door, that
you are sure to awake him.”
“I have opened more than one door in my time, and yet I never awoke
anybody in doing so; he must sleep wonderfully light.”
“Ay, so he may; but in this case the door is so strong that there is
no chance of breaking it open, without great inconvenience and noise;
there is no room to work in, and, moreover, the verger keeps a little
cur always sleeping on the mat close to his door, so that no one can
approach without his giving alarm.”
“What a brute!”
“Yes; but there is a means of entering besides that.”
“Where—and how?”
“In the back of the cathedral there is a large marble slab, on which is
carved some letters, that I never could make out; but I’m told it says
that somebody lies buried underneath that stone, but I know immediately
below are the vaults.”
“Well, but the marble you speak of would weigh fourteen or fifteen
hundred weight, which would be no joke.”
“No, by Jove,” said his companion; “we had better by far dig our way
in, since we shall have so much difficulty in getting in; we can soon
dig out soil enough to let us get down into the vaults.”
“Well, we had better set to work at once, lest we lose all chance. If
we have a long job, we had better set to work early, as well as stop
here, for if we are surprised we shall have to run.”
“And the yard will be watched ever afterwards, as sure as we shall have
a storm presently.”
“So we shall. Work away, Josh; where are the tools?”
“Here they are,” said the man, throwing the bag down and opening it;
and then he pulled out some tools, consisting of pickaxe and shovels,
and a crowbar or two, and several other little materials, which were
useful upon such occasions.
“Well, now, where shall we commence?”
“Just at the side here; we are safe to get in somewhere where the wall
is weakest, for I believe the vaults are all walled in.”
“They must be, to have a secure foundation for such a weight as there
must be about it; and, to my mind, we have got a decent job. It’s very
much like a fortress, and if it was easy to get in this way, we should
hear of such things being done much oftener than they are, that is my
opinion.”
“And a very good opinion it is, too, until another is heard; but it is
no use being faint-hearted; the harder the job, the harder we ought to
set at it, that’s all; but there are some few things not thought of by
others, you know, and it is sometimes the hardest thing in the world to
think of the most simple.”
“There’s some truth in that.”
The men having found the spot they most desired, they set about digging
and picking it up in good earnest; but it was difficult work, and
the soil about the cathedral was very hard, owing to the quantity of
rubbish that had been driven or trodden into the earth for centuries,
either through accident or design, to harden and secure the permanency
of the work around. There were many heavy and large stones, as well as
small broken stones; also, flint in no small quantity, that every now
and then resisted the blows of the pick.
“Well, I’m thinking we have all three worked half an hour, and have not
got a foot deep yet.”
“We have not got much deeper, certainly.”
“Do you think we shall get in to-night?”
“To-night or never,” said the third man.
“You are right, comrade; shoulder your picks and then we shall see what
way we can make in another half hour. Who can tell? we may come to a
softer soil below; this is only the filling up.”
The men again set to work heartily, but they seemed to have no
success—they could not make anything of it; it appeared to resist all
their efforts; and the sparks often flew from the blows they made with
their tools.
The perspiration ran down their faces, and as they paused to wipe their
foreheads, they gazed upwards at the clouds. It was heavy, and the wind
was blowing fresh, and now and then a heavy spot of rain.
“By St. Peter,” said one of them, “I expect we shall have a storm
presently. I already feel the heavy drops that fall occasionally;
and if one may judge by them of what we may expect, we shall have it
heavily.”
“So much the better; we shall have less interruption.”
“Well, I don’t know what you call interruption, but this is a complete
stopper; I can’t make any impression with the pick, it is as hard as
rock; and then comes some of those old walls that are rather harder
than granite—you may as well pick at a cart-load of pig iron.”
As this was said, the clouds suddenly appeared to open, and such a
deluge of rain descended, that the earth seemed to smoke. The drops
appeared to be continuous small spouts of water—a shower is too mild a
word—it was a deluging, as if some waterspout had burst.
The men stood a moment or two, but it was useless to work; they could
not do it, and they rushed to a part of the wall which sheltered them
from the fury of the storm that was raging.
“Well, I never saw anything like this before.”
“Nor I. Hark at the thunder! There’s a flash! Who would have expected
that at this season of the year?”
“Not I.”
“Nor any one else; but it seems to me as if we were to be defeated
to-night. I am sorry we made the attempt, since we are sure to find the
yard watched after this, for they will see what we have been up to.”
“Yes, it is vexing, but we cannot help this; it is quite impossible to
do anything in such weather as this. I do not care about a wet jacket,
but I cannot see, and hardly breathe, with so much falling water about
me.”
“Nor I; but yet I am loth to give it up; consider the jewellery and
money he had about him—it will pay us handsomely.”
“Well, it was a strange start of him, at all events. I wonder how he
came to be buried in such a manner—how was it?”
“I don’t know. All I know is, that the thing was kept secret because it
was considered that it would be a temptation to disturb any grave when
it was known that he was buried in his clothes and jewellery, and that
his money was buried also with him. It was certainly a temptation I
could not resist.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes; I will tell you, another time, how I came to know all about it;
indeed, I saw him screwed down, and the consequence is, I know that he
has the money and valuables about him.”
“Then I am sure we had better get into the church itself; we can do
more with your slab of marble than on the outside of the wall. And
besides that, I do not think that this rain will give over; the hole we
have already made is fast filling up with water, and we shall find it
impossible to work.”
“So we shall. What do you say to getting inside the cathedral?”
“Agreed, my lads; as quickly as you like; for, if we stay here much
longer, we shall certainly be drowned. I’m wet through as it is.”
“So am I; but never mind, my boys, bright gold and jewels will warm
your hearts, and that will keep your outsides dry, or at least you will
not feel it. I am sure that I should not if I can but get it.”
“Ay, that is all I care about; but, if you get foiled, you may depend
upon it you don’t feel any the better—you are rather worse, and feel
everything more; but what do you say to yon window?”
“That will do if we can reach it; that is my only difficulty.”
“That is one that is easily overcome,” said his companion, “for I know
where the ladder is, and that is just over our heads; all you have to
do is to put the point of the crow-bar under the staple to which the
chain is fastened that secures it, and then you have the means at once
of entering.”
“But if we get in and are detected, how shall we get out again?”
“Are we not three to one? If the old verger should come, I think we
could make a dead body of him in a very short while; and I cannot tell
where you will be if you can’t get the better of the old man.”
“Well, say no more about it; up with the ladder, and we will get in
and chance it. Such a night as this, it would be strange, indeed,
if anybody heard us; but, as there is much to be got, why, we can’t
grumble at the risk.”
The three men set to work about wrenching the staple out to which was
attached a chain which secured the ladder. That was soon effected, and
the ladder placed against one of the lowermost windows, and then one of
the men went up, and forcing the window open said, after he had looked
in,—
“All right—come up. We have got to a right place.”
They all three came up one after another, when the first up crept in at
the open aperture, and by means of ornamental work, and a monument that
there projected from the wall in a manner that enabled them to descend
with ease, and in a few moments more the whole three stood in the old
cathedral of Winchester.
At that moment the bell tolled heavily the hour of twelve. The sound
was solemn, and it made a deep impression upon the robbers.
“What a dismal, hollow sound that has, to be sure,” said one.
“Yea; it sounded like tolling.”
“Pshaw!” said one of them; “’tis no matter—if it be tolling, it is not
for us, nor for the man we come to visit, so no more old women’s fears;
if you don’t like stopping in this place, you had better set to work
and be quick, when we shall have no further need of staying. Of what
use is it for you to stare and gape about with white faces, and swelled
eyeballs, like so many cats; be men—be active, and use your arms.”
“Well, where are we to use them? What are we to do? You brought us
here, and yet you do not tell us what we are to do. You know all about
this matter, and you cannot, or do not point out where we are to
commence.”
“Here, then; on the very stone you are standing; set to work to raise
this, and then we shall soon find our way into the vaults below, and we
shall then satisfy ourselves for our trouble, and be well paid too, I
hope.”
“I hope so, too, Josh; for, to tell you the truth, I don’t ever
recollect so uncomfortable a job as that which I am in to-night.”
“Well, you ain’t got paid all, I’ll warrant.”
“I haven’t got paid at all, yet; but we waste time; lend me a pick. I
don’t see how I am to get a tool in here. The chinks are all so small,
that you can hardly put in the blade of a penknife.”
“There is a hole somewhere near the head. There is a small piece of
black marble.”
“Yes; here it is.”
“Well, chip that out, and then you may insert a crow-bar, or pick,
beneath the stone, when you will find that it will lift up, and then,
by main strength, lift it back, and we may go down.”
These instructions were followed out. The black marble was discovered,
and then knocked out, when a large crevice was discovered, into which
a powerful crow-bar was immediately thrust; and then, by one united
effort, they contrived to lift the marble slab up out of its place,
though not above a foot, which required a great effort, when it is
considered that it was imbedded in cement.
“Well, we shall be able to get it up now, I think.”
“Don’t be too sure, for we have not got it far—it is enormously heavy,
and the lever has done all as yet.”
“Well, then, are you all ready? A long pull, you know, comrades, and a
strong pull, does the business. Now, then, altogether.”
“Heave, ho!” whispered another, and they all three made a prodigious
effort. It was not only a strong pull, but a very long pull, for the
stone was so heavy, it came slowly and unwillingly upwards, and it was
nearly three minutes before the enormous mass stood upright in the
aisle.
“Well, I didn’t think it would have been done. That’s the hardest job
that ever I had a hand in, and don’t desire to have such another, but
yet, hard as it is, it is easier than what we had to do outside.”
“Yes, much, and you will soon find it is so. Lend a hand to clear away
the rubbish that lies here; there’s a trap-door underneath that leads
into the vaults; it belonged to the monks of old, of whom it is said it
served either for the same purpose of burial, or for a cellar for wine.”
“Well, well, there are some things better than wine, I trow, in the
cellar, now, if we can find the coffin; there has been no other burial
in the vaults since he was buried, so we shall not have much trouble.”
“But what are we to do with the stone? If we let it down again, we
shall do some mischief.”
“We must turn it corner by corner until we get it against the pillars,
and there leave it; for if we let it down, it will go down like the
report of a gun, and smash all that comes in the way.”
This was agreed to, and it was not long before they propped the heavy
mass of stone against one of the pillars, and then returned to the
place whence it had been raised, and began to clear away the rubbish,
when a trap-door was plainly observable; and after much labour and
force, they contrived to open the door, when there appeared a dark
aperture, into which they could not look without some misgivings, for
nothing could be seen.
“Well, who’s to go down?”
This was a question that no one liked to answer. And certainly no one
would volunteer to go below. It was too dark to be inviting, and the
men looked at one another as well as they could, for it was total
darkness, or nearly so, in the aisle; and below, it was so utterly
dark, that it was impossible to make out anything.
“What is to be done now? Have you got the lantern?”
“I have, and matches, but did not think we ought to use them before,
lest we attract attention; however, we will have a light now, and
should anybody look down, they will think there is a general meeting
among the dead.”
So saying, he lit the lantern, which threw a light into the vault, and
rendered visible a flight of steps that ran up to the opening, but
which were invisible in the darkness that had reigned in the place.
“Now, then, jump down, and see where the last coffin is placed; it is
easily known from all the others, for I don’t think there has been a
burial here for many months—the old cathedral is not often disturbed
for the reception of the dead, and only when some rich man dies and
fancies he may lie more comfortable here.”
“Ay, rich men can afford to be buried in a good suit of clothes, and
money in their pocket, to bribe St. Peter to open the gate.”
“Ha! ha! ha! well said; Peter has the keys.”
“Yes, and here we have the coffin.”
“Have we? Is this it?”
“Yes; don’t you see that it has all the signs of newness about it?
There is hardly any dust collected upon it; here we shall find our
treasure; the coffin is a strong one, and will, I think, take some
trouble to break open.”
“Indeed! We shall be choked with the horrible stench which we have
below. I can’t stand it another minute—I shall be sick.”
“Ay, and I too.”
“Here, then, I have the lantern. Lay hold of the coffin and bring it up
stairs; we can carry it amongst us.”
“Ay, anything but remain here—that I cannot do.”
“Be quick, for confound me, but such a mass of putrid flesh as there
must be here, is horribly sickly. I would sooner be hanged than pass an
hour here.”
“I’m not so afraid of death as all that. I could manage to live through
a night.”
“You might, but you would soon find out the ill effects, and die of
some fever or other; and that is what we shall have, if we remain here
much longer.”
The three men then shifted the coffin from its place, and then on to
their shoulders, one at either end, and one under the centre.
The coffin was heavy—very heavy, and the men were tottering under their
burden. They were strong men, but hardly equal to the task of carrying
so dead a weight; but yet they never shrank from it, but, with slow and
unsteady steps, they gradually neared the stairs that led upwards. They
paused. If it was a task before, it was worse now. What more exertion
could they make?
“Do you think the steps will hold us?” said one.
“I’m sure I cannot say; and perhaps not.”
“I think they are rotten, or partially so; what do you say? How shall
we get the body up?”
“There is a rope, is there not?”
“Yes.”
“That will do then. I will get that; by its means we may hoist the
coffin up to the stone pavement above. I’m almost sick.”
“And I too. This place is enough to breed a pestilence in a town.”
The smell in the vaults was certainly very strong and very pernicious.
The fœtid odour that rose from the vaults was especially disagreeable;
the smell that comes from the accumulated and putrefying remains of
human bodies, is of all odours the most noisome, and, to our tastes,
the worst.
Right glad were the men, who had propped the coffin up against the
ladder, to get up into the aisle above, to breathe a less impure
atmosphere. They gasped again; and one of them climbed up the monument,
to get to the open window, at which they had entered, to inhale some
of the pure moistened air; and then, after a few inspirations, he
returned, at the call of his comrades to aid them.
The rope was procured and secured round the coffin, and one man
remained below to guide it, while the two others remained above to haul
up the rope, which would bring the body, coffin and all, to the top.
“Well, Josh, how goes the storm?”
“It is blowing over, I think; it does not rain, and it is breaking.
I shouldn’t wonder if we don’t have moonlight after all, and, if we
should, we shall have a trouble to get away unperceived.”
“You forget what hour it is.”
“Hark! there are the chimes.”
The four quarters now chimed from the great clock, and sounded solemnly
and mournfully in the dead of the night. The iron tongue struck one,
and the last sounds of the clock died away before any of the men moved
or spoke.
“Well, we have been here an hour, and nearly two hours since our first
commencement. It’s nearly time, I’m thinking.”
“Yes; haul tight at the rope—push up at the bottom there. Are you
ready?”
“Yes,” said the man below.
“Heave ho!” called out the leader of the gang, in a low voice.
The two men at the top hauled at the rope, while he below pushed the
coffin up with all his strength, and after a time they succeeded in
causing it to rise about a foot, or something less, at each haul, and
as it got higher, the man below could the better apply his strength to
it, and at length it came up to the top.
Here, however, they experienced another difficulty. It was hard to pull
up so high as to enable them to throw its weight on the pavement, and
the rope was almost useless as a means of pulling it up higher, and the
only one who had it in his power effectually to apply his strength,
was the man below. However, after a while, to their great relief, the
coffin lay fairly upon the stone pavement.
“A good job done!”
“So say I, Josh; and such another would completely finish me for the
night. I might lie down and defy the world.”
“How about the coffin—there is no time to rest. I have a small flask of
rum in my pocket, which we will discuss as soon as we have broken open
the coffin, which I expect is the last hard job we shall have.”
“And a hard job it would have been, had I not come provided with a
screwdriver—one that is used by undertakers in such work.”
“Set to work—good luck to you. I am quite dry, and quite tired too, and
the sooner this is over the better. There, the screws come out easily
enough, though they are long and hold firm.”
“Yes, they go deep; but they have a wide worm, that carries them down
or brings them up so quickly.”
In a few minutes more the whole of the screws were drawn, and the
lid of the coffin was thrown on one side, and the corpse was at once
discovered to them. It lay calm and quiet; but yet it was terrible
to look at. The living man had been tall—remarkably tall, as well as
remarkable-looking.
He was dressed as if for walking. It was strange, the corpse was
apparelled as if were in life; and this, perhaps, caused the extreme
paleness—even extreme for a corpse—to be so apparent that they spoke
not, but gazed in silence upon it, until at length one of them said,—
“Put out the light. We have the moon’s rays—at least there is enough to
enable us to see what we want, and the light is dangerous.”
The light was put out, and the subdued light of the moon rendered all
apparent enough to the robbers.
The storm had lulled and altogether ceased, while they had been busy
in the vaults and getting up the body, and now it was a perfect calm.
The moon, though obscured at the moment, promised to shed her rays upon
the earth; and as it was at the full, and the clouds clearing off, the
probability was that the town would become as light as day.
“There he is,” said one of the men.
“Yes; and about as ugly a chap as ever I saw.”
“He is no beauty; but he’s been a fine man.”
“If you mean tall, I dare say you are right; but he’s not fine as I
take it. He’s not quite full enough about the chest and shoulders.”
“He’s got some fine rings, and a gold watch and chain. Well, there is
a good ten or fifteen pounds each, and if his pockets are well lined,
why, he will afford us a tolerable good booty.”
“Yes; we must not complain. Shall we replace all?”
“It is not possible to do so, either in time to enable us to escape,
or to do it so as to escape detection. Besides, there would be no use
in it. See how bright the moon is getting. We shall have as much to do
as we shall get through to escape being seen. I am sure we shall run a
great risk.”
“I think so too.”
“Well, then, commence proceedings. Ha!”
The moonbeams had fallen upon the corpse just as he was speaking, and
he thought he observed a motion in the body.
“What is the matter, Josh?”
“Didn’t you think he moved.”
“Ha! ha! ha! dead! ha! ha! ha! dead moved—buried moved—ha! ha! ha!
Eh? why—oh—it’s all fancy; you’ll see me believe it, presently. I do
declare—well, a man dead and buried—I suppose a week.”
“No.”
“I think so——”
“Well, it does not matter much how long he has been buried; but he
can’t move unless you move him. D——n!”
As he spoke he started to his feet, and his hair began to straighten,
and his limbs quiver, and yet he appeared to think he might be
mistaken; for he endeavoured to speak to his companions; pointing to
the corpse, he contrived to say,
“I—’l—’l take the j—j—jewels; he—he—he moves.”
“Eh? Well, I told you I thought so, but you said no, and only laughed
at me for doing so; but stand on one side, and let the moonlight come
upon him, we can tell better then if he really does move; though,
notwithstanding all I saw, I am inclined to believe it is quite an
impossibility; but the more light we have the better we shall be able
to tell how the mistake arose.”
“I thought I saw his eyes move.”
As he spoke he moved on the side, as he had been standing between
the corpse and the moon’s rays, and for the most part intercepted
them; but the moment that he did move away, and the rays came full
upon the corpse, a shivering motion appeared to pervade it, to the
intense horror of the robbers, who could not believe what they saw, but
believed they were yet mistaken, though they were too much terrified to
speak or even move. They stood gazing upon the body with bursting eyes
and gaping mouth, as if they had suddenly become spell-bound by the
wand of some magician.
Presently the corpse opened his eyes and glared full at them. Oh, such
glistening, lead-like orbs, that froze the very current of their blood;
they knew not what to think, but when the body turned on one side,
towards the moon’s rays, all doubt vanished and the spell was broken.
“The devil, by —!” exclaimed Josh.
Not another word was uttered by either of the other two; but they
sprang like emancipated madmen up the slippery sides of the monument,
and out at the windows, as easily as a fly can run up a wall. It did
not occupy more than a few seconds to enable them to clear the place.
Half a minute had not elapsed before they stood shivering by the
beautiful old cross, at Winchester.
[Illustration: The vampyre rises from his coffin, while the robbers
flee.]
• • • • •
The corpse in the cathedral, which mysteriously became animated when
exposed to the moonlight, turned towards the moon’s rays and gazed upon
the flying and terrified robbers, who had just exhumed him.
No word passed his lips, and he looked around him for some time in
silence, upon the scene before him.
The moon came in at the tall windows of the cathedral, throwing long
streams of silvery light upon the stone flooring, and upon some of the
monuments that were erected by the pillars, or columns that rise to the
roof.
All was silent, all was still—no movement was discernible, save in the
form that now sat up, and leaned on his elbow in his coffin; and he but
turned his head slowly from side to side, as though he were meditating
upon the lovely and solemn beauty of the place.
At length he arose, but he appeared to move with extreme difficulty,
and once or twice he placed his hand in the region of the heart, as if
he felt something there that pained him, and tottered about; but seemed
to recover himself a little after a time, and muttered to himself, in
low but distinct tones,—
“I must have been another victim; I am weak, the vital action is
languid, and my veins are empty; I must satisfy the instinct of my
nature, and another victim must restore me to life and the world for a
season.”
He looked up towards the window, gave one look around him and on the
coffin, while a shudder passed though him; and then, gazing on himself
and feeling for his valuables, he slowly clambered up the monument, and
carefully got through the window, and thence into the open air, and he
finally disappeared from Winchester churchyard.
CHAPTER CXLIV.
THE STAR HOTEL, AND THE STRANGER’S ARRIVAL.—A REMARKABLE
COUNTENANCE.—THE ILLNESS AND DEATH OF THE STRANGER.—A STRANGE REQUEST
COMPLIED WITH.
Some days previous to the scene related in the previous chapter, the
London coach drove up opposite to the Star Hotel, and, as usual, out
came a couple of waiters to see what there was from the metropolis, in
the shape of a passenger, who might become an inmate of the hotel, and
a customer, of course.
“Now, then, Billy,” said the guard, a stout, good-humoured fellow, to
a very stiff and punctilious waiter, dressed in black, with a white
neckerchief.
“My good friend, my name is William, if you must be familiar, though I
am sure I don’t number you among my acquaintances.”
“Very good, Billy. I declare you are one of the politest waiters that
is to be found between Portsmouth and London; ay, and more than that,
you are _the_ politest. Didn’t you say you were edicated among a lot of
gals—young ladies, I mean?”
“I never held any discourse, relative to my early days, with you, my
friend; I am not, just this moment, aware of it.”
“Ah! I see you are too polite to pass an east wind without taking your
hat off to it; how do they when they have none?”
“Have you anybody for us?” said William, mildly.
“Yes, my pink, I have.”
“Who is he, and where is he? I must not waste my master’s time; it is
an impropriety I am especially anxious to avoid.”
“You needn’t be in a hurry, nevertheless, especially as I see he is
fumbling about for small change; but what will you say if I introduce a
customer to you, a good six foot high, and perhaps a little to spare;
and the colour of a well scraped horse-radish? Eh? what do you say to
that, my primrose?”
William did not know what to say, but, after a moment’s hesitation, he
said,
“We don’t charge our customers by the room they take, or by their
personal appearance. A gentleman is a gentleman, Mr. Guard, all the
same, whether he have a red face or a white one.”
“Well, that’s good, Billy; but the chief thing is, after all, of what
colour is his money, and how he parts with it; eh?”
The guard winked and William’s impassive features were lit up with a
spark of intelligence and vivacity, which, however, was only transient,
and he relapsed into his old state of extreme and unimpeachable
gentility.
“Hold your tongue, Billy; here he comes.”
At that moment the gentleman pulled down the window, and said to the
guard,
“Open the door, if you please; I shall get out here.”
“Yes, sir,” said the guard, who immediately obeyed the injunction; and
a tall, but awfully pale individual descended the steps, wrapped up in
a huge cloak, so that but little of his person was seen, or features
either; what little there was visible was not prepossessing by any
means by the colour.
“This is the Star?” said the stranger, inquiringly.
“Yes,” said the guard.
“I’ll stop here. Are you the waiter?” said he, addressing William.
“I am, sir,” said William. “Will you walk this way, sir?”
“Yes; show me into a private apartment—let me have a good fire, for I
am exceedingly cold.”
William immediately took him into a room where there was a fire,
saying,—
“If you please to remain here, sir, we will make you a fire and warm
the room; and, as you are cold, perhaps you will prefer this to going
into a room without a fire there already lighted for your reception.”
“Certainly, I much prefer it.”
“Would you like to take any refreshment, sir?” inquired William.
“Not now,” replied the stranger, in mild accents.
William left the room, muttering to himself,—
“Well, he deserves to be a prince; he is as mild and gentlemanly as a
prince. I vow I never heard any one speak in such a tone, and with so
much amiable condescension. What a pity he is so white—at least, that
he is so, I only infer from the nose, and part of the forehead and
cheeks around the eyes—these being the only parts that I have noticed;
he is, indeed, not much unlike, in colour, to the guard’s vulgar
simile—a well scraped horse-radish. I never saw white so opaque and
dead before.”
While those thoughts passed through the mind of William, he saw that
the apartment was placed in readiness for the stranger’s reception,
and placed himself in communication with the proprietor, and obtained
his orders; he then returned to the stranger, and conducted him to his
proper apartment, and then awaited his commands.
The stranger gave him some orders, which were at once executed, and
then he said,—
“I shall sleep here, of course.”
“Yes, sir,” said William.
“I am very particular about my beds—I must have my bed well and
thoroughly aired.”
“Oh, yes, sir,” said William; “we always——”
“Never mind, never mind all that,” said the stranger, blandly. “Never
mind all that; I know what you would say. All your beds are always
aired. Well, be it so—I have no desire to dispute it—but I once slept
in a damp bed—I fell ill, and have never entirely recovered from it.”
“Oh, that makes him look so horrible pale,” thought William.
“So you perceive, my friend, that I have cause to be particular,
and, therefore, you will excuse me when I inquire minutely into the
character of the beds.”
“Oh, certainly, sir—certainly, sir.”
“Then you will see that my bed is aired, will you not?”
“Yes, sir, I will take care that it is especially aired; and, if you
approve of my doing so, sir, I will have a fire lit in your bed-room.”
“If you please. If you will do all this, you will greatly oblige me.
Are there any females in the family?”
“Yes, sir; the servants,” said William, fearing some impropriety was
meant.
“Oh, the servants; and no others?”
“None,” said William, quite suddenly.
“Oh, yes, that is right—none but the servants. Then my requests will
not put you to any serious inconvenience?”
“Not in the least, sir,” said William, pleased to find that the females
had only been inquired about for fear of annoying them.
The stranger sat up in his room, and appeared to be very ill, and ate
and drank but little, though he ordered whatever was requisite for
a liberal individual; and, though taken away untouched, yet it was
clearly understood he would have to pay for it.
The bed was used and approved of, and the tall remarkable looking
stranger expressed himself satisfied to the proprietor of the hotel,
who came to inquire if he should desire anything more or different from
what was already done.
This was at once answered in the negative, and the proprietor retreated
by no means prepossessed in the stranger’s personal appearance, which
was remarkable to a degree—that was noticed by every one in the hotel.
“Winchester is an old town—a city—sir,” said the proprietor, by way of
entering into a conversation with his guest.
“Yes, very old,” said his guest.
“And the cathedral, sir, has been built in part ever since the Saxon
times, and then increased by the Normans.”
“Ay, it is very beautiful; one could wish to lie there, it is so calm
and beautiful,” said the stranger, with a shudder, which he endeavoured
to suppress; and then he added, “The grave-yard is quiet and retired.”
“Yes, sir. You have been in Winchester before?”
“I have,” replied the stranger.
Finding any further attempt at conversation likely to appear
intrusive, the landlord quitted the apartment with a bow, which was
condescendingly returned by the guest, who folded his hands one
over the other, and turned towards the fire, upon which he gazed
thoughtfully for some time in silence.
The strange and ghastly-looking countenance of the stranger had created
quite a sensation among the individuals at the hotel, all of them
declaring they never heard of, or saw anything equal to it in all their
lives. But what was it? How did it happen so? They had seen dead men,
but they had never seen any so ghastly and so fearfully pale.
“He doesn’t seem long for this world,” said one of them.
“If you had said he didn’t belong to this world,” said another, “I
should almost have been inclined to believe you.”
“He does look like a corpse,” added an old woman.
“Yes, and what a tooth he has projecting out in front. Upon my word I
never saw his like.”
“And I,” said another, “never beheld such eyes. Why, he is scarcely
human. Such eyes as those I scarcely wish to look at again.”
“He always appears to me to be in some dreadful agony,” said the cook;
“he really looks as if he had a perpetual pain in his stomach, and had
eaten something that had disagreed with him.”
There was some truth in this last assertion, for the stranger always
did appear as if suffering from some internal pain—mental or physical,
or both—and it was soon seen that he was rapidly losing strength, and
could scarcely walk abroad.
The cause of all this none could tell; possibly, it was only a sudden
illness, or perhaps it was a long affliction, to which he was used to,
and hence the terrible expression upon his countenance, which appeared
as if it had never been otherwise, so deep and so settled was the
expression of pain.
• • • • •
The stranger appeared anxious to get out, but was unable to do so;
he could just walk across the room several times in the day, but was
unable to get down stairs; and whenever he attempted to do so, he sunk
down, his limbs losing the power of sustaining his weight.
“I can go no further,” he muttered to himself, and he endeavoured to
walk down stairs; “I am lost.”
As he spoke, a truly horrible expression came across his countenance,
that made William, who came to his aid, step back terrified.
“You—you are ill, sir,” he said, in somewhat uncertain accents.
“I am ill,” he replied, “very ill.”
“Will you allow me to help you up, sir, to your room?”
“If you please,” said the stranger, who was endeavouring to rise by the
aid of the banisters; and by these, and with William’s assistance, he
got up; and then, with some difficulty, he reached up stairs—his own
bed-room.
“I will send master immediately, sir.”
“You need not be in any hurry,” said the stranger. “I do not desire his
presence.”
However, William left the stranger to seek his master; and when he
found him, he said,—
“Oh, sir, the strange-looking gentleman in No. 5, is very ill.”
“Is he, William? What is the matter with him?”
“I am sure I don’t know, sir; he sank down on the stairs just now, and
could only get up to his room again by my help.”
“Something serious I think, then. I thought he appeared ill when first
I saw him, from the expression of his countenance.”
“Yes, sir; ’tis very strange.”
“Very,” said the landlord, thoughtfully. “I’ll go and see him; but, in
the mean time, you had better send for Doctor Linton, who knows me, and
will come at once.”
“Yes, sir,” said William.
The landlord immediately sought the stranger’s apartment, which he
entered without any ceremony, and advanced to the bed in which the
stranger lay; and, upon his first glance at the occupant, the landlord
stepped back in affright, so truly terrible did the countenance of the
stranger appear.
“Ah,” said the stranger, as he turned his glassy eyes upon him.
“I—I—I have come to see you,” stammered the landlord. “I have come to
see you; my servant informed me you were ill, sir.”
“I am very ill.”
“I feared so, and I have sent for Doctor Linton, who will be here
immediately.”
“It is of no consequence; I believe, I am too far gone to recover.”
Another horrible spasm passed across his countenance.
“What does your illness arise from?”
“Decay of the system. I want renovating,” said the stranger.
The landlord paused; he didn’t understand this at all, for the stranger
did not bear the appearance of decay about him. He was tall, and
seemingly of the middle age, he thought, and nothing about him to
savour of decay, save, indeed, the terrible and remarkable paleness
which his flesh appeared to bear; and his system generally, in other
respects, bore nothing of the appearance of general decay.
“Shall I send for any one, sir? Have you any friends I could write to
for you?”
“None, sir, thank you,” replied the stranger, who, however, bated
nothing of his politeness, even in his present position.
“Have you any desire to see any one in particular?”
“No one, I thank you.”
At that moment Doctor Linton was announced, and the proprietor having
introduced him, left the apartment, leaving the doctor and his
patient together; the former at once perceived, and wondered at his
extraordinary paleness. After a few preliminary questions, he appeared
quite puzzled, and said to him,—
“May I inquire what is the cause of this extraordinary complexion?”
“Certainly,” said the stranger; “it was caused by damp beds.”
“Damp beds,” muttered the doctor, amazed, and hardly comprehending what
was said, or the nature of the reply; he was at a loss, but did not say
so, what was the connexion between cause and effect.
“Yes, damp beds,” said the stranger.
“Have you ever suffered in this way before?” inquired the surgeon.
“Yes, more than once.”
“And you have recovered?” said the doctor, abstractedly.
“I am here,” said the stranger, mildly.
“Truly, you are,” said the surgeon. “I had almost forgotten that, your
case is so singular. Your pulse is very low and irregular.”
“It is,” coolly replied the stranger; but immediately a kind of spasm
shot across him, as he had before exhibited to the landlord.
“Do you feel much pain?—does that often happen?”
“No, only occasionally. I don’t think you are at all likely to benefit
me, sir,” said the stranger, with much courtesy in his manner. “I do
not mean any disrespect to you; but my complaint is a fatal one in our
family.”
“Are you all afflicted in this manner?”
“Yes, all before me died,” replied the stranger; “and when it does come
on, we have no means of avoiding the end that approaches; there is no
medical aid that can be rendered, ever did us any good.”
“You are quite an exception to nature, sir,” said the medical man,
“quite an exception. Your case cannot be beyond the assistance of
medicine—if not to cure, to ameliorate—though its nature may not be
ascertained; but if we could do so, we could tell you what we might be
able to do.”
“That has been attempted before,” said the stranger, mildly; “and hence
it is I am loth to give you needless trouble.”
“Well, I will call upon you, and see you again; but you ought to take
some medicine. I am persuaded that it is some great and extraordinary
derangement of the system—a complete sinking of the whole system.”
“Most undoubtedly it is a sinking in the whole system—a sinking which
has never yet been stopped by human aid. But you can pursue what course
you may deem proper.”
“Will you take medicines if I send any?”
“Yes,” replied the patient; “I will take them when you choose to send
them.”
“I will endeavour to send you something that shall infuse something
like vitality into the system, that will indeed help you to rally.”
“That will, indeed, be doing something more than was ever yet done by
any one who attended any individual of our family. I feel I am very
weak, and am sinking fast, and do not expect that I shall again have
the honour of seeing you.”
As he again spoke, the same spasm seized upon him; his frame was
convulsed for more than an minute, and his pallid features appeared to
give forth expressions which it was impossible to describe.
The doctor paused, and gazed with something like fear and awe upon
him. He had never before seen such a case so destitute of facts, nor
yet such a man; it was quite beyond his experience; there was nothing
like it in all his previous experience; there was no apparent cause
for all that he saw. It might be some severe chronic disorder which
did not manifest itself outwardly. If this were the case, it was most
extraordinary.
But more extraordinary than all was, apart from the medical question,
the strange and terrible appearance of the stranger; his paleness—the
terrible expression of his features—the strange, and even revolting
cast of his eyes, that completely baffled all his attempts to
understand them, or to remember anything he had ever heard of, or seen.
The stranger languidly turned in his bed, and then closed his eyes,
leaving his medical attendant to his reflections.
“Well,” muttered Doctor Linton, as he looked at his incomprehensible
patient. “I never met with so fearful a human puzzle before. I never
saw such an expression of countenance in all my life; nor did ever I
meet with such a case. Had he been one of the fabled monsters of old,
the creation of the German mind, he could not have been more unlike a
human being, to wear a human form.”
As he spoke, he quitted the room, and made his way to the proprietor of
the hotel, who was as anxiously waiting to see him, as he was to meet
him.
“Well, doctor, what do you think of the patient?”
“Why, I don’t know what to think. I never saw such a man before in all
my life—I cannot make him out.”
“Nor I. I can’t understand what he means or what he is.”
“Nor anybody else. But he is quite a gentleman; and yet there is
something very frightful to be seen in him. I don’t know why it is, I
don’t care about going oftener to him than I am obliged.”
“I don’t doubt it. There was something in the feel of his hand more
like a corpse than anything I ever felt before.”
“Indeed—it is a queer affair.”
“Do you know him?”
“No, I do not,” replied the proprietor. “He has not been here more than
two days; and when he entered he had that deadly paleness which he has
now.”
“Did he indeed. It is, I dare say, natural to him, though it must
create an unpleasant sensation, go where he would.”
“He must feel it to be so, no doubt; but, at the same time, he could
not avoid it. Have you come to any conclusion respecting his complaint?”
“I have not indeed; I will send him some medicine; though, to tell you
the truth, I can hardly tell what is the matter with him. His disorder
seems to consist of a rapid sinking of the whole system, accompanied by
a few minor symptoms, and a spasm, which must be very painful; for it
produces an extraordinary effect upon his visage, and his eyes glisten
like a piece of tin.”
“That’s it, doctor. Do you know, I have been thinking for something to
which I could liken those eyes to, but could not do it. When do you see
him again?”
“To-morrow, some time; in the mean time I must bid you good day, for my
presence is wanted in the Dundrum family.”
“Oh, have you any of them for a patient?”
“Yes, two. Good day—good day.”
“Good day, doctor,” said the proprietor of the hotel, as he bowed the
doctor out, and then, returning to his own apartment, he wondered, in
his own mind, at all that had been said by that learned individual,
when William entered his room with a hastiness of manner quite unusual
to him.
“What is the matter, William?”
“Oh, sir—I beg your pardon—but the strange gentleman——”
“Eh!—Well!—What?”
“Why, he’s dying, and wants to see you, sir.”
“To see me, William—and dying!”
“Yes, sir—it’s very sudden—but good Lord, how dreadful he looks. He
clasped his hands and shook—it made the bed shake and the windows
rattle, just as if an earthquake were taking place.”
“Goodness me!” muttered the proprietor, who immediately quitted the
apartment, and followed William to that of the stranger, who lay in
the same attitude as that described by William; but he was evidently
endeavouring to repress all nervous emotion, and by the time he
was spoken to, he succeeded in this endeavour completely, and lay
apparently calm and collected for the landlord’s appearance.
“I believe you sent for me,” said that worthy, in a subdued tone.
“Yes; I wish to speak a word to you before I die.”
“Die!” said the landlord, with a start. “No, no, you cannot mean
that—you will get better—you are deceived.”
“No, no; do not endeavour to persuade me from believing what I know is
the truth. I shall die, and that, too, before many hours.”
“If the case is so urgent, let me send to Mr. Linton; he cannot have
gone far, and he will return.”
“Nay, do not do that; his aid is utterly useless—utterly.”
“He is a clever man; but still, if your own feelings tell you that you
can’t live, allow me to send for a clergyman.”
“My friend,” said the stranger, “I have settled all that in my own
mind. My affairs are all made up, my account is cast, and I shall learn
the balance where I am going to. I wish, while I have breath, to beg a
favour of you.”
“Anything on earth that I can do, I will,” said the landlord.
“Nay, I do not desire—all—that—I—I only want you to—to—to—promise me
you’ll—attend to my funeral.”
“All shall be done as you desire.”
“My breath—I feel it going. I have money enough about me; you will find
in my pocket-book and purse, a certain sum.”
“Yes, sir—yes.”
“And with that you will have the goodness to liquidate my debt to
yourself, my funeral expenses, and place the residue of that sum about
my person.”
“When you are dead!” exclaimed the landlord.
“Yes; will you promise me—will you swear to see it done?”
“Yes, I will—I do swear.”
“See you keep the oath; my breath is going fast—my strength is leaving
me—and—and——”
“I will do all.” said the landlord again. “Will you have any friend
attend your funeral obsequies? It’s melancholy, but I am obliged to
speak of it to you, because I cannot otherwise know your wishes.”
“Do not mind that,” said the stranger, turning towards the landlord;
“but when I am dead, dress me in my clothes, just as if I were about to
walk; let me have all my property and my money—such of it as remains
after paying all charges—the remainder cause to be placed about
my person—in fact, all that belongs to me; and place—me—and place
me—me—me——”
“Where—where would you be buried?” said the landlord.
“Place me,” gasped the dying man; “place me in the—the——”
A gurgling noise, succeeded by a sharp rattle in the throat, was all
the sound that escaped him, while his glazed eyes were fixed, with a
truly horrifying expression, upon the features of the landlord, whose
presence of mind appeared to forsake him, and he exclaimed, falling on
his knees in affright,—
“Lord, have mercy upon us, what a dreadful affair!”
“Horrible, sir,” said William.
“Oh! are you here, William?” inquired the landlord.
“Yes, sir,” replied that individual.
“Oh, I’m glad of that; did you see him die?”
“I did, sir. How dreadful!”
“Very; but I am glad you were here, because he has made some singular
requests about burying him, and in a certain manner, with all his
clothes on and his jewels and money about him. Now I should be
considered foolish if I did anything of the kind; but I have promised,
and as he has no friends, I will do what I have promised.”
“It is very good of you, sir; though I think he has been very silly in
making such a request; yet you cannot be so considered for performing
the wish of a dying man; it is the duty of any one so promising to
perform it.”
“Quite right, William, quite right; but did you understand what he
meant by his last words? I mean, where he wished to be buried.”
“I don’t know positively, sir, but I think he meant the cathedral—I
thought so, at least. I am not sure he said so, but I believe he meant
to do so.”
“Well, I think so myself; and in the cathedral he shall be buried; but
it is a terrible-looking corpse. I’m sure I could not sleep in the same
room with him. Poor fellow! What he’ll come to at last there is no
telling.”
“Yes, sir; he does look dreadful.”
“You needn’t tell anybody we have a dead customer in the hotel,
William.”
“No, sir.”
“Because people might be curious, and wish to see him, and if they were
to do so, I am sure they would leave the house.”
“So they would, sir. He’s a dreadful-looking corpse. I never heard
of such a one. What can be the cause of it?—and to be buried in his
clothes, too!”
“Ay, and his money and his jewels; that is very strange!”
“Very strange, sir, indeed; and the fewer persons who know of it the
better, else the body will not lie very long in its grave. There will
be those who would not mind turning resurrection-men for the value of
what he had about him.”
“So there would be, William; and now I think of it, the authorities of
the cathedral shall know nothing about it; for who can tell what fancy
they may take concerning it being an unchristian burial?”
“And yet, sir, he paid all his debts like a Christian.”
“Yes; and left a remembrance for the waiter.”
“There could not be a more Christian act than that, for who could be
more Christian-like than to remember the waiter?” and William at once
admitted the truth of the assertion, and they both left the room, and
instructions were given to William to obtain the proper aid respecting
the funeral, and an order was given to the undertaker to come and
measure the corpse for its last garment.
All these things were duly attended to, and kept secret, so that a
very few persons were aware of the fact that so strange an occurrence
had taken place in the good city of Winchester, much less were they
acquainted with the precise locality of the very house in which the
occurrence took place.
When the morning arrived on which the funeral was to take place, some
persons were surprised to behold a couple of mutes standing side by
side at the door of the Star hotel, and there had been no previous
signs of mourning.
The hearse and one mourning coach, however, was all that attended, into
which one solitary mourner entered. There were several others made up
for the occasion, to give the cavalcade an uniform appearance.
The body was carried down by eight men. It was very heavy, and the men
bent beneath the load they bore, and when it was placed in the hearse,
the one mourner got in, and they proceeded towards the cathedral, which
was quite close at hand.
A few—very few minutes served to bring them to the goal, and before the
entrance of the cathedral they stopped, and out came the undertakers,
who contrived, with much exertion, to carry the body into the church;
and then, after some preliminary ceremonies, it was conducted into the
vaults, where it was deposited, and the burial service was said over
it most duly and solemnly, and then left, it was presumed, safe and
secure, to abide its final doom at the day of judgment.
But many thoughts prove but the shadow of our wishes, and this seemed
but as a mocking shadow; as our readers are aware by this time of what
actually took place in the dead of the night.
“In what name was the deceased registered—the burial, I mean?” inquired
the clergyman, whose memory, like some of his other faculties, was
obscured by age.
“His name was Francis Varney,” replied the chief-mourner, who was no
other than the proprietor of the Star hotel.
CHAPTER CXLV.
A RURAL SCENE BY MOONLIGHT.—THE STORM.—AN ACCIDENT ON THE ROAD.—A
NEW AND STRANGE ACQUAINTANCE ACQUIRED.—A DISAPPOINTMENT.
It was one of those pleasant, moonlight evenings that are frequently
felt, as well as seen, towards the end of August, that a party of
individuals sat in a travelling-carriage, and were proceeding at an
easy pace on one of the cross-roads that run from Winchester to Bath,
and also from Southampton, the Isle of Wight, between Salisbury—more
properly speaking—and Bath.
The evening was lovely; the day had been sultry, and the sun had not
been gone down so long but that the heat of his rays yet remained.
Indeed, though the moon gave light, yet the radiated heat from the
earth, first received from the sun, was so great, that the light
evening breeze barely tempered the air.
The party thus proceeding had been spending a few weeks in rambling
about Southampton, Portsmouth, and Salisbury, and were now
wending their way to the city of Bath. They consisted of but four
individuals,—Captain Fraser, his wife, her sister, and younger brother.
The latter did not count more than twelve years, while the sister, Miss
Stevens, was just seventeen years of age.
Captain Fraser had scarce been married six months, and was upon one
of the early matrimonial jaunts which often take place in the earlier
part of the married life, when all is sunshine, and the matrimonial
barometer might always have the index nailed to “set fair” at such
periods.
The lady’s sister and brother were residing with her; for their parents
were dead, and hence they, the captain and his lady, were their natural
protectors.
They were riding in an open carriage, the head parted, and thrown back;
and even in this manner they felt the evening air was scarcely, though
riding, cool.
“I don’t think,” said Mrs. Fraser to her husband, “that ever I beheld
so beautiful a scene. The time—the warmth of the air—the occasional
delicious feel of the light evening breeze—the serene light of the
moon; altogether, I never felt so comfortable, or, I may add, so happy
as I do at this moment.”
“I am glad to hear you say so,” said the captain; “it gives me an
additional pleasure to find I can please you.”
“Now, Fraser, that is too bad of you.”
“What is too bad, my dear?” said the captain, inquiringly.
“Why, to say you are glad you can please. That is as bad as to say that
it is a very difficult matter; and you know I am very easily pleased,
especially when you make the attempt,” said Mrs. Fraser.
“Well, we will not quarrel about that, my dear. But I must say, with
you, this hour, time, and place are all one could desire, and such as
we seldom meet; the scene across the country is truly beautiful!”
“Yes,” said Miss Stevens; “it is beautiful, as far as we can see.”
“What river is that yonder?” inquired the brother.
“That is the Willey; the same that we saw at Salisbury,” said Captain
Fraser.
“Indeed! I thought that came from another direction more northerly.”
“That was another arm of the same river, and joined this about there,
and all the low grounds on this side of yon hills are called the Valley
of the Willey; and a beautiful little vale it is, too, fruitful and
picturesque.”
“How beautiful the moonbeams glisten on yonder water!”
“They do; but not so strongly as they did.”
“No. What is the reason of that? The air appears to darken. I have
noticed it for some minutes past. Why is that?”
“I suppose it is caused by the evaporation from the grounds and heavy
dews, to compensate for the want of rain that usually takes place at
this time of the year.”
“Then we shall be obliged to shut up the carriage, for the dew is more
likely to cause cold than anything else.”
“It is so; but we are upon comparatively high ground here; and,
moreover, they will not reach us yet; but, here are shawls; you can
wrap up if you feel chilly, or you can put on your veils.”
“It is yet so warm,” said Miss Stevens, “that I should be reluctant to
put on any more clothing yet-awhile.”
“Do as you please, but do not take cold,” said Captain Fraser. “How
indistinct the scene becomes around; the river, which we just now saw
so plain, is quite obscured, and you can scarcely tell where it is,
save here and there, where the doddered willows appear, and which mark
out the course of the stream.”
“It is so,” said the youth. “I can just see the green tops of the trees
appear above the thick mist that rises from the river below.”
“Exactly; that is the fact.”
“And see how it spreads itself over the cornfields and meadows.”
“Was that not a flash of light?” said Mrs. Fraser, suddenly.
“Light! I saw no light,” said the captain.
“Nor I,” said the youth; “did you, sister?”
“No, I did not do so; but it is very sultry, and therefore it is very
likely just at this time of the year. How much farther have we to
travel before we stop for the night?”
“I suppose seven or eight miles, not more.”
“There, that was no mistake, however,” said Mrs. Fraser, as a flash of
light shot across the heavens, and left not a trace behind it.
“No, there was no mistake about it; nor did I think so before,” said
Captain Fraser, “only I have not noticed it; but it is harmless—it is
what is called summer lightning, and has none of the ordinary results
of lightning.”
“It will possibly make the air cool,” suggested Mrs. Fraser, “and,
in that case, we shall have a more agreeable temperature; to tell
the truth, the extreme warmth and dryness of the air gives a strange
uneasiness to the body.”
“Another flash—ah, that’s a change in its character.”
“Yes; that is the blue-forked lightning, and I am much mistaken if we
do not have a sudden change—hark!”
At that moment, a sullen and deep rumbling was heard in the heavens,
followed by another flash, and then such a peal of thunder that boomed
and rattled through the air in a manner that startled the dull echoes
of the night, and made the welkin resound with the fearful sounds that
filled the heavens.
“We shall have a fall of rain in another moment,” said Captain Fraser;
“push on, drive on, and let us get out of this as soon as we can.”
“Aye, aye, sir,” said the driver, and crack went his whip—the horses
increased their speed, and they rattled on at a good pace.
“Had we better not stop and have the hood closed?”
“No,” said the captain; “I can manage that very well, with the
assistance of your brother, and we shall not lose time.”
Captain Fraser, and the young gentleman alluded to, brought the
coach-top up and secured it, just as a heavy shower descended in such
torrents that they could scarcely hear themselves speak, so heavily did
it rattle upon the leathern covering of the vehicle, and they sat for
some time in silence.
Soon, however, the thunder and lightning filled the air with sounds
and flashes in a manner that began to create a feeling of alarm in the
minds of the ladies, and some uneasiness in the mind of the captain;
not upon their account only, but because the cattle might take flight
under the circumstances, especially as they were fresh, and had now
scarcely run three or four miles; for their stage was a long one before
they reached their destination, which was now about two days’ easy
journeys.
The thunder and lightning appeared to become more and more terrible;
the storm, indeed, appeared to increase rather than diminish
in intensity; the very centre of the storm appeared to be fast
approaching, and making the spot upon which they stood the pivot on
which it turned; its fury increased, and with it the horses were each
moment becoming more and more unmanageable. Though in some measure
aware of the fact, Captain Fraser kept his place, fearful lest he
should alarm his wife, and at the same time distract the coachman.
Suddenly there was a bright and vivid flash of light, such as they
had not seen before, but which illumined the whole place around them,
and made everything as visible as if placed in the strongest light
imaginable, followed by such a crashing peal of thunder that the living
earth appeared to rock again.
It wanted but this to make the horses perfectly ungovernable, and they
dashed away at a furious speed along the road.
“Good heavens! the horses have taken fright,” said Mrs. Fraser, as she
became aware of the speed they were going at.
[Illustration: The carriage speeds through the storm.]
“They have merely taken fright, my dear,” said the captain, unwilling
to increase their alarm by informing them of his own; “he will keep
them in the middle of the road, and we shall be at our journey’s end
the sooner, and the more so the better.”
They were upon the point of being satisfied, when the jolts of the
carriage, added to its eccentric course from one side of the road to
the other, attracted so much of their attention that Miss Stevens said,—
“See, captain, how the carriage sways from side to side; we shall all
be over in another minute or two—we shall all be killed!”
“There goes the thunder again, worse than your kettle drums,” said
young Stevens, who appeared to think it rather a joke; “the lightning
flashes, too, as if we had got into an electrical machine.”
“Do not talk in that way, Charles, for goodness sake,” exclaimed his
younger sister. “We shall all be killed presently.”
“I hope not,” said Captain Fraser, “though I admit it looks serious;
but all you can do, and the best under all the circumstances, is to
remain calm and quiet, and see what happens.”
“See what happens! Dear me, captain, what do you think we are all made
of that we should sit calm,” said Miss Stevens, “and see what will
happen, when there may be broken limbs, at the least, if not death?”
“It is the best advice I can give you.”
“Had we better not get out—I don’t mind trying?”
“Aye, if you wish to run imminent risk of instant and violent death,
you will make the attempt; if you remain in here shut up, you have
every probability that, if we do have an upset, which is not yet
certain, we may all escape with but a little fright, or at most a few
bruises.”
“Yes, sister; you had better wait for the worst, if the worst must
happen, rather than rush into it.”
This was sensible advice, and the whole party fell into a deep silence,
which was unbroken save by the sounds of wheels, the rattling of the
carriage, the rain, and the roar of thunder, enough to employ their
minds, and at the same time to keep them in momentary dread of the
fearful catastrophe.
Suddenly there was a crash and dreadful jolt; they knew not what had
happened, except they felt that the vehicle was turned over.
In a moment more the door was opened, and a stranger lent assistance in
getting out the unfortunate travellers.
“Do not be alarmed, ladies,” said a strange, but courteous voice. “No
further mischief can happen now, beyond inconvenience.”
As the stranger spoke, he lifted the two ladies out of the carriage,
and placed them in a sheltered position by the body.
“Are you hurt?” inquired the stranger, as he assisted Captain Fraser
and young Stevens out of the fallen carriage.
“No, sir, I am not; I thank you for your timely aid. Where are the
ladies?”
“There they are; I hope, uninjured.”
Captain Fraser immediately ran up to them, and, seeing them in safety,
said,—
“I am glad to see you are safe. I was stunned at first by a blow on the
side of my head.”
“Yes, we are safe; but we have to thank this gentleman that we have
been so speedily and so easily extricated from our unpleasant prison.”
“I am much indebted, sir, for your aid to the ladies. May I trespass
upon your kindness to lend me a little further assistance?”
“I shall be happy to assist you under these unpleasant circumstances;
but, allow me to suggest as the first thing, that the cushions be
placed under the hedge for the use of the ladies, and what cloaks or
coats you have should be thrown over them.”
“Right, sir; I thank you.”
“If you are deficient in them, my cloak is at their service, though I
am afraid that it is almost saturated.”
“I have enough here,” said Captain Fraser, as he pulled out several
articles of that nature; and then he, with the assistance of the
stranger, placed them so that Mrs. Fraser and sister were almost, if
not entirely, sheltered from the storm.
“Now,” said the stranger, “the first thing that can be done will be to
right the carriage, and place it in a position where it will receive no
further damage.”
“But the driver and horses,” said Captain Fraser, “I must look after
them. Had we better not look after them? He may be dying.”
“By no means,” said the stranger; “he will do very well; if we place
the carriage upright, we shall be able to replace the ladies.”
“We can,” said the captain, who appeared to be divided between the
duties of humanity and the tender anxiety he felt for his wife.
“Exactly,” said the stranger; “and permit me to suggest that he has
either gone on beyond our aid, or does not require it.”
“It is possible.”
“And very probable,” said the stranger; “but if you prefer it, and
think the ladies will not suffer, we can walk on ahead till we come up
with them, if they stop before the end of the stage.”
“No, no, sir; you are quite right; I will get the carriage up if you
can so far assist me; we shall then place the ladies in comparative
safety.”
“We shall so.”
They immediately walked round the carriage, and examined its position,
as well as they were able, when, to the captain’s great relief, he
found that it was still on its wheels, though the body was thrown over
on its side.
“How can it have happened?” inquired the captain.
“I cannot well see,” replied the stranger; “but you will perceive
something must have caught the off-side wheel, and turned the whole
of the fore carriage that way, which has left this corner of the body
without support; added to which, the speed or momentum it must have
acquired in its course, has thrown it over.”
“Precisely. I see now how it is; but if we get the body up, it will
fall again over on this side, since it has no support.”
“Oh, yes, it will remain up, since it has lost all force, all moving
power; unless, indeed, any of the straps are broken. We can try.”
“Here, Charles,” said Captain Fraser, “we shall want your aid.”
“Oh,” said the stranger, “the slightest assistance is valuable; it is
the last strain or effort that may complete the removal. Now, if we can
lift it up from this side, we shall soon right it, and then the fore
carriage can be forced round, and the ladies replaced, until we can
better dispose of them.”
The stranger placed his shoulder to the carriage, as well as the
captain and his brother-in-law, young Stevens, and thus aided, he soon
lifted it up into its old position, and there it remained very quietly.
“Now we had better pull the wheels round.”
This was done, and the carriage assumed its former state.
“Well, how could they have got away?” inquired Captain Fraser,
examining the axles and the bars; “all appears right.”
“They have broken the splinter-bar, and here are the remains of the
traces. The splinter-bar, I find, has only lost its hooks, so it will
do again. Come, sir, you have less damage to regret than I at first
thought it possible you could have escaped with; I am truly glad it is
so.”
“Thank you, sir; your kindness and assistance has been truly great and
efficient; but I have yet to find the poor fellow who drove us.”
“We will seek after him; or, I had better ride on to the next town or
house where I can obtain assistance, while you will be better able to
protect the ladies by remaining with them, and my horse will carry me
quickly enough.”
“Oh! you are mounted.”
“I am; but the ladies wait.”
Thus admonished, the captain turned to the ladies, and, with the
stranger’s assistance, he conducted them back to the carriage, where
they were replaced, without any material damage or misfortune of any
kind, save what might arise from fright.
“Some one is coming this way,” said the stranger. “If I mistake not,
they are your runaways, by the sounds.”
They listened, and distinctly heard the sounds of horses’ feet coming
along, with the jingling of harness, that made it pretty certain that
what the stranger said was correct, and that it was most probable
that this was indeed the man who drove them coming back with the same
cattle, or some fresh.
A few moments more decided the speculation, and the man himself rode
up, and looked at the carriage, saying,—
“Well, I thought it was upset.”
“So it was, but we have righted it now. Has no accident happened to
you? But these are the same horses!”
“Yes, sir. When they got loose, or broke away, they went as if they
were shot out of a gun, and away they went for some miles, until I
contrived to stop them, which was a hard job; however, I thought then,
as there was nothing the matter with them or with me, I had better
return and see what was become of you, sir, and the ladies.”
“Quite right. Do you think they will go quietly in the harness again?”
“Oh, yes—oh, yes, sir.”
“Then we will harness them, and go on to the end of the next stage,
when we can see exactly what mischief, if any, has been done.”
This was immediately put in practice, and they were soon harnessed,
the broken straps and traces being mended in the best way time and
circumstances admitted, but effectually enough for the present purpose.
“Now, sir,” said Captain Fraser, “do you continue this road, or the one
we have come? I suppose we must have overtaken you, as you were coming
this way.”
“No; I was a traveller going in the same direction. I saw your speed
from a distance, and, believing your horses to have taken fright, I
rode on, and, being well mounted, I overtook you just as the accident
happened.”
“Then we may have the pleasure of your company on the road for some
distance to come, I hope, sir?”
“As far as the next place to stop at, at all events; for I do not
desire to travel further than I can avoid to-night.”
“Then I shall be able to thank you more at leisure, and at a better
opportunity than at present,” said the captain.
“Do not name it; I am too happy to have had it in my power to render
you any assistance. Shall I ride on and secure you proper accommodation
when you do arrive there?”
“You kindness is very great,” said the captain again. “I am much
beholden to you; but if we can get as far as we hoped to do, we shall
not require it; there will be sufficient for travellers under the
ordinary course of events. We shall do very well; and if we should not
be able to get so far, we must make ourselves content with whatever
chance accommodation we get on the road.”
“Then we will journey for that distance in company,” said the stranger,
as he mounted his horse, which had stood quietly by while the tall
stranger rendered the timely assistance he had to them.
They proceeded along now at a cautious pace. The weather had abated,
and the rain was now less severe; the thunder only heard in the
distance; while the lightning could only be seen in occasional flashes
in the distance, in a direction away from them. The clouds began to
lighten, and then the diffused light of the moon came and shed a gentle
light upon the scene, though it was very scarce, and of comparative
little use save it enabled them to see their way all the better.
The roads were good, and they travelled onwards with some increase of
speed; and finding none of their amended horse-tackle had given way,
they still kept journeying onwards at the same pace.
Time brought them to their destination, and when they arrived at the
inn at which they were to stop for the night, they found it had not
made much more than an hour or an hour and a half’s difference.
When they were fairly housed, the stranger took an apartment to
himself. It was while he sat before the fire that Captain Fraser
entered his room.
“I must apologise for my intrusion,” began the captain.
“Do not say a word on that head, sir,” said the stranger; “it is no
intrusion—you are welcome. Be seated, if you please; I am alone, and
perfectly at leisure.”
“I have come to thank you for the service you have done us, and to beg
that you will sup with us, and permit the ladies to have an opportunity
of thanking their preserver in person. You will oblige us all by
accepting the invitation.”
“I am much obliged for your courteous offer,” said the stranger, who
was a tall, dignified man. “I will come after supper, if you please,
and shall feel it a great honour, I assure you; but I am so truly
sensible that my efforts were more owing to accident than to anything
else, that I do not wish to hear anything more of it.”
“You must not be so self-denying, sir. We do not wish to put any more
merit on your act than we think it deserves; but that much you must
accept, if you will permit me to use such a word. Shall we have the
pleasure of your company?”
“After supper.”
“I will not press you against your feelings; but you will come in after
supper, sir? I hope I may have the pleasure of drinking a bottle of
wine with you. Will you come?”
“I will, sir, and thank you for the honour.”
“May I have the pleasure of being able to introduce you to the ladies
by name?” said the captain, with a little hesitation.
“Certainly—certainly. I beg your pardon. I am somewhat forgetful; I
forgot I had not passed through an introduction,” said the stranger.
“Permit me to give you my card.”
As he spoke, he handed Captain Fraser a beautifully-embossed card, upon
which was printed, in Italian characters,—“Sir Francis Varney.”
Captain Fraser took the card and read the name, and then, passing
a compliment, he said, that since he could not have his company to
supper, then he should expect him when he felt at leisure and disposed
to do so.
• • • • •
“My dear,” said Captain Fraser to his wife, when he returned to his
apartment, “our new friend will not come to supper but will take a
glass of wine with me afterwards.”
“I am sorry he will not come; though, under other circumstances, I
should have been glad of it; but I am sorry on this occasion.”
“And why would you have been glad?”
“Because, after the flurry and upset we had, I am hardly fit to see any
one, much less a stranger; but he so kindly and promptly rescued us
from our danger, that I cannot feel reluctance at any time.”
“Yes,” said her sister; “and I must say I never heard a voice that
sounded so really like a gentleman’s—indeed, I could fancy that any
one could positively assert that he was a gentleman, only from hearing
him speak, without seeing him at all; but, be that as it may, I felt
convinced he was such.”
“He is very courteous, I must say,” said Mrs. Fraser.
“And who do you think he is?”
“I have no means of forming any judgment.”
“Well, then, he is Sir Francis Varney.”
“Sir Francis Varney! Well, I do not know the name; I never heard the
name before that time; but I think there was some one of that name in
the time of Queen Elizabeth—an attendant on the Earl of Leicester.”
“Are you not joking?”
“Indeed I am not; I have read so.”
“And you think this gentleman may be a descendant of his?”
“There is no impossibility nor improbability about it, that I see,”
said Mrs. Fraser; “but I am the more obliged to him for his timely
assistance. I am sure it was fortunate that he was so close at hand.”
“Yes, it was very fortunate. Mary, my dear, we shall be introduced to a
baronet. It is quite a prophecy of yours in saying he was a gentleman
when you only heard him speak. By the way, Fraser, what sort of a man
is he?”
“Very singular indeed.”
“Singular! Ay—he is very tall.”
“Yes, he is tall; but very pale; more remarkable and dignified than
handsome; extremely courteous and polite.”
“What age is he?”
“Well, I cannot tell; perhaps forty, perhaps not so old by ten years;
it is quite impossible to say.”
“Dear me, how strange! I think I could guess anybody’s age better than
that.”
“You shall have an opportunity of doing so, then, in an hour or so,
when he will come; and I think I may venture upon saying you will be
pleased with his dignified politeness, and say he is much superior to
most men.”
• • • • •
The supper ended, and the wine was produced, and Captain Fraser, his
lady, and two young relatives, were seated round a good fire—for
the storm had chilled the air; besides, the damp they had stood in
rendered such a precaution necessary and pleasant, notwithstanding the
day had been sultry; but the change in the temperature was sudden and
great—awaiting, with something like impatience, the stranger’s arrival.
“He does not appear to come,” said Charles Stevens.
“He is not here, certainly; but he will come, no doubt, the moment he
is quite sure that we had done our supper, and he had finished his own;
perhaps he takes longer than we.”
“Perhaps so; but I am strongly tempted to go to him again.”
“It might be construed into undue urgency, or something of the sort,”
said Mrs. Fraser; “and yet he might be waiting for something of the
sort.”
“So he might,” said the captain. “At all events, I will go and see; if
he were inclined to do so under other circumstances, he would not take
offence under the present.”
“Perhaps not.”
At that moment the door was opened, and the waiter presented a note.
“A note for me?” said Captain Fraser.
“Yes, sir.”
“Who can it be from?”
“From the gentleman up stairs, sir, who came with you an hour back.”
“Oh!” exclaimed Captain Fraser.
“He was taken ill, and obliged to go to bed, sir.”
Captain Fraser immediately tore open the note, and read as follows:—
+Sir+,—I deeply regret I cannot keep my promise to take a glass of wine
with you, and have the honour of being introduced to the ladies. Favour
me so far as to make my excuses to them. It is a great pleasure lost to
me on the occasion; permit me to say deferred, rather than lost; and if
I might venture to make an appointment, under the circumstances, I can
only say that, if convenient, I should be happy to breakfast with you,
and then have the honour and happiness I have now the misfortune to
lose.
Sudden and severe indisposition alone have caused me to retire before
I had the honour of seeing you, and expressing my inability to attend
you.—Yours, obliged,
“+Francis Varney+.”
There was a blank upon the countenances of all present. Evidently a
deep disappointment was felt by all; but the captain was especially
surprised, and, turning to the waiter, he said,—
“Did you see this gentleman?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Was he unwell?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I mean, was he, or is he, dangerously ill?”
“He was very ill, sir; but I don’t know that he is dangerously ill. He
suffered much pain, and he was obliged to have aid to go up stairs.”
“Did he say what it was that ailed him?” pursued Captain Fraser.
“Not that I heard; though some said he had got the cramp and cold by
being too long in the wet.”
“Perhaps so—very likely—very likely—that will do. Let me know how he is
the first thing in the morning; do you hear?”
“Yes, sir, I will take care.”
“Well,” said Mrs. Fraser, when they were alone, “I did not expect
such a disappointment this evening. However, he makes up for it
by appointing the breakfast hour for our meeting; it is the more
agreeable, as we shall have had a good night’s repose, and shall be the
better able to appear to advantage.”
CHAPTER CXLVI.
THE ALARM AT THE INN.—BED-CHAMBER TERRORS.—A NIGHT SCENE.—A MORNING
SUCCEEDING TO A NIGHT OF ADVENTURE.
The inmates of the inn are all fast bound in sleep. The senses of all
seem steeped in deep forgetfulness; even the hour of dreams was passed.
The storm, which had raged so violently in the early part of the
evening, and which had appeared to have gone and a calm succeeded, had
returned, and the fury of the blast was only equalled by the deluging
rain and the fearful rumbling of the thunder.
But calmly slept the beautiful and innocent Mary Stevens. She was
young, and her mind bore no weight of care; when she slept no dreams
disturbed her rest, but a calm, death-like sleep sat upon her soul, and
steeped it in forgetfulness.
The storm raged around, but she heard it not; she was unconscious of
it. Perhaps the disturbance and fatigues of the previous day caused a
greater degree of depth to her insensibility, and rendered her mind
less liable to slight interruptions. But she slept soundly, and even
did not hear the intruder who walked across the floor of her bedroom,
and stood gazing on her fair arms as she lay sleeping.
The intruder was a tall man, enveloped in some strange mantle, all
white. He stooped over her, as if he listened to the beating of her
heart, while his strangely bright eyes, which shone fearfully, appeared
to express a horrible kind of joy, too terrible for human nature to
contemplate.
He stooped—he placed his hand upon her heart, and felt its pulsations,
and a terrible and ghastly smile passed over his features, while a
movement of the lips and mouth generally, appeared as if anticipatory
of a coming meal.
Then he took the white arm in his hands, and cast a longing look at
the features of the maiden, who appeared disturbed by the rude action,
and moved in her sleep, and was suddenly aroused from her slumber by a
severe pang in her arm, as though some creature had plunged its fangs
into her flesh.
She started up, and found herself flung upon the bed with gigantic
strength. She screamed, and uttered scream upon scream.
The old inn was filled with sounds of terror and pain. There was a loud
knocking heard at the door. Then, indeed, the assailant left his prey
to provide for his own safety; but it was almost too late, for the
door was burst open violently, as he made for another means of exit,
which was the means by which he had entered the apartment; but he was
prevented, and, as the first person entered the apartment, he threw him
down by placing something in his way. The light was thrown against some
furniture, which immediately rose up into a flame.
“Help! help! Fire! fire!”
These were fearful sounds, such as had never before been heard in that
place, and the inmates, woke up by the screams from deep slumber, were
startled and terrified at these sounds, and springing at once from
their beds, echoed the sounds as they run wildly about from place to
place.
“Where is the fire? What’s the matter?”
“Fire in the young lady’s room.”
All eyes were directed to that quarter, and in another instant there
were several persons rushing to the room, the glare of the fire in
which at once attracted their observation, and they rushed to the
rescue; among the foremost of whom was Sir Francis Varney, whose
bedchamber was not far distant from Mary Steven’s. He rushed to the
bed, and wrapping the bed-clothes round her, he carried her out of
the room and the scene of danger, and, as he came out of the room, he
inquired,—
[Illustration: Sir Francis Varney carries the girl from the fire.]
“Where is Captain Fraser?”
“Here—here I am, Sir Francis,” said the captain, coming hastily forward.
“Then, Captain, Fraser, I resign my charge up to you—you are her
proper protector; but I must apologise for my hasty intrusion into her
apartment.”
“Do not think of speaking in that manner, Sir Francis; we are already
indebted to you for our lives, and now we are again your debtor. Your
ready aid has twice saved the young lady.”
Captain Fraser took Miss Stevens from Sir Francis, and then carried
her, as she was quite insensible, to his own room to his wife, her
sister, where she was laid upon the bed, and found to be quite
insensible.
There was much confusion in the inn—people were running about from
place to place, and tumbling over each other in the confusion of
thought; and the moments were precious, for many were running about,
yet none did effective service, though all were willing enough to do
all that could be done by them under the circumstances.
“You had better get some water,” said Varney, “as quickly as you can.
It is useless to run about and stare at each other. Get all the buckets
you can. Be quick about it. There may yet be time enough to save the
inn, and keep the fire to the room where it is; but that time will soon
be at an end.”
Instantly two or three of the men ran down and got a plentiful supply
of water, and then, under the direction of Sir Francis Varney, the fire
was very soon got under, and the flames were extinguished.
Then came an inquiry how the fire had first appeared.
“Do you know how it happened?” inquired Sir Francis Varney, of the
innkeeper, who stood quite mute with astonishment at the scene before
him.
“Know, sir!” said the innkeeper. “I don’t know anything. I don’t know
myself. I don’t even know where I am, or what’s the matter.”
“Then I beg to tell you, sir,” said Varney, with much suavity of
manner, “then I beg to tell you, sir, that there has been a fire in
your inn—a young lady frightened out of her senses, and I know not the
cause.”
“No more don’t I,” said the landlord, with a short grunt, indicative of
wonderment and alarm. “I wish I did. I wonder who set the place a-fire;
that’s what I wants to know, and why he did it.”
“The motive was not a bad one, I believe.”
“Not a bad motive, that which causes one man to set fire to and destroy
another man’s property!”
“Not when it is not only not done with any evil intention, but it was
not even done wilfully,” said Sir Francis.
“Perhaps you saw it done,” said the landlord, with another grunt.
“I did,” replied Varney; “hearing the disturbance, I hastily threw on
some of my clothes, and ran out of my apartment to ascertain what was
the matter, and found several others had got here before me, and had
burst open the door. The first who entered, had a light in his hand,
and fell with it, setting the place on fire, which burned furiously for
a minute or more, the hangings being dry and old. I took the young lady
out, else I am sure she must have perished.”
“Well, I saw you come out with her in your arms, like a salamander; but
what I most want to know is, what was it that disturbed my customer?
That is of the greatest consequence to me.”
“You are perfectly right, my friend,” said Sir Francis, with much
composure, “to make that inquiry, that being the origin of all that
subsequently took place. You are a man of discernment, and must see
that the young lady herself can alone give us any account of that.”
“True, sir; but I am much obliged to you for the trouble you have
taken, not only for the young lady’s sake, but for the property you
have prevented being destroyed. You have, no doubt, saved the inn, and
all it contains.”
“That is enough, sir,” said Varney, waving his hand, “you have said
enough. I am glad I have rendered you a service, and that it has been
effectual.”
“It has been just the thing,” said the landlord.
“Then take my advice. See the place is secure, and send all persons to
bed, save, perhaps, a single individual, who might be set to watch the
room which has been on fire, and which may have some slumbering spark
in it, though I think not; but the quieter the place is, the sooner the
young lady’s alarm will be over, and then all will be well.”
“Certainly, certainly,” said the landlord, “it will be better to do so;
but here is the only gentleman who can tell us how the young lady is.”
Sir Francis Varney turned round, and beheld Captain Fraser coming
towards them with a very grave aspect.
“Captain Fraser,” said Sir Francis, “perhaps you can tell us what we
are so very anxious to learn, and what we have been inquiring about.”
“What may that be, Sir Francis?”
“We have been trying to learn what it is that caused the young lady to
scream out in such a fearful manner. We have settled the cause of the
fire—that has been manifest enough to us all.”
“Indeed! I am not acquainted with it.”
“It arose from the first person who entered her apartment after the
door was burst open, falling over something, and setting fire to the
curtains, which blazed up in an instant, and set the whole room on
fire.”
“Indeed!” said Captain Fraser, almost incredulously.
“Yes, I saw that myself,” said Varney, “and I stepped over him as he
lay on the ground, and therefore know it; but how is the young lady?
Has she recovered from the extreme fright into which she has been
thrown?”
“It is a much more serious affair than I had any notion of, Sir
Francis.”
“I am concerned to hear you say so.”
“Shall I send for the doctor?” inquired the landlord.
“Do—that is what I came to ask you to do; she has recovered once, and
has fainted again. I know not what to think. She has a singular wound
in her arm. I can’t understand that, at all events.”
“I did not see it when I took hold of her; though, to be sure, what
I did, was done in smoke and flame, and I could not be supposed to
scrutinize very closely, had I been so inclined; but what kind of wound
is it?”
“I can hardly describe it to you, save it is a bite; and there are
teeth-marks plain enough to be seen; though we have no means of telling
what kind of creature it was that inflicted the wounds.”
“Indeed! I am concerned, for the effect upon the imagination will be
very bad; but did she not see, or fancy she saw the object that injured
her?”
“It was dark, and the storm raged without; moreover, she was held down
by a powerful grasp; and when she attempted to rise, she was flung
down, and she could feel the blunted teeth enter her flesh, and the
creature appeared to suck her blood.”
“Dear me,” said Sir Francis, “what a very strange affair! It is
fortunate I was obliged to retire early, and I slept the lighter, and
was therefore easily aroused from my sleep; but I am proverbially a
light sleeper.”
“Are you, sir? But what has caused the wound in her arm I cannot tell;
it is quite a mystery. She has got a fancy into her mind that it was a
human being; but that could not have been the fact.”
“I should imagine not,” said Sir Francis.
“And then, I know of no animal who could commit such an act; a cat
or a dog could not have done it, though a dog might have made the
teeth-marks; but a dog would hardly have attempted to suck blood.”
“They will do it,” said Sir Francis, “that I know to be a fact; and
I believe it to be one that is generally admitted by all persons,
especially that breed of animals mostly kept, and which have something
of the bull-dog in them.”
“It may be so; but how could she be held down by one of them? She could
not be struck down when she attempted to rise.”
“It is not for me to combat the young lady’s opinions; but, remember,
my dear sir, how terrified, not to say how horrified, she must have
been at such an unusual, and, I may add, unheard-of an attack; if you
consider such things, and the improbability—not to say what appears
to me, the impossibility—you will see plenty of room for mistakes to
arise, and give her notions a wrong turn.”
“That is very true.”
“And besides, I would, if I were convinced of the contrary, endeavour
to persuade her of her mistake, unless you can discover the perpetrator
of the outrage, when justice demands that such a savage should be
severely punished.”
“By G—d! Sir Francis,” said the captain, “if I could see him, I would
shoot the scoundrel! But, then, I am getting angry without a cause; it
may not be what she thinks, and then, you know, all one’s anger goes
for nothing.”
“So it does; but, in the meantime, great care and attention is
requisite to regain her confidence and serenity of mind.”
“Oh, a day or two will make a great difference in these matters, when
we come to change the scene.”
“Are you travelling far, Captain Fraser?”
“As far as Bath,” said the captain.
At this moment the landlord returned, saying to Captain Fraser,—
“I have sent to Mr. Carter, who will be here, no doubt; he is close at
hand, and will come in a moment. He’s a very clever gentleman, is Mr.
Carter. I saw him perform four operations on coach accidents.”
“Operations on coach accidents!” said Sir Francis Varney; “a curious
matter, that. How did they succeed upon such materials?”
“Oh, they were two broken arms, and three broken legs.”
“Indeed! Did they all recover?”
“No; only one got over it.”
“Upon my word, a promising member of the faculty to entrust so tender a
charge to, under such delicate circumstances. But, landlord, have you
any bad characters about your house, or in the neighbourhood?”
“I can’t say anything about the neighbourhood, though I believe it is
as quiet and orderly as can be, or usually is. I never hear anything
against it, and know nothing against it; and as for them in the house,
I can answer they would not hurt a fly, unless provoked to do so; but
what I mean is, they are all honest and tried servants.”
“Well, that is saying a good deal,” said Captain Fraser; “but, have you
any dogs about the house—I mean, any large dogs?”
“Ah! dogs! Yes, I have several dogs, and good dogs they are, too.”
“Could any of them get into the rooms—the sleeping-rooms? I mean, could
any of them get into the room that has taken fire?”
“No, unless the door was opened,” said the landlord. “They are not
allowed to run about loose here, lest any one should get up in the
night and be mistaken for intruders; for my dogs, gentlemen, would take
any one they saw moving about outside of a night; but, otherwise, they
are quiet, well-conducted dogs.”
“Well, you mean to say they could not have got into Miss Stevens’s
room.”
“I do; I am sure of it. They could not, because there were none of
them about the house when we went to bed—when the house was shut up at
night. However, here is the doctor.”
The medical man now arrived, and was forthwith introduced to Captain
Fraser, who conducted him to the apartment in which Mrs. Fraser and
Miss Stevens were awaiting the coming of the doctor. Captain Fraser,
after having introduced him to the invalid, returned to the landlord
and Sir Francis.
“Well, I cannot make it out at all,” said Sir Francis. “There must
be some mystery in it, I am persuaded; and if that could only be
discovered, the matter would lose half its terrors to the mind of the
young lady.”
“No doubt it would do so,” said the captain. “The fire and her wound
together, have made a deep impression upon her.”
“The wound!” said the landlord. “Is the young lady hurt, then?”
“Hurt, indeed! she is seriously hurt. She has received a severe wound
in the arm, by some one, or some dog having seized and bitten her
seriously.”
“God bless me!” said the landlord; “I never heard of such a thing.
Somebody began to eat her, I suppose. Upon my word, it would almost
make one believe we are in the Cannibal Islands, to say the least of
it.”
“Here is the surgeon,” said Sir Francis, who noticed that gentleman’s
approach.
“Well, sir,” said Captain Fraser, “how is your patient?”
“I fear she is much terrified; and if she were to remain here long, I
should hardly like to answer for her health. She has received a very
severe shock.”
“Her wound—what think you of that, sir?”
“I really can’t say anything about it, save that it is a bite; but
how inflicted I cannot say. It is very mysterious, indeed; very
strange! But, what I look upon as most important in the affair, is
the impression it has produced upon her mind; that, you see, may last
her all her life, and produce very unfortunate consequences. I do
not know that it will be so, but I state what there is a possibility
of—or, I may, more correctly speaking, add,—of what there is a great
probability.”
“I regret to hear you say so,” said Sir Francis Varney. “Do you really
imagine the young lady has been bitten by any animal?”
“Yes, I do; there are evidences enough to prove that. There is the
wound in her arm, and the marks of the teeth quite plain; and she
suffers from the anguish of it much; but I shall be better able to say
more about it early in the morning, when I call again to see her.”
“She will be able to travel, I hope?”
“Oh, yes, she will be able to do that; indeed, I would recommend
she should try to do so, as the best means of throwing off all the
unpleasant feelings and thoughts upon the occasion.”
“Will you call early to-morrow?”
“I will,” said the doctor; and then he bade them good evening, and left.
“Well,” said the landlord, “I’m amazed at what the doctor says about
the young lady. I’m sorry it should have happened in my house; but I
hope something will turn up to make it turn out different.”
“That I’m afraid is not possible, seeing you have a clear demonstration
of what it is now; the mischief has been done.”
“I am the more sorry,” said the landlord, “that it is likely to prey
upon the young lady’s feelings, which are to be considered in the
case.”
“Certainly, certainly; there is where the mischief is likely to spring
from.”
“However, it is of no use to stand here all night—it is cold. I must
get an hour or two’s sleep before I get to business in the morning.”
“I think so too,” said Captain Fraser; “well, I will bid you good
night, Sir Francis, and shall expect you in the morning to breakfast.”
“With pleasure,” replied Varney; and they all parted, each going to his
own dormitory, to sleep or to think over the events of the night, as
best they might.
CHAPTER CXLVII.
The next morning came, and with it came also the usual bustle of a
country inn, when strangers are stopping there, especially carriage
strangers; as well as the usual coach stoppages, when they change
horses, which they did more than once that morning. It was at a later
hour than usual when the party breakfasted, and it was somewhat late
when Sir Francis Varney entered the room.
“Good morning,” said Sir Francis, with great suavity of manner, and in
a most courtly tone; “I trust I see you somewhat recovered from the
fright you were put to last night.”
“Oh, Sir Francis,” said Mrs. Fraser; “it was a dreadful fright, indeed;
but we have so much to thank you for. To you we owe much, and my sister
owes to you a double obligation—you have rescued her twice.”
“I am happy to think I have been a fortunate instrument in serving you.
I trust Miss Stevens is better than she was.”
“I think she is better, Sir Francis; but she desires to remain in her
apartment until we are ready to start. Though I thought it somewhat
unreasonable, because, if she is to travel, she had better have come
out.”
“But her rest was disturbed by the accident, and it might have been
early before she slept; and an hour’s rest and repose might do much
towards recovering her,” said Sir Francis; “her own feelings are a good
guide under those circumstances.”
“I think so, too,” said Captain Fraser.
“I,” said young Stevens, “was awoke by a desperate riot caused by
people running about; I did not hear anything of the scream.”
“I was awoke by it,” said Captain Fraser. “How did you hear of it—how
were you awoke?”
“By a loud scream,” said Sir Francis; “I was asleep, and when it awoke
me, I knew not what it was. I remained for a moment or two in doubt as
to whether I had not dreamt, but a repetition assured me that I was not
dreaming—and knowing from the sound it was a female’s voice, I jumped
up, and dressed myself as well as I could; but, before I could do that,
I heard people running about, and when I got into the gallery, I heard
the door burst in.”
“Did any one come out?”
“I cannot say—I saw no one; but the man who first entered the apartment
fell down, from some cause or other, and set the bed-curtains on
fire—accidentally, of course, but it was the same in effect.”
“Did you see any one in the room, Sir Francis?”
“No one at all; I did not even know who slept there; but seeing the
form of a human being lying there, and wrapping the bed-clothes, or
rather seizing her and the bed-clothes, by grasping with both arms, I
carried her out. I used but little ceremony, and the urgency of the
case must be my excuse.”
“And it is, Sir Francis, though I know not in what way we can manifest
our feelings of gratitude to you.”
“You may, madam, by saying no more about it; but I shall be delighted
to think you have such a good opinion of my services; and the knowledge
that they have been useful, that is a gratification to me.”
“And one you are well entitled to, Sir Francis,” said Captain Fraser.
“How far are you travelling?” inquired Mrs. Fraser.
“As far as Bath, madam, for the benefit of my health.”
“We are going to Bath, Sir Francis, as well. I am sure it will be a
great pleasure to Captain Fraser, to find that we are to have such
a travelling companion—that is, if you can accommodate yourself to
travelling in a carriage.”
“I can travel as you please. I am mounted, and am used to such
travelling, for months at a time.”
“Do you travel much at a time, Sir Francis?”
“Yes, I have been a great traveller, for years; not so much as regards
distance as to the constancy of my perambulations; for I continue for
months together out, riding from one town to another.”
“Without an attendant?”
“Always; I never carry a servant about with me; it cannot be done with
comfort by any one. You have always proper attendance if you stop
at a respectable inn, or hotel; or, if not, if the road you have to
travel be a cross route, you cannot expect any additional comfort from
a servant, but you are troubled at his not being comfortably lodged; at
least, I am, for I have tried it.”
“I dare say there is much wisdom in that. I know from experience that
a single traveller, who has leisure, and is willing, may enjoy himself
better than he could if he were attended by his servant. You are
somewhat restrained in your motions, and cannot do as you would please
under all circumstances.”
“I am fully persuaded of that, from experience; but I shall travel on
horseback till I get to Bath, and then I hardly know whether I shall
remain at an hotel, or take lodgings for the season—or what.”
“What we intend is, to take lodgings,” said Captain Fraser, “for a
time—as long as we feel inclined—and then to enjoy ourselves.”
“Quite right,” said Sir Francis; “quite right. I am glad to hear you
say so, and I hope it may be of advantage to Miss Stevens.”
“I hope so too. Shall we have the advantage of your company _en route_?”
“I shall have great pleasure in having your company so far. It will
give me great gratification, indeed; I shall be most happy to bear
your company as far as the city of Bath, and shall consider myself the
gainer by your society.”
“No, we shall be the only party that will benefit by it; but we shall
feel greatly your kindness, and I, for one, anticipate much pleasure on
the road from your society, and also when we arrive in Bath.”
“I feel such will be the case.”
At this moment Mr. Carter was announced also. In a few moments more
this individual was introduced to them; he was a plain gentlemanly man,
who really was a clever man, notwithstanding the fearful account of
his prowess and skill which the landlord had descanted on the previous
night.
“Well, Mr. Carter,” said Captain Fraser, “how do you find my sister—do
you think she is any better than she was?”
“I think she is calmer, and much of the first violence of terror is
gone; but I cannot say any more—she is still much disturbed.”
“Do you think there is anything dangerous in her state?”
“No, sir, I do not; though I cannot hide from you the possibility that
there is of her being permanently affected by it—I mean mentally; it
may take a deep hold of her, and there will be no getting her free from
it, save by judicious treatment.”
“You do not consider much, then, of her wound?”
“The arm? Oh, yes; that looks very angry, and has been a very severe
bite, and has caused her arm to swell; though I have no doubt about its
getting well, still it will be very painful for some days; and, had
it been a little more severe, it is possible that some of the tendons
might have been injured, or an artery wounded.”
“Upon my word,” said Sir Francis Varney, “this had very nigh turned out
a very bad and serious affair, if not a dangerous one.”
“Of that there can be no doubt,” said the doctor.
“Well, but, after all, what was it that has caused all this
disturbance? What was it, a man or brute?”
“Decidedly the latter,” said Sir Francis Varney, “decidedly the latter,
be the form of the creature what it may.”
“Indeed, you are right, Sir Francis,” said Mrs. Fraser; “but she
insists it was a human being who made this abominable attack upon
her—why or wherefore, no one knows; but she insists it was a man.”
“What do you say, doctor?”
“I only know, sir, what the young lady says.”
“Do you think it probable?”
“I cannot say I do. I think it most unlikely; though, to be sure, there
is nothing in it that is impossible. Had any one felt maliciously
towards the young lady, they might have perpetrated the crime; but, in
the absence of all malice, I cannot think so bad of human nature as to
believe it.”
“You discredit it, then?” said Sir Francis Varney.
“I do,” said the doctor, “with all due respect to the young lady; but
the probability of mistake is so great, and when you consider the
terror so natural to the occasion, her powers of observation were
limited and liable to error, that I cannot myself believe otherwise
than there is a great mistake.”
“And what do you consider of the wounds? I mean, do you think it
possible they were inflicted by human teeth? Are they of that shape and
character that could be inflicted by human teeth?”
“Yes, decidedly; that is, so far as I am able to judge, while the wound
is swelled and angry, I should consider them just such as might be
inflicted by the teeth of a man or woman.”
“That corroborates the young lady’s own belief.”
“It does, so far,” said Mr. Carter.
“Then comes the question of how could it have been done, and by whom?”
“These seem to be questions which cannot be answered. I asked the
landlord all that could tend to elicit that information, but with no
success; he knew nothing that could throw any light upon the subject.”
“Perhaps he knew nothing,” suggested Mrs. Fraser.
“Most probably he did not,” was the reply. “I know the landlord to be
a respectable, though somewhat eccentric man; and I think him quite
incapable of being a party to such an outrage upon any person, much
less upon a lady who was stopping at his house.”
“Well, however true that may be, yet it is undeniable that this outrage
has been committed, though by whom we cannot say, for we do not even
suspect anybody. I can’t understand it at all.”
“Nor I; but, as you observed, sir, the outrage has been committed, and
here, too; but, unfortunately, no one is suspected, and justice cannot
be done, which, in such a case, ought to be fully and clearly made out,
for there can be no palliation.”
“None at all.”
“I wish,” said Captain Fraser, “I had been first in the room.”
“Why, sir,” inquired Sir Francis Varney, “do you wish that?”
“Because you see, sir, I should have felt that inward satisfaction
arising from the fact, that I fancy I might have ascertained whether
any one was, or had been, in the room.”
“The young lady said there was,” said Sir Francis.
“Yes—yes; but then you saw the door opened, and saw no one come out.”
“I did not, though, after I had Miss Stevens in my arms, I came away,
and then it was possible any one might have got out, though there were
others who would have seen them; but still, in the bustle and confusion
of the moment, there might have been somebody.”
“Yes, there is that possibility,” said Captain Fraser; “and I don’t see
why I should trouble myself about this affair—I mean, by wishing myself
there; but I should have done nothing but carry out the body—that would
have been my first act.”
“No doubt,” said Sir Francis; “and what made such an act the more
necessary is, the fact that she was in instant danger of death from
burning, or suffocation.”
“True—true; who would have coolly gazed around him, when there, on the
bed, lay the unfortunate victim of God knows what.”
“Well, sir, I must bid you good day. I have some patients to visit.”
“Not before we square accounts, which is easily done. Let me know how
we may stand, sir, and I will pay you at once.”
This little affair was soon settled; and the doctor was about to
depart, when he said, before he left the room,—
“I have given the young lady directions what to do relative to her arm.
She must not use it much; but any medical man who may chance to see
it, will be able to prescribe for it; though what I have given I deem
almost enough to effect her complete restoration, as far as regards the
arm. The shock, the mind and nervous system have sustained, will only
be eradicated by time and change.”
“Thank you for your advice; that shall be attended to.”
The doctor now quitted the hotel; and the landlord entered the
apartment with a very serious aspect; and, after making his bow,
proceeded to say,—
“I am very sorry, sir, for the occurrence of last night—very sorry,
indeed. Indeed, sir, I cannot make it out at all. I have inquired all
over the house, and nobody at all knows anything about it, nor can’t
think how it could be. A good many of them won’t believe it at all,
though I told them there could be no doubt of it, for the young lady
was burnt, and the bed set on fire.”
“You may be sure of that, landlord; the young lady has been bitten on
the arm most severely.”
“And, as for the fire,” said Sir Francis, “I saw how that occurred.”
“So you said, sir,” replied the landlord; “if that fellow as fell down
had stood up, why, it wouldn’t have set the curtains a fire.”
“No, that is true.”
“Well, then, he would have been able to have seen what was the matter,
instead of his filling the room full of smoke and fire as he did; he
hadn’t no excuse to tumble down—nobody knocked him down.”
“But didn’t he hurt himself very badly?”
“Oh, only about two or three square inches, or perhaps a patch as big
as your hand, off his chin—that’s nothing to such as he.”
“Very good. But have you examined the place, to see if anybody could
have got in and concealed himself? Was there any possibility of a man’s
getting into your house, and secreting himself in any part of the
bed-room, which would thus afford him an opportunity of doing what has
been done?”
“Why, sir, I don’t think it likely; and yet these people are so
cunning, that you could not, by any possibility, guard against them
in any way, especially in an inn. But there is no house free from
intrusion of that character; but in this instance they could have had
no notion the young lady was to sleep there.”
“That is very true,” said Captain Fraser, “and tends to show she was
not singled out for outrage; but what seems very singular, is, that any
one should secret themselves, and that with a view to commit such an
outrage.”
“That is very true,” said the landlord; “but people do very strange
things sometimes, and I think the object of any one hiding himself in
the house in such a manner as this rascal must have done, was robbery.”
“But he met with no resistance, and there could have been no excuse for
so cowardly an assault as this complained of.”
“There is much truth in that, and yet we don’t know what human nature
is capable of,” said the landlord. “I have known a few things in my
time; but the man, or whatever he might be, might have been tempted to
make the assault complained of.”
“What? Then, landlord, you imagine that a thief who had got into the
house, would make an attempt to eat a young lady?”
“Why, as to eating her, sir,” said the landlord, scratching his head,
“I cannot say that he would. I don’t know what his intentions might be,
nor do I profess to understand it at all. I can’t, however, see what
can be the motive, save malice and spite; they mightn’t care whom they
injured, so long as somebody was hurt.”
“They must have been very bad.”
“Yes, sir; and I wish I had seen them; if I had, I would no more mind
chopping them in two than I would cleave a marrow-bone. I truly hope,
sir, you won’t consider that, however unfortunate the circumstances
are, that I am blameable in this affair. I took all the usual
precautions in this affair—that is, my house was secured as usual,
and the place watched during the day; for we are particular in that
respect, knowing that we are very liable to be robbed.”
“Exactly,” said Captain Fraser; “and though I much regret the
occurrence, yet, I tell you, I do not see anything in which I say you
are to blame. It is simply a great misfortune, and there ends the
matter.”
“Thank you. I regret it as much, I am sure, as anybody, because I am
very likely to be injured by it.”
“You are not to blame. Allow my carriage to be at the door in half an
hour, as we shall leave almost immediately.”
“And my horse, too, landlord, as I bear this gentleman company.”
The landlord departed, and went towards the stables, and gave the
necessary orders; while the guests remained conversing on the
extraordinary occurrence that had taken place, and much pleased with
the courtesy of their new friend.
Many were the speculations that were indulged in respecting the attack
upon Miss Stevens; many of them wild, but all wide of the mark,
fortunately, for her frame of mind; and then, before they had at all
come to any conclusion, or any satisfactory probability, the carriage
was announced.
“Well, Sir Francis, I presume you will ride with us?”
“Yes, on horseback.”
“I understand so; we shall be much indebted to you for your goodness;
but here is Miss Stevens.”
At that moment the young lady entered the room, ready attired for
travelling, but looking very pale and timid. Sir Francis advanced, and,
taking her hand, said,—
“May I have the pleasure of hearing you say the occurrence of last
night has done you only a temporary mischief?”
“I hope not,” said Miss Stevens; “but, to you, Sir Francis, I owe
everything. I am grateful to you for your ready and effectual aid under
such trying circumstances. I am sure I never can repay you for your
goodness.”
“Nay, the task is easier than you imagine,” said Sir Francis; “to know
that I have saved you, and to see it has been effectual, is repayment
enough. I am sure we never feel so much satisfaction and pleasure as
when we find our endeavours, however important or unimportant they are,
have proved effectual—that we have done what we desired to do—that is
ample reward.”
“You are so good, Sir Francis.”
“We will say nothing about that. None are so perfect but we may see
room for amendment; but we will have a truce, I hope, upon this
subject, and now converse upon the pleasures of our journey.”
“They, I hope, will be very many,” said Mrs. Fraser.
“I have every expectation of it myself,” said Sir Francis; “the day
appears fine, and the sun is high. The storm of last evening has
cleared the air of much of its heat; it is cool and pleasant. The
country will look refreshed, the fields will be quite gay and pleasant,
and the face of nature renewed.”
“Well, I am certain it will be a pleasant journey under such a change,
for I must say it was very sultry yesterday.”
“It was,” said Captain Fraser; “the appearance of the earth alone will
tell that. But are you all ready?”
“Yes, all,” replied Mrs. Fraser.
“Now, my dear Charles, what are you about?”
“I’m looking for my gloves,” said the youth; “but I can’t find them.”
“Never mind them; we shall be off without you.”
“I’ll come before you have all got into the carriage, so don’t wait.”
“Permit me, Miss Stevens,” said Sir Francis, as he offered his arm, “to
have the pleasure of seeing you safe into the carriage.”
The young lady accepted of the proffered arm of Sir Francis, though not
without something like reluctance, though, why, she could not tell;
but yet she did not like to appear to hesitate, and forced herself to
do what common courtesy, if not gratitude, demanded she should do. She
took his arm, and the whole party were shortly seated in the carriage,
and with Sir Francis Varney mounted beside them, they all quitted the
inn, where they had experienced such strange vicissitudes of fortune
during one night, that it would never be erased from their memories.
CHAPTER CXLVIII.
THE ROAD, AND THE TRAVELLERS.—THE PLEASURES OF DOING GOOD.—THE BEGGAR
WOMAN.—SIR FRANCIS VARNEY A PHILANTHROPIST.
The road was pleasantly bounded on either side by hill and dale
scenery, while it was itself of a very diversified character; and at
one moment they passed through long avenues of trees, at other times a
bare heath, without so much as a dwarf hedge; and then well-cultivated
country would succeed, studded with handsome villas, and country seats,
old half-castellated mansions and halls, where gentlemen lived in the
abodes of their ancestors, and felt pride in doing so.
The air was balmy and beautiful—every object appeared fresh, and every
tree and shrub looked as though new life had been infused into it; the
birds sang merrily, and the whole party were in high spirits.
“Such scenes as these,” said Sir Francis Varney, “please me better
than the gaieties and follies of the town. I am sure there is much
more happiness to be found by a contented mind, than there is in the
feverish pleasures of a city.”
“There is much truth in that, Sir Francis,” said the captain; “but,
in my own case, connected as I am with my professional friends, I
cannot follow what is the natural bent of my taste; but I find pleasure
wherever I go, for I am determined to make the best of all that passes
beneath my observation.”
“Sweets can be extracted from every bitter, and therefore it is good
philosophy to take the bright side of a picture, in all the ordinary
relations of life; we are better men and better subjects by so doing.”
Thus the distance was soon passed over, and a stage was but the same
as a pleasant morning ride; and then an hour or two spent of the heat
of the day in quiet in some small, but respectable, inn, with wine and
pleasing conversation, gave them a relish for the life they led.
The style of the conversation of the stranger, Sir Francis Varney, was
pleasing in the extreme; he was evidently a man of great and varied
talents and attainments, and one of great experience, and who had seen
much of life.
Two days passed this way, and they had not reached Bath; they were
tempted to stop longer by the way than they would have done.
“To-morrow,” observed Sir Francis, “we must reach Bath. About three
short stages will place us within its precincts, and then I presume
the assembly-room, as well as the pump-room, will occupy much of your
attention.
“We shall certainly go there.”
“Have you been in Bath before?”
“Yes, but many years ago, when we were quite children, so that I have
no recollection of the place.”
“And you, Captain Fraser?”
“No, I have not, I am quite a stranger there; but for the kindness
of your offer, I should have to trust to strangers, or my own good
fortune, to find out those things which strangers usually seek, and
those places they usually visit.”
“I shall have great pleasure in showing you that which is worthy of
your attention. It is now some years since I was there; but I believe,
though there may be improvements, yet the place is essentially the
same.”
“No doubt; cities seldom alter much, unless it be in their suburbs. If
the alteration be great, it will point itself out.”
“Exactly so.”
The party were seated beneath a large cedar tree, which stood in
the inn garden, with a table, upon which were spread some wine and
biscuits, walnuts, and a few things besides, of a character agreeing
much with the place.
Into this garden crept an unfortunate beggar woman, who, espying the
party from the road, escaped the vigilance of the waiters and menials
who hung about the inn, and entered. She crept timidly towards the
party, looking wistfully, but yet fearful of the consequences of the
intrusion; for there was a notice in the village, which gave forth
fearful threats to them, should they dare to beg for the bread for
which they were starving.
Presently, finding the captain’s eye fixed upon her, with a beseeching
look, she dropped her curtsey.
“Who is that woman, and what does she want?”
All turned to look upon the unfortunate creature, who began her
petition by saying,—
“Kind ladies and gentlemen, pity a poor woman who is starving. I am
very weary, and am weak with travelling—”
“Eh! what do you do here?” exclaimed the waiter. “Come, come, we don’t
allow beggars in this place. The high roads, or the Bridewell, are the
only places we have in these here parts.”
“Do not be in a hurry,” said Sir Francis, to the officious waiter.
“It might have been right enough to prevent her entering; but now we
have seen her, I cannot, if she deserve it, refuse to aid her in her
affliction.”
The woman dropped a very low curtsey.
“My good woman, where have you come from?”
“From Bath, sir,” said the unfortunate creature.
“From Bath, eh? And what took you there?”
“I lived there.”
“You lived there; if that were the case, why should you leave a place
where you did live, to wander about where you cannot live? That is a
bad policy, methinks. What do you say, captain?”
“I think so too, Sir Francis,” said the captain; “but that may be only
a verbal blunder of the woman; we can’t expect propriety in speaking
from such people; it would be expecting too much.”
“So it would,” said Mrs. Fraser.
“I have left Bath for two reasons, sir,” said the woman; “one is, I was
too unwell to work, and then my rent got into arrears. While I could
work, I did pay my way, though living very hard.”
“And what was the other reason?”
“Why, sir, I was turned out of my lodging, and having nowhere to go to,
and finding nobody would assist me, was compelled to beg.”
“What induced you to take this road, my good woman?”
“Because, sir, it will, if I live long enough, carry me to Portsmouth.”
“Are you known there?”
“No, sir.”
“What induces you to go so far? Speak out and do not be afraid; we have
no object in asking you questions, save with the view of assisting you
if we find you a worthy object.”
“I am going to Portsmouth,” replied the poor creature, “in the hope
that I may hear from my son, whom I have not seen these many years, and
who went to sea about seven years ago.”
“You have a son then?”
“Yes, sir, I had one. God knows if I have one now.”
The poor woman uttered these words with such sorrowing accents, that
all were convinced of the truthfulness of them.
“Speak out and tell us your story. Bring the poor woman some
refreshment,” said Sir Francis; “her tale may interest us, and give
us food for reflection. I am sure one cannot hear the misfortunes of
others, without feeling grateful for the luxuries and blessings one
enjoys over and above the common lot of mankind.”
“That is very true, Sir Francis,” said Mrs. Fraser; “and I am sure we
ought not to pass those whom we can assist by a trifle, when our means
will permit our doing so.”
“You are perfectly correct, ma’am.”
“Have you no husband?” inquired Mrs. Fraser.
“None, ma’am, none. When I had one, I had a good home over my head. I
would not wish for happier or better days to come again.”
“What was your husband?”
“A respectable tradesman, who kept a good house and his own servants.
We spent such a life as that for nearly fifteen years.”
“And how came it to a close?”
“His death, sir, which was brought on by a sudden cold; in a few days
he was a corpse. I can never forget that dreadful day. We were living
very comfortably and happy. My husband had just at that time entered
into some speculations that promised to make a handsome fortune in
a few years; and all promised success and happiness, complete and
continued.”
“How great a change!” said Miss Stevens.
“Yes, miss, great indeed. My husband hearing some news that caused him
to be anxious to ascertain its truth, he left home one wet night, and
got drenched through; and where he went to, he was obliged to remain in
damp clothes, and not being a strong man, he took a violent cold, and
inflammation followed.
“After this he had medical advice; but he soon sank, and was pronounced
beyond recovery; he died a very few hours after that, and I was left a
widow. A few short hours caused a great change in my circumstances.”
“What became of the business?”
“Why, that was carried on for a time; but an accident deprived me of
that.”
“What was that?”
“I will tell you, sir. My son was about fourteen years of age when his
father died, and was just able to carry on the business; and I believe
we should have done pretty well, because he was a steady youth, and I
could trust him; and he looked after the men employed, and I was not
robbed.
“However, a severe misfortune awaited me. I thought the loss of my
husband a dreadful misfortune; and I believe it was; but in his case he
left one behind who could help to maintain me. His loss I mourned; but
it did not produce the same disastrous results that the loss of my son
produced.”
“How came you to lose him?” inquired the captain.
“Why, sir, I had occasion to have some business transacted at Bristol.
I could send no one else, though I could ill spare him; but then I was
compelled to send him, and did send him. It was to accommodate some
terms of sale; and he only knew the affair. He, therefore, went to
Bristol. He was pleased enough, being his first journey; and I could
hardly have resisted his importunity, if I had been so inclined.
“He left me, and arrived safely in Bristol, and was there a day or
two, when, walking about one evening by the water-side, he was seized
by a press-gang, and carried out to sea. It was useless for him to
complain or to entreat; they would take him, and forced him on board a
man-of-war.”
“He served his king and country, then?” said the captain. “I honour
him, upon my soul; and you are going to learn something of him—if he be
dead or alive?”
“Yes, sir; I know this much, he was alive about two years ago, and
expected to reach Portsmouth in a couple of years.”
“Well, proceed.”
“When I heard my fate—the detention of my son—I was thrown on a bed of
illness, in which I lay for nearly three months, during which time I
was completely robbed, and run into debt; and when I recovered, I had
but a few pounds in the world, for an execution had been put into the
house, and all was sold.
“Thus was I left without a friend or a soul to comfort me, or any
relative upon whom I could call for aid and assistance. I had no right
to do so to any one; and after my misfortunes, I found that my former
friends deserted me. I found that it was necessary to have the means of
purchasing friends, just the same as anything else. I could obtain them
for money; but without money I had no friends.”
“I was by far too independent to ask for what I felt I was capable
of earning. I could live upon little, and I at once left all who had
formerly known me, before I attempted anything. I was determined that I
would not even ask work at their hands, but get it among strangers.
“Of course this caused me to seek a subsistence in the lowest capacity,
and I cared not for it, because it put a still greater barrier between
me and my late acquaintances. It was a long time before I obtained any
employment, because I was unknown to any one who could recommend me, or
who wanted my services.
“This was to be expected; but the first place I obtained work at
was through the interest of my landlady; and then I obtained more
afterwards, and one led to another, till I obtained a hard-earned but
honest living.
“I had a little money by me—some two or three pounds; in case of being
out of work, or in case illness overtook me, then I had something to
fly to, the workhouse being a place of all others I most dreaded;
sooner than go there I would consent to die by the roadside, and I have
put my resolution to the test.”
“You lost your work?”
“I fell ill for some months; all my little store of money was gone, and
my rent grew in arrears. I became more and more deeply indebted, and
what food I obtained was given me by others out of charity; but this
could not last long, and as soon as I was able to walk, my landlady
asked me for my rent.
“I then told her that I had no money, but that, in a few weeks, if I
could find food to enable me to get up my strength, I should then be
able to work, and I would then pay her off by degrees, until I was out
of debt.
“She knew what I had been, and had some thought that I had money, or
if I pleased I could obtain it from my former friends, and expected me
to make the attempt; but this I refused, and upon my doing so, she,
after the first expressions of astonishment and anger, gave me the
alternative of doing so or leaving the house.
“I was turned out, and had no refuge. I wandered about, and knew not
where to go, or what to do; indeed, I was houseless and friendless—a
wanderer without a penny. I could not now obtain work—I could not do
it; and my appearance caused people to shut their doors against me, and
I wandered about begging.
“This was the first time I ever took what I had not earned, save what
was voluntarily given me when I was ill.
“One evening, as I was creeping about, I heard some men conversing
about the different vessels that were out at sea, and one of them named
the one in which my son was. I instantly listened, and heard one of
them say that she was on her voyage homewards, and would be home in a
month.
“I had no sooner heard this than I had some hope.
“‘I will go,’ I said, ‘to Portsmouth. I will meet my son, and he will
not refuse to support his unfortunate mother. I know his disposition
too well to dream of it; and should he be unable to do so, I will beg
for him.’
“I slept in Bath that night, and then began to consider how I should
get to Portsmouth. It was a long road; many weary miles must be walked
over ere I could get there; and as for the means, I must trust to the
charity of the passengers. It would not be much more than what I was
doing. I could sit on a doorstep and beg; but to walk on the road where
there were few or no passengers, I might starve.
“However, I resolved to make the attempt, because I loved my son; and
if I could see him I should see an end to my misery.
“I started out about four days ago, and I have got this far; but I have
had only bread on the road, and almost despair of being able to reach
there; and the charity of people is not enough to support life upon.”
“And where have you slept as you came along?”
“Wherever I could, sir; beneath the haystack, or even a hedge.”
“Where did you sleep last night?”
“Beneath a haystack about seven miles from this place.”
“And is that all you have got through to-day?”
“Yes, sir, every step; and considering my weak state, I consider
it good travelling, and shall feel thankful for even that rate of
travelling. You do not know how intensely I wish to get to see my son.”
“I have no doubt of it, my good woman, and if I can, I will help you on
the road. I think yours is a case that deserves some attention. If you
choose to remain here all night and rest, you may. You shall have food
till you go, and some food shall be placed in your hands before you go.”
“Got bless you, sir,” said the poor woman, in tears; “you will, indeed,
do an act of kindness to me.”
“You will stop?”
“And be grateful to you for your kindness.”
“Here, waiter,” said Sir Francis.
“Yes, sir,” said that worthy, running up.
“Just take this person, and see that she wants for nothing—let her
have a bed here and breakfast in the morning, and let me know what the
charges are, and I will pay for it—do you hear what I say to you.”
“Yes, sir,” exclaimed the waiter, who considered the charge as one
beneath his dignity; but he was forced to obey, and the woman was
desired to follow him, which she did, after thanking Sir Francis Varney
for his humanity and generosity.
• • • • •
“Upon my word, Sir Francis,” said Mrs. Fraser, “you do those things as
if they were common occurrences to you.”
“Why, madam, I am—and perhaps I ought to abstain from making the
confession—one who does not love to come in contact with misery; but
then one does not feel justified in turning away from it.”
“You must have a deep purse to be able to satisfy all such claimants.”
“I cannot do that, if I were inclined, or they were deserving, which
many are not, as you no doubt must be well aware.”
“Indeed, that is a fact. Very few of the claimants possess the same
strength of right to our pity and commiseration. I am certainly struck
with the woman’s manners, and her artless mode of telling her story.”
“Exactly. It bears the impress of genuineness about it.”
“So it does.”
“And when that is the case, I cannot resist the sense of my duty, which
impels me to aid the distressed. But then I injure no one. I have ample
means; and, therefore, others may do less, and yet deserve more credit.
I have no heirs to come into my property, and I cannot, therefore,
injure any one; if I were to give it all away, I should be entitled to
do so.”
“You are as good, Sir Francis, as you are courageous and fortunate,”
said Miss Stevens; “I am sure I have every reason to be thankful to you
for two preservations.”
“Nay, say no more about the past; you say things at which I ought
to blush to hear, for my modesty is greater than you imagine; but,
seriously, I take more pleasure in it than most people, and that may
be a set-off against my disinterestedness, for I am only laying out my
money in pleasure and amusement.”
“No, no, that will not pass.”
“It will, I hope; but permit me to return and see how they have
disposed of this temporary protege of mine.”
“Certainly, Sir Francis; don’t let us detain you; we shall remain here
some time longer, and then we shall leave the shelter of this house.”
• • • • •
CHAPTER CXLIX.
THE ENTRANCE INTO BATH.—A NEW SCENE.—THE HOTEL AND THE
LODGINGS.—THE ATTENTIONS OF SIR FRANCIS VARNEY.
After Sir Francis Varney had left the place where the Frasers were
sitting, there was a long silence, in which each of the party appeared
to be engaged in meditating deeply upon something or other, and yet
each shrunk from expressing them. The first who broke the silence was
Captain Fraser, who said,—
“Well, my dear, what do you think of our new acquaintance?”
“I think he is a most amiable man.”
“Very courtly,” observed his sister.
“Yes; a sure sign of good breeding—of good company.”
“He is that,” said Captain Fraser. “I never met with one in whom
dignity, ease, and complete and unceremonious courtesy were so blended.”
“And he appears to be a very kind and amiable man.”
“But,” said Miss Stevens, “he is also a very strange and a very
singular man—a very singular man indeed! I never saw such a man before,
or any one approaching him. What a strange complexion!”
“He has a singular complexion, and it strikes me he is well aware of
it, and that is the reason why he prefers a country to a town life;
and his solitariness, together with his manners, all indicate that his
peculiarity in this respect causes him much annoyance.”
“I dare say it may,” said Captain Fraser.
“I never saw anything so truly terrible!” said Charles.
“Hush! do not speak in that way, Charles; it is ungrateful.”
“I hope not; it is merely the truth. I never saw a corpse so pale!
Indeed he is just such an one as you might imagine to have started out
of a grave with an unwholesome life, and whoever had resuscitated him
had forgotten to warm his blood, or to put blood into his veins.”
“How very absurd you are, Charles! I am sure Sir Frances Varney
deserves better of you than that. You are under a great obligation to
him. I feel assured he feels the peculiarity of his complexion—I mean
it has an effect upon his mind; and, if we knew the cause of it, it is
possible some disinterested action, terminating in evil to himself, has
been the cause of it.”
“Well, sister, I do not mean to say that you can admire such a visage;
but you ought not to say I am ungrateful, for I am not; and, moreover,
I never saw any gentleman whom I liked better—his conversation is quite
superior; but then, gratitude, surely, does not prevent one noticing so
glaring a circumstance.”
“Certainly not,” said Captain Fraser; “though I fancy it would be
better to remain silent upon such topics, if we cannot commiserate
them.”
“I think you are quite right, Fraser,” said Mrs. Fraser; “he deserves
respect at our hands, and the less that is said in regard to his
misfortunes the better.”
“I think the evening is getting very cool,” said Miss Stevens; “will
you remain here any longer?—I shall return to the house.”
“We may as well all go—especially if you feel chilly.”
“I do.”
“Then come along; to-morrow we shall be in Bath. Come, sister, you must
be quite well to share in the gaieties of the place. You know you said
you should have the greatest pleasure there—you have been anticipating
it all along.”
“I did,” said her sister.
“Well, but you will do so now. Why should your expectations not be
fulfilled? I can see no reason why they should not. Bath is a gay
place, and a city apparently made solely for the amusement of those who
can pay for them.”
“I have been so alarmed and terrified, sister.”
“I know that, my dear; but you have had now two days’ constant change
of scene, and lived, I may say, almost wholly in the open air, so that
you ought not now to be very nervous, sister.”
“I might have been worse under other treatment,” replied Miss Stevens;
“but at the same time you can have no idea of what it is to suffer from
such an outrage; you cannot conceive anything like it.”
“I dare say not; I am sure it must have been dreadful.”
“It must,” said the captain; “but we will not say anything about a
matter so disagreeable and so inexplicable.”
“Suppose we go in.”
“With all my heart; we shall be in Bath to-morrow, and you will have
nothing to fear; how does your arm feel now?”
“Sore, but much of the inflammation has gone down; that I think will
soon be well, and then I shall be able to use it as I used to do; I
don’t think it will leave any permanent injury or evil behind.”
“I am glad of it,” said the captain.
They now all returned to the inn, while the whole of the party passed
the remainder of the evening in company, retiring at an early hour with
the view of rising early for the purpose of getting into Bath in the
afternoon, or before the evening set in, at all events.
• • • • •
The next morning came, and with it a cloudless sky. They were all
in high health and spirits, and sat down to a breakfast that was
especially prepared for them.
“What has become of your protege?” said Mrs. Fraser to Sir Francis.
“I have not seen her this morning. I have not risen long, and I have
had no time to spare, but intend to see her before I go, and see that
she has means to reach Portsmouth in safety.”
“Will you send for her here, Sir Francis?”
“Certainly, if you wish it,” said Sir Francis; “I will tell the waiter
to inquire if she be ready, and, before she goes, to send her up.”
“That will be the best.”
This accordingly was done, and in about a quarter of an hour the poor
woman came up to the room; there were several alterations for the
better in her appearance, and she did not look so careworn and cast
down as she had done; she appeared thankful, and refreshed with rest
and food.
“You are now ready to start, my good woman?” said Sir Francis.
“I am, sir, thanks to you.”
“I wish you all possible success in your mission, and I hope your son
may be living, and prove grateful to you, as his mother.”
“If living, I am sure he will, sir; and I do not doubt now but I shall
be able to meet with him, thanks to your bounty.”
“I hope you may. Have they treated you well in the house, below?”
“Yes, very well, sir, and kindly.”
“I am glad of it. Have you any food given you to carry you on your
road?”
“I have, thank you, sir.”
“Then there remains now nothing to be done, but to give you some silver
to enable you to provide lodgings, and now and then a lift on the road.”
“Thank you, sir,” said the unfortunate widow, as she took the silver
which Sir Francis held out to her. She could only shed tears of
gratitude; and Miss Stevens added some to it from her own pocket.
“You have our best wishes,” said Sir Francis Varney. “Go now; we have
done all we can for you—good day.”
“God bless you,” said the woman; “may you never experience misfortune,
or ever know the want of even luxuries; you who can give, deserve
to have. The poor and unfortunate have few such as you, sir, for
benefactors.”
“That will do,” said Sir Francis. “Good day to you.”
“Good day, ladies and gentlemen,” said the woman, curtseying low, and
then turning round, she left the apartment.
“Poor thing,” said Sir Francis, “she has a long journey before her. A
temporary aid given to poor people, often lifts them above want, and
places them in a decent position in society.
“So it does,” said Mrs. Fraser.
“Yet, you see, people disclaim charity, and say private charity
is pernicious in its effects. But are there not two sides to any
picture? An individual might as well say it was pernicious to take
medicine because people sometimes poison themselves with some of the
ingredients. Besides that, it does good to the state; for it often
prevents such a one from coming to the state, and being a burthen upon
society at large. I am really of opinion that much temporary distress
might by aid be avoided; while, without that aid, it would, in all
probability, become permanent.”
“There is much wisdom in what you have said, Sir Francis; though you
must be aware that it opens a door to much abuse and reliance upon the
charity of others, which can scarcely be credible.”
“Oh, yes; I expect there is an abuse of everything; but we do not, from
that, argue its total cessation.”
At that moment the landlord entered the room, saying the carriage was
ready, as it had been ordered.
“Then we may as well at once proceed to the carriage, which is waiting,
and we are ready to depart.”
“And,” added Sir Francis, “I am ready too.”
They once more left the house they had slept in, and the carriage again
bore them onwards towards the city of Bath, which was now only three
short stages from them; and where they could arrive at almost any hour
they pleased, if they chose rapid travelling; but this they did not,
because it deprived them of much of the pleasure of travelling—the
views and beauties on the road.
There were many gentlemen’s seats on the road, which called forth
comment and admiration; as well as many smaller estates and houses,
that were often picturesquely situated, as well as lonely.
At length they came within sight of the famed city; and, each moment
they neared it, saw fresh evidences of a large and populous place.
However, they stopped not; but the closer they came to the town the
faster they went, until they were really within the city.
“Here we are in Bath at length,” said Sir Francis. “It is a fine city,
and much of fashion and talent may be found here.”
“I am glad we have arrived here at last,” said Captain Fraser.
“And so am I,” said Mrs. Fraser, “for I am almost tired of riding every
day. I begin to want rest; I want to stop for a time in one place.”
“We get fatigued, even with a change,” said the captain, “after a time;
and yet our lives are a complete round of change.”
“Yes; if you consider the character of time.”
They now stopped at one of the principal hotels, into which they all
entered, and ordered their dinner; and, while the ladies arranged
themselves for the occasion, Sir Francis Varney and Charles walked
out into the town, where they amused themselves with looking at the
different objects which were presented to the gaze of the stranger. In
all these things Sir Francis appeared to be well versed—knew what was
now, and what had been formerly.
• • • • •
Two days had passed by, and there had been but little time lost, so far
as the visiting of one part of the city and another was concerned, and
they gradually became acquainted with and visited the different places
of amusement—at least, so many of them as could be visited by them in
the time.
Sir Francis Varney was the chaperon; and, as he obtained attention and
consideration wherever he went, he was a valuable aid and assistance,
and the family had now got quite used to him, and he to the family.
The peculiarity of his countenance or complexion wore off, his pleasing
manners producing an effect that acted as an antidote to that, which
was likely to cause some peculiar feeling in all who looked at him;
but his courtly manners completely took from any one with whom he came
in contact the power and the desire to exhibit any dislike or aversion.
However, there was not one among all those who looked upon him who did
not look upon him with various emotions; but they were only such as
result from a source that acted upon their feelings and tastes, without
producing any deep or permanent emotion in any one.
Great care was taken by Sir Francis in dress, and his display was
altogether good, but there was no ostentation; his manners were those
of a man who was used to the position and sphere above what he even
then moved in.
There was no mistake in the matter at all, and the Frasers were well
convinced that he was what he appeared to be; and there was, moreover,
an evident partiality for Miss Stevens manifested by him, which had
already been more than once remarked by the captain and his lady, who
tacitly approved of the honour, though nothing was broached on either
side.
“Sir Francis appears to be a very gentlemanly man,” said the captain.
“Very,” said the lady—“very. I never saw one whom I could find so
little fault with; indeed, I may say he had none.”
“That is a very extensive compliment, at all events,” said the captain.
“No fault is a thing you can say of but very few people indeed.”
“I mean, as far as personal behaviour is concerned. Of course I know
nothing more; his demeanour appears perfectly unexceptionable. I am
sure I never saw any one at all his equal in that respect.”
“Perhaps not. He appears to be very attentive to your sister; indeed, I
should say he appears to be very partial.”
“I think so too. What do you say to Sir Francis Varney, Mary,” inquired
Mrs. Fraser, “as a lover, eh?”
“I cannot think of him in such a light,” said Miss Stevens.
“And wherefore not?” inquired the captain.
“Because I could not bear the idea. I don’t know why—I can’t tell you;
but I could not do so—it would be against my nature to accept of such a
lover. It would much pain me to refuse one who had done so much for me;
but I could not accept of him.”
“Upon my word you appear to feel strangely upon this matter,” said the
captain; “but I think you might think twice before you answered thus.”
“No; think how much I might, it could make no alteration in my mind;
for the more gratefully I think, and the more I endeavour to be, yet
the stronger would be my repugnance to have such a man for a lover.”
“Dear me, Mary! how can you say so?”
“I do indeed.”
“Ah, well! girls will be girls; but he has not done you the
distinguished honour to ask you, so you must not refuse in
anticipation. You may consider the grapes are sour because they hang so
high.”
“You ask me a question, to which I have given you the best answer I can
upon the moment. Besides, we know nothing of Sir Francis.”
“We know enough of him, I think, to speak and think with the utmost
gratitude of him. Not that that should make any of us overlook the
precautions that are usual on such occasions. And as for your opinion,
why, that might be amended by time; and I am sure that what we do know
of him is enough to cause us to respect him, and to have confidence in
him. He has not sought our acquaintance, and that is one guarantee in
his favour.”
“So it is.”
“But all this is useless. Sir Francis appears very sensitive. He is of
retired habits and tastes, and, perhaps, something of that may result
from the disadvantage under which he lies, which he may feel severely.”
“So he might; and, therefore, I would never, if I could help it, make
any personal allusion of any character before him, even though I were
speaking of some one else, and it had no reference to him, as he might
apply it to himself.”
“That is quite right, and just what it ought to be.”
CHAPTER CL.
SIR FRANCIS VARNEY IN BATH.—THE OLD WOMAN AND HER FANCIES.—THE MURDER
IN BATH.—THE TREASURE.
Sir Francis Varney, when he walked out into the city of Bath, appeared
to be lost in deep thought, and walked along as if he saw nothing that
was going on around him; he was lost in meditation—something weighed
heavy upon his mind, and he now and then muttered inaudibly to himself.
Whatever might have been his purpose, he merely wandered about without
going to any one place, as if he were in the search for an adventure,
rather than having any specific and determinate object. But, after much
wandering about, he came near the corner of a street, where he saw
two persons conversing together. A stray word appeared to rivet his
attention, and he paused, and then stepped into the shadow of a doorway
and listened.
“You see, Matthew, Aunt Martha is an old miser. She would sooner see
all the world at the last gasp, before she would dream of parting with
a shilling. I am sure it is much too bad.”
“What is too bad?”
“Why, that she, and such as she, should have so much money, and others,
who would work hard, should have none, or even the means of procuring
it.”
“Yes, it is hard; and yet if those who have it did not keep it, there
would be no one who would be worth money.”
“That is all very well; but the more money circulates, the more hands
it gets into; and that, of course, enriches every one who has for a
time the possession of it, for they do not part with it unless they
have value for it.”
“Well, well, that may do very well; but it does not appear to me to be
any business of mine that such an one should beg anything of anybody
else; but no matter, she has money enough.”
“She is single, is she not?”
“Yes,” replied the other.
“Then you may, after all, possess all she has.”
“I may, but she is fat and forty; she may live for years, and in the
meantime I may be a beggar all my life.”
“No, no, not so bad as that.”
“And what is worse than all, while she is living, she is decreasing the
money she has, and it will yearly get less and less, till, if any comes
to me, it will be so small a portion of it, that I am sure there will
be but little good come of it.”
“Indeed. If she be such a miser as you speak of, I should have imagined
that the property, personal or real, would increase under such
management as that.”
“It would, if she were not living on the principal.”
“On the principal—what do you mean?”
“That she lives on the principal, as I told you. She has got some
strange fancies in her head, and one of them is, that the banks will
break, all and every one of them, from one end of the kingdom to the
other.”
“What a notion.”
“Yes, and that is not all; she believes that all the banks will break,
so all the public securities will be of no use, but only so much waste
paper; and real property will all be seized, and there will be I don’t
know what universal ruin, desolation, and disorganisation.”
“What does she do?”
“Why, keeps all her cash at home; and then goes to her strong box and
takes out her bright gold guineas, which appear in such abundance, that
it would seem as if it could never sensibly diminish; and thus she has
been going on for a matter of two years or more.”
“Upon my word, what can she dream of? If she go on in that manner, I am
sure, too, that she will be a beggar.”
“That is certain; but she thinks not, and you can’t argue her into any
other belief whatever that is contrary to this matter. However, I have
no favour in her eyes, because I am her relative.”
“And why should that be?”
“Because, being her relative, she thinks I may be wishing her dead
every day she lives; so, you see, if she go on with this feeling about
her, she may take a complete dislike to me, and I should never have a
farthing left me, even if she died before all was gone, and dissipated.”
“Very true. Where do you live?”
“I have been living with my aunt.
“Indeed! And where may that be?” inquired her companion.
“Where—why, don’t you know number one hundred and nine, Chapel-street?
but I have left there—that is, I shall do so to-night.”
“Will you? You are wrong.”
“I doubt it, very much—very much indeed.”
“What motive can you assert there is, to make it good policy in doing
this?”
“She will think I do not care about waiting for her money; and that
motive being observed, I am sure it will influence her in my favour.”
“Then, you will not go back to-night?”
“No, not at all.”
“Well, you know best; but I should. However, I must now leave you, and
bid you good day. I must go.”
“Good day,” said the other, and they quitted the place.
When the two speakers had left the spot, Sir Francis Varney came
forth from his hiding-place, and gazed after them for some moments in
silence; but when they were no longer in sight, he muttered,—
“Could anything be more fortunate! I am reduced to the last guinea. I
have not another pound to pay my way with. Just at a moment, too, when
I think I may be successful at last in securing a victim.”
He then walked onwards until he came to the neighbourhood of the street
he had heard the stranger name, and then he paused and approached the
house with some curiosity, but passed by it without stopping.
It was a corner house, and a blank wall ran a short way down the
street, being the side of the house, and a small portion of ground
called a yard; here the wall was lower—here there was a chance of
getting over, and here Sir Francis Varney paused a moment, as if
examining the place with care and scrutiny.
He looked all around, and saw no one approaching; he heard no sound,
and he saw no face in any window that was within sight. It was,
moreover, too dark to be seen, and he, without a moment’s hesitation,
ran a few paces towards the wall, and by a violent effort succeeded in
placing one hand upon the summit, and then the other soon followed.
Sir Francis Varney was a man of great agility and strength, and he was
not long in drawing himself up to the top, and then he dropped down.
It was fortunate he dropped heavy, and also fortunate, from that
circumstance, he fell upon something soft. The good fortune of the
occurrences was dependent upon each other. We say it was fortunate he
fell heavy, because he fell upon the old lady’s yard-dog, an unamiable
cur, and prevented an alarm, for the dog was crushed, and unable to
utter a single howl before the animal died.
There was now nothing to do but enter the house if the back door was
open; but upon trial this proved not to be the case.
This was a matter that required some consideration; the door was not
to be forced, and he hoped to get in by that means, but he was foiled;
but yet it was something to have possession of the yard, he could hide
here; but yet that increased his danger, for if he remained there, he
was liable to a discovery, and that, too, before any attempt had been
made upon the coffers of the old woman, and no good effected by him.
What to do he could scarcely tell; but after some thought, he
determined to attempt the back windows in the parlour, or room above
the ground; and to effect this purpose, he would have to get upon a
water-butt, and thence to the railings facing the window of the room,
and which appeared to have no shutters.
Having once made up his mind, he set about it at once, and was soon
on the top of the water-butt, and made good his hold upon the small
balcony, and then he drew himself up.
This was a work of some difficulty, because the balcony was very close
to the window, and left him no room to lean over; but yet he succeeded,
and found to his great joy that the window was only closed without
being fastened; he had only cautiously and noiselessly to lift it up,
and he could enter it.
This he did at once, and then stood in the room; but all was dark, and
he could not hear a sound throughout the house, for he listened many
minutes, lest he might be suddenly intruded on by some one, and then
there would be no escape from there, and he would possibly lose all.
Caution, therefore, was the order of the day, and he gently closed the
window, lest the draught might be felt in some of the other parts of
the house.
That was very fortunate, for there was every possibility of a discovery
resulting from such a course; for any one, feeling a greater than usual
draught, would soon inquire into the cause.
Having got thus far, he opened the door and walked into the passage,
and then he heard the sound of conversation being carried on in an
undertone; he listened at the door, and heard two female voices.
“Betty,” said one.
“Yes, ma’am,” replied the other.
“Have you shut the shutters, and locked up all the doors?”
“Yes, ma’am.
“The kitchen-door?”
“Yes, ma’am—all right as can be; nobody can get in, I’ll warrant.”
“You don’t say so?”
“Oh, but I do; the dog’s out in the yard, too.”
“When you have had tea, I’ll have him brought in; he mustn’t lay out
there, poor creature, to spoil his coat, and catch cold. I’m almost
thinking I ought not to let him stay out to this hour.”
“He’s well enough—he’ll not hurt—he’s got the kennel to sleep in, and
he’s plenty of straw; there’s many a one about these parts as would be
glad of such a bed. I’ve taken care of him.”
“Very well, Betty; sit down to tea, and, when it is over, I’ll bet you
anything that old Martha Bell will be here.”
“Lord bless me, ma’am, you don’t say so!”
“Yes, I do; but I won’t be at home; she and I have fallen out of late,
and I’m not inclined to make up the quarrel, for she won’t believe the
banks will break, and you know they will, Betty.”
“To be sure, ma’am, they will—I know very well they will; it’s quite
certain—as certain as the almanac.”
“Yes; and, what’s worse, she wanted to borrow ten pounds, and that,
you know, will never do at any price; she would break, too, and then I
should have loss number one, and no one can tell how soon number two
might follow.”
“He! he! he!” said Betty; “oh, lawks, I shall split.”
“What’s the matter now—what are you laughing at, silly?”
“Oh, you are so funny, ma’am; I’m sure you’d make anybody laugh—you do
joke so, it makes one laugh.”
“Laugh!—what is there funny in losing ten pounds, I should like to
know? Nobody would laugh at that, I should imagine; I am sure I should
laugh at nothing of that sort. If you were to lose ten shillings, I am
sure that I should not laugh at you, nor do I think you would, either.”
“No, ma’am, I’m sure you would not, and I am sure I should not; but you
do say such things that make me forget all about the money.”
“Well, then, go down stairs and fetch some more coals.”
“Yes, ma’am,” said Betty; and, before Sir Francis Varney had time to
slip back and open the door of the other room, the door of the one he
was listening at was suddenly opened, and Betty stood before him.
She came out plump, before he had time to step back; and she ran
against him before she was aware any one was there; for coming from
a room where there was light, she could not see at all in the dark
passage.
“Oh, my ——”
She had got thus far in her exclamation, when she received a heavy
blow from the intruder, which felled her senseless to the floor, and,
as quick as thought, he drew his dress sword, and plunged the point
through her heart. Not a groan followed—she was dead, and might be said
to have died while bereft of sense or motion.
[Illustration: Varney plunges his sword through Betty’s heart.]
“What is the matter, Betty?” said the woman—her mistress.
No answer was returned, and Varney paused, as if uncertain what to do.
He was in some doubt if he should or not go in, or await the woman’s
approach to where he stood. He had not been seen, or she would have
screamed out; and if he went to her she would see him, and have time to
alarm people.
He paused, and awaited her coming; but she appeared to defer doing so,
and merely said,—
“Betty—Betty, what has ailed you? What can be the matter? You don’t
mean to say that the tea has got into your head? No, no,” she
muttered, after a pause; “that can’t be the case. She must have
been to my medicine bottle, and that has been too strong for her. I
shall discharge her. She’ll be breaking something or other, and then
who knows where that will end—begin by breaking a basin, and end by
breaking a bank.”
So saying, she muttered something unintelligible to Varney, and then
began to rise and walk along the room towards the door.
This was a moment of suspense—the door opened suddenly, and then she
stood before Varney, who made a rapid thrust with his sword. This would
have been as fatal as that which he had dealt Betty, but the mistress
was more fortunate, at the moment, for a steel busk was the means of
preventing its taking effect.
“Murder! What do you want! Oh, you wretch—I know you now! Depend upon
it you shall be hanged! Murder—murder!”
“One word, and you are a corpse,” said Varney.
“Mercy—mercy! Will you spare me—will you spare my life?”
“I will.”
“Oh, thank you—thank you! I never hurt you, and I don’t think you would
me. I am very sorry that I made any noise—but you will spare me?”
“Yes, upon one condition.”
“On a condition?” said the woman, tremblingly.
“Yes, upon a condition.”
“Tell me what it is you require of me, and I will comply.”
“Then,” said Varney, after a moment’s pause, “show me where you keep
your money. I must have money, so give me plenty.”
“Plenty of money, did you say?”
“Yes, plenty. I want some. You have money I know—gold—gold in quantity.”
“Ha, ha, ha! gold! Oh, yes—gold! Ha, ha! how funny!”
“Funny! Is my sword funny?” asked Varney; “because, if you think so,
you may have a small portion of it, which you may consider funnier
still.”
“No, no; but I have no money—none at all, save a little money I have
for immediate expenses. I have but little; for nobody now-a-days keeps
money in houses, if they can get any at any time.”
“But you have plenty of money.”
“I haven’t any, upon my ——”
“You have. You keep it in the house, you know, because the banks might
break, and you would lose all. Now give me some at once, or you are
dead as any nail in your house—mark that!”
“Oh, dear!—oh, yes! What would you have of me?”
“Money,” said Varney, pressing the point of his sword against her side.
“Oh, mercy! I’ll tell you all; but—but you must be satisfied with what
I have got, and not leave me a beggar, or kill me because I have no
more.”
“I will be satisfied with what you have got; but that I know to be much
more than I can carry away with me.”
“Oh, good lord, you don’t know me, or else you would know the reverse
of that. A poor lodging-housekeeper is not the person to have much
money in the house; but if the truth must be told, I have up stairs my
quarter’s rent, which I ought to give my landlord. I can give you that,
but God knows how he will believe me when I tell him I have lost it.”
“You have all your property about you. You have gold in quantities.”
“I have not.”
“Then take the fruits of your obstinacy,” said Varney, in a fury; and,
making a savage and sudden lunge at her, he passed his sword through
her breast, and with a smothered scream she fell to the earth, where
she lay gasping and writhing for several seconds, when a rapid gurgling
sound came from her throat, and she died.
“’Tis done;” said Varney to himself; “’tis done, and it would have been
as well if I had done it as first; but no matter, ’tis done quietly.”
There lay the two bodies upon the flooring, the one in the passage by
the door, and the other in the parlour. There was a long pool of black
blood, extending from one to the other of the two corpses—they mingled
their blood in death, though they held different positions in life.
What could be done? there they were, and even Varney could not pick his
way without treading in the blood.
He at once entered the apartment, and began to examine the whole place,
but he did not find much there—a few odd pounds, and yet he turned
everything upside down, to use a common phrase; but yet there was
nothing of the sort which he hoped for, and expected to find.
“Can I have mistaken the place?” was his first thought.
Upon consideration, he saw reason enough to make his mind easy upon the
score of mistakes in that matter. There was the number and the street,
and the old woman, and her conversation answered exactly to what he had
heard; and after a few moments’ consideration, he muttered,—
“It must be right; there are more rooms than one in the house. I will
go and search through the rooms, and if I don’t find any, I will set
the house on fire. Indeed, I think that will be better done, it will
prevent the deed taking light, and as little suspicion may be as well
incurred as can be.”
This was a thing only thought of to be resolved on; but he cast that
aside, and proceeded with his search, and having finished that room, he
splashed through the blood, and once more stood in the passage.
“And now for the bedrooms,” he muttered.
The candle he held was the only one he could obtain, and he was
compelled to walk steadily, lest he should lose its aid by going out;
however, he soon got up stairs, and walked into the best bedroom, where
he again began to search about for the hidden treasure, but found it
not.
“Curses upon the stupidity of the old fool, where does she hide her
money? I am sure she has it here, and I wanted to get back without
delay. I did not want to be away long, and here I have been, I dare
say, an hour.”
This was true, and he turned things over and about in great haste;
but his endeavours had liked to have been useless, as regarded the
discovery, only his eye chanced to light upon a panel.
He started up and pulled away a part the bed-curtains, behind which it
was partially concealed.
“Ha! ha! what have we here? What I have been wishing to find, no doubt.
This is the secret hiding-place of her gold—the treasury.”
However, whatever it might be, it did not appear to be in his power to
determine, for he could not open it.
This was, of course, a provoking state of things; and Varney seized
hold of each implement that came to his hands, but threw each down
again, being unable to effect his object by any means whatever.
He started up suddenly, after making many desperate attempts to break
the door open, which, however, were futile, and exclaimed,—
“There are keys to these places, and I am sure the old woman must have
them about her, if this place be really the receptacle of her wealth,
as I have every reason to believe it is. I will find out, if I can; no
doubt, however, I shall find it upon her somewhere—I’ll try.”
He immediately went down stairs and found the body of the old woman; it
was fast stiffening; but the clothes were all sopping in blood, and he
turned her over hastily until he found out the pocket; and from that he
drew a bunch of keys. They were all bloody, but he did not hesitate
about seizing them.
“These will, no doubt, let me into the secret. I shall find my way in,
now, and then the house will no longer hold me.”
He turned, and quitted the corpse; and, in going upstairs, he saw for
the first time that the stairs all bore the imprint of his own foot;
he saw they were stained in blood, and were clear, distinct, and well
defined.
“It matters not,” he muttered; “fire will, and shall efface that; and,
besides, if it did not, what care I?”
He ran up the stairs, and again entered the bedroom, and was once
more kneeling before the door of the cupboard. The bunch of keys was
composed of many, and he tried one after the other, until, after many
trials, he came to one, which was of a peculiar make and shape, and
which convinced him he was now in possession of the right key.
“I think I have succeeded, now,” he muttered, as he put the key into
the lock. It fitted very closely into the lock, and then it slowly
turned, and he saw the door open; but it only disclosed another door.
“What is the meaning of this?” muttered Varney; “what, is there another
door to be found? I suppose some of these keys will fit this as well.”
However, he was not compelled to make the search, for the key of this
inner door hung up by one corner, on a little hook, in a niche which
had been apparently cut out on purpose.
This was soon opened, and then came rather a startling sight.
In a small cupboard were packed a heap of human bones—more than bones,
for they had yet the flesh dried and sticking to them—the skull was
brown and bare, save here and there remained some hair.
[Illustration: Varney finds a heap of bones in the cupboard.]
“What is the meaning of this?” he muttered, angrily—“and have I
troubled myself in this manner for only these few bones?”
It was, however, an apparent fact. There was the place, and it was now
opened, and the contents were plain enough—bones!—bones!—human bones!
There could be no mistake; and Varney rested his hand on his knee, and
gazed intently into the cupboard at the bones, and everywhere else.
He was about to rise, when, somehow or other, he was induced to push
the bottom shelf—why, he could not tell; but, when he had done so, he
found it give downwards. Yes, the whole cupboard went down; he pushed,
and pushed, until the roof was no higher than the floor; then, indeed,
he saw a sight that caused him to feel a satisfaction.
“Ah!” he exclaimed, “ah! this is what I have sought, and I will have
it—gold!—gold!—aye, here is gold in heaps, more than I can carry.”
He stretched forth his arm, and leaned into the cupboard, and then
examined the contents, and felt assured that there were several
thousands of pounds; the glittering heap before him was what he wanted,
and for which he had remorselessly committed such fearful crimes.
“But I must make haste—I must make haste. I shall lose what I have such
a certainty of possessing.”
So muttering to himself, he put as much gold into his pockets as he
could, and carrying a bag under his arm, he re-locked the cupboard.
Having retraced his steps below, he replaced everything; while at the
same time he carefully examined his person, to see that there were no
traces of his deeds upon him; and then, wrapping himself up in his
cloak, he left the house, and proceeded towards his hotel.
CHAPTER CLI.
THE SCENE AT THE HOTEL.—THE RELATION OF THE CAUSE OF SIR FRANCIS
VARNEY’S PALENESS.
When Sir Francis Varney reached his hotel, he hurried to his own
apartment, and then he called for his luggage; and when that was
brought to him, and he was alone, he unlocked a portmanteau, and placed
his gold in it; and then, having taken care to dress himself, he again
met the Frasers below, at the evening meal.
“I have been strolling the streets for an odd hour,” he said, “and find
things pretty much as they used to be; I don’t see many alterations
worth speaking of.”
“And yet they say they are improving daily.”
“They may be; but only in parts and places; and it does not alter the
general plan of the place, though appearances may be benefited.”
“Exactly; that, I dare say, may be the case; as, indeed, it is most
likely to be the fact, especially when we see that, save in the case
of entire new streets, all improvements are effected by individual
exertions.”
“Exactly; but life and happiness is the result of individual
exertions,” said Sir Francis; “but yet many shrink from prosecuting a
scheme of happiness, lest barriers be placed in their path that would
be as injurious to all as they are effectual.”
“Indeed, that is often the case.”
“I have met with many instances of blighted devotion since I have
wandered about over the green vales of England.”
“I dare say you have met with some adventures?”
“I have, sir. I have met with many that, perhaps, few men would have
ventured into, and ever expect to come out alive; but I have not done
so without paying dearly for my temerity.”
“Indeed; have you incurred much danger?”
“I have, sir.”
“But still it must be pleasant to fall back upon the remembrances of
the past, and recall scenes and events that possess interest to your
mind.”
“It is so. I remember well that, some years ago, when I was in the
north, that an occurrence took place that has left a lasting memorial
upon me, and one I can never forget as long as I live.”
“It must have been a serious affair.”
“It was a serious affair—a very serious affair. I was going to
Scotland, when, by some accident, the carriage in which I was
travelling broke down, and it was unable to proceed, and I took up
my abode at the nearest inn; where I determined to remain until the
carriage was repaired, which would, it was said, take a couple of days,
at the least.
Well, in the evening of the first day, I walked about visiting the
different places where I could hope for any pleasure; in doing so, I
was wandering slowly down a lane, when I heard voices on before me. The
wind blew from them to me, and I heard all they said.
“Then this evening,” said one.
“Yes, yes; I consider this the most favourable opportunity than can be
taken advantage of.”
“Well, then, we had better go at once.”
“Yes; now we are on our road there, you see, and we shall be soon
there; there will just be light enough to reconnoitre.”
“Very well. We can secret ourselves somewhere about the place, where
we shall not be discovered, and then we can get into the house at our
leisure.”
“But we may have to meet with opposition.”
“Then, we must resist, too. You don’t intend to be taken, I suppose?”
“No, not I.”
“What did you intend to do if you were caught?”
“Fight my way out, or, if need be, I can push my knife into the ribs of
any one who may be in my way.”
“Right. I shall be inclined to do for any one who wants to keep me
against my will—you may reckon upon that for a certainty; and if the
old man but as much as moves or utters a single cry, I will do for him.”
“You don’t mean that, do you?”
“I do, and will do it.”
“Then I know, and I will do the same. I like to have a pal that will
stick by me, and have no nonsense. However, we need not be in a hurry,
and just do what is necessary—go to work steadily and determinedly.”
“Agreed. We will now go on—strike off to the left here, and we come
then to the house. There’s only one man servant, but he can be dealt
with; and as for the old man himself, he cannot do much.”
Then they both proceeded across the fields until they came to some
thick wood, when I lost sight of them.
Well, I knew the house they were both going to, and I determined to
proceed by another route to the same place.
I followed the lane as far as it would go, and found it led up to
the very house which I had heard the men declare their intention of
robbing, and possibly of murdering the owners—the inhabitants, I might
say, for master or servant alike they would not hesitate in destroying.
I entered the house—the door was open,—after having walked up a broad
and stately avenue of linden trees which lined the way up to the hall
door. I was for some moments unable to make any one hear, but soon
after I heard some one approaching the hall. I paused, therefore, and
presently there came an elderly gentleman, with a grave but pleasant
countenance, upon whose shoulders fell a profusion of snow-white locks;
he was venerable, yet pleasing in the expression of countenance.
He bowed when he saw me, but looked rather surprised.
“I dare say, sir, you appear surprised at my intrusion; but I do not
come without a motive.”
“I dare say not, sir. But you are welcome; will you walk in?”
“Thank you,” I said, “but I have come to put you on your guard against
an attempt at robbery, and possibly murder, that is to be made upon
your house to-night.”
“Indeed, sir. I can hardly believe any one would be so wicked as to do
anything of the kind; and yet, I am sure you would not say so if you
had not some grounds for such a belief.”
“I have,” I replied, “and I will relate them.”
I then related to him distinctly all that I had overheard in the lane,
and the direction the men had taken. He appeared very thoughtful for
some moments, and then he said to me, as he led the way up stairs,—
“Will you walk up stairs with me?”
I did as he desired, and followed him up stairs, until he came to a
small observatory erected in the top part of the house.
“You say you saw them enter the copse between here and the lane yonder.”
“Yes, I did; and I imagine they may be seen if watch is kept in such a
place as this; for I am sure they intend to examine the house, as to
the means of approaching it, and they expect to find only yourself and
a man-servant.”
“They would have met but little more, indeed; however, I am
fore-warned, and I will take care to be fore-armed.”
“That is my object in coming to you; to effect this is all I seek; and
now I will bid you good evening, for I have got some distance to walk
before I can get back to the hotel where I am staying.”
“Are you staying at an hotel?”
“Yes,” I replied; and I named the place where I was stopping, when he
said,—
“You are welcome, if you are pleased to do so, to remain here; I shall
be most happy with your company.”
“Thank you,” I said; “and frankly I must say, I should like to see
the issue of this affair, and will accept of your invitation, though,
perhaps, I have accepted of your invitation too readily.”
“Not at all—not at all, you are heartily welcome; we will sit up and
wait for these fellows; when we have beaten them off, we can retire in
security to rest, without fear of disturbance.”
“Do you see them?” I inquired, as he was looking through a telescope
towards the point I had named.
“No, I do not see them yet,” he said; “no, no; and yet I—I think I see
something now through a portion of the copse—it’s difficult to tell
what they are about; if they go much further in that direction, they
will be plain enough; there—there they are; I can see them both plainly
enough.”
“Two of them?” said I.
“Yes,” he replied, “I see two; they appear to be looking this way;
what are they doing now? Oh, I see, they are making for a place of
concealment nearer the house. Well, sir, I am much obliged to you—very
much, indeed; for you have evidently saved my house from being robbed,
and myself from murder—I owe you my life.”
“Nay, sir, not so bad as that; the villains might not have been
successful enough to have effected an entrance before you were alarmed.”
“And if they had, what could I have done? Why, truly, I have fire-arms,
but I should have been loth to have used them, and my hesitating might
have cost me my life; so I have to thank you for life and property.”
“As you please,” I said; “but what steps do you intend to take towards
your own and your property’s preservation?”
“I shall obtain the aid of another, and quietly await their coming; but
as I think, from their appearance, they are not mere country people who
come about robbing from distress, but men who make a kind of profession
of housebreaking, I will have both taken and dealt with according to
law.”
“It is their deserts,” I said, “for a more deliberately planned affair
I never yet heard of; and what makes it so very black, is the fact of
their early making up their minds to murder any one.”
“No doubt,” he replied; “but that is an inducement to take them in the
fact. I will send for one man, and, what with ourselves, we can secure
the villains; we are enough to do that.”
“They are desperate,” I said.
“But they will yield to numbers,” he said.
“No doubt; but there must be a yet greater number; the odds, in my
opinion, are not great enough to secure victory. These are desperate
men, for they will not be taken, and two to one will not deter
them—one, or even two lives may be sacrificed before they are secured,
if they do not get off.”
“Well, then, you appear to think that we had better obtain more aid?”
“I do,” I replied. “At least, a couple of men, if not, three, over the
number you first spoke of, if you wish it to be perfectly harmless in
its results.”
“I should so desire it,” he replied.
“Then you’ll find that requisite,” I answered.
Then I was invited down stairs, and great hospitality shown me by the
old gentleman, who was an exceedingly pleasant companion. He was well
informed, and a well read man, and was the only inhabitant of that
large mansion.
He had been many years a widower, and had but one child, a son, a young
man of great promise; he was abroad on a tour, and he was awaiting
his return with great anxiety, as he was somewhat longer than he had
anticipated.
We sat conversing for some hours. We had a handsome supper, and
afterwards some choice wine, and then in came three stout countrymen.
“My friends,” he said, “I want you to keep watch and ward to-night in
my house, to protect it from robbers.”
They agreed to do so, but expressed some surprise at what had occurred,
and appeared to believe it hardly possible that any one could have been
wicked enough to compass such an object.
However, he told them all I had said, and they were sent below, where
they were served with a very good supper, and promised reward, with
injunctions not to speak after a certain hour.
This all arranged, I and my host seated before a fire, and with some
wine, we passed the time agreeably enough.
• • • • •
“The time passes,” said my host, as the clock chimed the hours. “I
wonder if anybody is about now?”
“I should think,” I replied, “they must be about thinking of what they
have in contemplation. I am sure it is a quiet hour in this part of the
world, and I should imagine that no human being can be awake about
here.”
“None, I dare say, save ourselves, and our assailants, if they have
not altered their minds, and given up their intentions, or altered the
night they intended for the attempt. Who can tell? they may have done
so.”
“I hope not.”
“No; it will be very uncomfortable to be in constant dread, never
knowing any night I lay down what I may come to before morning; I may
lose my life, and never again see my son.”
“Yes,” I replied; “but had we better not put out the lights?”
“I will order it to be done.”
As he spoke, he rang a bell, and when a servant appeared, he said to
him,—
“William, you had better put out all lights, and be quite silent; and
if you hear any noise, get out of the way, and remain silent, unless
they try to get away and elude us.”
“Very well, sir.”
“And as soon as you hear them at work, you had better steal up and let
me know, as I intend to be present when they are taken into custody, as
I have a particular desire to see it done.”
“Very well, sir; but you don’t know the danger you run. These men are
desperate men, and they care not what they do.”
“I know all that, William; but hasten down, and see my orders executed.”
“Very well, sir,” said the servant, who at once left the room.
“These people,” said my host, “are not willing that I should run any
risk; perhaps they think they will not have so indulgent a master in
the next. Perhaps they are right; for I give but little trouble, and my
servants are mostly out visiting some of their relatives.”
“Indeed. I thought you were somewhat slenderly attended.”
“I am. I have two very ill away at this moment, and I have another away
on a visit to some relative.”
“Indeed; they have an easy life under you.”
“It is much the same as not having them at all; and yet, I must say, I
have nothing to complain of; my wishes are complied with, and I have
all my work done well, and punctually to a minute; and, if they have
extra work to do, they never complain, but set about it cheerfully.”
At that moment we heard William creeping up the stairs, and my thoughts
soon reverted from the contemplation of the calm contentment in which
all here appeared to dwell, to the confusion and bustle that was now
likely to ensue.
“Hilloa, William!”
“Yes, sir, they are come,” said William, in a low voice.
“Where are they getting in at?”
“In at the pantry window, sir. I can hear them unbolting the shutters.
They have cut a hole out of it, and they will be clear in another
minute.”
“Very good. Now do you all keep together, and, at the appointed signal,
rush upon them, and bind them hand and foot.”
“It shall be done, sir, as soon as they get into the kitchen.”
“Very well. I will come down and watch the operations; but don’t let
them get back again.”
“Oh, we’ll take care of that.”
“Make haste,” he said, “and station some of them under the stairs, so
that they cannot escape. They must both be taken.”
“And they shall.”
“Go on. Will you come down with me,” he said, turning to me, “or will
you remain here till we have secured them? You, sir, are a stranger,
and, perhaps, you had better remain here.”
“No, not I,” said I. “I will go down with you, by all means, and we
will see how these fellows behave themselves under these circumstances.
Let me see them. I was the first to discover them, and I hope you will
not refuse me permission to be present at a _denouement_ which I have,
in some measure, been instrumental in bringing about. I wish to be
present.”
“Then follow me,” said my host; “we shall not be too soon, for several
minutes have elapsed.”
I waited not a moment, but hurried down stairs, and found that, as I
was going down the kitchen stairs, the robbers were well aware of the
fact that they were entrapped; and, in their rage, they fought with
desperation, and forced their way out of the kitchen, and through the
barrier placed below; and, seeing they would effect an escape, I jumped
over the rails, and stood between them and the way out.
I had but my sword, and I drew that, and placed myself in a position,
threatening destruction to the first who should attempt to pass.
This, however, was disregarded; and the two men rushed at me, hoping to
bear me down, but my weapon ran through the first, when a pistol bullet
laid me low, and the man rushed over me.
“Good Heavens! and were you shot, Sir Francis?”
“Oh, yes, and was severely injured; and it was some months before I
was cured, the bullet having wounded an artery.”
“That was dangerous.”
“Yes, so much so, that two surgeons declared that, had I bled another
half-second, I must have been dead—that I must in fact have bled to
death, and I should never have recovered; for I had, they thought,
scarcely half an ounce of blood in my whole body—scarcely sufficient to
cause the heart to beat.”
“It was a fearful state—where did you remain?”
“I remained at this gentleman’s house the whole of the time; he was
very liberal, and very generous; I wanted for nothing. He said that,
but for the immediate attention of the surgeons, he thought I must have
bled to death; he saw me fall, and one of the men, without waiting for
orders to do so, ran for a surgeon, and hence the rapidity with which
the medical man was in attendance. And, what was worse, I had, in about
two months afterwards, to undergo an operation to have the bullet
extracted.”
“Good Heavens! you had a severe time of it?”
“I had; and I had nearly lost my life a second time, for I lost a vast
quantity of blood again; and, ever since that, I have been of the
extraordinary pale complexion which you now see.”
“I thought it was natural,” said Mrs. Fraser, suddenly; but a look from
Mr. Fraser told her she had done wrong.
“No, ma’am, it is not, indeed, natural.”
“It was not until the loss of blood occasioned it, I presume?”
“No, captain, it was not; it resulted partly from the dreadful loss
of the vital fluid which I sustained, and partly from a most violent
virulent typhus, which I took in consequence of my looseness of
system—that, I believe, did more than anything else towards bringing me
to my present position—for, before, I was considered fair and florid in
complexion, but my friends hardly knew me, or professed they did not,
and I have not seen them from that day to this.”
“Upon my word, Sir Francis Varney, you have had some extraordinary
occurrences in your life. I am amazed at them; indeed I could scarcely
believe one person, especially a gentleman of your property and
standing——”
“Why, as for that, I can only say that my position and rank have given
me the means to enable me to go through them without any inconvenience,
for I have no home or place dedicated to domestic delights; such a
life I should be proud and happy to possess, but which I can never
accomplish; indeed, I may say, I fear to make the attempt; but, no
matter. The prime of life will, in a few years, pass away, and then I
shall be past the desire for a home; and yet Varney-hall, in the north,
is an ancient, palace-like abode, that would grace a duchess.”
“Is that your ancestral hall?”
“It is,” said Varney, with emotion.
“And now uninhabited?”
“Oh, dear, no. When I determined to lead the life I do, I could not
permit the old place to become ruinous and deserted and, therefore, let
it, and those who now live there, are well able and willing to keep the
place in repair.”
“That is fortunate.”
“Well, sir, I hardly know what is fortunate or unfortunate as regards
myself; but I have one of my old fits of melancholy come over me.”
“Nay, you must battle against them, Sir Francis.”
“I have ever endeavoured to do so, but I don’t know how it is—I cannot,
somehow or other, bear up—I feel a terrible depression of spirits.”
“I am truly sorry to hear it; but let us hope that the gaieties of Bath
will restore you to your wonted serenity.”
“I am sure I wish it,” said Mrs. Fraser; “but where are we to go
to-morrow?—can you tell me that, Sir Francis?”
“To the pump-room in the morning—the library and the assembly in the
evening, if you are inclined to do all at once.”
“Yes; well, then, suppose we make the attempt; we can but give in if we
find it too much exertion, though I am inclined to believe we shall not
find it beyond our strength,” said Mrs. Fraser.
“Then that is our agreement,” said Sir Francis.
“Yes; it is.”
CHAPTER CLII.
THE SCENE OF THE MURDER.—THE VISIT TO THE HOUSE.—THE MYSTERIOUS
DISAPPEARANCE OF THE TREASURE.
The next day came; there was much excitement in the family of the
Frasers; each one could see the partiality of Sir Francis Varney for
Miss Stevens. She herself could not pretend that it was not so, or that
she was unable to see it. It was quite plain and evident, and yet it
gave her great pain, because she had an unconquerable aversion to him,
who was her benefactor, and to whom she owed so much.
This, however, was a strong and inexplicable feeling in her own mind,
and she felt that if death or Sir Francis were her only alternatives,
she must choose the former. This was from some feeling, from what
source it sprung she could not tell you, that appeared to forbid her
permitting the approach of such a lover.
It might have been instinct, or it might have been that she had taken a
personal dislike to him on account of his complexion; and yet she could
not admit so much even to herself as that, and yet it must have had an
origin.
She looked at him much more and more each hour, and more and more did
she dislike him. At length she felt so much repugnance to him, that, if
it were not for the deep gratitude she owed him, she would fly from and
not even endure his society, good as that she was compelled to admit
really was.
When he offered her his arm in their walk to the assembly-rooms and the
pump-room, they were much pleased with the appearance of everything,
and with the attentions of Sir Francis, who certainly did all he could
to make the party comfortable and amused, he was so well acquainted
with every object.
As they returned to the hotel, at which they all remained, they passed
the house of the old woman who had been so cruelly murdered the night
before. Sir Francis cast a cursory glance at it as they passed, but
there was no sign of the door having been opened, and the murder had
not yet been discovered; and this arose from the fact that the old
woman was an eccentric, and her shutters had remained in that way
before; and, therefore, no one took any particular notice of it.
When the party had reached the hotel, Sir Francis said,—
“You will, I presume, attend the ball this evening at the
assembly-rooms?”
“We should wish to do so,” replied the captain. “Do you intend to go,
Sir Francis?”
“I will, captain. It is now some time since I went to such a place, and
I think the change will be so great and agreeable, that I will go.”
“Then we shall have the advantage of your guidance,” said Captain
Fraser; “and I hope we shall long have the pleasure of doing so.”
“You are very good in saying so, captain; and, if agreeable to yourself
and the ladies, I am willing, and shall be happy to bear you company.”
“I am sure,” replied Mrs. Fraser, “we shall always be happy with Sir
Francis Varney’s company, and thank him for his condescension—shall we
not, sister?”
“Yes. I am sure I shall be much obliged to Sir Francis for this, as
well as many other services he has done us.”
“Do not talk in this manner,” said Sir Francis,—“do not speak of the
past, Miss Stevens; it is the present I would wish you to think of;
at the same time, I desire only to be accepted, because I may not be
thought intruding.”
“Dear me, Sir Francis, how you talk! Really, I am afraid we have said
something to give you displeasure, or my sister, here, has misbehaved
herself; if so, I shall really take her to task for so doing.”
“You will be acting unjustly if you do. But permit me to leave you for
a short time. I have some matters to transact. I expect a remittance
of money to this place, for I usually appoint some particular town or
city, for I do not consider it safe to carry any great amount of money
about me; it gives such temptations to robbery and violence that,
travelling as I do, from place to place, I am especially liable to such
attempts.”
“Certainly, you are.”
“Then I will bid you good evening, for the present,” said the baronet,
and he left the room.
• • • • •
When Sir Francis left the apartment in which he had been with the
Frasers, he walked to his own apartment, and taking a large cloak and a
small portmanteau he had purchased, he made his way to the very house
where he had the night before committed such a double murder.
Before he reached there, however, he put the cloak on, and when he
approached the house, he found the street entirely deserted; then
hastily stepping up, he put the key into the keyhole, and at once
opened the door and walked in.
He paused a moment or two, and then went down the passage a few feet,
until he came to the body, for which he felt with his foot.
“Ah!” he muttered; “I see all is right—quite right; here is the
body—nobody has been here to disturb it.”
He took out materials for obtaining a light, and then he pushed past,
and walked up stairs, until he came to the bed-room, where he again
opened the strange receptacle of gold and bones; but, as he did so,
what was his amazement to find a small packet of paper lying down, but
all the gold gone!
He started up in an instant, and laid his hand upon his sword, but at
the same time he appeared rivetted to the spot, and paused in this
attitude for more than a minute.
Then, recovering himself, he gazed round slowly and carefully from
side to side, as if to assure himself he was not trapped. But hearing
no sound—nothing stirring from any quarter whatever, he began to think
there might be some mistake in his vision.
“Surely—surely,” he muttered, “no one could have come in, and, seeing
the bodies, possessed themselves of the money, and then walked out.
They would surely have given the alarm; besides, any one who had
entered would never have gone further than the bodies.
“It is impossible,” he muttered, and he again stooped down to examine
the cupboard from which the treasure appeared to be abstracted. But
there was nothing to be seen, save the bare boards; no signs of the
treasure remained. This was a strange and mysterious disappearance of
what could not have gone without human means.
“How did they get at it?” he muttered; “the place was locked, and in
the same order as I left it; there is no getting into such a place
without unlocking or forcing open the cupboard, or, I may say, chest,
for this is a strong place; it is not broken open, and I have the key.”
Varney paused for several moments, and then he picked up some paper,
which was folded up, and seeing it was written upon, he thrust it into
his pocket, and again looked into the treasure coffer, but all was gone.
“D——n!” muttered Varney, furiously stamping his foot, as if at that
moment only he had become perfectly aware of his disappointment. “What
can be the meaning of this? But this is no place for me; some one has
been here, and the murder is known. I must quit it—eh?”
At that moment there came such a peal at the door with the knocker,
that made the house appear as if it were a pandemonium of noises and
echoes, which followed the first stunning sounds that filled the place.
Varney started and listened.
“Ah,” he said, “they have tracked me here. What can that mean? Have
they, indeed, laid a trap for me? Do they think I am caught? But,
no—no, I am too fast; they know me not, nor can any one have traced me
here, for they know not where I came from, and—but there, it is useless
speculating; they may have laid a trap to catch whom they could, or
they—ah, they have seen the light, and the house being shut all day,
they now want to see if anything is the matter; but I’ll warrant all is
safe and clear; there is nothing known, and all I have to do, is to get
away.”
That was very true; all Sir Francis had to do was to get away; but it
was somewhat more difficult to perform than he had any notion; for, as
he came out into the landing, he found there was an unexpected obstacle
in his path. As soon as he attempted to descend to the back parlour for
the purpose of getting out of the back window, he found the door had
been burst open by the impatience of the mob who stood below, and the
door not being very strong, the shoulders of those who were nearest
were sufficient to force it open.
In a moment the passage was filled with the crowd, the foremost of whom
tumbled over the body, and were up in a moment.
[Illustration: The crowd finds the nurse’s corpse.]
“Good God!” exclaimed one, “here is somebody lying down in the passage.”
“It is a corpse,” said another.
“The woman’s murdered,” said another, “Get a light—get a light, and let
us see what is the matter. Here is a dead body—a light—get a light,
can’t some of you?”
“Well, I suppose we can; but what of it? I expect it can’t be done
without giving anybody time to do it in; if you think it can, you had
better do it yourself, and perhaps you’ll begin now.”
However, there was a light produced, and that put an end to the
altercation, and silence was immediately restored, when they saw the
congealed blood, and the body lying in it; and then one, on pushing his
way into the parlour, exclaimed,—
“And here’s the old woman, she’s dead and cold.”
“She’s murdered!”
“Yes, there’s no doubt about that, poor creatures; and no one at hand
to lend them any assistance. What a horrible affair!”
“Yes, horrible; but who’s done it? There are rooms up stairs; they had
better be searched; let’s go up at once.”
“Aye—aye.”
Sir Francis waited not a moment more; he had heard enough to convince
him his only chance was to escape while he could, for if they once
seized him under such circumstances, he would not be able to escape
again, and he immediately rushed to the back window; but there was no
balcony there; he could not get out there, so came to the landing,
and just reached the short steps that led to the roof, and there, had
scarcely got the trap-door unbolted, when the heard a voice say,
“Up stairs, lad—up stairs. I hear somebody there trying to get out—up
stairs, lads, and follow him—up stairs.”
There was a shout, and then all rushed up stairs, and Varney had
scarcely got into the loft, when some one called out,—
“I see his legs—he’s got into the loft. Up the steps.”
“Hurrah! hurrah! up the steps, my boys; follow me,” said one man, as
he got on the landing, and ran to seize the ladder; but Varney saw the
necessity of preventing immediate and hot pursuit, lest he should be
recognised and followed to the hotel, when that would be death to his
hopes.
Just as the man had reached the ladder, Varney lifted it off the hooks
upon which it hung, and flung it back against the man, who fell back,
and he, with the fallen ladder, created a dreadful confusion amongst
those who were coming up stairs, many being knocked down, and the
remainder retreated, thinking that at least there were a battalion of
murderers.
[Illustration: Varney flings back the ladder against the men.]
This gave Varney time to get to the roof, and he then crept along
several house-tops, without being discovered, though he could hear the
shouts and hum of the mob, as they gathered round the house he had left.
Then how to get out of his present position was a question he was not
well able to tell. He must let himself out through some of the houses,
and to do that without raising a hue-and-cry, was a question he was not
able to solve. Once or twice he thought of letting himself down from
the outside; but this he gave up as being impossible, for destruction
to himself would be the instant result.
“I must get into one of these houses, and remain concealed,” he
thought, “till the dead of the night, and then I could get through the
house without any trouble, or fear of detection—but then the Frasers. I
must not disappoint them.”
This last consideration appeared to determine him, for he immediately
crawled to one house that appeared to be the best calculated for his
purpose, and he at once entered it by means of a small window that
belonged to an attic. In this room was to be seen only a bed, and a few
chairs, and a table.
All was silent, no one was moving; he stepped up to the bed, but was
somewhat startled to find it occupied by some odd-looking human form,
wrapped up in a curious and uninviting manner.
“Ah!” thought Varney, “I didn’t think to have found any one in
possession of this place so early; but they sleep, and that is enough.”
He had scarce said so, when a voice said,
“Nurse, nurse—confound you, why don’t you bring my posset? Do you hear,
cuss you? here have I been kept here for two hours without my supper,
and what you gave me last night had no rum in it. How’s a man to get
well, and kept upon short allowance? I tell you it cannot be done,
not at any price. Will you bring me my grog posset, or won’t you? You
inhuman wretch, to keep an old sailor upon short allowance of grog and
won’t give him any except in the shape of a posset!”
This was pathetic, but Varney paid no attention to it, and gently
glided out of the room. When he quitted the apartment, he descended the
stairs, and then he came to the passage or hall, when he was met by a
stout female.
[Illustration: Varney sends the nurse up stairs.]
“Whom do you want?” exclaimed the fat female.
“Madam,” said Varney, “are you aware of the calamity that has befallen
you?”
“No, sir. What—what is it?”
“The lunatic in the top room has in a fit of malignity set the upper
part of your house in flames. You had better take care of yourself.”
“Oh, my God! the house is on fire!” said the fat woman. “Oh, mercy,
mercy! Fire! fire! fire! The house is a fire.”
Varney turned round and opened the door, just as several people were
rushing out of their rooms at hearing these alarming exclamations.
“That will do,” muttered Varney, as he closed the door behind him,
and then walked hastily towards the hotel, to which, however, he did
not go quite straight; he went a little on one side to avoid meeting
the crowd, as being an unpleasant mass of human creatures which are
singularly unpleasant to meet with, leaving them to secure themselves
and find the murderer, if they were able to do so.
CHAPTER CLIII.
THE ASSEMBLY.—SIR FRANCIS’S FIRST OVERTURES TO MARY STEVENS.—THE
BREAKFAST SCENE.—AND THE HONOUR DECLINED.
Sir Francis Varney, as soon as he reached his hotel, changed his
habiliments, and sought the Frasers, whom he found ready for the
assembly, and somewhat fearful he was not coming; but he easily excused
himself on the score of illness, and then they persuaded him to remain
at their abode, and they would all do so too; but at the same time Sir
Francis insisted that his indisposition was but temporary, and he would
rather visit the place, as it was a ball night.
Thus persuaded, they agreed, and the five of them proceeded to the
assembly rooms, where they amused themselves as fashionable people
usually do. They danced, and were highly delighted with the place,
which was certainly of a very superior description, contained the very
_elite_ of the Bath visitors, and appeared to advantage.
The wealth and beauty to be found in the room would have caused many a
heart to bound with rapture, whether it was the miser’s or the lover’s;
for both could there find that which gladdened them most, gold and
beauty—wealth and youth; each could gloat his eyes on that he held
dearest.
“Did you ever witness a scene like this?” said Sir Francis Varney, as
he led Miss Stevens to a seat, and handed her refreshments. “Did you
ever behold one in which was collected so much beauty and youth?”
“There are many happy faces,” said Mary Stevens.
“And hearts, too, I hope,” said Varney.
“I hope so, too,” replied Mary.
“There are several here who have never been to a ball before; ’tis
their _debut_ in life, and a fine and lovely commencement it is; and
if all their future years should be such a round of pleasure and gaiety
as this, they needs must be happy.”
“I am sure they must. People here seem to wish to make each other
happy.”
“And if they strive in heart, they must succeed in doing so, and in
making themselves happy too.”
“No doubt they do.”
“And you, Miss Stevens, would you not make yourself happy when you make
others happy?” inquired Sir Francis Varney.
“I certainly do feel happy when I am an instrument in the hands of
another doing good, and seeing it really gives others happiness.”
“That is one of the noblest ends of life.”
“And one which you, Sir Francis, have pursued to some purpose. You
ought to be happy, if any man can claim happiness.”
“I am, in one respect; but when there is a great void in life, which
has to be filled—when that void is in the affections, can it be
surprising that sorrow and grief are there?”
“I cannot give you an answer, because I have no knowledge of such an
existence; had I, it would be otherwise; but I cannot say yea, or nay.”
“Well,” said Sir Francis, “it is so; that void is in my heart; and,
before I saw you, I felt it not; but now,” he paused, “but now I feel
it—feel it deeply, and I shall ever do so unless—but I hardly dare
say more—my heart will never again know sorrow, and never again feel
tranquil. Wants and wishes have sprung up which, until now, have
never presented themselves in the shape of possibilities, much less
probabilities, and which now are realities.”
“This is a strange conversation, Sir Francis.”
“It is, Miss Stevens, and I feel it to be so; but, unfortunately, I
have a certain difficulty to overcome, which, perhaps, accident, more
than courage, will enable me to break through. But, to speak plainly,
before I saw you, the whole world was alike to me; I cared not for one
more than another; but, now the world has new charms, I have new hopes
and wishes. God knows if they are to be dissipated, like the morning
mist before the glories of the rising sun. Love has made sad havoc in
my heart; and to love and despair is the bitterest lot humanity can
fall into. Man can bear all that adverse fate may entail upon him; but
that saps at the foundation of the superstructure, our love of life,
without which, society could not hold together; and, with disappointed
love, there is no love of existence.”
“Indeed, Sir Francis, I regret to hear it.”
“Will you prevent it?”
“I cannot now answer you any such question, if I were inclined to do
so—I have not the power. See, Sir Francis, there is another set.”
“Will you dance?”
“No; I do not think I will dance any more to-night; but I shall be glad
to rejoin my sister and brother.”
“I will lead you to them, with pleasure; but will you allow me to name
this matter to Captain Fraser?”
“I have no right to dictate to you, Sir Francis,” said Mary, with
evident embarrassment, “much less would I do so, or endeavour to do so
to one to whom I owe so much; and yet I fear it will be fruitless.”
“There, yonder, are your friends.”
As Sir Francis spoke, he pointed to another end of the room, to
which he was leading her, and which was occupied by many of the
most fashionable and beautiful; they also had to pass down a lane
of fashionables who were occupying seats, having been fatigued by
dancing—many not having danced at all, but come to keep watchful and
Argus eyes upon the sons and daughters whom they brought with them.
These, at least, noticed them—all eyes were fixed upon them, and Sir
Francis, certainly with an air of triumph, led the beautiful Mary
Stevens towards her friends, who were gazing at them with attention.
[Illustration: Sir Francis leads Mary to her friends.]
Mary thought herself somewhat awkwardly situated, and knew not how
to release herself; and also felt that any attempt of the kind would
really be as ungracious as it would be ungrateful, and so resigned
herself.
A few yards more, and then she was once again in the company of her
friends, but not released from Sir Francis, for he seated himself by
her side with the ease of one who was well accustomed to their society,
and of those around him.
“Well, Sir Francis,” said Mrs. Fraser, “you have not been unnoticed
in the ball-room. You have created quite a sensation; your dancing is
superior, and your tall figure has set you off.”
“You mistake, Mrs. Fraser; the object of such general attention was no
other than your beautiful sister—my fair partner.”
“Don’t make her vain.”
“That, indeed, would be a misfortune; but she has such an excellent
capacity of mind, that she runs no danger of such a misfortune; but
even were it not so, there would be much excuse.”
“You are flattering, Sir Francis.”
“Not I, I assure you. How do you find yourself?”
“I am getting fatigued. My recent journeys must plead an excuse for my
weariness at such a time and in such a place as this.”
“I am not surprised at this, considering how you have been riding about
for many days past. Would you choose to retire to-night, and remain
later on another occasion?”
“I think,” said Captain Fraser, “it may be as well. What do you say, my
dear?”
“I am quite willing.”
“And so am I,” said Mary. “Indeed I would much sooner we left early—if
midnight can be called early.”
“It is much past that hour now.”
“Then I think we are decided upon going.”
“Very well,” said Sir Francis; “then I will obtain a carriage for our
use, and then we shall retire to our homes.”
“If you please, Sir Francis.”
Varney then rose, and went out for the purpose of procuring what was
wanted, and, by the aid of a little silver, he soon obtained what he
desired, and then returned to inform his friends of the success of his
mission.
They then left the ball-room, and proceeded at once to enter the
carriage, which was so placed that they could at once enter without any
inconvenience; and they soon gained their hotel, and, after a slight
repast, they separated.
• • • • •
It was late next morning when Sir Francis Varney entered the room in
which he usually took breakfast with the Frasers; but, though late, he
only met Captain Fraser.
“I am afraid, Captain Fraser,” said Varney, “I have kept you all.
Perhaps the ladies are gone out?”
“No, no; they have not yet come down. Indeed, had you been in five
minutes earlier than this, you would not have found me here.”
“Well, I know not the reason, but I slept well myself. To be sure,”
said Sir Francis, “I did not fall readily to sleep, and that may
account for it.”
“Indeed! and do you not sleep sound?”
“Usually—I may say, generally; but sometimes some reflections keep the
mind actively employed against one’s own wishes.”
“They do so, Sir Francis. I have myself found that to be the case; but
I am sorry my female folks do not come down.”
“Nay, nay, Captain Fraser, do no wish that on my account. I am rather
pleased they are not down than otherwise.”
“Indeed, Sir Francis!”
“Yes,” replied Sir Francis, “as it leaves me an opportunity of saying a
few words to you, Captain Fraser, upon a subject that concerns myself
nearly and deeply.”
“You amaze me, Sir Francis.”
“I had hoped you might have had some guess at it, Captain Fraser, as it
would have helped me through my task; for my heart almost fails me when
I think of the possibility of want of success—my want of nerve is not
habitual.”
“I can depose to so much, Sir Francis; you showed courage, and nerve,
where courage and nerve were most wanted.”
“Ah, well, Captain Fraser, If I had been brought up to your noble
profession, I should have been better able to make an impression; but
I will do my best; but the subject is a grave one, as it relates to my
feelings toward your sister-in-law, Miss Mary Stevens.”
“Indeed, Sir Francis!”
“Yes, Captain Fraser. I, who have passed through so many ordeals of
beauty, have at last been compelled to bow before the shrine of beauty.
I am a devoted and humble admirer of Miss Stevens’s charms and virtues.”
“Well, Sir Francis?”
“I now beg your permission to visit her, and be accepted in your family
in the character of one who ardently wishes and desires to become a
member of it by means of an union between myself and that young lady.”
“Personally, Sir Francis, I have the greatest pleasure in hearing you
say so much.”
“Then I am likely to be fortunate.”
“So far as my approbation, and my consent are concerned, Sir Francis,
you certainly are successful; but, according to the vulgar proverb,
as one swallow makes no summer, so one individual’s consent is not
decisive where two are required to concur.”
“Certainly, Captain Fraser. I was not wishing to put the young lady
aside; but having your consent, I may go on to endeavour to obtain the
happiness I so much look forward to—but I may count upon your good
offices?”
“You may, most certainly.”
“And your amiable lady?”
“Yes, I think I may say she will unite with me in using all due means
of aiding you in your wishes—but here she is.”
At that moment, Mrs. Fraser entered the apartment, and advancing to Sir
Francis, offering him her hand and saying,—
“Sir Francis, how do you do this morning? I am afraid I have kept
you—ah, I see you are alone with Captain Fraser—where is my sister?”
“Mary has not yet come down,” said Fraser.
“Ah, we are both late, I think.”
“I am, madam; but you have come at a right moment.”
“Have I? Why do you reckon it so?”
“Because I was just at that moment speaking of you, and here you are;
so that I can speak to you, which is much better.”
“Well, so it is—but what is it about?”
“Your amiable and lovely sister.”
“Ah, that is what you men always say—it is just what Captain Fraser
said to me.”
“Then may I hope for a like success?”
“I don’t understand,” said Mrs. Fraser, doubtfully.
“Why, I was saying to Captain Fraser, if he could obtain your aid in
my behalf in an attack upon your sister’s heart. I have been unable to
hold out any longer—I am deeply and desperately in love.”
“Well, that is a very dangerous disorder, and I must see what Mary can
do to console you in your affliction.”
“You will indeed deserve my best thanks if you will do so; and, should
success crown our efforts, how deep a debt of gratitude will mine be to
you.”
“How much are we not yours already?”
“But my whole happiness will be through your efforts.”
“Oh, no, no; remember, you said but just now it was my sister you meant
to wed, and not me.”
“Good God! how could you imagine I had any such profane thought?”
“Ha! ha! Sir Francis, I must see what I can do with Mary; but, she
comes—another of the _dramatis personae_.”
Mary Stevens at that moment entered the room, and felt most abashed at
finding all eyes rivetted upon her without speaking, and she advanced
towards the fire, having made an inclination to Sir Francis, saying, as
she came down,—
“I fear I have been the means of keeping you waiting. I am sorry you
did so; but I was really not aware of the hour.”
“Nor were we,” said Mrs. Fraser; “and it appears we have all been late,
save Sir Francis, who, like a true knight, has been at his post, I
don’t know how long before I came down myself.”
“Nay, don’t you listen to any charges, Miss Stevens. I have been here
but a very short time, though I ought to have been here earlier.”
“It is fortunate then you did, Sir Francis, and I am relieved of the
charge of detaining breakfast to an unusual hour.”
“It matters but little when it is had, so long as it is to be had when
it is wanted. What say you, Sir Francis?”
“I believe that the grand object of all our wishes and wants, is to
have what we want when we want it. An eastern potentate could not be
better served, or more powerful, or richer, than to be able to say so
much.”
“You are his equal.”
“I am in some things certainly,” replied Sir Francis; “but I want an
empress, and thus, you see, I am dethroned and rendered powerless by a
few words.”
“You can obtain even that.”
“Not exactly; for she whom I might choose might refuse to become mine;
then, I am a weary wanderer upon earth’s surface—I am no longer one
among men; but a mere existence, moving about without filling any
allotted position.”
“This is very doleful, Sir Francis,” said Mary; “if you say much more,
you will spoil your appetite for breakfast.”
“Mary, that is a cruel cut, you did not mean it, I dare say; but it is
a sufficient rebuke. I must come to plain speaking, and at once hope
you recollect the subject upon which I spoke to you in the ball-room
last night.”
“I do, Sir Francis; it would be affectation to say I did not.”
“Well, I have sought Captain and Mrs. Fraser’s permission to endeavour
to win those smiles and good wishes, that I so much desire should be
mine.”
“You can never deserve less than good wishes from me,” said Mary
Stevens; “you cannot have less, I am too deeply indebted——”
“There, now, pray permit me to interrupt you. I must not hear any more
of that; I did my duty on that occasion——”
“Occasions!”
“Well, occasions; and I hope no gentleman, having the power, would have
done otherwise; and if so, I have only done what others would have done
under the same circumstances—a very ordinary act indeed.”
“You are making less of it than it deserves, were it only for our
sakes.”
“I see you won’t entertain my wishes seriously; but, recollect, what is
sport to you is death to me—the affections of a blighted heart cannot
weigh lightly when the evil is consummated.”
“Do not think, Sir Francis, I wish to evade or to slight any wishes
you may form; as far as I am concerned, they are a great honour to me;
but I am yet too young, and averse to anything of the kind yet to feel
justified in seriously entertaining such matters as those you allude
to.”
“That, indeed, must be a mistake; you are not too young. Let me hope
that you will not refuse to allow me the satisfaction and pleasure
of your company; that would indeed be a greater misfortune than could
otherwise happen to me to be deprived suddenly of that, I assure you.”
“Certainly I cannot feel otherwise than gratitude to you, Sir Francis,
and derive that pleasure in your society which others feel, and which
all your friends must experience; but we will say no more upon this
subject, except that I have given as serious and positive an answer as
I can.”
There were many other observations made during breakfast-time to
much the same effect, but it is unnecessary to record them, and the
breakfast passed off as pleasantly as possible, under the circumstances.
CHAPTER CLIV.
THE TWO SISTERS.—MARY STEVENS’S DISLIKE OF SIR FRANCIS VARNEY.—AN
USELESS SUIT.—DISUNION.
There was much stir in Bath next day on account of the murder that had
occurred, and everybody spoke of it. The papers were filled with it,
and it was thought to have been the most barbarous murder that had ever
been committed, and most active exertions were being made to discover
the perpetrators of this horrid deed. All sorts of conjectures were
being made as to who the murderer might be, and his object in becoming
one. Gold, of course, was assigned as that.
There was something terrible in the fact that this should have occurred
just as the Frasers had arrived in Bath—it was startling, they thought,
though they could of course have no connexion with it whatever.
While the examinations were being proceeded with, Sir Francis Varney
appeared out in the streets as seldom as possible; not that he had any
fear of recognition, for that was impossible; but, at the same time, he
would not run unnecessary risk, while so much was to be won.
The days passed, and many very pleasant hours were spent, and the
gaieties of Bath were enjoyed to their fullest; while Sir Francis was
their great friend everywhere, for, somehow or other, Sir Francis
obtained the precedence go where he would, and they shared it with him.
He pressed his suit with much ardour, and Mary Stevens appeared each
day less and less inclined to accept of Sir Francis Varney for a lover.
She felt a greater and greater repugnance to Sir Francis, who, however,
pressed her more hardly and more assiduously than ever.
However, Captain Fraser and his lady were sensible of the advantages of
such a match to themselves and to Mary, for they could not believe that
one so courteous and brave could do otherwise than make any lady happy;
the first objection would wear away in the person of such a man as
Varney; they therefore espoused his cause warmly when they found that
Mary was averse to the match.
“What can be your objection, Mary?” inquired Mrs. Fraser.
“I cannot tell.”
“Surely it cannot be an insurmountable objection,” said Captain Fraser,
“since you do not know what it consists of. You cannot have a very
definite idea; and possibly a little explanation may set the matter to
rights.”
“I know well enough what it means.”
“Do you, dear? Why not tell us?”
“I will. It consists of a strong dislike to Sir Francis. I cannot tell
you why; but it is a very strong and yet distinct feeling.”
“What can it arise from?”
“That I cannot explain.”
“If you could, we should be able to come to some conclusion respecting
it; but at present it appears like a blind, causeless antipathy, and,
against one so well calculated to make any female happy as Sir Francis
Varney, is so extraordinary that it really exceeds belief. I cannot
express my regret and astonishment.”
“I cannot understand it.”
“I am sorry for it.”
“And more like ingratitude, Mary, than I though you capable of. There
are two occasions upon which you stand indebted to him for your life.
He risked his own greatly on the last occasion.”
“I am truly sorry it should happen so, sister.”
“Well, then, Mary, amend the error; for if it were an ordinary affair,
common dislike might pass very well; but towards such a man as Sir
Francis Varney it is decidedly wrong. Indeed, when I recollect the
horrors of that night—when I remember the flames and smoke, and saw you
wrapped up safely from the effects of the fire, while he was exposed to
every breath of hot air——”
“Hush! I recollect it all; but it makes me shudder.”
“Can you, then, regard such a man with cold dislike? Upon my word, I am
shocked at your baseness.”
“Sister, sister, you are too severe—too severe.”
“Only just, Mary—only just.”
“More than just. Do not turn persecutor.”
“I would not; but this conduct of yours make me feel strongly—very
strongly, and I can hardly face Sir Francis Varney and tell him that
one who belongs to me can treat him in such a manner.”
“Does love always spring from gratitude?”
“It is useless to ask such questions, Mary, or I might retort by asking
if such services as his always produced dislike. But Sir Francis is no
ordinary man. Suppose you do not love him, which might be explicable;
but then you have no other love; you are fancy free, are you not?”
“Yes, yes:”
“Well, then, you have no motive for dislike, though you might be
indifferent. In such a case, I should not have thought it possible that
there could have been less than gratitude and the warmest esteem for
his services and his own good qualities; for he has as good qualities
as a man can have.”
“Yes, sister; but that dreadful night has left such an impression upon
my mind, that I cannot, dearest, do what you desire—I mean I cannot
love Sir Francis Varney.”
“What! not love him because of the remembrance of his services?”
“You quite misunderstood my feelings upon that occasion. I can never
feel grateful enough for the rescue from the horrible monster who
attacked me while I slept at the inn. I can never forget that moment of
horror and terror. I cannot even to this day make out the object of the
intruder. It was not robbery, and it could not have been any ordinary
attack, for it was not carried on in the usual manner. To seize any one
by the arm, and suck the blood from their veins, appears to me to be a
proceeding quite unaccountable in the ordinary course of things.”
“It was very strange.”
“Yes; and, stranger than all, it has given me a perfect horror of man
in general. I cannot abide the thought of being married at all; indeed,
I won’t, and I hope that is enough.”
“Upon my word, my good sister,” said Captain Fraser, half angry and
half jestingly, “you would almost make me believe you were desirous
of taking the veil; but you cannot have any reason for taking such
a strong antipathy to male creatures. You must know very well that,
because you have got a fright in a country inn, that all the abodes of
men in the world are not filled with goblins, spirits, and the like,
and wicked ogres, who are only waiting to eat up young maidens.”
“It was no jesting matter to me.”
“I do not say but what it was a frightful reality; but, at the same
time, such terrible occurrences as these cannot be supposed to happen
every day in one’s life; indeed, one in a long life would be a terrible
frequency which is never known, and I think you might dismiss the
subject from your mind, as an inexplicable event, unpleasant and
unprofitable to recall.”
“But it has been too terrible and too mysterious for me to ever forget;
and, least of all, could I do it in so short a time.”
“Well, I do not expect you could forget it immediately; but, at the
same time, I cannot see how it could affect your opinion of your
preserver. Indeed, it is a strange perversion of intellect, not to say
a degree of ingratitude, that it is difficult, if not impossible, to
understand or believe.”
“Well, I can say no more,” said Mary.
“That is very resigned and easy on your part; but what we are to say to
Sir Francis Varney I am sure I cannot tell. It appears to me that you
have a childish dislike to him—one for which you can allege no reason,
and, therefore, improper. I wonder what he, or any impartial person,
could think of it, if they had all fully and carefully explained to
them.”
“I am sure I do not know; but it is usually sufficient, in a case of
this kind, to say one cannot love the party, and to escape from what
becomes an infliction, or, in time, a persecution.”
“But this is not such a case as you would appear to imagine. There is
no persecution, and Sir Francis only desires that you will permit him
to attempt to obtain your good will.”
“But knowing he cannot obtain that—speaking in the light you mean—it
becomes a serious annoyance to me to think I should always be attended
by a person who, on the score of having done me some services, expects
me to listen to his addresses, and to accept him as a lover. It is
becoming a slave, indeed, when one must not exercise one’s discretion
in a matter that so nearly concerns the happiness of my future life.”
“You are making mountains out of mole-hills, Mary.”
“I have not taken the same view of this matter that you have,” replied
Miss Stevens, “and therefore you quarrel with me. I think that a great
deal too bad; I did not believe you would have quarrelled with me upon
such a subject—one that concerns me so much, too, as this.”
“Exactly; it does concern you, and it concerns us also, and that is
the reason why we feel warmly upon the subject. Your want of motive
is so apparent that it quite concerns us—we are completely staggered.
What it can all end in I am sure I cannot tell; but Sir Francis must
think us an ungrateful set, or at, least, he must believe you are
actuated by the worst and most ungracious caprice, and capable of great
ingratitude.”
“I am sorry for it; but for all that, I cannot consent to marry Sir
Francis Varney. I know not why, but I do.”
“You really ought to be ashamed of such an admission, for I am sure he
does not deserve such treatment.”
“I am compelled to admit that to be true.”
“Then why, in the name of Heaven, should you let prejudice surmount
reason—and reason that you acknowledge ought to be paramount? You know
your folly, and yet you persist in it. Was there ever such folly? Come,
Mary, come, you must give up this kind of nonsense; you must act as I
have always believed you would; you must meet Sir Francis in a proper
spirit, and the result will no doubt be that you will banish all these
idle fancies.”
“I should be glad to do so, for they make me very unhappy.”
“Well, well, they are calculated to do so, and when you have cast
them aside, your own happiness and that of your friends will be much
increased.”
• • • • •
There was much stir in Bath on account of the murder, and the papers
were filled with terrific descriptions of the scene, which some even
went to the trouble and expense of producing sketches of, which, what
with being badly drawn, badly copied, blotted, and printed, and being
as unlike the original as possible, gave the inhabitants and strangers
not a very vivid idea of the place.
When, however, the details were adverted to they were terrible enough;
and when Sir Francis Varney entered the apartment in which he usually
dined, he found his friends were full of the discussion.
“Have you seen anything of the murder, Sir Francis?”
“No, sir,” replied Sir Francis.
“Well, there is a dreadful affair happened. How horrible to think—they
might not have been discovered at all, but for the neighbours breaking
the doors in.”
“What is it all about, captain?”
“Why, two old women were murdered a few nights ago, and they have but
just been discovered; the papers are full of it.”
“What, the murderers? Well, that was a quick discovery.”
“No, no; I mean it was not discovered at all, as it is supposed, till
at least four-and-twenty hours after the deed.”
“Dear me; how was that?”
“I cannot tell, except the old woman was an eccentric, and her shutters
had been closed before for a whole day; but there were no other signs
of life about the house the whole day, which alarmed the neighbours
much, and they began to take precautions towards the evening to force
the door, when a tall, peculiar-looking man was observed entering the
house by means of a key.”
“They observed that, did they?”
“Yes; he was seen quite plain.”
“It will be fortunate, if he should have been the murderer, because
they can identify him.”
“Undoubtedly they can.”
“They know him again, then?” said Varney.
“Yes; so it appears they can.”
“I am glad of it,” said Varney.
“Well; he was seen to go in, and then to go over the house, because
there was a light seen to travel up stairs, and stop there some time;
and then they knocked for admission, but not being answered, they at
once forced open the door, and they all rushed in, but were horrified
to find themselves tumbling over the dead bodies of the old woman who
kept the house, and her servant.”
“Ah! it must have been a startling thing, certainly.”
“Well; they stopped a moment or two—as was most probable at such a
sight—and then they ran up stairs, believing the murderer was there.”
“And was he there?”
“He must have been so, because they heard him get up to the roof,
and they followed, but were baffled, because he threw the ladder
down, which caused them some confusion, and during that the murderer
contrived to escape.”
“Well; it was quite a field of adventure; but it is to be lamented,”
said Varney, “they were not successful in their endeavours to catch the
murderer; but what is the alleged motive for the deed?”
“They say that she had some strange fancies, and that, among others,
she had all her money in the house—her capital, upon which she lived,
without any fear of exhausting it. That was known to some one or other,
and got whispered about, and it is presumed that for this purpose the
poor woman was murdered.”
“How horribly barbarous! but ain’t there any suspicion upon any one,
because it is usually the case?”
“There is, I believe.”
“And upon whom does it fall?”
“Upon a relation of her own, who has not been seen for some days, and
who had been known to have spoken with impatience at the old woman’s
life, and the mode in which she spent her money.”
“That speaks for itself,” said Varney.
“So it does; but they have not taken him yet.”
“I hope they will, I am sure; because the whole affair is so truly
horrible!”
“So it is. Will you go to the theatre to-night; there is no ball—we can
have an excellent box?”
“What do you say, my dear?” said Captain Fraser to his lady.
“I am willing. Are you agreeable Mary?”
“Yes; I am quite content with your decision.”
“Then we are all agreed to the proposal. There will be a celebrated
actress from London there, and I hope we shall find the entertainment
well worthy of our patronage—indeed, I have little doubt of it.”
CHAPTER CLV.
THE EFFECTS OF PERSEVERANCE.—SIR FRANCIS VARNEY AND MARY STEVENS.—AN
EVENING PARTY AND CONVERSATION.
The evening was spent agreeably enough at the Bath theatre; Sir Francis
Varney having taken the greatest pains to ingratiate himself with Mary
Stevens so much and so delicately, that she could not but feel ashamed
at her antipathy towards him, and certainly did all she could to get
the better of it, and succeeded in some measure in doing so.
They all returned home in very good humour with themselves and
everything. Captain Fraser and his lady were completely predisposed to
look upon Sir Francis Varney as one of the first men in England for
rank and breeding; even Mary Stevens was compelled to admit she never
saw any one whose demeanour was to be more admired more than his.
The next morning they all assembled at the breakfast-table, and were
all full of lively images and thoughts of the preceding evening.
There was much more of cordiality and intimacy than had been felt among
them before; for Sir Francis Varney’s courtliness gave way, and he
became almost as one of the family. Mary looked upon him with something
like wonder, to see how agreeable a man could be whom she disliked.
One or two days more passed in this manner; and the dislike of Mary
Stevens to Sir Francis, if not less, was at least not so active or
violent; but she received him as an old friend.
That much emboldened Sir Francis, who again resolved he would speak
to her, and that in the presence of her brother and sister, hoping by
such a proceeding he should be able to overcome her dislike or fears by
his own efforts, aided by Captain and Mrs. Fraser, who would create a
diversion in his favour.
“I wish not,” he said, “to be importunate; but, in a matter that
concerns one’s future hopes and wishes—one cannot well slumber over
them—I wish to become one of such a family as that into which I find
myself so strangely and accidentally introduced, though I fear I have
failed to make myself as acceptable as I could wish.”
“No one could think Sir Francis Varney otherwise than acceptable,” said
Captain Fraser; “your services to us alone would be enough to endow us
all with the most lively gratitude and admiration, were you only to
appear amongst us with no other qualification; but you add those which
evidently make any gentleman an ornament to the circle he may grace
with his acquaintance and friendship.”
“You take a favourable view of all that you see, Captain Fraser.”
“No, no; I merely speak what I think upon a subject which I have had, I
may say, some experience. I have myself had some dealings in the world;
my profession puts me forward, and I may repeat what I said.”
“No, no, I will not suffer you to do that; what I wish to do is, to
impress, if possible, my fair friend here with favourable sentiments
towards myself. I am not as some of the young men of these times, who
win by the violence of their suit, which they urge with all the haste
of violence to attack and storm the citadel.”
“That is a very good plan, Sir Francis; why don’t you yourself pursue
such a system? It must carry the citadel by assault.”
“No, no,” said Mary, “you will not do anything of the kind. Was that
the way in which you yourself acted? If so, I am sure I pity my sister;
for what can she hope for when she was taken in such a violent manner?”
“Oh, no, no; Fraser was the unfortunate victor, who was taken prisoner
in the moment of victory.”
“Yes, that is the fact; I was taken prisoner; but I have since been
appointed governor in the enemy’s country.”
“Ha! ha! ha! well, that is a fortunate issue to your adventure. I would
that mine were as fortunate—I love, and yet fear to say so.”
“Fear never won a fair lady,” said Fraser; “so don’t be afraid.”
“What does my fair enemy say here?”
“I have said so much upon the subject, sir, before, that I was in hopes
I should not have had any occasion to say more.”
“I am sorry to hear you say so.”
“Why, it is a pity to render a matter that is settled uncertain,
without the prospect of anything being gained by it.”
“So it is; but I hope that is not the present case, Miss Stevens. My
petition, I hope, is not rejected merely because it has suffered so
before. I cannot but hope, though despair for ever stare me in the
face for it; but perhaps devotion and heartfelt love may make some
impression upon you, and soften the rigours of a heart that cannot, I
am sure, feel any pleasure in the distress of another.”
“No, no, Sir Francis; you only do me justice in saying so much. I
can, indeed, feel no pleasure in such things. You may rely upon it,
gratitude alone would prompt me to comply with any request you might
make at once and cheerfully; but you must admit that this is a question
that alters the complexion of other matters, and what might be proper
under other circumstances, cannot be expected under this.”
“Nor am I so unreasonable as to expect anything of the kind. Now, Miss
Stevens, you much mistake Sir Francis Varney if you think him capable
of such meanness. I wish you to act from your own unbiased judgment,
and, however painful the result, yet I would in silence put up with
your decision. But still I hope you will not act imperatively—that you
will look upon my suit with, at least, not a harsh and averse spirit.
Have some compassion upon one who is entirely at your mercy.”
“Come, Mary, do not act unkindly.”
“I—I do not know what to say. I—I cannot give any other answer.”
“Nay, I won’t hear of such a thing, Mary,” said Mrs. Fraser; “now or
never. I will not say that you must not be mindful of the past; but you
were never ungrateful, that I know. You cannot be otherwise than happy.”
“You embarrass me.”
“Miss Stevens, let nothing weigh with you, save your own happiness;
that is my object, and my own at the same time.”
“Say yes, Mary.”
“I—I cannot.”
“Will not! What objection? What on earth could you wish for more?”
“Do not press me.”
“I should be sorry to do so at such a moment, were it decidedly your
desire not to give an answer now; but I do beg you will not let me
linger longer than necessary. Indeed, I find I cannot exist in your
society and be deprived of the hope that I may call you one day mine
own.”
“Do, Mary, say yes—say yes!”
“Will Miss Stevens give me leave to suppose that there may be a time
when I may be rewarded for my patience? I will not press you for a
plain answer now, but give me some token that I am not to remain
unhappy.”
“Come, Mary, come—Sir Francis gives you every indulgence.”
But Mary was obstinate some time longer, until Sir Francis, in a
transport, pressed her hand, and placed it to his lips; at the same
time she suffered her silence to be construed into a consent to his
wishes.
• • • • •
“Well, Sir Francis,” said Captain Fraser, “let me congratulate you in
having subdued the enemy, and you, Mary, in having such a conqueror. I
protest it was a hard fought battle, and one that I could not tell who
would prove triumphant.”
“I feel well assured you may congratulate me, Captain Fraser. I
congratulate myself, I assure you; therefore you may do so to me.”
“I do heartily.”
“Thank you; I shall be happy. But what are the tactics for the night?”
“What are we to do?”
“Yes, precisely.”
“Oh, suppose we have a nice party among ourselves. We can amuse
ourselves, I dare say. I am fatigued myself, and care not to go out
to-night. We have all gone out so lately that it will be a change and a
rest.”
“So it will,” said Miss Stevens. “I am really glad that we shall have
one night, on which we can retire at early hours.”
“Are you willing, Sir Francis, to spend a dull evening?”
“It cannot be dull, at all events, in such company. I shall be happy to
remain with you, indeed. I feel that a quiet, happy evening is a thing
that would be very acceptable to me, at least; but still I can do as
you please.”
“Then we’ll have a quiet evening among ourselves.”
“Have you heard anything more about the murder that took place the
other day?”
“No,” replied Sir Francis. “Have you?”
“I have,” said Mrs. Fraser.
“What have you heard?” inquired Sir Francis.
“I will tell you,” replied Mrs. Fraser. “You recollect that the nephew
had been suspected of having murdered the two women, and committed a
robbery afterwards.”
“Yes, yes; I heard so much.”
“Well, they have taken the nephew now, and he has been examined before
a police-constable, and will be again examined in another day or two.”
“Indeed! they have made quick work of it. How can they suspect he had
any hand in the affair?”
“I believe they knew he had been very poor, and had been very impatient
for the old woman’s death, that he might have it all. Now, such a
line of conduct was bad, and has caused persons to suspect him; and,
also, the fact, that he has got a quantity of gold about him, for the
possession of which he cannot account.”
“Ay, that seems bad; but what kind of excuse can he give for the
possession of such treasure—he is surely not silent?”
“Oh, dear, no, he is not silent. All he says, however, is, that his
aunt gave it him to leave the country with.”
“That is strange—very singular.”
“It is, and that is why they disbelieve it; besides; he had made no
preparations for his departure, that have yet been discovered—besides,
his shoes were evidently soiled with human blood, and the footsteps in
the passage and on the stairs—at least, some of them, were exactly of
the same size.”
“That is a strong proof.”
“So it is; but there appears to have been an accomplice, for there are
other footmarks of a different size, much larger and longer.”
“Dear me,” said Varney; “didn’t you say there were many people who ran
up stairs after the man, who got away?”
“Yes; to be sure.”
“Well, some of them might have left a foot-print.”
“Well, I suppose they might, and yet they must have reasons for saying
that these footsteps were those of an accomplice; perhaps they were
fresher than the others, or it may be they have a different appearance
from the more recent ones.”
“It may be so.”
“However it may be; it is quite certain that he has done the deed;
whether he had any help or not, he, at least, will be punished.”
“No doubt he ought to suffer for such a deed; it is that which gives
security to the rest of society.”
“But it was a dreadful thing. A murder committed by a friend or
relation is, I think, more heinous, if possible, than when committed
casually, by ordinary murderers, whose sole crimes are murder and
robbery.”
“To be sure; when any tie that can bind one individual to another is
broken, who would have taken precautions against such as those whom we
value; but he was ungrateful, and killed his benefactress—for such she
had been.”
CHAPTER CLVI.
THE WEDDING MORNING.—THE PROGRESS OF JUSTICE, AND THE DISCOVERY OF THE
MURDERER.—THE DISSIPATION OF A SCENE.
The days flew by, and the aspect of affairs insensibly changed. Sir
Francis Varney gradually drew over the scene such an appearance of
candour and disinterestedness, that the Frasers were delighted with the
prospect of such an alliance, and they left no means of propitiating
and influencing Miss Stevens in his favour; and they succeeded to a
certain extent in stifling all expressions of dissent, and brought her
to a state of passive obedience.
She had nothing to allege against Sir Francis but her dislike to him,
and even that she felt was weaker, and the more she exerted her mind,
the weaker such impressions appeared to be; a convincing proof to her
that it was a mere blind, reasonless prejudice which it was her duty to
throw off, and she exerted herself to do so.
Thus it was she became passive in the hands of her friends; and Sir
Francis Varney had the satisfaction of seeing that he was about to
pick up a bride at length. His pleasure knew no bounds, and his eyes
glistened in a manner, that once or twice Mary recoiled from him in
terror, and she had nearly revived her first feelings against him.
However that might have been, he saw his error, and he conducted
himself differently afterwards; for he too well knew the effect it must
have upon the artless and beautiful young girl, whose affections he
cared not to win, so that he stifled her objections, and obtained her
hand—her heart was not with him an object.
“I think now,” said Captain Fraser to Sir Francis, when they were
alone—“I think, now, Sir Francis, that we ought to come to some
understanding.”
“I shall be but too happy, Captain Fraser, to do so, in every sense of
the word, and upon every subject we can have in common.”
“Then we shall have no difficulty in this affair.”
“I hope not, I assure you.”
“Well, then, Sir Francis, you desire to marry into our family?”
“Most unquestionably; my heart and fortune are at the disposal of Miss
Stevens. I care for nothing else but her—fortune, Captain Fraser, is no
object to me; I do not care for a single penny piece. I have enough for
myself.”
“Money is not happiness itself,” pursued the captain.
“I believe it—I feel it.”
“And yet Mary is not penniless; she has her dower, though by no means a
large one; yet she has one.”
“Then let the whole, whatever it may be, be safely, securely made over
for her own use, and that of her children.”
“It is generous—very generous of you, Sir Francis; and your generosity
much embarrasses me, and I hardly know how to proceed with a little
matter which I deem a part of my duty to perform.”
“Do not let me be an hindrance to you; I am sure I should regret it
much; besides, the more we know of each other, the greater confidence
we have in each other, provided our knowledge is of that character that
will increase our respect.”
“You are quite right, Sir Francis.”
“Well, captain, I hope what you are going to say, will not give me
cause to feel myself less happy than I am.”
“I hope not; I believe not; but what I was about to say is a very
ordinary and common occurrence on an occasion like the present.”
“Well, let me know all about it, and then the murder will be out.”
“Good. We have but little more than personal communication with each
other, apart from our respective homes; and we do not know much of each
other in the ordinary acceptation of the word. I wish to know something
relative to your private affairs.”
“I really cannot do so, unless you travel northward with me.”
“Indeed—indeed——”
“Stop. I can give you corroborative proof; I have none direct about me;
but I can do that much; but perhaps it will not do.”
“Quite enough. I am satisfied—if you can give me corroborative proof of
what you say, and that without premeditation, it will be still stronger
and more valuable.”
“If you think so, what do you say to those two letters, Captain Fraser?”
“Two letters.”
“The one is from my gamekeeper, and the other is from my bailiff, who
has to overlook my property, and advise me of what was being done on
the estate, and the state of my financial affairs.”
“They will do, sir, I believe.”
As Captain Fraser took the two letters, he looked at the post-marks,
and saw that they were plain and readable, and the date; they had been
correctly described by Sir Francis Varney—they came from the north,
and one was a business-like letter from the bailiff, and one quite in
keeping from the head gamekeeper, both of whom mentioned many local and
petty matters, that fully bore out all that was to be expected from
them.
“And do you keep up an establishment of this character, Sir Francis?”
“I do. I can afford it, and I do not like to turn the knaves adrift
on the world, who have, ever since they have been born, looked for
abundance from the soil that produced them; and I don’t think I shall
be justified in having the hardness of heart to turn them off.”
“You are a kind and good master.”
“I wish to be so.”
“And when, Sir Francis, do you intend to return there?”
“I am glad you ask the question. I should like to take my bride there
to spend the honeymoon. I wish now to leave other objects, and to
get back as soon as the ceremony is over. There I should like to
take her; it would be a rare and splendid life to lead in the old
gothic mansion—as much like a castle as anything I can describe; but
an ornamented castle, of course, for I don’t mean high walls, and no
windows.”
“Certainly not.”
“But will you assist me in obtaining her consent to a speedy union;
and, that effected, we will whirl off for the mansion, and you can
follow us at leisure. The union will, I hope and believe, be most
happy.”
“I hope so. I trust and believe it will.”
“In the meantime, any more information or proof you can desire shall be
obtained for you. Do not be backward upon this head.”
“I am quite satisfied, Sir Francis.”
• • • • •
Thus Sir Francis Varney had succeeded in hoodwinking Captain Fraser
and his wife, and had now entirely subdued all shew of objection, and
had so far succeeded as to obtain a quiet and tacit consent to all he
desired.
The interview described was reported to Mrs. Fraser and her sister, and
was considered liberal and satisfactory, and the marriage was spoken
of as likely to be immediate, which brought forth no remark from Mary,
and the matter was considered as nearly settled; the day only was to be
appointed, and that could not be very distant.
One morning as they were seated at breakfast, and that after the day
had been fixed at a greater distance of time than Sir Francis Varney
liked, the subject of the murder was again brought up, and Mrs. Fraser
said,—
“There is nothing more about the murder now—is there?”
“No,” replied Sir Francis; “not that I have heard of. I believe the
unfortunate man will be tried one of these days—he stands committed.”
“Stop,” said Captain Fraser, “here is something in the paper.”
“What is in it?”
“Something more about the murder.”
“What is it?” inquired Sir Francis. “I am anxious to learn if they
have done anything more, for I was sick of it, and wish to know when
such a horrible tragedy will end—the sooner it is past and forgotten,
the better.”
“That is true; for knowing a man is lying waiting for the hour to
arrive when he shall die a violent death, is truly terrible.”
“So it is. They seem to say there is some clue to another person, of
a most remarkable appearance, who escaped through another house, and
deceived the inmates by describing a fire that was up stairs.”
“Indeed! How strange,” said Sir Francis.
“Yes; they say they will not publish more, lest it defeat the ends of
justice.”
“Something else sprung up, I suppose?”
“No doubt. But here is something more: the prisoner will be tried in a
few days, and, if condemned, executed in a very short time.”
“Then I wish that one happy marriage would come off before that time. I
am sure Mary will be wretched, and I cannot be so happy as I could wish
to be.”
“Then postpone it for a few weeks.”
“No, no, no; that would never do; hasten it. Besides, we should have
to pass through all the wretchedness consequent upon knowing a man—a
murderer, it is true, and perhaps two of them—that is waiting to die.”
“I think myself,” said Captain Fraser, “that we might, with advantage,
leave Bath before the trial takes place. It would certainly be more
comfortable.”
“So it would,” said Mrs. Fraser; “and, to tell the truth, I begin to
get tired of this place, beautiful as it is. In fact, I want to get to
your mansion in the north.”
“Not more than I do, madam,” said Sir Francis. “Will Miss Stevens
permit me to persuade her to shorten my period of probation, to escape
some of the disagreeables we have mentioned relative to this unhappy
affair?”
• • • • •
The wedding morning was arrived. Sir Francis Varney had not been
sparing of his ill-gotten gains. He willingly made some handsome
presents to Mrs. Fraser and Mary Stevens; jewels were the form he gave
them in; and Sir Francis himself took care to display no small degree
of ornament, and yet he appeared to be a man who, though wearing and
having the best of all, still wore but little ornament.
But the occasion made the change in his habit. And now the post horses
are ready at the door—ready to bear them northwards. They are at the
church. Sir Francis, and Mary Stevens leaning upon his arm, come before
the altar, and the friends of the bride were on either side of them.
The clergyman was about to read, but asked first, if any knew any
causes or impediment, &c., to the marriage.
No answer was returned; when there was some bustle at the other end of
the church, and the clergy man paused to ascertain its character.
In a moment more there was a motley group of persons making towards the
altar; and foremost among these were two or three peace officers, and
after them a woman, dressed in many clothes, which added to her natural
obesity.
“Ah, that’s him—that’s the wagabone that said my house was on fire when
it warn’t; that’s him as frightened me so, that I’m quite thin through
it.”
“Shiver my timbers, and they begin to creak a bit now—d—n the gout!—but
that’s Varney, the vampyre! Who’d a thought he would always be turning
up in this way, like an old mop as nobody can use?”
Varney turned to the clergyman, and begged that these mad people might
be turned out, and, after the ceremony, he would meet any proper
accusation at a proper time and place; but he showed his anger so
strongly, that Mary shrank from him; while the two officers demanded
him as a prisoner.
The clergyman yielded; and Sir Francis, striking the officer near him
down, made a rush at a side door, and escaped.
[Illustration: Sir Francis is identified, and flees.]
The fact was, there had been more than one doubt about the murder; and
Sir Francis had been followed to the hotel the night of the murder by
one of the waiters, who came up behind him. They took his shoes, and
found they were bloody; and all things being traced home to him, it was
agreed to capture him at home; but he had left for the church, when the
officers followed him. Old Admiral Bell, who was gouty, happened to see
him pass, and determined to unmask him, which he did.
CHAPTER CLVII
THE MURDER IN THE WOOD DEL NOTTI.—A NEAPOLITAN SCENE.
There had been a great heat during the day, even for the sunny shore of
Naples. Not a cloud had been seen all day, not a breath of air had been
stirring; all was golden sunshine—all was fair; the very sea glittered
like molten gold, and the heat was oppressive in the extreme—so much so
that even the Neapolitans themselves stirred not out of doors, but sank
listless and sleepy on the couch, fanning themselves, and endeavouring
to create an air that would give some slight refreshment.
Even the sea was calm—the very waves lashed the shore lazily, and
appeared to partake of the general weariness that came over all
nature—all things that moved.
There was no soul stirring in the villas that were seen dotted about
the environs of Naples, most of them like palaces, surrounded on every
side by gardens and fountains, walled in, and secure from the intrusion
of a stranger.
There was one of great magnificence adjoining the small wood Del Notti,
that reared its stately structure on a slope looking towards the sea,
though at a mile or two’s distance, but close adjoining the wood.
The gardens were extensive, and abutted on the wood, which was a cool
and shady spot at most times, and if such a one were now to be found,
it would certainly be found in the wood Del Notti.
The trees grew tall, and spread their branches out until they
interlaced each other so completely, that when the foliage was on them
the light rarely found its way to the earth, save in a dim and diluted
form.
Here there might now and then be found some of those who had been
overtaken by the heat of the day, or who from choice preferred the
coolness of the woods to the walls of their houses. Here, then,
reposing beneath the great trees, might occasionally be found a few
individuals who slept in coolness and shade.
Near the wall of the villa where the wood ran were some tall black
trees, mostly fir and cedar; there beneath one of the latter lay a
tall, gaunt-looking man, who, notwithstanding the weather, was wrapped
up in a cloak of large dimensions, and sable colour.
There was something strange in that man’s appearance; above all, the
cloak which he wore was a thing so much out of place, that none other
than himself could or would have worn it. What was his motive none
could divine, were it not for the concealment of his person, which
seemed likely enough.
His slouched hat was bent over his eyes; his face was scarcely
distinguishable between the collar of the cloak and the hat, though he
lay on his back motionless, and without heeding aught that neared him.
It was true, there did not exist any reason why he should take any
heed, seeing that at that point no one ever came. It was a spot that
was not frequented, having a bad name, which usually deters people from
trusting themselves in such a place.
However, the stranger lay motionless, and apparently without fear.
Perhaps it was the long two-edged sword he wore, that gave him
his security; at all events, he lay there in silence, and almost
motionless—quite and entirely so, save the motion in breathing; and his
eye now and then turned in a particular direction.
The hours rolled by, and no one approached, till the sun sunk towards
the ocean, there to bury himself till another morrow appeared.
The heat of the high noon was past, and the shadows of the trees
reduced the light in the wood to a twilight; and the stranger arose
and stood beneath the shadow of a tall one, while he appeared to
be listening for some sound which he appeared to expect from some
particular quarter of the wood.
The hour of noon is some hours past; and with it a gentle sea breeze
begins to fan the heated shores, and here and there might be seen some
of the inhabitants creeping about in the shady places.
The stranger listened, and from the quarter to which he appeared most
to direct his attention, he heard sounds proceed. These were those made
by persons walking over the dried leaves and sticks which lay scattered
about from the effects of the storms that sometimes visit even these
pleasant shores.
“She comes!” he muttered, and his eye glanced round, and he grasped the
hilt of his sword. “She comes! but does she come alone?”
He paused, and again listened.
“She comes not alone—another is with her; but no matter; she shall
come. I have the means of security here. But, above all, I need _her_.”
He paused again, and listened, but quietly drew his sword, which was
long and sharp, and stood beneath the tree, while the voices and
sounds slowly approached, until they came quite distinct and audible.
“And so,” said a man’s voice, but in a low key, “the marchese is not
well.”
“She is quite indisposed.”
“I was about to say I could hardly feel it in my heart to regret it.”
“And why could you be so unfeeling?”
“Because, by dear Fiametta, had she been well, you would scarce have
got away from her this evening, and I should have had but little of
your sweet company.”
“I admit that; but were you not selfish in desiring it?”
“Yes, I was.”
“And are you not ashamed to say so?”
“No, I am not, Fiametta. I can acknowledge anything that concerns
myself and you; for I must admit a great deal of selfishness in this
matter. I love you tenderly, and that puts all the world beside us. I
think nothing of any one save you, and for you I would sacrifice the
whole world.”
“I am fearful of you.”
“And wherefore should you be fearful of me, fair one? Am I not willing
and ready to fight and die for you? I would not fear the summons of
death this moment, if I knew that I could save you but one hour’s pang.”
“I hope,” said Fiametta, leaning on her lover’s arm, “I hope that you
will never be called upon for so sad a sacrifice. I am sure I should
never know an hour’s happiness if I thought there was a possibility of
it.”
“I do not think there is any possibility of that happening. But,
Fiametta, when do you hope for an end to this slavery? Can’t you leave
the old marchese?—she is anything but kind to you, and would marry you
to one of her poor relatives; and unless you marry with her consent,
you will never be rewarded for the many listless hours you have passed,
night after night, at her bedside.”
“But she will reward me when she dies.”
“What an age to wait!”
“Surely you cannot grudge her life!”
“I do not, only so long as it is a term of imprisonment for you. If
you would leave her, and come back with me, I will make you happy. You
shall have a happy home, and form new ties, and new affections.”
“I have not got so tired of the old, that it is necessary to change
them; but I cannot leave the marchese. She is almost alone—no one goes
near her to do her a good office, and I am her only friend.”
“And yet she won’t give you liberty.”
“She says I am too young, and, if you must know all, she says I am too
pretty to be trusted in everybody’s company.”
“I must admit there is much of truth in that, and yet I cannot see its
application in this instance, as far as I am concerned.”
“No; that is not to be expected from you, you know; but this must be
admitted, that she speaks of men in general. Besides, she says, if I
have patience to await her death, she will handsomely endow me.”
“Upon my word, I think the old woman only wants to lease her life a few
years longer, or, I should say, wishes to live forever.”
“How can you make that appear?”
“Thus—when you are waiting for people’s deaths, you never do succeed
in hearing of their dying within any reasonable space. It gives them
new life, and the spirit of opposition and obstinacy is created within
them, and they won’t die.”
“For shame.”
“Nay, you will find, Fiametta, that we shall both grow grey-headed
in waiting for the happy moment when you and I are man and wife. Do
not stay, then, any longer, leave here, and come with me; we shall be
happy, and defy the world.”
“But look what a dowry I shall lose.”
“Never mind about that. Such a dowry would not make you young again,
nor would it recall many years of past service and attendance upon her.
You must know how very precarious such a life must be. It may so happen
that you may forfeit all you have deserved through some fancy of this
old woman. She may take it into her head to insist upon your marrying
her poor cousin there. You know, if you were to displease her, she
might very easily leave you nothing for your pains.”
“I admit all that; but it amounts to nothing, because she has said as
much that she would never force me, only she wished me to marry him, as
being a worthy man and one who would act justly to me through life.”
“Justly through life! What a sound! It sounds but little of love.
Justly, indeed! I would I could act no otherwise to others, but to you,
Fiametta, I should as soon think of forgetting you as merely acting
justly. I love you; I would, at this moment, lay down my life for you.”
At that moment they neared the stranger, who was standing silently and
motionless, with his sword concealed beneath his cloak, but eagerly
watching them, and devouring every word they uttered; and, by degrees,
they drew nearer and nearer.
“I am sure it will be wise to wait awhile. I am sure the poor old
marchese will not live long. She cannot eat and drink, save with great
difficulty. I am sure we shall not have long to wait.”
“I am willing to abide by your wishes, Fiametta; but it cannot be well
to wait for an age—it cannot be well to wait till we are old.”
“I know that; but——”
Fiametta screamed, as her eye fell upon the stranger, who rushed out
upon them, with his sword drawn. This gave her male companion time to
defend himself, by, in the first instance, jumping aside.
“Mercy! mercy!” screamed Fiametta.
Her lover drew his sword, and put himself upon his defence, saying, as
he parried the first thrust of his enemy,—
“Villain! what mean you? Is it robbery you would attempt, or murder
alone? Will nothing but shedding blood satisfy you?”
The stranger made no reply, but pressed on furiously, and with great
strength and skill, for two or three minutes, when Fiametta’s lover, by
changing his ground, contrived to elude so desperate an assault upon
his life.
Fiametta, however, believed her lover was getting the worst of it. She
screamed out for help several times, but none came. However, it caused
the stranger to press his adversary more quickly, and to hasten his own
movements, for he was quite desperate and furious; but this laid him
open to the assaults of the other. But, so fierce was the attack, and
such was the strength exhibited, that Fiametta’s lover was compelled to
give ground.
“What is your object, villain?—speak!”
But the stranger spoke not, but furiously threw himself upon him, and
endeavoured to beat down his guard, which his great strength and height
almost enabled him to do; but as the other gave ground he was obliged
to follow him, and then his foot caught against some of the tangled
roots that grew out of the earth, and threw him forward; and his
adversary, not slow to profit by it, and rid himself of so dangerous an
enemy, stepped forward and received him upon the point of his sword.
“A good deliverance,” said the lover, drawing his sword out of the body
as it fell to the earth—“a timely deliverance, truly.”
He wiped his forehead, for the perspiration streamed down his face; the
day was warm, and his exertion great.
“Oh, Jose,” exclaimed Fiametta, “what a horrid man!”
“A brigand, I suppose.”
“But he said nothing—he asked nothing.”
“No, he meant murder; there is no doubt of it, now, in the world; but I
never saw such an ill-looking wretch before.”
As Jose spoke, he kicked the hat and cloak off which the brigand wore,
and which remained partially on. There was a ghastly wound in his
breast where Jose’s sword entered and let out the life of the stranger.
He was very tall, but thin and emaciated; his features remarkable, and
he wore some straight, straggling hair, that was disordered, and fell
over his forehead and face of more than marble paleness.
“Well, I never met with such an encounter before, and I never met with
such an ill-looking villain,” said Jose. “Come away, Fiametta; we need
not say anything to any one about the affair. I will not come here
again, though it may be needless to take the precaution, seeing that
none could be brought to match this fellow in villainy and ugliness; at
least, it is so to my mind. Come away.”
Wiping his sword on the cloak of the fallen man, and sheathing it, he
took the hand of Fiametta, and drawing it through his arm, left the
spot.
CHAPTER CLVIII.
A MAIDEN’S MIND DISTURBED.—AN EASY WAY OF PROMOTING COMFORT OF
CONSCIENCE.—THE MONK.
The spot was deserted, and no soul came near; but the body lay, with
its ghastly wound, all sopping in its gore. It was a fitting place
for such a scene as this; no sound was heard, and the lazy hours
turned slowly over, till the shades of evening came on apace; the
light grew dim, and darkness increased; but there the dead body of the
tall, remarkable-looking stranger lay, without motion. It was cold
and bloodless—death had long since deprived it of its last spark of
animation.
• • • • •
Jose and Fiametta quitted the neighbourhood of the deed of darkness as
quickly as they could, and it was many minutes before either of them
spoke, so filled were their minds with the reflections natural to, and
consequent upon, the strange occurrence that had just before fallen
upon them.
At length Fiametta broke silence, by saying,—
“Oh, Jose, what a dreadful thing has happened!”
“Truly, it had like to have been a dreadful affair; but it don’t
matter now, he’s settled, I believe.”
“Yes; but you have killed a man.”
“Truly, my dear Fiametta, I have killed a man, or devil, I don’t yet
know which; but that man would have killed me if I had not done so.”
“Yes, he would; but how dreadful.”
“So that being the case, it is, in my opinion, a very good job he is
dead; a very good job, indeed; he will be safe where he is:”
“But still,” said Fiametta, crossing herself, “how dreadful it must be
to be slain thus; with all one’s sins upon one’s head.”
“What would have been my fate?”
“As bad, and to me it would have been worse by far; but still it is
really dreadful to think that there should be a soul thus sent to
heaven without so much as the good offices of a priest.”
“He would have killed me without giving me time for repentance. He
would have forced me to leave a world in which I have all happiness yet
to know; a world which I am by no means prepared to quit.”
“Truly no, Jose, nor I; but what a state for this man to be in; he is
so much the worse prepared than even you, because his end was bad; now,
you had no evil intention.”
“None—none.”
“You did not know even that you were in danger from him.”
“I did not. Fiametta, else I had never brought you there. I cannot
understand what brought him there—what he wanted, or why it was he made
such a desperate attack upon me; my life was aimed at.”
“It was, Jose; but have you no private enemy, whom you believe capable
of such a deed as this? Surely—surely it cannot be done, save from some
motive.”
“That is the thing that most puzzles me; I cannot understand the
motive. I know him not; I have no enemy who would hire an assassin; but
there let him and his deed lie buried in oblivion.”
“He has no burial.”
“He deserves none,” said Jose.
“But, dear Jose, do you not think we ought to give him one.”
“Are we his executors or heirs?”
“God forbid!—but we saw him die, and not for his sake, but for the sake
of human nature, do not let us leave him unburied like a dog. He may
not deserve it, but he has answered all his offence.”
“Yes, yes; I admit he has been punished—he paid to the uttermost all he
owed me, and I gave him a receipt in full. He will never make another
demand upon me; we have quite done with each other, I believe.”
“I shall never forget the horrible sight; it will haunt me day and
night; I shall not be able to banish the terrible features from my
mind. I shall, in truth, pass a sad life; I wish this had never
happened.”
“Why, so do I, dear Fiametta; but, surely, you do not accuse me of
wrong, in having, to save my life, killed this man. I was compelled,
forced to do it; it was either his life or mine; and, the truth to
tell, I never was in such peril, from any single sword, in all my life,
and but for the lucky accident that laid him open, I had not been here
with you, but where he now is.”
“Thank God for your deliverance, Jose; but—but what a revolting thing
to remember, that in the wood Del Notti, there lies a corrupting mass
of humanity, over which loathsome insects crawl; a thing that had once
been a living soul like ourselves; but now, alas! what is he?”
“But, Fiametta, your grief appears misplaced; you mourn this stranger
as if he was near and dear to you. Do you know him?”
“Not I,” said Fiametta, sorrowfully.
“Then what have you to grieve about, Fiametta? Tell me truly. You have
nothing to blame yourself with. I do not feel I have acted wrongly. Say
what it is that causes you so much sorrow.”
“I grieve to think that the body of that sinful and wicked man lies
unburied, and that no masses have been said for the repose of his soul.”
“If that be all you require to set your mind at rest—though the villain
deserves it not—I will see that he is buried and masses said for him.”
“Will you, indeed, Jose?”
“Upon my conscience, I will see your desire executed.”
“Well, then, Jose, yonder lives a holy monk. He is a pious and good
man, and will, I am sure, do all that is required—watch and pray by the
body till midnight, and continue there until the sun shall illumine the
wood.”
“Be it so, my dear Fiametta—be it so. We will go to the holy man and
tell him of our distress, and will reward him; and then I will see you
in safety, and return to conduct him to the spot where you know we
left the body. I would the villain had come by a less noble death than
falling by the sword.”
“It will be a danger that will never be forgotten by me,” said Fiametta.
“Nor by me,” replied Jose. “What that man meant I cannot conceive. But
then there can be but one answer to the question—he meant robbery;
nothing else could have tempted him to draw his sword upon me.”
“But why did he not demand your money at once?”
“Because he might meet with what he has met; and he took me at a
disadvantage, and, of course, gave him a better chance of killing me,
and running less danger in doing so. I am not, therefore, surprised at
it.”
“Here is the holy father’s residence. He is poor—very poor; but,
withal, he is very good. He is a holy man.”
“Then he will serve our turn the better; for it would, in my opinion,
take something more than a saint to pray out of purgatory such a soul
as his must be. It must wing its way through space very much like a
bat.”
“Hush, Jose—hush! Not a word about that. Here is the holy man’s abode.
Shall I enter with you?”
“If you will, Fiametta—if you will.”
Fiametta stood by her lover’s side while he knocked at the holy man’s
door, and, after a pause of about a minute, a deep voice said,—
“Who is it that knocks at my door?”
“’Tis one who needs your service, good father.”
“Enter,” said the monk, and a bolt was withdrawn. The door opened,
and Fiametta followed her lover into a hovel, or rather a bare room,
in which was nothing, save some straw in one corner, and some few
clothes; besides which there were one or two articles of necessary use
and convenience, but they were very few indeed.
“Well, my son, what wouldst thou? Dost thou require mine aid to bind
thee to this maiden, and she to thee?”
“I do indeed wish so much, but she is not willing.”
“Not willing! Then wherefore dost thou come to me?”
“You see, holy father, as we were walking in the wood Del Notti, which
I dare say you well enough know——”
“I do, my son.”
“Well, I was talking to my companion, heedless of danger, nor dreaming
any could be at hand, when my attention was attracted to a spot on the
right of me whence a man rushed out upon me, with a drawn sword, and
attacked me.”
“I should not have had time to see him, much less time to draw and
defend myself, but for the scream of her who was by my side. I looked
where I saw her look, and saw him advancing, and had time to spring
back and draw.”
“Did you kill your opponent?”
“As it fell out, good father, I did. He rushed on and pressed me so
hard, that I had no alternative. My life was in great danger, and I
could not rid myself of my enemy, or preserve my own life, except at
the expense of his.”
“Did you slay him?”
“I did.”
“Another soul ushered into eternity,” said the monk, gloomily. “How
long will it be before the wickedness of men shall cease to bear such
fruits?”
“But, holy father, I did but act lawfully in saving my life. It was
only the law that nature has implanted in us, and can hardly be called
wickedness, since Heaven itself gives us the power and impulse.”
“Hold thy peace, my son, thou knowest nothing of these matters;
therefore I say hold thy peace, and let me know what it is you desire
of me.”
“That you will say masses for the repose of his soul, and give
him Christian burial. I do not like—we do not like such a portion
of humanity to remain where it is; we would it were not entirely
neglected, or deprived of burial rites.”
“It is but just of thee, my son; but I have known many who would
have neglected it altogether, and permitted the body of one of God’s
creatures to lie and rot like a dog. My son, you have done well, and I
will, for your sake, do mine office.”
“Nay, holy father, I cannot permit thee to do it wholly without giving
the church some due, and here in this purse you will find all I have.”
“I take it, my son, not for my own sake, but for that of the church, to
whom belongs all that is offered her.”
“And this, too, holy father,” said Fiametta, giving a small purse;
“take that, and for my sake do what may be done by those on earth for
those who have departed from it by a violent and sudden death.”
“I will, daughter.”
“And now, holy father,” said Jose, “if you will, I am ready to take you
to the spot where fell this man.”
“I will follow, my son,” said the monk, concealing his two gifts
beneath his garments, but rising at the same time—“I’ll follow thee.”
They all left the place, but went a circuitous route, to enable Jose to
leave Fiametta in safety at the marquise’s villa, where she resided in
half dependence, being a distant relative of her’s.
Jose led on the monk until he came to the spot where the stranger fell,
and where he yet lay just as he had fallen—a ghastly corpse.
“Here, holy father, you see the caitiff, a treacherous villain, who has
now been paid for his villainy—for, perhaps, a life of villainy.”
“Perhaps so, my son. He does not appear to have been formed by nature
when in one of her most kindly moods; but yet it might have been she
impressed his character upon his features as a warning to the rest of
mankind.”
“It was so, most likely; but you see he is slain. Fiametta would never
have known peace again unless the body was watched through the night by
some holy man, and prayed for. That is what is desired, holy father;
and now I will leave you to your task, bidding you adieu, and wishing
your office a prosperous one, and a pleasant night to watch by.”
CHAPTER CLIX.
THE WATCH BY THE DEAD MAN’S SIDE.—THE DEAD ALIVE.—THE DEATH-STRUGGLE,
AND THE MURDER OF THE MONK.
The monk gazed after Jose for some moments, until he had vanished from
his sight; even then he continued gazing upon the vacant space that he
lately filled, as if meditating in his own mind, and quite unmindful of
the present. At length he turned and gazed upon the clay-cold corpse
before him.
There it lay in all its hideousness—all its horrible reality. The
slouched hat was knocked off in the fall, and the face was exposed to
view.
“Ave Maria!” muttered the monk, telling his beads. “I never before
saw so unfavourable a looking creature. I pray Heaven he may have
been better favoured in grace than in features—that he may make a
better appearance spiritually than bodily. I would I had had time to
speak with him before his spirit fled, for I misdoubt me much of his
salvation—but I will not charge him with unknown sin.”
“That,” he muttered, after a pause, “might, indeed, be quite
unnecessary, seeing his appearance and his deeds—at least the only one
I know of is of a like character; were it otherwise, I would be loth to
doubt him; but two such proofs are enough to damn the best spoken-of
being in all Christendom.”
He paused again; examined the features of the dead man, but could not
appear at all satisfied with the success of his ministry.
“I would sooner have had some poor, but honest corpse to watch by,”
he said as he gazed upon the long white visage of the dead man, whose
leaden eye appeared fixed upon him; “I would,” he continued, “much
sooner have had some early flower cut down before its prime—I could
have wept and prayed for him, then; but this, alas! was but full-grown
iniquity, I strongly fear—it cannot be otherwise.”
The monk sank down upon a tree.
“Alas! what a sinner I am, for uttering such a thought—nay, I am worse
for conceiving such a thought, and expressing it must be heinous. To
have such a one would be to cut off the most worthy, instead of looking
at the destruction of the full grown sinner in all his pride and moral
deformity, as being the full extent of the length he was permitted to
go by Divine wisdom and intelligence. He has filled his measure of
iniquity, and the Lord hath cut him off in the midst of his sins.”
The monk now devoutly crossed himself, and muttered several of his Ave
Marias and paternosters, and prayed in bad Latin for some time, nearly
an hour, when he appeared to think he might be indulged in a rest from
his theological labour, and that his mind might refresh itself.
The monk arose and paced about the body for some minutes in solemn and
deep wonder at the place chosen for such a deed.
A number of fresh thoughts now rushed through his mind, as he assigned
all possible motives for the deed that had been done, or attempted to
be done; and, also, for the choice of spot; but this speculation was
more curious than useful.
Time passed by, and the hours rolled on, and darkness came on apace. A
heavy atmosphere seemed to hang over him, and the light gradually faded
away, and the moon showed no light on that night.
“It is dark,” muttered the monk, “but the Lord is my light, and
darkness has no fears for me. I am in the discharge of my ministry, and
am safe. The dead man lies quiet and still—no sound comes thence.”
He listened, but no sound; not the rustle of a leaf could be heard;
not a breath of air stirred. All was silent and still; no one sound
disturbed the stillness of the night—all was quiet.
“It is a night of death,” said the monk to himself—“a night such as
might be supposed to exist if the last man had ceased to live.”
There was a weight in the air that appeared stronger, and had an effect
upon the monk, and made a gloomy feeling come over him.
“What ails me?” he said to himself. “I am not strong and confident as I
am wont to be—the reverse; I am doubting, and very sad. Yet why should
I be sad—I, a minister of religion? I, at all times, am prepared to
die, or ought to be.”
“And yet there is the clinging after life, as in all; but I am mortal,
as other men are. I have not all the motives for life they have. I am
alone in the world. I am but a pilgrim, whose stay is short, and who
leaves behind him nothing to remember, and no one to remember me. It is
better it is so than otherwise.”
The monk paused again, and approached the trunk of the tree, upon which
he sat in deep meditation for more than an hour, without altering his
posture, or uttering a single word. A whole hour passed thus.
“Now,” muttered the monk, as if waking up from a profound meditation,
“man is here but in a state of probation. If he were not, what would be
the explanation of the chequered course he runs, what the use of all
the various stages he goes through during a long life, and then to drop
into rottenness at last?”
“Why are we educated and improved, if for any other purpose? Why should
we spend years in improving ourselves, only to be deprived of the jewel
at last, and to have it not only taken, but destroyed.”
“No—no; it is for better use.”
The monk’s mind was evidently disturbed in regard to some speculation
which had been suggested by the solitary moments of his watch. At such
times, all the strange and inquiring thoughts that could be devised by
man usually arise and enter his mind, and strange doubts and fancies
will supervene, when all other thoughts have been banished, and they
take their place.
Man’s mind is always liable to these fanciful intrusions, and will
remain so, while there is a single important assertion or circumstances
existing, incapable of positive and mathematical demonstration.
When all shall be clear, and when there shall be no longer any play
for the mind—any room for imagination—any possibility of conception
left, then doubt may be cleared up, and an unanimity might be raised
upon such a structure that never would be raised under any other
circumstances whatever.
But, as this is not likely to happen, human doubt will exist, more or
less, to all; we shall none of us be freed from that great cause of all
the calamities of races. But to proceed with our narrative.
The monk looked around him. He could, however, see nothing, save the
few trees near him, but beyond that he was unable to see. There was a
strong mist up—one that limited vision, and left no room for any other
object to shine through, and diversify the scene.
“I would,” muttered the monk, “that the morning would come. There is no
light; the moon is hidden; no rays penetrate the dense air; and all the
while the air is close and muggy, Not a star out, or luminary visible.”
He looked upwards, and found he could see the spot where the moon
was striving to force its rays through some thinner stratum of the
clouds; but it was doubtful, and the monk, of very weariness, began
to count his beads and to repeat his paternosters, between whiles and
alternately, until he grew weary.
It wanted yet an hour of midnight, and the night would not be passed
for many hours, and the monk thought that the nights were long.
“It is cold,” he muttered; “but yet ’tis not midnight. ’Tis the
moisture with which the air is loaded, and thus it is cool more rapidly
than it could have otherwise happened; but it matters not to me—if
I were to lose my life, I shall only be called home in my ministry;
therefore it matters not. I am in the discharge of my duty, and shall
have the reward appropriate to the service.”
A slight breeze sprung up, and in a short time the mist was cleared
off, and not a cloud was to be seen on the horizon.
There might be seen the moon rising slowly and majestically, while a
gentle and diffused light shed its influence throughout the wood. Of
course its direct rays could not enter until it had risen to its full
height.
“Ha!” said the monk, “now I shall be relieved of some of the terrors of
my watch; it will cease to be so tedious and so long; but, no matter,
I am content, quite content. Soon I shall be able to see the body, and
then I will close its eyes. I had forgotten to do so before; but it is
time enough.”
“Pater noster,” again began the monk, until he came to the last word,
by which time the light was enough to enable him to discover the body
plainly; then he knelt down by its side to pray, and gazed on its
features.
“I see its eyes are glaring wildly—aye, no wonder! no wonder! he met
with a sudden, painful, and violent death.”
“Poor erring mortality! what an end to come to; but, alas! what can men
expect? He who lives by the sword will die by the sword.”
The monk closed the eyes of the dead man, and pulled the cloak, which
lay open, over him, and then leaned back against a tree, and shut his
eyes for a moment; but they did not remain long shut, for some fancied
noise drew him out of a train of speculation he was indulging in.
“He moves not!” he muttered.
However, he knelt down by the side of the body, and began to repeat his
paternoster again, and for a few moments shut his eyes, as if he had no
service for them, and continued his prayers without intermission.
The moon’s rays now came with their full effulgence, and the forest
appeared like some enormous piece of lattice work; for the moon’s rays
were able to penetrate the leaves and branches of many of the trees.
The moonbeams at length fell upon the body of the dead man, and he got
slowly up until he rested on his elbow with his face towards the moon;
and the monk, who yet remained kneeling, was still praying with his
eyes wholly shut.
“Ha!” groaned the stranger.
The monk stopped in his prayer, started, and opened his eyes, which
were fixed, in an extremity of terror and horror, upon the apparition
before him—he was entranced, and had no power to remove his eyes.
“Ha!” said the figure, slowly rising to a sitting posture, but, at the
same time, immediately facing the unfortunate and wretched monk, who
was prostrated by fear.
“Ha!” groaned the figure, by a strange effort.
“My God—my God!” exclaimed the monk, “save me—save me!”
He endeavoured to rise, but shook so much he could not do it, for the
figure kept its horrible eye fixed upon him, and he shook violently;
but after a while he contrived to say, scarcely audible though,
“Avaunt, Satan, I command thee.”
The figure heeded it not, but took some ominous proceedings, by
laying its hands upon the monk’s shoulder; but this had the effect of
releasing him from his spell, and he sprang to his feet, exclaiming,—
“The Lord of Hosts aid me!”
The figure replied not, but rising without taking his hand off, a
deadly struggle ensued between the two, which lasted some minutes. The
monk, being driven desperate, resisted with great strength; but he
had one to deal with, whose strength was far beyond his, and he felt
himself gradually sinking, till, after another effort, which ended in a
wild shriek, he was forced on his knees.
In this posture the strange man seized him by the throat, which he
compressed, and thrust his knees into his chest, until the unfortunate
and wretched man was quite dead and senseless.
CHAPTER CLX.
THE DEVIL A MONK WOULD BE.—THE DEMAND FOR ADMISSION INTO THE CONVENT
OF ST. MARY MAGDALEN.—THE PORTRESS AND THE MONK.
It was some minutes before the stranger, who had so newly risen from
the dead, let go of the grasp he had of the monk’s throat. He held him
firmly by the throat by both hands; but as he stood grasping him, his
face was turned upwards towards the moon’s rays, which fell upon his
breast and features, insomuch that he appeared to gain strength at
every breath he drew.
But what a ghastly face he wore; what a death-like paleness spread over
his forehead; the horrible looking eyes appeared to throw back the
light of the moon, much the same as its rays are reflected by glass.
The unfortunate monk was partially kneeling, his back forced against
the trunk of the tree, upon which he had been sitting, his face turned
upwards, and his eyes almost bursting from their sockets, while his
hands convulsively grasped those of his enemy; but his strength
decreased as that of the other increased; his cowl fell off, and his
bare head was exposed to the moonlight.
There was a death-like pause, and the figure slowly released its hold
upon the throat of the monk and stepped back a pace or two to look
upon his work. The monk’s body retained the posture given to it by the
efforts to extinguish his life, and appeared as though his muscles had
rigidly set in death, but the trunk of the tree itself was a sufficient
support.
“Dead!” muttered the figure; “dead!”
Again he moved about, and went into an open space, where the moonlight
came uninterruptedly, without any barrier, and from this spot he
surveyed the hideous work of his hands.
“Dead—dead!” muttered the figure.
This was undoubtedly true; and yet there remained the body of the monk,
which, but for the turn of the head backwards, and its face upwards, it
might be easily supposed that he had died in the attitude of devotion
or supplication; but, as it was, it was evident by what means he had
come by his death.
“I must have a victim,” muttered the stranger; “am I always to meet
with the pangs of death but to renew such a life on such terms! Never
to obtain a renewal without the pangs of death; and why? because I have
not been able to obtain the voluntary consent of one that is young,
beautiful and a virgin; I might then for a season escape the dreaded
alternative.”
He walked round and round the body of the monk for some time, and
then he came and sat down by its side upon the trunk of the tree, and
appeared lost in contemplation; but at length he looked at the body,
saying,—
“Ay, ay—I have a plan. The church has furnished many a victim—let it
furnish me with one. The church will furnish the sacrifice, and will
give me the means of obtaining the offering. Well and good; it shall be
done.”
He arose, and walked about the body once more, and then approached it;
having apparently made up his mind, he came to it, saying,—
“I will become a monk, too, of the most holy order of St. Francis; yes,
that will serve me well enough. I will take his cassock, it will serve
my turn, and be a ready introduction to the religious world. I am the
good monk Francis myself. My learning and sanctity is great; it will
carry all before it, and I shall be in great request. It will indeed
be strange if there be no fruit upon such a tree. I am sure I shall
deserve it.”
He seized the body, and pulled off the monk’s clothing, and quickly
apparelled himself in it, leaving the body as if fell by the side of
the tree; and, having thrown his own clothes on one side, he drew the
cowl over his head, and, seizing the staff he brought with him, he was
about to leave the spot; but a sudden thought occurred to him, and he
turned back, and began to rummage among the pockets of the monk.
“These churchmen, I have heard, never travel without something of value
about them, and his gold, if he have any, may as well be mine as any
one else’s who may be passing this way.”
He found the two purses that had been given him by Fiametta and Jose,
and some that he had beside; moreover, there were some letters and
papers, which he put into his pocket, merely observing,—
“These will enable me to pass for the character I assume successfully.
I am and will be a monk. I will shrive and confess poor deluded souls,
and send them on their eternal journeys.”
A ghastly and hideous smile crossed his face; and having burthened
himself with what he thought necessary, or worth while, he quitted the
spot.
• • • • •
There were two convents, or nunneries, near the city of Naples, at some
short distance apart from each other.
One was the convent of St. Mary Magdalen, and the other was the convent
of St. Cecilia, about a mile and a half apart, or perhaps more—some
said a league; and so it was by the road, but not in a direct line.
It was late one evening, when the great bell of the convent of St. Mary
Magdalen gave warning from without that some one demanded admission.
The superior of the convent, a woman far advanced in age, and somewhat
proud of her character, and not a little disposed to personal comfort,
was much annoyed at the sound which gave some promise of trouble.
“Well,” muttered the portress, as she rose from before a fire, and
tottered towards the gate, looking through the iron grating for the
object that disturbed her in her meditations and her devotion to the
good things that Providence had furnished her with,—“well, what do you
want?”
“I am a poor travelling brother of the order of St. Francis; I am
benighted, and I wish for a lodging and food.”
“Friend, brother of St. Francis, this is at a later hour than that at
which we open our gates to strangers.”
“They little think at Rome,” said the monk, “that, to obtain a shelter,
we have to get to the gates of a holy house before a certain time; and
those who most need shelter, because it is less to be had, must wait
and perish in the cold.”
“The gates are shut.”
“I see it.”
“And the abbess has got the keys.”
“Will she not give me shelter and food?”
“I may not ask her.”
“I must, then, remain here outside the walls until the morning, and
then I will wend my way back to the holy city, where I will say their
messenger could not obtain rest and shelter at the convent here.”
“Do you come from Rome?”
“I do; and do you refuse to tell your abbess an unworthy brother of
holy St. Francis is here, and waiting for admission?”
The portress made no reply; she was by far to indignant to make any
answer, and yet too fearful to refuse to do his bidding; for he spoke
in a peremptory tone, that indicated an authority beyond what was usual
in his appearance.
She, therefore, found her way to the lady abbess, to whom she began
with every expression of submission and respect.
“My lady,” said the portress, “there is one without who wants to come
in.”
“Well,” said the abbess, “we can’t let him in.”
“I told him so,” replied the portress; “but you would hardly credit
it what he said about a holy pilgrim from Rome, stopping outside the
gate all night, and returning to the holy city and speaking of our
inhospitality.”
“Did he,” said the abbess, “say so much?”
“He did.”
“Then let him in,” said the abbess.
“Let him in!” said the portress, in an extasy of surprise, opening her
eyes very wide, and repeating the words “Let him in.”
“Yes; do as we bid you,” said the abbess.
“Yes,” replied the portress, “certainly; whatever our holy superior
orders, it is for me to obey. I do your bidding.”
Away went the holy portress to discharge her spleen in privacy; and, at
the same time, unable to account for the orders given her, she returned
to the portal, and having unbarred the gate, she drew the bolts and
turned the lock, and opening the door, stood for the monk to enter.
“Come in,” she said. “What do you mean?—do you not want to come in?”
“Am I free to enter?”
“Wherefore do I hold the gate open—for pleasure?”
“No, sister,” said the monk, “through anger, I believe; but if you can
find it in your conscience to be angry because I am at the door and
give you this trouble, what will be the feelings of St. Peter, who
keeps the gates of Heaven, when you present yourself thereat a hungry
being and erring sinner; but peace be upon this place.”
“Amen,” said the portress.
At that moment one of the nuns came from the superior of the convent,
saying,—“Holy father, when you have rested and refreshed yourself, our
worthy abbess will be glad to converse with you.”
“I am even now at her commands,” said the holy man.
“Will you not taste food, and rest yourself?”
“I never tire or need food, when I have aught to do that in any way
concerns our religion.”
“But, holy father, the body needs refreshment.”
“It can be supported upon spiritual food alone, if the Lord wills,”
said the monk, crossing himself most devoutly.
“You must have great gifts, holy father!”
“Not I, but he that sent me,” said the monk, solemnly.
“Will you follow me, holy man, and I will lead you to the abbess, who
will be right glad to speak with you? She wishes to speak to one lately
come from the holy city; you can tell her news of the holy father.”
“I can, my sister.”
“Then, come this way,” said the nun, who immediately led the way to the
abbess, and the monk followed her closely, till he was lost sight of by
those in the waiting-room.
CHAPTER CLXI.
FATHER FRANCIS’S INTERVIEW WITH THE ABBESS OF ST. MARY MAGDALEN.—THE
OBJECTS AND WISHES OF THE HOLY FATHER.
After passing through a few passages, they entered into a room which
had the appearance of a waiting-room, in which were placed chairs and
seats; but they did not stop here, for the sister approached a door, at
which she knocked, and paused a moment; but a voice from within desired
her to enter; and, beckoning the monk to follow her, which he did, they
both entered a comfortable room in which the abbess was seated.
“Here is the holy father,” said the sister, “who demands lodging and
refreshment; but he will take nothing until he has done all that may be
required of him.”
“Holy brother,” said the abbess, “the traveller needs rest, and he that
is hungered requires food. Will you partake of our hospitality?”
“I was told you desired to converse with me, and I could not let my
ministry wait while I, like a glutton, ate and drank.”
“No, brother, it was not for such a purpose I sent for thee, but to
hear what news thou hadst from Rome, whence I heard you have come.”
“I have come thence.”
“But will you not take some refreshment here—it shall be brought thee,
if thou wilt have it, or in the buttery, which you please.”
“Whichsoever you please, sister,” said the member of St. Francis.
“Then let some of the best be brought, sister, for the good man; and
stay, I ate none at the last meal, which I may amend now; let me have a
small moiety of a pasty, and a small trifle of cold venison.”
The sister departed, and the abbess opened a small cupboard, from which
she took a bottle and two glasses, of goodly dimensions, considering
the fact that the place was inhabited only by females.
“Pronounce a blessing upon us, holy father,” said the abbess. “This has
been tasted by no unhallowed lips; it was a present from a holy lady to
me, to take myself, and to offer to such as I deemed worthy of it—and
you, holy father, I believe are worthy.”
The worthy monk pronounced the required benediction, and drank as fine
a glass of real Burgundy as ever went down consecrated lips.
“Thanks, worthy sister, thanks.”
“Brother, I am glad to be able to give it thee; it gives me more
pleasure to do so than thee to drink. I’ll warrant me, that never has
such wine passed through the merchants’ hands, because he would never
have parted with it at a price that would have made it procurable in a
place like this, for we are, holy brother, poor, very poor.”
“The people who live in these parts are, I fear, not so godly as they
should be, to let a house like this want.”
“There are many nobles.”
“And they ought to pay handsomely.”
“They do, I am thankful; but I should like to be able to offer the
poor, diseased, and helpless men, better sort of diet than I do.”
“It ought to be in your power when the rich and great are so close
around you here. You ought to have rich penitents.”
“But few of the rich are penitent, brother.”
“Naples I was told was a sink of iniquity. I did not expect to find it
in reality such as I have heard it described. But, sister, we must
be thankful that we have what the times will afford; but, at the same
time, when the enemy is thus about, we must be up and doing, and preach
salvation to them.”
“But they only answer by sending invitations for Sabbath balls,” said
the unfortunate abbess, in great dolour.
“That must be looked to. They must be chidden.”
“And then they withhold their hands from works of charity—from doing
any good deed to us—and we have no gifts and offerings.”
“But that ought not to be any motive. When they see you in earnest,
they will not resist any longer; they will, as they must, give in.”
“Ah, holy father! you don’t know the Neapolitans; they are the most
sinful set of men that you ever met with.”
“The holy father must know of this; he must be informed of the
character of these bad people—of these facts. It is a melancholy state
of things, which is a disgrace to a Christian country, and must be
amended.”
At that moment the nun returned with the refection for the monk and the
abbess, who cast a longing glance towards it.
When this was laid on the table, the abbess gave a signal that there
was no need of the further attendance of the servitor, who quitted the
room, leaving the abbess and the monk to enjoy each others society at
leisure.
Some minutes elapsed before either spoke, which time was spent in
mastication of no ordinary morsels, being some of the most delicious
meats that could be obtained for a religious house of this character,
and they were usually supplied with the best of everything that could
be had.
“Holy father,” said the abbess, “the fare is poor; but I hope it will
relieve those calls which imperious nature demands you to satisfy.”
“Yes,” said the monk; “I am well satisfied.”
“Permit me to press upon your notice those venison pasties; they are
made by Sister Bridget, who never made an indifferent one in all her
life.”
“I decidedly approve of Sister Bridget’s skill,” said the monk. “She is
no doubt a worthy woman, and a woman fit for her station.”
“I would not have another to do her duties for a trifle, save as a
penance,” said the abbess. “I will, at all events, retain her while the
convent will give her a place of shelter.”
“Very right, sister—very right.”
“But what news from Rome, brother?”
“Little, save the holy pontiff has been very ill.”
“I heard as much; and by many it is presumed that his holiness will be
translated, if he should not be better soon.”
“No; his holiness is safe, as far as it is possible for any human being
to be. God preserve him long!”
“Amen!” said the abbess, devoutly.
“But have you no penitents, holy sister?”
“I have several, but they are all in the way of performing their
penances, save one, who is somewhat refractory, holy father, and I know
not what to do with her. She has no respect for those in authority.”
“Is she one of the order?”
“No, a neophyte.”
“How is it, then—what brings her here?”
“She is sent by relatives who are afraid of a disgrace, and will not
give her any chance of committing their family to such a disgraceful
marriage. She at one time pledged herself to take the vows, but now has
some objection to do so.”
“On what grounds does she refuse?”
“Because she thinks she shall not be happy.”
“Absurd! Where is she?”
“We must have been compelled to secure her, for she has made more than
one attempt to escape, and I have reasons to believe that these efforts
have been aided from without.”
“’Tis a serious offence—a very serious offence to those concerned, and
would inevitably lead to a terrible example, if they were detected.”
“No doubt; and we should feel it our duty to make every exertion to
punish any one who makes an attempt to violate the sanctity of our
house.”
“It must be so, sister.”
“Yes, certainly; and I have secured the maiden, who, if she be brought
to their mind, will largely endow the convent.”
“That ought to be seen to.”
“I am, as you may imagine, holy father, anxious that the young maiden
should become a member of our house. Who can tell,” muttered the
abbess, half aloud, “but she may become a chosen vessel by which much
good may be effected?”
“She may,” said the monk. “I am from Rome; you may examine these
credentials which I have with me. I will take the charge of this
refractory sister of yours, and will pursue such a course as will bring
her round to your way of thinking.”
“And the endowment?”
“Will still belong to your house, to which it will be given. I have no
object, sister, save the welfare of the church; reward I seek not, save
what may be given in the good words of the wise and good.”
“You are deserving of all praise, holy father. I was not thinking about
the endowment, holy father, because, you see, it will not belong to
me, but to the church, and this house in particular, for the use of
the poor lambs here, over whom I am appointed shepherdess; so I have
no feeling in the matter beyond what I ought to have in the spiritual
welfare of our fellow sinners.”
“I have no authority to interfere in aught else.”
“I see, holy father,” said the abbess, “you are a wonderful man, and
such a one as will do much good.”
“I will make an attempt to do good, sister.”
“And I will make bold, holy brother, to say you will be successful;
though, I venture to say, with humility, that I have tried everything
with the unfortunate young woman, which appears to aggravate the evil,
rather than give any promise of the future.”
“So I might expect.”
“You will pursue a different course?”
“I may; but it must depend upon circumstances. If I find it necessary,
I must have some place of security, where no one can have any
communication with her, save when I shall order it, or deem it proper
she should be so confined.”
“Certainly; very right.”
“Moreover, if I find she needs such severe measures, I shall not let
any food be given, save what is given by me, or in my presence, which,
of course, amounts to the same thing.”
“Exactly, holy father.”
“And,” continued the monk, “I will not permit this holy house to be
insulted by a recusant, for I am quite resolved that no heretic shall
baffle the ministers of religion.”
“Oh, very improper; it would be indeed, not only an aggravation, but a
decided loss to the church, which would damnify it to that extent.”
“Undoubtedly,” replied the holy man, “undoubtedly; and with your aid I
hope to be able to make one good effort, and I pray heaven it may be
attended with grace.”
“I trust so; and now, holy brother, what may I call you?”
“You will see by these presents I am called Father Francis, of the
order of St. Francis; and unworthy brother, who has, perhaps, beyond
his gifts, obtained the praise and good wishes of his holiness the
Pope, who has been pleased specially to send me forth on a travelling
commission, to report to him and to stay where I thought my services
might be required.”
“Holy father, we may have you stay here some time, I hope, and your
favourable report of our poor endeavours; they are in the right
direction, and carried on with the right spirit; but we are all weak
and erring mortals, we cannot always be as successful as we would wish,
and in this matter we have been unsuccessful.”
“You have done all that could be expected; there are some matters that
will not yield to the weaker vessel, but which would yield to the
stronger; therefore you have nothing to blame yourself with; but you
are to be commended for what you have done.”
“Thanks, holy father; I would not be willingly found wanting.”
“Nor are you, sister, according to my poor judgment.”
“And when will you see this neophyte?”
“I will see her on the morrow; and in the meantime I must be chargeable
to you for board and lodging, if you will so far grace me.”
“Name it not, holy father; I have nothing here but what is yours; and
when you choose to retire, there will be the best traveller’s bed ready
for you.”
“Straw and sackcloth are good enough for me,” said the monk,
ostentatiously.
“But it concerns our housekeeping, holy father, and our hospitality
too. We must not let you lodge thus. I pray you, for our sakes, permit
us to do what the credit of the place will permit us to do in the way
of entertainment.”
“Be it even as you will, sister; it does not beseem me that I should
contend for matters like these—be it so; I will retire.”
“It grows late. I will summon Sister Agatha to show you your dormitory.”
Accordingly, Sister Agatha was summoned, and the monk was, after
another delicate libation of rich Burgundy, led to his room.
CHAPTER CLXII.
THE CELL OF THE NEOPHYTE.—THE INTERVIEW.—THE UNEXPECTED TURN GIVEN TO
THE AFFAIRS AT THE CONVENT OF MARY MAGDALEN.
The morning broke, and the matins were duly performed at St. Mary
Magdalen.
This was what happened every day in the week included, for the convent
was always alive to the performance of its duties from the dawn of day
until sunset and after; but it was their business—a business from the
toil of which they rested not on the Sabbath.
But then it happened that there was no labour; it was all easy-going,
straight-forward work, and was a mere pastime, that only occupied the
lips and ears; for not half of it was understood, and the other half
had long since ceased to produce any impression upon the stagnant minds
of the mewed-up sisterhood.
However, there was not lack of comfort, especially for those who held
any of the good offices in the convent. The holy Father Francis was met
at table by the abbess, who was great and gracious to him.
“Will you inform the sisterhood, holy sister, of my stay here, lest it
bring any scandal upon your house, the well-being of which is to me of
importance.”
“I have already done so. I anticipated your wishes on that point, holy
father—in fact, I did it on my own account, too, for we live in evil
times—in very evil times.”
“We do, sister.”
“So that being done, you have but to express your wishes; for of course
they are the wishes deputed of the pope.”
“Certainly—certainly; it could not be otherwise.”
“I knew,” said the abbess; “and now I wait for your wishes; let me know
them, and I will answer for it, that nothing that is desired by his
holiness through you shall meet with any other than the most profound
attention and willing obedience.”
“You are a worthy superior, and if Heaven please to permit me, I will
not fail to let his holiness know of all this devotion and obedience;
and, not less, your regularity and religious observances; he will be
well pleased, I am sure.”
“Thanks, holy father.”
“Nay, ’tis justice. But I would now see your unworthy guest.”
“The probationist? Yes, she can be seen. She has had her food given her
for breakfast, and will be ready to receive you.”
“I am ready, then. In the meantime, what is her name and designation?”
“Her name is Juliet, and of a noble house—that of the famous Di
Napotoloni.”
“Indeed! ’tis very strange.”
“She desired to marry against her friends’ wish, who would not hear of
the iniquity that was desired to be perpetrated.”
“I will see her, then. I may be able to do some good.”
“You cannot fail.”
“I do not know. The race is not always with the swift, nor the battle
with the strong; but I will essay to try.”
“If you will come this way, holy father, you shall be admitted into her
cell. Shall I remain, or shall I return?”
“I will be alone, for I will confess her, and bring her mind to a calm
state. Then, when I have her confidence, I will begin the object in
view, and then we shall find whether there is any probability of that
system being successful.”
“Certainly; but if not?”
“Why, we must adopt more energetic means, and these we must continue
to pursue until there is an end of hope, or life; for when coercion is
once begun we must continue it on without intermission.”
“No doubt—no doubt, holy father.”
“Have you any others who are in a very similar state to this unhappy
being?”
“None, holy father, none; but this is her door. She will be sulky, or
spiteful, as the humour may be; but, at the same time, she will not
spare me, because I have, as you see, thus confined her to this place
as a punishment.”
“You have done right, sister, quite right—there is no blame.”
The abbess opened the door, and at the same moment they both entered
the dungeon in which the unfortunate young female was thrust by the aid
of paternal authority, sanctioned by religious usage, and a presumed
right they had over her actions.
“This, holy father,” said the abbess, “is the unfortunate female whose
case I told you of as being so desperate, that there is no remedy left
but that to which we never resort, save in an extremity, and upon no
other occasion whatever.”
“I see, sister—I see; but I hope one so young has not been entirely won
over to the enemy. I trust she will not strive against those who strive
for her.”
“This holy man,” said the abbess to Juliet; “this holy man has
travelled from St. Peter’s, at Rome, and has come to examine, with
the sanction of his holiness the Pope, the state of our spiritual
existence. See that you give good account of yourself.”
“What the lady abbess has stated to you,” said Father Francis, “is no
more than the truth. I am so come, and for such a purpose. Prepare,
therefore, to confess, and tell me freely what it is that troublest
your soul. Confess, daughter.”
The monk drew a stool towards him, and having sat down, he waved his
hand towards the abbess, who stood by, saying,—
“I will hear her confess; we must be alone.”
There was an instant movement on the part of the abbess, and she
quitted the cell of the lady, placed the key of the door on the inside,
and left them alone.
“Daughter,” said the monk, after awhile, “daughter, what is this I hear
of you?”
The unfortunate young woman fixed her eyes upon her questioner, and
took them not off him during some minutes; and a shudder seemed to pass
through her mind.
“I have spoke to thee,” said the monk.
“You have,” answered Juliet.
“Then answer me.”
“I cannot. I know not what has been said.”
“Could you not guess?”
“I might, holy father; but what can that be to such as you? You must
know that I have been put here according to the abbess’s orders.”
“I do know so much, daughter. What more have you to say?”
“Simply, that I know not what I am thus confined here for.”
“Since you know it not, I will tell you. You have disobeyed the
abbess’s orders—that is what you are now punished for—’tis a heinous
offence.”
“I am not yet one of the order, holy father; and, therefore, the abbess
has no right to do this; and if she did not know that my friends were
her abettors, she dare not do it; ’tis a grievous injury, and a deep
and shameful wrong. Instead of religion being, as it ought to be, the
safeguard of the poor and weak against the rich and powerful, it is a
means of oppression against those who have no power.”
“These are hard accusations, daughter.”
“They will bear the proof, however, and that fairly. Where have I taken
the vows?—where am I the sworn sister?—tell me that, holy father.”
“I have come for another purpose, daughter; you have been undutiful
to those whom nature and God gave control over you; and you have
desired to live disgracefully; surely, these are things that deserve
punishment, for they are great moral crimes.”
“I cannot see any such, holy father.”
“I am afraid your soul is in an unclean state, daughter. There is no
hope for you until this is amended; depend upon it, you can never
prosper while you set at naught the desires of those who rule you.”
“But they have no right to force me to an alternative that my soul
revolts at.”
“You cannot mean you revolt at becoming one of the holy and chaste
sisterhood here?—that must be a libel upon your chastity.”
“Holy father, it is not the age, nor under the circumstances, at which
such a proposal can be made with any chance of success; for I am quite
confident that I am born with better prospects than those which now
threaten me. My father and mother had no right to send me here; they
led me to believe I should inherit a fortune, and now they desire I
should enter a cloister.”
“And you have given them cause to change the original intention they
had concerning you; you are disobedient, that is enough.”
“But, holy father, there is a power stronger than a father’s or a
mother’s—a power of which the church approves. What would you more?”
“What power?”
“The divine command which says, we shall leave a parent and fly to the
arms of him whom we have chosen to become our husband.”
“The devil can quote scripture when he has any object in view. But,
Juliet, you are carried away by the strength of your own passion. This
is a disgraceful marriage, and one you should not contract—one that
would never be sanctioned by them.”
“It might be so—that is, unsanctioned by them; but there is no disgrace
in being married to a young officer who loved me.”
“And whom you mean really to marry?”
“Yes.”
“And you would, in fact, marry any one who would offer himself, instead
of being a nun?”
“I would sooner die—and I will, by slow starvation—sooner than become
one of this or any other order.”
“I see—but who was this young man?”
“Jules di Maestro.”
“How strange—how passing strange!” said the monk, changing his tone
from one of severity to one of sadness and sorrow.
“Why, what ails you, holy father? Has anything happened?”
“I know not, my daughter, whether to feel most sorrow or most anger;
but your case is one that requires some care. Whether to tell you all,
or whether to conceal a part, or—or—in fact, to tell the whole and
trust to your goodness.”
“What do you mean—what do you mean? Your manner distresses me. I cannot
understand you at all—speak, for the love of Heaven!”
“I can hardly do so, unless, by a solemn vow, you promise secrecy.”
“I swear,” said the hasty and impatient Juliet.
“Then listen.”
“I do—I do. For Heaven’s sake, keep me no longer in suspense!”
“Well, then, Jules di Maestro and I concocted a plan together, which we
were to execute with the view of getting you out of this convent, so
that you might both quit the kingdom of Naples, and get into some of
the free states.”
“Oh, dear Jules! and did he really take so much trouble about me—did he
really mean to do so much? I can never be grateful enough to him.”
“Why, you remember his last attempt?”
“I heard of it; but it did not succeed, But it must be two months ago.”
“It was. We both were present.”
“Both! You?”
“Yes; I was present, and wounded in the affray, though not so bad as
poor Maestro.”
“Hurt! but he has got over that, else you would not come here from him
to plan another escape, which I see you have. I am truly sorry for his
hurts; but he is, no doubt, well again.”
“Stay—stay—you are much too sanguine.”
“He has not forgotten me?”
“No; but you must permit me to speak. I am quite sure that had you
heard the whole of the affair, you would not speak in this strain;
for had I known that I had to tell you unwelcome news, I would not
have undertaken this affair, even urged as I have been by him and your
beauty.”
“What mean you?”
“Why, that Jules is dead. He died within a few days after the last
attempt that he made to rescue you from your captivity.”
“What, do I hear aright! Jules dead! Great God, impossible—quite
impossible! Nothing so dreadful can be real.”
“I am sorry to say it is so,” said the monk; “very sorry.”
“But how did it fall out?” asked Juliet, who appeared to be too much
stunned to feel anything acutely; “tell me how.”
“When we made our last attempt to get you out, it failed; for we were
both compelled to defend ourselves, and to fly before a numerous body
of men. I should have got clear of them, but I saw that Jules was made
prisoner, so I charged and rescued him from their hands.”
“It was nobly done of you.”
“Then, you see, I got some marks that I could not help; there were too
many; but poor Jules got mortally wounded.”
“Heaven be merciful to him!”
“I hope so; but he was not killed immediately. I got him quite away
without any one being able to tell who he was, but that was an effort
that cost me much. I took him away, as I said, and I sat by his side
when he breathed his last breath.”
“And what said Jules?” inquired Juliet, as she shed many bitter tears.
“What said he? did he not curse her who had caused him such an end?”
“No, no; Jules did not; he wept when he knew his wounds were mortal,
not because he was to die, but because he must leave you here, and you
would be for ever ignorant of his fate; that is what most affected him,
I assure you.”
“Ah! he was of a noble, generous nature.”
“I, however, promised him that I would see you, and let you know how
the matter had stood with him; and he gave you his last blessing, and
desired me not to tell your family that he was dead, as it would be
a triumph for them; at the same time he wished, if possible, I could
supply his place to you in his stead.”
“No, no,” said Juliet; “no, no; that can never be. I loved Jules, and
can never love any one else, and will never try. No, no; Jules and
Jules only, will I live for!”
“But he is dead.”
“Then for him will I die, too; he died for me, and I will for him.”
“But his last words were to me—‘Go and see Juliet, tell her truly how I
died, and what my last wishes were. Those I have formed with the full
belief that they are for her benefit. I know how she is placed—without
a friend, and in danger.’”
“Yes, yes; now I have no one to help me.”
“You have me, if you choose.”
“Not at the price you spoke of.”
“But you know not how clearly he expressed himself upon the matter;
he knew the life you lead then—what it will be by and by—you know the
starvation which you will have to feel, and, perhaps, be built up in a
wall after all.”
“Oh, God!”
“He said, ‘See, and tell her you have nearly lost your life in
serving me, and in serving her; that I am under an obligation to
you for saving my life more than once. Thus, Juliet is the last word
I pronounced, and the last I thought of—but if I had a legacy to
leave you,’ he said, ‘I would leave her, and die happy if I thought
you would enable her to escape. Marry her, and keep all the world at
defiance—then, indeed, I could be happy—almost as happy as if I lived
to be in your happy position.’
“‘I will,’ I replied; ‘I will endeavour to obtain her escape.’
“‘Will you swear?’
“‘I do swear,’ I replied; ‘and at the same time I will risk my life,
and lose it, if she will accept of me for a husband; but I cannot for
less.’
“‘You have said enough,’ he replied; ‘I am satisfied.’”
“And he died?” said Juliet.
“Yes; he died; but I have been long enough. I will see you again before
another day is past, and then I will learn your determination. Do not
let my cause be rejected because I have not urged it forward as I could
have done; but the truth is, it is an honest one, and it will speak for
itself. Farewell for the present; be secret and silent. They think me
monk, for I have assumed this disguise, at the peril of my life, which
will be taken with cruel tortures if I am discovered.”
There was a pause, when the monk resumed again,—
“If you can consent to become my wife by this time to-morrow, I will
endeavour to free you from bondage.”
“Why purchase the motive to a good action?”
“I do not do so. I only purchase a right which, if risk of life, and
all that man hold dear, be anything, why, you will not think me a Jew
in the bargain. Think, lady, think upon what I have offered you.”
“I do think; but ’tis a hard bargain for me to lose my liberty either
way.”
“Nay, you gain it, for you would be my mistress. But, hark! here comes,
the abbess. I must bid you adieu.”
“How fares the penitent?” inquired the abbess, entering.
“I cannot gain either a satisfactory or an unsatisfactory answer to
your inquiry. I will, however, see her to-morrow again, and if I find
she is obdurate, perhaps the shortest way will be an application to the
inquisition.”
“Think of that, daughter,” said the abbess, leaving the cell.
“Think of that,” added the monk, “as your means of leaving the cell—of
escaping. Farewell, daughter. Benedicite.”
CHAPTER CLXIII.
THE NUN’S ATTEMPTED ESCAPE FROM THE CONVENT OF ST. MARY MAGDALEN.—THE
PURSUIT AND THE DISCLOSURE.—THE ESCAPE OF THE PRETENDED MONK.
The next day all Naples was alive to the fact that a holy man had been
murdered in the wood Del Notti—a holy brother of the order of St.
Francis, who was much respected by the good people of Naples.
Jose and Fiametta both attended before the municipal authorities to
give the required information they had given the monk gold to remain by
the side of the dead man whom Jose had killed.
There was a general terror throughout Naples, for no one was aware of
how the matter had fallen out, nor how the enormity would be punished,
and who would be the sufferers in the present case.
The officers of the state were in active search after the perpetrator
of so wicked a deed—as well as the officers of the inquisition.
• • • • •
The next time Father Francis called at the convent, he went straight to
the lady abbess, and said to her with some earnestness,—
“I am sorry to tell you, the more I reflect upon the conversation I had
with your neophyte Juliet, I have some strong doubts about the course I
originally thought of pursuing towards the young person.”
“In what respect, holy father?”
“I thought of pursuing a mild course towards her.”
“I have done it, and failed.”
“The reason I think is not that she is hardened, but that she simply
does not believe we will proceed to the extremity that we have
threatened.”
“I think she is hardened, holy father.”
“Time alone will show; but I have altered my plans respecting her.”
“In what respect, holy father?”
“I think I will begin to strike terror into her soul, and at once shew
her the reality of my intentions, with respect to what I shall subject
her by way of punishment for her resistance to her religious superiors.”
“Very good, holy brother; I think it the plan that will most likely
succeed the best; if she be terrified, she will be obedient.”
“And to that end,” said the monk, “I have ordered the alguazils of the
inquisition to be here in half an hour’s time, when she will be carried
there, and subjected to the first process of torture.”
“You will not hurt her?”
“Not much.”
“Just enough to teach what powers you can exert.”
“Yes, just so. Now, when they come, let me know, and, if she consents
to go, all well and good; and, if she do not, we must use force.”
“And how long will you keep her at the inquisition?” inquired the
abbess; “because, eventually, the parents will claim her of me.”
“About three weeks, at the farthest; but, if the parents are
troublesome, name the inquisition, and say holy brother Francis, from
Rome, will come and confess them, and make some inquiries concerning
their belief and faith in the church.”
“I will, holy father.”
The monk now returned to the cell where the unfortunate Juliet was
confined, and, on opening the door, he found her in tears.
“Juliet,” he said, “I come again.”
“You are here;” she replied, “I see.”
“And I am here with all the means of escape; you have but to say the
word, and you are free and at liberty.”
“I cannot—I cannot.”
“You cannot. Do you love life—do you love liberty?”
“I do.”
“And yet you choose the cold, bare walls of a cloister, to a life of
happiness and love; to a life that is made for such as you.”
“I cannot love you.”
“I love you; that I have risked my life for you more than once, is
true; my persecution is another proof of that.”
“It may be so.”
“Then why not consent? you have no alternative that can interest you
more, or that will offer you more happiness.”
“I cannot so soon forget Jules.”
“Nay, we will not quarrel about that; I cannot expect you. I am not
unreasonable, because I know so well the circumstances of the case. All
is haste and confusion; there is no time for thought or preparation—all
lies in self-preservation; say at once you will have me; I will
endeavour to gain your love and esteem afterwards; our happiest days,
our courting-time will come after our wedding.”
“It cannot come.”
“But will you choose the horrors of the inquisition rather than wed one
who would give life and fortune to you?”
“Who speaks of the inquisition?” inquired Juliet, terrified.
“The abbess spoke to me about it when I came here last time, and said
she had your father’s commands to deliver you over to them.”
“I’ll not believe it.”
“I entreated her not to do so, but to leave it in my hands, and I would
undertake to communicate with the inquisition, and bring their officers
here to-day.”
“And have you?”
“I have brought those who will counterfeit them, and carry you off.
The plan is matured. Will you leave this place, wed me, and be a happy
woman, or remain here to be tortured and disfigured by the tortures of
the inquisition—perhaps to die in their hands?”
“Horrible!” said Juliet, with a shudder.
“Think on this and on that.”
At that moment a tremendous uproar occurred in the convent, and a
ringing of bells. The pretended monk started, and listened attentively.
“They come,” he muttered—“they come!”
“Have they discovered you?” inquired Juliet.
“I know not—I care not if they have. Will you quit the convent, and
leave Naples with me? Will you become my wife? You see what I have
risked for you. I wait but your answer; they are coming.”
Before any answer could be given, the door was thrown open, and the
abbess, followed by a troop of soldiers, entered the cell, and, among
them, the vampire monk saw his late adversary, Jose, and his love,
Fiametta.
“There is the murderer,” said Jose, pointing to the monk, whose cowl
had fallen off; “and he is the man whom I believed I had killed.”
[Illustration: Jose and Fiametta point to the vampyre.]
“Oh, yes, it is the same horrid face!” said Fiametta.
“The murderer of Father Francis?” said the abbess.
“I know not how it was done; but I told Father Francis to watch and
pray by the dead body, and see it decently buried, and he said he would
do so. I gave him gold, and left him at his watch and his devotions.”
“And he is dead now—his cassock and papers torn from him.”
“Seize him, comrades!” said the officer.
At the sound of the officer’s voice, Juliet looked up, and beheld her
lover, Jules di Maestro, whom she was told had been killed. She sprang
up, saying,—
“It is all false, then. You are not slain—you are still living—and you
did not send this man to marry me?”
“I—who—Oh! Juliet, have I found you?”
“I am here, dear Jules. Take me hence—take me hence!”
“I will not do so now; but I have their majesties’ favour, and will
take care you shall be released from this vile durance.”
“And that man——”
“Ay, look to your prisoner,” said the officer.
But there was no prisoner to look to. He had slipped off his cowl and
cassock, and left the convent, leaving all present immersed in their
own affairs. The abbess was indignant at the imposture, and would not
risk Jules’s appeal, on behalf of Juliet, to the king, and at once
consented to her release and immediate marriage; and at the same time
Fiametta consented to wed Jose, so that all was forgotten, save the
murder of the holy Father Francis, and the resurrection of the vampire
monk, who was, in reality, no other than Sir Francis Varney, who was no
more heard of in Naples, but supposed to roam about the world at large.
CHAPTER CLXIV.
THE STORM.—A SHIPWRECK AT SEA.—THE HAPLESS FATE OF THE MARINERS.
The morning was ushered in with wind and rain; a tempest was howling
over the main; the seas lashed the shores with a fury that made it
dangerous for even such vessels as were moored; and great fears were
entertained that many wrecks would be seen before the night set in. The
roar of the ocean and the bellowing of the wind was almost deafening;
and the few fishermen and sailors that now and then showed themselves,
as they came towards the shore to ascertain the safety of their little
barques, could scarcely make themselves heard.
The sky was too heavy, and the rain too incessant, to permit them to
see very clearly or very far; they could not see any ships in the
offing.
“Neighbour,” said one, “did you hear the wind in the night?”
“Hear it!” replied the man spoken to; “could I help it? Who is there
that could sleep, while such a tempest was blowing great guns. I never
heard anything like it in all my life. God help those poor fellows who
are at sea such a night as this.”
“So say I, neighbour, so say I; if there be any upon this coast—if any
awake with the morning dawn and find themselves upon a lee shore, they
will never get off again, depend upon it; they are all lost men.”
“So they are; there’s no hope for them on this shore; every vessel
must, indeed, come upon it, and no aid could be rendered to them.”
“You are right, neighbour. I am glad our boats are high and dry;
for, if they were not, they would never be on the sea again, except
as fragments; every timber in them would be broken to pieces, and
scattered about the beach.”
“Ay, ay, ’tis an awful day. I propose, neighbour, we should make an
attempt to get our boats still higher on the beach; see, the sea comes
now within a few boat-lengths of them; a few more waves heaving one
upon the other will at last reach them, and, if so, we are, indeed,
poor men, neighbour.”
“With all my heart; we have no time to lose, neighbour—see, the waves
have got nearer yet—come on, come on.”
The two fishermen hurried down to the beach; and, with the aid of
one or two more, who had hurried onwards with the same object as
themselves, that of putting the boats out of danger from the waves,
they succeeded; and then they returned, leaving their boats, their only
wealth, high above the reach of the most tempestuous sea.
“There, neighbour, I never heard such a sea. I will go and see what can
be done in-doors by the fire-side; this is not a day to be out in; you
are wet through in about ten minutes, and nothing to do but to look on
the black clouds.”
“No, neighbour; though I don’t think in-doors much better, for I expect
our roof to come off, or the chimney to fall over; and must consider
myself very fortunate if I do not have the whole house blown down.”
“Ay, ay; but I expect to hear of a few accidents. I don’t see any
vessel coming in the horizon at all—do you see any?”
“None.”
“Well, I hope there may be none. I’m for the house; too much of this
may be hurtful to a fisherman; so, good day.”
“Good day, for the present. I dare say we shall see each other before
the day’s out, if anything may happen in the shape of wreck.”
“Safe and sure to be out.”
“If you hear a gun, let me know, if I should not be out; for the wind
blows and the sea roars so loudly that I can scarcely hear at all.”
“I’ll be with you; and do you the same for me, if I should happen to
miss it; though I can’t tell how that can be, as the wind blows dead in
shore.”
“It’s a bargain—I’ll do it.”
The two fishermen parted from each other, and entered their own
dwellings to escape the fury of the elements; for there was nothing
to keep them outside, but there was everything to induce them to stay
in-doors—a warm fire and freedom from the wind and rain, though that
howled and roared in the chimneys in a frightful manner.
• • • • •
If the aspect of the affairs was bad on the land, it was much worse
at sea; for there a vessel rode out the fury of the storm gallantly
enough, and resisted the force of the winds and waves for some time;
but she could not resist the impetuosity of the elements, though she
strove hard and resisted long.
She strained, and timber after timber started, masts were gone, and the
rudder became damaged, and at length no hope was left.
The crew was not a large one, and the pumps had become completely
choked and useless; while the vessel was drifted hither and thither
without any means of guidance whatever; she was at the mercy of wind
and waves.
“We are drifting towards the shore,” said the mate to the master; “we
cannot keep her head out to sea at all.”
“I know it,” answered the master, gloomily—“I know it; she has been
making land for some time now, and as we have neither rudder, nor
sails, nor masts, we may as well make our peace, for the worst must
soon come.”
“I expected that some time ago, when I found that the wind was set dead
on shore, and the rudder was gone.”
“Surely, we haven’t much time to lose; let the guns be fired, as a
signal of distress; it may give warning to those on shore.”
“We cannot expect assistance.”
“Not here, I know.”
“Certainly not; no boat would live for a moment in a sea like this.”
“No, I know it would not; but it may put them upon the look out, and
some of our poor fellows may get picked up; for we don’t exactly know
how far we may be driven towards the land, and we may be sent right on
to the beach, for aught we can tell.”
“So we might.”
“I hope we may.”
“Are the guns ready?”
“Yes, sir, they are loaded; but there is only one barrel of powder dry.”
“Let it be cared for; fire the guns.”
The order was promptly obeyed, for the men had left off pumping,
conceiving it useless to continue it any longer; indeed, they could
not, for the pumps were no longer serviceable, and they saw the land
ahead, and each man made up his mind that the struggle for life was
about to commence; while the firing of the guns was a measure of
precaution which might, or might not, be of use; and as every one clung
to hope to the last, the order was obeyed with alacrity.
The guns were fired in minute intervals, and at length every half
minute while the powder lasted, and then they ceased.
There was not more than from fifteen to twenty souls on board; but
there were several passengers among them; one in particular was
remarkable for his height, and the singular pallid hue of his features.
He was reserved, but of gentlemanly deportment; he was well aware of
his danger, but it did not appear to render him incapable of seeing and
understanding what was going on; but he was grave and melancholy.
“How long, captain, do you think it will be,” he said, approaching the
master, “before the vessel will break up; for I see that we shall be
wrecked, that is no secret at all to any of us, and certainly not to
me.”
“I don’t know,” replied the captain; “it is impossible to say.”
“Cannot you form an opinion upon the subject?” inquired the stranger.
“I can; but it is only an opinion. I can give you no information,”
replied the captain, who did not wish to give an opinion upon such a
subject.
“Certainly, I am aware of that. I asked for an opinion; if you have
one, perhaps you may be good enough to favour me with it, if it be
not too great a favour to expect from you, sir. I thought you had
experience enough to enable you to form an opinion, and it was for that
reason I asked you.”
“Well, sir, we strike in five minutes, perhaps in twenty; it depends
upon wind and waves, our course, and how far we may go ashore.”
“I understand you; if we are forced in upon the shore in a direct line,
we may expect the shortest time.”
“We may.”
“And if we should not meet with any obstruction, we may be thrown far
on shore.”
“Yes; if we had but the means of guiding the vessel, I could steer her
within fifty or a hundred yards of the shore, where she would strike,
and a better chance would then be had of some reaching the shore.”
“Which is now rather more than uncertain.”
“It is so,” said the master.
At the moment there was such a shock from the vessel striking upon a
sunken rock, that they were all thrown down on the deck, and the sea
made a clear breach over her, and swept away several of the crew.
The master contrived for a moment or two to secure himself to a spar,
with the hope that he would be able to float off, but this was a vain
hope, for a moment after he was lifted up by a sea, and dashed against
the stump of the mast, and crushed in a horrible manner, his blood
dying the deck for a minute, and then it was washed away, as he himself
was by the same wave, and was not seen again.
The master no doubt had been killed, and there was nearly all of the
crew swept away; but among those who yet survived, was to be seen the
tall stranger, who stood in the storm, and held on by a portion of the
vessel; he still braved the fury of the waves as they broke over the
deck, clearing all before them.
Each breach of the sea made away with some one of the unhappy mariners
who yet clung with hopeless desperation; but yet they feared to quit
their last hold, and to throw themselves into the foam that was boiling
around them.
In the meantime the vessel heeled about, and every now and then,
being in shallow water, a great wave would come and lift her up, and
then leave her higher on the rocks, but giving her each time dreadful
shocks, and breaking her keel up.
The only hope the unfortunate men had, was that some portion of the
wreck upon which they might chance to be, would be floated to the shore
before life was extinct; but this was more and more hopeless, for the
breakers over which they would have to float would probably be their
destruction, for they would be dashed to pieces.
The wind and the waves howled and roared, and drowned all noise—nothing
could be heard, and nothing seen, for the waves broke over them so
furiously, and raged so high above them, that they neither could do
so, nor even see the shore. Nothing but a white sea of foam and spray
met their eyes, whenever they cold raise them, and free them from salt
water.
[Illustration: The ship goes to pieces under the men.]
At length an immense wave came rolling towards them; the men shrieked
as the flood came onwards. In a moment afterwards they were lifted
up, vessel and all, and carried a few yards further onwards and then
left, with a report that seemed like that of a cannon to them; but they
felt the shock, and when the wave left them, the vessel was no more;
a mere mass of boards and other matters floated about; she had been
utterly and entirely destroyed; no vestige of her was left, and nothing
but a confused mass of planks was to be seen, with here and there a
human being clinging to them for life. But, alas! their efforts were
vain—they sank—they could not sustain the battle with the waves and the
breakers; they were dashed to mummies, and every limb broken on the
foaming, raging breakers.
CHAPTER CLXV.
THE FISHERMEN.—THE DESPAIRING CRY OF THE MARINERS.—THE BREAKERS FROM
THE SHORE.
On shore the day wore away; the wind blew furiously, and the ocean
roared to such an extent, that no other sound was audible; and the
fishermen who lived upon the coast kept within doors, knowing that
nothing could be done out of doors on such a day; and each one seated
by the fire, began to recount some wonderful tale of death and
shipwreck, or of happy escapes from the boiling sea, until noon had
long since passed, and the turn of the day showed a decided approach
towards evening; but no abatement of the tempest.
The principal fisherman on the coast, a man whose poverty was less,
rather than his wealth was greater than his fellows, sat by his
fireside, with one or two others of his class seated with him.
“I never saw a worse storm,” said one of them.
“I have,” said Massallo, the fisherman.
“You have?” said one of his comrades, in his turn.
“I have, I can promise you—one that blew me upon this coast, where I
have ever since remained, and intend to remain.”
“I have heard you say so; but I never heard the particulars of that
story; it must have been many years ago, I fancy.”
“Yes, it must have been fifteen years ago,” said Massallo, speaking;
“fifteen years ago at the very least, if not more than that.”
“Well, I think it must be quite that time; for my old man has been dead
these fourteen years, and he remembered you very well, and used to
speak of you; and, as I thought, you must have known him more than a
year.”
“Aye, two.”
“Well, it must, then, have been more than sixteen years ago since you
came here.”
“I dare say it was; very nearly seventeen years ago, now I come to
think of it. The storm, if possible, blew harder, and the waves beat
higher than they do now; the rain was heavier than it rains now; and,
in addition to all, the thunder and lightning were tremendous, not a
sound could be distinguished. The speaking-trumpet was useless—no sound
issued from it—all was confusion and danger.”
“It must have been a rare time, certainly.”
“It was a time for devils to be abroad, and not for men; but we were
compelled to pump, and cut away the wreck. Why, you see, we had been
chased by the Algerines, and we had got nearer to the land than we
would have gone, but for the fact that we desired to escape from a
superior and formidable enemy, who knew no mercy.
“Yes, the Algerines, if they had spared us, would have made slaves of
us for our lives, and there would have been little wisdom in being
caught by them, if we could help it.”
“I should imagine no one would ever do it.”
“Well, that was the cause of our being in shore nearer than we ought;
but we noticed that the Algerine sheered off at a moment when there
was but little chance of our escaping him; but we could not tell the
reason; but we concluded that he saw some danger, of which we were at
that moment ignorant.
“Well, we had not time to haul out a little before we were surprised by
a tremendous clap of thunder and lightning, as vivid as if it had been
brought from all quarters of the world, and loosened at one and the
same moment.”
“It must have added to your terrors.”
“It was the main thing that wrecked us on this coast.”
“What, the lightning! why, I suppose it struck you, then?”
“Yes; we could have held off, or run the vessel bump ashore—almost
dry—but we lost all command over her, when the lighting shivered our
mast to atoms and left the stump burning in the vessel; then, more than
that, it killed two of our best hands at that moment, and most of us
were knocked up and unable to work at the pumps; but it was of no use;
we came ashore, crash went the vessel, and we were all in the boiling
sea in an instant, and a wave or two more threw me on the beach,
without any fatal injury, and I scrambled up out of their reach.”
“And then you remained by us.”
“Yes; I did not find means to return whence I came for some years.”
“Perhaps you had reason.”
“I had; I was a rival for a girl; I was then endeavouring to win money;
I had entrusted some money in the vessel—all I had; and with her I
lost all, and with that all I lost even hope, and never returned to my
native home.”
“Did the girl love you?”
“She liked me well enough to have me, if her relations would consent,
but they would not, unless they saw I had more money than I could
obtain; and, in default of that, they would marry her to another, who
had more money than I; and I only obtained time to get money by the
girl’s intercession; but I was balked.”
“Well, that was bad; but I suppose you were well assured that you would
be rejected if you had not money.”
“I was, by her family.”
“And herself——”
“That was not so sure; and yet they had great influence upon her; but I
could not have the courage to go back and ask her to wed poverty; a man
without even the means of purchasing a wedding garment.”
“You did right, neighbour.”
“I did, and I knew it,” replied the fisherman, bitterly.
“But you have prospered since; and you have been happy, if I mistake
not.”
“Yes, I have been prosperous, and tolerably happy; it is wonderful how
men adapt themselves to the circumstances around them.”
“They do; if they did not, how insupportable would life be.”
“You are right; I should have been miserable for ever; I should never
have recovered my feelings, and should never have been what I am now.”
“The storm seems as furious as ever, neighbour,” observed one of the
fishermen, after a long pause, for they were meditating upon what they
had heard, “and I think we shall have but a very rough night of it.”
“Good; we shall have a night of it.”
“I think,” said another, “I must be getting near my own fireside
by this time; they will expect me home, or think some accident has
happened.”
“And I will step out to see how the weather looks before it grows dark;
there appears no change.”
“Hark! what is that?”
There was a moment’s pause, and in about a minute, in one of the lulls
of the wind, they thought they heard a gun; but the storm increased so
as to leave them in great doubt of what it was.
“It was a gun, I think,” said the fisherman. “Such sounds as those I
have heard before; but ’tis hard to tell them from the sounds of the
elements.”
“We can tell when we get outside, I dare say; but the wind sweeps all
sounds past so rapidly that it is scarcely possible to tell even there;
but there is yet light to see, and as the sun sets in the horizon, we
have a chance of seeing a sail if there be one.”
“We have, but not of helping her.”
“True; there is no help for those on board.”
“May Heaven have mercy upon the poor mariners,” said the fisherman’s
wife. “It is hard times with them now. Life is dear to all, and they
will cling to it. Do what you can for the poor beings.”
“There’s no doing anything,” said the fisherman, gloomily. “Neither
boat nor ship can ride through such a sea, on the ocean or at anchor.”
“But they may be cast ashore, and they may not be quite dead, you know;
instant aid might avail much, when even they had ceased to feel.”
“We will not fail in that particular. We are going down to the beach
now, and shall not neglect any means that are in our power, at all
events; more we cannot do, but that much shall be done, and I hope it
may be of some service.”
“Hark! the same sound again,” said his companion.
“I did not hear it.”
“Nor I.”
“Come on; we shall now know better in the open air,” said the
fisherman, as he wrapped himself up in a large rough coat, and pulled
his hat over his eyes. “The rain is as heavy as ever, and I think it
will soon fill the sea to overflowing.”
The fishermen left the hut and proceeded towards the beach; at least,
they did not go down, for the waves ran so high that they beat a long
way inland—more so than they had ever done before.
“What do you think of our storm?”
“It is a complete tempest—furious; and the wind blows the waves towards
the shore, and that is the cause why we have the sea so high; and
should the wind continue in that quarter for a day or two, even our
cottages will be in some danger.”
“I dare say they would; but it would be without example if the winds
were to continue in that quarter for so long a time, blowing a complete
hurricane without any intermission. I should almost think the world
about to end.”
“Do you see any vessel out in the horizon?” inquired one of the
fishermen.
“Not I.”
“But I can hear the gun.”
There came booming across the waters the sound of a piece of artillery.
There was no mistaking it—it was plain and evident to all that there
was a vessel in distress somewhere, but they could not exactly tell
where.
Again the sound reached them on the wind, accompanied by the roar of
the elements; but it was enough to distinguish it by from the rest of
those awful sounds, which spoke plainly to them of the dreadful fate of
the unfortunate men who were on board the vessel in distress.
“Can you make them out?” inquired one of the fishermen of his
companion. “I cannot see her, though I hear the guns, and can almost
imagine her whereabouts.”
“No, I can’t see her,” replied the man spoken to.
“I can though,” replied the first fisherman; “she lies close in shore,
not a mile out, nor yet that. I think she’s dismasted.”
“I see her now, myself. I looked about in the horizon, above her there.
She labours much, and the sea breaks over her.”
“She has lost her rudder, I have no doubt, and is drifting right in
shore. What will become of them, I cannot well think.”
“It is too easy to think.”
“Do you imagine that one man among the whole crew can be saved?”
“Hardly, on such a shore as this, with rocks on all sides; every man
that is swept overboard will be dashed to pieces, and disabled, even if
lashed to spars.”
“You are right; for if one man survives this wreck, it will be a
miracle, and I can hardly believe it to be possible.”
They now watched the course of the vessel. The guns had ceased to
fire, and daylight was fast departing; and though she came nearer, yet
she became less distinct; but still they could see her, and note her
progress well through the surf that rose up around her as it dashed
against the labouring vessel’s side.
“She strikes,” cried one of the men; “that shivering action is her
first shock.”
“Yes,” said a companion. “Poor wretches, they have but a short time
now. She will go to pieces on those rocks as sure as they are there.”
“May she not hold together?”
“No; see, she heaves up again! No; as there are but bare rocks under
her, and she will not settle into any place, but continue beating and
bumping upon them until she will break and split to shivers, not a
timber can hold.”
“Too true—too true,” said his companion.
The fishermen now bent their eyes upon the ocean, where this exciting
scene was going on, but they spoke not. It was growing yet darker, and
yet they gazed steadfastly, heedless of the beating and overwhelming
rain; but they could hardly see the vessel, until at length a loud
shriek came to them, borne to them upon the hoarse winds, and heard
distinctly above the roaring of the ocean.
The fisherman knit his brows, and compressed his lips, as he heard the
sounds, and then, clasping his hands, he said,—
“Heaven have mercy on them! for I fear the sea will have none. It’s all
over, and they are dead and dying. Follow me!”
CHAPTER CLXVI.
THE ONE BODY WASHED ASHORE.—THE FIRST REQUEST.—THE SHIPWRECKED
STRANGER.
The fishermen followed down towards the beach, for they had been
standing upon some cliffs which commanded the sea below, which now was
one dark boiling mass, in which nothing at all was distinguishable;
and, therefore, they could not tell what went on below.
They soon arrived at the little bay, in which their fishing-boats used
to ride; but they had been drawn up beyond the reach of the sea, though
the sea now ran quite up into the land, and they stood watching the
waves as they rolled upwards.
“Had we not drawn our boats higher,” said one “they would have been
wrecks by this time, and we should have been beggars.”
“Ay; so we should, neighbour.”
“Don’t you see the waves beating over the very spot were they lay?”
“I do; and they ain’t far from them even now, and I am in some fear
lest they reach them; but they have been moored as well.”
“They are doubly secured.”
“Do you see anything upon the water yet?” inquired the first fisherman.
“Nothing.”
“Nor I, and I have strained my eyes to their utmost. They are most
likely all dashed to pieces, and they are not likely to live through
such a sea.”
“No, no; they must be overwhelmed with water. God help them, poor
fellows! and if they are not to be saved, may they soon have an end to
their tortures, for the strife after life must be dreadful.”
“It is dreadful,” said the other; “but you must know that the
sufferings are endured under excitement, and therefore not so much felt
as when they have been saved. To have passed the barrier of life, and
to become insensible to all, and then to be recalled to life, is an
agony not to be described. I have seen men who have been restored to
life, and who have solemnly declared that the pangs of death they could
encounter, and not those of a return to life.”
The fisherman made no reply, but stood listening to the howlings of the
storm, and watching the waves; but this was productive of nothing—they
watched for more than two hours, and yet nothing came ashore.
“I don’t see we can do any good here,” said one.
“Nor I. Those who were alive, must now have been dead some time.”
“Yes; the sea don’t wash them this way.”
“Most likely,” added another, “they are washed among the breakers, and
dashed against the cliffs, and therefore cannot reach this place, where
they can reach the land.”
“It usually happens so.”
“It does; but we may as well return. There is a wreck, no doubt.”
“That is quite settled.”
“Quite, as you say; but there are no signs of it.”
“Save such as you saw.”
“Yes; we have evidence enough of the fact. We saw her go to pieces,
and we have heard the death-shriek of the mariners, and more we cannot
have seen. When we come down here in the morning, we may indeed see the
bodies, and the broken and severed planks of the unfortunate vessel,
strewn over the sands.”
“I shall return again after I have had an hour or two’s turn in,” said
the fisherman.
“Give me a call,” said his companion, “and I will go with you.”
“And I.”
“Agreed. Then about midnight we will again visit the beach, and see if
any of the men are ashore.”
• • • • •
There was no one now by the shore, and nought save the sounds of the
turmoil of the elements could be heard. What other sounds can be any
possibility be distinguishable at such a time? There was nothing
that could be done there that would sound. The loud roar of the
breakers was tremendous; the dash of the waves against the cliffs,
and the steady bellowing of the wind, which sounded not much unlike a
steady and continued report of great guns fired at a distance, were
as but one sound and that sound of a strange, awful, and furious
character—perfectly dreadful.
There was one body, however thrown up by the waves, as if they would
yield that one alone, and no other, or as if that one was the only one
they refused to swallow; it floated about for some time, and was thrown
hither and thither, now thrown on shore by one wave, and withdrawn by
another.
At last a high wave came rolling onwards, and falling upon the shore,
it lifted the body up, and carried it further upon the beach and there
left it, and no subsequent wave came so far as that, and it was left
unmolested.
That body was the carcass of the stranger, who of all the rest had been
swept towards the little bay, and deposited there alone.
• • • • •
The fisherman left his hut to call his companions, and having done so,
they came towards the beach, while they conversed together.
“Well,” said one, “I did not expect to see the storm abate so soon.”
“I did not,” replied his companion, “though, I dare say, it was much
too violent to last much longer; and yet I can scarcely credit my
senses that it is really gone, and that the deluging rain has ceased
altogether.”
“Yes; and there comes the moon peeping behind that mass of clouds.”
“The wind blows stiffly yet; but it has greatly moderated, and I think
it will continue to do so.”
“I hope it may; but the sea does not abate a bit, and will not for many
hours, even if the wind was to go down.”
“Oh, dear, no; the waves will keep on in this fashion for some hours;
and I dare say it will be useless to get our boats out; we shall not
have any more fish for some days to come.”
“Most likely not; but I would not venture to go out while the sea is
heaving, after such a storm as this; there would be but little use in
doing so, I am quite persuaded; but what is that yonder?”
“Where—I see nothing?”
“There, lying a few yards from the reach of the waves; to me it looks
like a human body. It is quite quiet and still—no motion—it is, I fear,
dead; there is no motion, and the attitude is that of one who has not
moved after he was thrown there—I think not, however; but let us see
what it is.”
The fishermen now went down unto the beach, where the body lay, for
such it really was; and, when they reached it, at once saw it was a
human body, and they all paused before it.
[Illustration: The fishermen discover the body on the beach.]
“Bring it higher up on the beach; the waves may come upon you
presently—they are high enough. Bring him up higher on the beach, and
you will then see what state he is in; for if his limbs are broken, and
his body otherwise injured to any extent, you may spare much useless
labour.”
The fishermen drew the body up higher; they then carried him to a dry
and sheltered spot, and examined him, but found no particular injuries
to speak of, but that he was apparently drowned.
“What course to pursue,” said one, “I don’t know; no doubt but he is
quite dead; he must have been in the water several hours, besides being
knocked about on the breakers, which is enough to destroy life itself.”
“I should imagine so; and yet, we had better take it up to the cottage,
and place it under cover; indeed, we cannot tell how long it has been
thus; therefore, I say we had better make some attempt to recover him;
he may yet come round, though there may be but little hope in it.”
“We will try; stand out of the moonlight—we shall be able to see
presently better what he is, than we can now.”
The moon was now freed from the mass of deep heavy clouds that hung
over it, like a curtain before that luminary, and which now shed a
brilliant light upon the earth. The fishermen stood round gazing upon
the body of the stranger.
“Ha! it moves,” said one.
The body did move, and no sooner did the moonlight fall full and fair
upon its form, than it slowly raised itself upon its elbow, and gazed
around. A deep inspiration took place, almost a groan, and some sea
water was vomited.
“He lives—he lives!” exclaimed the fisherman.
“Take him to the hut,” said another.
They all stooped down to aid him, and began to lift him up.
“He lives—he lives!”
“Away with him to the hut,” said several of the fishermen. “Before a
warm fire, and with some warm drinks, he will get better.”
“A little more light—a little more light, if you please,” said the
stranger, in a bland but broken voice, as he attempted to move his hand.
“He speaks!” exclaimed the fishermen in a breath, and at the same time
they removed a pace or two, and looked at each other with amazement,
and then again at the stranger, who gradually rose up, and sat upright
in the light of the moon.
“Are you any better?” inquired one of the men who had looked on in
silent amazement, not unmixed with awe, as they gazed.
“Yes; much better. What a vile thing is sea water,” said the stranger,
turning such a ghastly face upon the men that they shrunk in horror,
and yet they were not men used to fear or any like passion.
However, they soon approached him, muttering to each other,—
“What manner of man is this?”
They did not long consider what was to be done, for one of their number
replied,—
“Poor fellow! he is not used to the rough usage of the waves, and
therefore does not improve upon their acquaintance. But let us lend
him a hand.”
“With all my heart,” replied his comrades.
“Will you come with me to my cottage?” said the fisherman. “You will
benefit more by a good fire than by the cold moonlight, I’ll warrant. I
never throve upon night air and wet clothes, and I cannot believe you
will.”
“We all know our constitutions best,” said the stranger; “but if you
will grant me the accommodation you speak of, it will be welcome.”
“Come, lean upon me; never mind your clothes being wet.”
The stranger rose, and, to the amazement of all, he appeared to walk
as well as any of those present; and the only difference was, he was
ghastly pale, and he was dripping with sea water, which left a track
after him.
“Had you been long on the beach?” inquired one.
“I don’t know,” replied the stranger. “I was insensible.”
“Can you form any idea how long you have been in the water?”
“I really cannot tell even that; for I was insensible immediately after
the ship went to pieces, which she did about the close of the day; and
I only remember receiving a hard blow by being struck against a rock,
or a piece of timber, I cannot say which.”
“You must have been insensible for some hours.”
“I dare say I was.”
“I never heard of such a miraculous preservation.”
“Nor I.”
“To come to life, too, without any aid to recover you, that is what
entirely bothers me.”
“Well, they do say, those that are born to be hanged will never
be drowned,” added one of the fishermen, in an under tone, to his
companion.
They soon arrived at the hut of the fisherman, in which there was a
good fire, and the wife and daughter were ready to do all that could be
done for the unfortunate stranger.
“You have saved a mariner, then?” said the wife.
“We have picked up one from the wreck, wife; but we cannot call him a
mariner. This gentleman was, no doubt, a passenger.”
“Welcome, sir! I did not expect to see any one alive from the wreck,
much less in condition to walk an speak.”
The stranger paid them some compliments; but contented himself with
sitting by the fire, and being entirely passive in their hands, and
eventually retired to rest well wrapped up and warm.
CHAPTER CLXVII.
THE FISHERMAN’S COTTAGE.—THE FIRESIDE, AND THE TRAVELLER’S BED.
The fisherman’s hut was large and roomy. There was no choice furniture,
though there was enough of the homely conveniences that were to be
found in such habitations—much more so than is usual. There was a large
fire-place, upon which some faggots had been newly laid, and which now
blazed away most cheerfully.
“Our home is humble, sir,” said the fisherman; “but such as it is, you
are welcome to it, and may it serve you instead of a better.”
“I am much beholden to you,” replied the stranger; “much beholden to
you, and cannot thank you enough. This change is most valuable. I do
not know in what state I should have been, had you not come forward and
offered the shelter of your house to me. I am very cold, indeed, and
the warmth of your fire is grateful to me.”
“I am glad of it, sir. You are the only one, I fear, as far as I know,
that is saved. Was there many on board?”
“About twenty, I think.”
“Poor fellows! they have met with a watery grave.”
“Yes, they have, I fear. They have had a fearful struggle, for many
were lashed to spars, hoping they might be washed, or floated,
ashore. I hope I am not disturbing, though I fear I am, your wife and
daughter—that is your daughter, I presume, if I may judge from her
likeness to yourself.”
“Yes, sir, that is my daughter; she’s a good girl, sir, though I say
so, that am her father; and if a secret must be told, in another month
she will exchange a father’s for a husband’s control and care, which
will I hope, be a happy change.”
“They have long loved each other,” said the mother, “and, to my mind,
it is cruel to keep them apart. Times will never be better, and I don’t
see but they may begin the world as well as others, with little more
than a will to work.”
“You are right,” said the stranger; “you are right; it was never
intended that mankind should wait till circumstances were propitious,
or it would have made the desire dependent upon circumstances, too.”
“You have hit the right nail, sir—you have spoken the truth; but still
we must recommend caution.”
“Very right. I wish them joy and prosperity,” said the stranger.
There was now a bustle in the cottage. Some of those who had
accompanied the stranger into the hut, now departed, while the
remainder left a few moments after, in company, leaving the fisherman
and his family with their guest.
“Well,” said one, “of all the odd looking fish that ever I saw come out
of the sea, I think he beats all; not but what I make every allowance,
but I cannot make any in such a case, because he has not been drowned.”
“He was quite insensible, and had been so for a long time. Don’t you
remember what he said about his becoming insensible immediately after
the ship struck.”
“Yes; I heard it all, but hang me if I can understand it. He is as if
he had been bled to death, and then came to life.”
“He ain’t got much of a colour.”
“No; but more than that, the dreadful deathly, or ashy paleness is
fearful; and then his peculiar features, his long hair, flattened to
his head by the water, and the teeth in his head, which appear as if
they had been set with the express intention of enabling him to catch
otters.”
“That would be no easy task, either; but I must say, as you say, that
there have been better looking men than he, at all events.”
• • • • •
In the fisherman’s hut the stranger was willingly attended to by the
fisherman and his family, without any invidious attention; and when he
had changed his habiliments, he seated himself again by the fire, when
some warm drinks and other refreshment were given him.
“I did not think to find any one alive when I went down to the beach,”
said the fisherman. “I thought all were lost.”
“And I doubt not but they are all lost, save myself,” said the
stranger, blandly; “and though I do not appear much hurt by the
occurrence, yet I feel as if the whole mass of my blood was changed,
and that I should never again be what I was; that, in fact, I shall
always carry about me the appearance, and certainly the feeling, of a
man torn from the arms of death, and made to live.”
“It does affect some people strangely,” said the fisherman. “I know
what shipwreck is myself, and, therefore, can easily guess what it is
to those who are unused to the sea. I was the only one saved out of a
whole crew.”
“Indeed! then your case is identical with mine.”
“In that respect it is,” replied the fisherman; “but I was used to the
dangers of the sea; and, though that makes no difference when you find
yourself in the boiling waters, yet a man who has the fear of wreck
constantly before his eyes, can see the danger—take more precaution,
and is not so likely to lose that presence of mind which at such times
is so valuable.”
“So it is; though I took it very quietly, and stood still until I was
thrown down by the first shock of the vessel.”
“She struck more than once?”
“She did; four or five times; she was thrown upon the rocks in shallow
water, I believe, as I understand these matters.”
“Yes, it was so,” said the fisherman—“it was so.”
“Well, it was only when the waves left us that we came down with a
dreadful crashing shock, which caused the vessel to shiver as if she
had been but a leaf. Well, every time a wave swept towards us, it
lifted the vessel off the rock, and carried her a few yards further,
sometimes scraping and scratching her keel as she went along; at other
times, she was lifted clear of the rocks, and then suddenly thrown upon
them with great force, and then every timber separated.”
“Just what might be expected.”
“And just as it occurred,” said the stranger.
“And, of course, the crew were carried into the sea, and drowned.”
“Yes; but what became of them—I mean where they were carried to—I
cannot tell; but I suppose among the tall rocks that I saw before the
wreck. But why was I not carried there and left?”
“It is something that neither you nor I can tell,” said the fisherman.
“Perhaps so; but I am safe, and only so to tell the disaster to others,
not for a warning; for it can be none, but I am saved.”
“You are. Perhaps you would like to lie down for an hour or two before
daylight comes, and then we will take a walk down to the shore in the
morning, and see if there is anything washed ashore.”
“I am tired, and think that it would be of some service, if I can
sleep; though I dare say I shall be dreaming of what I have seen and
felt, and hardly dare to sleep, so great is the disturbance in my mind.”
“Sit up, and welcome, by the fire,” said the fisherman; “you can do so;
it may be as well, perhaps, too—you may be able to sleep that way.”
“No, no, I’ll lie down on the boards—I am not particular upon such an
occasion; and, as it has turned out, I shall be too much in need of
rest to sit up. The warmth of the fire, too, draws me off, I can find,
and I dare say you feel it too.”
“It has that effect, as much as I am used to it,” replied the
fisherman; “but do what you please; I shall turn in till daylight,
unless you want anything more.”
“Nothing, thank you, my good friend, but a place to lie down on, and
then I am quite content for the remainder of the night.”
“There is a settle up in yon corner where you can sleep; it is rough
and homely, but we have nothing otherwise here.”
“No apology; I am too thankful for what I have escaped from, and for
what I have received, to look hard at the mercies afforded me.”
• • • • •
The stranger said no more, but took the fisherman’s advice and walked
to the settle, and then lay down with his face towards the fire.
“Good night,” said the fisherman; “pleasant slumbers.”
“The same to you, my friend; I hope I have not dispossessed any of your
family of their means of rest. I have, perhaps, deprived them of their
bed.”
“No, no; sleep in peace; we are all provided for. I sleep here,” he
said, as he was about to open the door; “and my daughter sleeps there,”
he added, pointing to a small door. “So, you see, we have our appointed
places, and that on which you now sleep is retained for the use of any
strange traveller or friend that may need it.”
“Then good night,” said the stranger, which was returned again by the
fisherman, who entered his own room, leaving his guest lying on his
bed, and looking around him by the light of the fire, which burned yet
for some time.
CHAPTER CLXVIII.
THE NIGHT IN THE FISHERMAN’S HUT.—THE MIDNIGHT FEAST OF BLOOD.—THE
CHASE, AND THE GUN-SHOT.
The stranger, as he lay, listened to the sounds that were emitted by,
and occasionally opened his eyes to gaze upon, the flames, as they
ran upwards; he watched the forked tongues as they played about the
faggots, and then turned his eyes towards the various parts of the
apartment as it was now and then illuminated with its warm glare.
What might have been his feelings after his escape it is difficult to
conjecture, for he appeared not inclined to sleep, but to gaze about
him and keep watch over the fire, which every now and then blazed up
afresh; and his mind appeared to be intent upon something else than
merely thinking of the past—there was too much of inquiry and curiosity
about it.
“The time has come round again,” he muttered; “my blood requires
renewal, my strength renovation, and no aliment will do that but
maiden’s blood.”
A horrible expression of countenance came over him that must have
caused a feeling of horror to have crept through the veins of any one
who might have been near to see him; but, as it was, he was alone, and
there was no one to be terrified.
“Yes, yes; I must have that supply, else, though the sea may give up
its dead, and the earth refuse to cover me, yet I may sink into that
sleep I would so willingly escape from; then, indeed, I should suffer
what I cannot bear to think of.
“Yet how near have I been to that death from which I have believed it
impossible to return; but yet the moonbeams have found me, and I have
again been re-animated, and the horrible appetite has returned which
must have its periodical meal—its terrible and disgusting repast. It
must be done, aye, it must be done.”
As he muttered, his lips met, and his long tongue was occasionally
thrust out, as if he were anticipating the pleasures of the feast.
“Yes, yes; this very night must renew the life that has been this
night restored to me. I must make a fresh attempt. I think he said his
daughter lay in yonder chamber; in another hour I will adventure upon
this scheme.”
His eyes were fixed upon the door, which he appeared to watch and
examine with the utmost care and avidity.
He watched, however, for some time, and the flames appeared to subside,
and the embers gave out a dull, red glare, and some warmth.
“Now is the moment,” he muttered, as he rose softly from his bed; “now
is the moment—all are asleep, and stillness reigns around me. I will go
and ascertain if all be quiet, and then to my midnight orgies—a feast
that shall restore me to my life—my former self.”
He crawled out of the bed, and stood upright for a moment, and
listened, and then, with a noiseless step, he crept to the door of the
fisherman’s bedroom, and then listened for some seconds, and muttered
as if he were satisfied,—
“Yes, yes; they sleep sound enough, and will not readily awaken.”
He then took a small cord, and tied the handle of the door to a
nail on the post, so as to offer an impediment to egress from the
sleeping-room, and then he went towards the other which the fisherman
had told him belonged to his daughter. He paused, and listened at the
door for a few moments, and then he said,—
“Yes, yes; that is the maiden’s chamber—that is sure to be her
chamber—her father said so, and I have no reason to doubt he told the
truth, since he had no cause to lie; here, then, is the casket that
contains all my treasure—the elixir vitæ of my life—the undefiled blood
of a maiden’s veins.”
He tried the door, but it was secured on the inside.
This, for a moment, disconcerted him, and he took a moment or two to
consider what best could be done; and at length he saw a small chink
in the wall, which he approached; then, peeping in, he saw that if he
could enlarge the hole, he might push his hand in, and open the door by
undoing the fastenings.
This was effected by means of a chisel which happened to be lying near
at hand; then he opened it, and thrust in his hand and withdrew the
bolt that held the door, and quietly opened it.
With cat-like caution he approached the bed where the fisherman’s
daughter lay. She was a beautiful girl, scarce eighteen, and, by a
consent of all, the queen of the place, in respect of beauty.
With greedy eyes the vampyre approached the bed on which lay the
form of the sleeping maiden, and gazed upon her fair white neck and
bosom—heaving with the sleeper’s breath; and then, as if he could
contain himself no longer, he eagerly bent down over her, and then, as
her face was turned on one side, his lips and teeth approached the side
exposed.
• • • • •
A scream ran through the fisherman’s hut that awoke its inmates in an
instant, and which, though it banished sleep, yet it gave not the power
of thought.
“Help! help! help!” screamed the maiden.
“’Tis Mary!” said the fisherman; “surely——”
“Hasten, and see what ’tis that ails her. She never would scream so,
unless in utmost peril; hasten, and see.”
“Help! help! again screamed the maiden, as she struggled in the arms
of the monster, who kept her in his powerful grasp while he sought the
life current that crimsoned her veins with horrible desire.
“The door is secured; d——n!” muttered the fisherman. “What does this
mean? Give me my gun down, while I force the door.”
The old woman handed down the gun, while the fisherman put his strength
to the door, which quickly gave way and flew open.
“Here is your gun. Be quick; but do not be too hasty in its use. See to
Mary and the shipwrecked voyager.”
“Who secured my door, dame, but he?”
“The door! Ay, I remember—hasten!”
“Help—help!” again shouted or screamed Mary, but not in so loud a voice
as before; she was getting weaker, and just as the fisherman emerged
into the large room, the faggots fell together and gave forth a sudden
blaze, and in an instant the whole place was lighted up, and the
fisherman’s eye sought the couch of the stranger whom he had lodged,
but the bed was empty.
“Gone!” he muttered—“gone!”
He turned his head in the direction of his daughter’s bedchamber, and
saw the door was open, and he heard a struggle and a sucking noise.
“Ha!” he muttered, and rushed in exclaiming—“What means this noise? Who
calls for help?”
The appearance of the fisherman was so opportune and so sudden, and so
intent was the vampyre upon the hideous meal, that he did not hear the
approach of the fisherman, and it was not until the latter shouted that
he turned and saw him.
“Treacherous and ungrateful villain!” said the fisherman, who was
almost powerless from terror and astonishment.
The vampyre turned and dropped his victim on the bed, while he
endeavoured to pass the fisherman; but the act recalled him to himself,
and he made a blow at him with the butt-end of the gun; but the vampyre
jumped back, and the blow missed its intended object, and they both
closed for a struggle.
The fisherman, however, found that he had one to do with whose strength
was even greater than his own, however great that might be; and in a
moment more he was thrown down, and the monster rushed across the outer
room, oversetting the fisherman’s wife; and forcing open the outer
door, he fled.
“I am thrown,” said the fisherman, rising; “but not done for. Mary, are
you hurt?”
“Oh, my God—my God!” exclaimed the poor girl. “He had begun to eat me
and suck my blood! I have the marks of his teeth in me.”
“I’ll have revenge upon him yet.”
“Nay, father. He is some monster—do not go!”
“No, no,” said his wife—“no, husband, do not attempt it!” Strong he is;
he may do you a mischief.”
“I know,” said the fisherman. “He has thrown me, and he has abused my
hospitality; he is not fit to live. He has not, however, any means of
fighting against the contents of my gun. I have got that loaded, and
will punish him. Be he man or devil, I will make the experiment of
following him.”
All this took place in less time than it takes to relate it, and the
fisherman rushed out of his hut to follow the stranger who had acted so
badly.
It was now early dawn; and, though the waves still lashed the shore in
angry violence, and kept up a ceaseless roar, yet the sky betrayed none
of the signs of yesterday’s storm, but was serene and calm, and not a
cloud was to be seen—nothing but a dim, grey night pervaded all space.
There was just light enough to see objects moving about, and when the
fisherman got outside the hut, he saw, about a hundred yards or better
before him, the form of the stranger, making for the woodland at the
height of his speed.
The fisherman hastened to intercept him which, however, was
unnecessary, for another, coming from that quarter, turned him, and
he fled towards the sea, whither he was followed, and, when upon the
cliffs, the fisherman fired, and the vampyre fell over and was supposed
to have been drowned.
[Illustration: The fisherman fired, and the vampyre fell from the
cliff.]
CHAPTER CLXIX.
THE ASSASSINS ON THE RIALTO.—THE ATTACK AND DEFEAT.—THE STRANGER.
On the Rialto, one evening, as the sun was sinking in the golden west,
a stranger was seen walking to and fro in deep musing, apparently
unmindful of what was passing around him, or of the approach of
evening, an hour when the remorseless assassin is known to stalk abroad
in the streets of Venice, and there the dagger finds its victim.
Several individuals looked hard at the stranger in the cloak, but no
one approached him, save those who passed him, and in doing so bestowed
a passing gaze upon him, which was not returned, for he heeded no one.
But he was not much open to recognition even if he were known, for the
cloak with which he had enveloped himself was of such ample dimensions
that it completely concealed him from the curiosity of the many;
indeed, his face was hardly visible, for the fur collar he wore hid all
save the bridge of a prominent nose, and his eyes, which had a peculiar
lustre.
The evening still grew darker and later, and the passengers were fewer
and fewer, but still the tall stranger walked slowly up and down;
but no one ventured to say anything, though more than one had the
inclination to speak; but the tallness of the man, and the point of the
long rapier which appeared beneath the cloak, checked any inclination
to familiarity, and induced a more voluntary courtesy than might at all
times have been accorded.
There were, indeed, a small knot of three individuals, who kept near
the same place, and whose eyes every now and then directed their
glances towards the stranger, as if they regarded him with impatience.
These men were of a suspicious character; they all wore cloaks and
slouched hats, but they had all seen some service, and were somewhat
the worse for it. They conversed together, and walked away for a short
space, but they returned presently, and still found the stranger as
before at the same spot.
“Well,” said one of the three, as they again met at a certain spot,
“what think you now—is he a spy or not?”
“I don’t know what to think, Rubino. Spy or no spy, he will interfere
with our duty to-night. I wonder what is best.”
“What do you mean?”
“Why, would it be better to chance his presence, or shall we put him
away? He evidently intends remaining there, the devil only knows how
long.”
“I believe you; but it appears to me that both plans are objectionable
to the last degree, though I confess I can see no alternative whatever.”
“Which do you consider the least objectionable plan?—that is what we
have to consider, for there are but two plans, and we cannot fail to do
our business; should we do so, we should lose something, and we should
never get any more employment.”
“Good. If we attack him, we shall lose our chance with our better
customer. We shall lose our man, at the least, if we get clear.”
“He wears a long sword, and is a tall man. If he has any skill, and I
dare be sworn he has, he will prove an ugly customer.”
“We are three.”
“That is very true; but an encounter only makes it the worse, and even
if he be killed, which, if we are true to ourselves, he must be, we
shall be obliged to quit the spot, and our main object defeated.”
“That is most true; but shall we risk the attempt when there are two?
It will make it too many odds; we shall not be so sure of success as we
ought to be.”
“We have the advantage of striking when we are not seen. A blow is sure
when no hand is raised to ward it off.”
“Ay, we should dispose of one before he has made any resistance, and
before the other can offer any opposition or attempt any assistance,
should the first have life enough to call out. Come, come, let’s have
no fear of the result; it is all in our own hands.”
“Shall we not run more danger during the encounter of being taken by
others who may come up, attracted by the fray? There is much to be
said about making an alarm, because numbers will then be drawn upon us,
and you know we have little sympathy among the multitude.”
“No, no; we must make all possible haste, and then we may elude all
possible chance. Strike the blow home, and then we may baffle all; for
if he cry, he will fall, and those who help him, will raise him, and we
shall have time to make our escape.”
“No doubt—no doubt; ’tis a good plan—a very good plan, and one that I
think will succeed; at all events, it only wants a good trial to make
it succeed; you see, a strong arm, quick eye, and swift foot, is all
that are necessary.”
“I see; and one more quality.”
“What is it?”
“Good luck.”
“Granted; but that often comes from the manner in which a thing is
done, and sometimes from the want of skill in those who should make it
the reverse. Confusion for a moment gives us our luck, and then we are
safe.”
“So we are.”
“How goes the time, Rubino?” inquired one of the assassins, for such
they were.
“Oh, it yet wants one hour of the time in which we are to meet him.”
“Well, then, we have more than a chance yet of our being undisturbed
here, and the stranger may leave for some other part of the city; but
our plan is fixed whether or no. Shall we turn into a vintner’s?”
“No; we have no time for that, as yet.”
“No time! What mean you Rubino?”
“That we have no time,” replied Rubino, “to quit this neighbourhood,
because you will perceive he may come any time these next two hours,
which is a matter of some importance; for if he reach home alive, we
have miscarried, and incur great displeasure, if not vengeance.”
“We care but little for the vengeance of another.”
“We may not individually; but you must know, this one knows too much of
us and our haunts to be a safe and pleasant enemy; besides, we shall
lose a liberal patron—one who has given us some gold and promised us
more.”
“Ay, ay; he’s the man to serve, and we will not disoblige him; we’ll
deal fairly by him, and he cannot expect more.”
“And he will reward us liberally.”
“Amen, say I. Now we have waited long enough, let us walk down the
Rialto, and when we get to the other end, we can plant ourselves in
such a position to watch his advance towards us, and then we can walk
to him.”
“Had we better not remain somewhere nearer at hand, because we can then
start on him unawares, and thus have a blow without alarming him; and,
if that be a deadly one, why, then we are safe. No one will know the
mischief is done.”
“So much the better; but come, we will continue our walk; it will lull
suspicion, and when we come again, one of our number can creep into one
of these alcoves, and there wait against his coming.”
“And you will be at hand?”
“Of course; we shall keep upon the look out, so as to be near at the
moment you commence the attack.”
“But suppose I should fall?”
“Then you must continue the attack in a sharp and rapid manner,
engaging all his attention to defend himself.”
“Ay; and leave me to myself to the attack of that man yonder, should he
be at hand at that moment.”
“Oh, no, no. Do not hurt yourself. You need be under no fear of that
sort, for you see it will only be man to man, and a fair encounter.”
“It has never yet been fairly done, and will not be with me in this
matter, don’t you see. If help arrives, I’m lost; and, if I be lost
without help, it will be the worse for you. I’ll take my share of
danger and mishap, but I won’t be imposed upon by a comrade, and so you
will understand it first.”
“Who was desirous you should? Shall we not be at hand?”
“At your heels, I expect; but don’t you see that, by giving a minute’s
time, you endanger all; for, if my first attack fail, he ought not
to be allowed rallying time; he ought not to be permitted to recover
himself, and attempt defence, indeed, because that gives time, and we
may be beat by others coming from whatever quarter we may go.”
“We do not intend it. We only are desirous that one of us should be
prepared to make the attack, while we are walking to and fro, and
perhaps attracting his attention, and drawing it from you. Then we aid
you; but, should you be foiled, why we will hasten as if we were coming
to help him.”
“I see; well, let it be so.”
“Good. We can then act effectively, and we are the gainers by this
stratagem. Now then, Roberto, do thou hide thyself in yonder alcove.”
“I will. My dagger is sharp, and you know my arm is not usually a weak
one, and that I have done some service with it ere now.”
“Thou hast.”
“And it will again do more.”
“Hush! hasten in. I hear footsteps yonder. ’Tis he, I think. We will
not go far, but within the reach of your eye; fifty yards, at most,
will be the distance. We will take and come towards you the moment we
find he has reached you.”
“Good. Begone—he comes.”
The assassin stole into an alcove, and then paused in the deep shade of
the place where he had concealed himself, and the other two walked down
a short distance—about a hundred and fifty yards or so—and then paused
and looked back.
“Do you see anything of them?”
“No; I don’t at this moment. It is getting very dark.”
“We had better return and see what happens. We shall get up in the very
nick of time, and be able to take part in the fray.”
“Well, be it so,” replied the other. “I’ll go with you; but we run some
risk in encountering the stranger in the rapier and long cloak.”
“Most true; but we shall not have taken any part in the affair; that
will clear us of anything that may tend to inculpate us. We are right;
and, if we find our comrade hardly pressed, we can aid him, and that at
a time when it is unexpected by the other party. Hark! they are at it
already.”
“Come on.”
They both hastened towards the scene of combat, towards which they both
ran, for they knew their comrade’s voice.
The other villain awaited the coming of the stranger, whom he was
waiting to assassinate, as soon as his comrades had left him.
The unconscious stranger walked down the Rialto with a slow and steady
gait, humming an air from some opera as he walked along, well pleased
in his own mind. He wore his cloak open in front, and his sword
dangling at his side, and altogether most unsuspicious of an attack.
Scarcely, however, had he passed the assassin’s hiding-place, than the
fellow rushed out and made a desperate blow at him with his dagger,
which, however, miscarried, on account of the loose manner in which he
wore his cloak; the blow was foiled by the folds of the garment, and
the wearer turned round.
“Villain!” he exclaimed, “thou shalt have thy deserts;” and, as he
spoke, he drew his sword, and became the assailant in his turn.
[Illustration: The stranger fights back against the assassin.
“Help! help!” shouted the villain, who found himself beset by one who
would quickly make him repent his temerity.
At that moment the rest of the assassins came up, and commenced a
furious attack upon the single stranger, who, of course, from being
almost a victor, was immediately compelled to give ground to the three.
“Help! help!” shouted the stranger, as he was forced on one knee, and
that with a wound; but at that moment help was at hand, and the tall
stranger stepped up to his side, and casting his cloak on one side, and
drawing his rapier, he ran one of the assailants through the body and
he fell backwards dead.
A furious combat ensued between the stranger and the other two
assassins, who were compelled to fight, so closely were they pressed by
the stranger; however, after a few moments, they turned and fled.
The stranger then turned towards the wounded man, who was rising from
the ground by the help of the pillar that was supporting the sides of
the alcove, and then endeavoured to stanch the wound he had received.
CHAPTER CLXX.
COUNT POLLIDORI’S PALACE.—SIGNORA ISABELLA, THE COUNT’S DAUGHTER.—THE
INTRODUCTION.
The stranger walked up to him and offered his services, saying,—
“Are you hurt, signor?—you bleed!”
“But slightly hurt, signor, thank you for that; you have saved my life.
I had been cold meat, indeed—a bloody corpse for all Venice to look
upon to-morrow, but for your valour and stout assistance.”
“Name it not, signor; but the rascals have been well paid. There lies
one of them—the others have escaped; but permit me, signor, to say,
that the sooner you get away from this spot the better, for the knaves
may return in greater force than before, or they will wait till you
leave; by that time they will have rallied, and dart out upon you as
you pass along.”
“I do not fear that, signor, much; but the fact is, I am almost too
weak to walk unaided.”
“Permit me to render you the assistance you require. I am a stranger in
this place, and therefore unused to your ways; but—”
“Say no more, signor; I will accept of your services if you will
accept of a lodging at my poor home. I have that which shall make you
welcome—heartily welcome; and the signora, my daughter, shall make you
welcome, too.”
“Signor, if I can be of service to you I will do so with pleasure. Lend
me your arm, signor; but your wound is not stanched—let me bind it more
carefully and securely; you ought not to bleed from such a wound when
bandaged.”
“Perhaps, signor, you have had more to do with these matters than I. I
am a peaceable Venetian of rank, and neither afraid nor unwilling to
draw a sword in a good quarrel, shrinking not from some odds, but I
have had no practice in these matters; times and circumstances have not
been propitious.”
“It matters not,” replied the stranger; “you shewed what you were
when you had nearly defeated one, and afterwards kept at bay three.
He must be a man who can behave thus, sir; he must have the heart and
conduct of a soldier—you would be one did occasion serve—no man can be
more; but I have seen many climes, and have therefore some knowledge
in these matters beyond the mere inward power and courage. I have,
from sheer necessity, been compelled to mix in _melees_, and not from
inclination.”
“I thank you for your skill as a surgeon, for truly you have stopped
the bleeding, which I had not been able to do myself.”
“Lean on my shoulder, signor; it will enable you to walk better. Have
you far to go?” inquired the stranger.
“No, signor; but we will take a gondola, it will be the easier
travelling, and, moreover, it will land us at my house, where you shall
be most heartily welcome. If we turn down here, we shall soon obtain
the aid of a gondolier. I had intended walking, but I have enough of
that for one night, even if I were able to walk, which I am not.”
“As you please, signor.”
As the stranger spoke he walked towards the place indicated by the
wounded man, and in a few moments more they reached the grand canal,
and finding a gondolier sleeping in his gondola, the stranger left his
wounded companion to wake the sleeper to his duty, by shaking him.
“Hillo!” said the stranger, “will nothing wake you—get up instantly,
and about your duty. Do you always sleep here?”
“No, signor,” said the man, sleepily.
“Well, then, are you engaged?”
“Yes, signor, if you engage me.”
“Well, then, I do.”
“Where to, signor?”
“Come with me to bring a wounded gentleman into the gondola, and he
will tell you where to. Come, quick—have you not yet awakened?”
“I’m awake, signor, and willing,” said the gondolier, following the
stranger to the spot where the wounded man was standing, and, by
direction of the stranger, he aided the wounded signor into the gondola.
“Now, signors, I have but to know where you desire to go to.”
“Row on until I tell you where to stop. Follow the course of the grand
canal, and you will go right enough.”
There was some time spent in silence, while the gondolier rowed as
desired up the grand canal, until they came to a large mansion, which
the wounded man gazed upon, and, after a moment’s pause, as if he had a
difficulty in speaking, he said, as he pointed to the building,—
“There, row up to yonder steps; there I will land—that is my house.”
The gondolier immediately obeyed the injunction, and pulled for the
stairs, and when they reached the place, the gondolier stepped out and
secured the gondola.
“Call out some of my people,” said the wounded man, “call them out. I
am very stiff, and not able to get out.”
The gondolier obeyed, and in a few minutes more several men, all in
livery, ran down the steps to the gondola, and lifted their master out,
who appeared to be unable to do so of himself.
[Illustration: The servants carry their master into his house.]
The gondolier was rewarded according to his deserts, and the stranger
followed the wounded man into his own house, which was a most extensive
building, and filled with servants, and furnished in the richest
manner, displaying magnificence and wealth to a degree that was scarce
to be surpassed in Venice.
They were shown into an apartment replete with every appointment that
wealth or luxury could suggest, and the wounded man was placed on a
sofa, and his attendants stood round him as if waiting his orders.
“Signor and stranger,” he said, “welcome to my house, as the preserver
of my life. All I have here is at your service.”
“I am obliged,” replied the stranger, with a dignified acknowledgement
of the courtesy—“I am obliged; but I cannot recognise on my part any
such right. If I have done you service—as I will not affect to believe
I have not—still you overrate the amount of it. But I will accept of
your hospitality for this night; for I am a stranger in Venice, and
have little or no knowledge of the best course to pursue.”
“Remain here.”
“But you had better dispatch some one for aid,” interrupted the
stranger. “You are in pain, at this very instant; send for some
assistance. You require the aid of a leech immediately.”
“I am faint—very faint,” he replied.
“Hasten,” said the stranger—“hasten some of you to fetch a leech,
instead of losing your wits in silent astonishment.”
The servants immediately bustled about, and seemed to have awakened
from a trance, and were seen running in different directions. The room
was soon cleared, and the tall stranger seated himself by his wounded
host.
“In me you see the Count Pollidori.”
The stranger bowed.
“I am not a native of this city, though now one of her favoured
citizens. I have left the land of my birth because I and my rulers
could not agree, and I ran some danger in staying against their will,
and I have settled and married here.”
“Our adopted country is that which demands our care and preference,”
replied the stranger. “That, at least, is my opinion.”
“No doubt. I am now,” he continued, “a widower.”
“Your lady is dead?”
“Yes; I am sorry to say so. I have, however, one child living at home,
and one who is serving his country in her fleets, an honour to our
house; but my greatest comfort is the dear image of my lost wife—my
daughter.”
“Is she here now?”
“Yes; in this palace. Signora Isabella is devoted to her father, and
would not for the world do aught that would give me a moment’s pain;
indeed, she would die for me rather than I should feel displeasure.”
“Such a daughter must be a treasure.”
“She is a treasure.”
“And what an inestimable jewel would she be as a wife.”
“She will be when the day comes when she will mate, which I hope will
be before I die; for I should be too anxious respecting the worth of
the man who was to be her husband, to permit me to die happy, unless I
saw and approved of the choice, or chose the individual myself.”
“I see you are more anxious,” said the stranger, mildly, “in providing
future happiness for your daughter, rather than in hoarding wealth or
titles for her.”
“I am,” said the count.
“And a most laudable ambition, too; an ambition that few parents do
not neglect in the pursuit of one of a different character—either some
young love, or some one who is endowed largely with worldly goods or
titles.”
“My Isabella will have enough of both; and, therefore, she will not
need to seek for them; but she will not throw herself away upon any
nameless adventurer who may love her fortune better than herself.”
“That would be as cruel a neglect as the other,” replied the stranger;
“and, in my opinion, more culpable of the two.”
“So it would.”
At that moment the door opened hastily, and a light step was heard, and
before the stranger could turn round, a lovely young female rushed to
the side of the count, throwing herself on her knees, saying,—
“Oh, heavens! my dear father, what has happened? Are you hurt? For
Heaven’s sake, my dear father, what is the matter?”
“Little or nothing, my dear Isabella.”
“But you are wounded. Ah! there is blood! My God! my God!”
“Hush, Isabella. I am wounded, but not hurt seriously.”
“I pray Heaven it may be so. But what sacrilegious hand could be raised
against you? You have wronged no one.”
“I am not aware of having done so, certainly,” said the count; “but
that does not always give any security to the wealthy. They will
sometimes destroy them from motives apart from individual revenge.”
“The monsters! But have the villains been secured?”
“One has paid the forfeit of his life for his temerity and villainy;
the rest fled.”
“Ah! what will these assassins not risk?”
“Well, my dear Isabella, I have answered your inquiries, and now,
perhaps, you will see if you be alone with me.”
“Alone with you!” repeated Isabella, not quite comprehending the words;
but she looked up, and her eyes encountered those of the stranger, who
was gazing earnestly upon her, and she started, as she rose and said,—
“Excuse me, signor, excuse me—I knew not any one was present.”
“Nay,” said the stranger, “filial love and respect need no excuse,
signora. Do not think so badly of me as to imagine I can think
otherwise than you were actuated by the tenderest impulses.”
“Your kindness, sir——”
“Isabella,” said the count, interrupting her, “but for this gentleman’s
timely and efficient aid, I should at this moment have been a corpse in
the streets of Venice.”
“You, my father?”
“Yes, my child. This signor came up just as I was wounded and beaten
down, and saved me from death. He killed one of my assailants, while
he put to flight the other two, who left their dead companion in the
streets. Thank him, my child, for he is my preserver, and he deserves
thanks for the deed as well as for the bravery with which it was done,
for he ran great risks in such odds.”
“He must. Signor, I know not how to thank you or what to say; the
greatness of the obligation paralyses me, and I have not words to tell
you how grateful I feel for your goodness and courage; but ’tis an
obligation that can never be forgotten or ever repaid—it is impossible.”
“My dear signora, permit me to say you rate my services too highly.”
“Nay, that is quite impossible; for my father’s life I prize far before
my own—before anybody in the world; and to save that is to lay me under
the heaviest obligation it is possible to impose upon me.”
“Say no more, signora; I will not underrate it after what you have
said; but you must say as little about it as you will. I am happy,
however, to have done any act worthy of your thanks.”
CHAPTER CLXXI.
THE OPINIONS OF DOCTOR PILLETTO.—THE STRANGER’S ACCOUNT OF
HIMSELF.—THE WELCOME OF THE SIGNORA.
At that moment the door opened, and a servant announced the arrival
of a leech, the famous Doctor Pilletto, who forthwith entered the
apartment, and advanced towards the couch on which the wounded man lay.
“Oh, doctor, do what you can for my father,” said Signora Isabella.
“I will, signora,” replied the doctor. “I will; but what are his hurts
or his disease? for I see he has been taken very badly; but why this
paleness? You appear to have lost blood.”
“I have bled, doctor, and I want you to dress my wound. I am hurt in
the side here, and but for my friend here I should have been hurt
mortally.”
“It was not a duel then?” said the doctor.
“No, no, doctor, no, no; it was an attempt at assassination, and I have
escaped the death some one with more enmity than courage had doomed
me to; but, at the same time, I am free, and one of his agents has
perished.”
“’Tis but just,” said the doctor; “but I must now see the wound; with
your good leave, we’ll strip the wounded part and apply bandages to it,
so as to secure it; after which something else must be done.”
The wounded Pollidori was stripped, and, after some exertion, the wound
was dressed, and all bleeding stopped.
“What is your candid opinion concerning my wound, doctor?” inquired the
count, “What do you think will be the result? I would be truly informed
of whatever probability of danger there may be, remote or immediate, as
the case may be; tell me, I beseech you, doctor?”
“I will, count.”
“I have those things to do which are important, and the execution of
them depends upon your answer; so do not mislead me.”
“I will not; I cannot form so clear a judgment of your case as I can
in a few days hence, when I may see the progress of the wound towards
healing; though at present I see no signs of danger, yet some may come.”
“You do not consider the wound dangerous of itself?” said the stranger.
“No, not of itself; but it is so close to a mortal part that it cannot
be considered free from danger; indeed, it may become so. A little more
on one side would have made it quickly fatal; but, as it is, if it heal
well, there will be no danger. You must keep your couch for some days.”
“That will be a lighter evil than any other,” replied the count.
“You have lost much blood, and that alone will make you very weak, and
it will take some time before you will be entirely recovered from your
present state, and then your wound will probably be healed.”
“And what you appear to think may be dangerous, is only any possible
interruption from the wound itself.”
“It does so happen sometimes from bodily infirmity, it shews itself
in healing, and the wound, which now appears healthy, may turn to
gangrene, and then the worst may be apprehended.”
“It may,” said the stranger; “but these things are only the worst that
may happen in extreme cases.”
“Exactly,” said the leech.
“And you have seen nothing in this case to induce you to anticipate any
such result as this—it is only what may happen.”
“That is all. It appears to me that all is well at present.”
“Then I think the count had better be left to himself in quiet, and he
may have a good mind upon his recovery.”
“It will be best,” said the doctor.
“I am fatigued and sleepy,” said the count; “I would be alone.
Daughter, you must entertain this gentleman as I would do were I able
to do so. Signor, the signora will do the office of hostess—excuse so
cold a welcome.”
“Name it not,” said the stranger. “I am well cared for. A welcome from
such a one is well worth the acceptance of a prince, much less that of
a stranger unknown in Venice. I thank you for it.”
“Say no more on that head,” said the count. “I came here almost a
refugee, and quite a stranger myself.”
“Will you come this way, signor,” said Signora Isabella; “we will leave
my poor father to himself, he will sleep.”
The stranger rose, and Doctor Pilletto also, both following the
signora, who led them into a separate, but splendid apartment, and
entreated them to sit down, and apologised for her own want of spirits
to entertain them suitably.
“For that matter,” said the doctor, “I am by no means surprised; for
such a mishap can never be heard of without producing lowness of
spirits.”
“And such a misfortune is always productive of grief,” said the
stranger. “Signora, say no more, I would not interfere with your grief.
I do not wish to stop it, and shall feel myself a bar to your own
feelings if you say any more. I am made welcome, and feel myself so.”
“You are, sir—-your kindness deserves no less; but I pray you tell me
how this affair occurred, in which you have been of such signal service
to my father, in saving his life?”
“To tell you that, signora, I must first tell you who and what I am.”
“I do not wish to be thought unduly curious,” replied signora.
“Not at all. I am bound to acknowledge you have a right to it, for
you have no introduction with me which usually supplies the place of
an account of who and what we are; therefore I’ll tell you, though I
cannot boast of being more than a simple chevalier of now no fortune,
having left my country because I raised my voice against the abuses of
state; therefore I am but a nameless and fortuneless stranger.”
“Many a worthy gentleman has been in such a plight before now,”
observed the doctor. “I have known many such.”
“And I am one. Not that I am without means,” added the stranger; “I
have been lucky enough to provide against such a calamity as that which
has befallen me, though not to the extent I could have wished.”
“You are fortunate, chevalier.”
“I am so far. I came but this morning to Venice; I landed here, and
agreed to meet the captain of the vessel, who promised to meet me on
the Rialto, to conduct me to some quiet and respectable change-house
where I could lodge.”
“And he met you not?”
“No. While I was waiting for him, I heard a cry for help, and found,
upon running up, the Count Pollidori beaten to the earth, beset by
three villains, who had already wounded him in the manner you have
seen; and I at that time stepped up, and, being unexpected, the men
were confused, and one of them fell, mortally wounded; and, after a
little further desperate fighting, they all fled.”
“It was fortunate you yourself were not beaten down too with such odds;
for these men are usually desperate.”
“True; but, you see, one was gone, and they could not tell how it might
be with the count—they did not know how far he might be able to join in
the fray again, and if he were to do so, there would immediately be an
equality between us, and such men do not seek such a fight.”
“Truly not, chevalier,” replied the signora—“truly not. When they are
safe and secure in their deeds of blood, they will perpetrate them; but
in fair contest such men never shine—their deeds are of darkness.”
“Most true—most true.”
“But they have a deal of ferocity,” said the stranger; “and, when they
can, will pour out blood like water; but what amazes me is, that one
like the count, your father, should have been beset by such villains.
They must have had some object to accomplish in getting rid of him by
such means.”
“Private enmity.”
“Indeed! It must be a bad state of things.”
“It is, chevalier. It is a sign of great degeneracy in the state; but
it is so. For gold you can procure the death of any man in Venice.”
“Horrible!” said the stranger. “I have heard of such things; but I
deemed them fabulous, or, at least, overrated.”
“No, no—I fear not; and yet, who could have an enmity so deep as only
to be healed by blood? and yet, the good and great have as many enemies
as the wicked, for they are always opposed to each other.”
“Undoubtedly,” said the doctor; “good and bad are always antagonists.”
“Exactly. What, however, is the worst in these cases is, the bad very
often get the better of the good, which is the reverse of what ought to
be done; because, you see, if we are to suppose that there is a power
above that rules men’s actions, surely we might expect to see goodness
manifest in the majority of cases; whereas, we usually see, to a much
greater extent, the success of evil.”
“Not always.”
“Not always, certainly,” said the doctor; “but the exception proves
the rule. Goodness ought to be the great object of men’s lives; but
it is not; yet it ought to rule, and we must endeavour to be ruled by
it, despite the way of the world, which is often, as we daily see, the
reverse of what it ought to be.”
“But,” added the chevalier, “when ambition rules the minds of men, you
will find that all other principles give way.”
“It is so; but why, I cannot see.”
“Because ’tis the master emotion of the mind,” said the stranger.
“And ambition appears to possess the souls of those who govern, whether
for good or for evil,” said the signora. “Some are ambitious of being
rulers—some of being conquerors, and some of politicians; but they are
all moved to it by ambition.”
“Aye,” said the stranger, “the lover is ambitious of the smiles of his
mistress, though ill fortune will, now and then, deny him the good luck
to win them.”
CHAPTER CLXXII.
THE COUNT POLLIDORI’S RECOVERY.—THE INTERVIEW WITH THE SIGNORA
ISABELLA.—THE CONSENT.
A few days’ confinement placed the count beyond the reach of danger.
His wound healed rapidly and favourably, but which was more than
anticipated by the cautious leech, who abstained from saying so, but
took his daily seat beside his patient’s bed, and, with his prosy and
imperturbable gravity, he continued to give his advice.
“Count,” he said, “your wound is healing.”
“I feel it is so,” said the count.
“But you must be cautious. I would not have you be too sanguine, or
trust your feelings too much.”
“I do not; but I may take wine?”
“Indeed, I would recommend you not to do so; for wine is inflammatory,
and you are likely to suffer for it.”
“And yet I took a bottle last evening.”
“Last evening, count?” said the physician.
“Yes; I speak truly.”
“I doubt it not; but it was very imprudent—very imprudent, indeed; for,
though half a bottle may do no hurt to a man in full health, yet a
whole can do him no good, even if it do him no harm; but, in your case,
it is dangerous.”
“It might be; but surely the danger is past now?”
“If you have taken it over twelve hours—though four-and-twenty would be
better.”
“It is over twelve hours.”
“’Tis well; but it was hazardous; you are fast getting well, and, as it
happens, you have no fever, or other evil changes about you; therefore,
you may continue your wine, but not in such quantities.”
“I will be more cautious; but, Pilletto, what is your opinion of my
guest?”
“Your preserver?”
“Yes; the same.”
“He is one of the most learned men I ever met with; even professed
scholars have not been found so full of knowledge.”
“That speaks something for his youth.”
“Most undoubtedly.”
“But what think you of him as a man of the world?”
“I think he has a vast fund of information; he has had an enlarged
experience of society, and has visited, I think, all the continent
of Europe; he understands their languages and manners, too, and has
the appearance of a traveller, and a man used to the best and most
distinguished society.”
“That is just my opinion of him.”
“I understand he is from France.”
“Yes.”
“A refugee, in point of fact, I suppose, without means.”
“No, he appears to have means, and hopes that times my so alter to
permit his return, and the resumption of his former fortune.”
“I understand as much, and he has spoken of people whom I know well in
France, that would not associate with any beneath their degree; and he
has told me things they would have divulged to none, save their equals
and families.”
“It is my opinion of him.”
• • • • •
The doctor took his leave, and the count was again left to himself, and
he began evidently to ponder over something in his mind, which appeared
to demand his attention, and he, for some time, sat immovable.
“My daughter,” he murmured, “is a rich reward even for such a deed.
I do not pit my life against her’s; no, no; she is by far the most
valuable; she I love more than life, and would provide for her in
a manner that shall procure her future happiness, rather than her
immediate approval.
“The dear girl does not well understand these matters; she does not
know that present pleasure may be followed by future pain. She knows
not that we should forgo the present, to ensure future happiness.”
He paused a moment, and then he continued,—
“But I cannot be mistaken in this man. No, he has done a deed, which,
though I value it not at so high a price, yet gratitude impose upon me
the necessity of showing the highest consideration. She is fancy free;
and I do not see there will be any difficulty in the way whatever.”
At that moment the door opened, and Signora Isabella entered, and
advanced towards the couch on which he lay.
“My father!”
“Ah, Isabella, I was but then thinking of you.”
“Of me, father? I come to see how you are. Our good guest and preserver
had been telling me he is quite sure you are much better than Doctor
Pilletto will admit; for he is slow and cautious to a degree.”
“My dear, he is quite right—I feel it.”
“Oh, how joyful I am!”
“What think you of our guest, Isabella? Do you not think him a man well
worthy of our warmest esteem and gratitude?”
“Indeed he is, father—he is noble.”
“I think so—the true nobility of soul can be seen in him; to such a man
as the chevalier, would I see my Isabella united; to such a man could I
confide my daughter’s happiness, for he would secure it.”
“What mean you, father?”
“That the stranger, of whom you speak so highly, is to be your future
husband; the preserver of the father will not act unkindly by the
child.”
“My father, I am stunned.”
“Yes, my dear daughter, I have fully settled this matter in my own
mind; he has asked your hand—go see him—you have my blessing. I am sure
he will be happy. Isabella, you never disobeyed your father; such an
act would be the cruelest stab that ever was planted in my bosom.”
“But when,” said Isabella, almost trembling; “but when will this be?
When am I to be given away, father, as you would a present of flowers?”
“Isabella, when have I deserved, when have I had such an answer from
thee? Let me have no more of this.”
“But when have you fixed as a time upon which I am to be sent away from
home to strangers?”
“You will not leave this palace, Isabella; you and your husband will
always be here, and I shall have the satisfaction of seeing the
happiness I have planned and made. He will be a father to the child, as
well as a husband.”
“I do not wish for any such change. I am happy, but shall be otherwise,
if I am compelled to wed.”
“Compelled, Isabella, compelled! Do you speak of being forced, when I
wish it? Now that I have settled it in my own mind, love and duty to
me, and gratitude to this gentleman, all conspire to point out how you
should act.”
“But when, father, when?”
“To-morrow.”
“To-morrow!” repeated Isabella, in mournful accents.
“Yes, my child; ’tis better done at once—’twill, at all events, save
any of those unnecessary thoughts that might disturb you.”
“My father! my father!” said the young lady, as she sunk upon her knees
before him.
“Well, my child?”
“Pardon me for once begging a favour of you.”
“What mean you by such words?”
“I wish a longer interval to be allowed me before I am—I am——”
“Married,” said her father.
“Yes, father; that is the dreadful word.”
“Isabella, mind, my love, what my wishes are.”
“I have heard them, father; but give me a week—indeed, you cannot
decently bring this matter to a conclusion before the end of that time.
I have had no previous warning from you, or this stranger, that such a
thing was in contemplation.”
“If I grant it you, my Isabella, I must be obeyed.”
“You shall be obeyed, father,” said Isabella, with an effort, “if it
cost me my life, and it will be near it; but let me keep my room until
that period is up, and then do with me what you will.”
“Be it so, Isabella; though it will look ungracious to our guest, yet I
will endeavour to excuse you with the best grace I can.”
The Lady Isabella was deathly pale, and, as she rose, she staggered,
and could scarce support herself out of the apartment.
CHAPTER CLXXIII.
THE WEDDING MORNING.—THE NEW ARRIVAL.—THE DISAPPEARANCE OF THE
VAMPYRE BRIDEGROOM.
The signora retired to her own chamber, and remained there for many
hours; but during that time two messengers had left the mansion
secretly, and then all was still. The lovely and beautiful Isabella,
however, was not to be seen in her usual walks, or at her father’s
board, as was her wont. She was only seen within the precincts of her
own apartments, pallid, sad, and sorrowful.
“Your daughter, count,” said the stranger, one morning, “does not
appear as usual. I trust she is quite well?”
“Yes; quite well.”
“I hope I have given no cause of offence if so, I hope I may be
informed of my error, that I may speedily amend it.”
“There is none, chevalier; but my daughter, Isabella, has asked a
week’s preparation for the nuptials—which week she will pass in her own
apartments secluded, and at the end of which time, she leaves them for
your protection, and which will, I trust, be to her happiness.”
“It shall be my business to make her happy, and, for want of good will
and hearty endeavour, she shall never lack content and bliss. I have
every presage of a most happy and felicitous life in the future. I am
sure she will be happy.”
“It is my great hope, chevalier; it is the one object of my life. I
would it were settled, and the affair over. I should die unhappy if I
thought poor Isabella in the hands of any one who would not use her as
she deserved to be. She is of herself a treasure.”
“She is—she is.”
“And when she is once a wife, she will not look for a father’s
protection, neither will she need it. My death, when it does happen,
will be a great and heavy blow; but it will be less when she has the
comfort and consolation of a husband to console her for what would
otherwise be irreparable.”
“Yes, it would have the effect of deadening the blow, and of shortening
the duration of its intensity, though it will be by no means prevented.”
“I cannot say I should desire it.”
“No, certainly not; and Signora Isabella never could forget such a
parent.”
“I have done my duty, I hope.”
“And may congratulate yourself, count; but then, with regard to
Isabella, she will meet me as usual here on the day of the ceremonial.”
“Most assuredly.”
“And I am to be denied her company till then?”
“Yes; she will meet you on the morning at the altar.”
“Be it so—but I could have been happy in her society. At any rate I
must be so, by reflecting that I shall soon be the favoured, happy
husband of Isabella, for with her my happiness will be complete.”
“And my happiness will be complete, in knowing her’s is so.”
“I could have wished that some of those who have known me in France had
been here to see my happiness; but that cannot be.”
“Could you not send to them?”
“There would not be time for their return. And, moreover, if there had
been, I question whether I ought to hold any communication with them,
lest I bring them under the ban of the government, and I may not do
that.”
“Truly, you have the same feelings as I used to have; but I have long
since ceased to feel any of that kind of interest.”
“Time cures that.”
“It does; and you will find it will heal all those wounds which such a
separation from your country causes you.”
“I hope so. My offences there they will never forgive.”
• • • • •
Thus conversed the stranger and the count, and thus six days passed,
during which time the Signora Isabella was seen by none save her
attendants, who were few, and most of her time was spent in tears and
prayers.
She had a heart full of grief, but she dared not disobey her father, he
whom she loved so well, and whom she had never thought for one moment
as being opposed to her own ideas of propriety and her own wishes. She
had always been taught to suppress her own, and submit to his.
Thus it was now, at the eleventh hour, she had no means of fortifying
herself in any preconceived liking she may have had.
Submission was all she had learned—a blind and willing submission to a
fond and doting parent. She knew no other course of action.
Her heart, however, had other yearnings. She had loved another; but
she knew not how to act. She dared not even entertain the thought of
throwing herself at her father’s feet, and imploring him to save her
from perpetual sorrow—much less did she think of opposing him; but she
had done this much.
In the first moment of her terror and anguish, she had written off to
her brother, informing him of her danger; but, at the same time, she
had advised nothing, and expressed no wish—only told him the fact and
her fears.
• • • • •
The wedding morning arrived, and the house of the count gave
indications of the festivity; and, with the day, came guests richly
dressed, and the bells rang a merry peal upon the occasion, and the
count was in high spirits; but the bride was not seen.
“How is Signora Isabella, your daughter?” inquired one of the guests.
“She is as well as maiden modesty will permit.”
“I have not seen her.”
“Nor I.”
“Nor you!” replied the guest, astonished.
“No; she has secluded herself, but will appear presently, when the bell
rings for the service. The fact is, she cannot leave her father, even
for the arms of a husband, without feeling a grief for the change.”
“I hope she will be happy.”
“I have no doubt of it; the man is worthy of her.”
“And capable of making her happy, I hope.”
“I have no doubt of that.”
“Hark! the bell sounds; is that the signal?”
“Yes; follow on. I will bring my daughter forth;” and, as he spoke,
he left the guests, who hurried to the chapel, and found the stranger
awaiting his bride with some impatience.
He acknowledged the courtesy of those who came to him, and looked
towards a small door, which presently opened, and the count and
his daughter appeared. She was of marble paleness, and no signs of
happiness were seen in her face. She trembled, and her whole soul
seemed to be intent on something afar from her presence.
She lifted her eyes and gazed upon the throng; but apparently saw
none—or not those whom she wished. Her father spoke to her; she heaved
a deep sigh, and appeared to be resigned to her fate.
• • • • •
The ceremony commenced, and Isabella stood; but her eyes occasionally
sought the chapel door; and in a few moments more, before the
important part was concluded, a bustle took place near the door, and,
immediately afterwards, some officers, in the Venetian uniform, entered
the chapel, among whom was the young count, Isabella’s brother, and
with him a young officer, into whose arms she instantly threw herself,
and fainted.
“Father,” said the young count—“father, this must not be.”
“Why not, my son?” said the count.
“Because my sister loves another, and yon man is a monster.”
“What mean you, sir?” said the chevalier. “If you were other than what
you are, your words would beget a different answer.”
“You are a vampyre,” replied a young Neapolitan, who stepped forward.
“I knew you before. Know you not the holy father whom you murdered?”
“’Tis false. I’ll bring one to prove it.”
As the chevalier spoke, he crossed the chapel, and left the place; but
he did not appear again; and, upon inquiry, he had quitted the palace
in a gondola, and never reappeared.
CHAPTER CLXXIV.
THE TWO HIGHWAYMEN.—THE MURDER AT THE GIBBET’S FOOT.—THE
RIDE TO THE GOLDEN PIPPIN.
The evening set in a stormy mood; sudden, gusty showers rattled against
the traveller; whilst the wind swept over the country, bending the tall
trees, and whistling round the peasant’s cot, and making the chimneys
appear as if they were the residences of imprisoned spirits, which
moaned and groaned most dismally to hear.
The clouds came rapidly across the sky; now darkening the earth, and
now they had fled past, leaving the moonbeams pouring a flood of light
upon the fields and roadways; but this was soon followed by another
darkness, a cold rain, and rushing wind, the night being inclement and
very boisterous—not to say a night too bad to permit travelling.
It was late on such a night, when down a lone cross-road a single
horseman might be seen to ride slowly and carefully. He was wrapped
up in a large cloak, and rode a powerful horse, and appeared to be
somewhat tired.
There was much difficulty in travelling over a bad road, that was loose
and shifty, with here and there a slough of some magnitude.
In a very wild and desolate spot stood a mound of stones that had
been heaped at the foot of a gibbet, and had been collected there in
consequence of the unpopularity of the occupant of the instrument of
punishment.
On the gibbet, swinging to and fro, was the body of a malefactor,
hung in chains—an awful and disgusting spectacle—whose death no one
regretted, inasmuch as he was the terror of the whole neighbourhood.
It was the body of a highwayman, or of a robber, who had committed all
kinds of depredations, and several murders. He was the son of a person
of property, but addicted to vicious courses, and, to support them, he
had recourse to robbery and murder.
Several of his former friends were robbed, and at length his own father
fell by his hands, when he refused to give up his purse in the road at
this spot. His own son shot him through the heart.
This was the last crime he ever committed; for he was taken and tried,
when enough was proved that would have hung a hundred men; and there
was not one man who could, or who would, speak one word in his favour.
He was executed; and so detested was he by all, that every one who came
by this spot threw a stone, until it grew, by these means, a goodly
heap, which remained a memento of their hate.
It was this spot the stranger was nearing, and to which he appeared to
look up with some degree of either curiosity, or interest; but, before
he got there, there was another horseman riding along the country
lane, and who would arrive there about the same time as the first; but
when he came there, it was easy to perceive that he was not alone, but
another horseman was in waiting beneath some trees, and hidden from the
traveller.
In a few moments more, the traveller reached the spot, and, looking up
at the dead body that was swinging to and fro in the night air, the
other horseman rode up; upon which the traveller was about to push his
horse forward at an increased speed, when he found that there was not
space enough.
“Which side do you take?” he inquired of the stranger.
“Stand and deliver!” was the reply.
“That is uncivil,” replied the stranger, “and a request that I do not
feel at all disposed to consent to.”
“Deliver your money and a pocket-book, or you are a dead man.”
“Nay,” said the stranger; “I have means of defence, too.”
And, as he spoke, he pulled out a bright, double-barrelled pistol,
which he levelled and cocked, saying, as he very leisurely did so,—
“Beware! you are playing with a determined man. I am not disposed to
play. Get out of my way, or you are a dead man!”
“Ha, ha, ha!” laughed the other, and made way at the same moment, thus
bringing himself alongside the traveller, leaving him room to go on.
“You are not to be frightened—well, well, go on.”
The traveller put his spurs to his horse, but at the same moment
received a bullet from the treacherous highwayman.
“Ha!” cried the traveller, putting his hand to his side, and in a
moment more he staggered and fell over the side of the horse on to the
ground.
“Ha, ha, ha!” said the highwayman, who immediately dismounted; but
before he could search the body, the other horseman came up at a gallop.
“Well, Fred, have you quieted him?”
“I have.”
“Resisted, then?”
“Yes. Have you got your lantern?”
“Yes; but it is not yet lighted. But that is soon done.”
“Then let us have it as quick as you can; for he has fallen down here
in a slough, and I should like to get the money without more mire than
I am obliged to put up with.”
“Here it is,” said the other, handing the lantern—a small one, which he
had lighted by means of some chemical matches.
The highwayman took the lantern, and, after some examination, he
secured the pocketbook and the purse, and having done this, he examined
the fingers, but saw no rings and no watch, and he said to his
companion,—
“Just come here. Did you ever see such a set of features as these? They
are truly strange and singular; I could never forget them.”
“Indeed! I must have a look at them,” said his companion, dismounting
and bending over the body; and when he looked at them, he said,—
[Illustration: The highwaymen examine the traveller’s body.]
“I saw that man to-day where I dined, and thought he took the other
road, and there waited for him.”
“Did you, though?”
“Yes, till I was tired; and then I came across the country in search of
you, but did not expect you to have any quarry.”
“Did you ever see such a countenance? it is most strange and ghastly.”
“Yes, it is; but he has died a violent death, you see, and therefore
there is much to be done by way of allowance.”
“Yes, yes, I know all that; but the nose, mouth, and teeth——”
“They are not the most agreeable in the world, certainly. Well, well,
it don’t matter; you have done all your business with him, have you
not?”
“I have got all, I believe,” said the other. “He has no watch or
chain—not even a ring has he got on his finger.”
“Perhaps you’ll find enough in his purse and pocket-book to console
you; though I must say, Ned, that he dined very sparingly. But no
matter the amount; ride on, for you know it is not a good plan to stand
longer here than necessary; for we may have other riders down upon us.”
“Not very likely, on this road, and at this hour; but ’tis bad. I’m
off, and he will remain behind till found by some frightened peasant
or other, who will go to the nearest market town, with a frightful
account.”
“Ride away; I hear horses’ feet, I think.”
“I am ready; forward! ho!”
The two highwaymen rode off at a rapid rate, conversing as they went;
but yet it was in suppressed tones for some distance; and after some
riding, one of them pulled up his horse, partially, saying,—
“Well, I don’t think it wise we should thus wear our steeds out; there
is no need of our riding for life; our horses never ought to be put to
their mettle, unless there be plenty of occasion, which there is not.”
“No—all is right, to-night.”
“Have you done much lately, Ned?”
“No; I have been rather upon the seek than find; I have been looking
out brightly, but have not been successful.”
“I have myself only done moderately; but I have done better than I
should have done, because I was fortunate enough to come across a fat
grazier who had more money than any three or four persons I have met
lately.”
“Your fortune is somewhat like mine.”
“You have met with little good then, Ned.”
“Indeed, I have not; but it is a long lane that has no turning.”
“Yes; indeed, it is.”
“However, I hope this queer-looking customer will reward one for one’s
pains; if you can but keep the game a going, you are sure to succeed
in the end; ’tis only two years or better since I first began to ride.”
“That is, put a period to other people’s rising.”
“Exactly.”
“Well, then, where do you intend to put up for the night? for I suppose
you do not intend to stay out all night any more than myself.”
“No; I think of going on until I come to ‘The Golden Pippin,’ where
I intend to stay for the night. The landlord can wink hard at his
friends, and not know they are in the house, or he can tell them a
thing if they want to know anything at all to their interest.”
“He’s the sort of man; I know him. I was thinking of going there; I
don’t know better or snugger quarters than are to be had at his hostel.”
“Then we’ll have a good supper and a bottle at ‘The Golden Pippin.’”
“With all my heart; but you don’t think there’ll be any danger of our
being pursued for this matter.”
“Oh, dear, no; the direct road lies another way, and we shall be quite
fifteen miles from the spot where the body lies.”
“So far.”
“Yes; we have come over the ground very rapidly, and have gone more
than two-thirds of that distance. When we get there we shall be safe,
easy, and comfortable; and right good wines are there to be had at ‘The
Golden Pippin.’”
CHAPTER CLXXV.
THE HORRORS OF THE NIGHT.—THE DISCOVERY IN THE ROAD.—CONTENTION
BETWEEN MAN AND HORSE.—COMFORTABLE QUARTERS IN THE GOLDEN PIPPIN.
The malefactor’s body swung to and fro on the gibbet, and the chains
squeaked and groaned as the wind impelled the body’s motions. The wind
itself whistled heedlessly by, and the transient, but heavy shower
passed on, heedless of the deed of blood that had been perpetrated
beneath its monitory shadow.
Now and then there was a little light, and then the body might be seen
heaped up, and lying in the mud and mire, which was all discoloured
with the blood of the fallen man—he was motionless. The rain fell on
him, but it mattered not—the body felt it not. The wind blew the cloak
about, but the body remained quiet, and nothing appeared to spare the
body.
There was no one nigh; that was a lonely spot, and that was tenanted by
two dismal gypsies. The body of the malefactor swung to and fro while
the body of the murdered traveller lay quiet enough.
The clouds travelled across the face of the moon, and intercepted her
light from the earth; but yet it was light enough at intervals to
enable the traveller to see his way on foot, or on horseback.
About two hours after that in which the traveller had been stopped and
murdered, there came another individual riding towards the scene.
This was a countryman—a grazier, who was well-mounted, and came along
at a rapid rate, having a stout trotting nag under him.
When he neared the spot where the murder had been committed, he gave a
look up at the disagreeable object—the gibbet, and when he had done so,
he put the spur to his horse’s side, with the intention of going by at
a quickened pace, exclaiming as he did so,—
“This is no pleasant place at nine o’clock at night. I wish I were at
the Golden Pippin, instead of here.”
As he spoke, he pushed his horse, as he manifested a design to stop;
but the animal, instead of going past, reared up.
“Hilloa! brute. What art after now, eh?”
The spur was again applied, but the animal only became more and
more unmanageable, and the rider near losing his seat; but he was,
nevertheless, the more anxious to get onward, for the neighbourhood was
not pleasant; added to which, it was a wet and dismal night, and late
for a cross-road.
“Curse you!” muttered the grazier; “What the deuce is the matter with
you?—did you never see the gibbet before? If thee hadn’t, I should not
have been surprised at thee shying at the man swinging on the gibbet;
but thee hast done so, and now thee art frightened. Whoa! d—n thee.”
He made another attempt to force the horse by, but it was fruitless,
and he was at length unseated into the mire.
“D——n!” muttered the man; “the first time I have been thrown these ten
years, drunk or sober, and now I am sober.”
This was apparently the first reflection that came to his mind after
the first effect of the concussion; he then scratched his head,
adjusted his hat, and was getting up, when for a moment his eyes rested
on something dark lying in the middle of the road, and at which his
horse had in reality shied.
“Oh!” he exclaimed, with a visible alteration in his demeanour; “that’s
what Peg shied at, eh? What the devil is it?”
As he muttered these words, his hair began to stand on end; and the
more he looked, the greater his apprehension; for he began to think
what he wished was further from the fact, though his notions were far
from being definite, and he did all he could to dispel the rising
terror.
“Why—it ain’t—no, it can’t be—and yet it must be! What makes ’un lay
there—he must be dead, surely!”
Thrice he scrambled to his feet, and then walked a little towards the
object against which his horse stood smelling and snorting with evident
signs of fear.
“Woa, brute! What’s the matter with thee?—confound thee! But I suppose
thee wast frightened.”
As the man spoke, he walked up to the animal, and, taking the bridle,
he passed it over his arms, and then approached the body.
“Aye, sure enough, he’s insensible—if not dead, poor fellow! What can
be done—there’s no one near at hand to lend assistance?”
He paused to consider what was to be done, when it occurred to him
as being the most likely thing that could be done was to probe the
unfortunate man; he could not say whether he was dead or alive, from
his position in the middle of the road.
“If ’un ain’t dead,” he argued, “he would come to no harm; for it
wasn’t every horse that cared as much for a man as Peg did; they might
get run over, or cause some desperate accident.”
Having made up his mind what to do, he secured Peg, and turned his
attention to the body of the stranger, which had been left on its back,
with its face upwards, but the wind had blown the cloak over it, and it
was not seen by the grazier, who now essayed to move the body.
After some trouble, he succeeded in dragging him there, and propping
him up against the bank, upon which grew a stunted hedge, and, when
there, he opened the cloak, and looked upon the features of the dead
man.
“Well,” he muttered; “I never yet saw such a face! I am sure I can
never forget that. Of all the ill-looking thieves, he is the worst! but
much, I suppose, must be set off on the fact that he is a dead man, and
a murdered one, to boot.”
There was a strange markedness in the style of features in the dead
man, that gave no pleasing impression to the mind; it was one that
could not easily be forgotten, especially accompanied by all the
horrors of their place and circumstances.
“He has been shot, no doubt,” he muttered. “This must be all blood.
Aye! in the breast, or thereabouts. Oh! he is dead. Well, I’ll ride to
the Golden Pippin, and then I’ll give them notice of it.”
He was just about to turn and mount his horse, when the clouds parted,
and the moonbeams, for a few moments, came upon the body, without any
hindrance, and the grazier thought he saw a movement.
“It must have been gammon,” he muttered. “I’ll be off—I’m quite cold
and shivery here. I’ll go to the Golden Pippin, and get some good
cheer, for I’m terribly shaken. Eh! what was that? The devil!”
The latter exclamations were uttered in consequence of the figure
turning towards the moon’s rays, and then opening its eyes, which
had such an effect upon the unfortunate man, that he staggered back
terrified.
“Lord have mercy!” he ejaculated. “What’s—what’s that? He—he’s coming
to—hilloa, friend!—how are you?”
The figure turned his large motionless eyes upon the terrified man,
and they had such an effect upon him, that, despite all he could do
to rally himself, he sprang involuntarily to his horse’s back, and
galloped off furiously.
• • • • •
It was scarce an hour before this occurred, when the two highwaymen
rode up to the Golden Pippin.
“Hilloa! hilloa! ostler—here!” shouted one of them, and in a few
moments more the ostler came out, willing enough.
“Hilloa, Jem! you are sharp to-night. How is it you are not asleep?”
“I was just going to roost, master; but I shall have a job instead, I
can see.”
“You will; but not an empty handed affair, this time; take care of the
nags, and there’s a crown for you.”
“Thank you, master—you are always generous.”
“When I can, Jem; but what company have you in the house?”
“Little to speak of,” said the ostler; “about three or four people,
as lives about here; but nobody that I know—anybody or anything—only
people that have to earn their own living; they are in the kitchen.”
“Good fire?”
“Yes.”
“Then we will go there, too,” said the highwayman; “it’s a raw cold
night, and one in which a good supper and a good fire will do one good.”
The two highwaymen then entered the house, and walked into the kitchen,
which was a large room, with beams across the top, and a variety of
utensils proper to the place; but the grand feature was the large
fire-place, in which burned brightly some good logs, and threw a
glowing warmth and bright light over the whole apartment, in which,
however, was one candle, as if to be mocked by the light of the fire.
The use of this solitary wick was to enable the smokers to light their
pipes without stirring, and also to be taken away at a moment’s notice
for any purpose that might be needed.
The three guests turned their attention to the new comers, without,
however, exchanging one word, and the landlord himself arose.
“Oh, landlord,” said one of the highwaymen, “I’m glad you have a good
fire; ’tis one of the best things, after a cold ride, a man can have
met with.”
“Except a good hot supper, and a cup afterwards,” said his companion.
“All these are very good things in their way, gentlemen,” said the
landlord, emptying the ashes of his pipe out into the fire-place by
tapping the pipe on the toe of his shoe, and thus dropped the ashes out
of danger.
“You are right, landlord,” said the other.
“But I always, think, gentlemen,” said the landlord gravely, “that they
are always a great deal better when they can be had together—they are
better for their company’s sake—the one helps the other.”
“So they do.”
“Well, then, let us have them all, old cock, as soon as you please, for
we are both cold, tired, and hungry.”
“And they are the best accompaniments you can have as a preparatory for
all that is to follow.”
“Amen! and about it,” said the highwayman.
The two new guests sat themselves down in one quarter of the kitchen,
and near to a table facing the fire, where they could enjoy its genial
warmth, which they appeared to do with much gusto.
Having opened their coats, and taken off their shawls, removed their
hats, and sat down in a comfortable manner, they began to look about
them.
“Well, Ned, we have made a good exchange.”
“How do you mean?”
“Why, we have exchanged the road to comfortable quarters, which, you
will, at least, admit, is all the better.”
“Yes, much better; though I have ridden many a long and weary a night
before now, with the runners at my heels.”
“Ay—ay, so have I; but hush—say no more of that there. I have no idea
of letting these blacks suspect anything; they are what you call honest
men, and men who would give a clue in a moment, if they thought it was
wanted.”
“I dare say it is so, Ned; but what are you going to have for supper?”
“I don’t know. Landlord, what can we have for supper—anything hot?”
“Why,” said the landlord, “I can kill a couple of chickens and brander
them, or there is some chicken pie, and a cold ham.”
“Well, what do you say, Ned?”
“Can’t you make the chicken pie warm?”
“It is warm now,” said the landlord. “I can’t make it quite hot without
doing too much; ’tis uncommon good, and has not long been put by from
supper; it was made for supper, but there’s a good half left.”
“Eh? What do you say to chicken pie, Ned?”
“With all my heart; chicken pie let it be, then,” replied Ned.
“Well, then, landlord, put the chicken pie on, flanked by the ham—some
of your foaming October, you know.”
“Ay—ay, sir; some with a head on, that would take a blacksmith’s
bellows to blow off, it is so strong.”
“Ha—ha—ha! that’s the strike for us.”
The landlord now arose, and set about getting the necessary articles,
and spreading them upon a table before the two guests, who were nothing
loath to see the expedition that he had made to please them.
“I think,” said the landlord, “you will say you never eat such
chickens; they are my hatching, and have been well fed; they have been
well killed, cooked, and I hope, will be well eaten.”
“That is our part of the business, landlord; and if they are such as
you speak of, why, you may depend upon our doing our duty by them.”
“And the ham is my own breeding and curing.”
“Better and better,—and the October?”
“Why, I am just going to get that. What say you to a tankard?”
“Yes, a foaming tankard.”
“Yes, gentlemen, I will obtain what you want; it is in beautiful
condition, and when chilled, will give you a cream as thick as new
cheese; and as mild as new milk.
CHAPTER CLXXVI.
THE GRAZIER’S RELATION, AND HIS FIRST TERRORS.—THE EFFECTS OF GOOD
CHEER AND THE SUDDEN INTERRUPTION TO A PLEASANT PARTY.
The landlord was not long gone for the October; he came back with a
placid smile and a smacking of his lips, when he shut the door behind
him, and then deliberately placing the candlestick down, he said,
handing them the tankard,—
“There, gentlemen, if you find any better brewed than that in the three
adjoining counties, why, you may take measure for my coffin, for I
won’t live after I am told there is any so good anywhere else.”
“We will not take your word, landlord,” said one of the highwaymen,
putting the tankard to his lips, which act produced an approving nod
from the jolly landlord, who said, with much encouragement,—
“That’s right; never trust nobody; that’s my motto, and I chalks it up
over the fire-place, and acts upon it—try for yourself, and then you
won’t be deceived. What’s your opinion upon that now, sir?”
“Never drank its equal, even here.”
“I thought you’d say so; it comes out of a particular cask—one as I
puts by for myself; but you have ridden hard, and I thought a brew of
an extra strike would be an acceptable drink.”
“You are right. It is cold and very wet. I’m as tired as if I had
ridden far—the wind has blown me about so.”
“Ah, don’t you hear how it roars in the chimney?”
“So it does. What do you think of the brew, Ned—ain’t it first rate?”
“Indeed it is; I never had any equal to it. I tell you what, landlord,
it will make an excellent night-cap, for a man who has taken a glass or
two of this, would not be better able to keep his saddle.”
“No; it’s lucky we intend putting up for the night here; you have beds.”
“Yes, good, and well aired.”
“That is capital. Well, your chicken-pie is good, landlord, your ham
good, and the October excellent; and now——what’s that?”
At that moment there was a sound of horses’ feet galloping furiously
towards the houses; and they had not listened long before they came
close to the door, and then there was evidently a sudden pull up.
“Hilloa! what is that?” said his companion.
“I think it is somebody pulled up at the door,” said the landlord;
“whoever they are they have come in haste.”
The two highwaymen half rose, but a look at each other caused them to
resume their seats, and in another moment there was a loud shouting,
and a call for the ostler; but there was no one at hand.
“Where is that Jim got to—I must go and see after him, at all events—he
won’t come if I don’t.”
So saying, he walked away whilst the guests remained silent watching
the actions of the two highwaymen.
“It is but a single horseman,” said the first.
“No,” said the other; “but still he may be mischievous; and yet I can
hardly think he would venture here at such a time; besides, it can’t be
known; we are much better here than anywhere else.”
“I think so; we have nothing to fear.”
“Nothing.”
At that moment the landlord retired; and, at the same time, the door
was suddenly opened, and the grazier entered the kitchen. He glanced
around him, much confused. The fire and light, no doubt, had some share
in that; but he stared, and appeared terrified, and all splashed over.
“Where’s the ostler?” he cried out.
“Here I be,” said the worthy behind.
“Look after my horse; he is very hardly ridden. See to him, that’s a
good fellow,” said the grazier.
“Yes; I’ll see to ’un,” said Jem, who departed with the animal.
“Landlord—landlord!”
“Yes; here I am, Master Green—here am I!”
“Give me something strong; I’m half dead. I’m cold, and I’m frightened,
and that is the truth. Where’s the fire?”
“Why, Master Green, I never saw you in this state before. Give me your
hand, Master Green. I’ll show you the fire,” said the landlord, holding
out his hand to Green. “Why, you are cold—what has happened?”
“You shall hear—you shall hear,” said the half-terrified Green. “Only
give me a toss of brandy, and get me a supper, and then I shall be able
to tell you more about it. At present I can say nothing.”
“Well, that is pretty well for a man that can’t speak,” said the
landlord. “You are getting better, Mr. Green.”
“I hope I shall; the fire is comfortable.”
“Here’s some good brandy; take a gill, man. It won’t hurt you on such
an occasion as this. I have seen you do as much before; but, as for
supper, why I can’t say much. These two gentlemen have had the only
thing I had in the house, and, save the ham, I doubt much if there will
be any left.”
“If the gentlemen will join us, he is welcome to take a share of what
we have,” said one of the highwaymen. “Here will be enough for us all,
I dare say, sir, if you do not object to our company.”
“Thank you—thank you,” said Green. “I will accept of your offer gladly;
for I have had a long ride, and have had much that is uncomfortable to
put up with, to see and to fear. Lord have mercy on me say I!”
“Well, what is the matter, Mr. Green?”
“Why,” said Mr. Green, as he, between his words, poked in large
mouthfuls of food, and now and then washed it down by the aid of the
October. “You all of you know the highwayman’s corner, about fifteen
miles from here?”
“Yes,” said the landlord, “I know it well; there’s a chap hanging up in
chains there, now, at this present day, that is, if nobody hasn’t run
away with it, or it hasn’t been blown down.”
“Exactly. Well, that’s the spot; there’s been another dreadful murder
been done there. Oh! it was dreadful.”
“Well, did you see it?”
“Yes; I did.”
“What! the murder!” said both highwaymen at once.
“No; the body—I only saw the body.”
“Where was it lying?”
“Stop, stop a bit—not so fast,” said Mr. Green, who was eating very
fast indeed, but paused a moment. “You must not ask too many questions
at once, because I have one way of telling a tale, and you’ll spoil it.”
“Well, go on your own way.”
“Well, then, listen. I was coming along at a rattling pace, I can tell
you, for I was late, and tired, as it was. When I had reached the
gallows, I looked up at the body swinging in the wind, and creaking and
screaming on its rusty swivels; but I had scarcely done so, when my
horse shyed, and very nearly landed me in the mud, but I contrived to
keep my seat, though not without trouble.”
“What! at the dead man?” inquired one of the highwaymen.
“Aye,” replied his companion. “I am sure they ought not to put men up
there like scarecrows, to frighten horses with; for my part, I never
pass it but my horse snorts and bolts, and I am obliged to be wary.”
“I don’t know much about that. I have come by without my nag being any
the worse. At all events, I thought there was something in his shying
at the gallows, and I tried to push him by, but he would not go.”
“What did you do?”
“Why, I was obliged to get down,” said the grazier.
“Thrown?”
“No, no.”
“Forced to get down, you mean,” said the highwayman.
“Why, in some sort of way I did feel myself compelled to get down,
because the brute wouldn’t go a-head, and I saw something on the ground
as the clouds cleared away a little, and showed me that there was
something suspicious in the middle of the road, very much like a bundle
of clothes.”
“Indeed!” said the landlord, “what was it?”
“I’ll tell you, in course. Now, you see, I saw the animal would not
move, so I got off to see what was the matter.”
“Forced off,” added the highwayman.
“D—n it, man, what can it matter; then I got off,” said the grazier,
getting into a passion, and then, after a pause, which he employed
in taking a long pull at the October, and then wiping his lips, he
continued,—
“What is the matter now?” thought I; “so I went to the object, and
found it was a man rolled up in a cloak in the middle of the road,
dead.”
“Dead?”
“Aye, dead as a door nail.”
“Lor!” said the highwayman. “Why, then he must have been murdered, I
suppose?”
“You may take your davy of that,” said the grazier; “but I tried to
wake him up, but he was not to be disturbed, so I dragged him to the
bank, where I left him.”
“Where was he hurt?”
“Shot right in the side, or stabbed, I don’t know which, but that’s
where the blood came from, so I was sure he was dead; but when I
removed the cloak from his face, I saw he had as ugly a set of features
as a man can desire—a long, peculiar face, large, but thin nose, an
awkward set of teeth, with one or two projecting in front, and oh! such
eyes, that is when he opened them.”
“Opened them,” said the highwayman; “both?”
“Opened them,” repeated the landlord; “why, did you not tell me he was
dead?”
“Aye; but when the moonlight came upon him, he opened his eyes. Oh!
what eyes—why, they were like a pair of enormous great fish eyes—cod’s
eyes, that had become suddenly lighted up, or the moonlight reflected
back from the bottom of a new tin saucepan, and then you have ’em.”
“The devil,” said the highwayman; “and what did you do?”
“Why, I came away as fast as I could. I wasn’t to be done by a dead
man. I didn’t wait to see more than that. He turned round and stared at
me. He was so horrible, that I got upon my horse the best way I could,
and came on here as fast as the animal would come.”
“The body, I dare say, rolled over, and you thought it moved of itself.”
“I know better; besides, it opened its eyes.”
“The moon shone on them, and you thought he looked at you. You was
terror-stricken, and that is the truth of it.”
“Then I know better,” said the grazier, doggedly; “it ain’t anything of
the kind. I know it ain’t a matter that happens every day, and that’s
why you don’t believe it, and don’t understand it, but I know I’m
right.”
“House, here, house! ostler!” shouted a loud, authoritative voice
without the door of the inn, which caused them all to start and listen
for a repetition of the same sounds to prove that they were not
illusory.
CHAPTER CLXXVII.
THE MYSTERIOUS STRANGER’S ARRIVAL.—THE CONSTERNATION OF THE
GUESTS.—THE GRAZIER’S TERRORS, AND POWERS OF IDENTITY.—THE
LANDLORD’S DAUGHTER.
“Hilloa! house! house!” shouted the strange voice on the outside, but
in a tone that seemed unearthly; whether it were merely a fancy, or
reality, yet it had its effect, and the landlord sat staring vacantly
with his two hands resting on either knee, leaning forward as if he was
staring some imaginary object out of countenance.
“Well,” said one of the highwaymen, “ain’t anybody going to the door.”
No one answered, but Jem the ostler was hastening by another passage
to the door, and then they heard some confused speaking, as if the
stranger was giving some directions for the care of his horse.
The grazier was fixed in his attention to what was going on, and
appeared petrified, and held a morsel on the end of his fork, halfway
between his mouth and the plate, with his eyes directed towards the
door.
In a few moments more they heard the steps of some one approaching the
door, and one of the highwaymen said to his companion,—
“Ned, there are people late on the roads to-night.”
“Yes; it appears so, but it is very uncomfortable travelling; the night
is bad, and the roads no better. Who’s this, I wonder?”
“We shall now see,” said the other, but their backs were turned towards
the door, and they could not see who entered the door so well as the
grazier, who sat in the same attitude, without a motion or movement,
even to wink his eye, when the door opened, and in walked a tall man,
wrapped in a horseman’s cloak.
The expression of horror in the grazier’s face, and the swelling of his
eyes almost out of his head, at once showed them there was something
extraordinary, and they both mutually turned round, and to their
extreme terror they perceived the very man, or his double, they had
left dead upon the spot where the grazier had seen him.
[Illustration: The grazier and the highwaymen recognize the stranger.]
Neither were they alone surprised, for all present were able at once to
recognise the same man without any difficulty.
“It’s the same man—I’m d—d!” said the grazier, as if he had made an
effort to speak, and when he had so, he couldn’t help himself. “Oh,
Lord!—oh Lord! who would have thought it?—it’s—it’s the—the—what do ye
call it?”
“The devil,” suggested the landlord.
“No,” said the stranger, “no. I am merely a traveller, somewhat weary
and tired—do not disturb yourselves. I am cold—very cold—the fire will
do me good; it is a very cold night—the roads are bad very unsafe.”
“Very,” said one of the highwaymen, involuntarily.
“Did you speak?” inquired the stranger, suddenly turning to the
highwayman who had spoken with a look of such a peculiar character,
that he caused the bold roadster involuntarily to start; but he
suddenly recovered himself, and said,—
“I did.”
“What did you say, sir?”
“The same as you,” replied the highwayman.
The stranger made no reply to the highwayman, whose natural effrontery,
and the necessity he always had or presence of mind in circumstances
of peril, gave him a greater superiority than most men possessed under
such circumstances.
“I’m not well,” said the stranger.
“Perhaps you’ve ridden far.”
“I have,” replied the stranger. “Landlord, will you have the goodness
to let me have some supper; I am weary.”
“I have only the remains of the chicken-pie and some ham,” said the
landlord, looking back at the already referred-to chicken-pie, which,
thanks to its being made of great size, had already supped three hungry
men,—“and there is but little of that.”
“It is not much that I want—a small matter will suffice—a little ham,
and something warm, and then I will to-bed—’tis late.”
“Very well, sir,” said the landlord; “here’s some good October; will
you like that? or is there anything else? I have French spirits.”
“Then let me have some brandy.”
“Yes, sir, I’ll fetch my daughter down stairs,” said the landlord;
“she’s young, and her hand is steadier than mine. I shall upset the
bottle; my—my hand, you see, is always unsteady after I’ve drawn the
October; somehow or other I always get out of order.”
“What is the reason of that?” inquired the highwayman.
“Why, it’s so strong; I believe it’s nothing else whatever.”
As the landlord turned to go, he give another look at the guest, and
appeared greatly disturbed, and certainly thought him a strange and
unaccountable man; for he believed that he was in truth the very man
spoken of, who had been left for dead on the bank, near the foot of the
gallows.
“Mary,” said the landlord, when he had ascended half a dozen stairs,
which led out of the kitchen, “Mary.”
“Yes, father,” was the ready answer, in a clear, pleasing voice.
“I want you, my dear. Bring the brandy down—the French—the sealed
bottle; the other’s out; I took the last this morning before breakfast.”
“Ho! ho!” said the highwayman; “hark at our landlord, how early he must
begin—no wonder his hand shakes.”
“Ah!” said the landlord, as he came back with a wink; “when you have
been a father and an innkeeper as long as I have, you’ll do many things
you don’t now dream of; but, no matter, I ain’t as young as I used to
be.”
At that moment a very pretty and genteel girl, about eighteen,
descended the stairs with a spirit bottle in her hand, and advanced to
the table.
“How will you take it, sir?” inquired the landlord.
“Mixed.”
“Make a glass, my dear,” said the landlord.
“Is that your daughter?” inquired the stranger, fixing his eyes upon
her,—and they were such leaden eyes, that the girl shrank from him in
dismay.
“Yes,” said the landlord.
“Any more?”
“None,” replied the landlord, and then there was a pause of some
moments, during which the stranger watched the young girl’s motions
with a greedy jealousy, as if he feared to lose one movement, and in a
manner that especially annoyed the old landlord, who, however, could
say nothing, he having been quite cowed by the stranger’s superiority
in station and demeanour; besides which, there was something very
strange and peculiar, not to say superhuman, about him that gave
weight, and caused a kind of awe to pervade all present, and they
looked upon him as something fearful or terrible.
It was not long before the stranger ate his supper—it was soon done; he
ate but little, and, when that was done, he turned to the brandy and
water; but there appeared an air of compulsion, upon his part, as if
everything he took was taken under the feeling that it was absolutely
necessary to take something, which did not escape the discerning eyes
of all present, especially the landlord, who felt it a slight upon
himself and his cheer.
“If I had known you were coming here,” said the landlord, “I would
have got something ready for you, but, as it was, I had nothing but
‘pot-luck’ for you.”
“What is that?” inquired the stranger.—“What is that?—I never heard of
such a dish before. I am a stranger in these parts.”
“Oh, it only means you could have anything what is in the house.”
“It will do,” said the stranger, quietly.
“Will you have anything more that we have in the house?”
“Nothing. I came by the gibbet, not far from this place; and I met with
an accident there that has left me but little stomach.
“By gosh, I should think not,” muttered the grazier; “it would have
settled my stomach altogether, and anybody else’s.”
“Well,” muttered one of the highwaymen, “It would have left me no
stomach, save what would be in a fair way to become food for the worms.”
“What kind of accident was it, sir?”
“A terrible blow in the side; it seemed to go through me.”
“Well, well, I imagine there would be but little comfort in a man’s
bowels after he had anything go through his side.”
“It depends upon the constitution,” said the stranger quietly.
“The what?” inquired one of the highwaymen, incredulously.
“The constitution,” replied the stranger, quietly.
There was a pause for some minutes, during which the strangers
exchanged glances at each other, when one of the highwaymen said,—
“Perhaps a bullet put in your side might be no hindrance to your animal
economy, and would in the course of nature become digested.”
“Why, I dare say it would not hurt me so much as many; but it would
take me some little while to recover the shock, which would be great;
but I am unwell, and perhaps had better retire. Will the young female,
your daughter, act as my chamber-maid and show me my room?”
“Yes,” said the landlord, mechanically; “here, Mary, show the gentleman
into No. 6, and leave the light.”
“Good night,” said the stranger, rising, and walking away erect, but
slowly, from the group, who gazed after him with amazement.
“Good night, sir,” said the landlord, which was echoed by those
present; and, when the stranger was gone, there was a general release
in their conversation from the constraint which the presence of the
last comer occasioned.
“Well, what do you think of him, Mr. Green?” inquired the landlord.
“The very same man I saw on the bank at the gallows corner.”
“Are you sure?”
“Quite.”
There was a general pause, as if there was something for them all to
think over; and their thoughts appeared to be so unsatisfactory, that
those who lived close at hand left the house, and those that remained
there went to their respective beds, and in half an hour the house was
quite silent.
CHAPTER CLXXVIII.
THE MIDNIGHT CRY OF ALARM.—THE VAMPYRE’S MEAL.—THE CHASE ACROSS THE
FIELDS.—THE DEATH OF THE LANDLORD’S DAUGHTER.
The old inn was in a state of repose; its various parts were no longer
vexed by the busy tramp of men, the noisy voice of the toper, or the
untiring hands of the housewife, who does not spare any part of its
edifice from her ablutions. The brush and the broom are sad intruders
and disturbers, and yet they are in perpetual requisition. However, the
inhabitants were all steeped in slumber.
Among those who lay in that house, there was not one, except one,
indeed, who did not lie down to rest, and fall into a deep sleep; but
that one exception was the stranger, who appeared to have other views.
He threw himself into a chair, and there appeared to meditate upon the
clouds which passed across the sky, in endless variety of shape and
form. He sat motionless, and still his large, lustreless eyes were
fully opened, and he was gazing earnestly for nearly an hour without
motion.
At length, as if his attention was of itself wearying to continue so
long, he moved, then sighed deeply, or rather groaned.
“How long is this hated life to last?” he muttered. “When shall I cease
to be the loathsome creature I am?”
There was some reflection in this that was very bitter to him. He
shuddered, and buried his face in his hands, and remained in that state
for some minutes; but then he lifted his head up again, and turned
towards the moon’s rays, muttering,—
“But I am faint; I feel the want of my natural slumbers. Blood alone
will restore me my strength. There is no resisting the dreadful
appetite that goads me on. I must—I must—I will satisfy it.”
He arose suddenly, and drew himself up to his full height, and threw
aloft his arms, as he growled out these words with frantic energy; but
in a few seconds he became more calm, and said,—
“I saw the maiden enter the room next to mine. I can enter it by the
same door, for I have the key, and that will place her at my mercy.
Good fortune for once avail me, and then my wants will be satisfied.”
He walked softly to his own door, and undid it stealthily, and listened
for some minutes.
“They are all asleep,” he said—“all, save one. I alone walk through the
place. All are in peaceful slumbers, while I, like the creatures of
prey, seek those whom I may devour. I must on.”
He crept into the passage, and advanced to the door of the young girl,
who lay soundly sleeping in innocence and peace, little dreaming of the
fate that awaited her—much less did she think that the destroyer was so
close at hand.
She might, indeed, have dreamed that there was some one in the house
who was scarcely of her nature—one that was loathsome and dreadful—one
who, in fact, lived upon the blood of the innocent and fairest.
“She sleeps,” he muttered—“she sleeps!”
He listened again, and then he gently put the key into the door, and
found that it was not locked, and then, turning the handle, he found
there was some impediment to its opening; but of what character he
could not tell.
“’Tis unlucky; but this must be removed.”
He place his hand and foot close to the door, and pressed it gradually
and hardly against it, and he found that it gradually gave way, and
that the impediment gave by degrees, and that, too, with hardly any
noise.
“Fortune favours me,” he muttered; “she does not hear me. I shall win
the chamber, and shall, before she can wake up, seize upon the dear
life-stream that is no less precious to me than to herself.”
He now had succeeded in effecting an entrance into the room, and found
that it was only an easy chair that had been placed against the door,
because there was no other means of securing it, the key having
unaccountably disappeared, and left her without any other means of
securing her door.
“I will lock it,” he muttered; “if I be disturbed, I shall be better
able to escape, and I shall be safe. My meal will be undisturbed; at
least not before so much has been taken as will revive my strength.”
He now approached the bed, and with eager eyes devoured the fair form
of the youthful and innocent sleeper.
“How calm, and how unsuspicious she lies,” he muttered; “’twere a pity,
but I must, I must—there is no help.”
He leaned over her. He bent his head till his ear almost touched the
lips of the sleeper, as though he were listening to the breathing of
the young girl.
Something caused her to start. She opened her eyes, and endeavoured to
rise up, but she was immediately thrust back, and the vampire seized
her fair flesh with his fanged teeth, and having fleshed them, he was
drawing that life current from her which ensanguined them both.
Horror and fright for a moment deprived her of strength, or the power
of uttering a sound of any kind; but when she did do so, it was one
wild unearthly shriek, that was heard throughout the whole house, and
awakened every human being within it in a moment.
“Help! murder, murder!” she shrieked out, as soon as the first scream
subsided, and she regained breath.
These cries she uttered rapidly, as well as attempting a desperate
resistance to her persecutor; but she was growing gradually more and
more faint.
• • • • •
The landlord had just got out of an uncomfortable dream about some
strange adventure he was having with some excisemen when he was young,
when the heart-piercing shriek of Mary came upon him.
“God bless me,” he muttered, “what’s that? I never heard anything so
horrible in all my life. What can it be?”
He sat up in bed, and pulled his night-cap off, while he listened, when
he heard the cries of help issuing from his daughter’s room.
“Good God! it’s Mary,” he muttered, “What can be the matter?”
He did not pause a moment, but huddled on his clothes, and then rushed
out of his room with a light, to his daughter’s bedroom.
“What is the matter?” inquired one of the highwaymen, who had been
disturbed by the dreadful shriek.
“I don’t know; but—but help me.”
“Help you to what?”
“To burst open this door; ’tis my daughter’s room, and the noise comes
from that place. Hark!”
“Help, help!” said a faint voice.
“Damnation!” said the highwayman, “something’s wrong there; somebody’s
sucking; surely the stranger is not there?”
“Burst the door open.”
“Then lend a hand; it must give,” said Ned; and they all three made
a rush at the door, and in it went, for their weight carried it all
before them, and they all three went into the apartment without
any hindrance, for the frail lock gave immediately, and the other
impediment only served to add to the noise.
Though they went in easily, yet they did not do so quickly enough,
for they all rolled over each other, and before they could rise they
distinctly saw the figure of the stranger start up and rush out of the
room with Mary in his arms.
“Help! help! mercy!” she shrieked out.
“’Tis she,” said the landlord.
“Mary——”
“Yes, after her boys—after her; for Heaven’s sake, after her.”
“We will not leave her,” said the highwaymen in concert, and at the
same moment all three rushed after her.
“The stranger has made his way down into the kitchen, and I think he
has her with him,” said the landlord.
“I will after him,” said Ned; “I saw her in his arms. She was all over
blood. Good Heavens! what can he mean? does he want to murder her?”
“Help! help! murder!” shouted the girl, and at that moment they heard
the stranger attempting the kitchen door below. In a moment they all
three ran down stairs as fast as they could, to seize the villain
before he could escape; but they had hardly got into the kitchen before
they saw the door swing to after him.
“He’s gone,” said the landlord; “he’s gone.”
“We’ll after them; come on, never mind a chase; she’s in white, and the
moon’s up, so we shall have them in sight.”
“Away after them, lads; save my girl—save my Mary!”
Away they went with great speed, but the stranger somehow or other kept
ahead of them; his great height gave him an advantage in length of
stride; but then he bore the landlord’s daughter in his arms, which was
more than enough to balance their powers; for though she was not heavy,
comparatively speaking, yet she was heavy to be borne along in this
manner; but the stranger appeared to possess superhuman strength, and
moved along safely until they lost sight of him among some hay-stacks,
for which they made.
“There, he’s gone into Jackson’s rick-yard,” said the landlord; “get
up; push on; we may be yet in time to prevent mischief.”
The highwaymen ran hard; they had been out of breath for some time, and
could hardly move their feet, but they made a sudden effort, or spirt,
and away they ran, and, in less than a minute, came up to the rick-yard.
They rushed into the yard, and then beheld the stranger seated upon
some partially cut hay with the helpless maiden on his lap, but his
fanged teeth were fleshed in her fair neck, and he was exerting himself
in drawing the life stream from her veins.
As soon as he saw the highwaymen he arose, and the unfortunate girl
rolled to the earth, and he started up and fled, the highwaymen firing
a parting shot after him, with pretty good aim, yet it took no effect.
The landlord’s daughter was picked up warm, but lifeless. Whether it
was in consequence of her wound and loss of blood, which was doubted,
or from sheer fright, is not known, but the latter was considered most
probable.
CHAPTER CLXXIX.
THE HOTEL.—THE FASHIONABLE ARRIVAL.—THE YOUNG HEIRESS.
Can it be true, and if so, how horribly strange, that a being half
belonging to a world of spirits, should thus wander beneath the cold
moon and the earth, bringing dismay to the hearts of all upon whom his
strange malign influence is cast!
How frightful an existence is that of Varney the Vampyre!
There were some good points about the—man, we were going to say—and
yet we can hardly feel justified in bestowing upon him that
title,—considering the strange gift of renewable existence which was
his. If it were, as, indeed, it seemed to be the case, that bodily
decay in him was not the result of death, and that the rays “of the
cold chaste moon” were sufficient to revivify him, who shall say when
that process is to end? and who shall say that, walking the streets
of giant London at this day, there may not be some such existences?
Horrible thought that, perhaps seduced by the polished exterior of one
who seems a citizen of the world in the most extended signification of
the words, we should bring into our domestic circle a vampyre!
But yet it might be so. We have seen, however, that Varney was a man
of dignified courtesy and polished manners; that he had the rare and
beautiful gift of eloquence; and that, probably, gathering such vast
experience from his long intercourse with society—an intercourse which
had extended over so many years, he was able to adapt himself to the
tastes and the feelings of all persons, and so exercise over them that
charm of mind which caused him to have so dangerous a power.
At times, too, it would seem as if he regretted that fatal gift of
immortality, as if he would gladly have been more human, and lived
and died as those lived and died whom he saw around him. But being
compelled to fulfil the order of his being, he never had the courage
absolutely to take measures for his own destruction, a destruction
which should be final in consequence of depriving himself of all
opportunity of resuscitation.
Certainly the ingenuity of such a man might have devised some means of
putting such an end to his life, that, in the perishable fragments of
his body there should linger not one spark of that vitality which had
been so often again and again fanned into existence.
Probably some effort of that kind may yet be his end, and we shall see
that Varney the Vampyre will not, like the common run of the world’s
inhabitants, be changed into that dust of which is all humanity, but
will undergo some violent disruption, and be for ever blotted out from
the muster-roll of the living creatures that inhabit the great world.
But to cease speculating on such things, and to come to actual facts,
we will now turn over another leaf in the strange eventful history of
Varney the Vampyre.
• • • • •
One stormy, inclement evening in November, a travelling carriage,
draggled with mud, and dripping with moisture, was driven up to
the door of the London Hotel, which was an establishment not of
the very first fashion, but of great respectability, situated then
in Burlington-street, close to Old Bond-street, then the parade of
fashion, and, as some thought, elegance; although we of the present
day would look with risibility upon the costumes that were the vogue,
although the period were but fifty years ago; but fifty years effect
strange mutations and revolutions in dress, manners, and even in modes
of thought.
The equipage, if not of the most dashing character, was still of
sufficiently aristocratic pretensions to produce a considerable
bustle in the hotel; and the landlord, after seeing that there was a
coronet upon of the panels of the carriage door, thought it worth his
while personally to welcome the guests who had done him the honour of
selecting his house.
These guests consisted of an oldish man and woman, a young man of
frivolous and foppish exterior, of about twenty-two years of age, and
a young lady, who was so covered up in a multitude of shawls, that but
little of her face could be seen; but that little was sufficient to
stamp her at once as most beautiful.
The whole party evidently paid great court to this young lady, but
whether they did so from affection, or from some more interested
motive, it would not be proper just now to say, as those facts will
come out before we have proceeded far in this little episode.
“Mind how you step, Annette,” said the old gentleman, as the young lady
descended the carriage. “Mind how you step, my dear.”
“Oh! yes, yes,” said the old lady, who was not so very old either,
although entering upon the shady side of fifty. “Yes. Oh! mind my dear,
how you get out.”
The young lady made no reply to all these kind injunctions, but pushing
aside the proffered arm of the younger gentleman, she tripped into the
hotel unaided.
The old lady instantly followed her.
“Now, Francis,” said the old gentleman to the servant, who got down
from the rumble of the travelling carriage. “Now, Francis, you
perfectly recollect, I hope, what my brother, Lord Lake, said to you?”
“Yes, sir,” said Francis, but there was not the most respectful
intonation in the world in the voice with which he returned the
affirmative.
“You remember,” continued the old gentleman; “you remember, Francis,
that my brother told you, you were to wait upon us just the same as
upon himself, with the carriage.”
“Oh, yes.”
“Oh, yes! what do you mean by saying ‘oh, yes!’ to me?”
“Do you want me to say, ‘oh, no?’”
“Francis, this won’t do. You are discharged.”
“That for you, and the discharge, too,” said Francis, as he snapped his
fingers in the face of the old gentleman. “I never meant to serve you,
Mister Lake; I’m Lord Lake’s groom, but I ain’t a going to be turned
over to a canting fellow like you, so you have only took the words out
of my mouth, for I meant to discharge myself, and so will George. I
say, George.”
“Yes,” replied the coachman; “what is it?”
“Are we going to be at the beck and call of Jonathan Lake?”
“See him d—-d first,” was the laconic reply of the coachman.
“Now, Mister Lake,” added Francis, “you knows what we thinks of you.
You is a humbug. We only came so far, because we wouldn’t put Miss
Annette, our young lady, to the inconvenience of a postchaise, while
my lord, her father’s carriage here, was so much more comfortable. We
shall take that to the coachmaker’s, where my lord’s other carriages
are standing, till he comes to England, and then you won’t see us no
more.”
“You rascals!”
“Oh, go on. You’re a humbug; ain’t he, George?”
“Oh, a _riglar_ one—a _numbug_ he is,” aid the coachman; “and what’s
more, we don’t believe a word of all what’s been a going on. Lady
Annette is Lady Annette, bless her sweet eyes. Come on, Francis, I’m
wet.”
“And I’m damp,” said Francis, as he shook himself, and made as much
splashing round him as a great Newfoundland dog, who has just had a
bath. “I’m ready now, mister, and you knows our minds, and we ain’t the
sort of folks to alter ’em. We serves our master; but we doesn’t serve
a humbug.”
Some of the waiters at the hotel had come to the door to hear this
rather curious colloquy, and not a little surprised were they at it. At
all events, whatever other effect it had upon them, it did not increase
their respect for the new arrivals, and one of them, named Slop, ran
after the carriage, and called out to Francis,—
“I say—I say!”
“Well, what?”
“I say, young fellow, just tell me where you will be staying, and I’ll
come and see you, and stand a glass.”
Francis leant over the roof of the carriage, and said,—
“George—George!”
“Here ye _air_,” said George.
“Here’s one o’ the waiters at the hotel wants to make an acquaintance.
It won’t be a bad thing to know him, as you see he can tell us all
about Lady Annette, and what the ladies are doing. What do you say to
it, George?”
“A good idea, Francis.”
“Very well. Hilloa! what’s your name, old fellow?”
“Slop—Solomon Slop, they calls me.”
“Well, if you come any evening to the King’s Head, in Welbeck-street,
you’ll find either me or George; and we always likes good company,
and shall be very glad to see you whenever you like. Suppose you say
to-morrow?”
“I will,—I will; to-morrow I can come easily at eight o’clock, so you
may expect me. Good night.”
“Good night, Slop. Pleasant evening, ain’t it? Drive on, George; I
shall be in a ague presently; drive on, good luck to you, and let’s get
a change of things, whatever you do. I never was so wet, I do think, in
all my life.”
“Nor me, nor me,” said George, who it will be perceived was not very
particular about his grammar; but that didn’t matter much. He was paid
for a knowledge of horses, not of moods, tenses, and cases.
Leaving the servants, then, of Lord Lake, as they had announced
themselves to be, let us return to the hotel, where the family party
had by this time got into comfortable enough quarters.
As far as the landlord of that establishment was concerned, Mr. Lake
had won him over completely, by ordering the best rooms, a supper, as
good as the house could afford, regardless of price; the best wines,
and altogether showed a right royal disposition as regarded expenditure.
But the waiters, who had often found by experience that the most
extravagant people were not the most liberal to them, did not forget
what had passed at the door, and many a whispered surmise passed from
one to the other regarding the circumstances that had induced the
coachman and groom to treat the family so very cavalierly, and so
obstinately to decline serving them.
When Slop returned, he got some of his companions round him in the hall.
“I shall know all about it,” he said; “I’m to go and take a glass with
them to-morrow night, at the King’s Head, in Welbeck-street, and you
see if they don’t tell me what it’s all about. I wouldn’t miss knowing
for a trifle.”
“Nor me—nor me.”
“Well, I’ll of course tell you all when I come back. You may depend
upon it it’s something worth knowing. Have you seen the young lady any
of you. I caught just a look of one eye, and the end of her nose, and I
should say she’s a out-and-outer, and no mistake.”
CHAPTER CLXXX.
THE SECOND ARRIVAL AT THE LONDON HOTEL.—THE MYSTERIOUS GUEST.
Scarcely had the bustle of the arrival we have noticed subsided at
the London Hotel, when another travelling chariot dashed up to the
door, and the landlord made a rush out to welcome his new arrival,
considering himself quite in luck to have two such customers in one
evening.
A gentleman, on whose head was a fur travelling cap, was at one of the
windows of this carriage, and he called to the landlord, saying,—
“Are your best rooms occupied?”
“Not the best, sir,” was the reply, “for we have several suites of
apartments in all respects equal to each other; but we have a family
just arrived in one suite. The Lake family, sir.”
“Well, it don’t matter to me who you have; I will get out if you can
accommodate me.”
“Oh, certainly, sir; you will find here accommodation of the very first
character, I can assure you, sir. Pray, sir, alight. Allow me, sir, to
hold an umbrella over you. It’s a bad night, sir; I’m afraid the winter
is setting in very strangely, sir, and prophetically of——”
“Silence. I don’t want your opinion of the matter. If there’s one thing
I dislike more than another, it’s a chattering man.”
This rebuff silenced the landlord, who said not another word,
although probably he thought the more; and those thoughts were not
of a very kindly character as regarded the stranger, who had so very
unceremoniously stopped his amiable remarks.
Indeed, when he got into the hall, he consigned the new comer to the
care of the head waiter, and retired to his own apartment in great
dudgeon.
“I hope everything is quiet here,” said the stranger to the head waiter.
“Oh, dear, yes, sir; the house is as quiet as a lamb, sir, I can
assure you. We have only three inmates at present, sir. There’s the
Lakes,—highly respectable people, sir. A brother of Lord Lakes, sir, I
believe, and the——”
“I don’t want to hear who you have. What the devil is it to me? If
there’s anything I dislike more than another, it’s a d—d magpie of a
waiter.”
The head waiter was terribly offended, and said not another word, so
that the gentleman was left in the sole occupation of his apartments,
and then to fling himself upon a couch.
“Ah, ah! God knows how it will all end. Well, well, we shall see, we
shall see. They have arrived, and that’s one comfort; I am now, then,
I think so well made up, that they will not readily know me. Oh, no,
no, I should hardly know myself, now, shaven clean as I am, after being
accustomed on the continent, to wear beard and moustache. Well, well,
we shall see, how it will all end. Thank the fates, they have not gone
somewhere where I could not find them.” He rung the bell.
“Waiter, let me have the best the house affords, will you? and remember
my name is Blue.”
“Sir! Bl—Blue, sir?”
“Yes, Diggory Blue.”
“Yes, sir,—yes sir. Certainly. What an odd name,” soliloquised the
waiter, as he went down stairs to tell his master. “I say sir, the gent
in No. 10 and 11 says his name is Diggory Blue.”
“Blue, Blue,” said the landlord, “it is an odd name for a Christian.”
“Perhaps he ain’t a Christian,” said the very identical Mr. Blue
himself, popping his head over the bar in which the little discourse
was going on, between the landlord and the waiter. “How do you know
he’s a Christian?”
“I beg your pardon, sir, really I—I—a-hem! a thousand pardons sir.”
“Pshaw!”
The strange gentleman went to the door, and gave some directions to the
servants belonging to his carriage, which sent them away, and then Mr.
Blue started up into his rooms again, without saying another word to
the landlord, who was terribly annoyed at being caught canvassing the
name of one of his guests, with one of his waiters.
“Confound him,” he muttered, “he has no business to have such a name
as Blue and good God! if his surname was Blue, what the devil made his
godfathers and godmothers call him Diggory? Sam, Sam!”
“Yes, sir.”
“Put down in the book, Diggory Blue.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Bless us! why there’s somebody else as I’m a sinner.” The landlord
could not have sworn by a better oath.
He ran to the door, and there beheld another travelling carriage,
out of which stepped a gentlemanly looking man enveloped in a rich
travelling cloak lined with fur.
“Can you accommodate us?” he said.
“Yes, sir, with pleasure.”
“Who have you here, landlord?”
“A family named Lake, sir, and a Mr.—a—a—Blue, sir.”
“Quiet people I dare say, I shall most likely remain with you a week or
two. Let me have the best apartments you have unoccupied at present.”
“Yes, sir. This way if you please, sir—this way.”
The last arrival seemed to be in bad health, for he walked very slowly,
like a man suffering from great bodily exhaustion, and more than once
he paused as he followed the landlord up the principal staircase of the
hotel, as if it were absolutely necessary he should do so to recover
breath, and moreover the landlord heard him sigh deeply, but whether
that was from mental or physical distress he had no means of knowing.
His curiosity, however, was much excited by the gentleman, and his
sympathies likewise, for he was the reverse of Mr. Blue, and listened
with a refined and gentlemanly courtesy to whatever was said to him by
any one apparently, although it was evidently an effort to speak, so
weak and ill did he seem to be.
“I am sorry, sir,” said the landlord, when he had shewn the gentleman
into his rooms, “I am sorry sir, you don’t seem well.
“I am rather an invalid, but I dare say I shall soon be better, thank
you—thank you. One candle only, I dislike too much light; charge for as
many as you please, but never let me have but one, landlord.”
“As you please, sir, as you please; I hope you will make yourself
comfortable here, and I can assure you, sir, that nothing shall be
wanting on my part to make you so.”
“I am sure of that, landlord; you are very good, thank you.”
“What name shall I say, sir, in case any gentleman should call to see
you, sir?”
“Black.”
“Black, sir!”—“Black.”—“Oh, Mr. Black!—Yes, sir, certainly, why not?
Oh, of course. I—only thought it a little odd, you see, sir, because we
have a gentleman already in the house called Blue. That was all, sir.
Mr. Black, thank you, sir.”
The landlord bowed himself out, and Mr. Black inclined his head with
the look of a condescending emperor, so that when the landlord got down
stairs, he said to his wife,—
“Now that _is_ a gentleman. He listens to all you have got to say, like
a gentleman, and don’t snap you up as that Mr. Blue did. Mr. Black, it
is quite clear to me, is a man of the world, and a perfect gentleman.
Hilloa, what’s that? Eh? What! why it’s Mr. Black’s bell, and he must
have almost broken the wire. Sam, Sam! run up to 8, and see what’s
wanted.”
Sam did run up to 8, and when he got there, he found Mr. Black lying
upon the floor in a fainting fit, and wholly insensible.
The alarmed waiter ran down stairs to his master with the news, and
the nearest medical man was sent for, but with as little parade as
possible, for the hotel-keeper did not wish to alarm all his other
guests with the news of the fact that there was a sick person in the
house, which he knew was not pleasing to many persons, and might induce
them to change their quarters.
When the medical man came, he was shown up stairs at once, when Mr.
Black had been lifted on to a sofa, where he lay without any signs of
consciousness at all, much to the horror of the landlord, who began to
think he was dead, and that there would be all the disagreeableness of
having a corpse in his house.
The surgeon felt the pulse and the heart, and then he said,—
“He is in a swoon, but he must be in a desperately weak state.”
“He looks it, don’t he, sir?”
“He does indeed. How dreadfully emaciated he is!”
By dint of great exertion and the use of stimulants, the surgeon
succeeded in restoring Mr. Black to consciousness, and when he was so
restored, he looked around him with that strange vacant expression
which a man wears who has newly come out of a trance and whose memory
is in a state of abeyance.
“Well, sir, how are you now?” said the surgeon.
He made no reply.
“I should advise that he be put to bed, landlord,” added the medical
man, “and something of a warm nourishing quality given to him. I will
send him some medicine.”
Mr. Black now made an effort to speak, and his memory seemed to have
come back to him as he said,
“I fear I have been a deal of trouble, but the fatigue of travelling
fast—it is that has unnerved me—I shall be much better to-morrow. Thank
you all.”
“I will call to morrow” said the surgeon, “and see how you get on, if
you please.”
“I shall be much obliged; I feel myself quite strong enough to retire
for the night without assistance, thank you.”
He made no opposition to the landlord sending him up by Sam some
spiced wine, and when it came, he said,—
“I hope no one sleeps near me who will come in late and disturb me, as
I require a full and clear night’s repose.”
“Oh no, sir,” said Sam, “it’s a young lady sir, as belongs to the Lake
family sleeps in the next room but one to you, that is to say, No. 9.
The very next room ain’t occupied at all, sir, to-night, so you will be
as quiet as if you was in a church, sir.”
“Thank you, thank you, good night, Samuel.”
CHAPTER CLXXXI.
THE NIGHT ALARM.—A SCENE OF CONFUSION.—MR. BLUE SUSPECTED.
It is midnight, and the landlord of the hotel suddenly springs out of
bed on to the floor as if he had been galvanised, carrying with him all
the bed-clothes and leaving his wife shivering.
“Good gracious! what was that?” he cried.
And well he might, for the repose of the whole house was broken in upon
by two loud shrieks, such as had never before sounded within those
walls, and then all was still as the grave.
“Murder! murder!” shouted the landlady, “somebody has stolen all the
bed-clothes.”
“Bother the bed-clothes” cried the landlord, as he hurried on his
apparel by the dim light of a night lamp that was burning on the
dressing table. “There’s something wrong in the house, or else I have
had one of the strangest dreams that ever anybody had, and one of the
most likely reality too. Did you hear them?”
“Oh, those horrid screams!”
“It’s not a dream then, for two people don’t dream the same thing at
the same moment of time that’s quite clear. Hark—hark! what’s that,
what a banging of doors to be sure. Who’s there? Who’s there? Wait a
bit.”
The landlord lifted the night bolt of his bed room, and then there
dashed into the room in only one garment, which fluttered in the
breeze, no other than the young man who had come with the ladies. He
made but one spring into the landlord’s bed, crying,—
“Oh! take care of me. Oh, save me! There’s thieves or something and I
shall be hurt. Oh, save me, save me, I can’t fight, I never did, spare
my life, oh, spare my life.”
“Oh, the wretch!” shrieked the landlady, and the landlord, justly
enough enraged at that intrusion, seized upon the intruder and shot
him out of the room _vi et armis_, and that with such force too that
he rolled all the way down the stairs, upsetting Sam who was rushing
up with a lantern, it having been his turn to sit up all night, as one
of the establishment always did, in case of fire or anything happening
which might make it necessary to arouse the inmates of the house.
The landlord, however, had completed enough of his toilette to enable
him to make a decent appearance; so out he sallied, having lit a
candle, and the first person he met upon the landing was Mr. Blue,
fully dressed and with a pistol in his hand.
“Good God, sir,” cried the landlord, “what is it all about, what has
happened sir?”
“I cannot tell you, and am as anxious as you can be to know. This way,
this way. It was the young lady who screamed. For God’s sake, lend me a
light!”
The landlord resigned his light mechanically, and he saw to his
surprise, that there was a black patch now over one of Mr. Blue’s eyes,
and he thought his face was painted. At all events, he was so much
disguised that it was only by his voice that the landlord knew him.
Before however, they either of them got across the corridor to the door
of the young lady’s room, Mr. and Mrs. Lake half-dressed, made their
appearance, both eagerly inquiring what was the matter.
“I don’t know,” said the landlord, “I only heard a scream.”
“Which came from the apartment of that young lady,” said Mr. Blue.
“What young lady?” said Mr. Lake sharply. “It’s rather odd that you,
a stranger, should know so precisely which was the apartment of that
young lady. Mrs. Lake go in and see if anything be the matter with
Annetta; I hope to Heaven, nothing is amiss with her.”
Mr. Lake looked suspiciously at Mr. Blue, and so did the landlord,
for when Mr. Blue had spoken in the presence of the Lakes, his voice
was completely altered, so that the landlord no longer could have
recognised him by it, and he was more puzzled than ever.
“Oh! come in, come in, Mr. Lake,” cried Mrs. Lake, appearing at the
door of Annetta’s room, “she is dead.”
“Dead!” cried Mr. Blue with a shout, “Oh! no, no, no!”
He dashed past Mr. Lake, the landlord, and Mrs. Lake, and was in the
room in a moment. They went after him as soon as they had recovered
sufficiently from their surprise to do so, and they saw him with his
hands clasped and bending over the form of the beautiful young girl as
she lay in bed.
“No, no, no,” he said, “she is not dead. She has fainted. God knows
what the cause may be, but she is not dead. Thank Heaven!”
He turned from the bedside, and without saying another word to the
parties present, he walked away to his own room, and left them staring
at each other in surprise. The young lady now opened her eyes, and
looked wildly about her for a few moments, and then she spoke quickly,
“Oh, help! help! help! away, away. Oh, horror—horror—horror!”
“Annetta, my dear Annetta,” said Mrs. Lake, “what is this? Pray, sir,
retire,” to the landlord. “My dear Annetta, what has alarmed you? My
dear, go away, Mr. Lake. I will let you know all about it. It’s a
mystery to me at present. Go away, I’ll be back soon.”
Mr. Lake left the room, and in the corridor he found the landlord, who
was looking as bewildered as any mortal man could well look, for he
could make neither head nor tail of the whole affair.
“Landlord,” said Mr. Lake, “who is that party who behaved so strangely
just now?”
“His name is Blue, sir.”
“Blue—Blue. An odd name, and an odd man. Where can I have seen him
before. Just as he cried out, and went into the room, I thought there
was a something in his voice that came familiarly to my ears, and yet
I don’t know him; I suspect landlord, that he has had more to do with
this midnight disturbance than he would care to own.”
“Well, sir, I don’t know,” said the landlord, whose interest it was not
to disoblige, or throw suspicion upon any of his guests. “It really
ain’t very likely, sir. I should say the young lady has had a bad
dream, sir, and that’s almost all that can be said about it.”
“It may be so.”
“You may depend that’s what it will turn out to be, sir.”
“I hope so, I hope so. These things are not at all pleasant, and
if anything of the kind should happen again we should have to quit
directly, you know, but I can say nothing now about it until I have
heard from Mrs. Lake what account Annetta gives of the affair. That
alone must guide us in the whole business. In the morning we will talk
about it, sir.”
There was a great deal of austerity in the manner of Mr. Lake; indeed
he might well enough be excused for not being over pleased at what had
taken place, and as for Mr. Blue there certainly was sufficient in his
behaviour to induce a large amount of suspicion, that he was in some
way connected with the affair. Moreover the efforts he evidently made
in the way of disguise were extremely suspicious in themselves. He
evidently had a something to conceal, and when the landlord was now
left alone in the corridor, he was strongly induced to make one of his
first acts in the morning a notice to Mr. Blue, that he would much
prefer his room to his company at the London Hotel.
And then it all of a sudden came into the landlord’s head, how poor Mr.
Black must have been distressed at what had taken place; for Sam had
told him what Mr. Black had said about wishing to sleep quietly, so
that he felt quite a pang at the idea of so civil a gentleman having
been so awfully disturbed, as he must have been, and he had no doubt
but that in the morning he would go away.
“I wonder if he is awake?” thought the landlord; “if I could but make
some sort of apology to him to-night, and soothe him, all might be
well. I’ll first go and listen at his door; it may be that he really
wants something, and if so perhaps it would look attentive to knock and
see him; I think I will. It’s quite out of the question that he should
have slept in the middle of all this riot.”
He approached Mr. Black’s door, and listened.
All was still as the very grave.
“What a horrid thing it would be if the shock, in his weak state, has
been the death of him!” thought the landlord, and the very idea made
him quake again.
After a few moments passed in this state of painful thought, he found
that it would be quite out of the question for him to go to his own
room again, without ascertaining how Mr. Black was, and accordingly
he knocked at the door, first gently and then louder, and then louder
still, but received no answer.
“Oh, this won’t do, I must get in somehow,” thought the landlord.
He tried the handle, and found in a moment that the door was not
fast; a light was burning on the side of the table which was close
to the bed, and there lay Mr. Black fast asleep, and looking so calm
and serene, although he was an ugly man, that the landlord was truly
astonished to see him.
“Well,” he said, “that’s what I call sound sleeping, at all events.
It’s a mercy however. Oh lor! he’s going to awake.”
Mr. Black opened his eyes, and looked up.
“I beg your pardon, sir,” said the landlord, “I earnestly beg your
pardon, but as there had been a little noise in the house I came to
see, first, if you had been disturbed, an then if you wanted anything,
sir.”
“No, no, thank you. Has there been a noise, do you say.”
“A—a little, sir.”
“Well, I was fast asleep and did not hear it. However, I do sleep so
sound that I think a cannon going off at my ear would hardly awaken me.
I am much obliged however for your attention, landlord.”
“Can’t I get you anything, sir?”
“Nothing until the morning, thank you.”
“Thank you sir, good night sir, good night.”—“Well,” said the landlord,
as, finding all quiet, he took his way now back to his own room, “well,
he is a gentleman, every inch of him, that he is. How very mild and
polite.—He hasn’t been disturbed, well that’s a comfort.”
CHAPTER CLXXXII.
THE WAITER TELLS THE STORY OF THE LAKES’ DISTURBANCE TO GEORGE AND
FRANCIS.
Nothing further occurred during the night to cause any alarm to the
inmates of the London Hotel, but we may as well give Miss Annetta’s
account of the night’s transaction; an account which she gave to Mrs.
Lake at the time, and which soon spread all over the hotel, with, no
doubt, many additions and embellishments as it was carried.
She said, that having retired to rest, she, being fatigued by her
journey, soon dropped off asleep. That she, to the best of her belief,
fastened her room door, although she certainly could not absolutely
swear to having done so, she was so very weary. She did not know how
long she had slept, but she had a frightful dream, in which she thought
she was pursued by wolves who ran after her through a large tract of
country until she took shelter in a wood, and then all the wolves left
her and abandoned the pursuit, except one, and that one caught her and
fastened his fangs in her throat just as she sunk down exhausted upon a
great heap of dried leaves that came in her way in the forest.
She then went on to say that in the agony of her dream she actually
awoke at that moment, and saw a human face close to her, and that _a
man had his mouth close to her neck, and was sucking her blood_.
It was then that she uttered the two screams which had so alarmed the
whole house; and then she stated that the vampire, for such she named
the apparition, left her and she fainted away.
Now this story so far as it went, might all be very well accounted for
by being called a dream, and the change from a wolf to a man might
be but one of those fantastic changes that our sleeping visions so
frequently undergo, but—and in this case this was a serious but—but
_she showed upon her neck the marks of two teeth_, and there was a
small wound on which even in the morning was a little portion of
coagulated blood.
This staggered everybody, as well it might, and the whole hotel was
in a state of confusion. Mr. Blue kept his room. Mr. Black got up and
declared that he was much better than the day before, attributing his
indisposition to bodily fatigue; and the Lakes were in a state of
consternation difficult to describe.
The landlord, too, was nearly out of his senses at the idea of a
vampire being in his house, and a grand consultation was held in the
bar parlour between him, Mr. and Mrs. Lake, and Mr. Black, who was
asked if he would step down and give his opinion, which compliment was
paid to him on account of his being such a gentlemanly and quiet man.
They took it in turns to speak, and the landlord had the first say.
“Gentlemen,” he said, “and you madam, you can easily conceive how
grieved I am about what has taken place, and I can only say that
anything in the world that I can do to find out all about it, I will do
with the greatest possible pleasure. Command me in any way, but—but if
I have a suspicion of anybody in this house, it is of that Mr. Blue.”
“And I too,” said Mrs. Lake.
“I don’t know what to say further,” remarked Mr. Lake, “than that my
suspicions of some foul play on the part of Mr. Blue, are so strong,
that if he is not turned out of the Hotel, we will leave to-night.”
“That’s conclusive,” said the landlord. “But if you Mr. Black, would
favour us with your opinion, I’m sure, sir, we should be all much
obliged.”
“I am afraid,” said Mr. Black in his quiet, gentlemanly way, “that my
opinion will be of very little importance, as I know nothing of the
whole affair, but just what I have heard from one and another; I slept
all the while it appears. But there is one circumstance that certainly
to me is an unpleasant and a suspicious one, and that is that Mr. Blue,
as he calls himself, was up and dressed, and that, with the exception
of your night-watchman, he was the only person in the hotel who was so.”
“That’s a fact,” said the landlord, “I met him.”
“Then that settles the business,” said Mr. Lake, “send him away. God
knows if there be such things as vampires or not, but at all events,
the suspicion is horrid, so you had better get rid of him at once.”
“I will—I will.”
“Stop,” said Mr. Black. “Before you do so, is it not worth while to
make some effort to come at the precise truth, and that in my opinion,
would be very desirable indeed.”
“It would—it would,” said Mr. Lake, “you must understand, sir, that
the young lady is especially under my care, and in fact I esteem her
greatly—very greatly I may say, for a variety of reasons, and therefore
anything that I can do, which may have the effect of securing her peace
of mind and happiness will be to me a sacred purpose.”
“Then I should recommend,” said Mr. Black, “that this lady and your
wife, landlord, keep watch in the young lady’s chamber to-night.”
“Oh, I couldn’t—I couldn’t,” said the landlady.
“Nor I,” replied Mrs. Lake, “nor I, I’m sure, I cannot think of such a
thing, I could not do it, I should faint away from terror.
“And so should I,” cried the landlady. “I feel quite ill even now at
the thought of the thing.”
“Then I can say no more, ladies. Of course, gentlemen cannot very well,
unless they are very near relatives, undertake such a job. I tell you
what we can do, though; suppose we watch in the corridor, you and I,
Mr. Lake, and leaving the door of the young lady’s chamber just closed
we shall hear if there be any alarm given from within and effectually
secure her from intrusion without. What say you to this, as a plan of
proceedings? There is your son too, might keep watch with us.”
“I’m afraid he is too nervous.”
“Yes,” said the landlord, “and he might pop into my bed again, as he
did last night in his fright. Oh don’t have him gentlemen, I beg of
you. I would go myself, but I am so sleepy always, that I never can
keep my eyes open after twelve o’clock. Not that I am at all afraid of
anything, but its downright sleepiness you see, gentlemen. I am on my
feet all day, and—and so you see I’d rather not on the whole.”
“I am willing,” said Mr. Black.
“Sir,” said Mr. Lake, “I am quite ashamed of giving you so much
trouble, but I can only say that I shall be very much obliged indeed,
by your company, and I do hope that we shall have the pleasure of
catching Mr. Blue if he be guilty.”
“Or acquitting him if innocent,” added Mr. Black. “Let us be just
even in the midst of our suspicions. It would be a terrible thing to
stigmatise this gentleman as a vampire, when perhaps he may have as
great a horror of such gentry as we possibly can.”
At this moment young Lake made his appearance. He looked rather pale as
he apologised to the landlord for his unintentional intrusion into his
room over night.
“The fact is,” said he, “I am as constitutionally brave as a lion, and
so whenever anything occurs I run away.”
“Indeed, sir, an odd way of showing courage,” said Mr. Black. “Why do
you run away?”
“For fear, sir, of doing something rash.”
“Well, I certainly never heard a better excuse for an undignified
retreat in one’s shirt, before in my life. But you will not be called
upon to do anything to-night. You had better shut yourself up, and let
you hear what you will, you need not come out of your room, you know.”
“Well, do you know, sir, I think that it would be the best way, for if
I came out I might do something rash, such as kill somebody, which I
should afterwards be sorry for, you know.”
“Certainly.”
“Then that’s understood, father, that let what will happen I won’t come
out. I have been speaking to Annetta, but I can’t somehow or another
get her to be pleasant.”
“Hush!” said old Lake, and he bent his brows upon his son reprovingly,
as if he fancied that he was letting out more of the family secrets
than he ought to have done. The young man was silent accordingly, for
he seemed to be in great dread of his father, who certainly if not a
better man, was a man of much more intellect and courage than the son,
who was but a very few degrees removed from absolute silliness. He
was fool enough to be wicked, and the father was cunning enough to be
so. How strange that vice should usually belong to the two extremes
of intellect, that folly and talent should lead to similar results, a
disregard of the ordinary moral obligations; but it is so.
We may pass over the rest of the day, and we do so the more willingly,
because we are anxious that the reader should be possessed of some
particulars which George and Francis, the servants of Lord Lake
communicated without any reserve at all to Slop, the waiter.
Indeed, far from having anything like a wish to conceal anything, they
seemed to glory in saying as much as they could with respect to those
matters that were uppermost in their mind.
This was just the frame of mind that Slop would have wished in his
prayers, had he prayed at all upon the subject, to find them in; for
although Slop was quite remarkable for neglecting his own affairs, he
never neglected anybody else’s and curiosity had been the bane of his
existence.
Upon arriving at the King’s Head, in Chiswell-street, he found that
the servants of Lord Lake were there, according as they had said they
should be, and glasses of something uncommonly hot and strong having
been ordered, they and Slop soon grew quite happy and familiar together.
First, though, before they would commence a history of anything they
had to tell of the Lake family, they resolved upon hearing from Slop
all that had passed at the London Hotel, and you may be quite sure,
that it lost nothing in the telling, but was duly made as much of as
the circumstances would permit. No doubt the fumes of the something hot
materially assisted Mr. Slop’s invention and general talents upon the
interesting occasion.
CHAPTER CLXXXIII.
THE COMMUNICATION OF THE SERVANTS RESPECTING THE LAKE FAMILY.
The coachman and groom, evidently listened with great interest to what
Slop had to relate. For a wonder, they were completely silent while
he spoke; and when he had concluded, they looked at each other, and
nodded, as much to say,—Ah! we can draw some conclusion from all that,
that you Mr. Slop, really know nothing at all about.
“Is that all?” said George.
“Yes,” said the waiter, “and sufficient I think.”
“More, a good deal,” remarked Francis. “But howsomdever, as you seem a
proper sort of fellow, we don’t mind telling you what we think of the
matter.”
“No, no,” interposed George, “not exactly that.”
“And why not?”
“Because you see, Francis, we have never known yet, my boy, what to
think about it.”
“Well there’s some truth in that at all events. But we will tell Mr.
Slop what happened once before, that wasn’t much unlike what has taken
place at the London Hotel.”
“Well, but tell him first who she is,” said George. “Then he’ll
understand all the rest better, as well as taking more interest in it.”
“Very good. Then listen, Mr. Slop.”
“With all my ears,” said Slop.
At this moment a bell rung sharply, and Slop on the impulse of the
moment, sprung up,—
“Coming—coming—coming.”
Both George and Francis burst into a great laugh, and Slop was quite
disconcerted.
“Really, gentlemen,” he said, “I’m sorry, very sorry, but I’m so used
to cry, coming, when a bell rings, that, for the moment, I forgot there
was no sort of occasion to do so here. I begs you won’t think no more
of it, but tell me all as you have got to tell.”
“Don’t mention it,” said Francis, and then after taking another draught
of the something strong, and settling himself in his seat, commenced.
“Lord Lake, you know, is our master, and a very good sort of a man he
is, only he’s a—a—a; what did the doctor call him George?”
“Oh, I know, a—a—a, what was it Frank?”
“Well, I asked you. It was a _wallytoddyhairyhun_, I think.”
“Something like it. Odd wasn’t it?”
“Wery.”
“I beg your pardon, gentlemen,” said a gentlemanly looking man who
was seated in an obscure corner of the room, and who was desperately
ugly—at least so much as could be seen of his face, for it was much
muffled up. “I beg your pardon, but the word you mean I suppose is
valetudinarian.”
“That’s it, that’s it! I knows it when I hears it. That’s it; well they
say that in consequence of being that ere he was rather cross-grained
a little when there wasn’t no sort of occasion for it, and barring
that, which, poor man, I suppose he could not help, he was about as
decent a master as ever stepped in shoe leather, wasn’t he, George?”
“I believe you, my boy.”
“Well, the Countess of Bhackbighte was his mother-in-law, you see, a
wicious old woman as ever lived, and when Lady Lake died it was she as
brought the news to Lord Lake that his wife was dead, and the wirtuous
baby as she had just brought into the world was dead too, wasn’t that
it, George?”
“I believe you my boy, rather.”
“Well, Lord Lake was _inconsolotable_ as they says, for ever so long,
and he made friends with his brother who would come next into the
property; they all went abroad together.”
“All who?” said Slop.
“Wery good, I’ll tell you, Lord Lake, his brother, his brother’s wife
and son. Them as is now at the London Hotel. Now you knows, don’t you?”
“Go on, I knows.”
“Well they hadn’t been there above a matter o’ fourteen years when the
old Countess of Bhackbighte dies, and then there comes a letter to my
lord as says that the precious baby as his wife had brought into the
world just afore she went out of it herself, wasn’t dead at all, but
had been smuggled away by the old Countess, nobody knows what for, and
that she was alive and kicking then, and ready to come to her papa
whenever he said the word, and so come she did, you see, and that’s our
young lady Annetta, you see as is at the London Hotel.”
“Well, but I don’t understand,” said Slop.
“Of course you don’t.”
“Oh.”
“But you will if you goes on a listening; you can’t expect to
understand all at once you know. Just attend to the remainder and
you’ll soon know all about it; but George is the man to tell you, that
he is.”
“Oh, no, no,” said George.
“Why, you heard it, and told it to me. Come, don’t be foolish, but tell
it at once, old fellow.”
“Well, if I must, I must,” said George, “so here goes; though when I
has to tell anything, I always feels as if I was being _druv_ with a
curb half-a-dozen links too tight. But here goes.”
“I am very much amused,” said Slop, “and should certainly like to hear
it all. Pray go on?”
“Well, you must know we was at an old tumble down place in Italy, as
they call’s Rome. Horridly out o’ repair, but that’s neither here nor
there. In course we had stables and riding out; and there was a nice
sort o’ terrace where Lord Lake used to walk sometimes, as well as his
brother, while the carriage was being got out, so that I could hear
what they said if I chose to do so.
“Well, one day the brother, Mr. Lake, or the Honourable Dick Lake as
he was sometimes called, was walking there alone, and I seed as he was
all of a tremble like, you understand! but I could not have any idea of
what it was about. Once or twice I heard him say,—‘It will do—and it
will do.’”
“Presently, then out comes Lord Lake, and he says, giving the other a
letter, ‘Good God, read that!’ Give us a trifle more sugar?”
“What?”
“Why, what do you mean,” said Francis. “Is that the way to tell a
story, to run into what people says what you happens to want yourself?
Here’s the sugar, and now go on.”
“Well, the brother reads it, and then he says; ‘Gracious Providence,’
says he ‘this here says as the Lady Annetta, ain’t your daughter, but a
_himposter_.’
“‘Yes,’ says Lord Lake, ‘oh, what will become of me now?’
“‘Calm yourself,’ says the brother, ‘and leave this affair to me. Let
her go with me to England, and we will clear up the mystery. I love
her as I would a child of my own; but still this here letter’ says he,
‘seems to contain such a statement’ says he——”
“Well? Well?”
“That’s all! After that, they walked off the terrace and I didn’t hear
no more at all. After that, in a day or two Lord Lakes comes to me; and
says, ‘George, my brother and his family, with Lady Annetta, are going
to England. I wish you and Francis to accompany them and to attend upon
them, just the same as you would on myself,’ says he, and in course I
didn’t like to say anything; so we came, but as our idea of the brother
is that he’s a humbug, we wouldn’t have no more to do with him, after
we got to London, you see; and so off we went as you heard.”
“Well, but,” said Slop; “there was a something else you was to tell me;”
“So there was,” said Francis “and this was it. While we were staying
at a place called Florence, and sleeping all of us in an old palace,
there was an alarm in the middle of the night, and we found it came
from the chamber of the Lady Annetta; who said that a man had got in by
the window, and she just woke in time to see him; and when she screamed
out away he went again, but nothing could be seen of him; the oddest
thing was that the window was so high from the ground, that it seemed
to be quite out of the question that he could have got at it without a
ladder; yet the deuce of a ladder was there to be seen.”
“And who was it?”
“Nobody ever knew, but the night after it was said that a vampire had
visited a cottage near at hand, and fastened on the throat of a little
girl of about seven, and sucked half the blood out of her, so that she
was lying at the point of death; and the description the child gave
of him was so like what the Lady Annetta said of the man that had got
in at the window of her bedroom, that my lord got very uneasy about
it, and moved away from Florence as quick as he could, and no wonder,
either, you will say.”
“It was odd.”
“It was, and what you have told me of last night, put me in mind of it,
you see.”
“No doubt; Lord, I’m all of a twitter myself.”
“Why, what need you care? those who know about vampires say that there
are two sorts, one sort always attacks its own relations as was, and
nobody else, and the other always selects the most charming young
girls, and nobody else, and if they can’t get either, they starve to
death, waste away and die, for they take no food or drink of any sort,
unless they are downright forced.”
“But who told you?”
“Oh, an old Italian priest, who spoke English.”
CHAPTER CLXXXIV.
THE MYSTERIOUS STRANGER.—THE NIGHT WATCH.
At this moment, the stranger who had put the coachman and groom right
about the word valetudinarian, rose from the seat he had occupied in
the corner of the room, and uttering a deep, hollow groan, walked
towards the door.
The party looked at him with awe and astonishment. He was of great
height but frightfully thin, and the slight glance they could get of
his face, showed how perfectly ugly he was. In another moment he had
left the place, and there was a silence of several minutes duration
after he had done so, but it was at length broken by the coachman, who
said,—
“I say, Frank, my boy.”
“Here you is,” said Francis.
“Don’t you think if you never seed anybody as looked like a vampire
before, you have seed one now.”
“The devil,” said Francis, “you don’t mean that?”
“Yes, I do though, and it strikes me wonderful as we have been a
telling all we had to tell afore the very indiwidual, of all others, as
we oughtn’t to a told it to, that’s a vampire. If a _hoss_ is a _hoss_,
that’s a vampire, Frank! I knows it—I feels it.”
Frank looked aghast.
“Why, why,” then he said, “we have just told him where to find the Lady
Lake if he wants her. Lor—what—suppose it’s the same one as got in at
the window at Florence! I’ll have him, he can’t have got far, I should
say, by this time, and hang me if I don’t stop him and know what he is,
afore he goes any further. I shan’t sleep if I don’t.”
Without waiting for any reply, although the coachman, and Mr. Slop
both seemed to be upon the point of saying something, out rushed the
valorous Francis into the street. But in about three minutes he came
back, and sat down with a disappointed look.
“He’s off,” he said.
“In course,” said the coachman, “through the air like a sky rocket, you
might a know’d that; but arter all, Frank, he mayden’t be a vampire. Do
vampires come into public houses, eh? Answer me that will you; I rather
think that’s a settler, Frank.”
“Do you?” said Frank. “It might be, old fellow, if you could prove it.
It would be an odd thing for a vampire to come into a public house
and drink, but I don’t see, if he has anything again by it, anything
to prevent him coming and ordering and paying for something, and then
leaving it. Look there!”
Frank pointed to the brimming glass of something which was on the table
just where the mysterious man had sat, and this to the coachman and to
Slop was such proof positive that they both looked at each other with
the most rueful expression of their countenances.
“I think you are convinced now, you old ump,” added Frank.
“Rather, rather.”
“I’m all over of a cold _inspiration_,” said Slop.
“Well,” added Frank, “it’s not never of no use, you know, putting
yourself out of the way about it, and that’s the fact, and all I’ve got
to say is that I’ve got nothing to say.”
“Wery good, wery good.”
“But if you, Mr. Slop, will give us a call to-morrow and let us know
if anything wrong has took place at the London Hotel, we shall be very
much obliged to you; for it’s natural for us that we feel an interest
in what’s going on there on account of our young lady, who we won’t and
don’t think is anything else but our young lady, and if she was not,
she ought to be; and I tell you what, just keep an eye on the spooney,
young Lake.”
“I will.”
“He wants to be quite sweet with the Lady Annetta, but she can’t abide
him. But you tell us if he tries to pitch it too strong, and we shall
perhaps hit on some scheme of operations.”
All this Slop promised faithfully, and with his own nerves rather
startled at the idea of having been in the same room for the better
part of an hour with a vampire, he walked back to the hotel, and as he
had not been enjoined to any secrecy he gave the landlord a full and
particular account of all that had taken place.
This was listened to with no small degree of interest, but as mine host
of the London Hotel could make nothing of it, he could do nothing with
it.
“Slop,” he said, “I don’t like the state of things at all, I assure
you, Slop, and I rather shake than otherwise about what’s to occur
to-night. You know there’s to be a watch kept in the corridor by the
young lady’s room, or else poor thing no doubt she wouldn’t get a wink
of sleep, and I’m quite sure that I sha’n’t at all events, let what
will happen or what won’t; I’m all in a twitter now as it is, I’ve
broke nine wine glasses already; and all I can say is, I wish they
would all go away.
The landlord did not like to give good guests notice to quit his
house, but he had a consultation with Mr. Black, whom he considered to
be quite his sheet-anchor in this affair, for if that gentleman had
not offered to sit up and watch for the vampire, he, the landlord,
certainly would, despite all profitable considerations, have requested
guests who brought with them such questionable connexions to leave.
The night had now come on, and as hour after hour passed away, the
anxiety of all concerned in the affairs that were taking place at the
London hotel increased. But we need not occupy the time and attention
of the reader with surmises and reflections while facts of an
interesting and strange nature remain to be detailed.
Suffice it that at eleven o’clock the Lady Annetta retired to rest.
Two chairs, and a table on which burnt two candles, were placed in
the corridor just outside the room in which the fair girl who had the
previous night had such a visitor reposed, and there sat Mr. Black and
Mr. Lake, both determined to do their utmost to discover the mystery
of the vampire’s appearance, and to capture him should he again show
himself.
During the first half hour’s watch, Mr. Lake related to his companion
the particulars of the affair at Florence, which as it has already been
told by Francis, we need not again recapitulate, suffice it to say that
the narration was listened to by Mr. Black with great interest.
“And did you,” he said, “make no discovery of who this midnight visitor
was?”
“None whatever.”
“’Tis awfully strange.”
“It is, and has given her abundance of uneasiness.”
“And well it may, sir, I shall be very happy if through my means any
elucidation of these mysteries and truly terrific visitations should
take place.”
“You are very good sir. What is that?”
“Twelve o’clock, I think, striking by some neighbouring church
time-keeper. Hush! is it not so? Yes, twelve.”
“It is. How still the house is. I was told this was a very quiet hotel,
and so indeed I find it, but yet, I suppose upon this occasion there is
more stillness than usual.”
“Doubtless. Hush, hush! what was that? I thought I heard something like
a window opening slowly and cautiously. Hark! There again. Do you not
hear it. Hush, hush. Listen now.”
“On my life I can hear nothing.”
“Indeed your sense of hearing then is not so sharp as mine. Look there.”
He pointed as he spoke to the door of Mr. Blue’s chamber, which was
opened a very short distance, not above a couple of inches, and then he
added in a whisper, “What do you think of that?”
“By heaven! I suspected him before.”
“And I—and—be still, whatever you do. But yet perhaps it would be
better. Go down stairs and bring up the hall porter, we may as well
be in force you know. The door at the head of the stairs is open. You
can depend upon my keeping a good watch while you are gone. Now, now,
quick, or we may be pounced upon and murdered before we are aware.”
Thus urged Mr. Lake ran down stairs for the purpose of rousing up the
night-porter, and he found that that individual did indeed require
rousing up.
“Hilloa, my man,” he said, “get up!”
“Eh? eh? what? fire!”
“No, no, they want you up stairs, that’s all. You are a pretty fellow
to consider yourself a night-watch here and to be fast asleep. Why,
with the exception that you have your clothes on you, you are no more
ready than anybody else in the house.”
“I beg your pardon sir, I always sleeps with one eye open.”
“Well well, come up stairs!”
A loud scream at this moment came upon their ears, and the night-porter
staggered back again into his great leathern chair, from whence he had
just risen, and looked aghast! while Mr. Lake turned pale and trembled
fearfully.
“Good God!” he said, “what’s that?”
A bell was run furiously, and then ceased, with a sudden jar, as
if the wire had broken, which was indeed the fact. Then Mr. Lake,
mustering all the courage he possessed, ran up stairs again, leaving
the night-porter to follow him, or not as he felt inclined; but when
he reached the door at the top of the staircase, he found that it was
fast, nor could he with all his strength force it open.
“Help! help! help!” he heard a voice cry.
CHAPTER CLXXXV.
THE VAMPIRE’S FEAST.—THE ALARM AND THE PURSUIT.
A general ringing of bells now ensued in the hotel, from all the
bedrooms that were occupied, and the din in the house was quite
terrific.
Mr. Lake hammered away at the door leading to the corridor, and he
was soon joined by the hall-porter, who having now recovered from the
first shock which the scream had given him, showed more courage and
determination than any one would have given him credit for. He was
rather a bulky man, and without any more ado, he flung himself bodily
against the door with such force that he dashed it open and rolled into
the corridor.
All was darkness.
“Lights! lights! lights!” shouted Mr. Lake. “Lights!—Mr. Black, where
are you? Mr. Black! Mr. Black!
A door, it was that of Mr. Blue, was now dashed open, and that
gentleman appeared with a candle in his hand, and a pistol firmly
grasped in the other. It was very strange but he wore an artificial
masquerade nose of an enormous size, and had on a red wig.
“Who locked my door?” he cried, “who locked my room door on the outside
and forced me to break it open—who did it?”
“Where is the vampire?” said Mr. Lake.
“Lights! lights! Lights!” shouted the night-watchman, and in another
minute the landlord and several waiters, half-dressed but carrying
lights, and each armed with the first weapon of offence he could lay
his hands on at the moment, made their appearance on the scene of
action.
“What is it? What is it?” cried the landlord. “Oh what is it?”
“God knows,” cried Mr. Lake, and he darted into the apartment of the
young lady. In another moment he emerged, and tottered towards one of
the seats.
“She is covered with blood,” he said.
Mr. Blue and the landlady of the Hotel both made a rush then into
the room, and the former came out in a minute, and going to his own
apartment shut the door. They thought that they then heard him fall at
full length upon the floor. All was mystery.
“I’m bewildered,” said the landlord, “What _is_ it all about?”
“And where is Mr. Black?” asked Mr. Lake.
“Here,” cried a waiter as he pointed to an insensible form lying so
close to the table, that nobody had as yet noticed it. “Here he is. He
looks as if he was dead.”
Poor Mr. Black was lifted up, his eyes were closed as well as his
mouth, and he seemed to breathe with difficulty. He was placed in a
chair, and then held, while water was dashed in his face to recover
him, and after a time, just as one of the waiters who had been sent
for the surgeon again who had before attended the young lady, made his
appearance with that gentleman, he slowly opened his eyes.
“Oh! mercy, mercy! Where am I now?”
“What is all this about?” inquired the medical man.
“Nobody knows sir,” said the landlord, “that’s the beauty of it. But
the young lady is very bad again; will you, wife, show the doctor into
her room. Good God, I shall go out of my wits, and my hotel that has a
character forming one of the quietest in all London—yes, the quietest I
may say. I’m a ruined man.”
“Mr. Black,” said Mr. Lake, “I implore you if you can to tell the
meaning of all this.”
“All—all I know,” said Mr. Black faintly. “All I know,—”
Everybody gathered round him to listen, and with looks of fright and
apprehension, and a trembling voice, he said:—
“I—I was sitting here waiting for Mr. Lake to come back with the night
porter, for we had some cause to wish for further help, when somebody
came suddenly up to me, and struck me down. The blow was on the top of
my head, and so severe, that I fell as if shot.”
“And then? and then?”
“Nothing. I don’t know anything else till you recovered me, and then, I
seemed as if all the place was scouring round me; and then—”
“But, Mr. Black, cannot you tell us who struck you? What was he like?
Could you identify him again?”
“I fear not. Indeed I hardly saw more of him than that he was tall.”
“Well,” cried Mr. Lake, “all I can say is that I have had my suspicions
since last night, and now I am certain, that is to say circumstantially
certain. What say you, landlord? Is there not one person in the house
who may not fairly enough be suspected.”
He looked towards the door of Mr. Blue’s room, as he spoke, and indeed
all eyes were turned in that direction, and the landlord mustering up
courage advanced to the door and said, as he did so, “We will have him
out. He shall not stay another hour on my premises. We will have him
out, I say. This sort of thing won’t do, and it shall not do. We will
have him out. I say gentlemen we will have him out.”
One thing was quite clear, and that was that the landlord wanted
somebody to come forward, and assist him in having out Mr. Blue; but
when he found that nobody stirred he turned round at the door, and
looked rather foolish.
Under any other circumstances, perhaps, this conduct might have excited
the risible faculties of all who were present; but the affair, take it
all in all, was of too mysterious and serious a character to indulge in
any laughter about.
“I,” said Mr. Lake, advancing, “will have him out, if nobody else will!”
It would appear as if Mr. Blue had been listening to what was going on;
for on the instant, he flung open his door, and said,—
“Who will have me out, and what for?”
“Vampire, vampire,” cried a chorus of voices.
“Idiots!” said Mr. Blue.
“Detain him!” sad Mr. Lake; “detain him, we shall never be satisfied
until this affair is thoroughly and judicially enquired into. Detain
him I say.”
“Let him who sets no value on his life,” said Mr. Blue, “lay but a hand
upon me, and he shall have to admire the consequences of his rashness.
I am not one to be trifled with; it is my fancy to leave this hotel
this moment let any one dare to stand in my way.”
“Your name is not Blue,” said the landlord, “you are not what you seem.”
“Granted.”
“Ah! you admit it,” said Lake. “Lay hold of him, I will give ten pounds
for him dead or alive; I have often heard of vampires, and by Heaven, I
now believe in them. Seize him, I say, seize him.”
He dashed forward himself, as he spoke, and was on the point of seizing
hold of Mr. Blue, when one well-directed blow from that individual sent
him sprawling. After this nobody showed any very marked disposition
to attack him, but he was allowed to walk calmly and slowly down the
staircase of the hotel; while Lake gathered himself up, looking rather
confused at the tumble he had had. But his passion was not subdued, for
he made a rush still after the supposed vampire, but he was too late.
The hotel door was closed with a bang, that reverberated through the
house, and Mr. Blue was gone, vampire, or no vampire.
“Landlord, I shall leave your house,” said Lake.
“I’m ruined,” said the landlord. “This affair will get into some Sunday
paper. Mr. Black, what is to be done?”
“Really, the top of my head is so hurt,” replied Mr. Black, “that I can
think of nothing else.”
“A plague upon the top of your head,” muttered the landlord.
The Lakes now, that is Mr. and Mrs. Lake found their way to the young
lady’s chamber, when they found her in a state of great alarm. The
story she told amounted to this:—
She was asleep, she said, having perfect confidence that no harm could
come to her, while the door of her room was watched in the way it was.
She had a light burning in her room, but it was one that gave a very
faint light, as she had usually an objection to sleeping otherwise
than in profound darkness; but she had no notion of how long she had
been asleep, when she was awakened by a hand being placed over her
mouth, which prevented her calling out, and nearly prevented her from
breathing.
She struggled to free herself but it was in vain. The monster attacked
her on the neck with his teeth, and all she remembered was getting
sufficiently free to utter one scream, and then she fainted away.
“My dear,” said Mrs. Lake, “I must have some serious talk with you upon
a subject which I have before urged. Go away, Lake.”
Lake left the room, and then, Mrs. Lake continued.
“This is a very dreadful affair, Annetta. You know that it is fancied
you are not the child of Lord Lake, and that we have the care of you.
Now we so much love and admire you,—”
“Stop madam, stop,” said the young lady, “I know what you are about to
say, you are going to urge me again to marry your son, which I will
never do, for I have the greatest aversion to him.”
“You will not? who will protect you from a vampire better than a
husband.”
“Probably no one, but at least I reserve to myself the right to choose
to whom I give that task, I am ill now and weak, I pray you not to
weary me further upon a subject concerning which it is quite impossible
we can ever agree. I only wish I were dead.”
“And that you may very well soon be if your blood is all sucked away by
a vampire.”
“So be it. Heaven help me!”
“Pshaw! you may die as soon as you like.”
CHAPTER CLXXXVI.
THE MEETING IN ST. JAMES’S PARK.
Another day passed over at the London Hotel, and as Mr. Blue had
been kind enough to take his departure, and that departure seemed to
be final, for he did not show himself again, Mr. Lake rescinded the
resolution he had made to leave.
Probably it was much more convenient for him to stay, although he
pretended that he did so out of consideration for the landlord, who
ought not to be punished for innocently harbouring so suspicious a
character as Mr. Blue, whether he were a vampire, or not.
But the day, as we say, has passed away, and it is about half-past
eight o’clock in the evening, and quite dark, for the moon did not rise
for an hour afterwards, when Mr. Lake might have been seen making his
way towards Saint James’s Park.
He entered it by the narrow mode of ingress by Spring Gardens, and made
his way towards the palace of Saint James, that is to say, the wall of
its private gardens that look upon the park; and then, under some shady
trees, he paused and looked inquiringly about him.
“He was to have been here a little before nine,” he muttered. “Hush!”
The Horse Guards clock chimed three-quarters past eight.
Mr. Lake drew back, as two men came at a slow pace towards where he
stood, and then he muttered,—
“It is Miller, but confound him, who is that he has brought with him?
Hang the fellow! I did not give him leave to make a confident in this
ticklish piece of business.”
One of the men only now advanced, leaving the other about twelve paces
from him.
“Mr. L—, I think,” he said.
“Yes, Miller, it is I; but who in the name of all that’s infernal have
you brought with you? Are you mad to trust to anybody but yourself?”
“Oh, don’t trouble yourself about that, sir. The fact is, he has been
with me for a number of years; he is my managing clerk, and as great a
rogue as you would wish him to be. I cannot keep anything wholly from
him, so the best way, I find, is to make a confident of him at once.”
“I don’t half like it.”
“You may thoroughly depend upon Lee, that is his name, and you never
knew such a rogue as he is, sir; besides, somebody, you know, must have
been trusted to personate the father, and he will do that, and then,
you know likewise, sir, that——”
“Hush, hush! speak lower! will you? bring this accomplished rogue this
way, since I must do business, it seems, with him! Call him here,
Miller, and we will talk as we walk on, that is always safer than
holding a conference in one spot, near which any one may hide; but it
is a much more difficult thing for a spy to follow and overhear you at
the same time.”
“You have a genius, Mr. Lake.”
“Bah! I don’t want any compliments from you, Miller; we want downright
business.”
By this time, Mr. Miller had made a sign to his clerk, Lee, to come up,
which that individual did, and at once saluted Mr. Lake, and made some
trivial remark about the weather, in an off-hand way.
Mr. Lake made rather a distant reply and then he said,—
“I presume, sir, that Mr. Miller has made you acquainted with the
affair in which, it seems, I am to purchase your kind co-operation?”
“Oh no,” said Miller, “I have certainly given him a brief outline,
but I always prefer that the principal himself should give all the
directions possible to every one, and tell his own story.”
“Well, sir, I think you might as well have told this Mr. a—a what’s his
name?”
“Lee, sir.”
“Ay, Lee, you might as well have told him, and not given me the
trouble. But, however, if I must, I must; so pray attend to me sir.”
“I will,” said Lee.
“My brother then, is Lord Lake. It’s a new title rather, as our father
was the first who had it, and he left large estates to my brother,
and to his son if he had one, or his daughter, if he had one. The
title descending to heir males, I must have the title by outliving my
brother, if I do, but hang it all, he has a daughter, and she will have
the estates.”
“I comprehend.”
“The old countess of Bhackbighte smuggled the child away at its birth,
and took care of it for a consideration that used up two-thirds of my
income, but the old cat on her death confessed that the child was Lord
Lake’s, but luckily, you see, without criminating me. Now Mr. Miller
was her solicitor, and so between us we have forged a letter supposed
to be found among the old countess’s papers, in which she states that
she intends to palm off a child as the Lord Lake’s when she is dying,
but that his child really did die, you see.”
“Oh yes.”
“Now this has had an effect upon Lord Lake, who to some extent had
repudiated the girl, and what I want is to clinch the matter, by
providing some one who will actually own her.”
“I understand,” said Lee, “but it will be an awkward affair if found
out.”
“I want to provide against any consequences of a disagreeable nature,
by getting her to marry my son, but I don’t think she will. Absolute
distress to which I am determined to bring her, if I can, may move her
to that step, and then all’s right. The secret is in my hands to play
with, as I think proper.”
“A very good plan.”
“You see, there’s a lover of hers too, a young officer in the Guards,
but he will be off as soon as he finds that she’s the daughter of a
lawyer’s clerk instead of a lord—ha! ha! ha!”
“Likely enough. I’ll father her.”
“Thank you; and now about money matters. Miller gets a thousand
pounds—what do you want? Be moderate.”
“I ought to have five hundred pounds to pay me.”
“The deuce! Well, I don’t want to stint you. But you will bear in mind
that that is very good pay; and now we must get up a first rate story,
so complete in all its parts that there shall be no sort of doubt
about it, you see—a story that will stand the test of examination and
criticism.”
“That can be better done in my chambers,” said the attorney; “I think
now we understand each other perfectly well, and that we need hardly
say any more just at present. Money matters are settled, and as Mr. Lee
has once undertaken the business, I am quite satisfied, for one, that
it will be well done.”
“I am glad to hear you say that, Miller, and I am quite reconciled,
which I must own I was not at first, to Mr. Lee having a finger in the
pie.”
“Thank you,” said Lee, “thank you; we shall manage it all right, no
doubt. Indeed now that you have fully explained it to me, it seems
quite an easy and straightforward affair.”
“You think so.”
“I certainly do think so.”
“Then you take off my mind a load of anxiety for thought it would be
a difficult thing to arrange, and require no end of chicanery and
trouble, but you quite reassure—you quite reassure me, Mr. Lee.”
“Oh, these things are done every day, my dear sir.”
They had walked to and fro as they spoke till now, by the time they
had settled their affairs thus far, they stood by the centre of the
principal mall. The park was very quiet, and had quite a deserted
aspect. Indeed, it was near the time when there would be more
difficulty in traversing it in consequence of the extra vigilance of
the night sentinels.
The moon faded gradually away, or seemed to fade away as the light
fleecy clouds swept over its face, and the parties who had held this
interesting dialogue separated. Mr. Lake walked hurriedly towards his
hotel, and the attorney and his accomplice stood for a few moments
conversing in whispers. They then turned towards the Green Park, and
as they did so, they were crossed by a tall, spectral-looking figure
wrapped up in an immense cloak, but who did not seem to observe them,
for his eyes were fixed upon the moon, which at that moment again began
to emerge from the clouds.
He stretched forth his arms as if he would have held the beautiful
satellite to his heart.
“An odd fish,” whispered the attorney.
“Very,” said his companion. “I should like now to know who he is.”
The attorney shrugged his shoulders, as he said, “Some harmless lunatic
most likely. They say that such often wander all night about the parks.”
“That’s strange; only look at him now, he seems to be worshipping the
moon, and now how he strides along; and see, there is another man meets
him, and they both hold up their arms in that strange way to the moon.
What on earth can be the meaning of it?”
“I really don’t know.”
“Some religious fanatics, perhaps.”
“Ah! that’s as likely as not. We have all sorts of them, jumpers and
screamers and tearers, and why not a few who may call themselves
Lunarians. For my part I would rather worship the moon than I would, as
most church and chapel going women do, worship some canting evangelical
thief of a parson, who has—oh dear! such elegant hands, and such
whiskers, and speaks so soft and impressive. Of all the rogues on
earth, I do detest those in surplices!”
CHAPTER CLXXXVII.
THE CHURCHYARD AT HAMPSTEAD.—THE RESUSCITATION OF A VAMPIRE.
It wants half an hour to midnight. The sky is still cloudy, but
glimpses of the moon can be got as occasionally the clouds slip on
before her disc, and then what a glorious flood of silver light spread
itself over the landscape.
And a landscape in every respect more calculated to look beautiful and
romantic under the chaste moon’s ray, than that to which we would now
invite attention, certainly could not have been found elsewhere, within
many a mile of London. It is Hampstead Heath, that favoured spot where
upon a small scale are collected some of the rarest landscape beauties
that the most romantic mountainous counties of England can present to
the gratified eye of the tourist.
Those who are familiar with London and its environs, of course,
are well acquainted with every nook, glade, tree, and dell in that
beautiful heath, where, at all and every time and season, there is
much to recommend that semi-wild spot to notice. Indeed, if it were,
as it ought to be, divested of its donkey-drivers and laundresses, a
more delightful place of residence could scarcely be found than some
one of those suburban villas, that are dotted round the margin of this
picturesque waste.
But it is midnight, nearly. That time is forthcoming, at which popular
superstition trembles—that time, at which the voice of ignorance and of
cant lowers to whispers, and when the poor of heart and timid of spirit
imagine worlds of unknown terrors. On this occasion, though, it will be
seen that there would have been some excuse if even the most bold had
shrunk back appalled at what was taking place.
But we will not anticipate for truly in this instance might we say
sufficient for the time are the horrors thereof.
If any one had stood on that portion of the high road which leads right
over the heath and so on to Hendon or to Highgate, according as the
left hand or the right hand route is taken, and after reaching the
Castle Tavern, had looked across the wide expanse of heath to the west,
they would have seen nothing for a while but the clustering bushes of
heath blossom, and the picturesque fir trees, that there are to be
beheld in great luxuriance. But, after a time, something of a more
noticeable character would have presented itself.
At a quarter to twelve there rose up from a tangled mass of brushwood,
which had partially concealed a deep cavernous place where sand had
been dug, a human form, and there it stood in the calm still hour
of night so motionless that it scarcely seemed to possess life, but
presently another rose at a short distance.
And then there was a third, so that these three strange-looking beings
stood like landmarks against the sky, and when the moon shone out from
some clouds which had for a short time obscured her rays, they looked
strange and tall, and superhuman.
One spoke.
“’Tis time,” he said, in a deep, hollow voice, that sounded as if it
came from the tomb.
“Yes, time,” said another.
“Time has come,” said the third.
Then they moved, and by the gestures they used, it seemed as if an
animated discussion was taking place among them, after which they moved
along in perfect silence, and in a most stately manner, towards the
village of Hampstead.
Before reaching it, however, they turned down some narrow shaded walks
among garden walls, and the backs of stables, until they emerged close
to the old churchyard, which stands on high ground, and which was not
then—at least, the western portion of it—overlooked by any buildings.
Those villas which now skirt it, are of recent elevation.
A dense mass of clouds has now been brought up by a south wind, and
had swept over the face of the moon, so that at this juncture, and as
twelve o’clock might be expected every moment to strike, the night was
darker than it had yet been since sunset. The circumstance was probably
considered by the mysterious beings who sought the churchyard as
favourable to them, and they got without difficulty within those sacred
precincts devoted to the dead.
Scarcely had they found the way a dozen feet among the old tomb-stones,
when from behind a large square monument, there appeared two more
persons; and if the attorney, Mr. Miller, had been there, he would
probably have thought they bore such a strong resemblance to those whom
he had seen in the park, he would have had but little hesitation in
declaring that they were the same.
These two persons joined the other three, who manifested no surprise
at seeing them, and then the whole five stood close to the wall of the
church, so that they were quite secure from observation, and one of
them spoke.
“Brothers,” he said, “you who prey upon human nature by the law of
your being, we have work to do to-night—that work which we never leave
undone, and which we dare not neglect when we know that it is to do.
One of our fraternity lies here.”
“Yes,” said the others, with the exception of one, and he spoke
passionately.
“Why,” he said, “when there were enough, and more than enough, to do
the work, summon me?”
“Not more than enough, there are but five.”
“And why should you not be summoned,” said another, “you are one of us.
You ought to do your part with us in setting a brother free from the
clay that presses on his breast.”
“I was engaged in my vocation. If the moon shine out in all her lustre
again, you will see that I am wan and wasted, and have need of——”
“Blood,” said one.
“Blood, blood, blood,” repeated the others. And then the first speaker
said, to him who complained,—
“You are one whom we are glad to have with us on a service of danger.
You are strong and bold, your deeds are known, you have lived long, and
are not yet crushed.”
“I do not know our brother’s name,” said one of the others with an air
of curiosity.
“I go by many.”
“So do we all. But by what name may we know you best.”
“Slieghton, I was named in the reign of the third Edward. But many have
known me as Varney, the Vampyre!”
There was a visible sensation among those wretched beings as these
words were uttered, and one was about to say something, when Varney
interrupted him.
“Come,” he said, “I have been summoned here, and I have come to assist
in the exhumation of a brother. It is one of the conditions of our
being that we do so. Let the work be proceeded with then, at once, I
have no time to spare. Let it be done with. Where lies the vampyre? Who
was he?”
“A man of good repute, Varney,” said the first speaker. “A smooth,
fair-spoken man, a religious man, so far as cant went, a proud,
cowardly, haughty, worldly follower of religion. Ha, ha, ha!”
“And what made him one of us?”
“He dipped his hands in blood. There was a poor boy, a brother’s only
child, ’twas left an orphan. He slew the boy, and he is one of us.”
“With a weapon.”
“Yes, and a sharp one; the weapon of unkindness. The child was young
and gentle, and harsh words, blows, and revilings placed him in his
grave. He is in heaven, while the man will be a vampyre.
“’Tis well—dig him up.”
They each produced from under the dark cloaks they wore, a short
double-edged, broad, flat-bladed weapon, not unlike the swords worn by
the Romans, and he who assumed the office of guide, led the way to a
newly-made grave, and diligently, and with amazing rapidity and power,
they commenced removing the earth.
It was something amazing to see the systematic manner in which they
worked, and in ten minutes one of them struck the blade of his weapon
upon the lid of a coffin, and said,
“It is here.”
The lid was then partially raised in the direction of the moon, which,
although now hidden, they could see would in a very short time show
itself in some gaps of the clouds, that were rapidly approaching at
great speed across the heavens.
They then desisted from their labour, and stood around the grave in
silence for a time, until, as the moon was longer showing her fair
face, they began to discourse in whispers.
“What shall become of him,” said one, pointing to the grave. “Shall we
aid him?”
“No,” said Varney, “I have heard that of him which shall not induce
me to lift hand or voice in his behalf. Let him fly, shrieking like a
frightened ghost where he lists.”
“Did you not once know some people named Bannerworth.”
“I did. You came to see me, I think, at an inn. They are all dead.”
“Hush,” said another, “look, the moon will soon be free from the
vapours that sail between it and the green earth. Behold, she shines
out fresh once more; there will be life in the coffin soon, and our
work will be done.”
It was so. The dark clouds passed over the face of the moon, and with a
sudden burst of splendour, it shone out again as before.
CHAPTER CLXXXVIII.
THE VAMPYRE.—THE FLIGHT.—THE WATCHMAN IN THE VALE OF HEALTH.
A death-like stillness now was over the whole scene, and those who had
partially exhumed the body stood as still as statues, waiting the event
which they looked forward to as certain to ensue.
The clear beauty and intensity of the moonbeams increased each moment,
and the whole surrounding landscape was lit up with a perfect flood
of soft, silvery light. The old church stood out in fine relief, and
every tree, and every wild flower, and every blade of grass in the
churchyard, could be seen in its finest and most delicate proportions
and construction.
The lid of the coffin was wrenched up on one side to about six inches
in height, and that side faced the moon, so that some rays, it was
quite clearly to be seen, found their way into that sad receptacle
for the dead. A quarter of an hour, however, passed away, and nothing
happened.
“Are you certain he is one of us?” whispered Varney.
“Quite, I have known it years past. He had the mark upon him.”
“Enough. Behold.”
A deep and dreadful groan came from the grave, and yet it could hardly
be called a groan; it was more like a howl, and the lid which was
partially open, was visibly agitated.
“He comes,” whispered one.
“Hush,” said another, “hush; our duty will be done when he stands upon
the level ground. Hush, let him hear nothing, let him know nothing,
since we will not aid him. Behold, behold.”
They all looked down into the grave, but they betrayed no signs of
emotion, and the sight they saw there was such as one would have
supposed would have created emotion in the breast of any one at all
capable of feeling. But then we must not reason upon these strange
frightful existences as we reason upon human nature such as we usually
know it.
The coffin lid was each moment more and more agitated. The deep
frightful groans increased in number and sound, and then the corpse
stretched out one ghastly hand from the open crevice and grasped
despairingly and frantically at the damp earth that was around.
[Illustration: The corpse grasps at the earth around its coffin, as the
vampyres watch.]
There was still towards one side of the coffin sufficient weight of
mould that it would require some strength to turn it off, but as the
dead man struggled within his narrow house it kept falling aside in
lumps, so that his task of exhumation became each moment an easier one.
At length he uttered a strange wailing shriek, and by a great effort
succeeded in throwing the coffin lid quite open, and then he sat up,
looking so horrible and ghastly in the grave clothes, that even the
vampyres that were around that grave recoiled a little.
“Is it done?” said Varney.
“Not yet,” said he who had summoned them to the fearful rite, and so
assumed a sort of direction over them, “not yet; we will not assist
him, but we may not leave him before telling him who and what he is.”
“Do so now.”
The corpse stood up in the coffin, and the moonlight fell full upon him.
“Vampyre arise,” said he who had just spoken to Varney. “Vampyre arise,
and do your work in the world until your doom shall be accomplished.
Vampyre arise—arise. Pursue your victims in the mansion and in the
cottage. Be a terror and a desolation, go you where you may, and if the
hand of death strike you down, the cold beams of the moon shall restore
you to new life. Vampyre arise, arise!”
“I come, I come!” shrieked the corpse.
In another moment the five vampyres who had dug him from the grave were
gone.
Moaning, shrieking, and groaning he made some further attempts to get
out of the deep grave. He clutched at it in vain, the earth crumbled
beneath him, and it was only at last by dint of reaching up and
dragging in the displaced material that lay in a heap at the sides, so
that in a few minutes it formed a mound for him to stand upon in the
grave, and he was at length able to get out.
Then, although he sighed, and now and then uttered a wailing shriek as
he went about his work, he with a strange kind of instinct, began to
carefully fill up the grave from which he had but just emerged, nor did
he cease from his occupation until he had finished it, and so carefully
shaped the mound of mould and turf over it that no one would have
thought it had been disturbed.
When this work was done a kind of madness seemed to seize him, and he
walked to the gate of the grave yard, which opens upon Church-street,
and placing his hands upon the sides of his mouth he produced such an
appalling shriek that it must have awakened everybody in Hampstead.
Then, turning, he fled like a hunted hare in the other direction,
and taking the first turning to the right ran up a lane called
Frognal-lane, and which is parallel to the town, for a town Hampstead
may be fairly called now, although it was not then.
By pursuing this lane, he got upon the outskirts of the heath, and
then turning to the right again, for, with a strange pertinacity he
always kept, as far as he could, his face towards the light of the
moon, he rushed down a deep hollow, where there was a cluster of little
cottages, enjoying such repose that one would have thought the flutter
of an awakened bird upon the wing would have been heard.
It was quite clear that the new vampyre had as yet no notion of what
he was about, or where he was going, and that he was with mere frantic
haste speeding along, from the first impulse of his frightful nature.
The place into which he had now plunged, is called the Vale of Health:
now a place of very favourite resort, but then a mere collection of
white faced cottages, with a couple of places that might be called
villas. A watchman went his nightly rounds in that place. And it so
happened that the guardian of the Vale had just roused himself up at
this juncture, and made up his mind to make his walk of observation,
when he saw the terrific figure of a man attired in grave clothes
coming along with dreadful speed towards him, as if to take the Vale of
Health by storm.
The watchman was so paralysed by fear that he could not find strength
enough to spring his rattle, although he made the attempt, and held it
out at arm’s length, while his eyes glared with perfect ferocity, and
his mouth was wide enough open to nourish the idea, that after all he
had a hope of being able to swallow the spectre.
But, nothing heeding him, the vampyre came wildly on.
Fain now would the petrified watchman have got out of the way, but he
could not, and in another moment he was dashed down to the earth, and
trodden on by the horrible existence that knew not what it did.
A cloud came over the moon, and the vampyre sunk down, exhausted, by
a garden-wall, and there lay as if dead, while the watchman, who had
fairly fainted away, lay in a picturesque attitude on his back, not
very far off.
Half an hour passed, and a slight mist-like rain began to fall.
The vampyre slowly rose to his feet, and commenced wringing his hands
and moaning, but his former violence of demeanour had passed away. That
was but the first flush of new life, and now he seemed to be more
fully aware of who and what he was.
He shivered as he tottered slowly on, until he came to where the
watchman lay, and then he divested that guardian of the Vale of his
greatcoat, his hat, and some other portions of his apparel, all of
which he put on himself, still slightly moaning as he did so, and ever
and anon stopping to make a gesture of despair.
When this operation was completed, he slunk off into a narrow path
which led on to the heath again, and there he seemed to waver a little,
whether he would go towards London, or the country. At length it seemed
that he decided upon the former course, and he walked on at a rapid
pace right through Hampstead, and down the hill towards London, the
lights of which would be seen gleaming in the distance.
When the watchman did recover himself, the first thing he did was, to
be kind enough to rouse every body up from their sleep in the Vale of
Health, by springing his rattle at a prodigious rate, and by the time
he had roused up the whole neighbourhood, he felt almost ready to faint
again at the bare recollection of the terrible apparition that had
knocked him down.
The story in the morning was told all over the place, with many
additions to it of course, and it was long afterwards before the
inhabitants of the Vale could induce another watchman, for that one
gave up the post, to run the risk of such a visitation.
And the oddest thing of all was, that the watchman declared that he
caught a glance at the countenance, and that it was like that of a Mr.
Brooks, who had only been buried the day previous, that if he had not
known that gentleman to be dead and buried, he should have thought it
was he himself gone mad.
But there was the grave of Mr. Brooks, with its circular mound of
earth, all right enough; and then Mr. B. was known to have been such a
respectable man. He went to the city every day, and used to do so just
for the purpose of granting audiences to ladies and gentlemen who might
be labouring under any little pecuniary difficulties, and accommodating
them. Kind Mr. Brooks. He only took one hundred pounds per cent. Why
should he be a Vampyre? Bless him! Too severe, really!
There were people who called him a blood-sucker while he lived, and now
he was one practically, and yet he had his own pew at the church, and
subscribed a whole guinea a year to a hospital—he did, although people
did say it was in order that he might pack off any of his servants at
once to it in case of illness. But then the world is so censorious.
To this day the watchman’s story of the apparition that visited the
Vale of Health is talked of by the old women who make what they call
tea for Sunday parties at nine pence a head. But it is time now that
we go back to London, and see what is taking place at the hotel where
the Lakes are staying, and how the villainy of the uncle thrives—that
villainy of which he actually had the face to give such an exposition
to Mr. Lee the clerk of the attorney.
Let us hope that the right will still overcome the injustice that is
armed against it, and that Lord Lake and his beautiful child may not
fall victims to the machinations that are brought into play against
them, by those who ought to have been their best friends.
CHAPTER CLXXXIX.
MISS LAKE PASSES A FEARFUL NIGHT.—THE IMPOSTOR PUNISHED.
The landlord of the London Hotel made every possible exertion to keep a
profound secret the events of the night, but people will talk when even
they have not anything particular to say, so that we cannot wonder at
their doing so when they have.
In fact the story of the vampyre at the London Hotel got known pretty
well half over London in the course of the day succeeding that second
attempt upon the life blood of the young lady, who had become the
object of attack from the monster.
Mr. Lake was in a strange frame of mind as regarded the whole affair.
He did not yet know whether to really believe it or not—whether to
ascribe it, after all, to a dream, or, as Mrs. Lake hinted, for she
was a woman fond of scheming herself, so always ready to suggest its
existence in others—a mere plan upon the part of the young girl to get
rid of the projected alliance with young Master Lake, and possibly
evoke the sympathy of all who heard her story.
This view of the matter however, although it did not make much
impression upon Mr. Lake, suggested a something to him, that he thought
would chime in well with his other plans and projects.
“If,” he said “I could but instil a little courage into my son he might
now, at all events make a favourable impression upon his cousin.”
Full of this idea, he summoned the young gentleman to a conference
with him, and having carefully closed the door, he said in a low
confidential tone,—
“Of course you have heard all about this—this vampyre business?”
“Yes, governor, to be sure I have. Who could fail of hearing all about
it? Why, nobody in the house will talk about anything else. I’m afraid
to go to bed, I can tell you; that is to say, for fear I should do
anything rash, you know, that’s all.”
“I understand you, and it’s no use blinking the fact to me, that you
are a coward.”
“I am a coward, I—oh, you are very much mistaken. I’m a long way off
that. I’m only always desirous of getting out of the way when anything
happens, for fear of doing a rash act; it’s excess of courage you
know—that’s what alarms me.”
“Well, there are cases in which there would be no harm resulting, were
you ever so rash.”
“Ah! only show me one, and then you’ll see.”
“Very well, your cousin, you know—and you know she is your cousin—won’t
have you. Now, unless you are married to her, all our nicely got up
plans are liable to be blasted by any accident, or by any breath of
treachery that may come across them. But if you were the husband of
your cousin, policy, habit, and, indeed, everything would combine to
induce Lord Lake and her to smother up the affair. You comprehend.”
“But what am I to do, if she won’t have me?”
“I will tell you. You must awaken her gratitude by rescuing her from
all these foolish terrors about vampyres, and when once a woman feels
and knows that a man has done a brave act in her behalf, the principal
entrance to her heart is open to him.”
“Oh, but—I—I—the vampyre; that’s rather unpleasant.”
“Come, now, you are not such a fool, as really to believe that it’s,
after all, anything but a mere dream. Don’t tell me. Vampyres, indeed!
At all events you can vapour as much as you like upon that subject
without any danger occurring.”
“Yes, yes—you may think so.”
“I know so. Listen to me.”
The son did listen, and the father added:
“You must volunteer to watch alone by your cousin’s door for this
vampyre, and of course nothing will think of coming. It’s too
ridiculous altogether, that it is; so, you see, you run no risk at all.
You comprehend that?”
“Well, but if I run no risk, I don’t see what’s the use of doing it,
you know; for if all is quiet, how can she be grateful to me for having
rescued her from nothing at all?”
“Very well put, very well indeed. But as there will be nothing really
to rescue her from, suppose we make something that will just suit our
own purposes.”
“What do you mean?”
“Why, you know my great grey travelling cloak—what is to hinder you
having that with you, and whenever you are quite certain that your
cousin is fast asleep, you can put that on over your face partially,
and go into the room, and pretend to be the vampyre, and when she is
in a paroxysm of terror do you dash out the light, and then in your
natural voice, cry out, ‘Ah, wretch, I have you, I have you. How dare
you invade the sanctity of this chamber?’ and all that sort of thing,
you know, and you can knock about the chairs as much as you like, so
as to induce the belief that you are engaged in a deadly struggle, and
then you call for lights, and you are there, and the vampyre gone.”
“Well, I rather like that, and if I were quite sure—”
“Of what?”
“That there was no real vampyre, you know, why I wouldn’t mind it.”
“Pshaw!”
“Well, well, I’ll do it, I’ll do it, I tell you. I see all the
importance of getting her for my wife. Ahem! and if I do,” he added to
himself aside, “I’ll take deuced good care you don’t get hold of the
money, for after we are married, I shall just tell Lord Lake all about
it.”
During the day Mr. Lake had sought an opportunity of speaking to Mr.
Black.
“My dear sir,” he said to him, “you don’t seem well at all, and I shall
insist that you do not trouble yourself to watch to-night by the door
of the young lady, who has had so disagreeable a visitor.”
“I am certainly not quite well,” said Mr. Black. “The fact is, my
health will not bear anything like a shock; a family occurrence has so
shattered my nerves.”
“My dear sir, say no more; you shall have no more trouble about us. My
son who loves his cousin, and is quite jealous of anybody defending
her but himself, will watch alone by her door. He has great courage
when once his spirit is up, and it is now.”
“I’m glad to hear it; it takes some time to get it up!”
“Why, a—a—yes, sometimes.”
“I must be on the look out myself to-night, or the cowardly fellow
will spoil all,” thought Mr. Lake; “any unusual noise in the house,
I suppose, will be almost sufficient to induce him to faint away.
Confound his cowardice, it mars all.”
Mr. Lake was not by any means so clear in his own mind as he pretended
to be of the fact of the vampyre being only a delusion and a creation
of the brain of his niece; so when the evening came, he did all that
was in his power to keep the courage of his son to the mark.
He even took care that he should have a glass of something strong and
hot, for he knew by personal experience that while they lasted, the
fumes of hot alcohol did something for a weak heart.
But what pleased Mr. Lake most of all was the ease with which he had
thus managed matters with Mr. Miller and his clerk, who he had no
doubt, would fabricate such a story as would convince the single minded
Annetta of his claims to be her father.
“Then,” thought the old Lake, “we can surely among us badger her into
marrying my son. Oh, it will be all right. Let no plot henceforward
hope to succeed if this one does not. It must, and it shall; it shall,
and it must.”
It’s all very well of any one to say that a scheme shall succeed;
“But how light a breath of air will chase away,
The darkly woven fancies of a thousand plots.”
Mr. Lake stood upon a precipice which he little saw, or the terrific
height of it would have driven him distracted.
Miss Lake was in a great state of mental depression; if anything, more
than another was calculated to thoroughly break down the spirits of a
young and innocent girl, it certainly would be such circumstances as
those which now surrounded her, and deprived too, as she was, of that
aid and sympathy she would have received at the hands of a father or a
mother, it was only a wonder that she did not sink under the affliction
most completely.
She made no objection to young Lake watching by the outside of her
door. Indeed, she was weeping and depressed, so that she could scarcely
know what proposal was made to her.
“I shall not sleep,” she said. “God knows what will become of me.”
“Do not despair, all may be well; it was a very sad thing that my
brother Lord Lake ever found out that you were not his daughter. I’m
sure I would have given freely all I possessed to have averted any such
news, for it has attacked both his happiness and yours.”
The young girl made no reply to this, but the look she gave him was
quite sufficient to show him how much she doubted the sincerity of the
professions of friendship and affection for her that fell from his
lips. There was a something in his hollow, heartless character which,
young and innocent and unknowing in the ways of the world even as that
young girl was, she saw through, and he felt that she did so.
This was the most provoking thing of all that his heartlessness and
selfishness should be transparent to one so young as she was.
But the night came at last, and with it the fidgetty fears of young
Lake increased mightily. He was all of a shake, as Slop the waiter
said, like a lot of jelly.
It was only by repeated doses of brandy-and-water that he kept himself
from declaring off the adventure altogether, so that by eleven o’clock
at night he was in a terrible state between fear and intoxication; and
as any two impulses will each do its best to defeat the other, he was
prevented from getting entirely drunk by his fears, and from getting
entirely afraid by the liquor.
But at last he did actually take his place by the door of the chamber
occupied by his cousin, and then with a table before him on which were
lights, brandy-and-water, and cigars, he prepared to go through what to
him was a terrible ordeal.
“You—you—really think,” he whispered to his father, who came to promise
him that he would not undress himself, but remain in his own room
within call, “you really think there is no vampyre?”
“Tut, tut.”
“Well, but really now, really—”
“Have I not told you before? Come, come, nonsense, there’s the old grey
travelling cloak, put it under the table, and now I shall leave you;
it’s about half-past eleven, and you have nothing in the world to do
but just to enjoy yourself, you know. Good night.”
CHAPTER CXC.
THE VAMPYRE DISCOVERED.—THE ESCAPE ON THE THAMES.
“Enjoy myself!” muttered the young Lake, “enjoy myself! That may be
his idea of staying here vampyre-catching, but it ain’t mine. What a
fool I was to consent to come here, to be sure, and all alone too. Eh,
what was that? Oh! I’m all of a shake. I thought I heard somebody, but
I suppose it was nothing. Oh dear, what a disagreeable affair this is;
what an infernal fool I am, to be sure. Eh? eh?”
The hair on his head nearly stood up as he heard, or fancied he heard,
a low groan. He shook so while he arose from his seat that he was glad
to sit down again as quickly as he possibly could, for he found his
strength evaporating along with the Dutch courage, or rather as it
should be called, French courage, that had been instilled into him by
the brandy.
“What shall I do,” he gasped, “what shall I do? Oh, what will become of
me? I’m in for a row, I’m in for it to a certainty; I—I think I’ll call
the old man.”
He did not, however, call his father, whom he designated the old man,
more familiarly than respectfully, but as all continued now quiet, he
thought he would wait until the next alarm, at all events, before he
made a piece of work and thoroughly exhibited his own pusillanimity.
“It may be nothing” he said, “after all, perhaps only the wind coming
through some chink in a door or window. Lord bless us, I’ve read of
such things in romances till my blood had turned to curds and whey.
There was the Bloody Spectre of the Tub of Blood, or the Smashed Gore.
Eh? eh? I thought somebody spoke. No, no—oh, it’s all, what do they
call it, imagination, that’s what it is, and the sooner I get the job
over the better, so I’ll just pop on the cloak, and do the business.”
With trembling hands Mr. Lake junior drew the cloak from under the
table and put it on, bringing the collar of it right up to the top of
his head, so that but a small portion of his head was at all visible
when he was thus equipped, and he certainly might look like a vampyre,
for he did not look like anything human by any means.
“Now, I wonder if she’s asleep,” he muttered as he laid his hand gently
on the lock of the door, “if she ain’t, it would be a pity; but still I
can say, I only wanted to know how she was, so I’ll just make the trial
at all events. Here goes.”
He opened the door of the bedroom a very short distance, and said,—
“Hist! hist! are you awake, eh? eh? What did you say?—nothing, oh,
she’s asleep, and now here goes—upon my life when one comes to think
of it, it ain’t by any means a bad plan. But just before I begin, I’ll
have another drain.”
About two-thirds of a glass of brandy-and-water were in the tumbler
on the table, and that he tossed down at once, and feeling very much
fortified by laying in such a stratum of courage, he drew up the cloak
to its proper vampyre-like position, as he considered it, and advanced
two steps within the chamber of the sleeping girl.
She was sleeping, and slightly moaning in her sleep. It was a great
satisfaction to young master Lake, to hear her so moaning, for it
convinced him that such were the sounds which he previously heard, and
which had gone near to terrifying him out of his project.
He had no compunction whatever regarding the amount of alarm which this
dastardly project was likely to give to Miss Lake. No, all he looked
to and thought of was himself. A light was burning in the chamber, and
that according to the directions of his father he blew out, and then
groping his ways towards the bed, he laid his hands upon the young
girl’s face, and said,—
“The vampyre! the vampyre has come!—blood, blood, blood!—the vampyre!”
She awoke with a cry of terror as usual, and then master Lake moved off
to the door, and said in his natural voice,
“I’ll protect you—I’m coming—I’ll soon clear the room of the vampyre.
Come on, you wretch! Oh, I’ll do for him. Take that—and that—and that.”
Then he commenced kicking about the chairs, and nearly upset the
washing stand, all by way of making the necessary disturbance, and
convincing his cousin what a sanguinary conflict he was having with the
vampyre. In the midst of this something laid hold of him by the ears
and whiskers on each side of his head, and the door swinging open, his
own light that was upon the table in the corridor shone upon a hideous
countenance within half an inch of his own. The long fang-like teeth of
which, with the lips retracted from them, were horrible to look upon,
and a voice like the growl of an enraged hyena said,—
“What want you with the vampyre, rash fool? He is here.”
Master Lake was absolutely petrified with horror and astonishment. The
hair bristled up upon his head. His eyes opened the width of saucers,
and when in a low voice the vampyre said again,—“What want you,
reptile, with the vampyre?” he let his feet slide from under him, and
had he not been upheld by the horrible being who grasped him, he would
have fallen.
Bang went a pistol out of the corridor, and the vampyre uttered a cry
and let go his hold of Lake, who then fell, and being out of the way,
showed his father standing on the threshold of his own door, with a
pistol in his hand recently discharged, and another apparently ready.
In another moment the vampyre kicked the insensible form of young Lake
out of the way, and shut himself in the girl’s bedroom. The father
heard him lock the door, and although he instantly sent another pistol
shot through the panelling, he heard no sound indicating its having
done any execution.
“Help, help, help,” he cried, “help here. The vampyre, the vampyre, the
vampyre!”
All this had not taken above two or three minutes, and the whole house
was now alarmed by the sound of fire-arms, and as nobody had completely
undressed themselves to go to bed since the first alarm of the vampyre,
the landlord and several of the waiters, and the night watchman ran
with all speed to the spot, looking full of consternation, and all
asking questions together.
“Force the door, force the door,” cried Mr. Lake, “a hammer, a hatchet,
anything, so that we may get the door forced; the vampyre is inside.”
“Oh lor!” cried one of the waiters who had gone close to the door, but
who now made a precipitate retreat, treading upon the stomach of young
Lake as he did so.
“If you’ll pay for the door, Sir,” said the landlord, “I’ll soon have
it open.”
“Damn it, I’ll pay for twenty doors.”
The landlord took a short run at the door, probably he knew its
weakness, and burst it open at once. There was the pause of about a
moment, and then Mr. Lake, snatching up the candle, the light of which
had first revealed the hideous features of the vampyre to his son,
rushed into the room.
In these cases all that is wanted is a leader, so he was promptly
enough followed. The state of affairs was evident at a glance. The
young lady had fainted, and the window was wide open, indicating the
mode of retreat of the vampire.
“I thought you told us,” said Mr. Lake “that this window was too far
from the ground to anticipate any danger from—”
“Yes, so I did, sir. But don’t you see he could easy enough jump off
the sill on to those leads there. Nobody could get in by the window,
but anybody that wasn’t afraid could get out. But we have him, sir, we
have him now as sure as a gun.”
“Have him. How?”
“Why don’t you see sir, there’s nothing but high walls. He must be
among our stables, and he can’t get out, for I have the keys of the
outer doors myself, we shall not lose him now sir, I’m not a little
thankful for it. Come on, everybody, round to the stables, and nothing
now can prevent us catching him if he is flesh and blood. Come on, come
on.”
By this time Mrs. Lake had reached the scene of action, and although
the first thing she did was to tumble, sprawling, over her hopeful son,
who lay in the door-way of his cousin’s chamber, she gathered herself
up again, and remained in charge of Annette and the chamber, while Mr.
Lake accompanied the landlord and the waiters to the stables of the
hotel, which were surrounded by high walls and only to be approached by
a pair of large gates, which were quite satisfactorily fastened, and
there was not a chink large enough for a cat to get through.
The landlord had the keys, and he opened a small wicket in one of the
large gates.
“Now be careful,” he said, “for fear he bounces out.”
At this everybody but Mr. Lake, who to do him but justice, had
certainly the quality of courage, looked as alarmed as possible, but he
said,—
“I have re-loaded my pistols, and he shall not escape me.”
The wicket was opened, and in an instant out walked Mr. Black! He
appeared at first somewhat agitated, but speedily recovered his
self-possession, and looking at the group, he said,—
“Have you caught him? I have been upon the look out, notwithstanding my
indisposition, and jumped out of the bedroom window after him; I cannot
see him anywhere. Have you caught him.”
“Yes,” cried Mr. Lake, “I saw you in the room when I fired at you—_you_
are the vampyre!”
He made a rush forward as he spoke, but Mr. Black got dextrously out
of the way, and seizing the landlord by the hair of the head he cast
him so fairly in Mr. Lake’s way that they both fell down together; with
amazing rapidity the vampyre then fled from the spot.
“After him, after him,” cried Mr. Lake, as he scrambled to his feet,
“don’t let him escape, after him, whatever you do; alarm the whole
city, rather than let the monster elude you. This way—this way, I see
him. Follow me, a vampyre, a vampyre; help—help, seize him, a vampyre!”
“Fire,” cried the landlord, and he too ran.
But all the running was in vain, the vampyre had fairly got the start
of them, and he took good care to keep it, for with the most wonderful
fleetness he ran on, until, to his great relief, he found his pursuers
were distanced.
He made his way to the Strand, and diving down one of the narrow
streets terminated by the river, and at the end of which was a landing
place, he called aloud,—
“Boat, boat!”
An old waterman answered the hail.
[Illustration: A waterman answers the vampyre’s hail.]
“Where to, your honour?”
“Up the river, I will tell you where to land me, row quick, and row
well, and you may name your own fare, without a chance of its being
questioned.”
“That’s the customer for me,” said the waterman.
CHAPTER CXCI.
THE PLOT DISCOVERED.—THE LETTER LEFT AT THE HOTEL BY THE VAMPYRE.
The further pursuit of the vampyre was very soon given up by those who
had commenced it with, as they had vainly imagined such an assurance of
success.
Probably with the exception of Mr. Lake himself none were really very
eager in it at all, and they were not sorry for a good excuse to drop
it.
There sat upon the countenance of Mr. Lake an appearance of great
anger, and when they got back to the hotel, he said to the landlord,
“This is a very disagreeable affair, and I cannot think of remaining
here over to-morrow.”
“But sir, the vampyre has gone now!”
“Yes, and may come again, for all I know.”
“Oh, dear me, surely not now, sir. After what has happened, I should be
inclined to say that you will find this the quietest hotel in London.”
Mr. Lake would not be moved from his determination, however, and
briefly again announced that he would on the morrow remove.
“How very vexatious,” thought the landlord, but he could do nothing in
the matter. His only hope, and that was a very slight one indeed, was,
by the morning the exasperated feelings of Mr. Lake would be somewhat
assuaged, and therefore, he thought it would be, at all events, a
prudent thing to say no more to him just then, when he was in such a
mood.
When Mr. Lake retired to his own apartment he was in anything but a
pleasant frame of mind, for he found that things were not exactly
turning out as he wished, and he much feared that all his schemes would
turn out abortive, in which case they would recoil upon his own head in
their consequences.
It was quite by accident, that happening to cast his eyes upon the
dressing-table, he saw a sealed letter lying there, and upon looking at
the superscription he was surprised to find that Annetta was the person
for whom it was intended.
It was not, as the reader may suppose from what he knows of Mr. Lake,
from any honourable scruples that he hesitated at once to open this
letter addressed to his niece, but he was for a time considering
whether he might not, by doing so, be getting himself into some scrape
from which he might find it very difficult to extricate himself.
“Who the deuce can it come from?” he said.
He turned the epistle about in all directions, but such an inquiry did
not assist him, and finally he made up his mind that come what might,
he would break the seal and look at the contents.
He soon, after coming to the determination, carried it into effect,
and to his surprise he found that the letter contained the following
statement:
To the lady Annetta Lake.
Fear nothing, lady. He who disturbed your repose will disturb
it no longer. Be happy, and do not let the dread of such
another visitation ever disturb your pure imaginings. Your
father will rescue you from your present unhappy circumstances,
and you will, likewise, soon see one who ere this would have
been with you, had he known of your being in London.
This comes from,
+Varney the Vampyre+.
“If Mr. Lake, your bad uncle, upon whose dressing table this
note is placed, delivers it not to you, woe be to him, for
I will make his nights hideous with realities, and his days
horrible with recollection and anticipation.”
Mr. Lake was superstitious. Are not the unprincipled always so?
He read the postscript to the note with a shudder; and he felt that
he could no more muster courage enough to destroy the letter, than he
could to lay violent hands upon himself. There he was with an epistle
that he would fain have kept from Annetta, and yet he dared not do so.
“Confound my unlucky destiny,” he said, “for bringing me to this hotel.
Perhaps if I had gone elsewhere, all this would not have happened. Oh,
if I could but have suspected what this Mr. Black really was, I would
have tried some means for his extermination.”
He paced his chamber in an agitated manner until Mrs. Lake made her
appearance from the chamber of the lady Annetta, where she had been
staying, and to her then he at once communicated the letter that gave
him so much uneasiness.
“I don’t know what to do,” he said, “or what to think.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes, indeed. Perhaps you can suggest something?”
“And can you allow yourself to be made a slave of such fears. There
is but one course to pursue, and that is, to-morrow to put the affair
altogether in a different shape, by overwhelming Annetta with the
seeming evidence that she is the daughter of an attorney’s clerk,
instead of her real father, Lord Lake. I know of no other way; and then
when she finds such, as she will think, to be the case, it’s my opinion
that she will no longer hesitate to marry our son.”
“You think so?”
“Indeed do I, The girl is not an absolute fool surely.”
“Well, of course, I should be very glad if that darling project could
be, after all, brought about, but what is to be done with this letter?”
“Can you ask?”
“I do, when I consider the threat that is in it. That threat,
recollect, is to me, and you can afford to think lightly of it.”
“I will take the consequences. It is hardly likely that you will be
punished for what you can’t help. I will take good care that this
letter never reaches Annetta, and as you have it not, why of course you
cannot deliver it, and so cannot be blamed.”
“But I might have it.”
“No such thing,” said the lady snatching it up. “You know me rather
too well, I should think, to hope that I would give it up to you, and
as for your taking it by force, I should think you knew me too well
likewise to make such a ridiculous attempt.”
“Well, then I wash my hands of it.”
“Ah! you may as well. I don’t know what has come over you of late, you
are as mean spirited as you can be, and formerly you used to be able to
cope with anything.”
“We never played for such a stake as we have now upon the board, and I
confess that I am rather nervous for the consequences.”
“Pshaw! I see that I must guide you, or all will be lost. To-morrow
let the whole affair be settled. Let this attorney Miller, as you call
him, come here, and bring with him the person who is to claim Annetta
as his own daughter. Let him have all the evidence that you tell me he
has been so ingenious in getting up, ready, in order that he may be in
a position to answer any questions.”
“Yes, yes.”
“And then, when all is settled, our son must come forward, and make a
speech, saying, he don’t care a bit, who or what she is, that he loves
her and will make her his wife, although she has not a penny piece in
the world.”
“I see, I see.”
“I think, from what I know of her, that such a course of proceeding
will have a great effect upon her.”
“Well, I hope so.”
“You hope so! How despondingly you talk.”
“Why the honest truth—”
“Good God! what do you mean by making use of such words, I never told
the honest truth in all my life; you may depend that won’t do in this
world, on any consideration. Never let me hear you say such a thing
again, I beg of you.”
“I was merely going to remark that this vampyre’s business had really
so completely unsettled my whole nervous system, that I could not act
with all the tact and the determination that used to characterise my
proceedings, and for which you were ever disposed to give me so much
credit.”
“Really.”
“Yes. But I cannot regret such a state of things so much as I should
otherwise do, because I see that you are unmoved and as energetic as
ever.”
“Well, well, say no more.”
“I am done.”
“I will prepare our boy for the part he is to act to-morrow; and mind,
I shall rely upon you to see your associates and get all the affair
in train. Let it be all over by twelve in the morning, so that if you
like you can send to Lord Lake where he is staying, at Florence still I
presume, an account of the matter by post that same night; only let me
see the letter before you send it.”
“I will, I will; you are my guardian angel.”
“Pho, pho; you are getting quite romantic and foolish; we have both
made up our minds to get money, and we have likewise known so much the
want of it, in abundance that is to say, that we have resolved to get
it in any way we can.”
“Yes, that I rather think is our principle of action.”
“And has it not succeeded hitherto. Have we not lived well without
troubling ourselves to earn the means by which we have done so. Earn,
indeed! I leave that to a parcel of sleepy drones of people who have
not the wit to live upon others as we have; so now go to bed and sleep
off some of the unmanly fears that seem of late to be continually
pressing upon you. It is well you have me to look after you as I do.”
CHAPTER CXCII.
THE MEETING IN THE MORNING AT THE HOTEL.—THE PREPARATIONS
OF THE ATTORNEY.
It is no less than strange, the difference that takes place in people’s
feelings with regard to precisely the same circumstances in the
morning, from what they really felt and thought in the evening, and
when the shadows of night were upon them.
This mental phenomenon was not wanting in the case of Mr. Lake.
He felt as he rose the next day, and the sun was shining in at the
window of his bedroom, most thoroughly ashamed of his fears and his
nervous tremors of the preceding night.
His wife saw with a smile the change in his feelings.
“You are no longer,” she said, “afraid of the vampyre.”
“Oh, say no more about it,” was his reply. “I shall go immediately
after breakfast and see Mr. Miller, and with him make such arrangements
as will bring the affair upon which we have set our hearts to a crisis,
and while I am gone you can instruct our son in what he has to do.”
“I will.”
The breakfast passed over in rather a constrained manner. Mrs. Lake had
made an attempt to persuade Annetta that she was really too unwell to
get up for an hour or two, but that Annetta would not submit to, as she
felt herself, notwithstanding all her sufferings and all her fright,
really capable of rising.
The consequence was, that she appeared at the breakfast table, and
stopped most effectually anything in the shape of a confidential
discourse taking place among the Lakes.
The meal therefore passed off rather silently, and there were only a
few remarks made, incidentally, about the preceding night’s alarm.
Annetta was evidently in a state of great nervousness, as well she
might be, for the idea that she would be again subjected to the
frightful visits of the vampyre, was ever present to her, and she was
denied the consolation which the letter of Varney might, and most
probably would have given her.
After the morning meal, Mr. Lake gave his wife a significant look
to intimate that he was then going to Mr. Miller’s, and that in his
absence she was to play her part.
She perfectly understood him, and nodded in return, and thus this
worthy pair separated.
We will follow Mr. Lake.
The attorney did not live in one of the most respectable haunts of the
profession, but he was a man of his word, and by the time Mr. Lake
reached his chambers he was there, it being then not much above ten
o’clock.
There was some delay in admitting Mr. Lake to the private room of the
attorney, and he thought that the clerk who was in the outer office
looked a little confused.
“Is anybody with Mr. Miller?” asked Lake.
“Yes—that is to say—I mean no.”
“A strange answer. Yes, and you mean no.”
“Why, Sir, I only meant that Mr. Miller was rather busy, and we are
so much in the habit when that is the case, of saying that he has
some one with him that it slipped out unawares, only as we would not
deceive you, sir, for the world, you understand that that was why, you
perceive, sir, that in a manner of speaking, I corrected myself.”
This explanation was rather more wordy than satisfactory to Mr. Lake,
however, for want of a better, he was compelled to put up with it, and
he said nothing, but waited with the most exemplary patience, until Mr.
Miller’s bell rang.
The clerk answered it, and in a few moments returned to say that Mr.
Miller had got through a legal document he had been engaged upon, and
that he much regretted having kept Mr. Lake waiting, but was then quite
at his disposal.
Now Lake could have sworn that he had heard the sound of a voice from
the private room of the attorney, and he consequently did not feel
quite easy.
When he went in he found Mr. Miller with a number of letters before him.
“Ah, my dear sir,” cried the lawyer, “sit down.”
“Thank you. I thought somebody was with you?”
“Oh, dear no, not at all. I was going through a lease, you see, and
from long experience in such matters, I have found that I have a better
and clearer understanding of the matter, if I read it aloud to myself,
but perhaps that is only a peculiarity of mine.”
“Then it was your voice I heard just now?”
Mr. Lake’s suspicions were about half removed, certainly not more than
half, but he could say no more about it, although he cast now and then
suspicious glances round the room; yet if he had been asked what he
was suspicious of, he would hardly have been able to give a clear and
understandable answer to the question.
It is one of the curses of conscious guilt ever to live in an
atmosphere of doubt and dread, and to the full did Mr. Lake feel that
curse.
“Well, Mr. Miller,” he said, after a pause, “I have called upon you to
say that I hope it will suit your convenience to settle a little affair
to-day at twelve o’clock at the hotel.”
“Twelve—let me see—twelve. Not at the hotel my dear sir, I am compelled
to be in chambers in case of a letter coming on very particular
business, but if you will bring her here, I can manage it very nicely;
if she don’t leave this place with a conviction that she has a father
in London, I’ll eat my boots.”
“Well, I don’t see why we should not come here, as you give me great
satisfaction Mr. Miller by avowing yourself to be so confident of the
result.”
“I am as confident as that I sit on this three legged stool.”
“Good—then you may depend upon our coming here at twelve o’clock
precisely. There will be myself. Mrs. Lake, my son and the young lady.
Mind she is no fool, she must be perfectly overwhelmed with proofs of
what we wish to make her believe.”
“Exactly, that she is not the daughter of Lord Lake, but a mere
changeling imposed upon him as his own child—the said own child being
dead.”
“Precisely.”
“Agreed, sir, agreed. With respect to my reward, I have been thinking
that I should like, you know, to have some acknowledgement. You tell
me you have no money now, but that this obstacle once removed you will
come in for all the Lake estates, and that Lord Lake cannot live long.”
“That’s the state of the case.”
“Then sir, will you give me a note for £2000, payable on demand.”
“On demand?”
“Yes; of course it would be needless folly of me to present it until
you have money you know.”
“True, true.”
We need not pursue the conversation further, but satisfy the reader by
stating the result, which was, that the attorney got the note for £2000
from Lake, likewise a paper signed, which admitted the debt more fully
still, and effectually barred Lake from objecting to any proceedings
on account of want of consideration for the promissory note, or
that it had not been fairly obtained of him, pleas which might have
inconvenienced Mr. Miller if he chose to pursue Lake for the amount.
In the meantime Mrs. Lake had not been idle, but had spoken to her
booby and cowardly son, making him aware of what he had to do in the
business, namely, to shew his great disinterestedness in taking for his
wife Annetta after she was supposed to be proved not the daughter of
Lord Lake, but quite a different personage, and altogether destitute of
pecuniary resources.
He managed pretty well always to understand any villainy, and so
entered life and soul into the scheme of his mother.
“Ah! I like that a monstrous deal better than keeping watch for
a vampyre, which is a sort of job that don’t at all suit such a
constitution as mine, do you see?”
Mrs. Lake not being aware of the alteration of arrangements by which
they were all to proceed to the lawyer’s chambers, instead of coming
to the hotel, took no trouble with Annetta, conceiving that it would
perhaps be better at twelve o’clock, when the parties were assembled,
to take her by surprise, than to say anything to her beforehand, which
might have the effect of preparing her for what was to come, and so
getting up a spirit of resistance and of inquiry which it might be
difficult to resist or satisfactorily to meet.
When Mr. Lake came home from Gray’s Inn, she was made aware of the
alteration, and consultations ensued as to how Annetta was to be got
there at all. At length after several modes of managing the matter had
been discussed, Mrs. Lake said,
“You two can walk there, and then I can say to Annetta that I am going
for a drive and to make a few purchases, so that she will have no
objection to go with me for an airing, and I will take good care to be
with you at the hour of twelve.”
“That will do prime,” said the son. “Leave mother alone for managing
things.”
“Well,” said Mr. Lake, “it shall be so, I don’t see any objection to
the scheme, nor can I suggest a better one, so we will look upon that
as settled. All you have to do,” turning to his son, “is to play your
part well.”
“Oh! never fear me, I like the girl and I like money.”
CHAPTER CXCIII.
THE VAMPYRE’S VISIT TO THE BARRACKS AT KINGSTON.—THE YOUNG OFFICER.
We do not wish altogether to lose sight of Varney in these proceedings,
and it so happens that he is sufficiently mixed up in what further
occurred to make it desirable that we should now again refer to him.
It was not the least singular fact in the character of that mysterious
being, to notice how he always endeavoured to make some sort of amends
or reparation to those whom he had so much terrified by his visitations.
We have seen in the case of the family of the Bannerworths how
eventually he was most anxious to do them a service, as a recompense
for the really serious injury he had inflicted upon them, and how
it was really and eventually through him that they emerged from
the circumstances of difficulty and danger in which they had been
pecuniarily engaged.
We shall now see if Varney, who really in his way is a very respectable
sort of a personage, is about good or evil.
We left him on the river, after promising in his usual liberal spirit,
a handsome reward to the waterman whom he employed to row the boat in
which he embarked.
After going some distance, the waterman, finding his fare was silent,
thought it would be as well again to ask him where he was going.
Accordingly, with a preparatory hem, he began by saying,
“About as nice a tide, sir, as we could have for going up the stream.”
“Very likely,” was the brief reply.
“Do you land near hand, sir?”
“I want to go to Kingston; take me to some Quay on the river as near as
you can, for the purpose of my walking there.”
“Kingston?” said the waterman, with a look rather of surprise. “It’s a
long pull to Kingston, and if your honour could get a conveyance, your
best way would be to get out at Putney.”
“Wherefore?”
“Why after that, the river takes such a plaguey lot of windings and
turnings that you have to go treble the actual distance before you
reach Teddington.”
“I said Kingston.”
“Well that’s close by Teddington; but I’ll row your honour if you like,
only it will take us some hours to get there that’s all.”
“Go on.”
“Very good, pull away, pull a—way.”
Having now, as he knew, a long job before him, the waterman husbanded
his strength, he did not row near so fast, but to a low kind of tune he
muttered to himself he worked away at his sculls, slowly and surely,
and got through the water at a moderate easy rate, while rather a quick
jerking one would soon have exhausted him.
The boat went slowly onward, and many an interesting sight was passed
upon the banks of the river, but none appeared in the least to attract
the attention of the man who sat in the boat, apparently deeply
absorbed in his own meditations.
The boatman began much to wonder who he had got as a fare, and to
think that it would be but a dull and wearisome job to row all the way
to Teddington without any amusing gossip by the way, so he made yet
another attempt to break the stillness that reigned around.
“The river up this way, sir,” he said, “is quiet enough at night; it’s
different below bridge though, for there there is always some bustle
going on.”
“Ah!” said Varney.
“But here, somehow, it is dull to my mind.”
“Ah!”
“Though the gentry and those as is book-learned find a deal of pleasure
in looking at the old places on the banks, where things have been done
and said by folks many a long year since, whose heads don’t ache now,
sir.”
“Ah!”
There was no getting on at this rate, so, after two or three more
remarks and getting nothing by “Ah!” as a reply, the waterman gave
it up as a bad job altogether, and pulled away, chaunting in a low
tone his song again, without making another attempt to disturb the
taciturnity of his fare, who sat as still as a statue in the boat,
and looking as if he did not breathe, so rigid and strange were his
attitude, and the lifeless-like appearance he had.
The waterman was really a little alarmed by the time they reached
Teddington, for he thought that it might be possible his fare was dead,
and the horrid idea that he had stiffened in that attitude as he sat,
began to find a place in the boatman’s imagination.
When, however, he boat’s keel grated on the landing-place, he cried,—
“Here we are, your honour.”
The vampyre rose and stepped on shore. He held out his hand and dropped
a guinea into the extended palm of the waterman, and then stalked off.
After he had walked some distance he spoke to a watchman whom he met,
saying,—
“Are there not military barracks somewhere hereabout?”
“Oh, yes.”
“Thank you. Can you direct me?”
“Certainly. You have only to go on, and take the second turning to
your left, and you will see the gate; it’s horse soldiers that’s there
now—the 4th Light Dragoons.”
By keeping to the directions which the watchman had given, Varney soon
reached the gate of the barracks, and then it was three o’clock in the
morning. A sentinel was pacing to and fro at the gate. To him Varney at
once went, and with a lofty kind of courtesy, that made the man at once
respectful to him, he said,—
“Is Lieutenant Rankin in barracks?”
“Yes, sir,—on duty.”
“Indeed! Is he on guard to-night?”
“Yes, sir, to four o’clock. He will be relieved then.”
“That’s fortunate, I want to see him. It is on business of the very
first importance, or of course I would not trouble him or myself. You
must send to him somehow.”
The sentinel hesitated.
“I hardly know,” he said, “how the lieutenant will take it—he is on
duty.”
“But I suppose he is human for all that, and is liable to all the
accidents and alternations of human affairs, which may make it
absolutely necessary he should be communicated with, even at such an
hour as this. I will hold you harmless.”
This was so reasonable, and there was such an air of quiet gentlemanly
authority about Varney, that the soldier began to think he should
run less risk of offending somebody of importance if he consented to
disturb the lieutenant than if he refused. Accordingly he stepped a
pace or two within the gate and called out.
“Guard!”
A soldier from the guard-room answered the summons.
“Ay,” he said, “what is it?—a strange cat I suppose.”
“No, none of your nonsense. Here is a gentleman, I think a general
officer, by Jove, wants to see Lieutenant Rankin. Go and tell him.”
“And give him this,” said Varney, as he handed the soldier a card, on
which was written,—
“A friend to a friend of Lieutenant Ranking, whose initials are A. L.”
“I know that this young soldier loves the Lady Annetta,” muttered the
vampyre to himself, “and he shall be given the opportunity of flying
to her rescue from her villainous relations. So far, I will make
reparation to her.”
In less than three minutes, Lieutenant Rankin came hurriedly to the
gate.
“Where is the gentleman?” he said.
“Here sir,” said Varney, “step aside with me.”
The young officer did so, and then Varney said to him,—
“It matters not how I became acquainted with the fact, but I know
that you love the Lady Annetta Lake, and that you are far from being
indifferently regarded by her. She is in London at the London Hotel. A
vile plot is formed to marry her to her cousin, the gist of which is to
make her both her and her father believe that she is a changeling and
not the daughter of Lord Lake. You love her, young man. Go and rescue
her.”
“Annetta in London!”
“Yes, what I tell you you may rely upon, as if it were a voice from
heaven that spoke to you. Go and snatch her whom you love from the
base hands of those who, under the mask of pretended friendship, would
betray her.”
“And you,” cried the young soldier; “who are you, and how can I repay
you for bringing me this intelligence of her whom I—”
“Enough,” said the vampyre. “I have performed my mission. It is for
you, young sir, to take a due advantage of that which I have told to
you.”
In another moment he was gone.
CHAPTER CXCIV.
AN ECLAIRCISSEMENT.—THE INNOCENT TRIUMPHANT.
It is eleven o’clock, Mr. and Mrs. Lake are standing by one of the
windows at the hotel conversing in whispers, while the hopeful son is
brushing his hat.
“It is time, you think?” said Mrs. Lake.
“Yes,” was the reply. “and I will be off now at once, and depend upon
you following with Annetta to Mr. Miller’s.”
“That you may be sure of. She has had a refreshing night’s rest, and
this morning she eagerly enough caught at the proposal to take a drive
round the principal thoroughfares in the carriage we have hired so that
that is no longer a difficulty.”
“What is to be done if she rejects?”
Mr. Lake gave a jerk with his head in the direction of his son, to
signify that it was of him he talked.
“It can’t be helped if she does. Then I should say all we have to do,
is to persevere in making her out no child of Lord Lake’s, and wait
for his decease. We must be careful what we are about, though, or he
may take it into his head to make some ample provision for her, to the
decrease of his personal means, which I hope to see all ours.”
“The only way to stop that will be getting Miller and the pretended
father to make it as a complete part of the plan that Annetta herself
should seem latterly to have been a party to palming herself off upon
him as his daughter when she knew the contrary quite well.”
“Ah, if that could be done.”
“It must and shall; Miller’s ingenuity in such matters is immense. He
will accomplish anything in the world—aye seeming impossibilities—for
money.”
“He is just the man for us, so now be off with you at once, and expect
me in good time.”
In a few moments afterwards, Mr. Lake set off with this booby son to
the lawyer’s, enjoining him all the way as they went, to be especially
careful how he maintained the character of a disinterested suitor,
which had been marked out for him in the programme of the family
proceedings.
“Oh, never fear me, father.”
“Well, I hope that you will do and say the right things, and what is as
important, I hope you will do and say them at the right time, otherwise
you will spoil all.”
Thus armed at all points, as they thought, for conquest, old Lake and
young Lake, than whom all London could not have produced two more
unprincipled persons, arrived at Gray’s Inn, and were received in the
outer room of Mr. Miller’s chambers with every demonstration of respect.
“Walk in, gentlemen, walk in to the clients’ private-room if you
please,” said the clerk. “Mr. Miller left directions with me that when
you came, you should be shown in at once.”
All this was very gratifying indeed, and the solicitor was there,
seated in his easy chair, looking as full of serenity as possible, and
as if the least affair in the world was on _tapis_.
Scarcely had the usual salutations passed, when the clerk announced
Mrs. Lake and a young lady.
“My wife with Annetta!” exclaimed Lake; and in a moment his words were
verified by the appearance of the parties he had named.
“Tell me at once,” said Annetta, “why I am brought here?”
“My dear young lady,” said Mr. Miller, “if you will condescend to take
a seat, I will explain.”
“Be brief, sir.”
The party was seated, and then Mr. Miller, clearing his throat said,—
“Ahem! You are of course aware, miss, that great doubt arose in the
mind of Lord Lake with regard to your proper identity, and he sent you
over to this country from Italy with his brother and family, to have
those doubts resolved—ahem! They are resolved, and you are found to be
the daughter of a gentleman now in London.”
“The proofs, sir,” said Annetta, with a dignity and a calmness that
surprised the whole party.
“Ah, ah—the proofs. Let me see, oh yes; there are the papers. No. 1,
copy of a confession made by——”
“Stop, sir,” said young Lake, “stop. This is—it must be painful to
the feelings of this young lady, and very, very painful is it to my
feelings, for I have been long fervently attached to her, and let her
be whose daughter she may, she is to me all perfection. I love her and
would gladly make her my wife, let her be named whatever she may.”
“But she is destitute,—quite destitute,” said Miller.
“It don’t matter to me,” cried young Lake—he was playing his part
famously—“it don’t matter to me; I love her, and will work for her—she
shall never want while I have life-blood in my veins.”
“If this now were sincere,” said Annetta, “I should begin for the first
time to respect you. But you will excuse me for doubting it very much.
I likewise doubt much the pretended evidence that you bring forward
regarding my birth.”
A tremendous knock at the outer door of the chambers now disturbed
the party. An altercation was heard with the clerk—then a shout for
police, and a heavy fall as if somebody had been knocked down, and in
another moment the door of Mr. Miller’s private room was dashed open,
and Lieutenant Rankin, in his undress military uniform, stood upon the
threshold.
“Annetta!” he cried.
“Rankin—oh, George, George!” shrieked Annetta, and in another moment
she was in his arms.
“Here’s a go,” cried young Lake; “I say, young fellow, this won’t do.”
“Oh, George, George!” said Annetta, “they will have it that I am not my
own father’s child, that I am some nameless, houseless thing.”
“They lie, Annetta who say so,” replied the young soldier; “you shall
be mine, and the proudest that ever stepped shall treat you with
becoming respect, or shall rue the consequences.”
“Well, I think it’s time!” cried Mr. Miller in a marked manner, and
throwing open the door of an inner room, he added, “my Lord Lake, come
forth; no doubt you have heard all.” Lord Lake himself—the Mr. Blue
of the London Hotel, the sham confidential clerk of Miller—made his
appearance, to the utter confusion of the Lakes.
“My father,” said Annetta, “my dear father!”
[Illustration: Annetta greets her dear father.]
“Hold,” said Lord Lake, gravely, “I suspected, Annetta, from the first
that your birth was impugned by my brother from the most interested
motives, and I followed you from Italy—Mr. Miller disclosed all to me,
and the infamous plot is discovered.”
“Then I am your child?”
“Confusion,” muttered Lake, “death and the devil, what a _contre
temps_.”
“Stop,” added Lord Lake, “the strangest thing of all has yet to be
told. This plot to make out that you are not my child is but a plot,
but it is not baseless as to the fact. You are not my daughter. I have
by mere chance found out that lately, and I cannot provide for you, as
the resources I have must go to him who will inherit my title. What say
you, Master Lake, this girl with all her beauty is destitute, her name
is Smith—will you have her?”
“Not I in faith, thank you for nothing.”
“Will you, young soldier, knowing what she is?”
“Ay, will I with all my heart! she is the highest, brightest treasure
this world can offer me. Any name or no name—poor or rich—noble or
commoner—she is still my own dear girl, and her resting place shall be
my heart, the whole world shall not tear her from it.”
“God’s blessings on you,” cried Lord Lake, grasping his hands; “I did
but this to give yon shrinking coward a chance of creeping into favour
with me, because he boasted so of his disinterested affection a while
ago. She is my child, the Lady Annetta Lake—I never doubted it, and she
is yours—George Rankin, and you shall be the dear son of my adoption.”
“I say, father,” said young Lake, “I—I think we had better go.”
“Curse you all,” cried Lake, “and doubly curse you, lawyer Miller, you
have betrayed me; but I’ll be revenged.”
“Through the bars of a prison,” said the lawyer. “An officer is down
stairs to arrest you for two thousand pounds. Ha, ha, ha!”
• • • • •
Thus then was it that this episode in the life of Varney the Vampyre
terminated. But still he lived, and still there existed all the strange
and fearful mixture of good and evil that was in his disposition.
There he was yet upon the earth’s surface, looking like one of the
great world, and yet possessing so few feelings in common with its
inhabitants.
Surely to him there must have been periods of acute suffering, of
intense misery, such as would have sufficed to drive any ordinary mind
to distraction, and yet he lived, although one cannot, upon reviewing
his career, and considering what he was, consider that death would have
been other than a grateful release to him from intense suffering.
Perhaps, of all the suffering that, in consequence of his most awful
and singular existence, was inflicted upon human nature, he suffered
the most, for that he was a man of good intellect no one who has
followed us thus far can doubt, and one cannot help giving in almost at
times to as strange and fanciful theory of his own, namely that this
world was to him the place of perdition for crimes done in some other
sphere.
“It must be so!” he would say, “but as the Almighty Master of all
things is all merciful, as he is all powerful, the period of my
redemption will surely come at last.”
This was the most consolat thought that Varney could have, and it
showed that even yet there was a something akin to humanity lingering
in his heart.
This showed that despite the dreadful power he had—a power, as well as
an awful propensity—he had some yearnings after a better state.
What had he been? How did he become a vampyre? Did the voice of fond
affection ever thrill in his ears? Had little children ever climbed the
knee of that wretched man? Fearful questions, if he could have answered
them the affirmative—if he bore about with him, deep in his memory, a
remembrance of such joys gone by.
CHAPTER CXCV.
THE VAMPYRE HAS SERIOUS THOUGHTS.—THE DREAM.—THE RESOLUTION.
The next day after the events that we have detailed, Varney found
himself in a hotel in London. He did not even make the effort to
inquire how the affair connected with the Lady Annetta, in which
towards the last he had played a generous part, prospered.
He was too spirit-broken himself to do so.
For nearly the whole day he remained in a room by himself, and although
to avoid uncomfortable and ungracious remarks being made by the people
of the house, he ordered from time to time food and wine, he, in
accordance with his horrible nature, which forbade him any nourishment
but human blood, touched neither.
During that day he seemed to be suffering acutely, for now and then
as the waiters of the hotel passed the door of the private room he
occupied, they heard deep agonising groans, and when once or twice they
went in, fancying that he must be very ill or dying, they found him
seated at a table on which his head was resting.
He would start up on these occasions, and sternly question them for
interrupting him, so at last they left him alone.
Let us look at him in his solitude.
It is getting towards the dim and dusky hours of late twilight, and he
can only barely be descried as he sits bolt upright in a high-backed
arm-chair, looking at vacancy, while his lips move, and he appears to
be conversing with the spirits of another world, that in their dim
intangibility are not visible to mortal eyes.
Now and then he would strike his breast, and utter a dull groan as if
some sudden recollection of the dreadful past had come over him, with
such a full tide of horror that it could not be resisted.
It was not until a considerable time had elapsed, and the darkness had
greatly increased, that he at length spoke.
“And I was once happy,” he said mournfully, “once happy, because I was
innocent. Oh! gracious Heaven, how long am I to suffer?”
A spasmodic kind of movement of his whole features ensued, that was
quite dreadful to look upon, and would have terrified any one who could
have seen them. Then he spoke again.
“I was happy one hundred and eighty years ago,” he said, “for that has
been the awful duration my life as yet; yes, a hundred and eighty years
have, with their sunshine of summer, and their winter storms, passed
over my head; and I had a wife and children, who, with innocent and
gladsome prattle, would climb my knee and nestle in my bosom. Oh! where
are they all now?”
He wrung his hands, but he did not weep the fount of tears had dried up
for a hundred years in his bosom.
“Yes, yes! the grave holds them—holds them? said I. No, no, long since
have they crumbled into dust, and nothing of them remains as a faint
indication even of who once was human. I, I it was who listened to the
councils of a fiend, and destroyed her who had give up home, kindred,
associations, all for me.”
He rose up from the chair, and seemed to think that he would find some
relief in pacing the room to and fro, but he soon threw himself again
into the seat.
“No, no,” he said, “no peace for me; and I cannot sleep, I have never
slept what mortals call sleep, the sleep of rest and freedom from care,
for many a long year. When I do seem to repose, then what dreadful
images awake to my senses. Better, far better that my glaring eyeballs
should crack with weariness, than that I should taste such repose.”
The sympathetic shudder with which he uttered these words was quite
proof sufficient of his deep and earnest sincerity. He must indeed
have suffered much before he could have give such a sentiment such an
utterance. We pity thee, Varney!
“And when, oh, when will my weary pilgrimage be over,” he ejaculated;
“Oh when will the crime of murder be cleansed from my soul. I killed
her. Yes, I killed her who loved me. A fiend, I know it was a fiend,
whispered suspicion in my ear, suspicion of her who was as pure as the
first ray of sunlight that from heaven shows itself to chase away the
night, but I listened and then created from my own fevered brain the
circumstances that gave suspicion strength and horrible consistency—and
I killed her.”
After the utterance of these words he was silent for a time, and then
in heart-rending accents he again repeated them.
“I killed her—I killed her, and she was innocent. Then I became what I
am. There was a period of madness, I think, but I became a vampyre; I
have died many deaths, but recovered from them all; for ever, by some
strange accident or combination of circumstances, the cold moonbeams
have had access to my lifeless form, and I have recovered.”
By this time the landlord of the hotel in which Varney was staying, had
got in a fearful fidget, for he began to think that he had a madman
in his house, and that it would turn out that his guest had made his
escape from some lunatic asylum.
“I wonder now,” he thought, “if a little soothing civility would do any
good; I will try it. It can’t surely do any harm.”
With this intent the landlord went up stairs to the room in which
Varney the Vampyre was, and he tapped gently at the door.
There was no reply, and after a few moments’ consideration, the
landlord opened the door and peeped in, when he saw his customer
sitting in an arm-chair, in the manner in which we have described him
to sit.
“If you please, sir,” said the landlord, “would you not like——”
“Blood!” said Varney, rising.
The landlord did not wait for any more, but bustled down stairs again
with all the promptitude in his power.
It was a bed-room and sitting-room that Varney occupied at the hotel,
the one adjoining the other, and now although he groaned and sighed at
the idea of repose, he flung himself upon the bed, full dressed, as he
was, and there he lay as still as death itself.
One of those strange fitful kind of slumbers, such as he had himself
described as being so full of dread, came over him.
For a time he was still, as we have said, but then as various images of
agony began to chase each other through his brain, he tossed about his
arms, and more than once the word “mercy” came from his lips in accents
of the most soul-harrowing nature.
This state of things continued for some considerable time, and then in
his sleep a great change came over him, and he fancied he was walking
in a garden replete with all the varied beauties of a southern clime,
and through the centre of which meandered a stream, the chrystal music
of which was delightfully calming and soothing to his senses.
All around seemed to speak of the peace and loveliness of an Eden.
As he wandered on, he fancied that some form was walking by his side,
and that he heard the gentle fall of its feet, and the flutter of
garments.
“Varney,” it said, “you have suffered much.”
“I have. Oh, God knows I have.”
“You would die, Varney, if the moonbeams could be prevented from
reaching you.”
“Yes, yes. But how—how?”
“The ocean. The deep, deep sea hides many a worse secret than the
corpse of a vampyre.”
It might have been that, after all, his sleep was to some extent
refreshing to him, or that the dream he had, had instilled a hope
into him of a release from what, in his case, might truly be called
the bondage of existence; but he certainly arose more calm, cool, and
collected, than he had been for some time past.
“Yes,” he said, “the deep sea holds a secret well, and if I could but
be washed into some of its caverns, I might lie there and rot until the
great world itself had run its course.”
This idea took great possession of him. He thought over various modes
of carrying it out. At one time he thought that if he bought a boat on
the sea coast, and went out alone, sailing away as far from land as he
could, he might be able to accomplish his object. But then he might not
be able to get far enough.
At length he thought of a more feasible and a better plan than that,
and it was to take his passage in some ship for any port, and watch his
opportunity, some night when far from land, to steal up upon the deck
and plunge in the waves.
The more he considered of this plan the better he liked it, and the
more it wore an appearance of probability and an aspect of success, so
at length the thought grew into a resolution.
“Yes, yes,” he muttered, “who knows but that some friendly spirit—for
the mid air that floats ’twixt earth and heaven is peopled with such,
may have whispered such counsel in my ears. It shall be done; I will no
longer hesitate, but make this attempt to shake off the dreadful weight
which mere existence is to me.”
CHAPTER CXCVI.
THE SCOTCH PACKET SHIP.—THE SUICIDE.
It was in pursuance of this resolution, so strangely and suddenly
formed, that the unhappy Varney rose on the following morning and went
to that region of pitch, slop clothing, red herrings, and dirt—the
docks.
But yet, somehow, although the docks may not be the cleanest or the
most refined part of the vast city of London, the coarseness and the
litter there—for after all it is more litter than dirt—are by no means
so repulsive as those bad addenda to other localities.
There is a kind of rough freshness induced by the proximity of the
water which has a physical and moral effect, we are inclined to think,
upon the place and the people, and which takes off much of what would
otherwise wear the aspect of what is called low life.
But this is all by the way, and we will at once proceed to follow the
fortunes of Varney, in carrying out his plan of self annihilation.
The hour was an early one, and many a curious glance was cast at him,
for although he had humanised and modernised his apparel to a great
extent, he could not get rid of the strange, unworld-like (if we may
use the phrase) look of his face. He was very pale too, and jaded
looking, for the thoughts that had recently occupied him were not such
as to do good to the looks of any one.
He cared little in what vessel he embarked. He had but one object in
embarking at all, and that was to get out to sea, so that the ultimate
destination of the ship that should receive so very odd and equivocal a
passenger was a matter of no moment.
Stopping a personage who had about him a sea faring look, Varney,
pointing to a bustling place of embarkation, said,
“Does any vessel start from there to-day?”
“Yes, there’s one going now, or as soon as the tide serves her, She is
for Leith?”
“On the coast of Scotland, I think?”
“Yes, to be sure.”
Varney walked on until he came to a kind of counting-house, where sat a
man with books before him, and, not to take up more valuable space, he
secured what was called a berth on board the “Ocean”, a dirty, small,
ill-convenient ship bound for the port near the Scotch metropolis of
Edinburgh.
Not wishing to be himself much noticed, and having no desire to notice
anybody, Varney went down below, and seated himself in a dark corner
of the generally dingy cabin, and there, amid all the noise, bawling,
abuse, and bustle contingent upon getting the ill-conditioned bark
under weigh, he never moved or uttered a word to any one, although the
cabin was frequently visited.
But Varney had no idea of the amount of annoyance to which he was
likely, in the course of the evening, to be subjected.
The vessel was got under weigh, and as both wind and tide happened to
be favourable, she dropped down the river rapidly, and soon was clear
of the Nore-light, and holding on her course northward.
The cabin now began to fill with the passengers, and extraordinary as
the fact may appear, there were many Scotchmen actually going back
again. They were, however, only going to pay visits, for it is one of
the popular delusions that Scotchmen try to keep up in this country,
that they have left something dear and delightful behind them in
Scotland, and that, take it altogether, it is one of the most desirable
spots in the whole world. It becomes, therefore, quite necessary for
them to go back now and then, in order to keep up that delusion.
Personal vanity, too, is one of the great characteristics of the
nation; and many a Scotchman goes back to Edinburgh, for example, to
make an appearance among his old friends and family connexions, totally
incompatible with his real position in London.
By about nine o’clock at night, when the shore to the west could only
be discovered as a dim, grey line on the horizon, the cabin of the
“Ocean” packet was crammed.
Whisky was produced, and a drink that the Scotch call “bottled yell,”
meaning ale; and as these two heady liquids began to take effect
“Auld Lang Syne” was chaunted in the vernacular by the whole party.
At length a feeling of annoyance began to grow up from the fact of
the isolated aspect of Varney, and the quiet, unobtrusive manner in
which he looked on at the proceedings, appearing not in the smallest
degree enthusiastic, even when the most uproarious Scotch songs, in
the most unintelligible of all jargons, were sung, for strange to say,
the authors of that nation take a pride in slaughtering the English
language.
At length a Scotchman approached Varney and said,—
“Ye’ll take a glass to auld Reekie mon?”
[Edinburgh is called Reekie in consequence of the absence of drainage,
giving it a horrible fœtid smell, a reeky atmosphere, in a manner
of speaking; which may be illustrated by the Scotchman, who was
returning to that place from England, on the top of a stage coach,
when within about fifty miles he began sniffing and working his nose
in an extraordinary manner.—“What are you doing that for?” said an
Englishman. “Eh! mon, I can smell the gude auld toon.”]
“I do not understand your language,” said Varney, and he walked from
the cabin to the deck of the vessel. He recoiled an instant, for the
moon was rising.
“Ever thus, even thus,” he said, “how strange it is that I never dream
of ridding myself of the suffering of living, but the moon is shining
brightly. Can its rays penetrate the ocean?”
The deck was very still and silent indeed. The man at the helm, and
one other pacing to and fro, were all that occupied it, save Varney
himself, and he stood by the side gazing in the direction, where he had
last seen the dim grey speck of land.
“A pleasant run, sir, we shall have of it,” said the man who had been
pacing the deck, “if this kindly wind continues.”
“It blows from the west.”
“Yes, nearly due-west; but that suits us. We keep her head a few points
in shore, and do well with such a wind, although a south-west by south
is our choice.”
“How far are we from land?”
“It’s the coast of Suffolk that is to our left, but we are I hope a
good thirty miles or more from it.”
“You hope?”
“Yes, sir. Perhaps you are not sufficient of a sailor to know that we
never hug the shore if we can possibly help it.”
“I understand. And there?”
“Oh, there lies the German Ocean.”
“How deep now should you say the sea was here?”
“Can’t say, sir, but it’s blue water.”
This was not much information to Varney, but he bowed his head and
walked forward, as much as to say that he had had enough of the
information and conversation of the man, who was the mate of the
vessel, and quite disposed to be communicative. Perhaps in the very dim
light he did not see exactly what a strange-looking personage he was
talking to.
“Thirty miles from land,” thought Varney, “surely that is far enough,
and I need have no dread of floating to the shore through such a mass
of water as that thirty miles. The distance is very great; I can
to-night in another hour make the attempt.”
To his great joy some heavy clouds climbed up the sky along with the
moon, and congregating around the beautiful satellite, effectually
obscured the greater number of its beams. There was in fact, no
absolute moonlight, but a soft reflected kind of twilight coming
through the clouds, and dispersed far and wide.
“This will do,” muttered Varney. “All I have to fear are the direct
moonbeams. It is they that have the effect of revivifying such as I am.”
The man who had been pacing the deck finally sat down, and appeared to
drop off to sleep, so that all was still, and as Varney kept to the
head of the vessel, the man at the wheel could see nothing of him,
there being many intervening obstacles. He was perfectly alone.
Now and then, with a loud roaring about, he heard some boisterous
drinking chorus come from the cabin, and then a rattle of glasses as
fists were thumped upon the tables in token of boisterous approbation,
and then all would be still again.
Varney looked up to the sky and his lips moved, but he uttered no
sound. He went closer to the vessel’s side and gazed upon the water as
it lazily rippled past. How calm and peaceful, he thought, he ought to
be, far beneath that tide.
A sudden plunge into the sea would have made a splash that would have
been heard, and that he wished of all things to avoid. He clambered
slowly over the side, and only held on by his hands for a moment. The
cool night air tossed about his long elfin locks, and in another moment
he was gone.
CHAPTER CXCVII.
THE OLD MANOR HOUSE.—THE RESCUE.—VARNEY’S DESPAIR.
At about ten o’clock on that same night on which Varney the Vampyre
plunged into the sea with hopes of getting rid of the world of troubles
that oppressed him, a small fishing boat might have been seen a
distance of about twenty-five miles from the Suffolk coast, trying to
make for land, and baffled continually by the wind that blew off shore.
In this boat were two young men, and from their appearance they
evidently belonged to the wealthier class of society. They were
brothers.
From their conversation we shall gather the circumstances that threw
them into such situation, not by any means divested of peril as it was.
“Well, Edwin,” said one, “here we have been beating about for five
hours, trying to get in shore, and all our little bark permits us to do
is I think not materially to increase our distance from home.”
“That is about the truth, Charles,” said the other, “and it was my
fault.”
“Come, Edwin, don’t talk in that way. There is no fault in the matter;
how could you know that the wind would stiffen into such a breeze as it
has, so that we cannot fight out against it; or if there be fault, of
course it’s as much mine as yours, for am not I here, and do I not know
full well what an amount of consternation there will be at the Grange?”
“There will indeed!”
“Well, their joy when we get back will be all the greater.”
“Shall we get back?”
“Can you ask? Look at our little boat, is she not sea-worthy? Does she
not dance on the waves merrily? It is only the wind after all that
baffles us, if it would drop a little, we could, I think make head
against it with the oars.
The brothers were silent now for a few moments, for they were each
looking at the weather. At length Edwin spoke, saying,—
“We shall have the moon up, and that may make a change.”
“Very likely—very likely. There is not, I think, quite so much sea as
there was; suppose we try the oars again?”
The other assented, and the two young men exerted themselves very much
to decrease their distance from the Suffolk coast by pulling away right
manfully, but it was quite evident to them that they did no good, and
that they had just as well dropped westward as they had been doing, by
keeping the sail set, and steering as near as possible to the wind.
“Why, if this goes on, Charles, where shall we get to by the morning?”
“To Northumberland, perhaps.”
“Or further.”
“Well, if we go far enough, what say you to attempting the _vexata
questio_ of the north-west passage?”
“Nay, I cannot jest—it’s a sad thing this—more sad a good deal for
those who are at home, than for us. To-morrow is Clara’s wedding day,
and what a damper it will be upon all to suppose that we have perished
at sea.”
“They will never suppose that we would do anything so ridiculous. Why,
at the worst, you know, we could go before the wind and run on to
Holland.”
“Yes, if no storm arises or such a gale as might founder our boat.
There, there is the moon.”
“Yes, and she will soon be overtaken by yon bank of clouds that seem to
be scudding after her in the blue heavens. Ha! a sail, by Jove!”
“Where? where?”
“Not I think above four miles there to the east, by our little compass
which it is a thousand mercies we have with us. Look, you may see her
sails against that light cloud—there.”
“I see her. Think you she will see us?”
“There is every chance, for her swell of canvass will be all the other
way. Fire your fowling-piece and the sound may reach her, the wind is
good for carrying it.”
Charles took a fowling-piece from the bottom of the boat. The brothers
had merely gone out at sunset or a little before it, to shoot gulls,
and he tried to discharge the piece, but several seas that they had
shipped, while they were thinking of other things than keeping the gun
dry, had, for the time being, most effectively prevented it from being
discharged.
“Ah!” said Edwin as he heard the click of the lock, “that hope is lost.”
“It is indeed, and to my thinking the ship is distancing us rapidly.
You see our mast and sail, will, at even this distance, lie so low in
the horizon that they will hardly see us unless they are sweeping the
sky with a night glass.”
“And that is not likely.”
“Certainly not, so we have nothing for it but to hold on our way. I am
getting hungry if you are not.”
“I certainly am not getting hungry, for I have felt half famished these
last two hours; but I suppose we may hold out against the fiend hunger
some hours yet. What are you looking at so earnestly, eh?”
“I hardly know.”
“You hardly know? Let me see—why—why what is it?”
“There seems to me to be something now and that much darker than the
waves, tiding on their tops; there, do you not see it? There it is
again. There!”
“Yes, yes.”
“What on earth can it be?”
“A dead body.”
“Indeed! ah! it drifts towards us. There is some current hereabouts,
for you see it comes to us against the wind.”
“Don’t deceive yourself, brother. It is we who are going with the wind
towards it, and now you can see there is no doubt about what it is.
Some poor fellow, who has been drowned. Get out the boat-hook, get it
out.”
“Why, you would not take in such a cargo, Edwin.”
“God forbid! but I feel some curiosity to see who and what sort of a
personage it is. Here we have him. What a length he is to be sure.”
The body was nearly alongside the boat, and one of the brothers
detained it with a boat-hook, while they both looked earnestly at it.
It was the body of a man, remarkably well dressed, and had no
appearance of having been under the water long. The features, as far as
they could see them, were calm and composed. The hands were clenched,
and some costly looking rings glittered on the fingers through the salt
spray that foamed and curled around the insensible form.
“Charles,” said Edwin; “what we shall do?”
Edwin shook his head.
“I—I don’t like.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t like to cast it adrift again, and not take it ashore, where it
can rest in an honest man’s grown if he be one. Fancy it being one of
us, would it not be a consolation to those who love us to know that we
rested in peace among our ancestors, in preference to rotting in the
sea, tossed and mangled by every storm that blows. I do not like to
cast the body adrift again.”
“It’s a ghastly passenger.”
“It is, but that ghastliness is only an idea, and we should remember
that we ourselves——”
“Stop, brother, stop. Do not fancy that I oppose your wish to convey
this body to the shore, and place it in some sanctified spot. What I
expressed concerning it was merely the natural feeling that must arise
on such an occasion, nothing more.”
“Then you are willing?”
“I am.”
The two brothers now, without further doubts or remarks upon the
subject, got the body into the boat, and laid it carefully down. Then
Edwin folded and tied a handkerchief over the face, for as he truly
enough said,—
“There is no occasion to have to encounter that dead face each moment
that one turns one’s eyes in that direction; it is sufficient that we
have, by taking the body in at all done, all that humanity can dictate
to us.”
To this Charles agreed, and it was remarked by them both as a strange
thing that from the moment of their taking in the dead body to the
boat, the wind dropped, and finally there was almost a calm, after
which there came soft gentle air from the south-east, which enabled
them with scarcely any exertion on their own parts to make great
progress towards their own home, from which they found they had not by
any means been driven so far northward as they had at first thought.
The brothers looked at each other, and it was Edwin who broke the
silence, and put into words what both thought, by saying,—
“Charles, there is something more in this whole affair than what lies
just upon its surface.”
“Yes, it seems as if we were driven out to sea by some special
providence to do this piece of work, and that having done it, the winds
and the waves obeyed the hand of their mighty Master, and allowed of
our return.”
“It does seem so,” said the other.
CHAPTER CXCVIII.
A FAMILY SCENE.—THE SISTERS.—THE HORRIBLE ALARM.
In the course of two hours more, the young men were so close in shore
that they could see the lights flashing along the coast, and they even
fancied they could catch a glimpse of human forms moving along with
torches; and if such were the case, they doubted not but that these
people were sent to serve as a guide to them should they with their
little bark be hovering near the coast.
“Look, Edwin,” said Charles, “we are expected, are we not?”
“Yes, yes.”
“I am certain that those lights are meant as guides for us.”
“They may spare themselves the trouble, for do you not see that the
clouds are wearing away, and that in a few minutes more we shall have
the undimmed lustre of a full moon looking down upon us.”
“It will be so.”
The boat had now got so far within a large natural inlet of the ocean
that but very little wind caught its gently flapping sail, so that the
brothers bent manfully to their oars, and got the boat through the
water at a rapid rate.
Oh, how very different their sensations were now to what they had been
when they were beating about at the mercy of the winds and waves, but
a few short hours since, and when it certainly was but an even chance
with death whether they would ever see their home again.
If a gale had sprung up, accompanied by anything in the shape of a very
heavy sea, they must have been lost.
Soon they saw that their boat was descried, and at a particular portion
of the coast there stood a complete cluster of men with torches,
inviting them there to land, and they knew that such landing place was
upon their father’s property, and that in a few minutes they would be
safe on shore.
Neither of them spoke, but reflection was busy in the hearts of both.
There was a loud and thoroughly English shout, as the boat grated upon
the sandy beach, and Edwin and Charles jumped on shore. They were in
another moment pressed in their father’s arms.
“Why, why, boys,” he said, “what a fright you have given us all;
there’s Clara and Emma have been forced—I say forced, for nothing but
force would do it—to go home, and the whole country has been in an
uproar. You were blown out to sea, I suppose?”
“Yes, father, but we have not been in any danger.”
“Not in any danger with such a cockle-shell of a boat fairly out
into the German Ocean. But we will say no more about it, lads. Not
another word, come home at once, and make all hearts glad at the old
Grange-house.”
“There’s something in the boat,” cried one of the men who held a light.
“Good God, yes!” exclaimed Charles.
“We had forgotten,” said Edwin, “we met with a little adventure at sea,
and picked up a dead body.”
“A dead body?”
“Yes, father, we could not find it in our hearts to let it be, so we
brought it on shore that it might have the rites of Christian burial in
the village church-yard. Somebody who loved the man may yet thank us
for it, and feel a consolation to know that such had been done.”
“You are right boys, you are right,” said the father, “you have done in
that matter just as I would wish you; I will give orders for the body
to be taken to the dead house by Will Stephens, and to-morrow it shall
be decently interred.”
This being settled, the father, accompanied by his two sons, who were
not a little pleased to be safe upon _terra firma_ again, walked
together up a sloping pathway, which led to the Grange-house, as it was
called.
The joy that the return of the brothers caused in the family, our
readers may well imagine. The sisters Clara and Emma wept abundantly,
and the mother, who had let her fears go further than any one else, was
deeply affected.
[Illustration: Charles and Edwin are reunited with their mother.]
But it is time that we should inform the reader who these people were,
whom we have introduced upon the scene of our eventful history.
Sir George Crofton, for such was the name of the father of Edwin and
Charles, was a wealthy warm-hearted country gentleman, and constantly
resided upon his own estate all the year round, being a good landlord
to his tenantry, and a good father to his four children, who have
already been to some extent presented to the reader.
The mother was a kind-hearted, but rather weak woman, with an
evangelical bias that at times was rather annoying to the family.
This, however, was perhaps the good lady’s only fault, for with that
one exception, she was fond of her children to excess, notwithstanding,
as Sir George sometimes jestingly said he verily believed, she in her
heart considered they were all on the high road to a nameless abode.
The night was so far advanced when the young men got home that, of
course, not much was said or done, and among other things that were put
off until the following morning, was the story of the finding of the
body.
“There is no occasion,” whispered Sir George, “to say anything to your
mother about it.”
“Certainly not, father.”
“At least not till to-morrow, for if you do, I shall not get a wink of
sleep for her reflections on the subject.”
The two young men knew very well that this was no exaggeration, and
that their mother would, like any divine, eagerly seize the opportunity
of what is called “improving the occasion” by indulging in a long
discourse upon the most dismal of all subjects that the mind of any
human being can conceive, namely, the probability of everybody going to
eternal perdition unless they believe in a particular set of doctrines
that to her seem orthodox.
The consequence of this was that the dead body was quietly taken out
of the boat by men who did not possess the most refined feelings in the
world, and carried to the bone house.
“He seems a decent sort of chap,” said one, as he looked at the very
respectable habiliments of the corpse.
“Ah! look at the gould rings.”
“Yes, you may, look, Abel, but eyes on, hands off.”
“Why?”
“Why, you gowk, do you think as young Master Charles and Edwin don’t
know of ’em, and more besides, who would touch dead man’s gold off of
his fingers?”
“Is it unlucky?”
“Horrid!”
“Then I’ll have nought to do with un.”
The body was placed on the ground, for there was no coffin of any sort
to put it in, and the door was shut upon it in the dead house, and then
the party who had brought it there thought it a part of their duty
to wake up Will Stephens the sexton, to tell him that there was such
a thing as a dead body placed in his custody, as it were, by being
put into the dead house, which was not above a hundred yards from the
cottage occupied by Will.
They hammered away rather furiously at his door, and no wonder that he
felt a little, or perhaps not a little, alarmed upon the occasion.
In a few moments a casement was opened and out popped a head.
“Hilloa! you ragamuffins, what do you mean by hammering away at an
honest man’s door at this rate, eh? Am I to have any sleep?”
“Ragamuffin yourself,” cried one; “there’s a dead body of a drowned
man in the bone-house. All you have got to do is to look after it, and
there’s a lot of gold rings on its fingers with diamonds in them, for
all we know, worth God knows how much. You may make the most of it now
that you know it.”
“A dead man! Who is he?”
“Ah, that’s more than we can tell. Good night, or rather good morning,
old crusty.”
“Stop! stop!—tell me——”
The men only laughed, for they had no desire to protract a conversation
with the sexton, and he called in vain after them to give him some
further information upon the subject of this rather mysterious
information.
“A drowned man,” he pondered to himself, “a drowned man, and with
fingers loaded with gems, and brought to the bone-house! Oh, pho! pho!
It’s a hoax, that’s what it is, and I won’t believe it. It’s done to
get me up in the cold, that’s all, and then there will be some trick
played off upon me safe, and I shall be only laughed at for my pains.”
Full of this idea, the sexton turned into his bed again, and hoped that
by speedily going to sleep, he should get the laugh of his tormentors,
instead of they getting it of him, as well as lose the shivering that
had come on him through standing at the open window, exposed to the
night air so very indifferently clad.
CHAPTER CXCIX.
THE SEXTON’S AVARICE.—THE DEAD AND THE LIVING.—THE RING.
It was all very well for the sexton to wish, and to try to got to
sleep, but actually to succeed in procuring
“Nature’s sweet oblivion”
was quite another matter.
In vain he tossed and turned about, there was no rest for him of any
kind or description, dreamless or dreamful, and still he kept repeating
to himself,—
“A dead body, with gold and diamond rings in the bone-house.”
These were the magic words which, like a spell that he was compelled
by some malign influence continually to repeat, kept Will Stephens
awake, until at last he seemed to lose entirely his first perception of
the fact that he might be only hoaxed, and all his imagination became
concentrated on the idea of how came the dead body in the bone-house,
and how was it that gold and diamond rings were left on its fingers in
such a place?
These were mental ruminations, the result of which was transparent from
the first, for that result in the natural order of things was sure to
be that the passion of curiosity would get the better of all other
considerations, and he, Will Stephens, would rise to ascertain if such
were really the state of things.
“It ain’t far off morning, now,” he reasoned with himself, “so I may
as well get up at once as lie here tossing and tumbling about, and
certainly unable to get another wink of sleep, and besides after all I
may be wrong in thinking this a hoax. There may really be such a dead
body as those fellows mentioned in the bone-house and if there be, I
ought certainly to go and look after it.”
We easily reason ourselves into what is our pleasure, and so while
these cogitatory remarks were uttered by the sexton, he rose.
He found that if he drew back the blind from before his window, the
moon which was now sailing through a nearly cloudless sky, would give
him amply sufficient light to enable him to go through the process of
dressing, so he at once began that operation.
“Yes,” he said, “I ought to go, it’s my positive duty to do so, after
getting the information I have, and if that information be untrue, let
it recoil on the heads of those who invented the falsehood. I shall go,
that’s settled. What a sweet moonlight.”
It was a sweet moonlight indeed. The floods of soft silvery light fell
with an uncommon radiance upon all objects, and the minutest thing
could have been seen upon the ground, with the same clearness and
distinctness as at mid-day.
The only difference was that a soft preternatural looking atmosphere
seemed to be around everything, and a kind of marble like look was
imparted to all objects far and near on which those soft silvery rays
rested in beauty and sublimity.
The sexton was full dressed, and although the moonlight guided him
well, he thought that he might in the bone-house require another mode
of illumination, and he lighted and took with him a small lantern which
had a darkening shade to it.
Thus prepared, he walked at a rapid pace from his own house towards the
small shed-like building which served as a receptacle for the unowned
dead, and for such human remains as were from time to time cast ashore
by the waves, or flung up from new graves by the spade and the mattock.
Familiar as he was and had been for many a year with that bone-house,
and often in contact with the dead, he yet on this occasion felt as if
a strange fear was creeping over him, and then a flutter of his heart
and the fiery feel that was in his brain were circumstances quite novel
to him.
“Well, this is odd,” he said, “and I suppose it is what they call being
nervous I can’t make it out to be anything else, I’m sure.”
Thus reasoning with himself upon his own unwonted timidity, he reached
the bone-house.
The door of the dilapidated building which was known by that name, was
only secured by a latch, for it was not considered that the contents of
the place were sufficiently interesting for any one’s cupidity to be
excited by it.
The sexton paused a moment before he lifted the latch, and glanced
around him. Even then he half expected to hear a loud laugh expressive
of the triumph of those who had combined to play him the trick, if it
were one, of getting him out of his bed on a bootless errand. But all
was still around him—still as the very grave itself, and muttering then
in a hurried tone, “it is true, there is no trick,” he hastily opened
the door, and went into the bone-house.
All was darkness save one broad beam of moonlight that came in at
the door-way, but the sexton closed the entrance, and applied to his
lantern for a light.
He slid the darkening piece of metal from before the magnifying glass,
and then a rather sickly ray of light fell for a moment upon the
corpse that lay then upon its back—a ray only sufficiently strong and
sufficiently enduring to enable the sexton to make quite sure that
there was a body before him, and then his lantern went out.
“Confound the lantern!” he said, “I ought to have looked to it before
I started, instead of lighting it on the mere hazard of its going on
comfortably. What’s to be done? Ah, I have it, I remember.”
What the sexton remembered was that on the same wall in which the door
was situated, there was a large square aperture only covered by a kind
of shutter of wood, the withdrawal of a bolt from which would cause it
to fall in a moment on its hinges.
The sexton knew the place well, and drawing back the somewhat rusty
bolt, down went the shutter, and a broad flood of moonlight fell at
once upon the corpse.
“Ah,” said Will Stephens, “there it is sure enough. What a long
odd-looking fellow to be sure, and what a face—how thin and careworn
looking. I do very much wonder now who he really is?”
As he continued to gaze upon the dead body, his eyes wandered to the
hands, and then sure enough he saw the bright and glittering gems
the men had spoken of, and which the salt water had not been able to
tarnish into dimness. Perceiving that the setting was gold and the
stones real,—
“Ahem!” said Stephens, softly; “they will not bury the corpse with
those rings on his fingers. Why, he must have half a dozen on at least;
they will be somebody’s perquisite of course, and that somebody won’t
be me. The idea of leaving such property unprotected in a bone-house!”
Will Stephens remained now silent for a short time, moving his head
about in different directions, so that he caught the bright colours of
the jewels that adorned the dead man’s hands, and then he spoke again.
“What’s more easy,” said he, “than for some of the very fellows who
brought him here, to slip back quietly, and take away every one of
those rings?”
After this much, he went to the door of the bone-house and listened,
but all was perfectly still; and then his cogitations assumed another
shape.
“Who saw me come from my house?” he said.—“Nobody. Who will see me go
back to it?—Nobody. Then what is to hinder me from taking the rings,
and—and letting the blame lie on some one else’s shoulders, I should
like to know? Nothing will be easier than for me to say in the morning
that owing to the strange and insolent manner in which the information
was given me of the arrival of the dead body in the bone-house, I did
not believe it and therefore did not rise, and so—so I think I may as
well eh?”
He thought he heard something like a faint sigh, and the teeth
chattered in his head, and he shook in every limb as he bent all his
energies to the task of listening if there were really any one in or at
hand, playing the spy upon him.
All was as before profoundly still, and with a long breath of relief,
he cast off his terror.
“What a fool I am to be sure,” he said; “it was but the wind after all,
no doubt, making its way through some one of the numerous chinks and
crevices in this shed; it did sound like a sigh from some human lips,
but it wasn’t.”
The propriety of making short work of the affair, if he wished to do it
at all, now came forcibly to the mind of the sexton, and arming himself
with all the courage he could just then summon to his aid, he advanced
close to the corpse.
Kneeling on one knee he took up one of the hands from which he wished
to take the rings, and when he saw them closer, he felt convinced that
they did not belie their appearance, but were in reality what they
seemed to be—jewels of rarity and price.
The hand was cold and clammy and damp to the touch, and the knuckles
were swollen, so that there was great difficulty in getting the rings
over them, and the sexton was full five minutes getting one of them off.
When he had done so, he wiped the perspiration of fear and excitement
from his brow, as he muttered,—
“That’s always the case with your drowned folks, they are so swelled
when first they come out of the water, and so I shall have quite a job,
I suppose.”
The sexton’s cupidity was, however, now sufficiently awakened, to make
him persevere, despite any such obstacles, in what he was about, and
accordingly, kneeling on both knees he clasped the wrist of the dead
man in one hand, and with the other strove to coax off, by twisting the
hoop of gold round and round, a ring that had one diamond, apparently
of great value, set in it, and which the robber of the dead thought was
a prize worth some trouble in the obtaining.
In an instant, the dead hand clasped him tight.
CHAPTER CC.
THE RECOVERY.—THE SEXTON’S FRIGHT.—THE COMPACT.
What pen shall describe the abject fright of Master Will Stephens, the
sexton, as the cold clammy fingers of the supposed corpse closed upon
his hand.
The blood seemed to curdle at his very heart—a film spread itself
before his eyes—he tried to scream, but his tongue clove to the roof of
his mouth, and he could utter no sound.
In good truth he was within an ace of fainting, and it was rather a
wonder that he did not go clean off.
Power to withdraw his hand from the horrible grasp he had not, and
there he knelt, shivering and shaking, and with his mouth wide open,
and the hair literally bristling upon his head.
How long he and the dead man remained in this way together in silence,
he knew not, but he was aroused from the state of almost frenzy in
which he was, by a deep sepulchral voice—the voice of the apparently
dead.
“What has happened?” it said, “what has happened? Is this the world
which was to come?”
“M-m-mer-cy—help,” stammered the sexton. “I—I—I—am a poor man—I—I
don’t want your rings, good Mr.—Mr. Ghost. Oh—oh—oh—have mercy upon me
I—I—implore you.”
The only reply was a frightful groan.
The perspiration rolled down the sexton’s face.
“Oh, don’t—oh, pray don’t—hold—hold me so—so tight.”
“Now,” said the dead man, “I know all. The die is cast; my fate has
again spoken. Steel shall not slay me, the bullet shall kill me not,
fire shall not burn me, and water will not drown while yon bright
satellite sails on ’twixt earth and heaven.”
“Yes—yes, sir.”
“The fiat has gone forth, and I am wretched, oh, Heaven so unutterably
wretched!”
“Perhaps, good Mr. Ghost, you—you will let me go now. Here’s your ring,
I don’t want to keep it. Here’s the only one I took off your worshipful
fingers, good Mr. Ghost.”
A very thin filmy sort of cloud had been going over the moon’s disc,
but now had passed completely away, and such a flood of unchecked
untempered brilliancy poured in at the open window, if it might be so
called of the dead-house that it became quite radiant with the silvery
beams.
The drowned man rose with a wild howling cry of rage, and springing at
the throat of the sexton, bore him down to the earth in an instant, and
placed his knee upon his chest.
“Villain,” he groaned out between his clenched teeth, “you shall die,
although you have made me live. There shall be one victim to the fell
destroyer.”
The sexton thought his hour was come.
“Wretch!” pursued the revived corpse, “wretch, what devil prompted you
to do this most damnable deed? Speak—speak, I say, who are you?”
“What—what deed?” gasped the sexton.
“The deed of restoring me to life—of dragging me from the ocean, and
forcing me to live again.”
“I—I—oh dear.”
“Speak. Go on.”
“I didn’t do anything of the sort. The truth is, I only came to—to—to——”
“To what?”
“To borrow a ring of you, that’s all, and the greatest calamity that
ever happened to me is your coming to life.”
“How came I here?”
“That I can’t tell your worship. I am the sexton of this place, it’s
called Culburn, and is in Suffolk, and they picked your worship up
at sea, and brought you here. That’s all I know about it, as I hope
for mercy. It can’t do you any good to kill a poor fellow like me.
I don’t think you are a ghost now, but some ugly—no I mean handsome
fellow—supposed only to be drowned.”
“Do you tell me truth?”
“As I live, and hope your worship will let me live I do. And here’s the
ring, I came to borrow of you, sir, as a proof.”
“Of what?”
“Of—of—of—I hardly know what to say to you, sir.”
“If you are not the great enemy to me that I thought you—you are a mere
thief. You came to steal the jewels I had upon my fingers. Is not that
the truth?”
“I—I rather think it is, sir.”
“You may save your wretched life if you like. If you promise me that
you will keep all that has happened a secret, except so much of it as I
shall empower you to reveal, I will spare you; but if after having so
promised, you break faith with me, and let your tongue wag further than
I wish it, you will not live twenty-four hours afterwards, be assured,
for I will find you out, and twist your head from your shoulders.”
“Anything, sir, I will promise anything, I will swear if you like.”
“I heed no oaths. Consideration for your own safety will keep you
silent. Rise.”
He took his knee off the chest of the sexton and his hand off his
throat, and then Will Stephens tremblingly rose to his feet. The
idea did cross him for a moment of measuring his strength with the
resuscitated man, but when he beheld the tall, bony, gaunt figure
before him, he saw he had not the shadow of a chance in a personal
struggle.
Moreover he had a lively remembrance of a most vice-like pressure upon
his throat, which seemed to say that the ugly stranger was by no means
in an exhausted state.
Upon the whole, then, the sexton was glad to have escaped so well.
“You have only to say, sir, what you would have me do,” he said.
“Answer me first. Have you always lived here? Is this your native
place?”
“Oh, no, sir, I came from London; but then it’s years ago.”
“Very well. You must say that you remember me in London, as a gentleman
of good repute, and you must add that you came to the bone-house here,
and found me reviving, and that you took measures to complete my
recovery.”
“Yes, sir. And here is your ring.”
“Keep it as a memento of this affair.”
“Many thanks, sir. Will it please you to tell me your name and
condition?”
“John Smith, a foreign merchant; and now tell me, minutely, how I was
rescued from the ocean, or did the waves themselves give up their dead?”
The sexton who was now assured in his own mind that it was no ghost
he was speaking to, entered as far as he knew into the story of the
finding the body, and bringing it to the bone-house, but as that
information was not great, he volunteered, if Mr. Smith would go with
him to his cottage, to get him all the particulars.
To this the other consented, and they both left the bone-house together.
On the short bit of road, the sexton began to think that his companion
must be some madman, for ever and anon when the moon was brightest, he
saw him lift up both his arms to it, as if he were worshipping it, and
at those times too, he heard him mutter some words in a language that
he did not comprehend. At length the singular being spoke in English.
“Henceforth,” he cried, as if quite forgetful of the presence of
another, “henceforth, begone remorse, begone despair. The great sea has
rejected me, and not again will I seek destruction; I will live, and I
will live to be the bane and curse of the beautiful.”
“Sir,” said the sexton, “here is my house, sir; if you will step in,
I will soon dish you up a little something in the way of refreshment.
You see, sir, I live alone, that is to say, an old woman who keeps my
cottage in order and waits upon me goes away at night, and comes again
in the morning, but as it is not her time yet, I will get you anything
you like to eat or to drink.”
“I never eat nor drink.”
“Not eat!—nor—drink! Never, sir?”
“Never. I shall cost you nothing to entertain me. I want some rest, and
while I am taking it, do you go and get me such information as you can
regarding me. Make no concealment that I am alive, but go at once, and
return with what expedition you may, and remember that your fate is in
my hands.”
“I will, sir.”
The sexton was quite terrified enough to do what he was bidden, and
perhaps, the consciousness that the strange and mysterious man whom
he had for a guest might accuse him of the projected robbery of the
jewellery he had about his person influenced him more than the rather
obscure threat of personal vengeance by the promised screwing his head
off.
But the matter, take it for all in all, was anything but an agreeable
one for Master Will Stephens, and most heartily did he wish he had
remained in his bed and left the stranger to recover, if was to
recover, by himself. Will did not attribute that recovery to the
moonlight he had himself let in.
CHAPTER CCI.
THE NIGHT ALARM.—THE VAMPYRE’S ATTACK UPON THE BRIDE.
The particulars concerning the bringing in of the body that had been
picked up at sea by the brothers Edwin and Charles Crofton, were to be
learnt from many mouths so soon as the sexton evinced a disposition to
know them, and in a very short time, and as the daylight was making
the fainter and more spiritual light of the moon fade away, he again
reached his own abode, where he had left a guest of whom the reader
knows much, but of whom Will Stephens knew but little.
He found the self-christened Mr. Smith waiting for him rather
impatiently.
“Well,” he cried, “your news? your news?”
“May be told, sir, in a few words,” replied the sexton, and then he
made his new friend acquainted with the whole story, just as he had
heard it of the fishermen on the coast.
Mr. Smith, or as we may as well call him at once the vampyre, hesitated
for a few moments as if he had not exactly and accurately made up his
mind what to do, and then he said,—
“You will go to the Grange-house and tell the story that I have before
informed you I would have told. Be sure that you expatiate upon my
gentility and respectability, for I want to be upon good terms with the
Crofton family.”
“Well, but sir, I’m a tenant of Sir George Crofton’s and so you see—”
“What,” said the vampyre, his eyes flashing with indignation as he
spoke “dare you dispute my positive commands?”
“No, sir, I—I only——”
“Peace caitiff, and know that I hold thy life in my hands for your
attempted robbery of me.”
The sexton trembled. That was indeed the weak point now of all his
defences against whatever commands might be put upon him by his master,
as we may now call the vampyre, although after all it was but the usual
dominion of a strong mind over a weak one, for there was not so much
in reality for the sexton to be afraid of as his own guilty conscience
dictated to him.
It were easy enough for the vampyre to charge him with robbery, but not
at all so easy for him to prove such a charge, and at the same time to
substantiate, as by some inquisitive counsel he might be called upon to
do, his own position in society.
But it is most true
“Conscience doth make cowards of us all.”
And feeling that his intention regarding the rings of the supposed
drowned man had been of a dishonest character, he could not summon
courage sufficient to defy him now.
“I will go,” he said, “I am going.”
“’Tis well.”
In far from the pleasantest train of thought the sexton went to the
Grange, and asked to see Mr. Charles Crofton, and to him he related the
version of the resuscitating of the supposed drowned man. It was heard
with, as might be expected, the most profound astonishment, and the
sexton soon found himself confronted with the whole assembled family,
and force to repeat the wonderful facts over again.
It seemed, as indeed it might well do, a something quite beyond belief.
“Why, Edwin,” said Charles, “he must have been in the water far beyond
the length of time that it mostly takes to drown any one, before we saw
him.”
“I think so too.”
“It must be so, for this reason, that he was a considerable distance
from land, and there was no vessel near enough for him to have come
from.”
“Hold!” said Sir George Crofton, “my dear boys, you are forgetting the
most important fact of all.”
“Are we, father?”
“Yes, and that is that the gentleman is alive. You cannot get over
that, you know, and as I have often heard that whatever is is natural,
why there’s no use in disputing any more about it; and besides how do
we know but that he was in some boat which was swamped a few minutes
before you saw him.”
“That is a most rational supposition,” said Edwin.
“And that we can say nothing against,” added Charles; “what is to be
done father?”
“Why, do not let us do good by inches, we know that this is the only
decent house within a considerable distance for a gentleman to remain
in, if he have the habits of comfort about him. So Master Stephens, if
you will go and give our compliments to the stranger, and ask him to
come here, I shall be much obliged to you.”
“I will, Sir George.”
“And you can tell him that we are plain folks, but assure him of a
hearty welcome.”
Will Stephens made his bow and exit.
“Well,” said Edwin, “it’s very odd, although of course, it must be all
right, and I am the last person who would wish to make anything out of
a common-place event, but to all appearances dead he was when we took
him into the boat, and I never before heard of a spontaneous recovery
like this from such a state.”
“Then you have added to your stock of experience,” said his father,
laughing, “and I must own, for my own part, that I am rather curious to
see this person, who was a curiosity in appearance, according to your
accounts when he was dead or supposed to be dead.”
“He was so,” remarked Charles, “for I am certain you might travel the
world over without meeting a more singular looking man than he was;
in the first place, he looked particularly tall, but that might have
arisen from the fact that we only saw him in a horizontal position,
and then there was a something about the expression of his face which
was perfectly indescribable, and yet at the same time filled you with
feelings of curiosity and dread.”
The sisters heard this account of the mysterious stranger with feelings
of great interest.
“Why,” said Emma, “we have all of us often complained of being dull
here, but such an animal as this will be quite an acquisition.”
“And just as Clara is going, too, what a pity,” laughed Edwin.
“I shall endeavour to survive the horrid disappointment,” said Clara,
for she was to be married on that day, to one who had been the chosen
companion of her heart for many a day, and was to leave the home of her
childhood to proceed far away to his house in Wales, where she was to
be the light of joy to another admiring and loving circle.
“Ah, well, I pity you,” said Emma.
“Then you had better at once,” remarked Clara, “forbid the occasional
visits here of a certain young officer who, I’m afraid, has some
audacious intentions.”
[Illustration: The young officer courting Emma, on horseback.]
The ready colour flushed to the cheek of the younger sister, who had
scarcely expected such a retort, although she had fairly provoked it.
“Come, girls,” said the father, “we will have no more lance breaking
between you about your lovers.”
“Certainly not, father,” said Clara, “but then, you know, unless Emma
is made to see that she is vulnerable, she will go on tormenting me.”
“In other words, Emma,” said Edwin, “you see that people who live in
glass houses should not throw stones—a most useful maxim.”
“I don’t care for any of you,” said Emma, half crying, as she ran out
of the room.
Clara followed her, for there was really the very best understanding
and the kindest feeling between the two young girls, although
occasionally a smart repartee would be uttered upon some such occasion
as the present, but all that was soon forgotten.
The sexton who was getting each moment more and more uneasy about the
share he had in the affair of the resuscitated man of the bone-house,
went back to the cottage, and there informed the self-named Mr. Smith
of the success of his mission to the Grange-house.
“You think they will welcome me,” said the vampyre.
“I am sure of it, sir. They are the frankest, freest family I ever
knew, and they would not have asked you to go to the Grange if they did
not mean to use you well.”
“And there are two daughters?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And young and fair, you tell me.”
“They are two as handsome girls as you will find in this part of the
country, sir. They have always been much admired. One of them, as I
before mentioned, is going to be married and taken away, but the other
stays at home.”
“’Tis well, now you will not fail to remember the awkward situation in
which you are. Keep the ring which you took from my finger, and with
it keep your own counsel, for any babbling upon your part will most
assuredly lead to your destruction.”
“Yes, sir, I know.”
“And although that destruction might not be immediate, you would lead
a life of trembling terror until your doom was accomplished, and that
doom should be a dreadful one in its manner. Now farewell! farewell!
and remember me.”
“I shall never forget you the longest day I have got to live,” said the
sexton, with a shudder, as he saw the tall, angular, gaunt-looking form
of his most mysterious new acquaintance leave his cottage, and make his
way towards the Grange.
CHAPTER CCII.
THE DEFILE IN THE ROCKS.—THE HORSEMAN AND THE ACCIDENT.
The Grange-house was visible from the cottage of the sexton, and so the
vampyre had declined the offer of Will Stephens to be his guide.
As it happened, though, it would have been better as regarded his
reaching the Grange quickly that he should have taken the sexton with
him, for the cliffs that were close at hand concealed to the eye many
deep gullies and frightful precipices that had to be coasted round,
before any one could reach the Grange-house by that route.
If he could have gone directly onward, about half a mile’s walking
would have sufficed to enable him to reach the place, but before he
had proceeded a quarter of that distance, he came upon a deep ravine
or splitting in the cliff, too wide to jump across, and with all
the appearance of extending inland a considerable distance without
narrowing.
“I had indeed better have brought a guide with me,” muttered Varney.
He then paused for a few moments, as if he was debating with himself
whether or not he should return back and get the sexton. But the mental
hesitation did not last long, and accustomed as he was to trust to his
own sagacity and his own resources more than to other people, he walked
along by the side of the fissure in the cliff, muttering to himself,—
“Were all the guides in the country here, they could but do as I am
doing, namely, walk on until the ravine closes.”
With this idea he pursued it, but to his mortification he found that
it widened instead of presenting the least symptoms of closing, and
suddenly it opened to his eyes to a width of about fifty feet, and he
paused again irresolute.
“How am I to proceed?” he said; “this is a perplexity.”
He advanced close to the brink, and looked down. The depth was very
considerable, and at the bottom there was evidently a road made of sand
and chalk, which wound down somewhere from the interior of the country
to the sea-beach.
As he looked, he heard the rapid sound of a horse’s feet.
In another moment there dashed down the road towards the sea, a horse
bearing on his back a man, who was exerting himself in every possible
way to stop the maddened, headlong career of the animal, but it would
not be checked.
With starting eyes and dilated nostrils, and with its flanks covered
with foam, the frighted steed, which had evidently come some distance
in that state, rushed on, but the broken nature of the ground made it
almost impossible that it should make such great speed then as it had
been making, at least with any degree of safety.
This was what occurred to the thoughts of Varney, and it was
sufficiently proved to be a correct idea, by the horse stumbling the
next moment, and throwing his rider heavily upon the sand and broken
rock that was strewn around.
The steed, now disencumbered of its load, recovered itself in a moment,
and with a snort of rage and probably of pain likewise, dashed and
disappeared from the sight, round the abrupt corner of the ravine to
the left hand on the beach.
“So be it,” said the vampyre, calmly; “another being is snatched away
from the muster roll of the living, one who perhaps would gladly have
preserved his existence, while I—I remain and cannot, let me do what I
will to accomplish such a purpose, shake off the cumbrous load of life
that will cling to me.”
Suddenly quite a whirlwind of passion seemed to come on him, and,
standing on the brink of the ravine with his arms extended, he cried,—
“Since death is denied to me, I will henceforward shake off all human
sympathies. Since I am compelled to be that which I am, I will not
be that and likewise suffer all the pangs of doing deeds at which a
better nature that was within me revolted. No, I will from this time
be the bane of all that is good and great and beautiful. If I am
forced to wander upon the earth, a thing to be abhorred and accursed
among men, I will perform my mission to the very letter as well as the
spirit, and henceforth adieu all regrets, adieu all feeling—all memory
of goodness—of charity to human nature, for I will be a dread and a
desolation! Since blood is to be my only sustenance, and since death is
denied to me, I will have abundance of it—I will revel in it, and no
spark of human pity shall find a home in this once racked and tortured
bosom. Fate, I thee defy!”
He continued for some few moments after uttering this speech in the
same attitude in which he had spoken the words. Then suffering his
hands slowly to fall, again he looked cold, and passionless, as he had
been before.
But his determination was made.
By looking carefully about him, he saw that there was a kind of
footpath down the side of the ravine, which an active person might
descend by, although, probably, not altogether without some risk, for
the least false step might precipitate him to the bottom.
The vampire, however, had no such fears. He seemed to feel that he
possessed a kind of charmed life, and that he might adventure to do
what others might well shrink from.
This feeling begot a confidence which was almost certain to be his
protection, even if it had been only founded upon imagination, for it
fortified his nerves, and when he began the descent down the side of
the ravine, it was without the smallest terror.
He found, however, that when he was fairly on the path, it was a
better and a wider one than he had a first supposed it to be, and in
the course of five minutes he had got completely down to the narrow
road, on which, apparently dead, lay the wounded man, for he was only
grievously hurt by his fall, although he was quite insensible.
The vampyre strode up to him.
“Ah,” he said, “young, and what the world would call handsome. Ha! ha!
Heaven takes but little care sometimes of its handiwork.”
After a few moments’ contemplation of the still form that lay at his
feet, he knelt on one knee by its side, and placed his hand upon
the region of the heart, after roughly tearing open the vest of the
stranger.
“He lives—he lives. Well, shall I crush the fluttering spirit that now
is hovering ’twixt life and death, or shall I let it linger while it
may within its earthly prison? Let it stay. The worst turn that any one
can do another in this world, is surely to preserve existence after
once the pang of what would be all the agony of death is past.”
The vampyre rose, and was moving away up the ravine, when a sudden
thought seemed to strike him, and he turned back again.
“Gold,” he said, “is always useful to me, and I think with my new
thoughts and feelings it will now be more so than ever. This insensible
man may have some about him.”
Again he knelt by the side of the young man, and soon possessed himself
of a tolerably well-stocked purse that he found upon him. Round his
neck, too, by a thin chain of gold, hung a small portrait of a young
and beautiful girl, upon which Varney gazed intently.
“She is fair,” he said, “very fair—she would make a fit victim for me.
I will take this portrait; it might stand me in some stead should I
encounter the original.”
He placed the portrait in his pocket, and was in the act of rising,
when he heard the sound of a footstep.
“Ah, some one comes; it will be no part of my plan to have been seen by
the body.”
He darted forth down the narrow gorge or ravine, and was soon
sufficiently hidden from the sight of those who were advancing. They
proved to be some fishermen going to spread their nets upon the beach,
which just below the spot where the seemingly fatal accident had taken
place, was as level as a carpet, screened from the wind, and composed
of the finest sand.
Of course, it was impossible to avoid seeing the body that lay in their
path, and Varney had no need to be fearful that he would be seen, when
an object of so much greater and more absorbing interest lay in their
direct and unavoidable path.
He heard from the sudden exclamations that fell from them, that they
had seen the body, and upon advancing a step or two, he found that they
were collected round it in a dense throng, for there were about a dozen
men in all.
“’Tis well,” said Varney, “it matters not to me if he be living or
dead. I can doubtless now find my way to the Grange-house by this path
along the shore. I will pursue it at all events, and see whither it
will lead me.”
He did so, and after going about half a mile, he found another ravine,
which, upon entering and ascending for a time, led him quite close to
one of the entrances of the Grange-house, as it was called, and which
he was so anxious to reach.
CHAPTER CCIII.
THE DISAPPOINTMENT AT THE GRANGE.—THE NEWS OF DESPAIR.—THE
FINDING OF THE BODY.
It was a fine old place the Grange, view it from what aspect you
might, and had not the mind of Varney, the vampyre, been so fearfully
irritated by the circumstances of his horrible existence, he must have
paused to admire it.
It was one of those ancient English edifices, which, alas, are fast
disappearing from the face of once merry England. Railways have gone
tearing and screaming through the old parks and shady glens. Alas, all
is altered now, and for the sake of getting to some abominable place,
such as Manchester, or Birmingham, in a very short space of time, many
a lonely spot of nature’s own creating is marred by noise and smoke.
“So,” said Varney, “this then is the home of these young men who have
done me such an injury as to rescue me from the sea.”
He ground his teeth together as he spoke, and it was quite clear that
he felt disposed to consider that a most deadly injury had been done
to him by Edwin and Charles Crofton, who had only followed the proper
dictates of humanity in rescuing him from the waves.
“It shall go hard with me,” added Varney, “but I will teach such
meddling fools to leave the great sea in charge of its dead. Oh, had
I but been allowed to remain until now, which but for these officious
persons might still have been the case, I should have sunk deep—deep
into the yellow sands, and there rotted.”
His passion as he uttered these words had in it something fearful, but
in a few moments the external symptoms of it passed away, and he walked
slowly and to all appearance calmly enough towards the Grange.
The distance he had to go was still as before, a deceiving one, for he
had to wind round a clump of trees before he really got to the gate,
which appeared to be just in sight, but at length he reached it, and
paused as he saw an old man, who was a kind of warder there.
“Is this Sir George Crofton’s?” he said, and he threw into his voice
all that silvery softness which at times had been so fascinating to the
Bannerworth family.
“It is, sir.”
“Will you announce me?”
“I do not leave this gate, sir, but if you go down this avenue, you
will reach the mansion, and some of the servants will attend to you.”
Varney walked on.
The avenue was one formed by two stately rows of chestnuts, the
spreading branches of which met over head, forming a beautiful
canopy, and notwithstanding that they were so near the sea—that foe to
vegetation, these trees were in good truth most luxuriantly beautiful.
“There was a time,” muttered Varney, “when I should have admired such a
spot as this, but all that has long since passed away. I am that which
I am.”
He now arrived in front of the house itself, and being perceived by one
of the domestics, he was politely asked what he wanted.
“Say that Mr. Smith is here,” was the message that Varney gave.
The servant had already heard that such was the name of the person who
had been rescued from the sea by his young masters Edwin and Charles,
he now hastened with the information to the drawing-room, where the
family was assembled.
“Oh, if you please, sir, he has come.”
“Who has come?”
“The drowned man, Mr. Smith.”
“Admit him instantly.”
The servant ran back to Varney, and then politely ushered him into
the large really handsome room, in which the family sat awaiting his
arrival with no small share of curiosity. What the sexton had said of
him had excited much speculation, and the eagerness to see a man who
was, as it were, a present from the sea, was extreme.
“Mr. Smith,” announced the servant; and Varney with one of his courtly
bows, and a smile that was half hideous, half charming, entered.
There was a decided effect produced by his appearance, and perhaps that
effect is best described by the word awe. They all seemed as if they
were in the presence of something very peculiar, if not something very
superior.
Sir George Crofton broke the rather awkward silence that ensued by
addressing his visitor with all the frankness that was a part of his
nature.
“Sir,” he said, “I am glad to see you and hope you will make yourself
as much at home as if you were in a house of your own.”
“Sir,” said Varney, “you know how much I owe your family already, and I
fear to increase the heavy debt of gratitude.”
“Oh, you are welcome, most welcome. Stay here as long as you like; we
are rather dull at times in this isolated house, and the arrival of an
intelligent guest is always an event.”
Varney bowed, and Edwin advanced.
“Mr. Smith,” he said, “I suppose I may almost call myself an old
acquaintance.”
“And I,” said Charles.
“Gentlemen, if you be those to whom I am indebted for my preservation,
I owe you my warmest thanks.”
“Oh, think nothing of it,” said Sir George; “it was not at all likely
that my two boys would see a fellow creature in such a situation, and
not, dead or alive, take possession of him. Your recovery is the only
remarkable thing in the whole affair.”
“Very remarkable,” said Varney.
They waited a moment as if he was expected to make some sort of
explanation of that part of the business, but as he did not, Sir George
said—
“You have no idea of how you became resuscitated.”
“Not the least.”
“Well, that is strange indeed.”
“Perhaps the good fellow who afforded me an immediate shelter, applied
before that, some means of recovering suspended vitality.”
“Oh no. Will Stephens is to the full as much surprised as any one. But,
however, I dare say, to you, sir, that is not the most entertaining
subject in the world, so we will say no more about it, except that we
are very glad to have a living guest instead of a dead one.”
“I much fear, from what I have heard,” said Varney, “that I shall be
intruding at a time like this into your family circle.”
“Oh, you allude to the marriage to-day of one of my daughters, and that
puts me in mind of really quite an omission on my part. Mr. Smith—my
daughters, Clara and Emma.”
The vampyre bowed low, and the young ladies went with established grace
through the ceremony of the introduction to the remarkable personage
before them.
At this moment there came upon the ears of all assembled there the
sound of hurried footsteps, and a servant without any ceremony burst
into the apartment, exclaiming—
“Oh, Sir George—Oh, oh, sir—”
“What is it? Speak!”
“Oh, oh. They have found him—killed in the ravine.”
“Who, who?”
“Mr. Ringwood, as was to be married—”
“My daughter.”
Clara uttered a cry of despair, and sank into a chair in a state of
insensibility. The scene of confusion and general consternation that
now ensued baffles all description, and the only person who looked calm
and collected upon the occasion was Mr. Smith, although it was not the
insulting calmness of seeming indifference.
In a few minutes, however, Sir George himself recovered from the first
shock which the intelligence had given to him, and he said,—
“Where is he? Where is he? Let me to the spot.”
“And allow me, sir, to accompany you,” said Varney. “Believe me, sir, I
feel deeply for the family misfortune. Let me be useful.”
“Thank you, sir, thank you—Edwin, Charles, come with me and this
gentleman, and we will see if this dreadful report be true. Let us hope
that fear and ignorance have exaggerated a very simple affair into so
seemingly dreadful a circumstance.
Leaving Clara to the care of her sister and some of the female
domestics of the Grange, who were hastily summoned to attend upon her,
the little party, consisting of Sir George, his two sons, Varney, and
several of the men-servants, turned from the Grange in the direction of
the ravine.
Their intimate acquaintance with all the neighbourhood enabled them to
reach the place much sooner than Varney thought it possible to do, and
as they came within sight of the spot where the accident had occurred,
they saw a crowd of villagers and fishermen assembled.
They quickened their pace, and forcing through the throng, Sir George
Crofton saw his intended son-in-law, to all appearance, lying dead and
bleeding on the sands.
Such a sight was enough, for a moment, to paralyse every faculty, and
it really had, for a time, that effect upon Sir George.
CHAPTER CCIV.
THE SICK CHAMBER AT THE GRANGE.—THE NIGHT.
“Is he dead? Is he dead? cried Sir George.
“We don’t know, sir,” replied one of the fishermen; “some of us think
he is, and some of us think he is not.”
“What is to be done?”
“Have him taken at once to the Grange, father,” said Charles, “and
let us get medical assistance; who knows but the affair may turn out
in reality very different from what it first appeared. He may be only
stunned by a fall.”
“I hope to Heaven it may be so. Can you, among you, my men, make
anything like a litter to carry him on?”
This was soon done. Some of the loose seats from some boats close at
hand, and a rough cloak or two, made a capital couch for the dead or
wounded man, as the case might be. They lifted him carefully into
it, and then four of them lifted the rude but easy and appropriate
conveyance, and carried him towards the hall.
“How could this have happened?” said Sir George.
“Perhaps I may be able to throw some light upon it,” said Varney. “As
I came here to your hospitable house, a horse without a rider, but
caparisoned for one, passed me furiously.”
“That must have been his horse then,” said Charles. “You may depend,
father, he was riding on to see Clara before the hour appointed for
their marriage, and has met with this accident. Come, there is some
consolation in that. A fall from his horse is not likely to kill him.”
“Where is Edwin?”
“Oh, he went off at once for Dr. North, and no doubt he will get to the
Grange about as soon as we shall.”
“That was right—that was right. I really have been taken so much by
surprise that I hardly know what I am about. It was very right of
Edwin.”
Nothing of any importance now passed in the way of conversation, nor
did any incident worth recording take place until the melancholy little
procession reached the Grange, and by the advice of Varney, the young
bridegroom was carried direct to a bed-chamber before he was removed
from the litter on which he had been carried.
The operation was scarcely performed, and he laid upon a bed, when
Dr. North came, having mounted his horse upon hearing the information
from Edwin that he was wanted in a case of such great emergency at the
Grange, and ridden hard all the way.
He was at once introduced to his patient, and upon a cursory
examination, he said,—
“This is a concussion of the brain, but don’t let that alarm you. It
may be very slight, although it certainly has an awkward sound, and a
little rest and blood-letting may put him all to rights.”
This was to some extent cheering, and the doctor at once proceeded
to bleed his patient. As the ruddy stream fell into a crystal goblet,
the young man gradually opened his eyes, and looked round him with a
bewildered glare.
“Darken the room,” said Dr. North; “he is right enough, but he must be
kept quiet for a day or two at all events.”
“What has happened?” said the wounded man.
“Nothing particular,” replied Dr. North, “nothing particular. You have
had a fall from your horse.”
“Clara!”
“Ah, I know, and now listen to me. If you remain quiet and don’t speak,
you will see Clara soon; but if you are wilful and disobey orders, you
will bring on a brain fever and you won’t see her at all in this world;
so now you can judge for yourself.”
“You are rather harsh,” said Sir George.
“Pardon me sir, I am not. There is nothing like making a patient
thoroughly understand his own position; and I give this young gentleman
credit for sufficient wisdom to enable him to profit by what I say to
him.”
Mr. Ringwood nodded.
“There, you see, all’s right; now he will go to sleep, and as all will
depend upon the state in which he awakens, I will, if you please wait
here, unless I should be urgently sent for from home, for I have left
word where I am.”
“Pardon me, doctor, for finding any fault with you.”
“Don’t mention it; what I said did sound harsh.”
Sir George went now at once to the room where his daughter Clara
had been taken to, for the purpose of informing her of the hopeful
state of affairs. He found her just recovered from her swoon, so
that recollection had not yet sufficiently returned to give her all
the agony of thinking that the news so heedlessly and so suddenly
communicated by the servant might be true in its full intensity.
“My dear, you must not distress yourself,” said Sir George. “Ringwood
was riding over here, it seems, to see you, and his horse, getting
restive, has thrown him; Dr. North says, there is nothing particular
the matter, and that after a little rest he will recover.”
Clara tried to speak, but she could not—she burst into tears.
“Ah!” said the old nurse, who was attending her, and who had been in
her family many years, “ah, poor dear, she will be all right now. I was
just wishing that she would have a good cry; it does any one a world of
good, it does.”
[Illustration: The old nurse and Sir George comfort Clara.]
“What an agitating night and day this has been, to be sure,” said Sir
George. “First the terror of losing both my boys, then their return
with the dead man, who, so oddly comes to life again; Then this
dreadful accident to Ringwood; upon my word the incidents of a whole
year have been crammed into a few hours. I only hope this is the last
of it.”
“And I shall see him again, father,” sobbed Clara.
“Of course you will.”
“You—you have sent him home very carefully?”
“Home? no. He is here under this roof and here he shall stay till
he recovers, poor lad. Oh dear no, I never thought of sending him
home, but I must send some one, by-the-by, with the news of what has
happened. This is well thought of.”
The knowledge that her lover, and her affianced husband was doing
well, and that he was under the same roof with her, gave Clara the
most unalloyed satisfaction, and she recovered rapidly her good and
healthful looks. It was duly explained to her, that she must not go
near Ringwood to disturb him, as rest was so very essential to his
recovery; so she did not attempt it. The whole household was commanded
to be unusually quiet, and never had the Grange before presented such a
collection of creeping domestics, for they went up and down stairs like
so many cats.
Clara did not omit to thank Mr. Smith for the assistance he had
rendered them in this evil emergency, and Dr. North stood with the
family in the dining room waiting, perhaps with greater anxiety than he
chose to express, the awaking of his patient.
A servant was left in the adjoining chamber to that occupied by
Ringwood, who was told to bring to the dining-room the first intimation
that the wounded man was living.
About two hours elapsed when the servant came in with an air of
affright.
Dr. North sprang to his feet in a moment.
“What is it, is he awake?”
“Not exactly awake, sir, but he is speaking in his sleep, and it’s all
about a—a——”
“A what?”
“A vampyre.”
“Stuff.”
“Well, sir, he’s a having some horrid dream, I can tell you, sir,
and he said, ‘Keep off the vampyre; save her, oh, save her from the
vampyre!’”
“How singular!” said Varney, “what an absurd belief that is! A vampyre!
what on earth could have put such a thing in his head, I wonder?”
“I will go to him,” said Dr. North, “if he should be very much
disturbed, perhaps I shall think it preferable to awake him; but I can
inform you all that such dreams show that there is much excitement
going on in the brain.”
“Then you do not consider the symptom favourable, doctor?”
“Certainly not; quite the reverse of favourable.”
Dr. North rose, and as Varney offered very politely to accompany him,
he made no sort of objection, and they proceeded to the chamber of the
bridegroom.
During the time that the doctor had been in the society of Varney, he
had been much pleased with him, for he found that he possessed a vast
store of knowledge upon almost any subject that could be touched upon,
besides no small amount of skill and theoretical information upon
medical matters, so he let him come with him, when perhaps he would
have objected to any one else.
Varney the vampyre could fascinate when he liked.
When they reached the chamber the young man was quiet, but in a few
minutes he began to toss about his head, and mutter in his sleep,—
“The vampyre, the dreadful vampyre. Oh, save her! Help, help, help!”
“This won’t do,” said the doctor.
He went to the toilette table, and procuring a large towel he soaked
it well in cold water, and then wrapped it round the head of Ringwood,
and so carefully too as not to arouse him. The effect was almost
instantaneous. The vexed sleeper relapsed into a much easier attitude,
the breathing was more regular, and the distressing fancies that had
tortured his fevered brain were chased away.
“A simple plan,” said Varney.
“Yes, but a most efficacious one.”
CHAPTER CCV.
A MIDNIGHT ALARM.—THE CHASE.—THE MYSTERY.
Young Ringwood did awaken about two hours afterwards, and the state he
was in, although not such as to create alarm, was not pleasing to Dr.
North. That gentleman desired that he should be carefully watched and
kept quiet, while he went to his own house for some medicines.
He returned as soon as he possibly could, and administered such
remedies as he considered the urgency of the case required, and having,
as he always made a practice of doing, left word at his own house where
he was, he offered to remain at the Grange the whole of the night.
It is scarcely necessary to say, that such an offer was most gratefully
accepted.
Clara was profuse in her acknowledgements of the doctor’s kindness, and
they all passed the evening together in the large dining room, to which
Varney was first introduced.
Not, however, for a long time had so gloomy an evening been passed at
the Grange as that; nobody was in spirits, and although there was a
great deal of conversation, it somehow assumed always a very sombre
shape, let it commence on what subject it might.
Half past ten o’clock was the usual hour at which the family retired
for the night, and it was quite a relief to every one, when that hour
came, and Sir George ordered lights for the bed chambers.
Clara, indeed, being much oppressed, had retired some time before, and
so had Emma, so that there were none but gentlemen in the dining room
at half past ten.
“I have ordered a bed to be prepared for you close to your patient’s,”
said Sir George to Dr. North.
“Oh, thank you, but I shall only lie down in my clothes, a couch
would have done just as well, I am used to sitting up all night upon
occasion.”
“No doubt, but I hope you will not be disturbed, and that
to-morrow-morning we shall have a better account of your patient.”
“I hope so too; a good calm night’s rest may do much.”
“You speak doubtingly.”
“Why in these cases it is difficult to know the extent of injury. There
is no fracture of the skull, but it is as yet impossible to say what
amount of shaking he has had.”
“Well, we can but hope for the best. Mr. Smith, although we retire at
this early hour, there is no sort of occasion for you to do so. Order
what wines you please, and sit as long as you please.”
“By no means, Sir George; I am a great patron of early hours myself.”
Varney was shown into a bed-room which was upon the same floor with
those of the family, and which formed one of a range of chambers, all
opening from a corridor that ran the entire length of the house, and
which in the daytime was lighted by a very large, handsome window at
one end, while at the other was a broad flight of stairs ascending from
the lower part of the house.
The sisters occupied contiguous chambers, and then there was an empty
room, and next to that again was the bed-room in which was Ringwood,
and then Dr. North’s.
Exactly opposite was Varney’s room, and close at hand slept the sons,
while Sir George himself occupied a room at the furthest corner of the
corridor.
Emma made Clara an offer to sleep with her that night, as she was in
grief and anxiety, but this Clara would not permit, for she could not
think of sacrificing her sister’s repose to attend upon her.
“No, Emma,” she said, “I will hope for the best, and strive to rest.”
They bade each other affectionately good night, and shortly afterwards
retired to their separate apartments.
By eleven o’clock all was still in the house.
Dr. North had begged a book from the library, for he thought it likely
enough that he should not be able to get much repose, and with that he
sat in his room, the only one, as he thought, in all the house who was
not in bed.
He continued reading for about an hour, and then, after visiting his
patient, and finding him asleep, he thought it would be just as well
for him to pull off his boots and his coat, and lie down on the bed to
snatch a few hours’ sleep.
He performed all the operations but the final one—the sleeping—for
scarcely had he lain down, when he heard a soft sliding sort of noise
close to the room door, he thought, and he sprung up in a sitting
posture to listen to it.
“Who’s there!” he cried.
There was no answer, and jumping off his bed, he took the light which
he had not put out, and opened his door. All was deserted and still in
the corridor.
“Imagination, or some accidental noise that I am not familiar with,”
said the doctor, as he closed his door again.
Down he laid himself, and he was just upon the point of getting to
sleep, when he heard a scratching sound as he thought upon the very
panel of the door of his room.
Up he sprang again, and this time without the delay of asking who was
there; he opened his door, and looked out into the corridor, holding
the light above his head so as to diffuse its rays as much as possible,
but he saw no one, and all the other doors were close shut.
“A plague take it,” he said, “I may keep myself at this sort of thing
all night, if I am foolish enough. It’s a cat, perhaps, for all I know;
however it may scratch away, I won’t move again.”
Shutting the door, he lay down, now fully determined that he would not
move, unless something very much out of the common way, indeed, should
take place.
Again he started. There was a curious sound about the lock of his door,
and he listened intently.
“Now, what on earth can that be?”
All was still, and he nearly dropped asleep. Twice, however, he thought
he heard the sound again, but he would not move, and in a few moments
more, he was enjoying a sound repose.
How long this repose lasted, he had no means of telling, for he was
suddenly awakened by such a cry, that at first he lay overpowered
completely by it, and unable to move. It was a loud shrieking cry, such
as might come form any one in a most dreadful agony.
“Good Heaven!” he cried, “what’s that?”
Now, Dr. North was not a fearful man, nor a nervous one, and he soon
recovered. Besides, such a cry as that, he knew very well, must have
the effect of arousing everybody in the house, so he sprung out of his
bed, and rushed to the door.
It was fast.
In vain he tried the lock, and hammered at it and pushed. The door was
a thick and a heavy one, and it was quite clear he was a prisoner.
This was serious, and he cried out,—
“Help! help! here, undo the door, undo the door. Who has locked me in?”
He heard the scraping of feet, the sound of voices, the ringing of
bells, and all the symptoms of a suddenly disturbed and alarmed
household, but nobody paid any attention to him. He dragged on his
boots, in order that he might be able to keep up a constant kicking on
the lower part of his door, and he did keep it up with a vengeance.
At length he heard voices close to his door, and some one cried,—
“Open the door, sir, open the door!”
“Open it yourself,” said Dr. North, “you have fastened it on the
outside, I suppose.”
There was some further running about, and then with a crash the door
was forced open with a crowbar, and upon emerging from the apartment,
the doctor found assembled in the corridor the whole family, with the
exception of the two girls, and several servants half-dressed bearing
lights.
“What’s the matter,” cried Sir George, “what’s the matter?”
“Ah,” said the doctor, “that’s what I want to know.”
“Yes, why—why you made all the disturbance.”
“I beg your pardon, there was a scream came from somewhere, and when I
tried to come out to find what it was, my room door was fast. That’s
all I know about it.”
Bang—bang, bang, bang, came now a sound. Bang, bang, bang; and all eyes
were turned in the direction of the chamber occupied by Mr. Smith, and
they heard his voice from within shouting in loud and frightened tones.
“Help! help! is it fire! Open my door, help—help. Do you lock in your
guests here? Help!”
“Why, God bless me,” said Dr. North, “that gentleman is locked in
likewise.”
“But it can’t be,” said Sir George, “for the keys of all these doors
are in the library in a drawer. The fact is, we none of us fasten up
our bed-rooms, and the keys were all removed years ago.”
“Help! help! help!” cried Mr. Smith.
“Break the door open,” said Sir George, “this is inexplicable to me, I
cannot make it out in the least.”
The same crow-bar that had been brought by one of the servants to bear
upon the door of Dr. North’s room, was now applied to that of Mr.
Smith, and it soon yielded to the force of the lever that was used with
strength and judgment.
Mr. Smith partially dressed, and with rather a terrified look, emerged.
“Good God,” he cried, “I wish you wouldn’t lock one in; what has
happened? I heard a shriek that awoke me up, as if the last trumpet had
sounded.”
“My daughters, are they safe,” cried Sir George.
He flew to the door of Clara’s room, it yielded to his touch.
“Clara, Clara,” he called.
“I am paralysed,” said Dr. North, “and so are you, sir. Come in.”
He seized a light from one of the servants, and with a presentiment
that there was to be found a solution of, at all events, the mystery of
the dreadful shriek that had alarmed all the house, he dashed into the
chamber of the young girl, followed by the father.
CHAPTER CCVI.
THE SIGHT OF TERROR.—THE DOCTOR’S SUSPICIONS.—THE NIGHT WATCH.
The sight that met the eyes of the father in his daughter’s chamber,
was, indeed, one calculated in every respect to strike him with horror
and misery.
Emma was lying insensible at the side of the bed, and Clara seemed to
be dead, for she was ghastly pale, and there was blood upon her neck.
The father staggered to a seat, but Dr. North at once rushed forward,
and held the light to the eyes of Clara, at the same time, that he
placed his finger on her wrist to note if there was any pulsation.
“Only a fainting fit,” he said.
“But the blood—the—the blood,” cried Sir George.
“That I know nothing about, just at present, but let us see what’s the
matter here.”
He raised Emma from the floor, and found that she too had fainted, but
as she appeared to be perfectly uninjured. She slightly recovered as
he lifted her up, and he resigned her at once to the care of some of
the female servants, who now made their appearance in the chamber, all
terribly alarmed at the shriek that had awakened them.
“This is strange,” said Dr. North, “here is a small puncture upon the
throat of your daughter Clara, that almost looks like the mark of a
tooth.”
“A tooth!”
“Yes, but of course that cannot be.”
“Hear me, oh, hear me,” cried Emma, at this moment. “Horror—horror!”
“What would you say—speak at once, and clear up this mystery if you
can. What has happened?”
“I heard a noise, and came from my own chamber to this. There was some
one bending over the bed. ’Twas I who shrieked.”
“You?”
“Yes, oh yes! ’Twas I. I know not what then happened, for I either
fell or was struck down, and I felt that my senses left me. What has
happened? I too ask; oh, Clara! What was it? what was it?”
“Imagination, most likely,” said the doctor. “You had better go to
your room again, Miss Emma, for you are trembling with cold and
apprehension. Perhaps in the morning, all this affair will assume a
different shape. At present we are all too much flurried to take proper
cognisance of it. There your sister is rapidly recovering. How do you
feel now, Miss Clara?”
“I—I—-am mad!”
“Oh, pho! pho! nonsense!”
“Oh, God help me! How horrifying! How more than dreadful! That awful
face! Those hideous teeth!—I am mad!—I am mad!”
“Why, my dear child, you will drive me mad,” cried Sir George, “if you
talk in such a strain. Oh, let me beg of you not.”
“Don’t heed her,” said Dr. North. “This will soon pass away. Come, Miss
Clara, you must tell me freely, as your medical man, what has happened.
Let us hear the full particulars, and then you know well, that if any
human means can aid you, you shall be aided.”
This calm mode of discourse had evidently a great effect upon her, and
after the silence of a few moments, she spoke much more collectedly
than before, saying,—
“Oh, no—no! I cannot think it a dream.”
“What a dream?”
“You—you shall hear. But do not drag me from my home, and from all I
love, if I am mad; I pray you do not—I implore you!”
“You are quite safe. Why, what a ridiculous girl you are, to be sure.
Nobody wants to drag you from your home, and nobody will attempt such a
thing, I assure you. You have only to tell us all unreservedly, and you
will then be quite safe. If you refuse us your confidence how can we
act for you in any way?”
This argument seemed to be effective, and to reach her understanding
quite, so that after a shudder, and a glance around her of great dread
and dismay, she spoke, saying in a low, faltering voice,—
“Something came; something not quite human, yet having the aspect of a
man. Something that flew at me, and fastened its teeth upon my neck.”
“Teeth! everybody says ‘teeth!’” exclaimed the father.
“Hush!” said the doctor, with an admonitory wave of his hand; “keep
that a secret from her, whatever you do. I implore you, keep quiet on
that head. Well, is that all, Clara?”
“Yes—yes.”
“Then it was a dream, and nothing else, I can assure you. Nothing but a
dream; make yourself comfortable, and think no more of it. I dare say
you will have a quiet sleep now, after this. But you had better let
your sister Emma lay with you, as your nerves are a little shattered.”
“Oh, yes, yes.”
Emma, who truth to tell, was very little better than her sister,
professed her readiness to stay, and the doctor giving Sir George a
nod, as much as to say, “Let no more be said about it just now,” led
the way from the room at once.
When he reached the corridor, where Varney and the two sons were
waiting, he said,—
“We shall none of us after this, I am certain, feel inclined to sleep;
suppose we go down stairs at once and think and talk this matter over
together; there is more in it, perhaps, than meets the eye; I will
follow you in a moment, when I have just seen that my patient is all
right.”
They all proceeded down stairs to the dining-room, and in a few
minutes, the doctor followed; lights were procured, and they sat down,
all looking at the doctor who had taken the lead in the affair, and who
evidently had some very disagreeable, if not very true, ideas upon the
subject matter of the evening’s disturbance.
“Well, doctor,” said Sir George, “we rely upon you to give us your
opinion upon this business, and some insight into its meaning.”
“In the first place then,” said the doctor, “I don’t understand it.”
“Well, that’s coming to the point.”
“Stop a bit; it was no dream.”
“You think not.”
“Certainly not a dream, two people don’t dream of the same thing at the
same time; I don’t of course deny the possibility of such a thing, but
it is too remarkable a coincidence to believe all at once; but Emma
avows that she saw a somebody in her sister’s room.”
“Ah,” said Sir George; “she did, I had in my confusion forgotten that
horrible confirmation of Clara’s story. She did so, and before Clara
was well recovered too, so she could not have put the idea into her
head. Good God! what am I to think? For the love of Heaven some of you
tell me what are your opinions upon this horrible affair, which looks
so romantically unreal, and yet so horribly real.”
All except the doctor looked at each other in surprise.
“Well,” he said, “I will tell you what the thing suggests; not what it
is, mind you, for the affair to me is too out of the way of natural
causes to induce me to come to a positive conclusion. Before I speak,
however, I should like to have your opinion, Mr. Smith; I am convinced
it will be valuable.”
“Really I have formed none,” replied Varney; “I am only exceedingly
surprised that somebody should have fastened me in my bed-room. I know
that that circumstance gave me a terrible fright, for when I heard all
the outcry and confusion, I thought the house was on fire.”
“Ah! the locking of us in our rooms, too,” said the doctor, “there’s
another bit of reality. Who did that?”
“It puzzles me beyond all comprehension,” said Sir George; “how the
doors could be locked I cannot imagine; for as I told you the keys are
in a drawer in my library.”
“At all events, the doors could not lock themselves, with or without
keys,” said Charles; “and that circumstance shows sufficiently
evidently that some one has been at work in the business whom we have
still to discover.”
“True,” said Mr. Smith.
“Well, gentlemen,” added the doctor, “I will tell you what I suggest;
and that is contained in a letter, written a long while ago by a
distant relation of mine, likewise a surgeon. Mind, I do not of course
pledge myself at the present time, for the truth and accuracy of a man
who was dead long before I was born; he might too have been a very
superstitious man.”
“But what did he suggest?”
“He did more than suggest; he wrote for a medical publication of that
day an account, only of course suppressing names, of the appearance of
a vampyre.”
“A what?”
“A vampyre!”
“I have heard of such horrors,” said Mr. Smith, “but really at the
present day, no one can think of believing such things. Vampyres
indeed! No—that is too great a claim upon one’s credulity. These
existences, or supposed existences, have gone the same way as the
ghosts, and so on.”
“One would think so, but you shall hear.”
Sir George Crofton and his sons looked curious, and thought that the
doctor was going to draw upon his memory in the matter to which he
alluded, but he took from his pocket a memorandum book, and from it
extracted some printed papers.
“The communication was so curious,” he said, “that I cut it out of the
old volume in which it appeared, and kept it ever since.”
“Pray,” said Mr. Smith, “what was the name of your distant relation,
the medical man?”
“Chillingworth.”
“Oh, indeed; an odd name rather, I don’t recollect ever hearing of it.”
“No, sir, it is not likely you should. Dr. Chillingworth has been dead
many years, and no one else of his name is at present in the medical
profession to my knowledge. But you shall hear, at all events, what he
says about it.”
The doctor then opened the folded paper, and read as follows:—
“Notwithstanding the incredulity that has been shown regarding
vampyres, I am in a condition from my own knowledge to own the
existence of one, I think he is dead now. His name was Varney, at least
that was the name he went by, and he came strangely enough under my
observation, in connection with some dear friends of mine named B——”
“Is that all?” said Mr. Smith.
“Not quite,” replied Dr. North, “He goes on to say that but for
touching the feeling of living persons, he could and would unfold
some curious particulars respecting vampyres, and that if he lived
long enough he will perhaps do so, by which I suppose he meant if he
outlived the parties whose feelings he was afraid of hurting by any
premature disclosures.”
“And—and,” faltered Sir George, “do you draw a conclusion from all
that, that my daughter has been visited by one of these persons—surely
not.”
“May be, Sir George; I draw no conclusions at all, I merely throw out
the matter for your consideration. It is always worth while considering
these matters in any possible aspect. That is all.”
“A most horrible aspect,” said Sir George.
“Truly dreadful,” said Mr. Smith.
“This shall be settled,” said Charles, “Edwin and I will take upon
ourselves to-morrow night to set this question completely at rest.”
At this moment there was a loud cry of “Help, help, help,” in the voice
of Emma, and they all rushed up stairs with great speed.
“Oh, this way, this way,” she cried, meeting them at the head of the
stairs. “Come to Clara.”
They followed her, and when they reached the room, they found to their
horror and surprise that Clara was dead!
CHAPTER CCVII.
FAMILY TROUBLES.—THE HOUSE OF MOURNING.
It was too true. It was not the mere appearance of death, but the
reality of the fell destroyer that the Crofton family had to mourn.
She who, but a few short hours since, was in all the bloom of apparent
health, and youth, and beauty was now no more.
The poor father, the sisterless sister, the astonished, indignant, and
agonised brothers formed a group that was too sad to contemplate.
As they gazed upon the wreck of her whom they had all loved so fondly,
they could scarcely believe that death had indeed claimed her as her
own; they
“Thought her more beautiful than death,”
and could not, as they gazed tremblingly upon her still form, bring
themselves to believe that she had indeed gone from them for ever.
Dr. North, however, soon put all doubt upon the subject to rest by an
announcement that her spirit had really fled. In vain he tried all the
means that his art suggested. That mysterious and mighty something
which we call life, which we miss and yet see no loss, which is so
great, yet so evanescent and impalpable, was gone.
“Come away,” he said, “we can do no good here now. Come away, all of
you!”
“Oh, no, no,” cried Sir George. “Why should we leave my child?”
“That,” said the doctor, as he pointed to the corpse, “that is not your
child.”
The old man shuddered, and with an aspect upon his face, as if ten
years of added age had at least passed over him in those few moments,
he suffered them to lead him from the room. They all passed down stairs
again, leaving Emma in her own chamber along with the female servants,
so hastily again called up to remain with her.
When the dining-room was reached once more, Mr. Smith, who bore all the
appearance of being quite thunder-struck by what had passed, spoke in
the most feeling manner, saying,—
“This is truly one of the most affecting circumstances I ever remember.
It is dreadful; a young girl to be at once snatched from a circle
of admiring and loving friends in this manner, is too sad a picture
for any one with a heart to feel for the distresses of others to
contemplate. What, sir, is your opinion,” to Dr. North, “of the actual
cause of death?”
“The shock to the nervous system I suspect has induced some sudden
action of the heart that has been too much for vitality.”
“Dreadful!”
“Alas, alas!” sobbed Sir George. “What have I done, that Heaven should
thus launch against me the bolts of its bitterest vengeance? Why should
I be robbed of my child? Surely there were angels enough in Heaven
without taking mine from me.”
“Hush, hush,” said Dr. North; “you are in grief, sir, and know not what
you say. These were not else the words that would fall from the lips of
such a man as you are.”
The bereaved father was silent, and the sons looked at him with
countenances in which dismay was most strongly pictured. They seemed
as if as yet they had not become fully alive to the loss they had
sustained, or of what had really happened within the once happy
domestic circle, of which the fairest portion was now so ruthlessly
dragged from them.
“It is like a dream,” said Edwin, addressing his brother Charles in a
whisper. “It is much more like a dream than aught else in the world.”
“It is, it is. Oh, tell me that this is not real.”
“It is too real,” said the doctor, “you must bow with what amount of
resignation you can call to your aid to that stroke of destiny which
you cannot control; you should consider that as regards her who has
gone from you, that she is now no object of pity. Death is an evil
to you in your loss, but it is the end of all evil and pain to her;
and then again, she has but gone a few years, after all, earlier than
usual, for how long shall we—ay, the best and strongest of us—be behind
her?”
This was consolation of the right sort, and was sure to have its effect
upon persons in the habit of conversing coolly and calmly upon general
subjects, so that in a short time, the father even felt much better,
and although the sons were quite convinced of their loss they no longer
looked at each other with such bewildered aspects, but exhibited the
rational grief of men.
Charles spoke after a time with great energy, saying,—
“It is true that we may call our reason to our aid, and contrive to rid
ourselves of our grief in a great measure; but there is another duty we
have to perform, and that is, to diligently inquire why and how it was,
that our sister got this horrible fright, that has had the effect of
hurrying her into eternity.”
“Yes, brother,” said Edwin, “you are right! our sister’s memory shall
be vindicated, and woe be to him who has brought this desolation and
grief upon us.”
Sir George looked from one of his sons to the other, but said nothing;
he appeared to be prostrated too much by his feelings, and the doctor
strongly urging him to retire to rest, he shortly did so, where we will
leave him for a time, hoping that he will find the oblivion of sleep
creep over him, and
“Knit up the ravelled sleeve of care.”
“Now,” said Dr. North, “here we are four men with cool heads, and
active enough judgments. For God’s sake, let us try to come to some
sort of conclusion about this dreadful affair. What do you say,
Charles?”
“In the first place, I should recommend that the house be searched
diligently, in order that we may see if any stranger is in it, or
discover any means by which an entrance to the premises has been
effected. We don’t know but that after all some robbery may be the aim,
and that the fright of our sister which has had so fatal an effect, may
be the consequence merely of the appearance of a thief in her room.
“Agreed,” said Edwin, “let the search of the house be our first step.”
Two of the new servants were summoned with lights, and the party of
four proceeded to an examination of the house, which on account of its
size was not a very short process, for there was so many staircases
and rooms opening the one into the other, that the hiding places were
numerous enough.
At length, however, they were not only satisfied that no one was
concealed on the premises, but likewise that all the fastenings were
quite secure, and had been made so before the servants retired to rest.
The mystery therefore was rather increased.
Had there not been the collateral evidence of Emma and the singular
fact of the fastening up of the doors of the doctor’s and Mr. Smith’s
bed-chambers, no doubt the whole affair would have rested where it was,
and have been put down as a remarkable death arising from the influence
of a dream.
But that was out of the question—somebody had been seen, and whether
that somebody was really not an inhabitant of this world was the
question.
In the midst of all this, the day began to dawn.
Sir George had had no sleep, but he had done himself some good in the
solitude of his own chamber. He had prayed long and earnestly, and
his prayers had had the effect which they almost invariably have upon
all imaginative persons, namely, of bringing him an amount of mental
calmness, peace, and resignation, highly desirable in his circumstances.
The breakfast table was laid in silence by the servants, and when Sir
George met his sons and his guests, he spoke calmly enough, saying to
them,—
“You will no more hear from me the accents of grief or of despair. I
accept what consolation I can find, but as a man, and a father I will
have justice; my child has been terrified to death, and I will find
who has done the deed, for let him be whom he may, he is as much her
murderer as though he had plunged a dagger in her heart.”
“It is so,” said Mr. Smith.
“Being so, then let him beware.”
Varney thought that as the father uttered these last words, he glanced
in a peculiar manner at him, but he was not quite sure that such was
the case. Had he been sure, perhaps, he would have taken other steps
than he did.
Little more passed during the breakfast, but when that meal was over,
Sir George said,—
“Edwin, we are but dull and poor company to Mr. Smith; it will amuse
him, perhaps, if you take him through the grounds, and show him the
estate.”
Edwin made no objection, and as the thing was put in the shape of an
amusement to him, Varney could only say some civil things, and rise to
go.
“I regret,” he said, “to be of so much trouble.”
“Not at all,” said Edwin, “no trouble, sir; my own mind, God knows,
wants something to distract it from too close a contemplation of its
own thoughts. If you will accompany me in a walk over the estate, it
will, perhaps, put me into better spirits.”
They left the room, and when they were gone, Sir George Crofton rose
and shut the door, fastening it on the inside carefully, rather to
the surprise of the doctor and his son Charles, who looked at him in
silence.
“Charles,” he then said, “and you, doctor, I have something particular
to say to you.”
“What is it? What is it?”
“God forgive me if I am wrong, but I suspect our guest?”
“Mr. Smith?”
“Yes, I don’t like his looks at all; now we know nothing of him but
from his own report; we have searched the house right through, or at
least you have, you tell me, and found nothing. He is the only stranger
within our doors. Perhaps it is uncharitable to suspect him, but I
cannot help it, the thought came too strongly upon me last night, as I
was alone in my chamber, for me to overcome it. I have now spoken to
you both frankly, and tell me what are your thoughts.”
“I don’t like him,” said Charles.
“He is a singular man,” said Dr. North.
“What—what now if he were—were—”
“Why do you hesitate, father? what would you say?”
“Go on, sir,” said Dr. North, with a nod, that signified, I know very
well what you are going to say. “Go on, sir.”
“What, then, if it were really true, that there were such things, and
he is a vampyre?”
Edwin sprang to his feet in surprise, and said,—
“Good God! you put a frightful idea into my brain that will now never
leave it. A vampyre?”
“Heaven forbid,” added Sir George, “that I should say such a thing
heedlessly, or that I should take upon myself to assert that such is
the case; I merely throw it out as a supposition—a horrible one, I
grant, but yet one that perhaps deserves some consideration.”
“Get rid of him,” said Dr. North.
“It is difficult after telling him he was welcome to stay, to now
tell him that we want him to go. I would much prefer watching him
closely, and endeavouring by such means, either to confirm or to do
away entirely with my suppositions. And you can take an opportunity of
speaking to Edwin upon the subject, quietly and carefully.”
“I will, father.”
“Then we can be all upon the alert; but above all things I charge you
say nothing to Emma of the really terrific idea. Only I should say that
to-night it is in the direction of her chamber that I would wish to
keep the closest watch.”
“And that, too, without her knowing it,” said the doctor. “If she
is aware of anything of the sort, there is no knowing what tricks
her imagination might play her, and now, Sir George, I must say
that I take the greatest interest in the matter, and will with your
permission remain here until I am sent for. Poor Ringwood still remains
insensible, and I take it that under the circumstances that it is
really a mercy, for what a sad communication has to be made to him,
when he does recover sufficiently to hear it.”
“Sad, indeed.”
It was now finally agreed among them that there was to be no variation
whatever in their conduct towards Mr. Smith, but that after they had
taken leave of him for the night, and had all gone to bed, they should
each glide out of his chamber, and wait at the extreme end of the
corridor in silence, to mark if anything should happen.
This was duly announced to Edwin, who with a shudder announced that he
had his suspicions, too, of Mr. Smith, so he of course came into the
scheme at once; and now they waited rather anxiously for the night to
come again.
CHAPTER CCVIII.
THE NIGHT WATCH.—THE SURPRISE.—THE CHASE.
Everything was now said and done that could induce a feeling in the
mind of Varney, that he was perfectly welcome at the Grange, and to
dispel the least idea of anything in the shape of supposition that he
might have had, that he was suspected, although he had not himself by
word or look betrayed such a feeling.
The day to all parties seemed a frightfully long one. Ringwood remained
in the same state of unconsciousness as he had been in the day
previous, and the only circumstance that served to break the monotony
of the time, was the arrival of some of his friends to see him.
It is not essential to our story that we should take up space in
detailing what they said and what they did; suffice it that all the
grief was exhibited that was to be expected, and that finally they left
the Grange with a conviction that the wounded man was in as kind hands
as they could possibly wish him, and everything would be done, that
kindness and skill could suggest, to recover him and preserve his life.
Probably the dreadful catastrophe that had happened in the family of
the Croftons had its effect in reconciling the Ringwoods to the lesser
calamity, for Dr. North gave them strong hopes of his ultimate recovery.
And so the time passed on, until the dim shadows of the evening began
to creep over the landscape, and the distant trees imperceptibly
mingled together in a chaotic mass. The song of the birds was over—the
herds and flocks had sought their shelter for the night, and a solemn
and beautiful stillness was upon the face of nature.
Assembled once more in the dining-room of the Grange, were the
Croftons—but not Emma, she was in her chamber—the doctor, and Mr. Smith.
Varney had exerted himself much to be entertaining, and yet not
obtrusively so, as under the calamitous and extraordinary circumstances
in which the family was placed, that would have been bad taste; but he
led the conversation into the most interesting channels, and he charmed
those who listened to him, in spite of themselves.
Dr. North was peculiarly pleased with so scientific a companion, and
one who had travelled so much, for Varney spoke of almost every portion
of the globe as familiar to him.
In this kind of way, the evening sped on, and more than once, as Varney
was giving some eloquent and comprehensive description of some natural
phenomenon that he had witnessed in some other clime, not only were the
suspicions entertained against him forgotten, but even the grief of the
family faded away for a brief space before the charm of his discourse.
At length the time for rest came.
Sir George rose, and bowing to Varney, said,—
“Do not let our example influence you, sir. We retire now.”
“I shall be glad to do so,” said Varney, “likewise; last night was a
disturbed as well as a melancholy one for all in this house.”
“It was indeed.”
[Illustration: Sir George says goodnight to Varney.]
In another five minutes, the dining-room was vacant, and all that could
be heard in the house was the noise of putting up extra bars, and
shooting into their places, long unused bolts in order that it should
be quite beyond all doubt that no one could get into the premises.
After that, all was still.
The moon was in her last quarter now, but only at the commencement
of it, so if the night proved not to be cloudy, it would be rather a
brilliant one, which might, or might not be of service to those who
were going to watch in the corridor the proceedings of Mr. Smith.
An hour elapsed before there was any movement whatever, and then it was
Dr. North who first, with great care, emerged from his room.
He had drawn on his stockings over his shoes, so that his footsteps
might not be heard, and he took his station in a dark corner by the
large window we have before spoken of as lighting the corridor.
The moon was up, but it only shone in obliquely at the window, so that
one side of the corridor was enveloped in the deepest gloom, while on
the other the pale rays fell.
A few minutes more, for half-past eleven was the hour on which they had
all agreed, and Sir George, with Edwin and Charles joined the doctor,
who merely nodded to them, as they could faintly see him.
Sir George spoke in a very faint whisper, saying,—
“We are well armed.”
“Good,” replied the doctor, in a similar cautious tone, “but let me
implore you to be careful how you use your arms. Do nothing hastily I
beg of you; you don’t know what cause of regret the imprudence of a
moment may give rise to.”
“Depend upon us, we will be very careful indeed.”
“That is right.”
“We had better not talk,” said Charles, “these corridors carry sound
sometimes too well; if we are to do any good, it must be by preserving
the profoundest silence.”
This advice was too practical and evidently good to be neglected, and
consequently they were all as still as they could be, and stood like so
many statues for the next half hour.
They heard a clock that hung in the hall below strike the hour of
twelve, and when the reverberations of sound were over, a stillness
even more profound than before seemed to pervade the whole house. The
half hour they had waited in such silence appeared to them to be of
four times the usual length, and they were glad to hear twelve strike.
Still they said nothing, for if silence before twelve o’clock was a
thing to be desired, it was much more so after that hour, for it was
then that the alarm of the preceding evening had taken place. Their
watchfulness, and their anxiety momentarily increased.
The old clock in the hall chimed the quarter past twelve, and yet all
was as still as the grave; not the smallest sound disturbed the repose
of the house.
The moon had shifted round a little, so that the gloom of the corridor
was not so complete as it had been, and Dr. North was aware that in
another hour the spot where they all stood would be visited by some
rays which would render their concealment out of the question.
But as yet all was right, and there was no need to shift their position
in the least.
Suddenly Sir George Crofton laid his hand upon the arm of the doctor,
and an exclamation involuntarily escaped him, but not in a loud tone.
“Hush, for God’s sake,” whispered the doctor.
They had all heard a slight noise, like the cautious opening of a door.
They looked eagerly in the direction from whence it came, and to their
surprise they found it proceed from the chamber of the dead!
Yes, the door of the room in which lay the corpse of Clara slowly
opened.
“God of Heaven!” said Sir George.
“Hush—hush,” again whispered the doctor, and he held him by the arm
compulsively.
All was still. The door creaked upon its hinges a little, that was all.
A quarter of an hour passed, and then Sir George was about to say
something, when he started as if a shock of electricity had been
applied to him, for the door of Varney’s room was swung wide open, and
he appeared, full dressed.
All the doors opening from the corridor creaked unless they were flung
open smartly and quickly, and there could be no doubt but that Varney
knew this, and hence the apparent precipitancy of his appearance.
There he stood in the moonlight, close by the threshold of his
room, gazing about him. He bent himself into an attitude of intense
listening, and remained in it for some time, and then he with slow
sliding steps made his way towards the door of Emma’s room.
His hand was actually upon the lock, when Sir George, who could stand
the scene no longer, levelled a pistol he had taken from his pocket,
and without giving any intimation to those who were with him of what he
was going to do, he pulled the trigger.
The pistol only flashed without being fully discharged.
“How imprudent,” said the doctor. “You have done it now! Follow me!”
He rushed forward, but he was too late, Varney had taken the alarm, and
in a moment he regained his own room and fastened it securely on the
inside.
“We must have him,” cried Charles. “He cannot escape from that room.
There is no other door, and the window is a good thirty feet from the
garden below. Alarm the servants, we will soon open his door. It can’t
be very secure, for the lock was broken last night.”
As he spoke, Charles made a vigorous effort to open the door, but it
resisted as if it had been a part of the solid wall, while within the
chamber all was perfectly still, as if Mr. Smith had quite satisfied
himself by shutting out his assailants, and meant to take no further
notice of them.
“This is strange,” said the doctor, “but we shall soon find out what he
means by it. The door must be forced as quickly as possible.”
Edwin ran down stairs by his father’s orders to arouse some of the men
servants, besides getting some weapon or tool by the assistance of
which the door might be forced, and he soon returned with several of
the men, and one armed with the identical crow-bar that had been used
with such effect on the preceding evening. They brought lights with
them too, so that the capture of Mr. Smith appeared to be no longer a
matter of doubt with such a force opposed to him.
“Now,” cried Sir George, “do not mind what mischief you do, my men, so
that you break open the door of that room, and quickly too.”
People somehow are always glad to be engaged in anything that has a
destructive look about it, and when the servants heard that they might
break away at the door as much as they liked, they set about it with a
vengeance that promised soon to succeed in the object.
The door yielded with a crash.
“Come on, come on. Yield yourself,” cried Sir George, and he rushed
into the room followed by his sons and by Dr. North.
There was no Mr. Smith there.
“Escaped,” said Dr. North.
“Impossible,—impossible! and yet this open window. He must be lying
dashed to pieces below, for no one could with safety drop or jump such
a height. Run round to the garden some of you, at once.”
“Stop,” said Charles. “There is no occasion. He has had ample time to
escape. Look here.”
Charles pointed out the end of a thick rope, firmly fastened to the
ledge of the window, and by which it was quite clear any one could
safely descend into the garden, it only requiring a little nerve to do
so with perfect ease.
“This has all been prepared,” said Dr. North.
“Still,” cried Sir George, “I will not give the affair up. Mind I offer
a reward of twenty guineas to any one of my household who succeeds in
catching Mr. Smith.”
“Lor, sir! what has he done?” said a groom.
“Never you mind what he has done. Bring him in, and you shall have the
reward.”
“Very good, sir. Come on, Dick, and you Harry; let’s all go, and you
know it will be all the pleasanter to share the reward among us. Come
on.”
Thus stimulated by their companion, the servants ran out of the house
into the moonlit park in search of Varney the Vampyre.
CHAPTER CCIX.
THE FUNERAL.—A STRANGE INCIDENT.
It was all very well for Sir George Crofton to offer his twenty guineas
for the taking of Mr. Smith, and nothing could be more legitimate than
his servants making active exertions to endeavour to earn that amount
of money, but the really succeeding in doing so was quite another thing.
To be sure they went out into the park, and did the best to catch him,
and being well acquainted with every turn and every pathway within it,
they considered they had a fair chance of succeeding, but after their
pains they were at length obliged to give up the affair as a bad job,
after an hour or two’s most active search.
While they were away though, there was something that occurred at the
Grange which gave a great additional shock to Sir George and his sons.
It will not fail to be remembered that the first door they saw move
while they were keeping watch and ward in the moonlit gallery was the
door of the chamber in which lay the corpse of Clara, who had met with
so melancholy an end.
This circumstance recurred to them all with fearful force when they
felt convinced that the now more than suspected Mr. Smith had really
and truly made his escape.
Upon proceeding to that room of the dead, Dr. North being first, they
found some difficulty in opening the door, but upon using force they
succeeded, when to their absolute horror they saw that the dead body
was lying upon the floor close to the door, and that it had been the
obstruction to moving it.
Dr. North would fain have spared the feelings of Sir George this
affecting sight, but the baronet was so close behind him that he could
not do so.
“Oh, God!” cried the father, “my child, my child.”
“Take your father away, boys, for heaven’s sake,” said Dr. North to the
two young men; “this is no sight for him to see.”
It appeared too as if it was no sight for any one to see unmoved, for
both Charles and Edwin stood like statues gazing at it, and for a time
incapable of motion.
“My sister—is it indeed my sister?” said Charles.
The doctor fairly closed the door upon them all, and turned them so out
of the room. Then he having professionally lost all dread of the dead,
lifted the body upon the bed again, and disposed of it properly, after
which, without saying a word, he walked down to the dining-room.
“Tell me, tell me,” said Sir George “what does all this mean?”
“Do not ask me,” replied Dr. North, “I cannot tell you; I confess I do
not know what advice to give you, or indeed what to say to you.”
The old man rested his head upon his hands, and wept bitterly, while
his two sons sat looking at each other perfectly aghast, and unable
to think anything of a rational import concerning the most mysterious
proceedings that had taken place.
• • • • •
Let our readers then suppose that a week has passed away, and that the
morning has arrived when the body of Clara is to be placed in a vault
appropriated as the resting place of the Croftons, beneath the church
that was close at hand.
During that time nothing whatever had been heard of Mr. Smith. He
seemed to have completely disappeared from the neighbourhood as well as
from the Grange-house.
Fortunately, although Sir George had offered twenty guineas for the
apprehension of Mr. Smith to his servants, he had said nothing of the
cause why he offered such a reward, and the neighbourhood was left to
its own conjectures upon the subject.
Those conjectures were of course sufficiently numerous, but it was
quite agreed between Sir George, Doctor North, and the two sons that
nothing more should be said upon the subject.
They of course did not wish
“To fill the ear of idle curiosity”
with such a tale as they might tell, but had a thousand reasons, each
good and substantial of its kind, for withholding.
Young Ringwood was sufficiently recovered to be about, and to have
told him the story that widowed his heart. He fell into a profound
melancholy which nothing could alleviate, and as his recovery went on,
he asked permission to remain at the Grange.
Sir George, and indeed all the Crofton family, gladly pressed him to
remain with them as long as he would do so, for it was some alleviation
of their own distress to have him about them.
He begged permission to be present at the funeral, and it is of that
funeral we have now to speak, for it took place on that day week on
which the vampyre had first taken up his dreadful residence at the old
Grange-house, where all before had been so happy.
The church, as we have remarked, was not very distant, and a mournful
procession it was, consisting of the funeral equipages, followed by Sir
George Crofton’s carriage, that at twelve o’clock in the day started to
place the youngest and the fairest of the name of Crofton that had ever
reposed in the family vault.
The whole neighbourhood was in a state of commotion, and by the time
the funeral cortege reached the churchyard, there was not a person
capable of being out, for some miles around, that was not congregated
about the spot.
The old church bell tolled a melancholy welcome to the procession,
and the clergyman met the corpse a the entrance of the graveyard, and
preceded it to the church, where it was placed by the altar while he
made an impressive prayer.
This brief ceremony over, the coffin was carried to the part of one
of the aisles, where upon the removal of a large stone slab, the
resting-place of the Croftons was visible.
“I have not looked upon these stone steps,” said Sir George, “since my
poor wife went down there in the sleep of death.”
“Compose yourself,” whispered Dr. North, who was present. “You ought
not, sir, to have been present at such a scene as this.”
“Nay, it surely was my duty to follow my own child to her last
resting-place.”
The body was lowered into the vault, and the funeral service was read
impressively over the cold and still remains of Clara.
“All is over,” said the doctor.
“Yes,” faltered Sir George; “all is over. Farewell, my dear child, but
not a long farewell to thee; this blow has nearly stricken me into the
grave.”
“Leaning on the arm of his son Charles, who as well as Edwin was deeply
affected, the old man now allowed himself to be led from the church.
He met at the door Will Stephens, the sexton, who seemed desirous of
speaking to him.
“What is it, Will?”
“Will your honour have some fresh sawdust put down in the vault. It
wants it, Sir George; there ain’t been any put in for many a long day.”
“Very well. It will be ready for me when I go. It won’t be long before
the vault is again opened.”
“Oh, do not say that, father,” said Edwin. “Do not leave us; think that
if you have lost one child who loved you, you have others who ought to
be as dear to you.”
“That’s right, Edwin,” said the doctor.
Sir George made no distinct reply to this, but he pressed the hand of
his son, and looked kindly upon him, to signify that he felt the full
justice of what he had just said, so they had hopes that time would
soon produce its usual effects upon that feeling which of all others
is, while it lasts, the most poignant, at the same time that it is the
most evanescent—grief for the dead.
And well it is that it should be so, otherwise we should be a world of
weepers and mourners, for who is there that has not felt the pang of
losing some fond heart in which we have garnered up the best affections
of human nature.
Emma since her sister’s death had been terribly broken down in spirit,
and when they all got home to the Grange, they found her looking so
ill, that the old baronet took Dr. North on one side, and said to him
in tones expressive of the deepest anguish,—
“Am I to lose both my girls?”
“Oh no—no; certainly not,” was the decided reply. “Why, my old friend,
you used to be a man of great moral courage. Where has it all gone to
now?”
“It is in the grave of my child.”
“Come, come, you must for your own sake, as well as for the sake of
others, who are near and dear to you, rouse yourself from this state
of mental torpor, as I may call it. You can do so, and it is worthy of
you to make the effort. Only think what would have been your situation
if you had had but one child, and that had been snatched away from you;
but you have yet three to comfort you, and yet you talk despairingly,
as if every tie that bound you to the world had been suddenly burst
asunder.”
After this Sir George Crofton was almost ashamed to make such an
exhibition of his grief, and whatever his thoughts were he kept them to
himself, as well as exercising a much greater control over his voice,
and the external expression of the feelings, which were still busy at
his heart.
The despondency of Ringwood was great. He could not help fancy that if
he had not met with the unlucky accident in the ravine, Clara would
have been saved, and in some obscure way to his mind, the circumstances
seemed to be connected together. He could not account either for the
loss of her miniature, which he had been in the habit of wearing but
which he missed upon his convalescence, so that he was irresistibly led
to the conclusion that some unfriendly hands had been about him during
his insensibility.
So highly did he prize the miniature, that he offered a sum of money,
exceeding its intrinsic value by twenty times, for its recovery
and pledged himself to make no inquiry as to how it came into the
possession of the party who should restore it to him; but for all that
it was not forthcoming.
The reader of this narrative knows very well in whose possession it
was. Varney the Vampyre had possessed himself of it in the ravine, when
he saw the young bridegroom lying insensible at his feet, and he kept
it, although why he did so does not as yet appear, for surely the sight
of it could only remind him of one of his victims; but then Varney had
other thoughts and feelings than he used to have.
Alas, what a thousand pities it was that the ocean had presented him to
the two brothers? Why did he not sink—why did not some wave hide him
from their observation? What misery would have been spared to them,
and to all dear to them. And what misery would have been spared to the
wretched Varney himself!
It is true that he had given expression to sentiments, and declared
intentions which would go far to prove that he had for ever given up
and got rid of all human feelings and influences, but has he really so
got rid of such feelings? It is a question which time alone can answer.
We shall soon see in his now very short career whether he is most to
suffer or to inflict suffering, and what will be the result of his
new principles of action—those principles which he had in the despair
and the agony of his heart painted to himself as the main springs
of a combined existence, he had with such vain and such fruitless
perseverance strove to rid himself of. It was sad—very sad, indeed,
that such a being could not die when he chose, the poorest privilege of
all.
CHAPTER CCX.
THE STRANGE VISITOR TO THE OLD CHURCH AT NIGHT.
The request of Will Stephens to be allowed to put some sawdust in the
vault of the Croftons, was one of those regular things that he always
propounded to any one who had a vault opened beneath the old church,
and he generally made a very good thing of it.
People were always too much taken up with thinking of the loss of the
relation who had just been placed in that dismal repository, to think
much of a guinea to Will for a shilling’s worth of sawdust, and if they
did ever intimate that they thought it rather too much, he always had
his answer ready at the tip of his tongue.
“How should you like, sir, or madam, as the case may be, to go into a
vault among the dead, to lay the sawdust for ’em.”
That argument was generally conclusive, and Will would get his guinea.
With Sir George Crofton he was quite sure and safe, so he had no
scruples upon the subject, and the little bit of sawdust he meant to
carry in when he had time, was more for the say of the thing, than for
any utility it was at all likely to be of, but then as he said,—
“Where’s the odds, the dead ’uns can’t see it, and living ’uns won’t go
to see it, so it does very well, and I pockets my guinea, which does
better still, for after all a sexton’s ain’t the most agreeable life
in the world, and he ought to be paid well; not that I care much about
it, being used to it, but there was a time when I had my qualms, and
I’ve had to get over ’em the best way I could, somehow, if I am now all
right.”
These were Will’s arguments and reflections to himself before night,
when he meant to go and place the little bag of saw-dust in the
Croftons’ family vault.
But, before we follow Will Stephens on his saw-dust expedition, as
we intend to do, we wish first to draw the attention of the reader
to another circumstance, the relation of which to Will Stephen’s
proceedings will very shortly appear indeed.
As the night came on there was some appearance of stormy weather. The
wind blew in a strange, gusty and uncertain manner, shifting about
from point to point of the compass in an odd way, as though it had not
made up its mind from whence to blow. The most weather-wise personages
of the neighbourhood were puzzled, for just as they prognosticated
one species of weather from the particular direction whence the wind
came, it shifted and came from some other quarter very nearly directly
opposite.
This was extremely provoking, but at all events it was generally agreed
that the moon would not on that night, shed its soft light upon the
earth.
How far they were mistaken in this surmise we shall presently see.
Will Stephens had an opinion, from certain admonitory symptoms arising
from his corns, that it would rain; so he delayed going to the church
until he should see what sort of weather it was going to be, inwardly
deciding that it would be a capital excuse not to go at all that night
if the rain should come down pretty sharply.
This period of indecision he passed at a public house, known as the
Blue Lion, the charms of the excellent ale of that establishment
materially assisting him in coming to the conclusion that if it should
rain ever so little it would be better to put off his job until the
morning.
Now it was not that Will was afraid that he hesitated. He was too used
to death to feel now any terrors of fear. It was nothing but the ale.
Why then was the hurry? Simply that the flat stone which was over the
vault of the Croftons was left unfastened until the aforesaid saw-dust
was placed within the receptacle of the dead, and the next day was
Sunday, so that the job must be finished before the service should
commence.
At night, therefore, or very early the following morning, Will must
seem to earn his guinea by going to the vault. He did not like to
venture saying he had been and yet neglect going, for he knew there
were too many gossips about the village to make that safe.
While he is however regaling himself at the ale house, another person
totally, to all appearance, heedless of wind and threatening rain, is
abroad in the neighbourhood of the church.
A tall figure enveloped in a large murky looking cloak, is moving
slowly past the few cottages in the immediate vicinage of the church,
and so noiselessly that it looks like a spirit of the dead rather than
a living person.
It was unseen by any one, for it was a time of the night—half-past
eleven—now at which few persons in that little quiet place were abroad,
and as we have said, Will Stephens, perhaps the only inhabitant who
had any real business to be abroad at such an hour, was still solacing
himself at the Blue Lion with the ale that seemed to get better every
glass he took.
The figure moved on at a slow and steady pace among the old tomb stones
that lay so thick around in the circuit of the church-yard, until it
reached the church itself, and then it walked slowly around the sacred
edifice, looking with a curious eye at the windows that presented
themselves to observation, and apparently scanning the height from the
ground.
Finally he paused at a rugged-looking part of the wall, and commenced,
with great muscular power and most wonderful agility, climbing up to
one of the windows.
To look at that wall it would have seemed that nothing human could
possibly have succeeded in ascending it, and yet this stranger,
catching at asperities which scarcely seemed to be such, did, with a
wonderful power and strength, drag himself up until he grasped an iron
bar, close to the window immediately above him, and then he had a firm
hold.
After this his progress was easy, assuming that his object was merely
to get up to the window of the old church, for he stood upon the narrow
ledge without in a few moments.
There was a slight noise, it was of the breaking of a pane of glass,
and then the stranger introduced his hand into the church, and
succeeded in removing a rude primitive looking fastening which held the
window in its place.
In another moment he disappeared from external observation within the
sacred building.
What could he want there at such an hour, and who was he? Did he
contemplate disturbing the repose of the dead with some unhallowed
purpose? Was robbery his aim?
Let us be patient, and probably we shall soon enough perceive that some
affairs are in progress that require the closest attention, and which
in the vaults are calculated to fill the reflecting mind with the most
painful images, and awake sensations of horror at the idea that such
things can really be, and are permitted tacitly by Heaven to take place
on the beautiful earth destined for the dwelling place of man.
CHAPTER CCXI.
WILL STEPHEN’S VISIT TO THE FAMILY VAULT WITH THE SAW-DUST,
AND WHAT HE SAW THERE.
Will Stephens waited at the ale-house much longer than he intended.
To be sure the rain cleared off, but what of that? It was not a
circumstance that made the ale anything the worse, and so he waited to
drink it with a gusto that improved each glass amazingly, and then some
of those who were present—jolly topers like himself—began to laugh and
to say,—
“Ah, Will, you may as well poke that bag of saw-dust into some corner;
you won’t do anything with it to-night, old fellow, we know.”
Now, some people get good tempered and complying when they have had
the drop too much, and others again, get particularly obstinate and
contradictory. Will of the two, certainly had more pretensions to
belong to the latter class than the former, so when he heard such a
prophecy concerning his movements and knew it was all an assumption
based upon the ale he had drank, he felt indignant.
“Not go!” he cried. “Not go. You may fancy if you please that I will
not go, but you will find yourselves mistaken, I will go.”
“What, so late.”
“What’s the odds to me. Any of you now would be frightened out of your
lives to set foot in the old church at such a time as this, I know; but
I’m none of the timid sort, I’m afraid of nobody living, and it ain’t
likely that I am now going to be afraid of anybody dead.”
“Then you really will go.”
The only reply that he made to this was to finish off the glass of ale
that was before him, shouldering the bag of saw-dust, and sally out
into the open air. Will Stephens felt highly indignant and touchy about
his honour, and as he had said he would go and then somebody chose to
imply a doubt still, he was grievously offended.
When he got out, he found that the night was anything but an inviting
one. He was still sober enough to see that, and to feel that although
the heavy rain had ceased, there was a little disagreeable misty sort
of vapour in the air.
He staggered at the first turning he came to, for rather an
uncomfortable gust of wind blew in his face, carrying along with it
such a shower of small cold rain that he was, or fancied himself to be,
wet through in a moment.
“Pleasant, this,” thought Will, “but I won’t go back to be laughed at.”
As for the saw-dust he was carrying, its weight was by no means any
great consideration for it was just as light as it could be.
“No, I won’t go back—back indeed, not I; they would make me stand a pot
of ale to a certainly if I were to go back, and besides it would be all
over the parish to-morrow that Will Stephens after he got half way to
the church was afraid to go any further. Confound the small rain, it
pricks like pins and needles.”
Nothing is more sobering than rain, and as he, Will, gradually got
saturated with the small aqueous particles, the effect of the strong
ale as gradually wore off, until by the time the dim, dusky outline of
the church rose before him he was almost as sober as need be.
“Ah,” he said, “here I am at last at any rate. I do hate this sort
of rain, you can hardly make up your mind that it is raining at all,
and yet somehow you get soaked before you know where you are. It’s
just like going through a damp cloud, that it is, and yet somehow or
another, I don’t much mind it; I’m earning a guinea easy enough. Ha,
ha!”
This was by no means an unpleasant reflection.
“Yes,” he added, “I am earning a guinea easily enough that’s quite
clear, but then it’s not everybody who would, for a guinea, go into
anybody’s family vault at such a time. By-the-by, I wonder now what the
time is exactly.”
Scarcely had Will spoken those words when the old church-clock struck
twelve.
It was a very serious, deliberate sort of clock that, and it took
a long time to strike twelve, and Will listened with the greatest
attention with the hope of persuading himself that it was only eleven,
but there could be no mistake, twelve it was.
“Really,” he said, “is it so late, well, I didn’t think—”
Will stood within the porch of the church door, and he gave a sort of
shiver, and then, with the bag of sawdust in his hand, he stopped to
listen attentively, for he thought he heard a slight sound.
“What was that, eh? what—I thought, nay, I am sure I heard something;
it’s very odd—very odd indeed.”
As if then to afford Will an excuse for resolving the sound to
something else, the wind at this moment came in such a sudden gale
round the ancient edifice, that quite congratulated himself he was
within the porch and protected from its fury, and besides it to his
mind was a sufficing explanation of the noise he had heard.
“Some of the old doors,” he muttered, “rattled by the wind, that’s all.
Now I suppose we shall have a clear night after all the rain. Such a
gale will soon blow off the damp clouds.”
Will was right. The gale, for a gale it was, blew from the north, and
away went the rain clouds as if a curtain had been drawn aside by some
invisible hand.
After some rummaging Will found in his pocket the key of the church; it
was not the key of the principal door, but of a smaller side entrance,
at which the officials, who required at all times free ingress and
egress, made application. The little arched door creaked upon its
hinges and then Will stood in a sort of vestibule, for another door
that was never fast had to be opened before he could be fairly said to
be within the church.
This second door was covered with green baize, and could be opened and
shut very noiselessly, indeed.
Will Stephens stood in the vestibule until he had got a small lantern
out of one pocket, and some matches from another. Then, in a few
moments he had a light, and once again shouldering the bag of sawdust,
he pushed open the inner door, and stood in the church.
It might have been fancy—nay, he felt certain, it could be nothing
else—but he thought as he opened the door that a faint sort of sigh
came upon his ears.
Fancy or not, though, it was an uncomfortable thing at such an hour,
and in such a place too, and he had never before heard anything of the
sort upon his visits to the church, and he had visited it at all hours,
many and many a time.
“It’s odd,” he said, “it’s uncommonly odd, I never felt so
uncomfortable in the church before. I—I never used to mind coming to it
in the middle of the night. But now, I—eh?—what was that?”
Again an odd sort of noise came upon his ears, and he dropped the bag
of sawdust.
All was still again, save the regular roar of wind, as it swept round
the sacred building, and although Will Stephens stood for nearly ten
minutes in an attitude of listening, he heard nothing to augment his
terrors. But let an impulse once be given to fear, and it will go on
accumulating material from every trivial circumstance. The courage of
the sexton was broken down, and there was no knowing, now, what tricks
his awakened imagination might play him.
He began to wish he had not come, and from that wish, to think that he
might as well go back, only shame forbade him, for it would be easily
known on the morrow, that he had not placed the sawdust in the vault,
and lastly, he began to think that some one might be playing him a
trick.
This last supposition, probably, had more effect in raising his courage
than any preceding one. Indignation took possession of him, and he no
longer thought of retreating. He went forward at once, and fell over
the bag of sawdust.
“Murder!” shouted Will.
The moment he did so, he recollected what it was that had occasioned
his fall, and being ashamed of himself he called out impulsively, as if
somebody was there to hear him,—
“No—no, it’s only the sawdust. No—no.”
He rose to his feet again, heartily ashamed of his own fears. Luckily,
his lantern had not been broken or extinguished in his fall, and now,
without another word, he prepared himself to execute the work he came
to do, and leave the church to its repose as quickly as possible.
At one end of the church, the southern end, there was a large window,
which might be said to light the whole of the interior, for the little
windows at the sides were more ornamental than useful, being nothing
but lattices; and across this window was drawn a heavy cloth curtain,
so that when the sun shone too brightly upon the congregation on a
summer’s day, it could be wholly or partially excluded upon a sign from
the clergyman.
The curtain was drawn close on the window now, at night, and Will just
glanced up to it, as he walked on towards the aisle where the opening
to the family vault of the Crofton’s was situated.
“All’s right,” he said, “what a fool I have been, to be sure. Upon my
word I might have saved frightening myself all night, and some people
would too, but that’s not my way of doing business. So here we are,
all right. The door on one side, so that I have just room enough to go
down into the vault. Oh! when one comes to think of it, it was rather a
melancholy thing, the death of such a young girl as she was, going to
be married too. Well, that’s the way the world goes.”
The stone steps leading down to the vault were rather steep, and Will
threw down the bag of sawdust first, in preference to carrying it, and
then with his lantern in his hand, he commenced his own descent.
“That’ll do,” said Will, when he felt his feet upon the soft old
sawdust that was on the floor of the vault. “That’ll do—now for it, I
shall soon have this job settled, and then I’ll get home no faster than
I can.”
Somehow, or another, he felt very much inclined to talk; the sound of
his own voice, conversing, as he might be said to be, with himself,
gave him a sort of courage, and made the place not appear to be
altogether so desperately lonely as it really was.
That, no doubt, was the feeling that brought forth so many indifferent
remarks from Will Stephens. He held up his light to look round him, and
turned gradually upon his heels as he did so.
The light shook in his hand. The hair almost stood on end on his
head—his teeth chattered, and he tried to speak in vain, as he saw
lying at his feet, a coffin lid.
It was new. The nails that held the blue cloth upon it, were bright,
and fast—the plate shone like silver. Yes, it was the lid of the
coffin of Miss Clara Crofton; but how came it off—unsecured, and lying
upon the floor of the vault, while the coffin was in its proper niche?
“Gracious goodness!” gasped Will at length. “What does this mean?”
The question was easy to ask, but most difficult to answer, and he
stood trembling and turning over in his mind all the most frightful
explanations of what he saw, that could occur to any one.
“Has she been buried alive? Have the body snatchers been after her? How
is it—what—what has happened?”
Then it occurred to Will, that it would be just as well to look into
the coffin, and see if it was tenantless or not. If it were, and
thought he should know what to think, or if the dead body was there,
then he could only conclude that she had been buried alive, and had had
just strength enough to force open the coffin, and cast the lid of it
on the floor of the vault, and then to die in that horrible place.
It required almost more courage than Will could muster, to go and look
into the coffin, for now that his usual indifference was completely
broken down, he was as timid as any stranger to graves and vaults would
have been. But curiosity is, after all, a most exciting passion, and
that lent him power.
“Yes,” he said, “I-I will look in the coffin, I shall have but a poor
tale to tell to Sir George Crofton, if I do not look in the coffin.
I—I—have nothing to be afraid of.”
He advanced with trembling steps, the light shaking in his hands as he
did so. He reached the coffin, and with eyes unusually wide he looked
in: it was empty.
CHAPTER CCXII.
THE APPARITION IN THE CHURCH.—WILL STEPHENS’ SWOON.—THE MORNING.
For some minutes, Will Stephens continued to gaze in the empty coffin,
as if there was something peculiarly fascinating in it, and most
attractive, and yet nothing was in it, no vestige even of the vestments
of the dead. If Clara Crofton had herself risen, and left the vault, it
was quite clear she had taken with her the apparel of the grave.
Will had thought that if he found the coffin empty, all his fears would
vanish, and that he should be able to come at once to the conclusion,
that she had become the prey of resurrectionists. But new ideas, as he
gazed at that abandoned receptacle of the dead, began to creep across
him.
“I—I—don’t know,” he muttered, “but she may in a ghost-like kind of way
be going about. I don’t know whether ghosts is corpses or not. I-I wish
I was out of this.”
The idea of spreading the sawdust in the vault now completely left him;
all he thought of was to get away, and the dread that Clara Crofton
was, perhaps, hiding somewhere, and might come suddenly out upon him
with a yell, got so firm a hold of him, that several times he thought
he should faint with excess of terror.
“That would be too horrible,” he said, “I am sure I should go
mad—mad—mad.”
He retreated backward to the stairs, for the coffin, empty though it
was, held his gaze with a strange kind of fascinating power. He thought
that if he turned round something would be sure to lay hold of him. It
was a most horrifying and distressing idea that, and yet he could not
conquer it.
Of course, he must turn round, it would be an awkward thing to attempt
ascending the staircase short as it was, backward, so he felt the
necessity of turning his back upon the vault.
“I—I will do so,” he thought, “and then make such a rush up the steps,
that I shall be in the church in a moment, I—I can surely do that,
and—and after all it’s nothing really to be afraid of—it’s only a
matter of imagination, after all! oh, yes, that’s all, I—I will do
that.”
He put this notable scheme into execution by turning suddenly round and
making a dash at the stairs, but as people generally do things badly
when they do them in a hurry, he stumbled when about half-way and felt
himself at the mercy of the whole of the supernatural world.
“Have mercy on me,” he cried, “I am going. Have mercy on me.”
He had struck the lantern so hard against the stone stairs that he had
broken it into fragments, and now all was intense darkness around him.
He gave himself up for lost.
He lay, expecting each moment to feel some dead bony fingers clutching
him, and he only groaned, thinking that surely now his last hour was
come; and it is a wonder that his fancy, excited as it was, did not
conjure up to him the very effect he dreaded, but it did not do so,
strange to say, and he lay for full five minutes without anything
occurring to add to his terrors.
Then he began gradually to recover.
“If—if,” he gasped, “I could but reach the church, I—I think I should
be safe. Yes, I should surely be safe in the body of the church. Have
mercy on me, good ghosts; I never harmed any of you, I—I respect you
very much, indeed I do. Let me go, and—I’ll never say a light word of
any of you again, no, never, if I were to live for a thousand years.”
As he uttered these words, he crawled up the remaining stairs, and to
his great satisfaction, made his way fairly into the church.
But then a new surprise, if it was not exactly a new fright, perhaps it
was something of both, awaited him.
The curtain that had been, as he had observed when he was walking down
the aisle, closely drawn across the large south window was now drawn on
one side, so that a large portion of that window was exposed, and the
north wind having chased away by this time entirely the damp clouds,
the moon was sailing in a cloudless sky, and sending into the old
church a glorious flood of light.
“What a change,” said Will Stephens.
It was indeed a change; the church was as light as day, save in some
places where shadows fell, and they, in contrast to the silvery
lightness of the moonbeams, were of a jetty blackness.
But still, let the moon shine ever so brightly, there is not that
distinctness and freshness of outline produced as in the direct
daylight. A strange kind of hazy vapour seems to float between the eye
and all objects—an indistinctness and mysteriousness of aspect, which
belongs not to the sun’s unreflected rays. Thus it was, that although
the church was illuminated by the moon, it had a singular aspect, and
would scarcely have been recognised by any one who had only seen it by
the mild searching light of day.
But of course Will Stephens the sexton knew it well, and as he wiped
the perspiration from his face, he said,—
“What a relief to get out of that vault, and find now that the night
has turned out so fair and beautiful. I—I begin to think I have
frightened myself more than I need have done—but it was that coffin-lid
that did the business; I wasn’t my own man after that. But now that I
have got out of the vault, I feel quite different—oh, quite another
thing.”
Suddenly, then, it occurred to him, that the curtain had been close
on the window, when he came into the church, and following upon that
thought came another, namely, that it could not very well remove itself
from before the casement, and that consequently some hands, mortal or
ghostly, must have done that part of the business.
Here there was ample food again for all his fears, and Will Stephens
almost on the instant relapsed into his former trembling and nerveless
state.
“What shall I do?” he said; “it ain’t all over yet. What will become of
me? There’s something horrid going to happen, I feel certain, and that
curtain has only been drawn aside to let the moonlight come in for me
to see it.”
With a painful expectation of his eyes being blasted by some horrible
sight, he glared round him, but he saw nothing, although the dense
little mass of pews before him might have hidden many a horror.
His next movement was to turn his eyes to the gallery, and all round it
he carried them until he came to the window again, but he saw nothing.
“Who knows,” he muttered, “who knows after all, but that the wind, in
some odd sort of way, may have blown the curtain on one side. I—I wish
I had the courage to go up to the gallery, and see, but I—I don’t think
I should like to do that.”
He hesitated. He knew that it would sound well on the morrow for him to
be able to say that he went up, and yet it was rather a fearful thing.
“A—hem!” he said at length, “is any one here?”
As he made this inquiry, he took care to keep himself ready to make a
dart out at the door into the churchyard, but as there was no response
to it, he was a little encouraged. The gallery staircase was close to
where he stood, and after the not unnatural hesitation of a few moments
more, he approached them, and began slowly to ascend.
Nothing interrupted him, all was profoundly still, and at length he
did reach the south window, and he found that the curtain was most
deliberately drawn on one side, and that the window was fast, so that
no vagary of the wind could have accomplished the purpose.
“Now I’ll go—I’ll go at once,” he said, “I can’t stand this any longer!
I’ll go and alarm the village—I’ll—I’ll make a disturbance of some
sort.”
“Awake!” said a deep, hollow voice.
Will sunk upon his knees with a groan, and mechanically his eyes
wandered to the direction from whence the sound came, and he saw in a
pew just beneath him, and on which the moonlight now fell brightly, a
human form.
It was lying in a strange huddled up position in the pew, and a glance
showed the experienced eyes of the sexton that it was arrayed in the
vestments of the dead.
He tried to speak—he tried to scream—he tried to pray, but all was in
vain. Intense terror froze up every faculty of his body, and he could
only kneel there with his face resting upon the front of the gallery,
and glare with aching eyes, that would not close for a moment, upon the
scene below.
“Awake!” said a deep, strange voice again, “awake.”
It was quite clear that that voice did not come from the figure in the
pew, but from some one close at hand. The sexton soon saw another form.
In the adjoining pew, standing upright as a statue, with one hand
pointing upwards to the window, where came in the moonlight, was a tall
figure, enveloped in a cloak. It was from the lips of that figure, that
the sound came, so deeply, and so solemnly.
“Sister,” it said, “be one of us—let the cold chaste moonbeams endow
thee with your new, and strange, and horrible existence. Be one of us.
Be one of us! Hours must yet elapse, ere the faint flash of morning
will kill the moonbeams. There is time, sister. Awake, be one of us.”
There was a passing cloud that swept for an instant over the face of
the moon obscuring its radiance, and the figure let its arm fall to its
side. But when the silvery beams streamed into the church, it again
pointed to the window.
“’Tis done. She moves,” he said. “I have fulfilled my mission. Ha! ha!
ha!”
The laugh was so terrific and unmirthful that it froze the very blood
in the veins of Will, and he thought he was surely at that moment going
mad.
But still he did not close his eyes, still he moved not from the
position which he had first assumed when the horrible noise met his
ears.
“’Tis done,” said the figure, and the arm that had been outstretched
was let fall to his side.
Will Stephens looked in the pew, where he had seen what appeared to
be a corpse. It had altered its position. He saw it move and waive
its arms about strangely and deep sighs came from its lips. It was a
dreadful sight to see, but at length it rose up in the grave clothes,
and moved to the door of the pew.
[Illustration: Will Stephens watches the resuscitated corpse.]
The figure in the adjoining pew opened the door and stood on one side,
and the revivified corpse passed out.
Slowly and solemnly it passed down the aisle. It reached the door at
which Will Stephens had entered, and then it passed away from his
sight. The tall figure followed closely, and Will Stephens was alone in
the church.
What could he do? How could he give a sufficient alarm? Would the two
horrible personages return or not? Alas! poor Will Stephens, never was
an unhappy mortal sexton in such frightful tribulation before. He knelt
and shook like an aspen. At length a lucky thought entered his head.
“The bell. The bell,” he cried, all at once finding his voice. “To the
bell.”
He sprung to his feet, for what he was now about to do, did not involve
the necessity of going down again into the body of the church. There
was a narrow staircase at the corner of the gallery, leading to the
belfry. It was up that staircase that Will now struggled and tore.
CHAPTER CCXIII.
THE ALARM FROM THE BELFRY.—THE BEADLE IN A QUANDARY.
“The belfry,” cried Will Stephens. “Oh! if I could but reach the
belfry.”
He went stumbling on, now falling, then gathering himself up again to
renewed exertions, for the stairs were steep and narrow, and although
the little church tower was by no means very high yet the place where
the bell hung was not to be reached in a moment.
Perseverance, however, will do wonders, and it was reached at last.
Yes, he stood panting in a little square building in the very centre of
which hung a thick rope. It was the means of tolling the bell. To seize
it was the work of a moment.
The bell swung round and its iron tongue gave forth a loud and stunning
sound. Again and again—bang—bang—bang! went the bell, and then feeling
that at all events he had given an alarm, Will Stephens turned to
retrace his steps.
He was half stupefied by his previous fears. The noise of the bell, so
close as he had been to it, had been stunning and bewildering, and Will
Stephens reeled like a drunken man. The ale too might have a little to
do with that, but certainly he made a false step, and down he went head
foremost from top to bottom of those old steep, narrow belfry stairs.
• • • • •
Will Stephens was right when he considered that the tolling of the bell
would give an alarm. Most persons in the neighbourhood were awakened by
it, and they listened to the seven or eight pealing sounds in surprise.
What could they mean? Who was doing it? It could not be fire. Oh dear
no. The alarm would not leave off if it were. Somebody dead—ah, yes,
it was some great person in the state dead, and the news had been
brought there, and so the bell was tolled, and we shall hear all about
it in the morning. And so those who had been awakened went to sleep
again, and the unhappy sexton was left to his fate at the foot of the
little stairs leading up to the belfry, where he had gone with so much
trouble, and produced so little effect.
The long weary hours of the night crept on, and at last the faint dawn
of early morning showed itself upon the ocean, and in faint streaks of
light in the glowing east.
The fishermen began to ply their hazardous and hardy trade. The birds
in the gardens, and in the old lime and yew trees that shaded the
church-yard, shook off their slumbers. Gradually the light advanced,
and a new day began.
But there lay poor Stephens, the victim of what he had seen and heard
in the old church, and he was doomed to lie some time longer yet.
There was a Mr. Anthony Dorey, who was parish beadle, and he had
awakened, and heard the sound of the tolling of the well-known bell.
“I say, mother Dorey,” he had said to his better half, “what’s that?”
“How should I know, idiot,” was the polite rejoinder.
“Oh, very good.”
“You had better get up and see.”
“Oh dear no. It’s no business of mine; Master Wiggins is bell-ringer; I
dare say it’s something though.”
This was a wise conclusion for the beadle to come to, and he turned
to go to sleep again, which was wise likewise, only more easy in the
conception than in the execution, for his mind was more disturbed than
he had thought it possible anything could disturb it, by the tolling of
the bell.
Whenever he found himself just going off to sleep, he jumped awake
again quite wide, crying,—
“Eh! eh! Was that the bell?”
This sort of thing, varied by a great number of punches in the ribs
from Mrs. Dorey, went on until the morning had sufficiently advanced to
make it quite light enough to see objects with ordinary distinctness,
and then, fancying that all his attempts to sleep would be futile, the
vexed beadle rose.
“I can’t sleep, that’s a clear case,” he said, “so I will go and see
what the bell was tolled for at such an odd time of the night. The more
I think of it, the more I don’t know what to think.”
Full of this resolution, he went post haste to Mr. Wiggins’s and
knocked loudly at his cottage door.
“Hillo! hillo! Wiggins.”
“Well,” said Wiggins, looking out of his bed-room window with his head
picturesquely adorned by a red night-cap, “Well what’s the matter now?”
“That’s what I want to know. Why did you toll the bell in the middle of
the night?” “I toll the bell!”
“Yes, to be sure, I heard it.”
“Yes, and I heard it too, but it was none of my tolling, and if I had
not been rather indisposed, Mr. Dorey. I should have got up myself and
seen what it was all about. As it is you find me cleaning myself rather
early.”
“I’ll wait for you, then,” said Dorey.
Wiggins soon made his appearance, and he and Dorey walked off together
to the church, much pondering as they went, upon the mysterious
circumstance that took them there, for if neither had rung the bell
they could not think who had, for although the name of Will Stephens
certainly occurred to them both, they thought it about one of the most
unlikely things in the world that he would take the trouble to perform
upon the great bell in the middle of the night, when it was none of his
business to do so under any circumstances whatever.
“Nonsense,” said the beadle; “I hardly ever knew him do a very civil
thing.”
“Nor I either, so you may depend, neighbour Dorey, it’s not him.”
“It’s a great mystery, neighbour Wiggins. That’s what it is, and
nothing else.”
“I hope it don’t bode none of us no harm, that’s all. Times are quite
bad enough, without anything happening to make ’em worse.”
This sentiment, as any grumbling one always is, was acceded to by the
beadle, and so they went on conversing until they reached the church
door; and then the surprise of finding the smaller entrance open struck
them, and they stood staring at each other for some moments in profound
silence.
“There’s somebody here,” said Wiggins at last.
“In course.”
“What shall we do, Mr. Dorey? Do you think it’s our duty to—to go in
and see who it is, or—or run away? You know I ain’t a constable, but
you are, so perhaps it alters the case so far as you are concerned, you
see.”
“Not at all; you are a strong man, Mr. Wiggins, a very strong man; but
suppose we try to make some one answer us. Here goes.”
The beadle advanced close to the threshold of the door, and in as loud
a tone of voice as he could command, he said,—
“Ahem!—ahem!—Hilloa, hilloa!—What are you at there?—Come, come, I’m
down upon you.”
“What do they say?” inquired Wiggins.
“Nothing at all.”
“Then, perhaps, it’s nobody.”
“Well, do you know, if! thought that, I’d go in at once, like a roaring
lion—I would—and show ’em who I was—ah!”
“So would I—so would I.”
After listening for some short time longer, most intently, and hearing
nothing, they came to the conclusion, that although some one had
evidently been there, there was no one there now; so it would be quite
safe to go into the church, always taking care to leave the door open,
so that, in the event of any alarm, they could run away again, with all
the precipitation in the world.
It certainly was not one of the most hazardous exploits in the whole
history of chivalrous proceedings to enter a church in daylight, as it
then was, in search of some one, who it was very doubtful was there.
But to have seen the beadle and Mr. Wiggins, anybody would have thought
them bound upon an enterprise of life or death, and the latter the most
likely of the two, by a great deal.
“Ahem!” cried Mr. Dorey again; “we are two strong, bold fellows, and we
have left our six companions—all six feet high, at the door—ahem!”
No effect was produced by this speech, which Mr. Dorey fully intended
should strike terror into somebody, and after a few minutes search,
they both felt convinced that there was no one hidden in the lower part
of the church, and there was only the gallery to search.
And yet that was a ticklish job, for the nearer they approached the
belfry, of course the nearer they approached the spot from whence the
alarm had been given. It was therefore with rather a backwardness in
going forward, that they both slowly proceeded up the staircase, and
finally reached the gallery, where they saw no one; and much to their
relief the want of any discovery was.
“It’s all right,” said the beadle. “There’s nobody here. Oh, how I do
wish the rascals had only stayed, that’s all. I’d a shewn them what a
beadle was—I’d a took ’em up in a twinkling—I would. Lord bless you,
Mr. Wiggins, you don’t know what a desperate man I am, when I’m put to
it, that you don’t.”
“Perhaps not, but there don’t seem to be any danger.”
“Not the least. Eh? eh?—oh, the Lord have mercy upon us! I give
in—what’s that?—take my everything, but, oh! spare my life—oh! oh! oh!”
This panic of the beadle’s was all owing to hearing somebody give a
horrible groan—such a groan that it was really dreadful to hear it.
Mr. Wiggins, too, was much alarmed, and leant upon the front rail of
the gallery, looking dreadfully pale and wan. The beadle’s face looked
quite of a purple hue, and he shook in every limb.
“I—I thought I saw a groan,” he said.
“So—so—did—I—oh, look—then don’t you hear a horrible bundle up in that
corner. Oh, mercy! I begin to think we are as good as dead men—that we
are—oh, that we are. What will become of us?—what will become of us?”
By this time, Will Stephens, who, the reader is aware, was there to
make the groan, had got up from the foot of the belfry-stairs, and he
began to drag his bruised and stiffened frame towards the beadle and
Mr. Wiggins, which they no sooner perceived than they set off as hard
as they could scamper from the place, crying out for help, as if they
had been pursued by a thousand devils.
In vain Stephens called after them; they did not hear his voice, nor
did they stop in their headlong flight until they reached the door of
the clergyman, concerning whose power to banish all evil spirits into
the Red Sea, they had a strong belief, and as the reverend gentleman
was at breakfast, the first thing they both did was to rush in, and
upset the tea-tray which the servant had just brought in.
CHAPTER CCXIV.
THE CLERGYMAN’S VISIT TO THE VAULT.—RESCUE OF THE SEXTON.
“What the devil! Zounds!”
Yes; that was what the parson said. With all due respect for his cloth,
we cannot help recording the fact that the words at the commencement
of this chapter were precisely those that came from the lips of the
reverend gentleman upon the occasion of the sudden and rather alarming
irruption of the beadle and the bell-ringer into his breakfast parlour
at the parsonage.
“We beg your pardon, sir,” said the beadle, “but——”
“Yes, sir, we beg your pardon,” added the bell-ringer, “but——”
“What?” cried the parson, as he looked at the remains of his breakfast
lying upon the hearth-rug in most admired disorder at his feet.
“The bell, sir—the church—the gallery—a groan—a ghost—a lot of ghosts.”
Such were the incoherent words that came, thick as hail, from the
beadle and the bell-ringer. In vain the clergyman strove to get to the
rights of the story. He was compelled to wait until they were both very
nearly tired out, and then he said,—
“Very well, I don’t understand, so you may both go away again.”
“But, sir,——”
“But, sir,——”
“If one of you will speak while the other listens I will attend, and
not otherwise. This is Sunday morning, and I neither can, nor will
waste any more time upon you.”
Nothing is so terrible to a professed story teller, and the beadle was
something of that class, as to tell him you won’t listen to him, so Mr.
Dorey at once begged that Wiggins would either allow him to tell what
had happened, or tell it properly himself. Mr. Wiggins gave way, and
the beadle as diffusely as possible told the tale of the bell tolling,
and the visit to the church, with the awful adventure that there
occurred.
“What do you think of it, sir?” he concluded by asking.
“I have no opinion formed as yet,” replied the clergyman, “but I will
step down to the church now, and see.”
“You’ll take plenty o’ people with you, sir.”
“Oh dear no, I shall go alone. I don’t gather from what you have said
that there is any danger. Your own fears, too, I am inclined to think,
have much exaggerated the whole affair. I dare say it will turn out, as
most of such alarms usually do, some very simple affair indeed.”
The parson took his hat, and walked away to the church as coolly as
possible, leaving Mr. Dorey and Mr. Wiggins to stare at each other, and
to wonder at a temerity they could not have thought it possible for any
human being to have practised.
But the clergyman was supported by a power of which they knew
little—the power of knowledge, which enabled him at once in his own
mind to divide the probable from the impossible, and therefore was it
that he walked down to the church fully prepared to hear from somebody
a very natural explanation of the mysterious bell-ringing in the night,
which was the only circumstance that made him think that there was
anything to explain, for he had heard that himself.
When he reached the sacred building, he found the door open, as the
beadle and the bell-ringer had left it, and the moment he got into the
body of the church, he heard a voice say,—
“Help! help! will nobody help me?”
“Yes,” he replied, “of course, I will.”
“Oh! thank Heaven!”
“Where are you?”
“Here, sir, I think that’s your voice, Mr. Bevan.”
“Ah, and I think that’s your voice, Will Stephens; I thought this would
turn out some very ordinary piece of business, so you are up stairs;
and did you ring the bell in the night?”
“I did, sir.”
“Just so—come down then.”
“I’m afraid I can’t, sir, without some help. I have had a very bad
fall, and although, thank God, no bones are broken, I am sadly shaken
and bruised, so that it is with great pain, sir, I can crawl along,
and as for getting down the stairs, why—I—I rather think I couldn’t by
myself, if there was a hundred pound note waiting for me below, just
for the trouble of fetching, sir.”
“Very well, I’m coming, don’t move.”
Mr. Bevan ascended the staircase, and without “a bit of pride,” as Will
Stephens said afterwards, in telling the story, helped the bruised
sexton down the gallery steps to the body of the church, and then
he made him sit down on one of the forms, and tell him all that had
happened, which Will did from first to last, quite faithfully, not
even omitting how he had stayed rather late at the ale-house, and how
terrified he had been by the curious events that took place while he
was in the church, ending by his fall from the stairs leading up to
the belfry.
“Will, Will,” said Mr. Bevan, “the ringing of the bell is good proof
that you have been in the belfry, but you will scarcely expect me to
believe the remainder of your dream.”
“Dream, sir?”
“Yes, to be sure. You surely don’t think now, in broad daylight, that
it is anything else, do you?”
“I-I don’t know, sir; of course, sir, if you say its a dream—why—why—”
“There, that will do. I will convince you that it was nothing more, or
else you will go disturbing the whole neighbourhood with this story,
that it is quite a mercy, I have first heard.”
“Convince me, sir?”
“Yes; come with me to the vault.”
Will Stephens shrunk from this proposal and his fear was so manifest,
that Mr. Bevan was, at all events, convinced that he had told him
nothing but what he himself believed, and accordingly he felt still
more anxious to rid Will of his nervous terror.
“You surely,” he said, “cannot be timid, while I am with you. Come at
once, and if you do not find that the late Miss Crofton, poor girl, is
quiet enough in her coffin, I promise you upon my sacred word, that I
will never cease investigating this affair, and bringing it to some
conclusion. Come at once, before any curious persons arrive at the
church.”
So urgent a request from the clergyman of the parish to Will Stephens,
the sexton of the parish, almost might be said to amount to a command,
so Will did not see how he could get out of it, without confessing an
amount of rank cowardice that even he shrunk from.
“Well, sir,” he said, “of course with you I can have no objection.”
“That’s right. Come along; there are means of getting a light in the
vestry; wait here a moment.”
Will would not wait; he stuck close by Mr. Bevan, who went into the
vestry, and soon procured a candle, lighted from materials he kept
there under lock and key; and they went together to the vault, the
stone of which was just as it had been left when Will emerged with so
much fright.
“I will go first,” said Mr. Bevan.
“Thank you, sir.”
The clergyman descended, and Will Stephens followed, trembling, about
two stairs behind him. Little did he expect when he emerged from that
vault previous to his adventures in the church, that he should revisit
it again so quickly. Indeed he had made a mental resolve that nothing
should induce him to go down those stairs again, and yet there he was
actually descending them.
So weak are the resolutions of mortals!
“Needs must,” thought Will, “when the——parson, I mean, drives!”
“Come on, Will,” said Mr. Bevan.
Will looked about him, but no coffin-lid was visible. There was Miss
Crofton’s coffin in its proper niche, with the lid on, and looking as
calm and undisturbed as any respectable coffin could look. Will was
amazed. He looked at the coffin, and he looked at the parson, and then
he looked uncommonly foolish.
“Never mind it, Will,” said Mr. Bevan, “never mind it, I say. The story
need go no further. You can keep your own counsel if you like. You have
come here under the influence of strong ale, and you have gone to sleep
most likely in this very vault, and in your sleep, having a very vivid
dream, you have walked up into the gallery, and thence into the belfry,
where no doubt you did ring the bell under the influence of your dream;
and then you fell down the belfry stairs, I believe, as you say you
did.”
“Ah!” said Will, “bless you, sir. It may be so, but——”
“You are not convinced.”
“Not quite, sir.”
“Well, Will, you are quite right never to pretend to be convinced when
you are not. I do not blame you for that, but in a short time, when the
effect of the affair has worn off, you will entertain my opinion.”
“I hope, sir, I may.”
“That will do. Now the stone must be put over this vault.”
“Sir, if you wouldn’t mind, sir.”
“What, Will?”
“Staying a moment or two, while I empty the bag of sawdust on the
floor, sir, I shan’t be a minute, no—not half a minute, and then I
shall have done with the vault altogether I hope, sir.”
“Very well.”
Will set to work, and although at any other time he would have been
rather ashamed of letting Mr. Bevan see what a wonderfully small
quantity of sawdust made up a guinea’s worth, superior considerations
now prevailed, and he would not have spared the clergyman’s company on
any account.
“Now I’ve done, sir.”
“Very well, follow me.”
Will did not like to ask the clergyman to follow him, so in that
difficulty, for as to his remaining behind it was out of the question,
he made a rush and reached the church before Mr. Bevan could ascend
two of the steps. When that gentleman did reach the church he made no
remark about the precipitancy, and apparent disrespect of Will, for
he put it down to its right cause, but he left the church in order to
make the usual preparations for the morning service, which would now
commence in an hour-and-a-half.
Will walked home with his empty bag, for the little exercise he had had
sufficed to convince him that he was not so much hurt as he thought,
and that the stiffness of his limbs would soon pass away.
“It’s all very well,” he said to himself, “for Mr. Bevan to talk about
dreams, but if that was one, nothing real, has ever, happened to me
yet, that’s all.”
CHAPTER CCXV.
THE YOUNG LOVER’S MIDNIGHT WATCH.
Did the clergyman really think what he said? Had he no suspicions, that
after all there was a something more even than he was quite willing to
admit in the story told by Will Stephens?
We shall see in good time, but at all events one thing is evident, that
the parson thought it good sound policy, and it was, to endeavour to
nip the thing in the head, and by ascribing it to a dream, put it down
as a subject of speculation in the place.
He knew that nothing could be more dangerous than allowing any such
story to pass current as a wonderful fact, and well he knew that in a
short time, if such were the case, it would receive so many additions
and so many embellishments, that the mischief it might produce upon
the mind of an ignorant population might be extreme, and of a most
regretful character indeed.
All this he felt hourly, and therefore Will Stephens’ story was to be
put down as a dream.
Now Mr. Bevan, it will be recollected, had urged Will to keep his
own counsel, and to say nothing of the affair to any one, but he had
faint hopes only that Will would do that, very faint hopes indeed, for
after all he, Will, was the hero of the story, and there would be a
something extremely gratifying in telling it, and in stating what he
would have done, had not his foot slipped as he came down the narrow
stairs from the old belfry, and so completely stunned him by the fall.
Mr. Bevan therefore had very few if any compunctions in adopting the
course he did, which was, in the evening, when there was no service at
the church, to call at the Grange, to see Sir George Crofton upon the
subject.
Mr. Bevan was always a welcome guest at the Grange, and he was on those
intimate and good terms with the family, that he could always call
whenever he pleased, so that a mere announcement of his presence by no
means had the effect of preparing Sir George for any communication.
“Ah, Mr. Bevan,” he said, when the clergyman entered the room, “I am
glad to see you.”
“And I to see you, Sir George.”
“You come to a house of mourning, sir. But that will be the case here
for a long, long time. Time may and will, no doubt, do much to assuage
our grief, but the blow is as yet too recent.”
Tears started to the eyes of Sir George Crofton, as he made this
allusion to his daughter, and he turned his head aside to hide such
evidences of emotion from the parson, from whom, however, he need
have expected nothing but the most friendly sympathy that one human
being could bestow upon another. Mr. Bevan was a man of refinement and
consideration, and he let grief always have its way, seldom doing more
than merely throw out, in the form of a suggestion for consideration as
it were, that death was not the great evil it was thought to be.
In such a way he generally succeeded in bring persons smarting under
the infliction of the loss of dear friends and relations much sooner to
proper sense of the subject, than if he had indulged in all the canting
religious exhortations that some divines think applicable to such
occasions.
Sir George Crofton was alone, for his two sons had gone for a stroll in
the grounds. Ringwood who still remained with the family, was in the
library, where now he passed most of his time, in trying by reading to
withdraw his mind from a too painful and fixed contemplation of his
loss.
He was still weak, but might be considered now quite convalescent.
“Pray be seated, Mr. Bevan,” said Sir George. “Believe me, I take it
very kindly of you to come so often.”
“Pray dear sir, don’t say another word about it—I—I am very sorry to
feel myself obliged to allude to anything of an uncomfortable nature.”
“Think nothing of doing so, my friend. Think nothing of it, I have a
master grief which drowns all others.”
“But it is concerning that master grief, sir, that I come to speak.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes, sir, will you kindly hear me?”
“Certainly, certainly.”
“You told me on the day following the melancholy death of your
daughter, as a friend, the peculiar circumstances attendant upon that
death. Now I do not mean to say that what I am going to relate to you
has any connection at all with those circumstances, nor would I tell
you what I come to tell at all, were I not fearful that the same story
with some of the usual exaggerations of ignorance would reach you from
other quarters, for it is not a matter consigned to my bosom only, or
there it should remain.”
“You alarm me.”
“That I feared, but deeply regret. Listen to me, and remember always as
you do so, that I think the whole affair is a mere dream—a disturbed
slumberer’s vision—nothing more.”
[Illustration: Mr. Bevan informs Sir George Crofton of the events in
the church.]
Sir George Crofton did listen with breathless eagerness, and Mr. Bevan,
without detracting anything or adding anything to the narrative of Will
Stephens, told him the whole story just as Will had told it to him,
concluding by saying,—
“That is all my dear sir, and I felt that my duty powerfully called
upon me to be your informant upon the subject, simply that we might be
forewarned against any coarse version of the story.”
Sir George drew a long breath.
“More horrors! More horrors!”
“Nay, why should you say that?”
“Is it not so?”
“Nay I have already given my opinion, by saying, that I look upon the
whole affair as but the phantasma of dream.”
“Oh! Mr. Bevan, do not trifle with me. Is that really and truly your
opinion, sir, or only said from kindness to me.”
“It is the best opinion that I can come to.”
“I thank you, sir; I thank you. Clara, Clara, my child, my child!”
The old man was overcome with grief, and at the interesting moment,
Ringwood entered the room, with a book in his hand. He was astonished,
as well he might be to see such a fearful relapse of grief on the part
of Sir George Crofton, and he looked from him to Mr. Bevan, and from
Mr. Bevan to him, for some few moments in silence, and then he said,—
“Surely all here have suffered enough, and there is no new calamity
come upon this house.”
“Tell him all,” cried Sir George; “tell him all. It is fit that he
should know; he is one of us now, he loved my child, and loves her
memory still. I pray you, Mr. Bevan, to tell all to Ringwood, for I
have not the heart to do so.”
“I wonder,” said Ringwood, calmly, “to hear you speak thus. I wonder to
see that any new grief can come so near to that which we have already
suffered. The image of my lost one fills up each crevice of my heart.
I shall listen to you Mr. Bevan with respect, but my grief, I fear is
selfish, and cannot feel more than its own miseries.”
Ringwood seemed to imagine that what the parson had to say referred to
something with which Clara had nothing to do; but when, as the story
proceeded, he found how intimately connected she was with the affair,
his cheek flushed for a moment, and then grew of a death-like paleness,
and he sat trembling and looking in the face of Mr. Bevan, as he
proceeded with his most strange relation.
When he had concluded Ringwood gave a deep groan.
“You are much affected, sir,” said Mr. Bevan.
“Crushed! crushed!” was the reply. “Oh God!”
“Nay now this is not manly, sir, you feel this thing too much; if you
are so crushed how can any one expect that from you is to proceed the
necessary exertion to prove that the story in all its particulars is
but a falsehood?”
Ringwood caught at this idea in a moment.
“Exertion from me?” he said. “What exertions would I not make to prove
such a horror to be but a creation of the fancy? What would I not do!
What would I not suffer? You have warned me, sir. Yes, I have a duty
to do—a duty to Clara’s memory; a duty to you Sir George, and a duty
to myself, for did I not love her, and does not her gentle image still
sit in my inmost heart enshrined? I will prove that this most monstrous
story is a delusion. Bear with me, gentlemen, I must think. To-morrow
you shall know more, but not until to-morrow.”
He rose, and left the room.
“What does he mean,” said Sir George, vacantly.
“I cannot tell you, sir; but wait until to-morrow. Perhaps by then
he may have proposed some plan of action, that you or I may not
think of. You will use your own discretion, about communicating the
strange affair to your sons or not, sir. Upon such a point as family
confidence, I never venture an opinion. Allow me to call upon you
to-morrow morning, sir, when I hope to find you in better spirits.”
The clergyman would not have been in such haste to leave Sir George;
but as he saw Ringwood leave the room; that young man made a sign to
him, that he wished to see him before he left, and accordingly Mr.
Bevan was anxious to know what it was he had to say to him.
When he left Sir George, he asked a servant where Mr. Ringwood was,
and being told he was in the library, Mr. Bevan, being quite familiar
with the house, followed him there at once, and found him pacing that
apartment in great agitation, and with disordered steps.
“Thank heaven you have come, sir,” cried Ringwood, “tell me, oh, tell
me, what would you advise me to do, Mr. Bevan.”
“I think,” replied the clergyman, “you have already half decided upon a
course.”
“I have, I have.”
“Then follow it, if it be such a one as in its result will produce a
conviction of the truth. Do not, Mr. Ringwood, allow anything to turn
you aside from a course which you feel to be right; you will always
find strength enough to persevere if you have that strong conviction
upon you. What is your plan?”
“It is this night to watch in the church?”
“Be it so; I will, if you like, keep watch with you.”
“Oh, no, no! let me be alone. All I ask of you, sir, is to provide me
with the means of getting into the sacred edifice at midnight.”
“That I will do. You shall have a private key that I have for my own
use; you can let yourself in without any one knowing of your presence.
But do you think you have nerve enough to go alone? If you have the
smallest doubt or hesitation, let me accompany you.”
“No, no—I thank you, but let me go alone, and say nothing of this to
Sir George. I had it in my mind when I told him I would speak to him
to-morrow about what you had communicated. I would fain, if these
horrors be really true, keep him in ignorance that I have verified
them. But if I keep my night watch quite undisturbed, then he shall
have the satisfaction of knowing that it has been so kept.
“You are right in that; I will send the key to you in the course of
another hour and remember I am at your service if you should alter your
mind, and wish for company. Do not hesitate about disturbing my rest.”
CHAPTER CCXVI.
THE HORRORS OF THE GRAVE.—A FRIGHTFUL ADVENTURE.
One would have thought that young Ringwood might with effect and with
discretion have disclosed his plan of watching in the old church to one
of the brothers of Clara, but he shrunk from doing that.
In the first place he thought he should be put down as a visionary,
and as one who was disposed to insult the memory of Clara by imagining
that the story of the sexton could be true, and in the second place,
if anything did happen, he was afraid that the feelings of the brother
might clash with his.
“No,” he said, “I will go alone—I will not rest again until I have
thoroughly satisfied myself that this tale is but a fabrication of the
fancy. Oh, Clara! can it be possible—no, no. The thought is by far
too—too horrible.”
It may really be considered a fortunate thing that the communication of
the clergyman was made in the evening, for had it been earlier in the
day, the hours of frightful anxiety which Ringwood would have endured
until the night came must have been most painful.
As it was, however, the hours that would elapse ere he could venture to
go to the church on his strange and melancholy errand were not many,
and they passed the more quickly, that during some of them, he was
making up his mind as to what he should do.
“Yes, Clara, my best beloved Clara,” he said, “I will rescue your sweet
memory from this horrible doubt that is cast upon it, or I will join
you in the tomb. Welcome, a thousand times welcome death, rather than
that I should live to think that you are—God, no—no! I cannot pronounce
the dreadful word. Oh, what evil times are these, and what a world of
agony do I endure. But courage, courage; let fancy sleep, I must not
allow my imagination to become sufficiently excited to play me any
pranks to-night. Be still my heart, and let me go upon this expedition
as a spectator merely. Time enough will it be to become an actor, when
I know more, if indeed there be more to know.”
The clergyman sent the key, according to his promise, by a confidential
servant, who had orders to ask for Mr. Ringwood and to give it into his
own hands, so that the young man was fully prepared to go, when the
proper time should arrive for him to start upon his expedition.
He purposely kept very much out of the way of Sir George Crofton and
his two sons during the remainder of the evening, for such was the
ingenuous nature of young Ringwood, and so unused was he to place any
curb upon his speech, that he dreaded letting slip some information
regarding his intention to keep watch in the old church that night; in
such a case it would have been difficult to refuse company.
Sir George took the advice of the clergyman and said nothing to any one
of the dreadful communication that had been made to him. But he could
not conceal from the family and his servants, that some unusual grief
was preying upon him, beyond even the sadness that had remained after
the death of his daughter. He retired to rest unusually early, that he
might escape their curious and inquiring glances.
The clock struck eleven.
“It is time,” said Ringwood, as he sprung from his seat in his
bed-room. “It is time. For the love of thee, my Clara, I go to brave
this adventure, Mine are you in death as in life. My heart is widowed,
and can know no other love.”
He armed himself with a pair of loaded pistols, for he made up his
mind that if any trickery was at the bottom of the proceeding, the
authors of such a jest should pay dearly for their temerity, and then
cautiously descending from his bed-room, he crossed the dining-room,
and passing through a conservatory, easily made his way out of the
house, and into a flower-garden that was beyond.
He thought that if he went out of the grounds by the way of the
porter’s lodge, it might excite some remark, his not returning again,
so he went to a part of the wall which he knew was low and rugged.
“There,” he said, “I can easily climb over, and by getting into the
meadows make my way into the road.”
This, to a young man, was not by any means a difficult matter, and
he in a few minutes more found himself quite free of the house and
grounds, and making his way very rapidly towards the church, the tower
of which, he could just see.
The night was again a cloudy one; although nothing had as yet fallen,
the wind was uncertain, and no one could with any safety have ventured
to predict whether it would be fair, or rain. Of the two, certainly,
Ringwood would have preferred moonlight, for he wished in the church to
be able to see well about him, without thinking of the necessity of a
light.
“No,” he said, as he pursued his way, “I must have no light; that would
ruin all.”
By the time he reached the church, he had a better opinion of the
weather, and from a faint sort of halo that was in the sky, he was led
to believe that the moon’s light would soon be visible, and enable him
to see everything that might take place.
The key that the parson had given him opened the same little door
by which Will Stephens, the sexton, had entered, and there was no
difficulty in turning the lock, for it was frequently used.
The young man paused for a moment, debating with himself, whether he
should fasten the door securely on the inner side, or leave it open,
and at last he thought, that considering all things, the latter was the
best course to pursue.
“I do not wish,” he said, “to stop any proceedings, so much as I wish
to see what they are. There shall therefore be every facility for any
one coming into the church, who may chance to have an intention so to
do.”
He still, it will be seen, clung a little to the hope that it was a
trick.
When he pushed open the door that was covered with green baize, he
found that in consequence of the cloth curtain being entirely drawn
aside from before the south window, that there was not near the amount
of darkness within the building that he had anticipated finding there.
When his eyes got a little accustomed to it, he could even see, dimly
to be sure, but still, sufficiently to distinguish the several shapes
of the well-known objects in the church. The pulpit, the communion
table, the little rails before it, and some of the old monuments
against the walls.
The stone slab that covered the opening to the vault of the Crofton
family, had been before the commencement of the morning service
properly secured, so that that entrance could be walked over with
perfect safety, and Ringwood carefully ascertained that such was the
fact.
“Surely, surely,” he said, “it is as Mr. Bevan says. That man must have
come here half stupefied by ale, and have gone to sleep, The only thing
that gives the slightest semblance to such a tale, is the adventure of
that most mysterious man who was reclaimed from the sea.”
Yes, Ringwood was right. That was the circumstance, full of dread and
awful mystery as it was, which sufficed to make anything else probable,
and possible.
And what had become of him? Since the time when he made his escape from
the Grange, nothing had been seen or heard of him, unless that were
he indeed, who was in the church pointing to the moonlight when the
terrified Will Stephens was there.
And yet Stephens, although he might be supposed to be in a position to
know him, did not recognise him, for we do not find in his account of
the affair that he made any mention of him, or insinuated any opinion
even, that the Mr. Smith of the bone-house, was the same person who had
played so strange a part in the church.
The reader will have his own opinion.
“Where shall I bestow myself,” thought Ringwood, “I ought to be
somewhere from whence I can get a good view of the whole church.”
After some little consideration, and looking about him as well as
the semi-darkness would permit him, he thought that he could not by
any possibility do better than get into the pulpit. From there he
could readily turn about in any direction from whence any noise might
proceed, at the same time, that it was something like a position which
could not be very well attacked except with fire arms, and if such
weapons were used against him, he should have the great advantage of
seeing who was his assailant.
Accordingly he ascended the pulpit stairs, and soon ensconced himself
in that elevated place.
There was something very awful, and solemn, and yet beautiful about
the faint view he got of the old conventicle-looking church from its
pulpit, and irresistible had he chosen to resist it, there came to his
lips a prayer to Heaven for its aid, its protection, and its blessing
upon his enterprise.
How much calmer, and happier he felt after that. How true it is, as
Prospero says, that prayer,
——“Pierces so that it assaults
Mercy itself, and frees all faults.”
Who is there in the wide world who has not felt the benign influence of
an appeal to the great Creator of all things, under circumstances of
difficulty, and of distress. Let us pity the heart, if there be such a
one in existence, that is callous to such a feeling.
But there are none. A reliance upon divine mercy is one of the
attributes of humanity, and may not be turned aside, by even all the
wickedness and the infidelity that may be arrayed against it.
“All is still,” murmured Ringwood. “The stillness of the very grave is
here, Oh, my Clara; methinks without a pang of mortal fear, I could
converse in such an hour as this, with thy pure and unsullied spirit!”
In the enthusiasm of the moment, no doubt, Ringwood could have done so,
and it is a wonder that his most excited imagination did not conjure up
some apparent semblance of the being whom he loved so devotedly, and
whose image he so fondly cherished, even although she had gone from him.
“Yes, my Clara,” he cried, in tones of enthusiasm. “Come to me, come to
me, and you will not find that in life or in death the heart that is
all your own, will shrink from you!”
This species of mental exaltation was sure soon to pass away, and it
did so. The sound of his own voice convinced him of the impropriety of
such speeches, when he came there as an observer.
“Hush! hush!” he said. “Be still, be still.”
It was evident to him that many clouds were careering over the face
of the moon, for at times the church would get very dark indeed, and
everything assumed a pitchy blackness, and then again a soft kind of
light would steal in, and give the whole place a different aspect.
This continued for a long time, as he thought, and more than once he
tried to ascertain the progress of the hours by looking at his watch,
but the dim light baffled him.
“How long have I been here?” he asked himself; “I must not measure the
time by my feelings, else I should call it an age.”
At that moment the old church clock began to chime, and having
proclaimed the four quarters past eleven, it with its deep-toned solemn
bell struck the hour of twelve—Ringwood carefully counted the strokes,
so that, although it was too dark to see his watch, he could not be
deceived.
CHAPTER CCXVII.
THE MIDNIGHT HOUR.—THE STONE SLAB.—THE VAMPIRE.
Yes, it was twelve o’clock, that mysterious hour at which it is
believed by many that,
“Graves give up their dead,
And many a ghost in church-yard decay,
Rise from their cold, cold bed
To make night horrible with wild vagary.”
Twelve, that hour when all that is human feels a sort of irksome dread,
as if the spirits of those who have gone from the great world were too
near, loading the still night air with the murky vapours of the grave.
A chilliness came over Ringwood and he fancied a strange kind of light
was in the church, making objects more visible than in their dim and
dusky outlines they had been before.
“Why do I tremble?” he said, “why do I tremble? Clouds pass away from
before the moon, that is all. Soon there may be a bright light here,
and lo, all is still; I hear nothing but my own breathing; I see
nothing but what is common and natural. Thank heaven, all will pass
away in quiet. There will be no horror to recount—no terrific sight to
chill my blood. Rest Clara, rest in Heaven.”
Ten minutes passed away, and there was no alarm; how wonderfully
relieved was Ringwood. Tears came to his eyes, but there were the
natural tears of regret, such as he had shed before for her who had
gone from him to the tomb, and left no trace behind, but in the hearts
of those who loved her.
“Yes,” he said, mournfully “she has gone from me, but I love her still.
Still does the fond remembrance of all that she was to me, linger at
my heart. She is my own, my beautiful Clara, as she ever was, and as,
while life remains, to me she ever will be.”
At the moment that he uttered these words a slight noise met his ears.
In an instant he sprung to his feet in the pulpit, and looked anxiously
around him.
“What was that?” he said. “What was that?”
All was still again, and he was upon the point of convincing himself,
that the noise was either some accidental one, or the creation of his
own fancy, when it came again.
He had no doubt this time. It was a perceptible, scraping, strange
sort of sound, and he turned his whole attention to the direction
from whence it came. With a cold creeping chill through his frame, he
saw that that direction was the one where was the family vault of the
Croftons, the last home of her whom he held still in remembrance, and
whose memory was so dear to him.
He felt the perspiration standing upon his brow, and if the whole world
had been the recompense to him for moving away from where he was he
could not have done so. All he could do was to gaze with bated breath,
and distended eyes upon the aisle of the church from whence the sound
came.
That something of a terrific nature was now about to exhibit itself,
and that the night would not go off without some terrible and
significant adventure to make it remembered he felt convinced. All he
dreaded was to think for a moment what it might be.
His thoughts ran on Clara, and he murmured forth in the most agonising
accents,—
“Anything—any sight but the sight of her. Oh, no, no, no!”
But it was not altogether the sight of her that he dreaded; oh no, it
was the fact that the sight of her on such an occasion would bring the
horrible conviction with it, that there was some truth in the dreadful
apprehension that he had of the new state of things that had ensued
regarding the after death condition of that fair girl.
[Illustration: The appearance of the resuscitated maiden.]
The noise increased each moment, and finally there was a sudden crash.
“She comes! she comes!” gasped Ringwood.
He grasped the front of the pulpit with a frantic violence, and then
slowly and solemnly there crossed his excited vision a figure all
clothed in white. Yes, white flowing vestments, and he knew by their
fashion that they were not worn by the living, and that it was some
inhabitant of the tomb that he now looked upon.
He did not see the face. No, that for a time was hidden from him, but
his heart told him who it was. Yes, it was his Clara.
It was no dream. It was no vision of a too excited fancy, for until
those palpable sounds, and that most fearfully palpable form crossed
his sight, he was rather inclined to go the other way, and to fancy
what the sexton had reported was nothing but a delusion of his
overwrought brain. Oh, that he could but for one brief moment have
found himself deceived.
“Speak!” he gasped; “speak! speak!”
There was no reply.
“I conjure you, I pray you though the sound of your voice should hurl
me to perdition—I implore you, speak.”
All was silent, and the figure in white moved on slowly but surely
towards the door of the church, but ere it passed out, it turned for
a moment, as if for the very purpose of removing from the mind of
Ringwood any lingering doubt as to its identity.
He then saw the face, oh, so well-known, but so pale. It was Clara
Crofton!
“’Tis she! ’tis she!” was all he could say.
It seemed, too, as if some crevice in the clouds had opened at the
moment, in order that he should with an absolute certainty see the
countenance of that solemn figure, and then all was more than usually
silent again. The door closed, and the figure was gone.
He rose in the pulpit, and clasped his hands. Irresolution seemed for
a few moments to sway him to and fro, and then he rushed down into the
body of the church.
“I’ll follow it,” he cried, “though it lead me to perdition. Yes, I’ll
follow it.”
He made his way to the door, and even as he went he shouted,—
“Clara! Clara! Clara!”
He reached the threshold of the ancient church; he gazed around him
distractedly, for he thought that he had lost all sight of the figure.
No—no, even in the darkness and against the night sky, he saw it once
again in its sad-looking death raiments. He dashed forward.
The moonbeams at this instant being freed from some dense clouds
that had interposed between them and this world, burst forth with
resplendent beauty.
There was not a tree, a shrub, nor a flower, but what was made distinct
and manifest, and with the church, such was the almost unprecedented
lustre of the beautiful planet, that even the inscriptions upon the old
tablets and tombs were distinctly visible.
Such a refulgence lasted not many minutes, but while it did, it was
most beautiful, and the gloom that followed it seemed doubly black.
“Stay, stay,” he shouted, “yet a moment, Clara; I swear that what you
are, that will I be. Take me over to the tomb with you, say but that it
is your dwelling-place, and I will make it mine, and declare it a very
palace of the affections.”
The figure glided on.
It was in vain that he tried to keep up with it. It threaded the
churchyard among the ancient tombs, with a gliding speed that soon
distanced him, impeded, as he continually was, by some obstacle or
another, owing to looking at the apparition he followed, instead of the
ground before him.
Still, on he went, heedless whether he was conveyed, for he might be
said to be dragged onward, so much were all his faculties both of mind
and body intent upon following the apparition of his beloved.
Once, and once only, the figure passed, and seemed to be aware that it
was followed for it flitted round an angle made by one of the walls of
the church, and disappeared from his eyes.
In another moment he had turned the same point.
“Clara, Clara!” he shouted. “’Tis I—you know my voice, Clara, Clara.”
She was not to be seen, and then the idea struck him that she must have
re-entered the church, and he too, turned, and crossed the threshold.
He lingered there for a moment or two, and the whole building echoed to
the name of Clara, as with romantic eagerness, he called upon her by
name to come forth to him.
Those echoes were the only reply.
Maddened—rendered desperate beyond all endurance, he went some distance
into the building in search of her, and again he called.
It was in vain; she had eluded him, and with all the carefulness and
all the energy and courage he had brought to bear upon that night’s
proceedings, he was foiled. Could anything be more agonising than this
to such a man as Ringwood—he who loved her so, that he had not shrunk
from her, even in death, although she had so shrunk from him.
“I will find her—I will question her,” he cried. “She shall not escape
me; living or dead, she shall be mine. I will wait for her, even in the
tomb.”
Before he carried out the intention of going actually into the vault
to await her return, he thought he would take one more glance at the
churchyard with the hope of seeing her there, as he could observe no
indications of her presence in the church.
With this view he proceeded to the door, and emerged into the dim
light. He called upon her again by name, and he thought he heard some
faint sound in the church behind him. To turn and make a rush into the
building was the work of a moment.
He saw something—it was black instead of white—a tall figure—it
advanced towards him, and with great force, before he was aware that an
attack was at all intended, it felled him to the ground.
The blow was so sudden, so unexpected, and so severe, that it struck
him down in a moment before he could be aware of it. To be sure, he had
arms with him, but the anxiety and agony of mind he endured that night,
since seeing the apparition come from the tomb had caused him to forget
them.
CHAPTER CCXVIII.
THE YOUNG GIRL IN THE VILLAGE, AND THE AWFUL VISIT.
It is now necessary that we draw the reader’s attention to a humbler
place of residence than the Grange, with its spacious chambers and
lordly halls.
Situated not very far from the church, and almost close to the
churchyard, upon which its little garden abutted, was a cottage, the
picture of rural neatness and beauty. In the winter it was beautiful
and picturesque, but in the summer time, when its porch was overrun
with the woodbine and the sweet clematis, it was one of the sweetest of
abodes that content and happiness could ever live in.
This cottage was inhabited by an old woman and her only child, a young
girl of sixteen, beautiful as a rose, and as guileless as an angel.
They contrived to live upon a small annuity that the mother had from a
family in whose service she spent the best years of her life, and who,
with a generosity that would be well to be abundantly and extensively
imitated, would not see their old dependant want.
These two innocent and blameless persons had retired to rest at nine
o’clock, their usual hour, and had slept the calm sleep of contentment
until about half-past one, when the mother was awakened by a loud and
piercing shriek from her daughter’s chamber.
To spring from her humble couch was the work of a moment.
“Anna, Anna! my child, Anna!” she shrieked.
As she did so, she rushed across the small stair landing which
separated the two, and the only two upper rooms of the cottage, and was
about to enter her daughter’s room, when the door of it was opened from
within, and the old dame’s heart died within her, as she saw a figure
upon the threshold, attired in the vestments of the grave, and opposing
her entrance.
Was it a dream, or did she really see such a sight?
Aghast and trembling the mother stood, unable for a moment or two to
speak, and as she fell fainting upon the landing, she thought that
something passed her, but she could not be quite sure, as it was at the
instant her faculties were flitting from her.
How long she lay in that seeming death she knew not, and when she
recovered, it was some few minutes before recollection came back to
her, and she really remembered what had so completely overpowered her.
But when her reason did resume its sway, and she recollected that it
was some danger to Anna, which had first alarmed her, she called her
loudly by her name.
“Anna, Anna, speak to me.”
“Mother, mother,” replied the young girl. “Oh, come to me.”
These words supplied strength to the old woman, and rising she made her
way immediately into the chamber of her daughter, whom she found in an
agony of fear; a light was procured, and then Anna flung herself upon
her mother’s neck, and wept abundantly.
“Oh, mother, tell me, convince me that it was only a dream.”
“What, my child? oh what?”
The girl trembled so much that it was only by the utmost persuasion
that the following account was got from her, of the cause of her fright.
She said that she had gone to sleep as usual within a very few minutes
after going to bed, that she enjoyed a calm, and uninterrupted slumber,
the duration of which she had no means whatever of guessing, but she
was partially awakened by a noise at the window of her room.
She instantly rose and stood looking at the window, on which a sort of
shadow seemed to pass without, which alarmed her exceedingly.
Still as it did not come gain, and as she certainly had not been fully
awake when she sprung from her bed, she had thought it quite possible
that all might be a dream, and had forborne from making any alarm upon
the subject.
After some hesitation she had persuaded herself to go to bed again, and
when there, although she sometimes started awake fancying she heard
something, she at length yielded to sleep, and again slept, soundly for
a time, until a new circumstance awakened her.
She thought she felt something touching her about the neck, and after
opening her eyes, the moonlight, which at that moment happened to be
very bright, disclosed to her a white figure standing by the side of
her bed, the face of which figure was leaning over her, and within a
very few inches of her own.
Terror at first deprived her of all power of speech or motion, but as
the figure did not move, she at length gave utterance to her fears
in that shriek which had come from her lips, and so much alarmed the
mother.
This was all the young girl could say, with the exception that the
figure when she shrieked appeared to glide away, but where to she had
no means of telling, for some clouds at that moment came again over the
face of the moon.
The mother was much affected and terrified, and at first she thought of
calling up her neighbours, but at length as the night was considerably
advanced, and the intruder gone, they agreed to let the matter rest
till morning, and the mother retired to her room again.
How long it was before the shriek from her daughter’s room came again
she did not know, but come again it did.
Yes, again came the dreadful shriek. It was—it could be no delusion
now—and the mother once more sprung from her couch to rush to the
rescue of her child.
Confused and bewildered, she darted onward to the chamber, but the door
was fast, nor could all her exertions suffice to open it.
“Anna, Anna!” she shouted, “speak to me. One word only, my child, my
child.”
All was still. The trembling mother placed her ear to the door, and she
heard a strange sucking sound, as if an animal was drinking with labour
and difficulty. Her head seemed to be on fire, and her senses were upon
the point of leaving her, but she did manage to reach her own room. She
flew to the little casement—she dashed it open.
“Help! help! help!—for the love of God, help!”
There was no reply.
Again she raised her voice in shrieking wild accents.
“Help!—murder!—help!”
“What is it?” shouted a man’s voice. It was one who was going some
distance to take in his fishing nets.
“Oh! thank God, some human being hears me. Come in, come in.”
“How am I to get in?”
“Stay a moment, and I will come down and open the cottage door for you.
For the love of mercy do not go away.”
Trembling and terrified to a dreadful excess, the old woman went down
stairs and let the man into the cottage, when they both proceeded up to
the chamber of the daughter.
“What do you suppose is the matter?” asked the fisherman.
“Oh! I know not—I know not; but twice to-night—twice has this dreadful
alarm happened. Do not leave us—oh, do not.”
“I don’t want; but I should hardly think thieves would find it worth
their while to come here at all for what they would get. You must have
been dreaming.”
“Oh, that I could think so!”
Anna’s chamber was reached; and there, to the horror of the mother, she
was found lying perfectly insensible on her bed, with a quantity of
blood smeared about her neck.
“Why, it’s a murder!” cried the fisherman; and firmly impressed with
such a belief, he ran out of the house to spread an alarm.
The window of the chamber was wide open, and from that the mother now
cried aloud for help; so that between her and the fisherman, such a
disturbance was made all over the neighbourhood, that they were soon
likely to have more assistance than could be useful.
The people living the nearest were soon roused, and they roused others,
while the distracted woman, who believed Anna was dead, called for
justice and for vengeance.
The alarm spread from house to house—from cottage to hall—and, in the
course of half-an-hour, most of the inhabitants of the village had
risen to hear the old dame’s account of the horrible proceeding that
had taken place that night in the cottage.
Exaggeration was out of the question. The fact itself was more than
sufficient to induce the greatest amount of horror in the minds of
all who heard it, and there was one, and only one, whose information
enabled him to give a name to the apparition that had assaulted Anna.
That one was the schoolmaster of the place, and he, after hearing the
story, said,—
“If one could persuade oneself at all of the existence of such horrors,
one would suppose that a vampire had visited the cottage.”
This was a theme that was likely to be popular. The schoolmaster
foolishly gave way to the vanity, and explained what a vampire was—or
was supposed and said to be; and soon the whole place was in a state of
the most indescribable alarm upon the subject.
As yet the horrible news had not reached the Grange, but it was
destined soon to do so; and better would it have been that any one had
at once plunged a dagger in the heart of poor Sir George Crofton than
that there should be thought to be such a horrible confirmation of his
worst fears.
To be sure, his daughter was not named, but he received the news with a
scream of anguish, and fell insensible into the arms of his son.
All was confusion. The servants ran hither and thither, not knowing
what to do, and it was not until Mr. Bevan arrived that something like
order was restored. He as a privileged friend assumed for the nonce
a kind of dictatorship at the Grange, and gave orders, which were
cheerfully and promptly obeyed. Then he desired a strictly private
interview with Sir George.
It was, or course, granted to him; but the old baronet begged that
Charles and Edwin might now know all. It was Emma alone from whom he
wished to keep the awful truth.
CHAPTER CCXIX.
THE AWFUL SUPPOSITION.—A RESOLUTION.
It was with some reluctance that the clergyman spoke.
“Sir,” he said to the old baronet, “and you, my young gentleman, I
am afraid—very much afraid, that I am doing anything but right in
countenancing a supposition so utterly at variance with all my own
notions and feelings; but my abhorrence of a secret impels me to speak.
“Say on, sir—say on,” cried Sir George. “Perhaps we are better prepared
to hear what you have to tell, than you imagine.”
After this Mr. Bevan had less reluctance to speak, he said,—
“I was aware, although you all were not, that Mr. Ringwood intended
to keep watch last night in the church, in order to test the truth of
what had been told by Will Stephens, the sexton. I did all I could to
persuade him from making the attempt, but when I found that nothing
else would satisfy him, I thought it prudent to give him the means of
carrying out what had become such a fixed intention with him, that to
oppose it was to do far more mischief than to grant it all the aid I
had in my power to do.”
Sir George gave a nod of assent.
“He went there,” continued Mr. Bevan, “with a private key of my own,
and took his place in the church.”
“I wish, sir, you had been with him,” said Edwin.
“Yes,” added Charles. “If you, with your cool, calm, unbiased judgment
had been there, we should have been much better able to come to a
correct conclusion about what occurred; for that something did occur,
or was supposed by Ringwood to do so, we can well guess.”
“I wish, indeed, I had been there,” said Mr. Bevan, “but he begged so
earnestly to be allowed to go alone, that I had not the heart to refuse
him.”
“And what happened, sir?”
“I will tell you. I gave him a key which admitted him to the church, by
the small private entrance, at which I usually go in myself; in fact,
it was my own private key, for I at times visit the church, and wish to
do so, when I am not expected by those who have the ordinary charge of
it.”
“We have heard as much.”
“No doubt. Well, then, I say I gave him that key, but it was my
sympathy with his evident distress rather than my judgment which
consented to do so, and I had hardly done it, when I began to busy
myself with conjectures, and to deeply regret that I had yielded to
him so easily. ‘What if he, in his excited and grief-stricken state of
mind, should come to some serious mischief?’ I said to myself, ‘should
not I be very much to blame? Would not all prudent persons say that I
did very wrong to send a man in such a condition of mind into a church
at midnight, alone?’”
“Your motives and your known character, sir, would protect you,” said
Charles.
“I hope so,” continued Mr. Bevan. “I think it would from all other
charges, but imprudence; and if any great mischance had befallen
Ringwood, I should not so readily have forgiven myself, as others might
have been induced to forgive me.”
“I understand that feeling,” said Sir George.
“Well, then, with such sensations tugging at my heart, no wonder I
could not rest, and so at a little after twelve, I rose, and hastily
dressing myself, I left my house as noiselessly as possible, and made
my way towards the church. The moon’s light was at that time obscured,
but every spot was so familiar to me, that I was able to go with
speed, and I soon reached the venerable building. I walked round it,
until I came to the door, the key of which I had given to Mr. Ringwood;
it was open, but the moment I crossed the threshold, I stumbled on his
insensible form.”
“Go on! go on! He had seen something terrible,” gasped Sir George; “I
am nerved, I think, for the very worst; I pray you, sir, go on, and
tell me all.”
“I will, Sir George, because I feel convinced it is my duty to conceal
nothing in this transaction, and because I think you had better more
calmly and dispassionately, and without exaggeration, hear from me all
that is to be told.”
“That is a good reason, sir,” said Edwin. “We should, of course, hear
all from other sources, and probably, with all the aids that a feeling
for the marvellous could append to it.”
“That is my impression. When, then, I stumbled over a person lying just
within the little private door of the church, I had no immediate means
of knowing who it was; I tell you it was Ringwood, because I afterwards
discovered as much. I had the means of getting a light; when I did so,
I found Ringwood lying in a swoon, while at the same time, I could not
but notice a large bruise upon his forehead.
“Of course, my first duty was to look after him, instead of troubling
myself about his assailant, and having placed him in as convenient a
posture as I could, I hurried home again, and roused up my servants.
With their assistance I got him to my house, and placed him in bed.”
“And did you search the church, sir?”
“I did. I went back and searched it thoroughly, but found nothing at
all suspicious. Everything was in its right place, and I could not
account for the affair at all, because of the wound that Ringwood had.
I was most anxious to hear from him that he had had a fall.”
“But—but,” said Sir George, falteringly, “he told a different story.”
“He did.”
“A story which you will not keep from us.”
“I do not feel myself justified, as I have said, in keeping it from
you. This is it.”
The clergyman then related to the family of the Croftons what is
already known to the reader concerning the adventures of Ringwood in
the old church, and which that morning, upon his recovery, Ringwood had
told to him most circumstantially.
We need scarcely say that this recital was listened to with the most
agonised feelings. Poor Sir George appeared to be most completely
overcome by it. He trembled excessively, and could not command himself
sufficiently to speak.
The two brothers looked at each other in dismay.
“Now, I pray you all to consider this matter more calmly,” said Mr.
Bevan, “than you seem inclined to do.”
“Calmly,” gasped Sir George, “calmly.”
“Yes—what evidence have we after all that the whole affair is anything
more than a dream of Mr. Ringwood’s?”
“Does he doubt it?”
“No—I am bound to tell you that he does not; but we may well do so for
all that. He is the last person who is likely to give in to the opinion
that it is a mere vision, so strangely impressed as it is upon his
imagination. Recollect always that he went to the church prepared to
see something.”
“Oh, if we could but think it unreal,” said Sir George, glancing at
his sons, as if to gather their opinions of the matter from their
countenances.
“I will cling to such a thought,” said Charles, “until I am convinced
otherwise through the medium of my own senses.”
“And I,” said Edwin.
“You are right,” added Mr. Bevan, “I never in the whole course of my
experience heard of anything of which people should be so slow of
believing in, as this most uncomfortable affair. You now know all, and
it is for yourselves, of course, to make whatever determination you
think fit. If I might advise, it would be that you all take a short
tour, perhaps on the continent for a time.”
“Mr. Bevan,” said Sir George, in a kindly tone, “I am greatly obliged
to you. The suggestion I know springs from the very best and friendly
motives; but it carries with it a strong presumption that you really do
think there is something in all this affair which it would be as well
to have settled in my absence.”
The clergyman could not deny but that some such feeling was at the
bottom of his advice; but still he would not admit that he was at all
convinced of the reality of what was presumed to have happened, and a
short pause in the conversation ensued, after which Sir George spoke
with a solemn air of determination, saying to his sons, as well as to
his friend and pastor, Mr. Bevan,
“When I tell you that I have made a determination from which nothing
but the hand of heaven visiting me with death shall move me, I hope no
one here will try to dissuade me from carrying it out.”
After such an exordium it was a difficult thing to say anything to him,
so he continued,—
“My child was dear—very dear to me in life, and I have no superstitious
fears concerning one who held such a place in my affections. I am
resolved that to-night I will watch her poor remains, and at once
convince myself of a horror that may drive me mad or take a mountain of
grief and apprehension off my heart.”
“Father,” cried Charles, “you will allow me to accompany you.”
“And me,” added Edwin.
“My sons, you are both deeply interested in this matter—you would be
miserable while I was gone if you were not with me. Moreover, I will
not trust my own imagination entirely—we will all three go, and then we
cannot be deceived. This is my most solemn resolution.”
“I have only one thing to say regarding it,” said Mr. Bevan, “that is,
to prefer an earnest request that you will allow me to be one of the
party—you shall sit in a pew of the church, that shall command a view
of the whole building.”
“Accompany us, Mr. Bevan, if you will,” said Sir George, “but I sit in
no pew.”
“No pew?”
“No. But my child’s coffin, in the vault where repose the remains of
more than one of my race who had been dear to me in life, will I take
my place.”
There was an earnest resolved solemnity about Sir George’s manner,
which showed that he was not to be turned from his purpose, and Mr.
Bevan accordingly did not attempt to do so. He had done what he
scarcely expected, that is, got a consent to accompany him to the
night vigil, and at all events let what would happen, he as a more
disinterested party than the others, would be able, probably to
interfere and prevent any disastrous circumstances from arising.
“Say nothing of what has been determined on to any one,” said Sir
George, “keep it a profound secret, sir, and this night will put an end
to the agony of doubt.”
“Depend upon me. Will you come to my house at eleven o’clock, or shall
I come here?”
“We will come to you; it is in the way.”
Thus then the affair was settled, so far satisfactorily, that there
was to be a watch actually now in the vault, so that there could be no
delusion, no trick practised.—What will be the result will be shown
very shortly; in the meantime we cannot but tremble at what that
attached and nearly heart-broken father may have still to go through.
The excitement too in the village was immense; for the story of the
vampyre’s attack upon the young girl was fresh in everybody’s mouth,
and it lost nothing of its real horrors by the frequency with which it
was repeated, and the terror-stricken manner in which it was dilated
upon.
CHAPTER CCXX.
THE GRAND CONSULTATION AT THE ALE-HOUSE.—THE AWFUL SUGGESTION.
Sir George Crofton and his family could form no idea, owing to not
being in a position to know, of the state of excitement produced in the
village by the mysterious and frightful attack which had been made upon
the widow’s daughter.
When people are very much absorbed with their own grief, they are apt
to set a lighter value upon those of others, and thus it was that the
family of the Croftons was so entirely taken up with what itself felt
and had to do that there was little room for sympathy with others.
Mr. Bevan likewise, from his peculiar and respectable position, was not
likely to be made the depository of gossiping secrets; the inhabitants
of that little place were in the habit of approaching him with respect,
so that, although, as we are aware, he had heard from Will Stephens,
the sexton, a full and particular account of what had happened to him
in the old church, and was likewise cognizant of the story of the
midnight attack upon the widow’s daughter, he was not fully aware of
the startling effect which those circumstances had had upon the small
population of that fishing village.
We are bound to believe that if he had had any idea of the real result
of those operations or of what was contemplated as their result—he
would have done his best to adopt some course to prevent any disastrous
collision.
We, however, with all the data and materials of this most singular
narrative before us, are enabled to detail to the reader facts and
occurrences as they took place actually, without waiting the arrival of
those periods at which they reached the knowledge of those actors in
the gloomy drama of real life.
Our readers, then, will please to know that the excitement among
the inhabitants of the place was of that violent and overbearing
description, that all the occupations of the villagers were abandoned,
and a spirit of idleness, sadly suggestive of mischief, began to be
prevalent among them.
This feeling was increased by frequent visits to the ale-house, the
liquor of which was well esteemed by Will Stephens, as may be readily
imagined; and towards evening the large old-fashioned parlour of that
place of entertainment became crowded with a motley assemblage, whose
sole purpose in meeting together was to drink strong ale, and discuss
the irritating and exciting subject of the appearance of the vampyre in
the village.
This discussion, from being at first a sober, serious, and alarmed one,
became noisy and violent; and at length a blacksmith, who was a great
man in the politics of the place, and who of all things in the world
most admired to hear his own voice, rose and addressed his compeers in
something of a set speech.
“Listen to me,” he said; “are we to have the blood sucked out of all
our bodies by a lot of vampyres? Is our wives and daughters to be
murdered in the middle of the night?”
“No, no, no,” cried many voices; “certainly not.”
“Is we to be made into victims, or isn’t we? What’s Sir George Crofton
and his family to us? To be sure he’s the landlord of some of us, and a
very good landlord he is, too, as long as we pay our rent.”
“Hear, hear, hear.”
“But there’s no saying how long he might be so, if we didn’t.”
“Bravo, Dick!” cried the master of the place, handing the orator a pot;
“bravo, Dick! take a pull at that, old fellow.”
“Thank you, Muggins. Now, what I proposes is—”
“Stand on a chair, and let’s all hear you.”
“Thank you,” said the blacksmith; and getting upon a chair, he was
about to commence again, when some one advised him to get upon the
table, but in an effort to accomplish that feat, he unfortunately trod
upon what was a mere flap of the table, which had not sufficient power
to support his weight, and down he came amid an assemblage of pots,
jugs, and glasses, which made a most alarming crash.
This roused the fury of the landlord, who had no idea of being made
such a sufferer in the transaction, and he accordingly began to declaim
heavily at his loss.
A dispute arose as to how he was to be repaid, and it was finally
settled that a general subscription would be the best mode of
reimbursing him.
If anything was wanting to work up the feelings of the topers at
the public-house to the highest pitch of aggravation, it certainly
was their having to disburse for breakages a sum of money which, if
liquefied, would have trickled most luxuriously down their throats.
They were consequently ripe and ready for anything which promised
vengeance upon anybody.
The blacksmith was not discomfited by his fall. When is a man who is
fond of hearing himself talk discomfited by anything? and he soon
resumed his oration in the following words:—
“Is we to be put upon in this kind of way? Why, we shan’t be able to
sleep in our beds. All I asks is, is we to put up with it?”
“But what are we to do?” said one.
“Ah! there’s the question,” said the blacksmith, “I don’t know exactly.”
“Let’s ask old Timothy Brown,” said the butcher, “he’s the oldest man
here.”
This was assented to; and accordingly the individual mentioned was
questioned as to his ideas of the way of avoiding the alarming
catastrophe which seemed to be impending over them. He advised them to
wait patiently till the next night, and keep awake till the unwelcome
nocturnal visitor made its appearance, when whoever it might visit was
boldly to assail it, without any fear of the consequences to himself,
till further assistance could be procured. After Timothy Brown had
delivered himself of this piece of advice, a dead silence ensued among
the late boisterous company. There were many dissenters, and a few who
seemed in favour of a trial of the practicability of the plan. Both
parties seemed to give some consideration to the proposition, and they
were by far too much engaged in thinking of the advice which had been
given them, to pay much attention to the quarter from whence it had
emanated; more particularly, too, as from his age and infirmities,
he was incapacitated from carrying it out or from giving any active
assistance to those who were disposed to do so.
A great many efforts were made to get him to say more, particularly
with reference to the case under consideration, as being no common one,
but the octogenarian had made his effort, and he only replied to the
remonstrances of those who, alternately by coaxing and bullying, strove
to get information from him, by a vacant stare.
“It’s of no use,” said the butcher, “you’ll get nothing more now from
old Timothy; he’s done up now, that’s quite clear, and ten to one if
the excitement of to-night won’t go a good way towards slaughtering him
before his time.”
“Well, it may be so,” cried the blacksmith, “but still it’s good
advice, and as I said before it comes to this—is we to be afraid to lay
down in our beds at night, or isn’t we?”
Before any reply could be made to this interrogatory, the old clock
that was in the public-house parlour struck the hour of eleven, and
another peal of thunder seemed to be answering to the tinkling sounds.
“It’s a rough night,” said one, “I thought there would be a storm
before morning by the look of the sun at setting—it went down with a
strange fiery redness behind a bank of clouds. I move for going home.”
“Who talks of going home,” cried the blacksmith, “when vampires are
abroad? hasn’t old Timothy said, that a stormy night was the very one
to settle the thing in.”
“No,” cried another, “he did not say night at all.”
“I don’t care whether he said night or day; I’ve made up my mind to
do something; there’s no doubt about it but that a vampyre is about
the old church. Who’ll come with me and ferret it out? it will be good
service done to everybody’s fireside.”
CHAPTER CCXXI.
THE NIGHT WATCH.—THE VAULT.
It was each moment becoming a more difficult affair to carry on any
conversation in the public-house parlour, for not only did the thunder
each moment almost interrupt the speakers with its loud reverberations,
but now and then such a tremendous gust of wind would sweep round the
house that it would be quite impossible for any one to make himself
heard amidst its loud howling noise.
These were circumstances however, which greatly aided no doubt, in the
getting up of a superstitious feeling in the minds of the people there
assembled, which made them ripe for any proposition, which perhaps
in their soberer moments they would have regarded with considerable
dismay; hence when the blacksmith rushed to the door, crying,—
“Who will follow me to the old church and lay hold of the vampyre?”
about half-a-dozen of the boldest and most reckless,—and be it told to
their honour (if there be any honour in such an enterprise, which after
all, was a grossly selfish one,) they were the worst characters in the
village—started to their feet to accompany him thither.
There are many persons who waver about an enterprise, who will join
it when it has a show of force, and thus was it with this affair.
The moment it was found that the blacksmith’s proposition had some
half-dozen stout adherents, he got as many more—some of whom joined him
from curiosity, and some from dread of being thought to lack courage by
their companions if they held off.
There was now a sufficiently large party to make a respectable
demonstration, and quite elated with his success, and caring little for
the land storm that was raging, the blacksmith, closely followed by the
butcher, who had no objection in life to the affair, especially as he
was at variance with the parson concerning the tithes of a little farm
he kept, called out,—
“To the church—to the church!” and followed by the rabble, rushed
forward in the direction of the sacred edifice.
• • • • •
As the hour of eleven has struck, and as the reader is aware that at
that hour Sir George Crofton and his two sons, accompanied by Mr.
Bevan, had agreed to go to the church on their melancholy errand,
we will leave the noisy brawlers of the alehouse for the purpose of
detailing the proceedings of those whose fortunes we feel more closely
interested in.
The baronet was by no means wavering in his determination,
notwithstanding it had been made at a time of unusual excitement, when
second thoughts might have been allowed to step in, and suggest some
other course of proceeding.
Now, Mr. Bevan was not without his own private hopes that such would be
the case; for what he dreaded above all other things was, the truth of
the affair, and that Sir George would have the horror of discovering
that there was much more in the popular superstition than, without
ocular demonstration, he would have been inclined to admit.
Although a man of education and of refined abilities, the evidence that
had already showed itself to him of the existence at all events of
some supernatural being, with powers analogous to those of the fabled
vampyre, was such that he could not wholly deny, without stultifying
his intellect, that there might be such things.
It is a sad circumstance when the mind is, as it were, compelled to
receive undeniable evidence of a something which the judgment has the
strongest general reasons for disputing, and that was precisely the
position of Mr. Bevan, and a most unenviable one it was.
That night’s proceedings, however, in the vault, he felt must put
an end to all doubts and perplexity upon the subject, and so with a
fervent hope that, in some, at present inexplicable manner, the thing
would be found to be a delusion, he waited more anxiously the arrival
of the Croftons at the parsonage.
At half past ten o’clock, instead of eleven, for as the evening
advanced, Sir George Crofton had shown such an amount of nervousness
that his sons had thought it would be better to bring him to the
parsonage, they arrived, and Mr. Bevan perceived at once what a
remarkable effect grief and anxiety had already had upon the features
of the baronet.
He was a different man to what, but a few days since, he had been, and
more than ever the kind clergyman felt inclined to doubt the expediency
of his being present on such an occasion, and yet how to prevent him if
he were really determined, was a matter of no small difficulty.
“My dear friend,” said Mr. Bevan, “will you pardon me if I make an
effort now to persuade you to abandon this enterprise?”
“I can pardon the effort easily,” said Sir George Crofton, “because I
know it is dictated by the best of motives, but I would fain be spared
it, for I am determined.”
“I will say no more, but only with deep sincerity hope that you may
return to your dwelling, each relieved from the load of anxiety that
now oppresses you.”
“I hope to Heaven it may be so.”
“The night looks strange and still,” said Charles, who wished to
draw his father’s attention as much as possible from too close a
contemplation of the expedition on which they were bound.
“It does,” said Edwin; “I should not be surprised at a storm, for there
is every indication of some disturbance of the elements.
“Let it come,” said Sir George, who fancied that in all those remarks
he detected nothing but a wish to withdraw him from his enterprise;
“Let it come. I have a duty to perform, and I will do it, though
Heaven’s thunders should rock the very earth—the forked lightning is
not launched at the father who goes to watch at the grave of his child.”
Charles and Edwin, upon finding that Sir George was in the mood to make
a misapplication of whatever was said to him, desisted from further
remarks, but left Mr. Bevan quietly to converse with him, in a calm and
unirritating manner.
It was the object of the clergyman to put off as much time as possible
before proceeding to the church, so that the period to be spent in the
family vault of the Croftons should be lessened as much as possible,
for he felt assured that each minute there wasted would be one of great
agony to the bereaved father, who would feel himself once again in such
close approximation to that daughter on whom he had placed some of his
dearest affections.
Sir George, however, defeated this intention, by promptly rising when
his watch told him that the hour of eleven had arrived, and it was in
vain to attempt to stultify him into a belief that he was wrong as
regarded the time, for the church was sufficiently near for them to
hear the hour of eleven pealed forth from its ancient steeple.
“Come,” said Sir George, “the hour has arrived. I pray you do not
delay. I know you are all anxious and fearful concerning me, but I
have a spirit of resolution and firmness in this affair which shall
yet stand me in good stead. I shall not shrink, as you imagine I shall
shrink. Come, then, at once—it is suspense and delay which frets me,
and not action.”
These words enforced a better spirit into both his sons and Mr. Bevan,
and in a few moments the party of four, surely sufficiently strong to
overcome any unexpected obstacles, or to defeat any trickery that might
be attempted to be passed off upon them, proceeded towards the church.
It will be recollected that it was just a little after that time that
the storm commenced, and, in fact, the first clap of thunder, that
seemed to shake the heavens, took place just as they reached the old
grave-yard adjoining to the sacred building.
“There!” exclaimed Charles, “I thought that it would come.”
“What matter?” said Sir George, “come on.”
“Humour him in everything,” said Mr. Bevan, “It is madness now to
contradict him—he will not recede under any circumstances.”
The natural senses of Sir George Crofton appeared to be preternaturally
acute, for he turned sharply, and said quickly, but not unkindly,—
“No, he will not recede—come on.”
After this, nothing was said until they reached the church door, and
then while Mr. Bevan was searching in his pockets for the little
key which opened the small private entrance, some vivid flashes
of lightning lit up with extraordinary brilliancy the old gothic
structure—the neighbouring tombs and the melancholy yew trees that
waved their branches in the night air.
Perhaps the delay which ensued before Mr. Bevan could find the key,
likewise arose from the wish to keep Sir George as short a time as
possible within the vault, but he at length produced it, for any
further delay could only be accounted for by saying that he had it not.
The small arched doorway was speedily cleared, and as another peal of
thunder broke over head in awful grandeur of sound, they entered the
church.
Mr. Bevan took the precaution this time to close the door, so that
there could be no interruption from without.
“Now, Sir George,” he said, “remember your promise. You are to come
away freely at the first dawn of day, and if nothing by then has
occurred to strengthen the frightful supposition which, I suppose I may
say, we have all indulged in, I do hope that for ever this subject
will be erased from your recollection.”
“Be it so,” said Sir George; “be it so.”
Mr. Bevan then busied himself in lighting a lantern, and from beneath
one of the pews, where they were hidden, he procured a couple of
crowbars, with which to raise the stone that covered the entrance to
the vault.
These preparations took up some little time, so that the old clock had
chimed the quarter past eleven, and must have been rapidly getting on
to the half-hour, before they stood in the aisle close to the vault.
“This marble slab,” said Sir George, as he cast his eyes upon it,
“always hitherto has been cemented in its place. Why is it not so now?”
“Is it not?” said Mr. Bevan.
“No—lend me the light.”
Mr. Bevan was averse to lending him the light, but he could not very
well refuse it; and when Sir George Crofton had looked more minutely
at the marble slab, he saw that it had been cemented, but that the
cement was torn and broken away, as if some violence had been used for
the purpose of opening the vault; but whether that violence came from
within or without was a matter of conjecture.
CHAPTER CCXXII.
THE MADMAN.—THE VAMPYRE.
“What does this mean?” cried Sir George Crofton, excitedly.
“Hush!” said Mr. Bevan, “I pray you be calm, sir. If you are to make
any discovery that will give you peace of mind, rest assured it will
not be made by violence.”
“You do not answer my question.”
“I cannot answer it. Remember that I know no more than you do, and
that, like yourselves, I am an adventurer here in search of the truth.”
Sir George said no more upon that head, but with clasped hands and
downcast eyes he stood in silence, while his two sons, armed with the
crowbars that Mr. Bevan had provided for the occasion, proceeded to
lift up the marble slab that covered the vault where lay their sister’s
remains.
The work was not one of great difficulty, for the slab was not very
large, and as it was not cemented down, it yield at once to the
powerful leverage that was brought to play against it, and in a few
minutes it was placed aside, and the yawning abyss appeared before them.
“Oh! sir,” said Mr. Bevan, “even now at this late hour, and when the
proceedings have commenced, I pray you to pause.”
“Pause!” cried Sir George, passionately, “pause for what?”
“Disturb not the dead, and let them rest in peace. Absolve your mind
from the dangerous and perhaps fatal fancies that possess it, and let
us say a prayer, and close again this entrance to the tomb.”
The sons hesitated, and they probably would have taken the clergyman’s
advice, but Sir George was firm.
“No, sir,” he said, “already have I suffered much in coming thus far; I
will not retreat until I have effected all my purpose. I swear it, by
Heaven, whose temple we now are in. You would not, Mr. Bevan, have me
break such an oath.”
“I would not; but I regret you made it. Since, however, it must be so,
and this rash adventure is determined upon, follow me; I will lead
you the way into these calm regions, where you can sleep, I trust, in
peace.”
Sir George Crofton made a step forward, as if he would have arrested
Mr. Bevan’s progress and lead the way himself, but already the
clergyman had descended several steps, so he had nothing to do but to
follow him.
This they all did, Sir George going immediately after him, and his
two sons, with pale anxious-looking faces, as if they had a suspicion
that the adventure would end in something terrific, came last and
they glanced nervously and suspiciously about them; but they said not
a word; nor if they had spoken, it would have been to express great
apprehension, and that was what they were ashamed to do.
Mr. Bevan carried the light, and when he felt that he was at the bottom
of the stone steps, by finding that he was treading upon the sawdust
that was strewn on the floor of the vault, he turned and held the lamp
up at arm’s length, so that his companions might see their way down
the steps.
In another minute they all stood on the floor of the vault.
The light burnt with rather a faint and sickly glare, for so rapidly
were noxious gases evolved in that receptacle for the dead, that
notwithstanding it had been so frequently opened as it had been lately,
they had again accumulated.
In a few moments, however, this was partially remedied by the air from
the church above, and the light burnt more brilliantly—indeed, quite
sufficiently so to enable them to look around them in the vault.
Sir George Crofton’s feelings at that moment must have been of the most
painful and harrowing description. He had lived long enough to be a
witness of the death and the obsequies of many members of his family
whom he had loved fondly, and there he stood in that chamber of death,
surrounded by all the remains of those beings, the memory of whose
appearance and voices came now freshly upon his mind.
Mr. Bevan could well guess the nature of the sad thoughts that
transpired in the breast of the baronet, and the sons having by
accident cast their eyes upon the coffin that contained the remains
of their mother, regarded it in silence, while memory was busy, too,
within them in conjuring up her image.
“And it has come to this,” said Sir George, solemnly.
“We must all come to this,” interposed Mr. Bevan; “this is indeed
a place for solemn and holy thoughts—for self-examination, for
self-condemnation.”
“But there is peace here.”
“There is—the peace that shall be eternal.”
“Hark! hark!” said Charles; “what is that?”
“The wind,” said Mr. Bevan; “nothing but the wind howling round and
through the old belfry—you will remember that it is a boisterous night.”
“Turn, turn, father.”
Sir George turned and looked at Charles, who pointed in silence to the
coffin which contained the corpse of his mother. The light gleamed upon
the plate on which was engraved her name. Sir George’s features moved
convulsively as he read it, and he turned aside to hide a sudden gush
of emotion that came over him.
After a few minutes, he touched Mr. Bevan on the arm, and said in a
whisper,—
“Where did they place my child?”
The clergyman pointed to the narrow shelf on which was the coffin of
Clara Crofton, and then Sir George, making a great effort to overcome
his feelings, said,—
“Mr. Bevan, our worthy minister and friend, and you, likewise, my boys,
hear me. You can guess to some extent, but not wholly—that can only be
known by God—the agony that a sight of the poor remains of her who has
gone from me in all the pride of her youth and beauty, must be to me;
yet now that I am here I consider it to be my duty to look once again
upon the face of my child—my—my lost Clara.”
“Oh! father, father,” said Edwin, “forego this purpose.”
“You will spare us this,” cried Charles.
“Repent you, sir,” said Mr. Bevan, “of the wish. Let her rest in peace.
The dead are sanctified.”
“The dead are sanctified,—but I am her father.”
“Nay, Sir George, let me implore you.”
“Implore me to what, sir? Not to look upon the face of my own child?
Peace—peace. It is no profanation for one who loved her as I loved her
to look upon her once again. Urge me no more.”
“This is in vain,” said Charles.
“You are right—it is in vain.”
A shriek burst from the lips of Edwin at this moment, and flinging his
arms around his father, he held him back. Mr. Bevan, too, gave a cry of
terror, and Charles stood with his hands clasped, as if turned to stone.
Their eyes were all bent upon Clara’s coffin.
The lid moved, and a strange sound was heard from within that
receptacle for the dead—the clock of the old church struck twelve—the
coffin lid moved again, and then sliding on one side, it eventually
fell upon the floor of the vault.
The four spectators of this scene were struck speechless for the time
with terror. Then they stood gazing at the coffin as if they were so
many statues.
And now the light which Mr. Bevan still for a miracle held in his
trembling grasp, shone on a mass of white clothing within the coffin,
and in another moment that white clothing was observed to be in motion.
Slowly the dead form that was there rose up, and they all saw the pale
and ghastly face. A streak of blood was issuing from the mouth, and the
eyes were open.
Sir George Crofton lifted up both his hands, and struck his head, and
then he burst into a wild frightful laugh. It was the laugh of insanity.
Mr. Bevan dropped the light, and all was darkness.
“Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!” laughed Sir George Crofton. “Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!”
and the horrible laugh was taken up by many an echo in the old church,
and responded to with strange and most unearthly reverberations. “Ha,
ha, ha, ha!” Oh what a dreadful sound that was coming at such a time
from the lips of the father.
“Fly Edwin—oh, fly,” cried Charles.
Edwin screamed twice, for he was full of horror, and then he fell on
the floor of the vault in a state of insensibility.
Charles had just sense left him to spring towards the steps, and make
a frantic effort to reach the church; in his hurry he fell twice, but
each time rising again with a shout of despair, he resumed his efforts,
and all the while the horrible laugh of his maniac father sounded in
his ears, a sound which he felt that he should never forget.
By a great effort he did reach the aisle of the church, and when there,
he called aloud.
“Mr. Bevan, Mr. Bevan, help—oh help! For the love of God speak. Help,
help, Mr. Bevan, where are you, speak, I implore you? Am I too going
mad? Oh yes, I shall—I must. What mortal intellect can stand such a
scene as this. Help, help—oh, help!”
The church was suddenly lit up by a flash of light, and turning in the
direction from whence it proceeded, Charles saw Mr. Bevan approaching
with a light, which he had procured from the chancel, and it would
appear that immediately upon dropping in his horror the light in the
vault, he had ran up the stairs with the intent of getting another.
“Who calls me? Who calls me?” he cried.
“I—I,” said Charles. “Oh God, what a dreadful night is this.”
The clergyman was trembling violently, and was very pale, but he made
his way up to Charles, from whose brow the perspiration was falling in
heavy drops, and then again they heard the mad Sir George laughing in
the vault.
“Ha, ha, ha! ha, ha, ha! ha, ha, ha!”
“Oh God, is not that horrible?” said Charles.
“Most horrible,” responded Mr. Bevan.
Bang—bang—bang! at this moment came a violent knocking at the church
door, and then several voices were heard without shouting.
“The vampyre—the vampyre—the vampyre.”
“What is that? What is that?” said Charles.
“Nay, I know not,” replied Mr. Bevan, “I am nearly distracted already.
Where is your brother? Did he not escape from the vault? Where is he?
Oh, that horrible laugh. Good God! that knocking too at the church
door. What can be the meaning of it? Heaven in its mercy guide us now
what to do.”
The reader will understand the meaning of the knocking, although those
bewildered persons who heard it in the church did not. The fact is,
that the party from the alehouse headed by the valiant blacksmith, and
heated by their too liberal potations had just arrived at the church,
and were clamouring for admission.
They had seen through one of the old pointed windows, the reflection
of the light which Mr. Bevan carried, and that it was that convinced
them some one was there who might if he would pay attention to the
uproarious summons.
The knocking lasted with terrible effect, for the old door of the
sacred edifice shook again, it seemed as if certainly it could not
resist the making of such an attack.
Mr. Bevan was confounded. A horrible suspicion came across him, of what
was meant by those violent demands for admission, and he shook with
brutal trepidation as he conjectured what might be the effect of the
proceedings of a lawless mob.
“Now Heaven help us,” he said, “for we shall soon I fear be powerless.”
“Good God! what mean you?” said Charles.
“I scarcely know how to explain to you all my fears. The are too
dreadful to think of, but while that knocking continues, what can I
think?”
“I understand! they call for my sister.”
“Oh call her not now by that name. Remember, and remember with a
shudder what she now is.”
CHAPTER CCXXIII.
THE HUNT OF THE VAMPYRE.
All these occurrences which have taken a considerable time in telling,
occurred as simultaneously, that although it would appear Mr. Bevan
and Charles Crofton, rather neglected Sir George and Edwin who were
still in the vault, they had really not had time to think of them, to
say nothing of making any effort to extricate them from the frightful
situation in which they were placed.
Probably, after procuring a light, Mr. Bevan would have rushed to their
rescue had not that incessant knocking at the church door suggested
a new and more horrible danger, still, from the evil passions of an
infuriated multitude.
“Oh, Mr. Charles,” he said, “if we could but get your father away from
the church, there is no knowing what an amount of misery he might be
spared.”
“Misery, sir; surely there is no more misery in store for us—have we
not suffered enough—more than enough. Oh, Mr. Bevan we have fallen upon
evil times, and I dread to think, what will yet be the end of those
most frightful transactions.”
The knocking at the church door continued violently, and Charles
indicated a wish to proceed there to ascertain what it was, but Mr.
Bevan stopped him, saying,—
“No, Charles—no—let them be, I hardly think they will venture to break
into the sacred edifice, but whether they do or not, remember that
your duty and mine, yours being the duty of a son, and mine that of a
friend, should take us now to your father’s vault.”
“That is true, sir,” said Charles, “lead on I will follow you.”
Mr. Bevan, who had all the intellectual courage of a man of education,
and of regular habits, led the way again to the vault, with the light
in his hand. It was a great relief that the insane and horrible laugh
of Sir George Crofton had ceased, the best friend of any man could
almost have wished him dead, ere their ears had drunk in such horrible
sounds.
The shouts and cries from without now became incessant, and it seemed
as if some weapon had been procured, wherewith to hammer violently upon
the church door, for the strokes were regular and incessant, and it
was evident that if they continued long that frail defence against the
incursions of the rabble rout without must soon give way.
The only effect, however, which these sounds had upon Mr. Bevan was to
make him hasten his progress towards the vault, for anything in the
shape of a collision between those who wanted to take the church by
storm, and Sir George Crofton, was indeed most highly to be deprecated.
The steps were not many in number, and once again the clergyman and
Charles Crofton stood upon the sawdust that covered the flooring of the
vault.
At first, in consequence of the flaring of the light, the state of
affairs in that dismal region could not be ascertained; but as soon
as they could get a view, they found Sir George lying apparently in a
state of insensibility across the coffin of his daughter Clara, while
Edwin was in a swoon close to his feet.
“Sir George, Sir George,” cried Mr. Bevan, “arouse yourself; it is
necessary that you leave this place at once.”
The baronet got up and glanced at the intruders. Charles uttered a deep
groan, for the most superficial observation of his father’s face was
sufficient to convince him that reason had fled, and that wildness had
set up his wild dominion in his brain.
“Father—father,” he cried, “speak to me, and dissipate a frightful
thought.”
“What would you have of me,” said Sir George; “I am a vampyre, and
this is my tomb—you should see me in the rays of the cold moon gliding
’twixt earth and heaven, and panting for a victim. I am a vampyre.”
At this moment Edwin seemed to be partially recovering, for his eyes
opened as he lay upon the floor, and he looked around him with a
bewildered gaze, which soon settled into one of more intelligence as
memory resumed her sway, and he recollected the various circumstances
that had brought him into his present position.
“Rouse yourself, Edwin, rouse yourself,” cried Mr. Bevan, “you must aid
us to remove your father.”
“Do you talk of me?” said Sir George, “know you not that I am one of
those supernatural existences known as the death and despair-dealing
vampyres—it’s time I took my nightly prowl to look for victims. I must
have blood—I must have blood.”
“Gracious Heaven! he raves,” said Charles.
“Heed him not,” said Mr. Bevan—“heed him not, and touch him not, so
that he leave the place—when we have him once clear of the church we
can procure assistance, and take him to his own home.
“Edwin,” whispered Charles, “what of our sister.”
Edwin shook his head and shuddered. “I know nothing but that I
saw her—oh, horrible sight, rising from her coffin, and then in a
convulsion of terror my senses fled—a frightful ringing laugh came on
my ears, and from that time till now, be the period long or short, I
have been blessed by a death-like trance.”
“Blessed indeed,” said Mr. Bevan; “tarry one moment.”
Sir George Crofton was ascending the steps of the vault, but his two
sons paused for an instant at the request of Mr. Bevan, and then the
latter approaching Clara’s coffin slightly removed the lid, and was
gratified as far as any feeling could be considered gratification
under such circumstances, to find that the corpse occupied an ordinary
position in its narrow resting place.
“All’s right,” he said, “let us persuade ourselves that this too has
been but a dream, that we have been deceived, and that imagination has
played us tricks it is accustomed to play to those who give it the rein
at such hours as these—let us think and believe anything rather than
that what we have seen to-night is real.”
As he spoke these words, he ascended hastily the steps in pursuit of
Sir George, who, by this time had alone reached the top.
The heavy strokes against the door of the church had ceased, but an odd
sort of scraping, rattling sound at the lock convinced the clergyman
that a workman of more skill than he who had wielded the hammer, was
now at work, endeavouring to force an entrance.
“Oh, if we could but get out,” he said, “by the small private entrance,
all might be well; Charles, urge your father, I pray you.”
Charles did so to the best of his ability, but the blacksmith who had
originally incited the crowd to attack the church, in order to get
possession of the body of the vampyre, had sent to his workshop for the
tools of his craft, and soon quietly accomplished by skill what brute
force would have been a long time about, namely, the opening of the
church-door.
It was flung wide open, before Sir George Crofton and his sons could
reach the small private entrance, of which Mr. Bevan had the key.
The sight of the multitude of persons, for they looked such crowds in
the church porch, materially increased the incipient sadness of the
bereaved father.
CHAPTER CCXXIV.
THE FATE OF SIR GEORGE.—THE CROSS ROAD.
Sir George, when he saw the crowd of persons, seemed to have some
undefined idea that they were enemies, but this would not have
been productive of any serious consequences, if it had not most
unfortunately happened that a most formidable weapon was within his
grasp.
That weapon consisted of one of the long iron crowbars which had been
successfully used by his own sons in order to force a passage to the
family vault, where such horrors had been witnessed.
Suddenly, then, seizing this weapon, which, in the hands of a ferocious
man was a most awful one, he swung it once round his head, and then
rushed upon those he considered his foes.
He dealt but three blows, and at each of those one of the assailants
fell lifeless in the church porch.
To resist, or to attempt to contend with a man so armed, and apparently
possessed of such preternatural strength, was what some of the party
wished, and accordingly a free passage was left for him, and he rushed
out of the church into the night air shouting for vengeance, and still
at interval, accusing himself of being a vampyre, as most dangerous
theme to touch upon, considering the then state of feeling in that
little district.
Anxiety for the safety of Sir George induced his sons and Mr. Bevan
to rush after him, regardless of all other consequences, so that
the church, the vaults, and everything they contained, were left to
the mercy of a mob infuriated by superstition, rendered still more
desperate by the loss of three of their number in so sudden and
exampled a manner.
They opposed no obstacle to the leaving of those persons, who thus for
dearer considerations abandoned the old church, but they rushed with
wild shouts and gesticulations into the building.
“The vampyre, the vampyre,” cried the blacksmith, “death to the
vampyre—death and destruction to the vampyre.”
“Hurrah!” cried another, “to the vaults this way to Sir George
Crofton’s vault.”
There seemed to be little doubt now, but that this disorderly rabble
would execute summary vengeance upon the supposed nocturnal disturber
of the peace of the district.
Ever and anon, too, as these shouts of discord, and of threatening
vengeance, rose upon the night air, there would come the distant
muttering of thunder, for the storm had not yet ceased, although its
worst fury had certainly passed away.
Dark and heavy clouds were sweeping up from the horizon, and it seemed
to be tolerably evident that some heavy deluge of rain would eventually
settle the fury of the elements, and reconcile the discord of wind and
electricity.
Several of the rioters were provided with links and matches, so that
in a few moments the whole interior of the church was brilliantly
illuminated, while at the same time it presented a grotesque
appearance, in consequence of the unsteady and wavering flame from the
links, throw myriads of dancing shadows upon the walls.
There would have been no difficulty under any ordinary circumstances
in finding the entrance to the vault, where the dead of the Crofton
family should have lain in peace, but now since the large flagstone
that covered the entrance to that receptacle of the grave was removed,
it met their observation at once.
It was strange now to perceive how, for a moment, superstition having
led them on so far, the same feeling should induce them to pause, ere
they ventured to make their way down these gloomy steps.
It was a critical moment, and probably if any one or two had taken
a sudden panic, the whole party might have left the church with
precipitation, having done a considerable amount of mischief, and yet
as it is so usual with rioters, having left their principal object
unaccomplished.
The blacksmith put an end to this state of indecision, for, seizing a
link from the man who was nearest to him, he darted down the steps,
exclaiming as he did so,—
“Whoever’s afraid, need not follow me.”
This was a taunt they were not exactly prepared to submit to, and
the consequence was, that in a very few moments the ancient and time
honoured vault of the Crofton’s was more full of the living than of the
dead.
The blacksmith laid his hand upon Clara’s coffin.
“Here it is,” he said, “I know the very pattern of the cloth, and the
fashion of the nails, I saw it at Grigson’s the undertaker’s before it
was taken to the Grange.”
“Is she there—is she there,” cried half a dozen voices at once.
Even the blacksmith hesitated a moment ere he removed the lid from
the receptacle of death, but when he did so, and his eyes fell upon
the face of the presumed vampyre, he seemed rejoiced to find in the
appearances then exhibited some sort of justification for the act of
violence of which already he had been the instigator.
“Here you are,” he said, “look at the bloom upon her lips, why her
cheeks are fresher and rosier than ever they were while she was alive,
a vampyre my mates, this is a vampyre, or may I never break bread
again; and now what’s to be done?”
“Burn her, burn her,” cried several.
“Well,” said the blacksmith, “mind its as you like. I’ve brought you
here, and shown you what it is, and now you can do what you like, and
of course I’ll lend you a hand to do it.”
Any one who had been very speculative in this affair, might have
detected in these last words of the blacksmith, something like an
inclination to creep out of the future consequences of what might next
be done, while at the same time shame deterred him from exactly leaving
his companions in the lurch.
After some suggestions then, and some argumentation as to the
probability or possibility of interruption—the coffin itself, was
with its sad and wretched occupant, lifted from the niche where it
should have remained until that awful day when the dead shall rise for
judgment, and carried up the steps into the church, from thence they
passed into the graveyard, but scarcely had they done so, when the
surcharged clouds burst over their heads, and the rain came down in
perfect torrents.
The deluge was of so frightful, and continuous a character, that they
shrank back again beneath the shelter of the church porch, and there
waited until its first fury had passed away.
Such an even down storm seldom lasts long in our climate, and the
consequence was that in about ten minutes the shower had so far
subsided that although a continuous rain was falling it bore but a very
distant comparison to what had taken place.
“How are we to burn the body on such a night as this?”
“Aye, how indeed,” said another; “you could not so much as kindle a
fire, and if you did, it would not live many minutes.”
“I’ll tell you what to do at once,” said one who had as yet borne but a
quiet part in the proceedings; “I’ll tell you what to do at once, for I
saw it done myself; a vampyre is quite as secure buried in a cross-road
with a stake through its body, as if you burned it in all the fires in
the world; come on, the rain won’t hinder you doing that.”
This was a suggestion highly approved of, and the more so as there was
a cross road close at hand, so that the deed could be done quick,
and the parties dispersed to their respective homes, for already the
exertion they had taken, and the rain that had fallen, had had a great
effect in sobering them.
And even now the perilous and disgusting operation of destroying the
body, by fire or any other way, might have been abandoned, had any
one of the party suggested such a course—but the dread of a future
imputation of cowardice kept all silent.
Once more the coffin was raised by four of the throng, and carried
through the church-yard, which was now running in many little rivulets,
in consequence of the rain. The cross-road was not above a quarter of a
mile from the spot, and while those who were disengaged from carrying
the body, were hurrying away to get spades and mattocks, the others
walked through the rain, and finally paused at the place they though
suitable for that ancient superstitious rite, which it was thought
would make the vampyre rest in peace.
It is hard to suppose that Sir George Crofton, his sons, and Mr.
Bevan were all deceived concerning these symptoms of vitality which
they had observed in the corpse of Clara; but certainly now, there
was no appearance of anything of the kind, and the only suspicious
circumstances appeared to be the blood upon the lips, and the very
fresh-like appearance of the face.
If it were really a fact that the attack of Varney the Vampyre upon
this fair young girl had converted her into one of those frightful
existences, and that she had been about to leave her tomb for the
purpose of seeking a repast of blood, it would appear that the
intention had been checked and frustrated by the presence of Sir George
and his party in the vault.
At last a dozen men now arrived well armed with spades and picks, and
they commenced the work of digging a deep, rather than a capacious
grave, in silence.
A gloomy and apprehensive spirit seemed to come over the whole
assemblage, and the probability is that this was chiefly owing to
the fact that they now encountered no opposition, and that they were
permitted unimpeded to accomplish a purpose which had never yet been
attempted within the memory of any of the inhabitants of the place.
The grave was dug, and about two feet depth of soil was thrown in a
huge mound upon the surface; the coffin was lowered, and there lay the
corpse within that receptacle of poor humanity, unimprisoned by any lid
for that had been left in the vault, and awaiting the doom which they
had decreed upon it, but which they now with a shuddering horror shrunk
from performing.
A hedge-stake with a sharp point had been procured, and those who held
it looked around them with terrified countenances, while the few links
that had not been extinguished by the rain, shed a strange and lurid
glare upon all objects.
“It must be done,” said the blacksmith, “don’t let it be said that we
got thus far and then were afraid.”
“Do it then yourself,” said the man that held the stake, “I dare not.”
“Aye, do,” cried several voices; “you brought us here, why don’t you do
it—are you afraid after all your boasting.”
“Afraid—afraid of the dead; I’m not afraid of any of you that are
alive, and it’s not likely I’m going to be afraid of a dead body;
you’re a pretty set of cowards. I’ve no animosity against the girl,
but I want that we shall all sleep in peace, and that our wives
and children should not be disturbed nocturnally in their blessed
repose. I’ll do it if none of you’ll do it, and then you may thank me
afterwards for the act, although I suppose if I get into trouble I
shall have you all turn tail upon me.”
“No, we won’t—no, we won’t.”
“Well, well, here goes, whether you do or not. I—I’ll do it directly.”
“He shrinks,” cried one.
“No,” said another; “he’ll do it—now for it, stand aside.”
“Stand aside yourself—do you want to fall into the grave.”
The blacksmith shuddered as he held the stake in an attitude to pierce
the body, and even up to that moment it seemed to be a doubtful case,
whether he would be able to accomplish his purpose or not; at length,
when they all thought he was upon the point of abandoning his design,
and casting the stake away, he thrust it with tremendous force through
the body and the back of the coffin.
[Illustration: The blacksmith thrusts the stake through the body of the
vampyre.]
The eyes of the corpse opened wide—the hands were clenched, and a
shrill, piercing shriek came from the lips—a shriek that was answered
by as many as there were persons present, and then with pallid fear
upon their countenances they rushed headlong from the spot.
CHAPTER CCXXV.
THE SOLITARY MAN.—VARNEY’S DESPAIR.
There lay the dead, alone, in that awful grave, dabbled in blood, and
the victim of the horrible experiment that had been instituted to lay a
vampire. The rain still fell heavily.
Oh, surely, pitying Heaven sent those drops to wash out the remembrance
of such a deed. The grave slowly began to be a pool of water; it rose
up the sides of the coffin, and in a few minutes, more nothing of the
ghastly and the terrible contents of that grave could have been seen.
Before that took place, a man of tall stature and solemn gait stepped
up and stood upon the brink of the little excavation.
For a time he was as still as that sad occupant of the little space of
earth that served her for a resting place, but at length in a tone of
deep anguish he spoke,—
“And has it come to this?” he said, “is this my work? Oh, horror!
horror unspeakable. Is this some hideous dream or a reality of tragedy,
so far transcending all I looked for, that if I had tears I should shed
them now; but I have none. A hundred years ago that fount was dry. I
thought that I had steeled my heart against all gentle impulses; that I
had crushed—aye, completely crushed dove-eyed pity in my heart, but it
is not so, and still sufficient of my once human feelings clings to me
to make me grieve for thee, Clara Crofton, thou victim!”
We need not tell our readers now, that it was no other than Varney the
Vampyre himself from whom these words came.
After thus, then, giving such fervent utterance to the sad feeling that
had overcome him, he stood for a time silent, and then glancing around
him as well as he could by the dim light, he found the spades, by the
aid of which the grave had been dug, and which the men had in their
great fright left behind them.
Seizing one, he commenced, with an energy and perseverance that was
well adapted to accomplish the object, to fill up the grave.
“You shall now rest in peace,” he said.
In the course of about ten minutes the grave was levelled completely,
so that there were no signs or indications of any one having been there
interred.
The rain was still falling, and notwithstanding that circumstance, he
continued at his work, until he had stamped down the earth to a perfect
level; and then, even, as if he was still further anxious to thoroughly
destroy any indication of the deed that had been done, he took the
loose earth that was superfluous, and scattered it about.
“This done,” he said, “surely you will now know peace.”
He cast down the spade with which he had been working, and lingered for
a few brief moments. Suddenly he started, for he heard, or thought he
heard, an approaching footstep.
His first impulse appeared to be to fly, but that he soon corrected,
and folding his arms solemnly across his breast, he waited for the man
that was now evidently making speed towards that spot.
In a few moments more he saw the dusky outline of the figure, and then
Mr. Bevan, the clergyman, stood before him.
Mr. Bevan did not at the moment recognise in the form before him the
man who had been the guest of Sir George Crofton, and from whom it was
supposed had sprung all the mischief and horror that had fallen upon
the family, at the Grange.
“Who are you?” he cried; “can you give me information of an outrage
that has been committed hereabouts.”
“Many,” said Varney.
“Ah! I know the voice. Are you not he who was rescued from the sea by
the two sons of Sir George Crofton.”
“Well.”
“Now I know you, and I am glad to have met with you.”
“You will try to kill me?”
“No, no—peace is my profession.”
“Ah! you are the priest of this place. Well, sir, what would you with
me?”
“I would implore you to tell me if it be really true that—that—”
Mr. Bevan paused, for he disliked to show that the fear that it might
be true there were such creatures as vampyres, had taken so strong a
hold of him.
“Proceed,” said Varney.
“I will. Are you then a vampyre?”
“A strange question for one living man to put to another! Are you?”
“You are inclined to trifle with me. But I implore you to answer me. I
am perhaps the only man in all this neighbourhood to whom you can give
an answer in the affirmative with safety.”
“And why so?”
“Because I question not the decrees of Heaven. If it seems fit to the
great Ruler of Heaven and of earth that there should be ever such
horrible creatures as vampyres, ought I his creature to question it?”
“You ought not—you ought not. I have heard much from priests, but from
your lips I hear sound reason. I am a vampyre.”
Mr. Bevan shrunk back, and shook for a moment, as he said in a low
faltering tone,—
“For how long—have you—”
“You would know how long I have endured such a state of existence. I
will tell you that I have a keen remembrance of being hunted through
the streets of London in the reign of Henry the Fourth.”
“Henry the Fourth?”
“Yes, I have seen all the celebrities of this and many other lands
from that period. More than once have I endeavoured to cast off this
horrible existence, but it is my destiny to remain in it. I was picked
up by the brothers Crofton after one of my attempts to court death.
They have been repaid.”
“Horribly!”
“I cannot help it—I am what I am.”
There was a strange and mournful solemnity about the tones of Varney
that went to the heart of Mr. Bevan, and after a few moments pause, he
said,—
“You greatly, very greatly awake my interest. Do not leave me. Ask
yourself if there is anything that I can do to alleviate your destiny.
Have you tried prayer?”
“Prayer?”
“Yes. Oh! there is great virtue in prayer.”
“I pray? What for should I pray but for that death which whenever it
seems to be in my grasp has them flitted from me in mockery, leaving me
still a stranded wretch upon the shores of this world. Perhaps you have
at times fancied you have suffered some great amount of mental agony.
Perhaps you have stood by the bed-side of dying creatures, and heard
them howl their hopelessness of Heaven’s mercy, but you cannot know—you
cannot imagine—what I have suffered.”
As he spoke, he turned away, but Mr. Bevan followed him, saying,—
“Remain—remain, I implore you,”
“Remain—and wherefore?”
“I will be your friend—it is my duty to be such; remain, and you shall
if you wish it, have an asylum in my house. If you will not pray
yourself, to Heaven, I will pray for you, and in time to come you will
have some hope. Oh, believe me, earnest prayer is not in vain.”
“My friend!”
“Yes, your friend; I am, I ought to be the friend of all who are
unhappy.”
“And is there really one human being who does not turn from me in
horror and disgust? Oh, sir, you jest.”
“No—on my soul, that which I say I mean. Come with me now, and you
shall if you please, remain in secret in my house—no one shall know you
are with me—from the moment that you cross the threshold you shall hope
for happier days.”
The vampyre paused, and it was evident that he was deeply affected by
what Mr. Bevan said to him, for his whole frame shook.
CHAPTER CCXXVI.
THE STRANGE GUEST.—THE LITTLE CHAPEL.—VARNEY’S NARRATIVE.
Mr. Bevan could not but see that he had made some impression, even upon
the obdurate heart of Varney, and he was determined to follow that
impression up by every means in his power.
“Always have in mind,” he said, “that by trusting me, you trust one who
is not in the habit of condemning his fellows. You will be safe from
anything like sanctified reproach, for to my thinking, religion should
be a principle of love and tenderness, and not a subject upon which
people who, perhaps are themselves liable and obnoxious to all sorts of
reproach, should deal forth denunciations against their neighbours.”
“Is that indeed your faith?”
“It is; and it is the real faith, taught by my Great Master.”
“You are as one among many thousands.”
“Nay, you may have been unfortunate in meeting with bad specimens of
those who are devoted in the priesthood. Do not condemn hastily.”
“Hastily! I have been some hundreds of years in condemning.”
“You will come with me.”
“I will for once again put faith in human nature.”
“Tell me then, before we leave this spot, if you know aught of what has
happened to, or become of the body of Clara Crofton.”
“I can tell you; it was left here buried, but uncovered.”
“Indeed—the ground is level, and I see no trace of a grave.”
“No; I have obliterated all such traces, I have placed the earth upon
her—may she now rest in peace. Oh, that such a flower should have been
so rudely plucked, and I the cause. Is not that enough to make Heaven’s
angels mutiny if I should essay to pass the golden gates.”
“Say no more of that. I thank God that the body is so disposed of, and
that it will not come in the way of any of the Crofton family. This
affair had far better now be let sink into oblivion—alas! poor Sir
George is now the most pitiable sufferer.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes; madness has seized upon him. He only sits and smiles to himself,
weaving in his imagination strange fancies.”
“And call you that unhappy?”
“It is called, and considered so.”
“Oh, fatal error—he is happy. Reason! boasted, God-like reason—what are
you but the curse of poor humanity. The maniac, who will in his cell,
fancy it a gorgeous hall, and of the damp straw that is his couch make
up a glittering coronet, is a king indeed, and most happy.”
“This is poetical,” said Mr. Bevan, “if not true.”
“It is true.”
“Well, well; we will talk on that as well as other themes at our
leisure. Come on, and I will at once take you to my home, where you
will be safe, and I hope more happy.”
“Are you not afraid?”
“I am not.”
“You are right, confidence is safety—lead on, sir, I’ll follow you,
although I little thought to make any human companionship to-night.”
Mr. Bevan walked only about a step in advance as they proceeded towards
the parsonage house, and on the way he conversed with Varney with
calmness which considering the very peculiar circumstances, few men
could have brought to bear upon the occasion.
But Mr. Bevan was no common man. He looked upon nature, and all the
living creatures that make up its vital portion with peculiar eyes,
and if the bishop of his diocese had known one half of what Mr. Bevan
thought, he would not have suffered him to remain in his religious
situation.
But he kept the mass of his liberal opinions to himself, although he
always acted upon them, and a man more completely free from sectarian
dogmas, and illiberal fancies of superstition, which are nicknamed
faith, could not be.
There was still, notwithstanding all the circumstances, a hope
lingering in his mind that Varney might after all not be even what he
thought himself to be, but some enthusiast who had dreamt himself into
a belief of his own horrible powers.
We know that such was not the case. But it was natural enough for Mr.
Bevan to hold as long as he could by such an idea.
And so those two most strangely assorted beings, the clergyman and the
vampyre, walked together towards the pretty and picturesque dwelling of
the former.
“The distance is short,” said Mr. Bevan.
“Nay, that matters not,” replied Varney.
“I spoke because I thought you seemed fatigued.”
“No, my frame is of iron. My heart is bowed down with many griefs,
but the physical structure knows no feeling of dejection. The life
I possess is no common one. Oh! would that it were so, that I might
shuffle it off as any ordinary men can do.”
“Do not say that. Who knows but that after all your living accomplishes
better things?”
“I cannot say that it accomplishes aught completely but one thing.”
“And that?”
“That is my most exquisite misery.”
“Even that may pass away. But here we are at my little garden gate.
Come in, and fear nothing; for if you will seek Heaven, as I would wish
you, you will find this place such a haven of peace, and such a refuge
against the storms of life, as you hardly fancied existed, I dare say,
in this world.”
“Not for me. I did not fancy that there existed a spot on earth on
which I could lie down in peace, and yet it may be here.”
CHAPTER CCXXVII.
VARNEY OPENS THE VAST STORE-HOUSE OF HIS MEMORY.
A more singular conversation than that which took place between Varney,
the Vampyre, and this minister of religion, could not be conceived.
If there was any one particle of goodness existing in Varney’s
disposition, we may suspect it would now be developed.
Perhaps the whole domestic history of the world never yet exhibited so
remarkable an association as that between Mr. Bevan and Varney; and
when they sat down together in the little cheerful study of the former,
never had four walls enclosed two beings of the same species, and yet
of such opposite pursuits.
But we can hardly call Varney, the Vampyre, human—his space of
existence had been lengthened out beyond the ordinary routine of human
existence, and the kind of vitality that he now enjoyed, if one might
be allowed the expression, was something distinct and peculiar.
It speaks volumes, however, for the philanthropy and liberality of the
minister of any religion who could hold out the hand of fellowship to
so revolting and to so horrible an existence.
But Mr. Bevan was no common man. His religion was doctrinal, certainly,
but it was free from bigotry; and his charity to the feelings,
opinions, and prejudices of others was immense.
He was accustomed to say “may not my feelings be prejudices,” and one
of the sublimest precepts of the whole Scriptures was to him that which
says, “Judge not, lest ye, too, should be judged.”
Hence it was that he would not allow himself to revolt at Varney. It
had seemed right to the great Creator of all things that there should
be such a being, and therefore, he, Mr. Bevan, would neither question
nor contemn it.
“Look about you,” he said to Varney with a disordered gaze; “you seem
to look very about you as if there was danger in the very atmosphere
you breathe, but be assured you are safe here; it shall be my life for
your life if any harm should be attempted to be done you.”
[Illustration: Sir Varney’s revelation to the clergyman.]
Varney looked at him for a few moments silence, and then in his deep
and sepulchral voice he spoke, saying,—
“My race is run.”
“What mean you by that expression?”
“I mean I shall no longer be a terror to the weak, nor a curiosity to
the strong. In time past, more than once I have tried to shuffle off
the evil of this frightful existence, but some accident, strange, wild,
and wonderful, has brought me back to life again.”
“Perhaps not an accident,” said Mr. Bevan.
“You may be right, but when I have sought to rid the world of my own
bad company, I have been moved to do so by some act of kindness and
consideration, most contrary to my deserts; and then again when I have
been cast back by the waves of fate upon the shores of existence, my
heart is burdened, and I have begun to plan to work mischief and misery
and woe to all.”
“I can understand how your feelings have alternated, but I hope that
our association will have a better result.”
“Yes, a better result, for with consummate art, with cool perseverance
and extended knowledge, I trust I may think of some means which cannot
fail of changing this living frame to that dust from which it sprung,
and to which it should long since have returned.”
“You believe in that, but do you not think there is a pure spirit that
will yet live, independent of the grovelling earth?”
“There are times when I have hoped that even that fable were true; but
you have promised me rest, will you keep your word?”
“That will I most certainly; but will you keep yours? You have promised
me some details of your extraordinary existence, and as a divine, and I
hope in some degree as a philosopher, I look for them with some degree
of anxiety.”
“You shall have them—leave me pens, ink and paper, and in the solitude
of this room, until to-morrow morning, and you shall have what I
believe to be the origin of this most horrible career.”
“Your wishes shall be consulted—but, will you not take refreshment?”
“Nothing—nothing. My refreshment is one I need not name to you, and
when forced by the world’s customs and considerations of my own safety,
I have partaken of man’s usual food, it has but ill accorded with my
preternatural existence, I eat not—drink not—here. You know me as I
am.”
As he continued speaking, Varney evidently grew weaker, and Mr. Bevan
could scarcely persuade himself that it was not through actual want of
nourishment, but the Vampyre assured him that it was not so, and that
rest would recruit him, to which opinion, as the experience of human
nature generally afforded no index to Varney’s peculiar habits, he was
forced to subscribe.
There was a couch in the room, and upon that Varney laid himself, and
as he seemed indisposed for further conversation, Mr. Bevan left him,
promising to return to him as he himself requested in the morning, with
the hope of finding that he had completed some sort of narrative to the
effect mentioned.
It can scarcely be said that Mr. Bevan had thoroughly made up his mind
to leave his guest for so long a period, and as there was a window that
looked from the study in his little garden, he thought, that by now
and then peeping in, to see that all was right, he could scarcely be
considered as breaking faith with his mysterious guest.
“He will surely attempt nothing against his own life,” thought Mr.
Bevan, “for already he seems to be impressed with the futility of such
an attempt, and to think that when he has made them he has been made
the sport of circumstances that had forced him back to life again,
despite all his wishes to the contrary.”
Mr. Bevan reasoned thus, but he little knew what was passing in the
mind of Varney the Vampire.
After about two hours more, when the night was profoundly dark, the
liberal-minded but anxious clergyman went into his garden, for the
purpose of peeping into his study, and he then saw, as he supposed, his
visitor lying enveloped in his large brown cloak, lying upon the couch.
He was better pleased to see he was sleeping, and recovering from the
great fatigue of which he complained, instead of writing, although that
writing promised to be of so interesting a character, and he crept
softly away for fear of awakening him.
The hour had now arrived at which Mr. Bevan usually retired to rest,
but he delayed doing so, and let two hours more elapse, after which, he
again stole out of his garden, and peeped into the study.
There lay the long, gaunt, slumbering figure upon the couch.
“I am satisfied,” said Mr. Bevan to himself; “fatigue has completely
overcome him, and he will sleep till morning now. I long much to become
acquainted with his strange eventful history.”
After this, Mr. Bevan retired to rest, but not until in prayer he had
offered up his thanks, and stated his hopes of being able to turn aside
from the wicked path he had been pursuing, the wretched man who at that
moment was slumbering peacefully beneath his roof.
We should have less of opposition to churchmen, if they were all like
Mr. Bevan, and not the wily, ravenous, illiberal, grasping crew they
really are. There was no priestcraft in him, he was almost enough to
make one in love with his doctrines, be they what they might, so that
they were his.
Although we say that he retired to rest, we should more properly say
he retired to try to rest; for, after all, there were feelings of
excitement and anxiety about him which he could not repress wholly; and
although he had every reason to believe his guest was sleeping, and
calmly sleeping too, yet he found he was becoming painfully alive to
the slightest sound.
He became nervously alive to the least interruption, and kept fancying
that he heard the slightest indications of movements in the house, such
as at any other time he would have paid no attention to.
It always happened, too, provokingly, that just as he was dropping
into a slight slumber, that he thought he heard one of these noises,
and then he would start, awake, and sit up in his bed, and listen
attentively, until tired nature forced him to repose again.
Those who have passed such a night of watchfulness need not be told how
very very exciting it becomes, and hour after hour becomes more intense
and acute, and the power of escaping its fell influence less and less.
Indeed, it was not until the dawn of morning that Mr. Bevan tasted the
sweets of sound repose, then, as is generally usual after nights of
fever and disquietude, the cool, pure, life-giving air of early morn,
produced quite a different state of feeling, and his repose was calm
and serene.
CHAPTER CCXXVIII.
THE FLIGHT OF THE VAMPYRE.—THE MASS.
As was to be expected, in consequence of the sleepless state in which
he had been in the early part of the night, Mr. Bevan did not awaken
at his usually early hour; and as his confidential servant had stolen
into his room upon tip-toe, and seeing that he was sleeping quietly and
soundly, she did not think proper to disturb him.
An autumnal sun was gleaming into his lattice window when he
spontaneously awoke, and the reflection of the sunlight upon a
particular portion of the wall convinced him that it was late.
For a moment or two, he lay in that dreamy state when we are just
conscious of where we are, without having the smallest pretensions to
another idea; and probably he would have dropped to sleep again had it
not been that his servant again opened the door, the lock of which had
the infirmity of giving a peculiar snap every time it was used, and
that thoroughly awakened him.
“Oh, you are awake, sir?” said his old servant, “I never knew you sleep
so long. Breakfast has been ready an hour and a half. It’s a cool
morning, sir, and what’s worse, I can’t get into your study to light
you a bit of fire, which I thought you would want.”
The interruption altogether, and the mention of the study, served
completely to arouse Mr. Bevan to a remembrance of the events of the
preceding evening, and he cried,—
“What’s the time? What’s the time?”
“It’s after nine, and as for the study—”
“Never mind the study—never mind the study, I will be down directly.”
Scarcely ever had Mr. Bevan dressed himself with such precipitation as
he now did.
“How provoking,” he thought, “that upon this particular occasion, when
I should like to have been up and stirring earlier than usual, I am a
good hour and a half later. It can’t be helped though, and if my guest
of last night is to be credited, he won’t be waiting for his breakfast.”
The simple toilet of the kind-hearted clergyman was soon completed, and
then he ran down stairs to the lower part of his house, and finding
that his servant was in the kitchen, he thought he might at once
proceed to his study, to speak to the extraordinary inmate.
He had furnished Varney with the means of locking himself in for the
night, and it would seem that the vampyre had fully availed himself
of those means, for when Mr. Bevan tried the door, he found himself
as much at fault as his servant had been, and could not by any means
effect an admittance.
“He said his fatigue was great,” remarked Mr. Bevan, “and so it seems
it was, for surely he is yet sleeping. It is a comfort when one
oversleeps oneself that the necessity for one’s rising has been put off
by the same means.”
Unwilling to disturb Varney, and not hearing from the slightest
movement from within that he had yet done so, Mr. Bevan went to his
breakfast, much better satisfied than he had been a quarter of an hour
since, and as the breakfast room adjoined the study, he had every
opportunity if the vampyre should be stirring, of hearing and attending
to him.
Not above ten minutes elapsed in this kind of way, when Mr. Bevan,
although he saw nothing of his guest, heard something of the approach
of a visitor, by the trampling of feet upon the gravel walk, and upon
looking through the window, he saw that it was his friend Sir George
Crofton from the hall.
It was rather an early hour for visitors, but still under the peculiar
circumstances, Sir George might be supposed not to stand upon ceremony
in calling upon the clergyman of his parish and upon his old friend,
combining, as Mr. Bevan did, both these characters in one.
It was rather, though, placing the clergyman in a situation of
difficulty, for while there was nothing he so much hated as mystery
and concealment, he yet could not, upon the spur of the moment, decide
whether he ought to inform Sir George of the presence of Varney or not.
After the frightful manner in which the baronet and his family had
suffered from what might be called the machinations of the vampyre, it
could scarcely be supposed that his feelings were otherwise than in
a most exasperated state, and it might, for all he knew, be actually
dangerous for the personal safety of that guest whom he had pledged his
honour to protect, to allow Sir George Crofton to know at all that he
was beneath his roof.
While he was engaged in these considerations, and before he could
come to anything like a conclusion concerning them, Sir George was
announced, and shown as a privileged visitor into the parlour.
We cannot but pause to make a remark upon the stupendous change that
had taken place in the appearance of that unhappy man. When first we
presented him to the reader, he was as good a specimen of the hale
hearty English gentleman, as we could wish to see; good humour and
good health beamed forth on every feature of his face; and well they
might do so, for although the past had not been uncheckered by trials,
the future wore to him a sunny aspect, and some of the feelings of his
youth were returning to him, in the happiness of his children.
But what a change was now. Twenty years of ordinary existence, with
extraordinary vicissitudes, would scarcely have produced the effect
that the events of the last fortnight had upon that unhappy father.
He appeared to be absolutely sinking into the grave with grief, and not
only was his countenance strangely altered, but the tones of his voice
were completely changed from what they had been.
Alas! poor Sir George Crofton, never will the light of joy again
illumine your face. There are griefs, inevitable griefs, which time
will heal, griefs which the more we look upon them the more we find our
reason array itself against them. But his sorrows were of a different
complexion, and were apt to grow more gigantic from thought.
“Good morning, Mr. Bevan,” he said, “I am an early visitor, sir.”
“Not more early than welcome, Sir George. I pray you to be seated.”
“You are very good,” said the baronet, “but when one comes at an hour
like this, I am of opinion that he ought to come with something like a
good excuse for his intrusion.”
“There is none needed, I assure you.”
“But I have been thinking upon the advice which you have given me, Mr.
Bevan, to leave this part of the country, and try the endeavour, by the
excitement and changes of foreign travel, to lessen the weight of my
calamities.”
“I think your determination is a good one, Sir George.”
“Probably it is the best I could adopt, but I must confess that
I should set about it in better spirit, but I am haunted by
apprehensions.”
“Apprehensions, Sir George! is not the worst passed?”
“It may be, and I hope to Heaven it is, but I have another child,
another daughter, fair and beautiful as my lost Clara; but what
security have I that that dreadful being may not pursue her, and with
frightful vindictiveness drive her to the grave.”
Mr. Bevan was silent two or three minutes, and the idea crossed him
that if he could get Sir George in the proper state of mind, it would
be, perhaps, better that he should know that the vampyre was in the
house, and in such a state of mind as not to renew any outrages against
him or his family, than that he should go abroad with the dread
clinging to him of being still followed and persecuted by that dreadful
being.
“Sir George,” said Mr. Bevan, in an extremely serious voice, “Sir
George, did you ever reason with yourself calmly and seriously, and in
a Christian spirit, about this affair.”
“Calmly, Mr. Bevan! how could I reason calmly?”
“I have scarcely put my question as I ought; what I meant to ask was,
what are your personal feelings towards the vampyre? We must recollect
that even he, dreadful existence as he is, was fashioned by the same
God that fashioned us; and who shall say but he may be the victim of a
horrible and stern necessity? Who shall say but he may be tortured by
remorse, and that the circumstances connected with your daughter, of
which you so justly complain, may be to him sources of the bitterest
reflection? What if you were to be assured that never more would that
mysterious man cross your path, if man we can call him? Do you think
that you could then forgive him?”
“It is hard to say, but the feeling that my other child was safe would
prompt me much.”
“Sir George, I could make a communication to you if I thought you would
listen to it patiently; if you will swear to me to be calm.”
“I swear, tell me—oh, tell me!”
“The vampyre is in this house.”
CHAPTER CCXXIX.
THE MYSTERIOUS DISAPPEARANCE.
One may form some sort of judgment of the astonishment with which Sir
George Crofton heard this statement. He looked indeed a few moments at
Mr. Bevan, as if he had a strong suspicion that he could not possibly
have heard aright, so that the good clergyman was induced to repeat his
statement, which he did, by saying,—
“Sir George, I assure you, however remarkable such a circumstance may
be, and however much you may feel yourself surprised at it, that in the
extreme bitterness of spirit, and feeling all the compunction that you
could possibly wish him to feel, Varney the Vampyre is now an inmate of
this house.”
Had a bomb-shell fallen at his feet, Sir George Crofton could not have
felt more surprised, and he exhibited that surprise by several times
repeating to himself,—
“Varney the Vampyre an inmate of this house! Varney the Vampyre here!”
“Yes,” said Mr. Bevan, “here, an inmate of this house. He is within
a few paces of you, slumbering in the next apartment, and from his
own lips you shall have the assurance that never again will you have
any trouble on his account, and that he most bitterly and most deeply
regrets the suffering he has brought upon you and yours.”
“Will that regret,” said Sir George, excitedly, “restore the dead? Will
that regret give me my child again? Will it open the portals of the
grave, and restore her to me who was the life and joy of my existence?
Tell me, will it do that? If not, what is his regret to me?”
“No, Sir George, no, his regret will not do that. There is such
power, but it is not upon earth. Heaven delegates not such fearful
responsibilities to any of its creatures, and the only reason which has
induced me to make this confidence was to take from you the fearful
anxiety of fancying yourself followed by that dreadful being.”
“Vengeance,” replied Sir George Crofton, “vengeance shall be mine. In
the name of my lost child, I cry for vengeance. Shall he not perish who
has made her whom I love perish? Make way, Mr. Bevan, make way.”
“No, Sir George, no, this is my house. I, as a Christian minister,
offered the hospitality of its roof to Varney the Vampyre, and I cannot
violate my word.”
“You speak, sir, to a desperate man,” cried Sir George; “no roof to me
is sanctified, beneath which the murderer of my child finds a shelter.
Mr. Bevan, the respect that one man has for another, or ever has had
for another, cannot exceed the respect I have for you; but with all
that, sir, I cannot forget my own personal wrongs; the shade of my
murdered Clara beckons me.”
“Fly, Varney, fly,” cried Mr. Bevan, “fly.”
“Is it so?” said Sir George; “do you then side with my direst foe?”
“No—no, I side with Sir George Crofton against his own furious
unbridled passions.”
Neither from profession nor practice was Mr. Bevan one who was likely
to force to resist Sir George, and at the moment the baronet was about
to lay hands upon him to hurl him from his path, he slipped aside.
“Rash man,” he said, “the time will come when you will repent this
deed.”
The door of the study was still fast, but to the infuriated Sir George,
that opposed but a very frail obstacle, and with the effort of a moment
he forced it open, and rushed into the apartment.
“Varney, monster,” he cried, “prepare to meet your doom. Your career is
at an end.”
Mr. Bevan was after him, and in the room with him in a moment, fully
expecting that some very dreadful scene would ensue, as a consequence
of the unbridled passion of Sir George Crofton.
Sir George Crofton was standing in the centre of the apartment with
Varney’s large brown cloak in his grasp, which he had dragged from the
sofa, but the vampyre himself was not to be seen.
[Illustration: The discovery of the vampyre’s flight.]
“Escaped!” he cried, “escaped!”
“Thank Heaven, then,” said Mr. Bevan, “that this roof has not been
desecrated by an act of violence. Oh, Sir George, it is a mercy that
time has been given to think he has escaped.”
“I’ll follow him, were it to perdition.”
Sir George was about to open the window and rush into the garden,
thinking, of course, it was by that means by which the vampyre escaped,
but Mr. Bevan laid his hand upon the smooth gravel path that was
immediately below the casement.
“Behold,” he said, “one of the first results of an autumnal night. That
this coating of fleecy sleet, you see, is undisturbed; it fell about
midnight; nine hours have since elapsed, and you perceive there is no
foot mark upon it, and in what direction would you chase Varney the
Vampyre while he has such a start of you?”
Infuriated with passion, as was Sir George Crofton, the reasonableness
of this statement struck him forcibly, and he became silent. A
revulsion of feeling took place; he staggered to a seat, and wept.
“Yes, he is gone,” he said. “Yes, the murderer of my child is gone;
vengeance is delayed, but perhaps not altogether stopped. Oh, Mr.
Bevan, Mr. Bevan, why did you tell me he was here?”
“I do now regret having done so, but I believed him to be here, and his
departure is as mysterious to me as it can be to you.”
Mr. Bevan cast his eyes upon the table, and there he saw a large packet
addressed to himself. Sir George saw it too, at the same moment, and
pointing to it, said,—
“Is that the vampyre’s legacy to his new friend?”
“Sir George,” said Mr. Bevan, “let it suffice that the packet is
addressed to me.”
All the good breeding of the gentleman returned, and Sir George Crofton
bowed as he left the room, closely followed by the clergyman, who was
as much bewildered by the disappearance of Varney as even Sir George
could possibly be. He had a most intense desire to examine the packet,
with the hope that there he should find some explanation or solution of
the mystery; but not being aware, of course, of what it contained, he
could not tell if it would be prudent to trust Sir George at that time
with its contents.
As may be well supposed, there was a sort of restraint in the manner of
both of them after what had happened, and they did what was very rare
with them both, parted without making any appointment for the future.
But whatever might be the feelings of Sir George Crofton then, a little
reflection would be quite sure to bring him back again to a proper
estimation of what was due to such a friend as Mr. Bevan, and we
cannot anticipate any serious interruption to their general friendly
intercourse.
The moment the clergyman found himself alone, he with eager steps went
into his study, and eagerly seized upon the packet that was left to him
by the vampyre, the outside of which merely bore the superscription
of—“These to the Rev. Mr. Bevan, and strictly private.”
With eagerness he tore open the envelope, and the first thing that
attracted his attention was a long, narrow slip of paper, on which were
written the following words:—
“It was not my intention to trespass largely upon your
hospitality; it would have been unjust—almost approaching
to criminality so to do. I could only think of taking a
brief refuge in your house, so brief as should just enable
me to avail myself of the shadows of night to escape from a
neighbourhood where I knew I should be hunted.
The few hours which I have quietly remained beneath your roof
have been sufficient to accomplish that object, and the papers
that I leave you accompanying this, contain the personal
information concerning me you asked. They had been previously
prepared, and are at your service.
“To attempt to follow me would be futile, for I have as ample
means of making a rapid journey as you could possibly call to
your aid, and I have the advantage of many hours’ start; under
these circumstances I have no hesitation in telling you that
my destination is Naples, and that perhaps the next you hear
of me will be, that some stranger in a fit of madness has cast
himself into the crater of a burning mountain, which would at
once consume him and all his sorrows.
“+Varney the Vampyre+.”
One may imagine the feelings with which Mr. Bevan read this most
strange and characteristic epistle—feelings that for some moments kept
him a prisoner to the most painful thoughts.
All that he had hoped to accomplish by the introduction of Varney
to his house was lost now. He had but in fact given him a better
opportunity of carrying out a terrible design—a design which now there
really did not appear to be any means of averting the consummation of.
“Alas! alas!” he said, “this is most grievous, and what can I do now,
to avert the mischief—nothing, absolutely nothing. If it be true that
he has, as he says he has, the means of hastening on his journey, all
pursuit would be utterly useless.”
This was taking a decidedly correct view of the matter. Varney was not
the sort of man, if he really intended to reach Naples quickly, to
linger on his route, and then there was another view of the subject
which could not but occur to Mr. Bevan, and that was, that his
mentioned destination might be but a blind to turn off pursuit.
CHAPTER CCXXX.
VARNEY GIVES SOME PERSONAL ACCOUNT OF HIMSELF.
Never had Mr. Bevan in all his recollection been in such a state of
hesitation as now.
He was a man usually of rapid resolves, and very energetic action;
but the circumstances that had recently taken place were of so very
remarkable a nature, that he was not able to bring to bear upon them
any portion of his past experience.
He felt that he could come to no determination, but was compelled by
the irresistible force of events to be a spectator instead of an actor
in what might ensue.
“I shall hear,” he thought, “if any such event happens at Naples as
that to which Varney has adverted, and until I do so, or until a
sufficient length of time has elapsed to make me feel certain that he
will not plunge into that burning abyss, I shall be a prey to every
kind of fear; and then again as regards Sir George Crofton. What am I
to say to him? Shall I show him this note or not?”
Even that was a question which he could not absolutely decide in his
own mind, although he was strongly inclined to think that it would be
highly desirable to do so, and while he was considering the point, and
holding the note in his hand, his eye fell upon the other papers which
had been enclosed with it, and addressed to him.
Hoping and expecting that there he should find something that would
better qualify him to come to an accurate conclusion, he took up
the packet, and found that the topmost paper bore the following
endorsement:—
“SOME PARTICULARS CONCERNING MY OWN LIFE.”
“There, then,” said Mr. Bevan, “is what he has promised me.”
It was to be expected that Mr. Bevan should take up those papers with a
very considerable amount of curiosity, and as he could not think what
course immediately to pursue that would do good to Varney or anybody
else, he thought he had better turn his attention at once to the
documents that the vampyre had left to his perusal.
Telling his servant, then, not to allow him to be disturbed unless the
affair was a very urgent one indeed, he closed the door of his study,
and commenced reading one of the most singular statements that ever
created being placed upon paper. It was as follows:—
• • • • •
During my brief intercourse—and it has always been brief when of a
confidential nature with various persons—I have created surprise by
talking of individuals and events long since swallowed up in the almost
forgotten past. In these few pages I declare myself more fully.
In the reign of the First Charles, I resided in a narrow street, in the
immediate neighbourhood of Whitehall. It was a straggling, tortuous
thoroughfare, going down to the Thames; it matters little what were
my means of livelihood, but I have no hesitation in saying that I was
a well-paid agent in some of the political movements which graced and
disgraced that period.
London was then a mass of mean-looking houses; with here and there
one that looked like a palace, compared with its humbler neighbours.
Almost every street appeared to be under the protection of some great
house situated somewhere in its extent, but such of those houses as
have survived the wreck of time rank now with their neighbours, and are
so strangely altered, that I, who knew many of them well, could now
scarcely point to the place where they used to stand.
I took no prominent part in the commotions of that period, but I saw
the head of a king held up in its gore at Whitehall as a spectacle for
the multitude.
There were thousands of persons in England who had aided to bring about
that result, but who were very far from expecting it, and who were the
first to fall under the ban of the gigantic power they had themselves
raised.
Among these were many of my employers; men, who had been quite willing
to shake the stability of a throne so far as the individual occupying
it was concerned; but who certainly never contemplated the destruction
of monarchy; so the death of the First Charles, and the dictatorship of
Cromwell, made royalists in abundance.
They had raised a spirit they could not quell again, and this was
a fact which the stern, harsh man, Cromwell, with whom I had many
interviews, was aware of.
My house was admirably adapted for the purposes of secrecy and
seclusion, and I became a thriving man from the large sums I received
for aiding the escape of distinguished loyalists, some of whom lay for
a considerable time _perdu_ at my house, before an eligible opportunity
arrived of dropping down the river quietly to some vessel which would
take them to Holland.
It was to offer me so much per head for these royalists that Cromwell
sent for me, and there was one in particular who had been private
secretary to the Duke of Cleveland, a young man merely, of neither
family nor rank, but of great ability, whom Cromwell was exceedingly
anxious to capture.
I think there likewise must have been some private reasons which
induced the dictator of the Commonwealth to be so anxious concerning
this Master Francis Latham, which was the name of the person alluded to.
It was late one evening when a stranger came to my house, and having
desired to see me, was shown into a private apartment, when I
immediately waited upon him.
“I am aware,” he said, “that you have been confidentially employed by
the Duke of Cleveland, and I am aware that you have been very useful to
distressed loyalists, but in aiding Master Francis Latham, the duke’s
secretary, you will be permitted almost to name your own terms.”
I named a hundred pounds, which at that time was a much larger sum than
now, taking into consideration the relative value. One half of it was
paid to me at once, and the other promised within four-and-twenty hours
after Latham had effected his escape.
I was told that at half-past twelve o’clock that night, a man dressed
in common working apparel, and with a broom over his shoulder would
knock at my door and ask if he could be recommended to a lodging, and
that by those tokens I should know him to be Francis Latham. A Dutch
lugger, I was further told, was lying near Gravesend, on board of
which, to earn my money, I was expected to place the fugitive.
All this was duly agreed upon; I had a boat in readiness, with a couple
of watermen upon whom I could depend, and I was far from anticipating
any extraordinary difficulties in carrying out the enterprise.
I had a son about twelve years of age, who being a sharp acute lad, I
found very useful upon several occasions, and I never scrupled to make
him acquainted with any such affair as this that I am recounting.
Half past twelve o’clock came, and in a very few minutes after that
period of time there came a knock at my door, which my son answered,
and according to arrangement, there was the person with a broom, who
asked to be recommended to a lodging, and who was immediately requested
to walk in.
He seemed rather nervous, and asked me if I thought there was much risk.
“No,” said I, “no more than ordinary risk in all these cases, but we
must wait half an hour ’till the tide turns. For just now to struggle
against it down the river would really be nothing else but courting
observation.”
To this he perfectly agreed, and sat down by my fireside.
I was as anxious as he to get the affair over, for it was a ticklish
job, and Oliver Cromwell, if he had brought anything of the kind
exactly home to me, would as life order me to be shot as he would have
taken his luncheon in the name of the Lord.
I accordingly went down to the water-side to speak to the men who were
lying there with the boat, and had ascertained from them that in about
twenty minutes the tide would begin to ebb in the centre of the stream,
when two men confronted me.
Practised as I was in the habits and appearances of the times, I
guessed at once who they were. In fact, a couple of Oliver Cromwell’s
dismounted dragoons were always well known.
“You are wanted,” said one of them to me.
“Yes, you are particularly wanted,” said the other.
“But, gentlemen, I am rather busy,” said I. “In an hour’s time I will
do myself the pleasure, if you please, of waiting upon you anywhere you
wish to name.”
The only reply they made to this was the practical one, of getting on
each side of me, and then hurrying me on, past my own door.
I was taken right away to St. James’s at a rapid pace, being hurried
through one of the court yards; we paused at a small door, at which was
a sentinel.
My two guides communicated something to him, and he allowed us to pass.
There was a narrow passage without any light, and through another door,
at which was likewise a sentinel, who turned the glare of a lantern
upon me and my conductors. Some short explanation was given to him
likewise, during which I heard the words His Highness, which was the
title which Cromwell had lately assumed.
They pushed me through this doorway, closed it behind me, and left me
alone in the dark.
CHAPTER CCXXXI.
A SINGULAR INTERVIEW, AND THE CONSEQUENCES OF PASSION.
Being perfectly ignorant of where I was, I thought the most prudent
plan was to stand stock still, for if I advanced it might be into
danger, and my retreat was evidently cut off.
Moreover, those who brought me there must have some sort of intention,
and it was better for me to leave them to develop it than to take any
steps myself, which might be of a very hazardous nature.
That I was adopting the best policy I was soon convinced, for a flash
of light suddenly came upon me, and I heard a gruff voice, say,—
“Who goes there? come this way.”
I walked on, and passed through an open door way into a small
apartment, in the centre of which, standing by a common deal table on
which his clenched hand was resting, I found Oliver Cromwell himself.
“So, sirrah,” he said, “royalists and pestilent characters are to
ravage the land, are they so? answer me.”
“I have no answer to make, your highness,” said I.
“God’s mercy, no answer, when in your own house the Duke of Cleveland’s
proscribed secretary lies concealed.”
I felt rather staggered, but was certain I had been betrayed by some
one, and Cromwell continued rapidly, without giving me time to speak.
“The Lord is merciful, and so are we, but the malignant must be taken
by the beloved soldiers of the Commonwealth, and the gospel God-fearing
men, who always turn to the Lord, with short carbines, will accompany
you. The malignant shall be taken from your house, by you, and the true
God-fearing dragoons shall linger in the shade behind. You will take
him to the river side, where the Lord willing, there will be a boat
with a small blue ensign, on board of which you will place him, wishing
him good speed.”
He paused, and looked fixedly upon me by the aid of the miserable light
that was in the apartment.
“What then, your highness?” I said.
“Then you will probably call upon us to-morrow for a considerable sum,
which will be due to you for this good service to the Commonwealth;
yes, it shall be profitable to fight the battles of the Lord.”
I must confess, I had expected a very different result from the
interview, which I had been greatly in fear would have resulted, in
greatly endangering my liberty. Cromwell was a man not to be tampered
with; I knew my danger, and was not disposed to sacrifice myself for
Master Latham.
“Your highness shall be obeyed,” I said.
“Ay, verily,” he replied, “and if we be not obeyed, we must make
ourselves felt with a strong arm of flesh. What ho! God-fearing
Simpkins, art thou there?”
“Yes, the Lord willing,” said a dragoon, making his appearance at the
door.
Cromwell merely made him a sign with his hand, and he laid hold of the
upper part of my arm, as though it had been in a vice, and led me out
into the passage again where the sentinels were posted.
In the course of a few moments, I was duly in custody of my two guards
again, and we were proceeding at a very rapid pace towards my residence.
It was not a very agreeable affair, view it in whatever light I
might; but as regarded Cromwell, I knew my jeopardy, and it would be
perceived that I had not hesitated a moment in obeying him. Moreover, I
considered, for I knew he was generous, I should have a good round sum
by the transaction, which added to the fifty pounds I had received from
the royalists, made the affair appear to me in a pleasant enough light.
Indeed, I was revolving in my mind as I went along, whether it would
not be worth while, almost entirely to attach myself to the protector.
“If,” I reasoned with myself, “I should do that, and still preserve
myself a character with the royalists, I should thrive.”
But it will be seen that an adverse circumstance put an end to all
those dreams.
When we reached the door of my house, the first thing I saw was my son
wiping his brow, as if he had undergone some fatigue; he ran up to me,
and catching me by the arm, whispered to me.
I was so angered at the moment, that heedless of what I did, and
passion getting the mastery over me, I with my clenched fist struck
him to the earth. His head fell upon one of the hard round stones with
which the street was paved, and he never spoke again. I had murdered
him.
• • • • •
I don’t know what happened immediately subsequent to this fearful deed;
all I can recollect is, that there was a great confusion and a flashing
of lights, and it appeared to me as if something had suddenly struck me
down to the earth with great force.
When I did thoroughly awaken, I found myself lying upon a small couch,
but in a very large apartment dimly lighted, and where there were many
such couches ranged against the walls. A miserable light just enabled
me to see about me a little, and some dim dusky-looking figures were
creeping about the place.
It was a hospital that the protector had lately instituted in the
Strand.
I tried to speak, but could not; my tongue seemed glued to my mouth,
and I could not, and then a change came upon my sense of sight, and I
could scarcely see at all the dim dusky-looking figures about me.
Some one took hold of me by the wrist, and I heard one say, quite
distinctly,—
“He’s entirely going, now.”
Suddenly it seemed as if something had fallen with a crushing influence
upon my chest, and then a consciousness that I was gasping for breath,
and then I thought I was at the bottom of the sea. There was a moment,
only a moment, of frightful agony, and then came a singing sound, like
the rush of waters, after which, I distinctly felt some one raising
me in their arms. I was dropped again, my limbs felt numbed and chill,
an universal spasm shot through my whole system, I opened my eyes, and
found myself lying in the open air, by a newly opened grave.
A full moon was sailing through the sky and the cold beams were upon my
face; a voice sounded in my ears, a deep and solemn voice—and painfully
distinct was every word it uttered.
“Mortimer,” it said, for that was my name, “Mortimer, in life you did
one deed which at once cast you out from all hope that anything in that
life would be remembered in the world to come to your advantage. You
poisoned the pure font of mercy, and not upon such as you can the downy
freshness of Heaven’s bounty fall. Murderer, murderer of that being
sacredly presented to your care by the great Creator of all things,
live henceforth a being accursed. Be to yourself a desolation and a
blight, shunned by all that is good and virtuous, armed against all
men, and all men armed against thee, Varney the Vampyre.”
• • • • •
I staggered to my feet, the scene around me was a churchyard, I was
gaunt and thin, my clothes hung about me in tattered remnants. The damp
smell of the grave hung about them, I met an aged man, and asked him
where I was. He looked at me with a shudder, as though I had escaped
from some charnel house.
“Why this is Isledon,” said he.
A peal of bells came merrily upon the night air.
“What means that?” said I.
“Why this is the anniversary of the Restoration.”
“The Restoration! What Restoration?”
“Why of the royal family to the throne, to be sure, returned this day
last year. Have you been asleep so long that you don’t know that?”
I shuddered and walked on, determined to make further inquiries, and to
make them with so much caution, that the real extent of my ignorance
should scarce be surmised, and the result was to me of the most
astonishing character.
I found that I had been in the trance of death for nearly two years,
and that during that period, great political changes had taken place.
The exiled royal family had been restored to the throne, and the most
remarkable revulsion of feeling that had ever taken place in a nation
had taken place in England.
But personally I had not yet fully awakened to all the horror of what I
was. I had heard the words addressed to me, but I had attached no very
definite meaning to them.
CHAPTER CCXXXII.
VARNEY’S NARRATIVE CONTINUED.
Mr. Bevan paused when he had got thus far, to ask himself if he ought
to give credence to what he read, or put it down as the raving of some
person, whose wits had become tangled and deranged by misfortune.
Had the manuscript come to him without other circumstances to give
it the air of truthfulness, he would have read it only as a literary
curiosity, but it will be remembered that he had been a spectator of
the resuscitation of Clara Crofton, which afforded of itself a very
frightful verification of Varney’s story—a story so horrible in all its
details, that but for the great interest which it really possessed,
he would have deeply regretted the mixing it up in his memory with
brighter subjects.
There was something yet to read in the papers before him, and thinking
that it was better to know all at once than to leave his imagination
to work upon matters so likely seriously to affect it, he resumed his
perusal of these papers, which might be considered the autobiography of
Varney.
• • • • •
I have already said that I was not yet fully alive to the horror of
what I was, but I soon found what the words which had been spoken to
me by the mysterious being who had exhumed me meant; I was a thing
accursed, a something to be shunned by all men, a horror, a blight, and
a desolation.
I felt myself growing sick and weak, as I traversed the streets of the
city, and yet I loathed the sight of food, whenever I saw it.
I reached my own house, and saw that it had been burned down; there lay
nothing but a heap of charred ruins where it once stood.
But I had an interest in those ruins, for from time to time I had
buried considerable sums of money beneath the flooring of the lowest
apartments, and I had every reason to believe, as such a secret
treasure was only known to myself, that it remained untouched.
I waited until the moon became obscured by some passing clouds, and
then having a most intimate knowledge of the locality, I commenced
groping about the ruins, and removing a portion of them, until I made
my way to the spot where my money was hidden.
The morning came, however, and surprised me at my occupation; so I hid
myself among the ruins of what had once been my home for a whole day,
and never once stirred from my concealment.
Oh, it was a long and weary day. I could hear the prattle of children
at play, an inn or change-house was near at hand, and I could hear
noisy drinkers bawling forth songs that had been proscribed in the
Commonwealth.
I saw a poor wretch hunted nearly to death, close to where I lay
concealed, because from the fashion of his garments, and the cut of his
hair, he was supposed to belong to the deposed party.
But the long expected night came at last. It was a dark one, too, so
that it answered my purpose well.
I had found an old rusty knife among the ruins, and with that I set to
work to dig up my hidden treasure; I was successful, and found it all.
Not a guinea had been removed, although in the immediate neighbourhood,
there were those who would have sacrificed a human life for any piece
of gold that I had hoarded.
I made no enquiries about any one that had belonged to me. I dreaded to
receive some horrible and circumstantial answer, but I did get a slight
piece of news, as I left the ruins, although I asked not for it.
“There’s a poor devil,” said one; “did you ever see such a wretch in
all your life?”
“Why, yes,” said another, “he’s enough to turn one’s canary sour, he
seems to have come up from the ruins of Mortimers’s house. By-the-by
did you ever hear what became of him?”
“Yes, to be sure, he was shot by two of Cromwell’s dragoons in some
fracas or another.”
“Ah, I recollect now, I heard as much. He murdered his son, didn’t he?”
I passed on. Those words seemed to send a bolt of fire through the
brain, and I dreaded that the speaker might expatiate upon them.
A slow misty rain was falling, which caused the streets to be very much
deserted, but being extremely well acquainted with the city, I passed
on till I came to that quarter which was principally inhabited by Jews,
who I knew would take my money without any troublesome questions being
asked me, and also I could procure every accommodation required; and
they did do so, for before another hour had passed over my head, I
emerged richly habited as a chevalier of the period, having really not
paid to the conscientious Israelite much more than four times the price
of the clothing I walked away with.
And thus I was in the middle of London, with some hundreds of pounds in
my pocket, and a horrible uncertainty as to what I was.
I was growing fainter and fainter still, and I feared that unless I
succeeded in housing myself shortly, I should become a prey to some
one who, seeing my exhausted condition, would, notwithstanding I had a
formidable rapier by my side, rob me of all I possessed.
My career has been much too long and too chequered an one even to give
the briefest sketch of. All I purpose here to relate is how I became
convinced I was a vampyre, and that blood was my congenial nourishment
and the only element of my new existence.
I passed on until I came to a street where I knew the houses were large
but unfashionable, and that they were principally occupied by persons
who made a trade by letting out apartments, and there I thought I might
locate myself in safety.
As I made no difficulty about terms, there was no difficulty at all of
any sort, and I found myself conducted into a tolerably handsome suite
of rooms in the house of a decent-looking widow woman, who had two
daughters, young and blooming girls, both of whom regarded me as the
new lodger, with looks of anything but favour, considering my awful and
cadaverous appearance most probably as promising nothing at all in the
shape of pleasant companionship.
This I was quite prepared for—I had seen myself in a mirror—that was
enough; and I could honestly have averred that a more ghastly and
horrible looking skeleton, attired in silks and broad-cloth, never yet
walked the streets of the city.
When I retired to my chamber, I was so faint and ill, that I could
scarcely drag one foot after the other; and was ruminating what
I should do, until a strange feeling crept over me that I should
like——what? Blood!—raw blood, reeking and hot, bubbling and juicy, from
the veins of some gasping victim.
A clock upon the stairs struck one. I arose and listened attentively;
all was still in the house—still as the very grave.
It was a large old rambling building, and had belonged at one time, no
doubt, to a man of some mark and likelihood in the world. My chamber
was one of six that opened from a corridor of a considerable length,
and which traversed the whole length of the house.
I crept out into this corridor, and listened again for full ten
minutes, but not the slightest sound, save my own faint breathing,
disturbed the stillness of the house; and that emboldened me so that,
with my appetite for blood growing each moment stronger, I began to ask
myself from whose veins I could seek strength and nourishment.
But how was I to proceed? How was I to know in that large house which
of the sleepers I could attack with safety, for it had now come to
that, that I was to attack somebody. I stood like an evil spirit,
pondering over the best means of securing a victim.
And there came over me the horrible faintness again, that faintness
which each moment grew worse, and which threatened completely to
engulf me. I feared that some flush of it would overtake me, and then
I should fall to rise no more; and strange as it may appear, I felt
a disposition to cling to the new life that had been given to me. I
seemed to be acquainted already with all its horrors, but not all its
joys.
Suddenly the darkness of the corridor was cleared away, and soft and
mellow light crept into it, and I said to myself,—
“The moon has risen.”
Yes, the bright and beautiful moon, which I had felt the soft influence
of when I lay among the graves, had emerged from the bank of clouds
along the eastern sky, its beams descending through a little window.
They streamed right through the corridor, faintly but effectually
illuminating it, and letting me see clearly all the different doors
leading to the different chambers.
And thus it was that I had light for anything I wished to do, but not
information.
The moonbeams playing upon my face seemed to give me a spurious sort
of strength. I did not know until after experience what a marked and
sensible effect they would always have upon me, but I felt it even
then, although I did not attribute it wholly to the influence of the
queenly planet.
I walked on through the corridor, and some sudden influence seemed to
guide me to a particular door. I know not how it was, but I laid my
hand upon the lock, and said to myself,—
“I shall find my victim here.”
CHAPTER CCXXXIII.
THE NIGHT ATTACK.—THE HORRIBLE CONCLUSION.
I paused yet a moment, for there came across me even then, after I had
gone so far, a horrible dread of what I was about to do, and a feeling
that there might be consequences arising from it that would jeopardise
me greatly. Perhaps even then if a great accession of strength had
come to my aid—mere bodily aid I mean—I should have hesitated, and
the victim would have escaped; but, as if to mock me, there came that
frightful feeling of exhaustion which felt so like the prelude to
another death.
I no longer hesitated; I turned the lock of the door, and I thought
that I must be discovered. I left it open about an inch, and then flew
back to my own chamber.
I listened attentively; there was no alarm, no movement in any of the
rooms—the same death-like stillness pervaded the house, and I felt that
I was still safe.
A soft gleam of yellow looking light had come through the crevice of
the door when I had opened it. It mingled strangely with the moonlight,
and I concluded correctly enough, as I found afterwards, that a light
was burning in the chamber.
It was at least another ten minutes before I could sufficiently
re-assure myself to glide from my own room and approach that of the
fated sleeper; but at length I told myself that I might safely do so,
and the night was waning fast, and if anything was to be accomplished
it must be done at once, before the first beams of early dawn should
chase away the spirits of the night, and perhaps should leave me no
power to act.
“What shall I be,” I asked myself; “after another four-and-twenty hours
of exhaustion? Shall I have power then to make the election of what I
will do or what I will not? No, I may suffer the pangs of death again,
and the scarcely less pangs of another revival.”
This reasoning—if it may be called reasoning—decided me; and with
cautious and cat-like footsteps, I again approached the bed-room door
which I had opened.
I no longer hesitated, but at once crossed the threshold, and looked
around me. It was the chamber of the youngest of my landlady’s
daughters, who, as far as I could judge, seemed to be about sixteen
years of age; but they had evidently been so struck with my horrible
appearance, that they had placed themselves as little as possible in my
way, so that I could not be said to be a very good judge of their ages
or of their looks.
I only knew she was the youngest, because she wore her hair long, and
wore it in ringlets, which were loose and streaming over the pillow on
which she slept, while her sister, I remarked, wore her hair plaited
up, and completely off her neck and shoulders.
I stood by the bed side, and looked upon this beautiful girl in all the
pride of her young beauty, so gently and quietly slumbering. Her lips
were parted, as though some pleasant images were passing in her mind,
and induced a slight smile even in her sleep. She murmured twice, too,
a word, which I thought was the name of some one—perchance the idol of
her young heart—but it was too indistinct for me to catch it, nor did I
care to hear; that which was perhaps a very cherished secret, indeed,
mattered not to me. I made no pretensions to her affections, however
strongly in a short time I might stand in her abhorrence.
One of her arms, which was exquisitely rounded, lay upon the coverlet;
a neck, too, as white as alabaster, was partially exposed to my gaze,
but I had no passions—it was food I wanted.
I sprung upon her. There was a shriek, but not before I had secured
a draught of life blood from her neck. It was enough. I felt it dart
through my veins like fire, and I was restored. From that moment I
found out what was to be my sustenance; it was blood—the blood of the
young and the beautiful.
[Illustration: Varney’s first taste of blood, from the youngest
daughter.]
The house was thoroughly alarmed, but not before I had retired to my
own chamber. I was but partially dressed, and those few clothes I threw
off me, and getting into my bed, I feigned to be asleep; so that when a
gentleman who slept likewise in the house, but of whose presence I knew
nothing, knocked hardly at my door, I affected to awaken in a fright,
and called out,—
“What is it? what is it?—for God’s sake tell me if it is a fire.”
“No, no—but get up, sir, get up. There’s some one in the place. An
attempt at murder, I think, sir.”
I arose and opened the door; so by the light he carried he saw that I
had to dress myself—he was but half attired himself, and he carried his
sword beneath his arm.
“It is a strange thing,” he said; “but I have heard a shriek of alarm.”
“And I likewise,” said I; “but I thought it was a dream.”
“Help! help! help!” cried the widow, who had risen, but stood upon the
threshold of her own chamber; “thieves! thieves!”
By this time I had got on sufficient of my apparel that I could make an
appearance, and, likewise with my sword in my hand, I sallied out into
the corridor.
“Oh, gentlemen—gentlemen,” cried the landlady, “did you hear anything?”
“A shriek, madam,” said my fellow-lodger; “have you looked into your
daughters’ chambers?”
The room of the youngest daughter was the nearest, and into that she
went at once. In another moment she appeared on the threshold again
with a face as white as a sheet, then she wrung her hands, and said,—
“Murder! murder!—my child is murdered—my child is murdered, Master
Harding,”—which I found was the name of my fellow-lodger.
“Fling open one of the windows, and call for the watch,” said he to
me, “and I will search the room, and woe be to any one that I may find
within its walls unauthorised.”
I did as he desired, and called the watch, but the watch came not,
and then, upon a second visit to her daughter, the landlady found
she had only fainted, and that she had been deceived in thinking she
was murdered by the sudden sight of the blood upon her neck, so the
house was restored to something like quiet again, and the morning
being now near at hand, Mr. Harding retired to his chamber, and I to
mine, leaving the landlady and her eldest daughter assiduous in their
attentions to the younger.
How wonderfully revived I felt—I was quite a new creature when the
sunlight came dancing into my apartment. I dressed and was about to
leave the house, when Mr. Harding came out of one of the lower rooms,
and intercepted me.
“Sir,” he said, “I have not the pleasure of knowing you, but I have no
doubt that an ordinary feeling of chivalry will prompt you to do all in
your power to obviate the dread of such another night as the past.”
“Dread, sir,” said I, “the dread of what?”
“A very proper question,” he said, “but one I can hardly answer; the
girl states, she was awakened by some one biting her neck, and in proof
of the story she actually exhibits the marks of teeth, and so terrified
is she, that she declares that she shall never be able to sleep again.”
“You astonish me.”
“No doubt—it is sufficiently astonishing to excuse even doubts; but
if you and I, who are both inmates of the house, were to keep watch
to-night in the corridor, it might have the effect of completely
quieting the imagination of the young girl, and perhaps result in the
discovery of this nocturnal disturber of the peace.”
“Certainly,” said I, “command me in any way, I shall have great
pleasure.”
“Shall it be understood, then, that we meet at eleven in your apartment
or in mine.”
“Whichever you may please to consider the most convenient, sir.”
“I mention my own then, which is the furthest door in the corridor, and
where I shall be happy to see you at eleven o’clock.”
There was a something about this young man’s manner which I did not
altogether like, and yet I could not come to any positive conclusion
as to whether he suspected me, and therefore I thought it would be
premature to fly, when perhaps there would be really no occasion for
doing so; on the contrary, I made up my mind to wait the result of the
evening, which might or might not be disastrous to me. At all events,
I considered that I was fully equal to taking my own part, and if by
the decrees of destiny I was really to be, as it were, repudiated from
society, and made to endure a new, strange, and horrible existence,
I did not see that I was called upon to be particular how I rescued
myself from difficulties that might arise.
Relying, then, upon my own strength, and my own unscrupulous use of it,
I awaited with tolerable composure the coming of night.
During the day I amused myself by walking about, and noting the
remarkable changes which so short a period as two years had made in
London. But these happened to be two years most abundantly prolific in
change. The feelings and habits of people seemed to have undergone a
thorough revolution, which I was the more surprised at when I learned
by what thorough treachery the restoration of the exiled family was
effected.
The day wore on; I felt no need of refreshment, and I began to feel
my own proper position, and to feel that occasionally a draught of
delicious life-blood, such as I had quaffed the night before was fresh
marrow to my bones.
I could see, when I entered the house where I had made my temporary
home, that notwithstanding that I considered my appearance wonderfully
improved, that feeling was not shared in by others, for the whole
family shrunk from me as though there had been a most frightful
contamination in my touch, and as though the very air I had breathed
was hateful and deleterious. I felt convinced that there had been some
conversation concerning me, and that I was rather more than suspected.
I certainly could then have left the place easily and quietly, but I
had a feeling of defiance, which did not enable me to do so.
I felt as if I were an injured being, and ought to resist a something
that looked like oppression.
“Why,” I said to myself, “have I been rescued from the tomb to be made
the sport of a malignant destiny? My crime was a great one, but surely
I suffered enough, when I suffered death as an expiation of it, and I
might have been left to repose in the grave.”
The feelings that have since come over me held no place in my
imagination, but with a kind of defiant desperation I felt as if I
should like to defeat the plan by which I was attempted to be punished,
and even in the face of Providence itself, to show that it was a
failure entailing far worse consequences upon others than upon me.
This was my impression, so I would not play the coward, and fly upon
the first flash of danger.
I sat in my own room until the hour came for my appointment with Mr.
Harding, and then I walked along the corridor with a confident step,
and let the hilt end of my scabbard clank along the floor. I knocked
boldly at the door, and I thought there was a little hesitation in
his voice as he bade me walk in, but this might have been only my
imagination.
He was seated at a table, fully dressed, and in addition to his sword,
there was lying upon the table before him a large holster pistol,
nearly half the size of a carbine.
“You are well prepared,” said I, as I pointed to it.
“Yes,” he said, “and I mean to use it.”
“What do they want now?” I said.
“What do who want?”
“I don’t know,” I said, “but I thought I heard some one call you by
name from below.”
“Indeed, excuse me a moment, perhaps they have made some discovery.”
There was wine upon the table, and while he was gone, I poured a glass
of good Rhenish down the barrel of the pistol. I wiped it carefully
with the cuff of my coat, so there was no appearance upon the barrel
of anything of the sort, and when he came back, he looked at me very
suspiciously, as he said,—
“Nobody called me, how could you say I was called.”
“Because I thought I heard you called; I suppose it is allowable for
human nature to be fallible now and then.”
“Yes, but then I am so surprised how you could make such a mistake.”
“So am I.”
It was rather a difficult thing to answer this, and looking at me very
steadily, he took up the pistol and examined the priming. Of course,
that was all right, and he appeared to be perfectly satisfied.
“There will be two chairs and a table,” he said, “placed in the
corridor, so that we can sit in perfect ease. I will not anticipate
that anything will happen, but if it should, I can only say that I will
not be backward in the use of my weapons.”
“I don’t doubt it,” said I, “and commend you accordingly. That pistol
must be a most formidable weapon. Does it ever miss fire?”
“Not that I know of,” he said, “I have loaded it with such
extraordinary care that it amounts to almost an impossibility that it
should. Will you take some wine?”
At this moment there came a loud knocking at the door of the house. I
saw an expression of satisfaction come over his face and he sprung to
his feet, holding the pistol in his grasp.
“Do you know the meaning of that knocking,” said I, “at such an hour?”
and at the same time with a sweep of my arm I threw his sword off the
table and beyond his reach.
“Yes,” he said, rather excitedly; “you are my prisoner, it was you who
caused the mischief and confusion last night. The girl is ready to
swear to you, and if you attempt to escape, I’ll blow your brains out.”
“Fire at me,” said I, “and take the consequences—but the threat is
sufficient, and you shall die for your temerity.”
I drew my sword, and he evidently thought his danger imminent, for he
at once snapped the pistol in my face. Of course it only flashed in the
pan, but in one moment my sword went through him like a flash of light.
It was a good blade the Jew had sold me—the hilt struck against his
breast bone, and he shrieked.
Bang! bang! bang! came again at the outer door of the house. I withdrew
the reeking blade, dashed it into the scabbard just in time to prevent
my landlady from opening the door, which she was almost in the act
of doing. I seized her by the back of the neck, and hurled her to a
considerable distance, and then opening the door myself, I stood behind
it, and let three men rush into the house. After which I quietly left
it, and was free.
CHAPTER CCXXXIV.
VARNEY DETAILS HIS SECOND DEATH.
The clergyman was perfectly amazed, as well he might be, at these
revelations of the vampyre. He looked up from the manuscript that
Varney had left him, with a far more bewildered look than he had ever
worn when studying the most abstruse sciences or difficult languages.
“Can I,” he said,—“ought I to believe it?”
This was a question more easily asked than answered, and after pacing
the little room for a time, he thought he had better finish the papers
of the vampyre, before he tortured his mind with any more suppositions
upon the subject.
The papers continued thus, and the clergyman was soon completely
absorbed in the great interest of the strange recital they contained.
• • • • •
I cared nothing as regarded my last adventure, so that it had one
termination which was of any importance to me, namely, that termination
which insured my safety. When I got into the street, I walked
hurriedly on, never once looking behind me, until I was far enough off,
and I felt assured all pursuit was out of the question.
I then began to bethink me what I had next to do.
I was much revived by the draught of blood I had already had, but as
yet I was sufficiently new to my vampyre-like existence not to know how
long such a renewal of my life and strength would last me.
I certainly felt vigorous, but it was a strange, unearthly sort of
vigour, having no sort of resemblance whatever to the strength which
persons in an ordinary state of existence may be supposed to feel, when
the faculties are all full of life, and acting together harmoniously
and well.
When I paused, I found myself in Pall Mall, and not far off from the
palace of St. James, which of late had seen so many changes, and been
the witness of such remarkable mutations in the affair of monarchs,
that its real chronicles would even then have afforded an instructive
volume.
I wandered right up to the gates of the royal pile, but then as I was
about to enter the quadrangle called the colour court, I was rudely
repulsed by a sentinel.
It was not so in the time of Cromwell, but at the same moment I had
quite forgotten all that was so completely changed.
I always bow to authority when I cannot help it, so I turned aside at
once, without making any remark; but as I did so I saw a small door
open, not far from where I was, and two figures emerged muffled up in
brown cloaks.
They looked nothing peculiar at the first glance, but when you came to
examine the form and features, and to observe the manners of those two
men, you could not but come to a conclusion that they were what the
world would estimate as something great.
Adventure to me was life itself, now that I had so strangely shuffled
off all other ties that bound me to the world, and I had a reckless
disregard of danger, which arose naturally enough from my most
singular and horrible tenure of existence. I resolved to follow these
two men closely enough, and yet, if possible, without exciting their
observation.
“Shall we have any sport?” said one.
“I trust that the ladies,” replied the other, “will afford us some.”
“And yet they were rather coy, do you not think, on the last meeting,
Rochester?”
“Your majesty——”
“Hush, man—hush! why are you so imprudent as to majesty me in the
public streets. Here would be a court scandal if any eaves-dropper had
heard you. You were wont to be much more careful than that.”
“I spoke,” said the other, “to recall your majesty to care. The fugit
of Rochester, which you pronounced, is just as likely in the streets at
such a time to create court scandal as that of——”
“Hush, hush! Did I say Rochester? Well—well, man, hold your peace if I
did, and come on quickly—if we can but persuade them to come out, we
can take them into the garden of the palace; I have the key of that
most handy little door in the wall, which has served us more than once.”
Of course, after this, I had no difficulty in knowing that the one
speaker was the restored monarch, Charles the Second, and the other was
his favourite, and dissolute companion, Rochester, of whom I had heard
something, although I had been far too short a time in the land of the
living again, to have had any opportunity of seeing either of them
before, but since they had now confessed themselves to be what they
were, I could have no sort of difficulty in their recognition at any
other time.
I had carefully kept out of sight while the little dialogue I have
just recorded took place, so that although they more than once glanced
around them suspiciously and keenly, they saw me not, and having quite
satisfied them that their imprudent speech had done them no harm, they
walked on hurriedly in the direction of Pimlico.
Little did Charles and his companion guess how horrible a being was
following close upon their track. If they had done so they might have
paused, aghast, and pursued another course to that which was occupying
their attention. I had a difficult part to play in following them, for
although the king was incautious enough to have been safely and easily
followed by any one, Rochester was not, but kept a wary eye around him,
so that I was really more than once upon the point of being detected,
and yet by dint of good management I did escape.
Pimlico at that time was rather a miserable neighbourhood, and far,
very far indeed from being what it is now, but both the king and
Rochester appeared to be well acquainted with it and they went on
for a considerable distance until they came to a turning of a narrow
dismal-looking character bounded on each side not by houses but by the
garden walls of houses, and to judge from the solidity and the height
of those walls, the houses should have been houses of some importance.
“Bravo, bravissimo!” said the king, “we are thus far into the enemy
territory without observation.”
“So it seems,” replied Rochester; “and now think you we can find the
particular wall again.”
“Of a surety, yes. Did I not ask them to hang out a handkerchief or
some other signal, by which we might be this night guided in our
search, and there it flutters.”
The king pointed to the top of the wall, where a handkerchief waved and
something certainly in the shape of a human head appeared against the
night sky, and as sweet a voice as ever I heard in my life, said,—
“Gentlemen, I pray you to go away.”
“What,” said the king; “go away just as the sun has risen?”
“Nay, but gentlemen,” said the voice, “we are afraid we are watched.”
“We!” said Rochester, “you say we, and yet your fair companion is not
visible.”
“Fair sir,” said the lady, “it is not the easiest task in the world for
one of us to stand upon a ladder. It certainly will not hold two.”
“Fair lady,” said the king, “and if you can but manage to come over
the wall, we will all four take one of the pleasantest strolls in the
world; a friend of mine, who is a captain in the Royal Guard, will
at my request, allow us to walk in the private garden of St. James’s
palace.”
“Indeed.”
“Yes, fair one. That garden of which you may have heard as the
favourite resort of the gay Charles.”
“But we are afraid,” said the lady; “our uncle may come home. It’s very
improper indeed—very indiscreet—we ought not to think of such a thing
for a moment. In fact, it’s decidedly wrong gentlemen, but how are we
to get over the wall?”
The party all laughed out together.
CHAPTER CCXXXV.
THE PALACE GARDEN IN ST. JAMES’S.
It was certainly a very ingenious speech which the lady on the wall had
given utterance to, and sufficiently exemplified how inclination was
struggling with prudence. It was just the sort of speech which suited
those to whom it was addressed.
After the laughter had subsided a little Charles spoke,—
“By the help of the ladder we have,” he said, “you can easily leave
where you are, and as easily return, but I perceive you lack the
strength to lift it over this side so as to descend.”
“Just so,” said the lady, in a low voice.
“Well, I think that by the aid of my friend Smith here, I can get up to
the top of the wall, and assist you.”
Charles, by the aid of Rochester, contrived to scramble to the top of
the wall, to the assistance of the two damsels who were so fearful, and
yet so willing, to risk a little danger to their reputations, for the
purpose of enjoying a walk in the king’s garden at St. James’s.
The idea came across me of doing some mischief, but I did not just then
interfere as I wanted to see the result of the affair. The ladder was
duly pulled over by the monarch after both the ladies had got on the
top of the wall, and while Rochester steadied it below they descended
in perfect safety, and the party walked hastily from the place in the
direction of St. James’s.
I followed them with great caution, after having removed the ladder to
the all of a garden several doors from the proper one. They went on
talking and laughing in the gayest possible manner, until they reached
Buckingham house, and then they took a secluded path that led them
close to the gardens of St. James’s.
Some overhanging trees shed such an impervious shadow upon all objects
that I found I might as well be quite near to the party as far off, so
I approached boldly and heard that the ladies were beginning to get a
little alarmed at this secret and strictly private mode of entrance to
the garden.
“Gentlemen,” said one, “don’t go into the garden if you have no proper
leave to do so.”
“Oh, but we have,” said the king. “Lately I have had proper leave I
assure you; it did happen that for some time the leave was taken away,
but I have it again along with a few other little privileges that I
wanted much.”
“You need fear nothing,” said Rochester.
They all four stood in a group by the little door, while the king
fumbled about with a key for some few minutes, before he could open the
lock. At length, however, he succeeded in doing so, and the door swung
open. The king dropped the key and was unable to find it again; so
leaving the door as close as they could, the party passed onwards, and
I soon followed in their footsteps.
The place was profoundly dark.
I could feel the soft grating of fine gravel under my feet, and feeling
that such a sand might betray me, I stepped aside until I trod upon a
border, as I found it to be, of velvet turf. The odour of sweet flowers
came upon my senses, and occasionally as the night wind swept among the
trees, there would be a pleasant murmuring sound quite musical in its
effect.
The soft soil effectually prevented my footsteps from being heard, and
I soon stood quite close to the parties, and found that they were at
the entrance of a little gaudy pavilion, from a small painted window in
which streamed a light.
The ladies seemed to be rather in a flutter of apprehension, and yet
the whole affair no doubt to them presented itself in the shape of such
a charming and romantic adventure, that I very much doubt if they would
have gone back now, had they had all the opportunity in the world so to
do.
Finally they all went into the pavilion. I then advanced, and finding a
window, that commanded a good view of the interior I looked in and was
much amused at what passed.
The place was decorated in a tasteful manner, although a little
approaching to the gaudy, and the pictures painted in fresco upon
the walls were not precisely what the strictest prudery would have
considered correct, while at the same time there was nothing positively
offensive in them.
A table stood in the centre, and was covered with rich confectionery,
and wine, while the lamp that had sent the stream of light through the
painted window was dependent from the ceiling by three massive gilt
chains.
Take it for all in all, it certainly was a handsome place.
The king and Rochester were urging the ladies to drink wine, and now
that for the first time I had an opportunity of seeing the countenances
of the different persons whom I had followed so far, I confess that
I looked upon them with much curiosity. The ladies were decidedly
handsome, and the youngest who had fallen to the lot of the king was
very pretty indeed, and had a look of great innocence and sweetness
upon her face. I pitied her.
The king was a small, dark, sharp-featured man, and I thought that
there was an obliquity in his vision. As for Rochester, he was
decidedly ugly. His face was rather flat, and of a universal dirty
looking white colour. He certainly was not calculated to win a lady’s
favour. But then for all I knew, he might have a tongue to win an angel
out of heaven.
Such a capacity goes much further with a woman who has any mind than
all the physical graces, and women of no mind are not worth the winning.
CHAPTER CCXXXVI.
AN ADVENTURE.—THE CARBINE SHOT.—THE DEATH.
“Nay,” I heard the king say, “they ought, and no doubt do, keep choice
wine here; drink, fair one.”
The young girl shook her head.
“Nay, now,” said Charles with a laugh, as he finished off himself the
glass that the young girl took so small a sip of, “I will convince you
that I think it good.”
The lady with whom Rochester was conversing in a low tone, had no such
scruples, for she tossed off a couple of glasses as fast as they were
tendered to her, and talked quite at her ease, admiring the pavilion,
the pictures, the hangings and furniture, and wondering whether the
king ever came there himself.
Rochester began mystifying her, talking to her in a low tone, while I
turned my attention to the king, and the younger, and certainly more
estimable female of the two.
The king had been talking to her in a low tone, when she suddenly
started to her feet, her face flushed with anger and alarm.
“Louisa,” she said, “I claim your protection; you were left in care of
me. Take me home, or I will tell my uncle how you basely betrayed your
trust, by persuading me there was no harm in meeting those gentlemen.”
“Pho! The child’s mad,” said Louisa.
“Quite mad,” said the king, as he advanced towards her again; she fled
to the door of the pavilion. I knew not what impulse it was that urged
me on, but I left the window hastily, and met her, she fell into my
arms, and the light fell strongly upon me as I confronted the king.
“The guard. The guard,” he shouted.
Louisa pretended to faint, and the young girl clung to me as her only
protector, exclaiming,—
“Save me! save me; Oh save me!”
“The garden door is open,” I whispered to her, “follow me quickly, not
a moment is to be lost.” We both fled together.
I was about to pass through the doorway, when a shot from one of the
guards struck me, and I fell to the ground as if the hand of a giant
had struck me down. There was a rush of blood from my heart to my
head, a burning sensation of pain for a moment or two, that was most
horrible, and then a sea of yellow light seemed to be all around me.
I remembered no more.
It was afterwards that I found this was my second death, and that the
favourite, Rochester, had actually directed that I should be shot
rather than permitted to escape, for he dreaded more than the monarch
did the exposure of his vices. I do not think that Charles, in like
manner, had he been at hand, would have had my life taken, although it
is hard to say what kings will do or what they will not when they are
thwarted.
CHAPTER CCXXXVII
THE TOTAL DESTRUCTION OF VARNEY THE VAMPYRE, AND CONCLUSION.
The manuscript which the clergyman had read with so much interest, here
abruptly terminated. He was left to conclude that Varney after that
had been resuscitated; and he was more perplexed than ever to come to
any opinion concerning the truth of the narration which he had now
concluded.
It was one week after he had finished the perusal of Varney’s papers
that the clergyman read in an English newspaper the following statement.
“We extract from the _Algemeine Zeitung_ the following most curious
story, the accuracy of which of course we cannot vouch for, but still
there is a sufficient air of probability about it to induce us to
present it to our readers.
“Late in the evening, about four days since, a tall and
melancholy-looking stranger arrived, and put up at one of the principal
hotels at Naples. He was a most peculiar looking man, and considered by
the persons of the establishment as about the ugliest guest they had
ever had within the walls of their place.
“In a short time he summoned the landlord, and the following
conversation ensued between him and the strange guest.
“‘I want,’ said the stranger, ‘to see all the curiosities of Naples,
and among the rest Mount Vesuvius. Is there any difficulty?’
“‘None,’ replied the landlord, ‘with a proper guide.’
“A guide was soon secured, who set out with the adventurous Englishman
to make the ascent of the burning mountain.
“They went on then until the guide did not think it quite prudent to go
any further, as there was a great fissure in the side of the mountain,
out of which a stream of lava was slowly issuing and spreading itself
in rather an alarming manner.
“The ugly Englishman, however, pointed to a secure mode of getting
higher still, and they proceeded until they were very near the edge of
the crater itself. The stranger then took his purse from his pocket and
flung it to the guide saying,—
“‘You can keep that for your pains, and for coming into some danger
with me. But the fact was, that I wanted a witness to an act which I
have set my mind upon performing.’
“The guide says that these words were spoken with so much calmness,
that he verily believed the act mentioned as about to be done was some
scientific experiment of which he knew that the English were very fond,
and he replied,—
“‘Sir, I am only too proud to serve so generous and so distinguished a
gentleman. In what way can I be useful?’
“‘You will make what haste you can,’ said the stranger, ‘from the
mountain, inasmuch as it is covered with sulphurous vapours, inimical
to human life, and when you reach the city you will cause to be
published an account of my proceedings, and what I say. You will
say that you accompanied Varney the Vampyre to the crater of Mount
Vesuvius, and that, tired and disgusted with a life of horror, he flung
himself in to prevent the possibility of a reanimation of his remains.’
Before the guide could utter anything but a shriek, Varney took one
tremendous leap, and disappeared into the burning mouth of the mountain.
[Illustration: The death of Varney the Vampyre.]
THE END.
Transcriber’s Notes
• This book was originally published in “penny dreadful” form,
without authorship. It is generally considered to have been
co-written by James Malcolm Rymer and Thomas Preskett Prest.
• The serial “Varney the Vampyre” began publication in 1845 and
was such a success that it ran for two solid years of lurid and
shocking weekly installments. It was published in novel format in
1847, which included the preface, and again in 1853. The cover
shows the front wrapper of the first number from the 1853 parts
edition of Varney, from a photograph discovered in the New York
Public Library.
• The spelling of “Vampyre” is inconsistent. The title page and
page headings use “Vampyre”, the 1853 cover uses “Vampire”, and
both are used in the text (about 965 vampyre, 55 vampire).
• Main scans source is the 1970 Arno Press 3-volume reprint of the
1847 edition, excluding copyrighted additional material. Chapters
136 & 137 were missing, the text was recovered from other
editions.
• The Table of Contents was added by the transcriber, see
additional note there about numbering issues.
• Misnumbered pages were corrected.
• Other variations in spelling, hyphenation, and names were also
retained, such as:
- show/shew
- Henry/Harry Bannerworth
- ferryman/fisherman
• Spelling of foreign language phrases without diacritics, like
tete-a-tete for tête-à-tête, is retained.
• In other words, the text was left as printed as much as possible,
except obvious (to the transcriber) typographical errors have
been silently corrected.
• There are many chapter numbering issues, it was attempted to
keep them in sequence with the printed text and later editions.
Some numbers were skipped, but there seems to be no lapse in the
story from the previous chapter to the next. Many chapters were
misnumbered, these were corrected. Actual chapter count is 232.
• Illustrations were at regular intervals for printing, with page
references. They have been moved to the relevant paragraphs.
Captions are provided by the transcriber; some are adapted from a
different (1853?) printing.
• Internal transcriber’s notes are indicated by {curly braces}.
• Originally posted at PG with just 96 chapters; completely redone,
images improved, and missing material restored in 2026.
• Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_).
• Text enclosed by pluses is in small caps (+small caps+).
• Text enclosed by equals is in antiqua (=antiqua=).Project Gutenberg
Varney the vampyre; or, the feast of blood
Prest, Thomas Peckett & Rymer, James Malcolm
Chimera46
College