Chapter CCIII…

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.

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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.”

“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.”

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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.

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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!

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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.

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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.”

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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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.

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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.

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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.”

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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.”

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.”

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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.

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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.

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.

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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.

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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.

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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.”

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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.

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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.”

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