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Produced by Suzanne Shell, Sjaani and PG Distributed Proofreaders | |
CARMILLA | |
J. Sheridan LeFanu | |
1872 | |
PROLOGUE | |
_Upon a paper attached to the Narrative which follows, Doctor Hesselius | |
has written a rather elaborate note, which he accompanies with a | |
reference to his Essay on the strange subject which the MS. illuminates. | |
This mysterious subject he treats, in that Essay, with his usual | |
learning and acumen, and with remarkable directness and condensation. It | |
will form but one volume of the series of that extraordinary man's | |
collected papers. | |
As I publish the case, in this volume, simply to interest the "laity," I | |
shall forestall the intelligent lady, who relates it, in nothing; and | |
after due consideration, I have determined, therefore, to abstain from | |
presenting any precis of the learned Doctor's reasoning, or extract from | |
his statement on a subject which he describes as "involving, not | |
improbably, some of the profoundest arcana of our dual existence, and | |
its intermediates." | |
I was anxious on discovering this paper, to reopen the correspondence | |
commenced by Doctor Hesselius, so many years before, with a person so | |
clever and careful as his informant seems to have been. Much to my | |
regret, however, I found that she had died in the interval. | |
She, probably, could have added little to the Narrative _which she | |
communicates in the following pages, with, so far as I can pronounce, | |
such conscientious particularity_. | |
I | |
_An Early Fright_ | |
In Styria, we, though by no means magnificent people, inhabit a castle, | |
or schloss. A small income, in that part of the world, goes a great way. | |
Eight or nine hundred a year does wonders. Scantily enough ours would | |
have answered among wealthy people at home. My father is English, and I | |
bear an English name, although I never saw England. But here, in this | |
lonely and primitive place, where everything is so marvelously cheap, I | |
really don't see how ever so much more money would at all materially add | |
to our comforts, or even luxuries. | |
My father was in the Austrian service, and retired upon a pension and | |
his patrimony, and purchased this feudal residence, and the small estate | |
on which it stands, a bargain. | |
Nothing can be more picturesque or solitary. It stands on a slight | |
eminence in a forest. The road, very old and narrow, passes in front of | |
its drawbridge, never raised in my time, and its moat, stocked with | |
perch, and sailed over by many swans, and floating on its surface white | |
fleets of water lilies. | |
Over all this the schloss shows its many-windowed front; its towers, | |
and its Gothic chapel. | |
The forest opens in an irregular and very picturesque glade before its | |
gate, and at the right a steep Gothic bridge carries the road over a | |
stream that winds in deep shadow through the wood. I have said that this | |
is a very lonely place. Judge whether I say truth. Looking from the hall | |
door towards the road, the forest in which our castle stands extends | |
fifteen miles to the right, and twelve to the left. The nearest | |
inhabited village is about seven of your English miles to the left. The | |
nearest inhabited schloss of any historic associations, is that of old | |
General Spielsdorf, nearly twenty miles away to the right. | |
I have said "the nearest _inhabited_ village," because there is, only | |
three miles westward, that is to say in the direction of General | |
Spielsdorf's schloss, a ruined village, with its quaint little church, | |
now roofless, in the aisle of which are the moldering tombs of the proud | |
family of Karnstein, now extinct, who once owned the equally desolate | |
chateau which, in the thick of the forest, overlooks the silent ruins | |
of the town. | |
Respecting the cause of the desertion of this striking and melancholy | |
spot, there is a legend which I shall relate to you another time. | |
I must tell you now, how very small is the party who constitute the | |
inhabitants of our castle. I don't include servants, or those dependents | |
who occupy rooms in the buildings attached to the schloss. Listen, and | |
wonder! My father, who is the kindest man on earth, but growing old; and | |
I, at the date of my story, only nineteen. Eight years have passed | |
since then. | |
I and my father constituted the family at the schloss. My mother, a | |
Styrian lady, died in my infancy, but I had a good-natured governess, | |
who had been with me from, I might almost say, my infancy. I could not | |
remember the time when her fat, benignant face was not a familiar | |
picture in my memory. | |
This was Madame Perrodon, a native of Berne, whose care and good nature | |
now in part supplied to me the loss of my mother, whom I do not even | |
remember, so early I lost her. She made a third at our little dinner | |
party. There was a fourth, Mademoiselle De Lafontaine, a lady such as | |
you term, I believe, a "finishing governess." She spoke French and | |
German, Madame Perrodon French and broken English, to which my father | |
and I added English, which, partly to prevent its becoming a lost | |
language among us, and partly from patriotic motives, we spoke every | |
day. The consequence was a Babel, at which strangers used to laugh, and | |
which I shall make no attempt to reproduce in this narrative. And there | |
were two or three young lady friends besides, pretty nearly of my own | |
age, who were occasional visitors, for longer or shorter terms; and | |
these visits I sometimes returned. | |
These were our regular social resources; but of course there were chance | |
visits from "neighbors" of only five or six leagues distance. My life | |
was, notwithstanding, rather a solitary one, I can assure you. | |
My gouvernantes had just so much control over me as you might conjecture | |
such sage persons would have in the case of a rather spoiled girl, whose | |
only parent allowed her pretty nearly her own way in everything. | |
The first occurrence in my existence, which produced a terrible | |
impression upon my mind, which, in fact, never has been effaced, was one | |
of the very earliest incidents of my life which I can recollect. Some | |
people will think it so trifling that it should not be recorded here. | |
You will see, however, by-and-by, why I mention it. The nursery, as it | |
was called, though I had it all to myself, was a large room in the upper | |
story of the castle, with a steep oak roof. I can't have been more than | |
six years old, when one night I awoke, and looking round the room from | |
my bed, failed to see the nursery maid. Neither was my nurse there; and | |
I thought myself alone. I was not frightened, for I was one of those | |
happy children who are studiously kept in ignorance of ghost stories, of | |
fairy tales, and of all such lore as makes us cover up our heads when | |
the door cracks suddenly, or the flicker of an expiring candle makes the | |
shadow of a bedpost dance upon the wall, nearer to our faces. I was | |
vexed and insulted at finding myself, as I conceived, neglected, and I | |
began to whimper, preparatory to a hearty bout of roaring; when to my | |
surprise, I saw a solemn, but very pretty face looking at me from the | |
side of the bed. It was that of a young lady who was kneeling, with her | |
hands under the coverlet. I looked at her with a kind of pleased wonder, | |
and ceased whimpering. She caressed me with her hands, and lay down | |
beside me on the bed, and drew me towards her, smiling; I felt | |
immediately delightfully soothed, and fell asleep again. I was wakened | |
by a sensation as if two needles ran into my breast very deep at the | |
same moment, and I cried loudly. The lady started back, with her eyes | |
fixed on me, and then slipped down upon the floor, and, as I thought, | |
hid herself under the bed. | |
I was now for the first time frightened, and I yelled with all my might | |
and main. Nurse, nursery maid, housekeeper, all came running in, and | |
hearing my story, they made light of it, soothing me all they could | |
meanwhile. But, child as I was, I could perceive that their faces were | |
pale with an unwonted look of anxiety, and I saw them look under the | |
bed, and about the room, and peep under tables and pluck open cupboards; | |
and the housekeeper whispered to the nurse: "Lay your hand along that | |
hollow in the bed; someone _did_ lie there, so sure as you did not; the | |
place is still warm." | |
I remember the nursery maid petting me, and all three examining my | |
chest, where I told them I felt the puncture, and pronouncing that there | |
was no sign visible that any such thing had happened to me. | |
The housekeeper and the two other servants who were in charge of the | |
nursery, remained sitting up all night; and from that time a servant | |
always sat up in the nursery until I was about fourteen. | |
I was very nervous for a long time after this. A doctor was called in, | |
he was pallid and elderly. How well I remember his long saturnine face, | |
slightly pitted with smallpox, and his chestnut wig. For a good while, | |
every second day, he came and gave me medicine, which of course I hated. | |
The morning after I saw this apparition I was in a state of terror, and | |
could not bear to be left alone, daylight though it was, for a moment. | |
I remember my father coming up and standing at the bedside, and talking | |
cheerfully, and asking the nurse a number of questions, and laughing | |
very heartily at one of the answers; and patting me on the shoulder, and | |
kissing me, and telling me not to be frightened, that it was nothing but | |
a dream and could not hurt me. | |
But I was not comforted, for I knew the visit of the strange woman was | |
_not_ a dream; and I was _awfully_ frightened. | |
I was a little consoled by the nursery maid's assuring me that it was | |
she who had come and looked at me, and lain down beside me in the bed, | |
and that I must have been half-dreaming not to have known her face. But | |
this, though supported by the nurse, did not quite satisfy me. | |
I remembered, in the course of that day, a venerable old man, in a black | |
cassock, coming into the room with the nurse and housekeeper, and | |
talking a little to them, and very kindly to me; his face was very sweet | |
and gentle, and he told me they were going to pray, and joined my hands | |
together, and desired me to say, softly, while they were praying, "Lord | |
hear all good prayers for us, for Jesus' sake." I think these were the | |
very words, for I often repeated them to myself, and my nurse used for | |
years to make me say them in my prayers. | |
I remembered so well the thoughtful sweet face of that white-haired old | |
man, in his black cassock, as he stood in that rude, lofty, brown room, | |
with the clumsy furniture of a fashion three hundred years old about | |
him, and the scanty light entering its shadowy atmosphere through the | |
small lattice. He kneeled, and the three women with him, and he prayed | |
aloud with an earnest quavering voice for, what appeared to me, a long | |
time. I forget all my life preceding that event, and for some time after | |
it is all obscure also, but the scenes I have just described stand out | |
vivid as the isolated pictures of the phantasmagoria surrounded | |
by darkness. | |
II | |
_A Guest_ | |
I am now going to tell you something so strange that it will require all | |
your faith in my veracity to believe my story. It is not only true, | |
nevertheless, but truth of which I have been an eyewitness. | |
It was a sweet summer evening, and my father asked me, as he sometimes | |
did, to take a little ramble with him along that beautiful forest vista | |
which I have mentioned as lying in front of the schloss. | |
"General Spielsdorf cannot come to us so soon as I had hoped," said my | |
father, as we pursued our walk. | |
He was to have paid us a visit of some weeks, and we had expected his | |
arrival next day. He was to have brought with him a young lady, his | |
niece and ward, Mademoiselle Rheinfeldt, whom I had never seen, but whom | |
I had heard described as a very charming girl, and in whose society I | |
had promised myself many happy days. I was more disappointed than a | |
young lady living in a town, or a bustling neighborhood can possibly | |
imagine. This visit, and the new acquaintance it promised, had furnished | |
my day dream for many weeks. | |
"And how soon does he come?" I asked. | |
"Not till autumn. Not for two months, I dare say," he answered. "And I | |
am very glad now, dear, that you never knew Mademoiselle Rheinfeldt." | |
"And why?" I asked, both mortified and curious. | |
"Because the poor young lady is dead," he replied. "I quite forgot I had | |
not told you, but you were not in the room when I received the General's | |
letter this evening." | |
I was very much shocked. General Spielsdorf had mentioned in his first | |
letter, six or seven weeks before, that she was not so well as he would | |
wish her, but there was nothing to suggest the remotest suspicion | |
of danger. | |
"Here is the General's letter," he said, handing it to me. "I am afraid | |
he is in great affliction; the letter appears to me to have been written | |
very nearly in distraction." | |
We sat down on a rude bench, under a group of magnificent lime trees. | |
The sun was setting with all its melancholy splendor behind the sylvan | |
horizon, and the stream that flows beside our home, and passes under the | |
steep old bridge I have mentioned, wound through many a group of noble | |
trees, almost at our feet, reflecting in its current the fading crimson | |
of the sky. General Spielsdorf's letter was so extraordinary, so | |
vehement, and in some places so self-contradictory, that I read it twice | |
over--the second time aloud to my father--and was still unable to | |
account for it, except by supposing that grief had unsettled his mind. | |
It said "I have lost my darling daughter, for as such I loved her. | |
During the last days of dear Bertha's illness I was not able to write | |
to you. | |
"Before then I had no idea of her danger. I have lost her, and now learn | |
_all_, too late. She died in the peace of innocence, and in the glorious | |
hope of a blessed futurity. The fiend who betrayed our infatuated | |
hospitality has done it all. I thought I was receiving into my house | |
innocence, gaiety, a charming companion for my lost Bertha. Heavens! | |
what a fool have I been! | |
"I thank God my child died without a suspicion of the cause of her | |
sufferings. She is gone without so much as conjecturing the nature of | |
her illness, and the accursed passion of the agent of all this misery. I | |
devote my remaining days to tracking and extinguishing a monster. I am | |
told I may hope to accomplish my righteous and merciful purpose. At | |
present there is scarcely a gleam of light to guide me. I curse my | |
conceited incredulity, my despicable affectation of superiority, my | |
blindness, my obstinacy--all--too late. I cannot write or talk | |
collectedly now. I am distracted. So soon as I shall have a little | |
recovered, I mean to devote myself for a time to enquiry, which may | |
possibly lead me as far as Vienna. Some time in the autumn, two months | |
hence, or earlier if I live, I will see you--that is, if you permit me; | |
I will then tell you all that I scarce dare put upon paper now. | |
Farewell. Pray for me, dear friend." | |
In these terms ended this strange letter. Though I had never seen Bertha | |
Rheinfeldt my eyes filled with tears at the sudden intelligence; I was | |
startled, as well as profoundly disappointed. | |
The sun had now set, and it was twilight by the time I had returned the | |
General's letter to my father. | |
It was a soft clear evening, and we loitered, speculating upon the | |
possible meanings of the violent and incoherent sentences which I had | |
just been reading. We had nearly a mile to walk before reaching the road | |
that passes the schloss in front, and by that time the moon was shining | |
brilliantly. At the drawbridge we met Madame Perrodon and Mademoiselle | |
De Lafontaine, who had come out, without their bonnets, to enjoy the | |
exquisite moonlight. | |
We heard their voices gabbling in animated dialogue as we approached. We | |
joined them at the drawbridge, and turned about to admire with them the | |
beautiful scene. | |
The glade through which we had just walked lay before us. At our left | |
the narrow road wound away under clumps of lordly trees, and was lost to | |
sight amid the thickening forest. At the right the same road crosses the | |
steep and picturesque bridge, near which stands a ruined tower which | |
once guarded that pass; and beyond the bridge an abrupt eminence rises, | |
covered with trees, and showing in the shadows some grey | |
ivy-clustered rocks. | |
Over the sward and low grounds a thin film of mist was stealing like | |
smoke, marking the distances with a transparent veil; and here and there | |
we could see the river faintly flashing in the moonlight. | |
No softer, sweeter scene could be imagined. The news I had just heard | |
made it melancholy; but nothing could disturb its character of profound | |
serenity, and the enchanted glory and vagueness of the prospect. | |
My father, who enjoyed the picturesque, and I, stood looking in silence | |
over the expanse beneath us. The two good governesses, standing a little | |
way behind us, discoursed upon the scene, and were eloquent upon | |
the moon. | |
Madame Perrodon was fat, middle-aged, and romantic, and talked and | |
sighed poetically. Mademoiselle De Lafontaine--in right of her father | |
who was a German, assumed to be psychological, metaphysical, and | |
something of a mystic--now declared that when the moon shone with a | |
light so intense it was well known that it indicated a special spiritual | |
activity. The effect of the full moon in such a state of brilliancy was | |
manifold. It acted on dreams, it acted on lunacy, it acted on nervous | |
people, it had marvelous physical influences connected with life. | |
Mademoiselle related that her cousin, who was mate of a merchant ship, | |
having taken a nap on deck on such a night, lying on his back, with his | |
face full in the light on the moon, had wakened, after a dream of an old | |
woman clawing him by the cheek, with his features horribly drawn to one | |
side; and his countenance had never quite recovered its equilibrium. | |
"The moon, this night," she said, "is full of idyllic and magnetic | |
influence--and see, when you look behind you at the front of the schloss | |
how all its windows flash and twinkle with that silvery splendor, as if | |
unseen hands had lighted up the rooms to receive fairy guests." | |
There are indolent styles of the spirits in which, indisposed to talk | |
ourselves, the talk of others is pleasant to our listless ears; and I | |
gazed on, pleased with the tinkle of the ladies' conversation. | |
"I have got into one of my moping moods tonight," said my father, after | |
a silence, and quoting Shakespeare, whom, by way of keeping up our | |
English, he used to read aloud, he said: | |
"'In truth I know not why I am so sad. | |
It wearies me: you say it wearies you; | |
But how I got it--came by it.' | |
"I forget the rest. But I feel as if some great misfortune were hanging | |
over us. I suppose the poor General's afflicted letter has had something | |
to do with it." | |
At this moment the unwonted sound of carriage wheels and many hoofs upon | |
the road, arrested our attention. | |
They seemed to be approaching from the high ground overlooking the | |
bridge, and very soon the equipage emerged from that point. Two horsemen | |
first crossed the bridge, then came a carriage drawn by four horses, and | |
two men rode behind. | |
It seemed to be the traveling carriage of a person of rank; and we were | |
all immediately absorbed in watching that very unusual spectacle. It | |
became, in a few moments, greatly more interesting, for just as the | |
carriage had passed the summit of the steep bridge, one of the leaders, | |
taking fright, communicated his panic to the rest, and after a plunge or | |
two, the whole team broke into a wild gallop together, and dashing | |
between the horsemen who rode in front, came thundering along the road | |
towards us with the speed of a hurricane. | |
The excitement of the scene was made more painful by the clear, | |
long-drawn screams of a female voice from the carriage window. | |
We all advanced in curiosity and horror; me rather in silence, the rest | |
with various ejaculations of terror. | |
Our suspense did not last long. Just before you reach the castle | |
drawbridge, on the route they were coming, there stands by the roadside | |
a magnificent lime tree, on the other stands an ancient stone cross, at | |
sight of which the horses, now going at a pace that was perfectly | |
frightful, swerved so as to bring the wheel over the projecting roots | |
of the tree. | |
I knew what was coming. I covered my eyes, unable to see it out, and | |
turned my head away; at the same moment I heard a cry from my lady | |
friends, who had gone on a little. | |
Curiosity opened my eyes, and I saw a scene of utter confusion. Two of | |
the horses were on the ground, the carriage lay upon its side with two | |
wheels in the air; the men were busy removing the traces, and a lady | |
with a commanding air and figure had got out, and stood with clasped | |
hands, raising the handkerchief that was in them every now and then | |
to her eyes. | |
Through the carriage door was now lifted a young lady, who appeared to | |
be lifeless. My dear old father was already beside the elder lady, with | |
his hat in his hand, evidently tendering his aid and the resources of | |
his schloss. The lady did not appear to hear him, or to have eyes for | |
anything but the slender girl who was being placed against the <DW72> | |
of the bank. | |
I approached; the young lady was apparently stunned, but she was | |
certainly not dead. My father, who piqued himself on being something of | |
a physician, had just had his fingers on her wrist and assured the lady, | |
who declared herself her mother, that her pulse, though faint and | |
irregular, was undoubtedly still distinguishable. The lady clasped her | |
hands and looked upward, as if in a momentary transport of gratitude; | |
but immediately she broke out again in that theatrical way which is, I | |
believe, natural to some people. | |
She was what is called a fine looking woman for her time of life, and | |
must have been handsome; she was tall, but not thin, and dressed in | |
black velvet, and looked rather pale, but with a proud and commanding | |
countenance, though now agitated strangely. | |
"Who was ever being so born to calamity?" I heard her say, with clasped | |
hands, as I came up. "Here am I, on a journey of life and death, in | |
prosecuting which to lose an hour is possibly to lose all. My child will | |
not have recovered sufficiently to resume her route for who can say how | |
long. I must leave her: I cannot, dare not, delay. How far on, sir, can | |
you tell, is the nearest village? I must leave her there; and shall not | |
see my darling, or even hear of her till my return, three months hence." | |
I plucked my father by the coat, and whispered earnestly in his ear: | |
"Oh! papa, pray ask her to let her stay with us--it would be so | |
delightful. Do, pray." | |
"If Madame will entrust her child to the care of my daughter, and of her | |
good gouvernante, Madame Perrodon, and permit her to remain as our | |
guest, under my charge, until her return, it will confer a distinction | |
and an obligation upon us, and we shall treat her with all the care and | |
devotion which so sacred a trust deserves." | |
"I cannot do that, sir, it would be to task your kindness and chivalry | |
too cruelly," said the lady, distractedly. | |
"It would, on the contrary, be to confer on us a very great kindness at | |
the moment when we most need it. My daughter has just been disappointed | |
by a cruel misfortune, in a visit from which she had long anticipated a | |
great deal of happiness. If you confide this young lady to our care it | |
will be her best consolation. The nearest village on your route is | |
distant, and affords no such inn as you could think of placing your | |
daughter at; you cannot allow her to continue her journey for any | |
considerable distance without danger. If, as you say, you cannot suspend | |
your journey, you must part with her tonight, and nowhere could you do | |
so with more honest assurances of care and tenderness than here." | |
There was something in this lady's air and appearance so distinguished | |
and even imposing, and in her manner so engaging, as to impress one, | |
quite apart from the dignity of her equipage, with a conviction that she | |
was a person of consequence. | |
By this time the carriage was replaced in its upright position, and the | |
horses, quite tractable, in the traces again. | |
The lady threw on her daughter a glance which I fancied was not quite so | |
affectionate as one might have anticipated from the beginning of the | |
scene; then she beckoned slightly to my father, and withdrew two or | |
three steps with him out of hearing; and talked to him with a fixed and | |
stern countenance, not at all like that with which she had | |
hitherto spoken. | |
I was filled with wonder that my father did not seem to perceive the | |
change, and also unspeakably curious to learn what it could be that she | |
was speaking, almost in his ear, with so much earnestness and rapidity. | |
Two or three minutes at most I think she remained thus employed, then | |
she turned, and a few steps brought her to where her daughter lay, | |
supported by Madame Perrodon. She kneeled beside her for a moment and | |
whispered, as Madame supposed, a little benediction in her ear; then | |
hastily kissing her she stepped into her carriage, the door was closed, | |
the footmen in stately liveries jumped up behind, the outriders spurred | |
on, the postilions cracked their whips, the horses plunged and broke | |
suddenly into a furious canter that threatened soon again to become a | |
gallop, and the carriage whirled away, followed at the same rapid pace | |
by the two horsemen in the rear. | |
III | |
_We Compare Notes_ | |
We followed the _cortege_ with our eyes until it was swiftly lost to | |
sight in the misty wood; and the very sound of the hoofs and the wheels | |
died away in the silent night air. | |
Nothing remained to assure us that the adventure had not been an | |
illusion of a moment but the young lady, who just at that moment opened | |
her eyes. I could not see, for her face was turned from me, but she | |
raised her head, evidently looking about her, and I heard a very sweet | |
voice ask complainingly, "Where is mamma?" | |
Our good Madame Perrodon answered tenderly, and added some comfortable | |
assurances. | |
I then heard her ask: | |
"Where am I? What is this place?" and after that she said, "I don't see | |
the carriage; and Matska, where is she?" | |
Madame answered all her questions in so far as she understood them; and | |
gradually the young lady remembered how the misadventure came about, and | |
was glad to hear that no one in, or in attendance on, the carriage was | |
hurt; and on learning that her mamma had left her here, till her return | |
in about three months, she wept. | |
I was going to add my consolations to those of Madame Perrodon when | |
Mademoiselle De Lafontaine placed her hand upon my arm, saying: | |
"Don't approach, one at a time is as much as she can at present converse | |
with; a very little excitement would possibly overpower her now." | |
As soon as she is comfortably in bed, I thought, I will run up to her | |
room and see her. | |
My father in the meantime had sent a servant on horseback for the | |
physician, who lived about two leagues away; and a bedroom was being | |
prepared for the young lady's reception. | |
The stranger now rose, and leaning on Madame's arm, walked slowly over | |
the drawbridge and into the castle gate. | |
In the hall, servants waited to receive her, and she was conducted | |
forthwith to her room. The room we usually sat in as our drawing room is | |
long, having four windows, that looked over the moat and drawbridge, | |
upon the forest scene I have just described. | |
It is furnished in old carved oak, with large carved cabinets, and the | |
chairs are cushioned with crimson Utrecht velvet. The walls are covered | |
with tapestry, and surrounded with great gold frames, the figures being | |
as large as life, in ancient and very curious costume, and the subjects | |
represented are hunting, hawking, and generally festive. It is not too | |
stately to be extremely comfortable; and here we had our tea, for with | |
his usual patriotic leanings he insisted that the national beverage | |
should make its appearance regularly with our coffee and chocolate. | |
We sat here this night, and with candles lighted, were talking over the | |
adventure of the evening. | |
Madame Perrodon and Mademoiselle De Lafontaine were both of our party. | |
The young stranger had hardly lain down in her bed when she sank into a | |
deep sleep; and those ladies had left her in the care of a servant. | |
"How do you like our guest?" I asked, as soon as Madame entered. "Tell | |
me all about her?" | |
"I like her extremely," answered Madame, "she is, I almost think, the | |
prettiest creature I ever saw; about your age, and so gentle and nice." | |
"She is absolutely beautiful," threw in Mademoiselle, who had peeped for | |
a moment into the stranger's room. | |
"And such a sweet voice!" added Madame Perrodon. | |
"Did you remark a woman in the carriage, after it was set up again, who | |
did not get out," inquired Mademoiselle, "but only looked from | |
the window?" | |
"No, we had not seen her." | |
Then she described a hideous black woman, with a sort of turban | |
on her head, and who was gazing all the time from the carriage window, | |
nodding and grinning derisively towards the ladies, with gleaming eyes | |
and large white eyeballs, and her teeth set as if in fury. | |
"Did you remark what an ill-looking pack of men the servants were?" | |
asked Madame. | |
"Yes," said my father, who had just come in, "ugly, hang-dog looking | |
fellows as ever I beheld in my life. I hope they mayn't rob the poor | |
lady in the forest. They are clever rogues, however; they got everything | |
to rights in a minute." | |
"I dare say they are worn out with too long traveling," said Madame. | |
"Besides looking wicked, their faces were so strangely lean, and dark, | |
and sullen. I am very curious, I own; but I dare say the young lady will | |
tell you all about it tomorrow, if she is sufficiently recovered." | |
"I don't think she will," said my father, with a mysterious smile, and a | |
little nod of his head, as if he knew more about it than he cared | |
to tell us. | |
This made us all the more inquisitive as to what had passed between him | |
and the lady in the black velvet, in the brief but earnest interview | |
that had immediately preceded her departure. | |
We were scarcely alone, when I entreated him to tell me. He did not need | |
much pressing. | |
"There is no particular reason why I should not tell you. She expressed | |
a reluctance to trouble us with the care of her daughter, saying she was | |
in delicate health, and nervous, but not subject to any kind of | |
seizure--she volunteered that--nor to any illusion; being, in fact, | |
perfectly sane." | |
"How very odd to say all that!" I interpolated. "It was so unnecessary." | |
"At all events it _was_ said," he laughed, "and as you wish to know all | |
that passed, which was indeed very little, I tell you. She then said, 'I | |
am making a long journey of _vital_ importance--she emphasized the | |
word--rapid and secret; I shall return for my child in three months; in | |
the meantime, she will be silent as to who we are, whence we come, and | |
whither we are traveling.' That is all she said. She spoke very pure | |
French. When she said the word 'secret,' she paused for a few seconds, | |
looking sternly, her eyes fixed on mine. I fancy she makes a great point | |
of that. You saw how quickly she was gone. I hope I have not done a very | |
foolish thing, in taking charge of the young lady." | |
For my part, I was delighted. I was longing to see and talk to her; and | |
only waiting till the doctor should give me leave. You, who live in | |
towns, can have no idea how great an event the introduction of a new | |
friend is, in such a solitude as surrounded us. | |
The doctor did not arrive till nearly one o'clock; but I could no more | |
have gone to my bed and slept, than I could have overtaken, on foot, the | |
carriage in which the princess in black velvet had driven away. | |
When the physician came down to the drawing room, it was to report very | |
favorably upon his patient. She was now sitting up, her pulse quite | |
regular, apparently perfectly well. She had sustained no injury, and the | |
little shock to her nerves had passed away quite harmlessly. There could | |
be no harm certainly in my seeing her, if we both wished it; and, with | |
this permission I sent, forthwith, to know whether she would allow me to | |
visit her for a few minutes in her room. | |
The servant returned immediately to say that she desired nothing more. | |
You may be sure I was not long in availing myself of this permission. | |
Our visitor lay in one of the handsomest rooms in the schloss. It was, | |
perhaps, a little stately. There was a somber piece of tapestry opposite | |
the foot of the bed, representing Cleopatra with the asps to her bosom; | |
and other solemn classic scenes were displayed, a little faded, upon the | |
other walls. But there was gold carving, and rich and varied color | |
enough in the other decorations of the room, to more than redeem the | |
gloom of the old tapestry. | |
There were candles at the bedside. She was sitting up; her slender | |
pretty figure enveloped in the soft silk dressing gown, embroidered with | |
flowers, and lined with thick quilted silk, which her mother had thrown | |
over her feet as she lay upon the ground. | |
What was it that, as I reached the bedside and had just begun my little | |
greeting, struck me dumb in a moment, and made me recoil a step or two | |
from before her? I will tell you. | |
I saw the very face which had visited me in my childhood at night, which | |
remained so fixed in my memory, and on which I had for so many years so | |
often ruminated with horror, when no one suspected of what I | |
was thinking. | |
It was pretty, even beautiful; and when I first beheld it, wore the | |
same melancholy expression. | |
But this almost instantly lighted into a strange fixed smile of | |
recognition. | |
There was a silence of fully a minute, and then at length she spoke; I | |
could not. | |
"How wonderful!" she exclaimed. "Twelve years ago, I saw your face in a | |
dream, and it has haunted me ever since." | |
"Wonderful indeed!" I repeated, overcoming with an effort the horror | |
that had for a time suspended my utterances. "Twelve years ago, in | |
vision or reality, I certainly saw you. I could not forget your face. It | |
has remained before my eyes ever since." | |
Her smile had softened. Whatever I had fancied strange in it, was gone, | |
and it and her dimpling cheeks were now delightfully pretty and | |
intelligent. | |
I felt reassured, and continued more in the vein which hospitality | |
indicated, to bid her welcome, and to tell her how much pleasure her | |
accidental arrival had given us all, and especially what a happiness it | |
was to me. | |
I took her hand as I spoke. I was a little shy, as lonely people are, | |
but the situation made me eloquent, and even bold. She pressed my hand, | |
she laid hers upon it, and her eyes glowed, as, looking hastily into | |
mine, she smiled again, and blushed. | |
She answered my welcome very prettily. I sat down beside her, still | |
wondering; and she said: | |
"I must tell you my vision about you; it is so very strange that you and | |
I should have had, each of the other so vivid a dream, that each should | |
have seen, I you and you me, looking as we do now, when of course we | |
both were mere children. I was a child, about six years old, and I awoke | |
from a confused and troubled dream, and found myself in a room, unlike | |
my nursery, wainscoted clumsily in some dark wood, and with cupboards | |
and bedsteads, and chairs, and benches placed about it. The beds were, | |
I thought, all empty, and the room itself without anyone but myself in | |
it; and I, after looking about me for some time, and admiring especially | |
an iron candlestick with two branches, which I should certainly know | |
again, crept under one of the beds to reach the window; but as I got | |
from under the bed, I heard someone crying; and looking up, while I was | |
still upon my knees, I saw you--most assuredly you--as I see you now; a | |
beautiful young lady, with golden hair and large blue eyes, and | |
lips--your lips--you as you are here. | |
"Your looks won me; I climbed on the bed and put my arms about you, and | |
I think we both fell asleep. I was aroused by a scream; you were sitting | |
up screaming. I was frightened, and slipped down upon the ground, and, | |
it seemed to me, lost consciousness for a moment; and when I came to | |
myself, I was again in my nursery at home. Your face I have never | |
forgotten since. I could not be misled by mere resemblance. _You are_ | |
the lady whom I saw then." | |
It was now my turn to relate my corresponding vision, which I did, to | |
the undisguised wonder of my new acquaintance. | |
"I don't know which should be most afraid of the other," she said, again | |
smiling--"If you were less pretty I think I should be very much afraid | |
of you, but being as you are, and you and I both so young, I feel only | |
that I have made your acquaintance twelve years ago, and have already a | |
right to your intimacy; at all events it does seem as if we were | |
destined, from our earliest childhood, to be friends. I wonder whether | |
you feel as strangely drawn towards me as I do to you; I have never had | |
a friend--shall I find one now?" She sighed, and her fine dark eyes | |
gazed passionately on me. | |
Now the truth is, I felt rather unaccountably towards the beautiful | |
stranger. I did feel, as she said, "drawn towards her," but there was | |
also something of repulsion. In this ambiguous feeling, however, the | |
sense of attraction immensely prevailed. She interested and won me; she | |
was so beautiful and so indescribably engaging. | |
I perceived now something of languor and exhaustion stealing over her, | |
and hastened to bid her good night. | |
"The doctor thinks," I added, "that you ought to have a maid to sit up | |
with you tonight; one of ours is waiting, and you will find her a very | |
useful and quiet creature." | |
"How kind of you, but I could not sleep, I never could with an attendant | |
in the room. I shan't require any assistance--and, shall I confess my | |
weakness, I am haunted with a terror of robbers. Our house was robbed | |
once, and two servants murdered, so I always lock my door. It has become | |
a habit--and you look so kind I know you will forgive me. I see there is | |
a key in the lock." | |
She held me close in her pretty arms for a moment and whispered in my | |
ear, "Good night, darling, it is very hard to part with you, but good | |
night; tomorrow, but not early, I shall see you again." | |
She sank back on the pillow with a sigh, and her fine eyes followed me | |
with a fond and melancholy gaze, and she murmured again "Good night, | |
dear friend." | |
Young people like, and even love, on impulse. I was flattered by the | |
evident, though as yet undeserved, fondness she showed me. I liked the | |
confidence with which she at once received me. She was determined that | |
we should be very near friends. | |
Next day came and we met again. I was delighted with my companion; that | |
is to say, in many respects. | |
Her looks lost nothing in daylight--she was certainly the most beautiful | |
creature I had ever seen, and the unpleasant remembrance of the face | |
presented in my early dream, had lost the effect of the first unexpected | |
recognition. | |
She confessed that she had experienced a similar shock on seeing me, and | |
precisely the same faint antipathy that had mingled with my admiration | |
of her. We now laughed together over our momentary horrors. | |
IV | |
_Her Habits--A Saunter_ | |
I told you that I was charmed with her in most particulars. | |
There were some that did not please me so well. | |
She was above the middle height of women. I shall begin by describing | |
her. | |
She was slender, and wonderfully graceful. Except that her movements | |
were languid--very languid--indeed, there was nothing in her appearance | |
to indicate an invalid. Her complexion was rich and brilliant; her | |
features were small and beautifully formed; her eyes large, dark, and | |
lustrous; her hair was quite wonderful, I never saw hair so | |
magnificently thick and long when it was down about her shoulders; I | |
have often placed my hands under it, and laughed with wonder at its | |
weight. It was exquisitely fine and soft, and in color a rich very dark | |
brown, with something of gold. I loved to let it down, tumbling with its | |
own weight, as, in her room, she lay back in her chair talking in her | |
sweet low voice, I used to fold and braid it, and spread it out and | |
play with it. Heavens! If I had but known all! | |
I said there were particulars which did not please me. I have told you | |
that her confidence won me the first night I saw her; but I found that | |
she exercised with respect to herself, her mother, her history, | |
everything in fact connected with her life, plans, and people, an ever | |
wakeful reserve. I dare say I was unreasonable, perhaps I was wrong; I | |
dare say I ought to have respected the solemn injunction laid upon my | |
father by the stately lady in black velvet. But curiosity is a restless | |
and unscrupulous passion, and no one girl can endure, with patience, | |
that hers should be baffled by another. What harm could it do anyone to | |
tell me what I so ardently desired to know? Had she no trust in my good | |
sense or honor? Why would she not believe me when I assured her, so | |
solemnly, that I would not divulge one syllable of what she told me to | |
any mortal breathing. | |
There was a coldness, it seemed to me, beyond her years, in her smiling | |
melancholy persistent refusal to afford me the least ray of light. | |
I cannot say we quarreled upon this point, for she would not quarrel | |
upon any. It was, of course, very unfair of me to press her, very | |
ill-bred, but I really could not help it; and I might just as well have | |
let it alone. | |
What she did tell me amounted, in my unconscionable estimation--to | |
nothing. | |
It was all summed up in three very vague disclosures: | |
First--Her name was Carmilla. | |
Second--Her family was very ancient and noble. | |
Third--Her home lay in the direction of the west. | |
She would not tell me the name of her family, nor their armorial | |
bearings, nor the name of their estate, nor even that of the country | |
they lived in. | |
You are not to suppose that I worried her incessantly on these subjects. | |
I watched opportunity, and rather insinuated than urged my inquiries. | |
Once or twice, indeed, I did attack her more directly. But no matter | |
what my tactics, utter failure was invariably the result. Reproaches and | |
caresses were all lost upon her. But I must add this, that her evasion | |
was conducted with so pretty a melancholy and deprecation, with so many, | |
and even passionate declarations of her liking for me, and trust in my | |
honor, and with so many promises that I should at last know all, that I | |
could not find it in my heart long to be offended with her. | |
She used to place her pretty arms about my neck, draw me to her, and | |
laying her cheek to mine, murmur with her lips near my ear, "Dearest, | |
your little heart is wounded; think me not cruel because I obey the | |
irresistible law of my strength and weakness; if your dear heart is | |
wounded, my wild heart bleeds with yours. In the rapture of my enormous | |
humiliation I live in your warm life, and you shall die--die, sweetly | |
die--into mine. I cannot help it; as I draw near to you, you, in your | |
turn, will draw near to others, and learn the rapture of that cruelty, | |
which yet is love; so, for a while, seek to know no more of me and mine, | |
but trust me with all your loving spirit." | |
And when she had spoken such a rhapsody, she would press me more closely | |
in her trembling embrace, and her lips in soft kisses gently glow | |
upon my cheek. | |
Her agitations and her language were unintelligible to me. | |
From these foolish embraces, which were not of very frequent occurrence, | |
I must allow, I used to wish to extricate myself; but my energies seemed | |
to fail me. Her murmured words sounded like a lullaby in my ear, and | |
soothed my resistance into a trance, from which I only seemed to recover | |
myself when she withdrew her arms. | |
In these mysterious moods I did not like her. I experienced a strange | |
tumultuous excitement that was pleasurable, ever and anon, mingled with | |
a vague sense of fear and disgust. I had no distinct thoughts about her | |
while such scenes lasted, but I was conscious of a love growing into | |
adoration, and also of abhorrence. This I know is paradox, but I can | |
make no other attempt to explain the feeling. | |
I now write, after an interval of more than ten years, with a trembling | |
hand, with a confused and horrible recollection of certain occurrences | |
and situations, in the ordeal through which I was unconsciously passing; | |
though with a vivid and very sharp remembrance of the main current of | |
my story. | |
But, I suspect, in all lives there are certain emotional scenes, those | |
in which our passions have been most wildly and terribly roused, that | |
are of all others the most vaguely and dimly remembered. | |
Sometimes after an hour of apathy, my strange and beautiful companion | |
would take my hand and hold it with a fond pressure, renewed again and | |
again; blushing softly, gazing in my face with languid and burning eyes, | |
and breathing so fast that her dress rose and fell with the tumultuous | |
respiration. It was like the ardor of a lover; it embarrassed me; it was | |
hateful and yet over-powering; and with gloating eyes she drew me to | |
her, and her hot lips traveled along my cheek in kisses; and she would | |
whisper, almost in sobs, "You are mine, you _shall_ be mine, you and I | |
are one for ever." Then she had thrown herself back in her chair, with | |
her small hands over her eyes, leaving me trembling. | |
"Are we related," I used to ask; "what can you mean by all this? I | |
remind you perhaps of someone whom you love; but you must not, I hate | |
it; I don't know you--I don't know myself when you look so and talk so." | |
She used to sigh at my vehemence, then turn away and drop my hand. | |
Respecting these very extraordinary manifestations I strove in vain to | |
form any satisfactory theory--I could not refer them to affectation or | |
trick. It was unmistakably the momentary breaking out of suppressed | |
instinct and emotion. Was she, notwithstanding her mother's volunteered | |
denial, subject to brief visitations of insanity; or was there here a | |
disguise and a romance? I had read in old storybooks of such things. | |
What if a boyish lover had found his way into the house, and sought to | |
prosecute his suit in masquerade, with the assistance of a clever old | |
adventuress. But there were many things against this hypothesis, highly | |
interesting as it was to my vanity. | |
I could boast of no little attentions such as masculine gallantry | |
delights to offer. Between these passionate moments there were long | |
intervals of commonplace, of gaiety, of brooding melancholy, during | |
which, except that I detected her eyes so full of melancholy fire, | |
following me, at times I might have been as nothing to her. Except in | |
these brief periods of mysterious excitement her ways were girlish; and | |
there was always a languor about her, quite incompatible with a | |
masculine system in a state of health. | |
In some respects her habits were odd. Perhaps not so singular in the | |
opinion of a town lady like you, as they appeared to us rustic people. | |
She used to come down very late, generally not till one o'clock, she | |
would then take a cup of chocolate, but eat nothing; we then went out | |
for a walk, which was a mere saunter, and she seemed, almost | |
immediately, exhausted, and either returned to the schloss or sat on one | |
of the benches that were placed, here and there, among the trees. This | |
was a bodily languor in which her mind did not sympathize. She was | |
always an animated talker, and very intelligent. | |
She sometimes alluded for a moment to her own home, or mentioned an | |
adventure or situation, or an early recollection, which indicated a | |
people of strange manners, and described customs of which we knew | |
nothing. I gathered from these chance hints that her native country was | |
much more remote than I had at first fancied. | |
As we sat thus one afternoon under the trees a funeral passed us by. It | |
was that of a pretty young girl, whom I had often seen, the daughter of | |
one of the rangers of the forest. The poor man was walking behind the | |
coffin of his darling; she was his only child, and he looked quite | |
heartbroken. | |
Peasants walking two-and-two came behind, they were singing a funeral | |
hymn. | |
I rose to mark my respect as they passed, and joined in the hymn they | |
were very sweetly singing. | |
My companion shook me a little roughly, and I turned surprised. | |
She said brusquely, "Don't you perceive how discordant that is?" | |
"I think it very sweet, on the contrary," I answered, vexed at the | |
interruption, and very uncomfortable, lest the people who composed the | |
little procession should observe and resent what was passing. | |
I resumed, therefore, instantly, and was again interrupted. "You pierce | |
my ears," said Carmilla, almost angrily, and stopping her ears with her | |
tiny fingers. "Besides, how can you tell that your religion and mine are | |
the same; your forms wound me, and I hate funerals. What a fuss! Why you | |
must die--_everyone_ must die; and all are happier when they do. | |
Come home." | |
"My father has gone on with the clergyman to the churchyard. I thought | |
you knew she was to be buried today." | |
"She? I don't trouble my head about peasants. I don't know who she is," | |
answered Carmilla, with a flash from her fine eyes. | |
"She is the poor girl who fancied she saw a ghost a fortnight ago, and | |
has been dying ever since, till yesterday, when she expired." | |
"Tell me nothing about ghosts. I shan't sleep tonight if you do." | |
"I hope there is no plague or fever coming; all this looks very like | |
it," I continued. "The swineherd's young wife died only a week ago, and | |
she thought something seized her by the throat as she lay in her bed, | |
and nearly strangled her. Papa says such horrible fancies do accompany | |
some forms of fever. She was quite well the day before. She sank | |
afterwards, and died before a week." | |
"Well, _her_ funeral is over, I hope, and _her_ hymn sung; and our ears | |
shan't be tortured with that discord and jargon. It has made me nervous. | |
Sit down here, beside me; sit close; hold my hand; press it | |
hard-hard-harder." | |
We had moved a little back, and had come to another seat. | |
She sat down. Her face underwent a change that alarmed and even | |
terrified me for a moment. It darkened, and became horribly livid; her | |
teeth and hands were clenched, and she frowned and compressed her lips, | |
while she stared down upon the ground at her feet, and trembled all over | |
with a continued shudder as irrepressible as ague. All her energies | |
seemed strained to suppress a fit, with which she was then breathlessly | |
tugging; and at length a low convulsive cry of suffering broke from her, | |
and gradually the hysteria subsided. "There! That comes of strangling | |
people with hymns!" she said at last. "Hold me, hold me still. It is | |
passing away." | |
And so gradually it did; and perhaps to dissipate the somber impression | |
which the spectacle had left upon me, she became unusually animated and | |
chatty; and so we got home. | |
This was the first time I had seen her exhibit any definable symptoms of | |
that delicacy of health which her mother had spoken of. It was the first | |
time, also, I had seen her exhibit anything like temper. | |
Both passed away like a summer cloud; and never but once afterwards did | |
I witness on her part a momentary sign of anger. I will tell you how | |
it happened. | |
She and I were looking out of one of the long drawing room windows, when | |
there entered the courtyard, over the drawbridge, a figure of a wanderer | |
whom I knew very well. He used to visit the schloss generally twice | |
a year. | |
It was the figure of a hunchback, with the sharp lean features that | |
generally accompany deformity. He wore a pointed black beard, and he was | |
smiling from ear to ear, showing his white fangs. He was dressed in | |
buff, black, and scarlet, and crossed with more straps and belts than I | |
could count, from which hung all manner of things. Behind, he carried a | |
magic lantern, and two boxes, which I well knew, in one of which was a | |
salamander, and in the other a mandrake. These monsters used to make my | |
father laugh. They were compounded of parts of monkeys, parrots, | |
squirrels, fish, and hedgehogs, dried and stitched together with great | |
neatness and startling effect. He had a fiddle, a box of conjuring | |
apparatus, a pair of foils and masks attached to his belt, several other | |
mysterious cases dangling about him, and a black staff with copper | |
ferrules in his hand. His companion was a rough spare dog, that followed | |
at his heels, but stopped short, suspiciously at the drawbridge, and in | |
a little while began to howl dismally. | |
In the meantime, the mountebank, standing in the midst of the courtyard, | |
raised his grotesque hat, and made us a very ceremonious bow, paying his | |
compliments very volubly in execrable French, and German not | |
much better. | |
Then, disengaging his fiddle, he began to scrape a lively air to which | |
he sang with a merry discord, dancing with ludicrous airs and activity, | |
that made me laugh, in spite of the dog's howling. | |
Then he advanced to the window with many smiles and salutations, and | |
his hat in his left hand, his fiddle under his arm, and with a fluency | |
that never took breath, he gabbled a long advertisement of all his | |
accomplishments, and the resources of the various arts which he placed | |
at our service, and the curiosities and entertainments which it was in | |
his power, at our bidding, to display. | |
"Will your ladyships be pleased to buy an amulet against the oupire, | |
which is going like the wolf, I hear, through these woods," he said | |
dropping his hat on the pavement. "They are dying of it right and left | |
and here is a charm that never fails; only pinned to the pillow, and you | |
may laugh in his face." | |
These charms consisted of oblong slips of vellum, with cabalistic | |
ciphers and diagrams upon them. | |
Carmilla instantly purchased one, and so did I. | |
He was looking up, and we were smiling down upon him, amused; at least, | |
I can answer for myself. His piercing black eye, as he looked up in our | |
faces, seemed to detect something that fixed for a moment his curiosity. | |
In an instant he unrolled a leather case, full of all manner of odd | |
little steel instruments. | |
"See here, my lady," he said, displaying it, and addressing me, "I | |
profess, among other things less useful, the art of dentistry. Plague | |
take the dog!" he interpolated. "Silence, beast! He howls so that your | |
ladyships can scarcely hear a word. Your noble friend, the young lady at | |
your right, has the sharpest tooth,--long, thin, pointed, like an awl, | |
like a needle; ha, ha! With my sharp and long sight, as I look up, I | |
have seen it distinctly; now if it happens to hurt the young lady, and I | |
think it must, here am I, here are my file, my punch, my nippers; I will | |
make it round and blunt, if her ladyship pleases; no longer the tooth of | |
a fish, but of a beautiful young lady as she is. Hey? Is the young lady | |
displeased? Have I been too bold? Have I offended her?" | |
The young lady, indeed, looked very angry as she drew back from the | |
window. | |
"How dares that mountebank insult us so? Where is your father? I shall | |
demand redress from him. My father would have had the wretch tied up to | |
the pump, and flogged with a cart whip, and burnt to the bones with the | |
cattle brand!" | |
She retired from the window a step or two, and sat down, and had hardly | |
lost sight of the offender, when her wrath subsided as suddenly as it | |
had risen, and she gradually recovered her usual tone, and seemed to | |
forget the little hunchback and his follies. | |
My father was out of spirits that evening. On coming in he told us that | |
there had been another case very similar to the two fatal ones which had | |
lately occurred. The sister of a young peasant on his estate, only a | |
mile away, was very ill, had been, as she described it, attacked very | |
nearly in the same way, and was now slowly but steadily sinking. | |
"All this," said my father, "is strictly referable to natural causes. | |
These poor people infect one another with their superstitions, and so | |
repeat in imagination the images of terror that have infested their | |
neighbors." | |
"But that very circumstance frightens one horribly," said Carmilla. | |
"How so?" inquired my father. | |
"I am so afraid of fancying I see such things; I think it would be as | |
bad as reality." | |
"We are in God's hands: nothing can happen without his permission, and | |
all will end well for those who love him. He is our faithful creator; He | |
has made us all, and will take care of us." | |
"Creator! _Nature!_" said the young lady in answer to my gentle father. | |
"And this disease that invades the country is natural. Nature. All | |
things proceed from Nature--don't they? All things in the heaven, in the | |
earth, and under the earth, act and live as Nature ordains? I | |
think so." | |
"The doctor said he would come here today," said my father, after a | |
silence. "I want to know what he thinks about it, and what he thinks we | |
had better do." | |
"Doctors never did me any good," said Carmilla. | |
"Then you have been ill?" I asked. | |
"More ill than ever you were," she answered. | |
"Long ago?" | |
"Yes, a long time. I suffered from this very illness; but I forget all | |
but my pain and weakness, and they were not so bad as are suffered in | |
other diseases." | |
"You were very young then?" | |
"I dare say, let us talk no more of it. You would not wound a friend?" | |
She looked languidly in my eyes, and passed her arm round my waist | |
lovingly, and led me out of the room. My father was busy over some | |
papers near the window. | |
"Why does your papa like to frighten us?" said the pretty girl with a | |
sigh and a little shudder. | |
"He doesn't, dear Carmilla, it is the very furthest thing from his | |
mind." | |
"Are you afraid, dearest?" | |
"I should be very much if I fancied there was any real danger of my | |
being attacked as those poor people were." | |
"You are afraid to die?" | |
"Yes, every one is." | |
"But to die as lovers may--to die together, so that they may live | |
together. | |
"Girls are caterpillars while they live in the world, to be finally | |
butterflies when the summer comes; but in the meantime there are grubs | |
and larvae, don't you see--each with their peculiar propensities, | |
necessities and structure. So says Monsieur Buffon, in his big book, in | |
the next room." | |
Later in the day the doctor came, and was closeted with papa for some | |
time. | |
He was a skilful man, of sixty and upwards, he wore powder, and shaved | |
his pale face as smooth as a pumpkin. He and papa emerged from the room | |
together, and I heard papa laugh, and say as they came out: | |
"Well, I do wonder at a wise man like you. What do you say to | |
hippogriffs and dragons?" | |
The doctor was smiling, and made answer, shaking his head-- | |
"Nevertheless life and death are mysterious states, and we know little | |
of the resources of either." | |
And so they walked on, and I heard no more. I did not then know what the | |
doctor had been broaching, but I think I guess it now. | |
V | |
_A Wonderful Likeness_ | |
This evening there arrived from Gratz the grave, dark-faced son of the | |
picture cleaner, with a horse and cart laden with two large packing | |
cases, having many pictures in each. It was a journey of ten leagues, | |
and whenever a messenger arrived at the schloss from our little capital | |
of Gratz, we used to crowd about him in the hall, to hear the news. | |
This arrival created in our secluded quarters quite a sensation. The | |
cases remained in the hall, and the messenger was taken charge of by the | |
servants till he had eaten his supper. Then with assistants, and armed | |
with hammer, ripping chisel, and turnscrew, he met us in the hall, where | |
we had assembled to witness the unpacking of the cases. | |
Carmilla sat looking listlessly on, while one after the other the old | |
pictures, nearly all portraits, which had undergone the process of | |
renovation, were brought to light. My mother was of an old Hungarian | |
family, and most of these pictures, which were about to be restored to | |
their places, had come to us through her. | |
My father had a list in his hand, from which he read, as the artist | |
rummaged out the corresponding numbers. I don't know that the pictures | |
were very good, but they were, undoubtedly, very old, and some of them | |
very curious also. They had, for the most part, the merit of being now | |
seen by me, I may say, for the first time; for the smoke and dust of | |
time had all but obliterated them. | |
"There is a picture that I have not seen yet," said my father. "In one | |
corner, at the top of it, is the name, as well as I could read, 'Marcia | |
Karnstein,' and the date '1698'; and I am curious to see how it has | |
turned out." | |
I remembered it; it was a small picture, about a foot and a half high, | |
and nearly square, without a frame; but it was so blackened by age that | |
I could not make it out. | |
The artist now produced it, with evident pride. It was quite beautiful; | |
it was startling; it seemed to live. It was the effigy of Carmilla! | |
"Carmilla, dear, here is an absolute miracle. Here you are, living, | |
smiling, ready to speak, in this picture. Isn't it beautiful, Papa? And | |
see, even the little mole on her throat." | |
My father laughed, and said "Certainly it is a wonderful likeness," but | |
he looked away, and to my surprise seemed but little struck by it, and | |
went on talking to the picture cleaner, who was also something of an | |
artist, and discoursed with intelligence about the portraits or other | |
works, which his art had just brought into light and color, while I was | |
more and more lost in wonder the more I looked at the picture. | |
"Will you let me hang this picture in my room, papa?" I asked. | |
"Certainly, dear," said he, smiling, "I'm very glad you think it so | |
like. It must be prettier even than I thought it, if it is." | |
The young lady did not acknowledge this pretty speech, did not seem to | |
hear it. She was leaning back in her seat, her fine eyes under their | |
long lashes gazing on me in contemplation, and she smiled in a kind | |
of rapture. | |
"And now you can read quite plainly the name that is written in the | |
corner. It is not Marcia; it looks as if it was done in gold. The name | |
is Mircalla, Countess Karnstein, and this is a little coronet over and | |
underneath A.D. 1698. I am descended from the Karnsteins; that is, | |
mamma was." | |
"Ah!" said the lady, languidly, "so am I, I think, a very long descent, | |
very ancient. Are there any Karnsteins living now?" | |
"None who bear the name, I believe. The family were ruined, I believe, | |
in some civil wars, long ago, but the ruins of the castle are only about | |
three miles away." | |
"How interesting!" she said, languidly. "But see what beautiful | |
moonlight!" She glanced through the hall door, which stood a little | |
open. "Suppose you take a little ramble round the court, and look down | |
at the road and river." | |
"It is so like the night you came to us," I said. | |
She sighed; smiling. | |
She rose, and each with her arm about the other's waist, we walked out | |
upon the pavement. | |
In silence, slowly we walked down to the drawbridge, where the beautiful | |
landscape opened before us. | |
"And so you were thinking of the night I came here?" she almost | |
whispered. | |
"Are you glad I came?" | |
"Delighted, dear Carmilla," I answered. | |
"And you asked for the picture you think like me, to hang in your room," | |
she murmured with a sigh, as she drew her arm closer about my waist, and | |
let her pretty head sink upon my shoulder. "How romantic you are, | |
Carmilla," I said. "Whenever you tell me your story, it will be made up | |
chiefly of some one great romance." | |
She kissed me silently. | |
"I am sure, Carmilla, you have been in love; that there is, at this | |
moment, an affair of the heart going on." | |
"I have been in love with no one, and never shall," she whispered, | |
"unless it should be with you." | |
How beautiful she looked in the moonlight! | |
Shy and strange was the look with which she quickly hid her face in my | |
neck and hair, with tumultuous sighs, that seemed almost to sob, and | |
pressed in mine a hand that trembled. | |
Her soft cheek was glowing against mine. "Darling, darling," she | |
murmured, "I live in you; and you would die for me, I love you so." | |
I started from her. | |
She was gazing on me with eyes from which all fire, all meaning had | |
flown, and a face colorless and apathetic. | |
"Is there a chill in the air, dear?" she said drowsily. "I almost | |
shiver; have I been dreaming? Let us come in. Come; come; come in." | |
"You look ill, Carmilla; a little faint. You certainly must take some | |
wine," I said. | |
"Yes. I will. I'm better now. I shall be quite well in a few minutes. | |
Yes, do give me a little wine," answered Carmilla, as we approached | |
the door. | |
"Let us look again for a moment; it is the last time, perhaps, I shall | |
see the moonlight with you." | |
"How do you feel now, dear Carmilla? Are you really better?" I asked. | |
I was beginning to take alarm, lest she should have been stricken with | |
the strange epidemic that they said had invaded the country about us. | |
"Papa would be grieved beyond measure," I added, "if he thought you were | |
ever so little ill, without immediately letting us know. We have a very | |
skilful doctor near us, the physician who was with papa today." | |
"I'm sure he is. I know how kind you all are; but, dear child, I am | |
quite well again. There is nothing ever wrong with me, but a | |
little weakness. | |
"People say I am languid; I am incapable of exertion; I can scarcely walk | |
as far as a child of three years old: and every now and then the little | |
strength I have falters, and I become as you have just seen me. But | |
after all I am very easily set up again; in a moment I am perfectly | |
myself. See how I have recovered." | |
So, indeed, she had; and she and I talked a great deal, and very | |
animated she was; and the remainder of that evening passed without any | |
recurrence of what I called her infatuations. I mean her crazy talk and | |
looks, which embarrassed, and even frightened me. | |
But there occurred that night an event which gave my thoughts quite a | |
new turn, and seemed to startle even Carmilla's languid nature into | |
momentary energy. | |
VI | |
_A Very Strange Agony_ | |
When we got into the drawing room, and had sat down to our coffee and | |
chocolate, although Carmilla did not take any, she seemed quite herself | |
again, and Madame, and Mademoiselle De Lafontaine, joined us, and made a | |
little card party, in the course of which papa came in for what he | |
called his "dish of tea." | |
When the game was over he sat down beside Carmilla on the sofa, and | |
asked her, a little anxiously, whether she had heard from her mother | |
since her arrival. | |
She answered "No." | |
He then asked whether she knew where a letter would reach her at | |
present. | |
"I cannot tell," she answered ambiguously, "but I have been thinking of | |
leaving you; you have been already too hospitable and too kind to me. I | |
have given you an infinity of trouble, and I should wish to take a | |
carriage tomorrow, and post in pursuit of her; I know where I shall | |
ultimately find her, although I dare not yet tell you." | |
"But you must not dream of any such thing," exclaimed my father, to my | |
great relief. "We can't afford to lose you so, and I won't consent to | |
your leaving us, except under the care of your mother, who was so good | |
as to consent to your remaining with us till she should herself return. | |
I should be quite happy if I knew that you heard from her: but this | |
evening the accounts of the progress of the mysterious disease that has | |
invaded our neighborhood, grow even more alarming; and my beautiful | |
guest, I do feel the responsibility, unaided by advice from your mother, | |
very much. But I shall do my best; and one thing is certain, that you | |
must not think of leaving us without her distinct direction to that | |
effect. We should suffer too much in parting from you to consent to | |
it easily." | |
"Thank you, sir, a thousand times for your hospitality," she answered, | |
smiling bashfully. "You have all been too kind to me; I have seldom been | |
so happy in all my life before, as in your beautiful chateau, under your | |
care, and in the society of your dear daughter." | |
So he gallantly, in his old-fashioned way, kissed her hand, smiling and | |
pleased at her little speech. | |
I accompanied Carmilla as usual to her room, and sat and chatted with | |
her while she was preparing for bed. | |
"Do you think," I said at length, "that you will ever confide fully in | |
me?" | |
She turned round smiling, but made no answer, only continued to smile on | |
me. | |
"You won't answer that?" I said. "You can't answer pleasantly; I ought | |
not to have asked you." | |
"You were quite right to ask me that, or anything. You do not know how | |
dear you are to me, or you could not think any confidence too great to | |
look for. But I am under vows, no nun half so awfully, and I dare not | |
tell my story yet, even to you. The time is very near when you shall | |
know everything. You will think me cruel, very selfish, but love is | |
always selfish; the more ardent the more selfish. How jealous I am you | |
cannot know. You must come with me, loving me, to death; or else hate me | |
and still come with me, and _hating_ me through death and after. There | |
is no such word as indifference in my apathetic nature." | |
"Now, Carmilla, you are going to talk your wild nonsense again," I said | |
hastily. | |
"Not I, silly little fool as I am, and full of whims and fancies; for | |
your sake I'll talk like a sage. Were you ever at a ball?" | |
"No; how you do run on. What is it like? How charming it must be." | |
"I almost forget, it is years ago." | |
I laughed. | |
"You are not so old. Your first ball can hardly be forgotten yet." | |
"I remember everything about it--with an effort. I see it all, as divers | |
see what is going on above them, through a medium, dense, rippling, but | |
transparent. There occurred that night what has confused the picture, | |
and made its colours faint. I was all but assassinated in my bed, | |
wounded here," she touched her breast, "and never was the same since." | |
"Were you near dying?" | |
"Yes, very--a cruel love--strange love, that would have taken my life. | |
Love will have its sacrifices. No sacrifice without blood. Let us go to | |
sleep now; I feel so lazy. How can I get up just now and lock my door?" | |
She was lying with her tiny hands buried in her rich wavy hair, under | |
her cheek, her little head upon the pillow, and her glittering eyes | |
followed me wherever I moved, with a kind of shy smile that I could | |
not decipher. | |
I bid her good night, and crept from the room with an uncomfortable | |
sensation. | |
I often wondered whether our pretty guest ever said her prayers. I | |
certainly had never seen her upon her knees. In the morning she never | |
came down until long after our family prayers were over, and at night | |
she never left the drawing room to attend our brief evening prayers | |
in the hall. | |
If it had not been that it had casually come out in one of our careless | |
talks that she had been baptised, I should have doubted her being a | |
Christian. Religion was a subject on which I had never heard her speak a | |
word. If I had known the world better, this particular neglect or | |
antipathy would not have so much surprised me. | |
The precautions of nervous people are infectious, and persons of a like | |
temperament are pretty sure, after a time, to imitate them. I had | |
adopted Carmilla's habit of locking her bedroom door, having taken into | |
my head all her whimsical alarms about midnight invaders and prowling | |
assassins. I had also adopted her precaution of making a brief search | |
through her room, to satisfy herself that no lurking assassin or robber | |
was "ensconced." | |
These wise measures taken, I got into my bed and fell asleep. A light | |
was burning in my room. This was an old habit, of very early date, and | |
which nothing could have tempted me to dispense with. | |
Thus fortified I might take my rest in peace. But dreams come through | |
stone walls, light up dark rooms, or darken light ones, and their | |
persons make their exits and their entrances as they please, and laugh | |
at locksmiths. | |
I had a dream that night that was the beginning of a very strange agony. | |
I cannot call it a nightmare, for I was quite conscious of being asleep. | |
But I was equally conscious of being in my room, and lying in bed, | |
precisely as I actually was. I saw, or fancied I saw, the room and its | |
furniture just as I had seen it last, except that it was very dark, and | |
I saw something moving round the foot of the bed, which at first I | |
could not accurately distinguish. But I soon saw that it was a | |
sooty-black animal that resembled a monstrous cat. It appeared to me | |
about four or five feet long for it measured fully the length of the | |
hearthrug as it passed over it; and it continued to-ing and fro-ing with | |
the lithe, sinister restlessness of a beast in a cage. I could not cry | |
out, although as you may suppose, I was terrified. Its pace was growing | |
faster, and the room rapidly darker and darker, and at length so dark | |
that I could no longer see anything of it but its eyes. I felt it spring | |
lightly on the bed. The two broad eyes approached my face, and suddenly | |
I felt a stinging pain as if two large needles darted, an inch or two | |
apart, deep into my breast. I waked with a scream. The room was lighted | |
by the candle that burnt there all through the night, and I saw a female | |
figure standing at the foot of the bed, a little at the right side. It | |
was in a dark loose dress, and its hair was down and covered its | |
shoulders. A block of stone could not have been more still. There was | |
not the slightest stir of respiration. As I stared at it, the figure | |
appeared to have changed its place, and was now nearer the door; then, | |
close to it, the door opened, and it passed out. | |
I was now relieved, and able to breathe and move. My first thought was | |
that Carmilla had been playing me a trick, and that I had forgotten to | |
secure my door. I hastened to it, and found it locked as usual on the | |
inside. I was afraid to open it--I was horrified. I sprang into my bed | |
and covered my head up in the bedclothes, and lay there more dead than | |
alive till morning. | |
VII | |
_Descending_ | |
It would be vain my attempting to tell you the horror with which, even | |
now, I recall the occurrence of that night. It was no such transitory | |
terror as a dream leaves behind it. It seemed to deepen by time, and | |
communicated itself to the room and the very furniture that had | |
encompassed the apparition. | |
I could not bear next day to be alone for a moment. I should have told | |
papa, but for two opposite reasons. At one time I thought he would laugh | |
at my story, and I could not bear its being treated as a jest; and at | |
another I thought he might fancy that I had been attacked by the | |
mysterious complaint which had invaded our neighborhood. I had myself no | |
misgiving of the kind, and as he had been rather an invalid for some | |
time, I was afraid of alarming him. | |
I was comfortable enough with my good-natured companions, Madame | |
Perrodon, and the vivacious Mademoiselle Lafontaine. They both perceived | |
that I was out of spirits and nervous, and at length I told them what | |
lay so heavy at my heart. | |
Mademoiselle laughed, but I fancied that Madame Perrodon looked anxious. | |
"By-the-by," said Mademoiselle, laughing, "the long lime tree walk, | |
behind Carmilla's bedroom window, is haunted!" | |
"Nonsense!" exclaimed Madame, who probably thought the theme rather | |
inopportune, "and who tells that story, my dear?" | |
"Martin says that he came up twice, when the old yard gate was being | |
repaired, before sunrise, and twice saw the same female figure walking | |
down the lime tree avenue." | |
"So he well might, as long as there are cows to milk in the river | |
fields," said Madame. | |
"I daresay; but Martin chooses to be frightened, and never did I see | |
fool more frightened." | |
"You must not say a word about it to Carmilla, because she can see down | |
that walk from her room window," I interposed, "and she is, if possible, | |
a greater coward than I." | |
Carmilla came down rather later than usual that day. | |
"I was so frightened last night," she said, so soon as were together, | |
"and I am sure I should have seen something dreadful if it had not been | |
for that charm I bought from the poor little hunchback whom I called | |
such hard names. I had a dream of something black coming round my bed, | |
and I awoke in a perfect horror, and I really thought, for some seconds, | |
I saw a dark figure near the chimney-piece, but I felt under my pillow | |
for my charm, and the moment my fingers touched it, the figure | |
disappeared, and I felt quite certain, only that I had it by me, that | |
something frightful would have made its appearance, and, perhaps, | |
throttled me, as it did those poor people we heard of. | |
"Well, listen to me," I began, and recounted my adventure, at the | |
recital of which she appeared horrified. | |
"And had you the charm near you?" she asked, earnestly. | |
"No, I had dropped it into a china vase in the drawing room, but I shall | |
certainly take it with me tonight, as you have so much faith in it." | |
At this distance of time I cannot tell you, or even understand, how I | |
overcame my horror so effectually as to lie alone in my room that night. | |
I remember distinctly that I pinned the charm to my pillow. I fell | |
asleep almost immediately, and slept even more soundly than usual | |
all night. | |
Next night I passed as well. My sleep was delightfully deep and | |
dreamless. | |
But I wakened with a sense of lassitude and melancholy, which, however, | |
did not exceed a degree that was almost luxurious. | |
"Well, I told you so," said Carmilla, when I described my quiet sleep, | |
"I had such delightful sleep myself last night; I pinned the charm to | |
the breast of my nightdress. It was too far away the night before. I am | |
quite sure it was all fancy, except the dreams. I used to think that | |
evil spirits made dreams, but our doctor told me it is no such thing. | |
Only a fever passing by, or some other malady, as they often do, he | |
said, knocks at the door, and not being able to get in, passes on, with | |
that alarm." | |
"And what do you think the charm is?" said I. | |
"It has been fumigated or immersed in some drug, and is an antidote | |
against the malaria," she answered. | |
"Then it acts only on the body?" | |
"Certainly; you don't suppose that evil spirits are frightened by bits | |
of ribbon, or the perfumes of a druggist's shop? No, these complaints, | |
wandering in the air, begin by trying the nerves, and so infect the | |
brain, but before they can seize upon you, the antidote repels them. | |
That I am sure is what the charm has done for us. It is nothing magical, | |
it is simply natural." | |
I should have been happier if I could have quite agreed with Carmilla, | |
but I did my best, and the impression was a little losing its force. | |
For some nights I slept profoundly; but still every morning I felt the | |
same lassitude, and a languor weighed upon me all day. I felt myself a | |
changed girl. A strange melancholy was stealing over me, a melancholy | |
that I would not have interrupted. Dim thoughts of death began to open, | |
and an idea that I was slowly sinking took gentle, and, somehow, not | |
unwelcome, possession of me. If it was sad, the tone of mind which this | |
induced was also sweet. | |
Whatever it might be, my soul acquiesced in it. | |
I would not admit that I was ill, I would not consent to tell my papa, | |
or to have the doctor sent for. | |
Carmilla became more devoted to me than ever, and her strange paroxysms | |
of languid adoration more frequent. She used to gloat on me with | |
increasing ardor the more my strength and spirits waned. This always | |
shocked me like a momentary glare of insanity. | |
Without knowing it, I was now in a pretty advanced stage of the | |
strangest illness under which mortal ever suffered. There was an | |
unaccountable fascination in its earlier symptoms that more than | |
reconciled me to the incapacitating effect of that stage of the malady. | |
This fascination increased for a time, until it reached a certain point, | |
when gradually a sense of the horrible mingled itself with it, | |
deepening, as you shall hear, until it discolored and perverted the | |
whole state of my life. | |
The first change I experienced was rather agreeable. It was very near | |
the turning point from which began the descent of Avernus. | |
Certain vague and strange sensations visited me in my sleep. The | |
prevailing one was of that pleasant, peculiar cold thrill which we feel | |
in bathing, when we move against the current of a river. This was soon | |
accompanied by dreams that seemed interminable, and were so vague that | |
I could never recollect their scenery and persons, or any one connected | |
portion of their action. But they left an awful impression, and a sense | |
of exhaustion, as if I had passed through a long period of great mental | |
exertion and danger. | |
After all these dreams there remained on waking a remembrance of having | |
been in a place very nearly dark, and of having spoken to people whom I | |
could not see; and especially of one clear voice, of a female's, very | |
deep, that spoke as if at a distance, slowly, and producing always the | |
same sensation of indescribable solemnity and fear. Sometimes there came | |
a sensation as if a hand was drawn softly along my cheek and neck. | |
Sometimes it was as if warm lips kissed me, and longer and longer and | |
more lovingly as they reached my throat, but there the caress fixed | |
itself. My heart beat faster, my breathing rose and fell rapidly and | |
full drawn; a sobbing, that rose into a sense of strangulation, | |
supervened, and turned into a dreadful convulsion, in which my senses | |
left me and I became unconscious. | |
It was now three weeks since the commencement of this unaccountable | |
state. | |
My sufferings had, during the last week, told upon my appearance. I had | |
grown pale, my eyes were dilated and darkened underneath, and the | |
languor which I had long felt began to display itself in my countenance. | |
My father asked me often whether I was ill; but, with an obstinacy which | |
now seems to me unaccountable, I persisted in assuring him that I was | |
quite well. | |
In a sense this was true. I had no pain, I could complain of no bodily | |
derangement. My complaint seemed to be one of the imagination, or the | |
nerves, and, horrible as my sufferings were, I kept them, with a morbid | |
reserve, very nearly to myself. | |
It could not be that terrible complaint which the peasants called the | |
oupire, for I had now been suffering for three weeks, and they were | |
seldom ill for much more than three days, when death put an end to | |
their miseries. | |
Carmilla complained of dreams and feverish sensations, but by no means | |
of so alarming a kind as mine. I say that mine were extremely alarming. | |
Had I been capable of comprehending my condition, I would have invoked | |
aid and advice on my knees. The narcotic of an unsuspected influence was | |
acting upon me, and my perceptions were benumbed. | |
I am going to tell you now of a dream that led immediately to an odd | |
discovery. | |
One night, instead of the voice I was accustomed to hear in the dark, I | |
heard one, sweet and tender, and at the same time terrible, which said, | |
"Your mother warns you to beware of the assassin." At the same time a | |
light unexpectedly sprang up, and I saw Carmilla, standing, near the | |
foot of my bed, in her white nightdress, bathed, from her chin to her | |
feet, in one great stain of blood. | |
I wakened with a shriek, possessed with the one idea that Carmilla was | |
being murdered. I remember springing from my bed, and my next | |
recollection is that of standing on the lobby, crying for help. | |
Madame and Mademoiselle came scurrying out of their rooms in alarm; a | |
lamp burned always on the lobby, and seeing me, they soon learned the | |
cause of my terror. | |
I insisted on our knocking at Carmilla's door. Our knocking was | |
unanswered. | |
It soon became a pounding and an uproar. We shrieked her name, but all | |
was vain. | |
We all grew frightened, for the door was locked. We hurried back, in | |
panic, to my room. There we rang the bell long and furiously. If my | |
father's room had been at that side of the house, we would have called | |
him up at once to our aid. But, alas! he was quite out of hearing, and | |
to reach him involved an excursion for which we none of us had courage. | |
Servants, however, soon came running up the stairs; I had got on my | |
dressing gown and slippers meanwhile, and my companions were already | |
similarly furnished. Recognizing the voices of the servants on the | |
lobby, we sallied out together; and having renewed, as fruitlessly, our | |
summons at Carmilla's door, I ordered the men to force the lock. They | |
did so, and we stood, holding our lights aloft, in the doorway, and so | |
stared into the room. | |
We called her by name; but there was still no reply. We looked round the | |
room. Everything was undisturbed. It was exactly in the state in which I | |
had left it on bidding her good night. But Carmilla was gone. | |
VIII | |
_Search_ | |
At sight of the room, perfectly undisturbed except for our violent | |
entrance, we began to cool a little, and soon recovered our senses | |
sufficiently to dismiss the men. It had struck Mademoiselle that | |
possibly Carmilla had been wakened by the uproar at her door, and in her | |
first panic had jumped from her bed, and hid herself in a press, or | |
behind a curtain, from which she could not, of course, emerge until the | |
majordomo and his myrmidons had withdrawn. We now recommenced our | |
search, and began to call her name again. | |
It was all to no purpose. Our perplexity and agitation increased. We | |
examined the windows, but they were secured. I implored of Carmilla, if | |
she had concealed herself, to play this cruel trick no longer--to come | |
out and to end our anxieties. It was all useless. I was by this time | |
convinced that she was not in the room, nor in the dressing room, the | |
door of which was still locked on this side. She could not have passed | |
it. I was utterly puzzled. Had Carmilla discovered one of those secret | |
passages which the old housekeeper said were known to exist in the | |
schloss, although the tradition of their exact situation had been lost? | |
A little time would, no doubt, explain all--utterly perplexed as, for | |
the present, we were. | |
It was past four o'clock, and I preferred passing the remaining hours of | |
darkness in Madame's room. Daylight brought no solution of the | |
difficulty. | |
The whole household, with my father at its head, was in a state of | |
agitation next morning. Every part of the chateau was searched. The | |
grounds were explored. No trace of the missing lady could be discovered. | |
The stream was about to be dragged; my father was in distraction; what a | |
tale to have to tell the poor girl's mother on her return. I, too, was | |
almost beside myself, though my grief was quite of a different kind. | |
The morning was passed in alarm and excitement. It was now one o'clock, | |
and still no tidings. I ran up to Carmilla's room, and found her | |
standing at her dressing table. I was astounded. I could not believe my | |
eyes. She beckoned me to her with her pretty finger, in silence. Her | |
face expressed extreme fear. | |
I ran to her in an ecstasy of joy; I kissed and embraced her again and | |
again. I ran to the bell and rang it vehemently, to bring others to the | |
spot who might at once relieve my father's anxiety. | |
"Dear Carmilla, what has become of you all this time? We have been in | |
agonies of anxiety about you," I exclaimed. "Where have you been? How | |
did you come back?" | |
"Last night has been a night of wonders," she said. | |
"For mercy's sake, explain all you can." | |
"It was past two last night," she said, "when I went to sleep as usual | |
in my bed, with my doors locked, that of the dressing room, and that | |
opening upon the gallery. My sleep was uninterrupted, and, so far as I | |
know, dreamless; but I woke just now on the sofa in the dressing room | |
there, and I found the door between the rooms open, and the other door | |
forced. How could all this have happened without my being wakened? It | |
must have been accompanied with a great deal of noise, and I am | |
particularly easily wakened; and how could I have been carried out of my | |
bed without my sleep having been interrupted, I whom the slightest stir | |
startles?" | |
By this time, Madame, Mademoiselle, my father, and a number of the | |
servants were in the room. Carmilla was, of course, overwhelmed with | |
inquiries, congratulations, and welcomes. She had but one story to tell, | |
and seemed the least able of all the party to suggest any way of | |
accounting for what had happened. | |
My father took a turn up and down the room, thinking. I saw Carmilla's | |
eye follow him for a moment with a sly, dark glance. | |
When my father had sent the servants away, Mademoiselle having gone in | |
search of a little bottle of valerian and salvolatile, and there being | |
no one now in the room with Carmilla, except my father, Madame, and | |
myself, he came to her thoughtfully, took her hand very kindly, led her | |
to the sofa, and sat down beside her. | |
"Will you forgive me, my dear, if I risk a conjecture, and ask a | |
question?" | |
"Who can have a better right?" she said. "Ask what you please, and I | |
will tell you everything. But my story is simply one of bewilderment and | |
darkness. I know absolutely nothing. Put any question you please, but | |
you know, of course, the limitations mamma has placed me under." | |
"Perfectly, my dear child. I need not approach the topics on which she | |
desires our silence. Now, the marvel of last night consists in your | |
having been removed from your bed and your room, without being wakened, | |
and this removal having occurred apparently while the windows were still | |
secured, and the two doors locked upon the inside. I will tell you my | |
theory and ask you a question." | |
Carmilla was leaning on her hand dejectedly; Madame and I were | |
listening breathlessly. | |
"Now, my question is this. Have you ever been suspected of walking in | |
your sleep?" | |
"Never, since I was very young indeed." | |
"But you did walk in your sleep when you were young?" | |
"Yes; I know I did. I have been told so often by my old nurse." | |
My father smiled and nodded. | |
"Well, what has happened is this. You got up in your sleep, unlocked the | |
door, not leaving the key, as usual, in the lock, but taking it out and | |
locking it on the outside; you again took the key out, and carried it | |
away with you to some one of the five-and-twenty rooms on this floor, or | |
perhaps upstairs or downstairs. There are so many rooms and closets, so | |
much heavy furniture, and such accumulations of lumber, that it would | |
require a week to search this old house thoroughly. Do you see, now, | |
what I mean?" | |
"I do, but not all," she answered. | |
"And how, papa, do you account for her finding herself on the sofa in | |
the dressing room, which we had searched so carefully?" | |
"She came there after you had searched it, still in her sleep, and at | |
last awoke spontaneously, and was as much surprised to find herself | |
where she was as any one else. I wish all mysteries were as easily and | |
innocently explained as yours, Carmilla," he said, laughing. "And so we | |
may congratulate ourselves on the certainty that the most natural | |
explanation of the occurrence is one that involves no drugging, no | |
tampering with locks, no burglars, or poisoners, or witches--nothing | |
that need alarm Carmilla, or anyone else, for our safety." | |
Carmilla was looking charmingly. Nothing could be more beautiful than | |
her tints. Her beauty was, I think, enhanced by that graceful languor | |
that was peculiar to her. I think my father was silently contrasting her | |
looks with mine, for he said: | |
"I wish my poor Laura was looking more like herself"; and he sighed. | |
So our alarms were happily ended, and Carmilla restored to her friends. | |
IX | |
_The Doctor_ | |
As Carmilla would not hear of an attendant sleeping in her room, my | |
father arranged that a servant should sleep outside her door, so that | |
she would not attempt to make another such excursion without being | |
arrested at her own door. | |
That night passed quietly; and next morning early, the doctor, whom my | |
father had sent for without telling me a word about it, arrived to | |
see me. | |
Madame accompanied me to the library; and there the grave little doctor, | |
with white hair and spectacles, whom I mentioned before, was waiting to | |
receive me. | |
I told him my story, and as I proceeded he grew graver and graver. | |
We were standing, he and I, in the recess of one of the windows, facing | |
one another. When my statement was over, he leaned with his shoulders | |
against the wall, and with his eyes fixed on me earnestly, with an | |
interest in which was a dash of horror. | |
After a minute's reflection, he asked Madame if he could see my father. | |
He was sent for accordingly, and as he entered, smiling, he said: | |
"I dare say, doctor, you are going to tell me that I am an old fool for | |
having brought you here; I hope I am." | |
But his smile faded into shadow as the doctor, with a very grave face, | |
beckoned him to him. | |
He and the doctor talked for some time in the same recess where I had | |
just conferred with the physician. It seemed an earnest and | |
argumentative conversation. The room is very large, and I and Madame | |
stood together, burning with curiosity, at the farther end. Not a word | |
could we hear, however, for they spoke in a very low tone, and the deep | |
recess of the window quite concealed the doctor from view, and very | |
nearly my father, whose foot, arm, and shoulder only could we see; and | |
the voices were, I suppose, all the less audible for the sort of closet | |
which the thick wall and window formed. | |
After a time my father's face looked into the room; it was pale, | |
thoughtful, and, I fancied, agitated. | |
"Laura, dear, come here for a moment. Madame, we shan't trouble you, the | |
doctor says, at present." | |
Accordingly I approached, for the first time a little alarmed; for, | |
although I felt very weak, I did not feel ill; and strength, one always | |
fancies, is a thing that may be picked up when we please. | |
My father held out his hand to me, as I drew near, but he was looking at | |
the doctor, and he said: | |
"It certainly is very odd; I don't understand it quite. Laura, come | |
here, dear; now attend to Doctor Spielsberg, and recollect yourself." | |
"You mentioned a sensation like that of two needles piercing the skin, | |
somewhere about your neck, on the night when you experienced your first | |
horrible dream. Is there still any soreness?" | |
"None at all," I answered. | |
"Can you indicate with your finger about the point at which you think | |
this occurred?" | |
"Very little below my throat--here," I answered. | |
I wore a morning dress, which covered the place I pointed to. | |
"Now you can satisfy yourself," said the doctor. "You won't mind your | |
papa's lowering your dress a very little. It is necessary, to detect a | |
symptom of the complaint under which you have been suffering." | |
I acquiesced. It was only an inch or two below the edge of my collar. | |
"God bless me!--so it is," exclaimed my father, growing pale. | |
"You see it now with your own eyes," said the doctor, with a gloomy | |
triumph. | |
"What is it?" I exclaimed, beginning to be frightened. | |
"Nothing, my dear young lady, but a small blue spot, about the size of | |
the tip of your little finger; and now," he continued, turning to papa, | |
"the question is what is best to be done?" | |
"Is there any danger?" I urged, in great trepidation. | |
"I trust not, my dear," answered the doctor. "I don't see why you should | |
not recover. I don't see why you should not begin immediately to get | |
better. That is the point at which the sense of strangulation begins?" | |
"Yes," I answered. | |
"And--recollect as well as you can--the same point was a kind of center | |
of that thrill which you described just now, like the current of a cold | |
stream running against you?" | |
"It may have been; I think it was." | |
"Ay, you see?" he added, turning to my father. "Shall I say a word to | |
Madame?" | |
"Certainly," said my father. | |
He called Madame to him, and said: | |
"I find my young friend here far from well. It won't be of any great | |
consequence, I hope; but it will be necessary that some steps be taken, | |
which I will explain by-and-by; but in the meantime, Madame, you will | |
be so good as not to let Miss Laura be alone for one moment. That is the | |
only direction I need give for the present. It is indispensable." | |
"We may rely upon your kindness, Madame, I know," added my father. | |
Madame satisfied him eagerly. | |
"And you, dear Laura, I know you will observe the doctor's direction." | |
"I shall have to ask your opinion upon another patient, whose symptoms | |
slightly resemble those of my daughter, that have just been detailed to | |
you--very much milder in degree, but I believe quite of the same sort. | |
She is a young lady--our guest; but as you say you will be passing this | |
way again this evening, you can't do better than take your supper here, | |
and you can then see her. She does not come down till the afternoon." | |
"I thank you," said the doctor. "I shall be with you, then, at about | |
seven this evening." | |
And then they repeated their directions to me and to Madame, and with | |
this parting charge my father left us, and walked out with the doctor; | |
and I saw them pacing together up and down between the road and the | |
moat, on the grassy platform in front of the castle, evidently absorbed | |
in earnest conversation. | |
The doctor did not return. I saw him mount his horse there, take his | |
leave, and ride away eastward through the forest. | |
Nearly at the same time I saw the man arrive from Dranfield with the | |
letters, and dismount and hand the bag to my father. | |
In the meantime, Madame and I were both busy, lost in conjecture as to | |
the reasons of the singular and earnest direction which the doctor and | |
my father had concurred in imposing. Madame, as she afterwards told me, | |
was afraid the doctor apprehended a sudden seizure, and that, without | |
prompt assistance, I might either lose my life in a fit, or at least be | |
seriously hurt. | |
The interpretation did not strike me; and I fancied, perhaps luckily for | |
my nerves, that the arrangement was prescribed simply to secure a | |
companion, who would prevent my taking too much exercise, or eating | |
unripe fruit, or doing any of the fifty foolish things to which young | |
people are supposed to be prone. | |
About half an hour after my father came in--he had a letter in his | |
hand--and said: | |
"This letter had been delayed; it is from General Spielsdorf. He might | |
have been here yesterday, he may not come till tomorrow or he may be | |
here today." | |
He put the open letter into my hand; but he did not look pleased, as he | |
used when a guest, especially one so much loved as the General, | |
was coming. | |
On the contrary, he looked as if he wished him at the bottom of the Red | |
Sea. There was plainly something on his mind which he did not choose | |
to divulge. | |
"Papa, darling, will you tell me this?" said I, suddenly laying my hand | |
on his arm, and looking, I am sure, imploringly in his face. | |
"Perhaps," he answered, smoothing my hair caressingly over my eyes. | |
"Does the doctor think me very ill?" | |
"No, dear; he thinks, if right steps are taken, you will be quite well | |
again, at least, on the high road to a complete recovery, in a day or | |
two," he answered, a little dryly. "I wish our good friend, the General, | |
had chosen any other time; that is, I wish you had been perfectly well | |
to receive him." | |
"But do tell me, papa," I insisted, "what does he think is the matter | |
with me?" | |
"Nothing; you must not plague me with questions," he answered, with more | |
irritation than I ever remember him to have displayed before; and seeing | |
that I looked wounded, I suppose, he kissed me, and added, "You shall | |
know all about it in a day or two; that is, all that I know. In the | |
meantime you are not to trouble your head about it." | |
He turned and left the room, but came back before I had done wondering | |
and puzzling over the oddity of all this; it was merely to say that he | |
was going to Karnstein, and had ordered the carriage to be ready at | |
twelve, and that I and Madame should accompany him; he was going to see the | |
priest who lived near those picturesque grounds, upon business, and as | |
Carmilla had never seen them, she could follow, when she came down, with | |
Mademoiselle, who would bring materials for what you call a picnic, | |
which might be laid for us in the ruined castle. | |
At twelve o'clock, accordingly, I was ready, and not long after, my | |
father, Madame and I set out upon our projected drive. | |
Passing the drawbridge we turn to the right, and follow the road over | |
the steep Gothic bridge, westward, to reach the deserted village and | |
ruined castle of Karnstein. | |
No sylvan drive can be fancied prettier. The ground breaks into gentle | |
hills and hollows, all clothed with beautiful wood, totally destitute of | |
the comparative formality which artificial planting and early culture | |
and pruning impart. | |
The irregularities of the ground often lead the road out of its course, | |
and cause it to wind beautifully round the sides of broken hollows and | |
the steeper sides of the hills, among varieties of ground almost | |
inexhaustible. | |
Turning one of these points, we suddenly encountered our old friend, the | |
General, riding towards us, attended by a mounted servant. His | |
portmanteaus were following in a hired wagon, such as we term a cart. | |
The General dismounted as we pulled up, and, after the usual greetings, | |
was easily persuaded to accept the vacant seat in the carriage and send | |
his horse on with his servant to the schloss. | |
X | |
_Bereaved_ | |
It was about ten months since we had last seen him: but that time had | |
sufficed to make an alteration of years in his appearance. He had grown | |
thinner; something of gloom and anxiety had taken the place of that | |
cordial serenity which used to characterize his features. His dark blue | |
eyes, always penetrating, now gleamed with a sterner light from under | |
his shaggy grey eyebrows. It was not such a change as grief alone | |
usually induces, and angrier passions seemed to have had their share in | |
bringing it about. | |
We had not long resumed our drive, when the General began to talk, with | |
his usual soldierly directness, of the bereavement, as he termed it, | |
which he had sustained in the death of his beloved niece and ward; and | |
he then broke out in a tone of intense bitterness and fury, inveighing | |
against the "hellish arts" to which she had fallen a victim, and | |
expressing, with more exasperation than piety, his wonder that Heaven | |
should tolerate so monstrous an indulgence of the lusts and malignity | |
of hell. | |
My father, who saw at once that something very extraordinary had | |
befallen, asked him, if not too painful to him, to detail the | |
circumstances which he thought justified the strong terms in which he | |
expressed himself. | |
"I should tell you all with pleasure," said the General, "but you would | |
not believe me." | |
"Why should I not?" he asked. | |
"Because," he answered testily, "you believe in nothing but what | |
consists with your own prejudices and illusions. I remember when I was | |
like you, but I have learned better." | |
"Try me," said my father; "I am not such a dogmatist as you suppose. | |
Besides which, I very well know that you generally require proof for | |
what you believe, and am, therefore, very strongly predisposed to | |
respect your conclusions." | |
"You are right in supposing that I have not been led lightly into a | |
belief in the marvelous--for what I have experienced is marvelous--and I | |
have been forced by extraordinary evidence to credit that which ran | |
counter, diametrically, to all my theories. I have been made the dupe of | |
a preternatural conspiracy." | |
Notwithstanding his professions of confidence in the General's | |
penetration, I saw my father, at this point, glance at the General, | |
with, as I thought, a marked suspicion of his sanity. | |
The General did not see it, luckily. He was looking gloomily and | |
curiously into the glades and vistas of the woods that were opening | |
before us. | |
"You are going to the Ruins of Karnstein?" he said. "Yes, it is a lucky | |
coincidence; do you know I was going to ask you to bring me there to | |
inspect them. I have a special object in exploring. There is a ruined | |
chapel, ain't there, with a great many tombs of that extinct family?" | |
"So there are--highly interesting," said my father. "I hope you are | |
thinking of claiming the title and estates?" | |
My father said this gaily, but the General did not recollect the laugh, | |
or even the smile, which courtesy exacts for a friend's joke; on the | |
contrary, he looked grave and even fierce, ruminating on a matter that | |
stirred his anger and horror. | |
"Something very different," he said, gruffly. "I mean to unearth some of | |
those fine people. I hope, by God's blessing, to accomplish a pious | |
sacrilege here, which will relieve our earth of certain monsters, and | |
enable honest people to sleep in their beds without being assailed by | |
murderers. I have strange things to tell you, my dear friend, such as I | |
myself would have scouted as incredible a few months since." | |
My father looked at him again, but this time not with a glance of | |
suspicion--with an eye, rather, of keen intelligence and alarm. | |
"The house of Karnstein," he said, "has been long extinct: a hundred | |
years at least. My dear wife was maternally descended from the | |
Karnsteins. But the name and title have long ceased to exist. The castle | |
is a ruin; the very village is deserted; it is fifty years since the | |
smoke of a chimney was seen there; not a roof left." | |
"Quite true. I have heard a great deal about that since I last saw you; | |
a great deal that will astonish you. But I had better relate everything | |
in the order in which it occurred," said the General. "You saw my dear | |
ward--my child, I may call her. No creature could have been more | |
beautiful, and only three months ago none more blooming." | |
"Yes, poor thing! when I saw her last she certainly was quite lovely," | |
said my father. "I was grieved and shocked more than I can tell you, my | |
dear friend; I knew what a blow it was to you." | |
He took the General's hand, and they exchanged a kind pressure. Tears | |
gathered in the old soldier's eyes. He did not seek to conceal them. | |
He said: | |
"We have been very old friends; I knew you would feel for me, childless | |
as I am. She had become an object of very near interest to me, and | |
repaid my care by an affection that cheered my home and made my life | |
happy. That is all gone. The years that remain to me on earth may not be | |
very long; but by God's mercy I hope to accomplish a service to mankind | |
before I die, and to subserve the vengeance of Heaven upon the fiends | |
who have murdered my poor child in the spring of her hopes and beauty!" | |
"You said, just now, that you intended relating everything as it | |
occurred," said my father. "Pray do; I assure you that it is not mere | |
curiosity that prompts me." | |
By this time we had reached the point at which the Drunstall road, by | |
which the General had come, diverges from the road which we were | |
traveling to Karnstein. | |
"How far is it to the ruins?" inquired the General, looking anxiously | |
forward. | |
"About half a league," answered my father. "Pray let us hear the story | |
you were so good as to promise." | |
XI | |
_The Story_ | |
"With all my heart," said the General, with an effort; and after a short | |
pause in which to arrange his subject, he commenced one of the strangest | |
narratives I ever heard. | |
"My dear child was looking forward with great pleasure to the visit you | |
had been so good as to arrange for her to your charming daughter." Here | |
he made me a gallant but melancholy bow. "In the meantime we had an | |
invitation to my old friend the Count Carlsfeld, whose schloss is about | |
six leagues to the other side of Karnstein. It was to attend the series | |
of fetes which, you remember, were given by him in honor of his | |
illustrious visitor, the Grand Duke Charles." | |
"Yes; and very splendid, I believe, they were," said my father. | |
"Princely! But then his hospitalities are quite regal. He has Aladdin's | |
lamp. The night from which my sorrow dates was devoted to a magnificent | |
masquerade. The grounds were thrown open, the trees hung with | |
lamps. There was such a display of fireworks as Paris itself had never | |
witnessed. And such music--music, you know, is my weakness--such | |
ravishing music! The finest instrumental band, perhaps, in the world, | |
and the finest singers who could be collected from all the great operas | |
in Europe. As you wandered through these fantastically illuminated | |
grounds, the moon-lighted chateau throwing a rosy light from its long | |
rows of windows, you would suddenly hear these ravishing voices stealing | |
from the silence of some grove, or rising from boats upon the lake. I | |
felt myself, as I looked and listened, carried back into the romance and | |
poetry of my early youth. | |
"When the fireworks were ended, and the ball beginning, we returned to | |
the noble suite of rooms that were thrown open to the dancers. A masked | |
ball, you know, is a beautiful sight; but so brilliant a spectacle of | |
the kind I never saw before. | |
"It was a very aristocratic assembly. I was myself almost the only | |
'nobody' present. | |
"My dear child was looking quite beautiful. She wore no mask. Her | |
excitement and delight added an unspeakable charm to her features, | |
always lovely. I remarked a young lady, dressed magnificently, but | |
wearing a mask, who appeared to me to be observing my ward with | |
extraordinary interest. I had seen her, earlier in the evening, in the | |
great hall, and again, for a few minutes, walking near us, on the | |
terrace under the castle windows, similarly employed. A lady, also | |
masked, richly and gravely dressed, and with a stately air, like a | |
person of rank, accompanied her as a chaperon. | |
"Had the young lady not worn a mask, I could, of course, have been much | |
more certain upon the question whether she was really watching my | |
poor darling. | |
"I am now well assured that she was. | |
"We were now in one of the salons. My poor dear child had been dancing, | |
and was resting a little in one of the chairs near the door; I was | |
standing near. The two ladies I have mentioned had approached and the | |
younger took the chair next my ward; while her companion stood beside | |
me, and for a little time addressed herself, in a low tone, to | |
her charge. | |
"Availing herself of the privilege of her mask, she turned to me, and in | |
the tone of an old friend, and calling me by my name, opened a | |
conversation with me, which piqued my curiosity a good deal. She | |
referred to many scenes where she had met me--at Court, and at | |
distinguished houses. She alluded to little incidents which I had long | |
ceased to think of, but which, I found, had only lain in abeyance in my | |
memory, for they instantly started into life at her touch. | |
"I became more and more curious to ascertain who she was, every moment. | |
She parried my attempts to discover very adroitly and pleasantly. The | |
knowledge she showed of many passages in my life seemed to me all but | |
unaccountable; and she appeared to take a not unnatural pleasure in | |
foiling my curiosity, and in seeing me flounder in my eager perplexity, | |
from one conjecture to another. | |
"In the meantime the young lady, whom her mother called by the odd name | |
of Millarca, when she once or twice addressed her, had, with the same | |
ease and grace, got into conversation with my ward. | |
"She introduced herself by saying that her mother was a very old | |
acquaintance of mine. She spoke of the agreeable audacity which a mask | |
rendered practicable; she talked like a friend; she admired her dress, | |
and insinuated very prettily her admiration of her beauty. She amused | |
her with laughing criticisms upon the people who crowded the ballroom, | |
and laughed at my poor child's fun. She was very witty and lively when | |
she pleased, and after a time they had grown very good friends, and the | |
young stranger lowered her mask, displaying a remarkably beautiful face. | |
I had never seen it before, neither had my dear child. But though it was | |
new to us, the features were so engaging, as well as lovely, that it | |
was impossible not to feel the attraction powerfully. My poor girl did | |
so. I never saw anyone more taken with another at first sight, unless, | |
indeed, it was the stranger herself, who seemed quite to have lost her | |
heart to her. | |
"In the meantime, availing myself of the license of a masquerade, I put | |
not a few questions to the elder lady. | |
"'You have puzzled me utterly,' I said, laughing. 'Is that not enough? | |
Won't you, now, consent to stand on equal terms, and do me the kindness | |
to remove your mask?' | |
"'Can any request be more unreasonable?' she replied. 'Ask a lady to | |
yield an advantage! Beside, how do you know you should recognize me? | |
Years make changes.' | |
"'As you see,' I said, with a bow, and, I suppose, a rather melancholy | |
little laugh. | |
"'As philosophers tell us,' she said; 'and how do you know that a sight | |
of my face would help you?' | |
"'I should take chance for that,' I answered. 'It is vain trying to make | |
yourself out an old woman; your figure betrays you.' | |
"'Years, nevertheless, have passed since I saw you, rather since you saw | |
me, for that is what I am considering. Millarca, there, is my daughter; | |
I cannot then be young, even in the opinion of people whom time has | |
taught to be indulgent, and I may not like to be compared with what you | |
remember me. You have no mask to remove. You can offer me nothing in | |
exchange.' | |
"'My petition is to your pity, to remove it.' | |
"'And mine to yours, to let it stay where it is,' she replied. | |
"'Well, then, at least you will tell me whether you are French or | |
German; you speak both languages so perfectly.' | |
"'I don't think I shall tell you that, General; you intend a surprise, | |
and are meditating the particular point of attack.' | |
"'At all events, you won't deny this,' I said, 'that being honored by | |
your permission to converse, I ought to know how to address you. Shall I | |
say Madame la Comtesse?' | |
"She laughed, and she would, no doubt, have met me with another | |
evasion--if, indeed, I can treat any occurrence in an interview every | |
circumstance of which was prearranged, as I now believe, with the | |
profoundest cunning, as liable to be modified by accident. | |
"'As to that,' she began; but she was interrupted, almost as she opened | |
her lips, by a gentleman, dressed in black, who looked particularly | |
elegant and distinguished, with this drawback, that his face was the | |
most deadly pale I ever saw, except in death. He was in no | |
masquerade--in the plain evening dress of a gentleman; and he said, | |
without a smile, but with a courtly and unusually low bow:-- | |
"'Will Madame la Comtesse permit me to say a very few words which may | |
interest her?' | |
"The lady turned quickly to him, and touched her lip in token of | |
silence; she then said to me, 'Keep my place for me, General; I shall | |
return when I have said a few words.' | |
"And with this injunction, playfully given, she walked a little aside | |
with the gentleman in black, and talked for some minutes, apparently | |
very earnestly. They then walked away slowly together in the crowd, and | |
I lost them for some minutes. | |
"I spent the interval in cudgeling my brains for a conjecture as to the | |
identity of the lady who seemed to remember me so kindly, and I was | |
thinking of turning about and joining in the conversation between my | |
pretty ward and the Countess's daughter, and trying whether, by the time | |
she returned, I might not have a surprise in store for her, by having | |
her name, title, chateau, and estates at my fingers' ends. But at this | |
moment she returned, accompanied by the pale man in black, who said: | |
"'I shall return and inform Madame la Comtesse when her carriage is at | |
the door.' | |
"He withdrew with a bow." | |
XII | |
_A Petition_ | |
"'Then we are to lose Madame la Comtesse, but I hope only for a few | |
hours,' I said, with a low bow. | |
"'It may be that only, or it may be a few weeks. It was very unlucky his | |
speaking to me just now as he did. Do you now know me?' | |
"I assured her I did not. | |
"'You shall know me,' she said, 'but not at present. We are older and | |
better friends than, perhaps, you suspect. I cannot yet declare myself. | |
I shall in three weeks pass your beautiful schloss, about which I have | |
been making enquiries. I shall then look in upon you for an hour or two, | |
and renew a friendship which I never think of without a thousand | |
pleasant recollections. This moment a piece of news has reached me like | |
a thunderbolt. I must set out now, and travel by a devious route, nearly | |
a hundred miles, with all the dispatch I can possibly make. My | |
perplexities multiply. I am only deterred by the compulsory reserve I | |
practice as to my name from making a very singular request of you. My | |
poor child has not quite recovered her strength. Her horse fell with | |
her, at a hunt which she had ridden out to witness, her nerves have not | |
yet recovered the shock, and our physician says that she must on no | |
account exert herself for some time to come. We came here, in | |
consequence, by very easy stages--hardly six leagues a day. I must now | |
travel day and night, on a mission of life and death--a mission the | |
critical and momentous nature of which I shall be able to explain to you | |
when we meet, as I hope we shall, in a few weeks, without the necessity | |
of any concealment.' | |
"She went on to make her petition, and it was in the tone of a person | |
from whom such a request amounted to conferring, rather than seeking | |
a favor. | |
"This was only in manner, and, as it seemed, quite unconsciously. Than | |
the terms in which it was expressed, nothing could be more deprecatory. | |
It was simply that I would consent to take charge of her daughter during | |
her absence. | |
"This was, all things considered, a strange, not to say, an audacious | |
request. She in some sort disarmed me, by stating and admitting | |
everything that could be urged against it, and throwing herself entirely | |
upon my chivalry. At the same moment, by a fatality that seems to have | |
predetermined all that happened, my poor child came to my side, and, in | |
an undertone, besought me to invite her new friend, Millarca, to pay us | |
a visit. She had just been sounding her, and thought, if her mamma would | |
allow her, she would like it extremely. | |
"At another time I should have told her to wait a little, until, at | |
least, we knew who they were. But I had not a moment to think in. The | |
two ladies assailed me together, and I must confess the refined and | |
beautiful face of the young lady, about which there was something | |
extremely engaging, as well as the elegance and fire of high birth, | |
determined me; and, quite overpowered, I submitted, and undertook, too | |
easily, the care of the young lady, whom her mother called Millarca. | |
"The Countess beckoned to her daughter, who listened with grave | |
attention while she told her, in general terms, how suddenly and | |
peremptorily she had been summoned, and also of the arrangement she had | |
made for her under my care, adding that I was one of her earliest and | |
most valued friends. | |
"I made, of course, such speeches as the case seemed to call for, and | |
found myself, on reflection, in a position which I did not half like. | |
"The gentleman in black returned, and very ceremoniously conducted the | |
lady from the room. | |
"The demeanor of this gentleman was such as to impress me with the | |
conviction that the Countess was a lady of very much more importance | |
than her modest title alone might have led me to assume. | |
"Her last charge to me was that no attempt was to be made to learn more | |
about her than I might have already guessed, until her return. Our | |
distinguished host, whose guest she was, knew her reasons. | |
"'But here,' she said, 'neither I nor my daughter could safely remain | |
for more than a day. I removed my mask imprudently for a moment, about | |
an hour ago, and, too late, I fancied you saw me. So I resolved to seek | |
an opportunity of talking a little to you. Had I found that you had seen | |
me, I would have thrown myself on your high sense of honor to keep my | |
secret some weeks. As it is, I am satisfied that you did not see me; but | |
if you now suspect, or, on reflection, should suspect, who I am, I | |
commit myself, in like manner, entirely to your honor. My daughter will | |
observe the same secrecy, and I well know that you will, from time to | |
time, remind her, lest she should thoughtlessly disclose it.' | |
"She whispered a few words to her daughter, kissed her hurriedly twice, | |
and went away, accompanied by the pale gentleman in black, and | |
disappeared in the crowd. | |
"'In the next room,' said Millarca, 'there is a window that looks upon | |
the hall door. I should like to see the last of mamma, and to kiss my | |
hand to her.' | |
"We assented, of course, and accompanied her to the window. We looked | |
out, and saw a handsome old-fashioned carriage, with a troop of couriers | |
and footmen. We saw the slim figure of the pale gentleman in black, as | |
he held a thick velvet cloak, and placed it about her shoulders and | |
threw the hood over her head. She nodded to him, and just touched his | |
hand with hers. He bowed low repeatedly as the door closed, and the | |
carriage began to move. | |
"'She is gone,' said Millarca, with a sigh. | |
"'She is gone,' I repeated to myself, for the first time--in the hurried | |
moments that had elapsed since my consent--reflecting upon the folly | |
of my act. | |
"'She did not look up,' said the young lady, plaintively. | |
"'The Countess had taken off her mask, perhaps, and did not care to show | |
her face,' I said; 'and she could not know that you were in the window.' | |
"She sighed, and looked in my face. She was so beautiful that I | |
relented. I was sorry I had for a moment repented of my hospitality, and | |
I determined to make her amends for the unavowed churlishness of my | |
reception. | |
"The young lady, replacing her mask, joined my ward in persuading me to | |
return to the grounds, where the concert was soon to be renewed. We did | |
so, and walked up and down the terrace that lies under the | |
castle windows. | |
"Millarca became very intimate with us, and amused us with lively | |
descriptions and stories of most of the great people whom we saw upon | |
the terrace. I liked her more and more every minute. Her gossip without | |
being ill-natured, was extremely diverting to me, who had been so long | |
out of the great world. I thought what life she would give to our | |
sometimes lonely evenings at home. | |
"This ball was not over until the morning sun had almost reached the | |
horizon. It pleased the Grand Duke to dance till then, so loyal people | |
could not go away, or think of bed. | |
"We had just got through a crowded saloon, when my ward asked me what | |
had become of Millarca. I thought she had been by her side, and she | |
fancied she was by mine. The fact was, we had lost her. | |
"All my efforts to find her were vain. I feared that she had mistaken, | |
in the confusion of a momentary separation from us, other people for her | |
new friends, and had, possibly, pursued and lost them in the extensive | |
grounds which were thrown open to us. | |
"Now, in its full force, I recognized a new folly in my having | |
undertaken the charge of a young lady without so much as knowing her | |
name; and fettered as I was by promises, of the reasons for imposing | |
which I knew nothing, I could not even point my inquiries by saying that | |
the missing young lady was the daughter of the Countess who had taken | |
her departure a few hours before. | |
"Morning broke. It was clear daylight before I gave up my search. It was | |
not till near two o'clock next day that we heard anything of my | |
missing charge. | |
"At about that time a servant knocked at my niece's door, to say that he | |
had been earnestly requested by a young lady, who appeared to be in | |
great distress, to make out where she could find the General Baron | |
Spielsdorf and the young lady his daughter, in whose charge she had been | |
left by her mother. | |
"There could be no doubt, notwithstanding the slight inaccuracy, that | |
our young friend had turned up; and so she had. Would to heaven we | |
had lost her! | |
"She told my poor child a story to account for her having failed to | |
recover us for so long. Very late, she said, she had got to the | |
housekeeper's bedroom in despair of finding us, and had then fallen | |
into a deep sleep which, long as it was, had hardly sufficed to recruit | |
her strength after the fatigues of the ball. | |
"That day Millarca came home with us. I was only too happy, after all, | |
to have secured so charming a companion for my dear girl." | |
XIII | |
_The Woodman_ | |
"There soon, however, appeared some drawbacks. In the first place, | |
Millarca complained of extreme languor--the weakness that remained after | |
her late illness--and she never emerged from her room till the afternoon | |
was pretty far advanced. In the next place, it was accidentally | |
discovered, although she always locked her door on the inside, and never | |
disturbed the key from its place till she admitted the maid to assist at | |
her toilet, that she was undoubtedly sometimes absent from her room in | |
the very early morning, and at various times later in the day, before | |
she wished it to be understood that she was stirring. She was repeatedly | |
seen from the windows of the schloss, in the first faint grey of the | |
morning, walking through the trees, in an easterly direction, and | |
looking like a person in a trance. This convinced me that she walked in | |
her sleep. But this hypothesis did not solve the puzzle. How did she | |
pass out from her room, leaving the door locked on the inside? How did | |
she escape from the house without unbarring door or window? | |
"In the midst of my perplexities, an anxiety of a far more urgent kind | |
presented itself. | |
"My dear child began to lose her looks and health, and that in a manner | |
so mysterious, and even horrible, that I became thoroughly frightened. | |
"She was at first visited by appalling dreams; then, as she fancied, by | |
a specter, sometimes resembling Millarca, sometimes in the shape of a | |
beast, indistinctly seen, walking round the foot of her bed, from | |
side to side. | |
"Lastly came sensations. One, not unpleasant, but very peculiar, she | |
said, resembled the flow of an icy stream against her breast. At a later | |
time, she felt something like a pair of large needles pierce her, a | |
little below the throat, with a very sharp pain. A few nights after, | |
followed a gradual and convulsive sense of strangulation; then came | |
unconsciousness." | |
I could hear distinctly every word the kind old General was saying, | |
because by this time we were driving upon the short grass that spreads | |
on either side of the road as you approach the roofless village which | |
had not shown the smoke of a chimney for more than half a century. | |
You may guess how strangely I felt as I heard my own symptoms so exactly | |
described in those which had been experienced by the poor girl who, but | |
for the catastrophe which followed, would have been at that moment a | |
visitor at my father's chateau. You may suppose, also, how I felt as I | |
heard him detail habits and mysterious peculiarities which were, in | |
fact, those of our beautiful guest, Carmilla! | |
A vista opened in the forest; we were on a sudden under the chimneys and | |
gables of the ruined village, and the towers and battlements of the | |
dismantled castle, round which gigantic trees are grouped, overhung us | |
from a slight eminence. | |
In a frightened dream I got down from the carriage, and in silence, for | |
we had each abundant matter for thinking; we soon mounted the ascent, | |
and were among the spacious chambers, winding stairs, and dark | |
corridors of the castle. | |
"And this was once the palatial residence of the Karnsteins!" said the | |
old General at length, as from a great window he looked out across the | |
village, and saw the wide, undulating expanse of forest. "It was a bad | |
family, and here its bloodstained annals were written," he continued. | |
"It is hard that they should, after death, continue to plague the human | |
race with their atrocious lusts. That is the chapel of the Karnsteins, | |
down there." | |
He pointed down to the grey walls of the Gothic building partly visible | |
through the foliage, a little way down the steep. "And I hear the axe of | |
a woodman," he added, "busy among the trees that surround it; he | |
possibly may give us the information of which I am in search, and point | |
out the grave of Mircalla, Countess of Karnstein. These rustics preserve | |
the local traditions of great families, whose stories die out among the | |
rich and titled so soon as the families themselves become extinct." | |
"We have a portrait, at home, of Mircalla, the Countess Karnstein; | |
should you like to see it?" asked my father. | |
"Time enough, dear friend," replied the General. "I believe that I have | |
seen the original; and one motive which has led me to you earlier than I | |
at first intended, was to explore the chapel which we are now | |
approaching." | |
"What! see the Countess Mircalla," exclaimed my father; "why, she has | |
been dead more than a century!" | |
"Not so dead as you fancy, I am told," answered the General. | |
"I confess, General, you puzzle me utterly," replied my father, looking | |
at him, I fancied, for a moment with a return of the suspicion I | |
detected before. But although there was anger and detestation, at times, | |
in the old General's manner, there was nothing flighty. | |
"There remains to me," he said, as we passed under the heavy arch of | |
the Gothic church--for its dimensions would have justified its being so | |
styled--"but one object which can interest me during the few years that | |
remain to me on earth, and that is to wreak on her the vengeance which, | |
I thank God, may still be accomplished by a mortal arm." | |
"What vengeance can you mean?" asked my father, in increasing amazement. | |
"I mean, to decapitate the monster," he answered, with a fierce flush, | |
and a stamp that echoed mournfully through the hollow ruin, and his | |
clenched hand was at the same moment raised, as if it grasped the handle | |
of an axe, while he shook it ferociously in the air. | |
"What?" exclaimed my father, more than ever bewildered. | |
"To strike her head off." | |
"Cut her head off!" | |
"Aye, with a hatchet, with a spade, or with anything that can cleave | |
through her murderous throat. You shall hear," he answered, trembling | |
with rage. And hurrying forward he said: | |
"That beam will answer for a seat; your dear child is fatigued; let her | |
be seated, and I will, in a few sentences, close my dreadful story." | |
The squared block of wood, which lay on the grass-grown pavement of the | |
chapel, formed a bench on which I was very glad to seat myself, and in | |
the meantime the General called to the woodman, who had been removing | |
some boughs which leaned upon the old walls; and, axe in hand, the hardy | |
old fellow stood before us. | |
He could not tell us anything of these monuments; but there was an old | |
man, he said, a ranger of this forest, at present sojourning in the | |
house of the priest, about two miles away, who could point out every | |
monument of the old Karnstein family; and, for a trifle, he undertook | |
to bring him back with him, if we would lend him one of our horses, in | |
little more than half an hour. | |
"Have you been long employed about this forest?" asked my father of the | |
old man. | |
"I have been a woodman here," he answered in his patois, "under the | |
forester, all my days; so has my father before me, and so on, as many | |
generations as I can count up. I could show you the very house in the | |
village here, in which my ancestors lived." | |
"How came the village to be deserted?" asked the General. | |
"It was troubled by revenants, sir; several were tracked to their | |
graves, there detected by the usual tests, and extinguished in the usual | |
way, by decapitation, by the stake, and by burning; but not until many | |
of the villagers were killed. | |
"But after all these proceedings according to law," he continued--"so | |
many graves opened, and so many vampires deprived of their horrible | |
animation--the village was not relieved. But a Moravian nobleman, who | |
happened to be traveling this way, heard how matters were, and being | |
skilled--as many people are in his country--in such affairs, he offered | |
to deliver the village from its tormentor. He did so thus: There being a | |
bright moon that night, he ascended, shortly after sunset, the towers of | |
the chapel here, from whence he could distinctly see the churchyard | |
beneath him; you can see it from that window. From this point he watched | |
until he saw the vampire come out of his grave, and place near it the | |
linen clothes in which he had been folded, and then glide away towards | |
the village to plague its inhabitants. | |
"The stranger, having seen all this, came down from the steeple, took | |
the linen wrappings of the vampire, and carried them up to the top of | |
the tower, which he again mounted. When the vampire returned from his | |
prowlings and missed his clothes, he cried furiously to the Moravian, | |
whom he saw at the summit of the tower, and who, in reply, beckoned him | |
to ascend and take them. Whereupon the vampire, accepting his | |
invitation, began to climb the steeple, and so soon as he had reached | |
the battlements, the Moravian, with a stroke of his sword, clove his | |
skull in twain, hurling him down to the churchyard, whither, descending | |
by the winding stairs, the stranger followed and cut his head off, and | |
next day delivered it and the body to the villagers, who duly impaled | |
and burnt them. | |
"This Moravian nobleman had authority from the then head of the family | |
to remove the tomb of Mircalla, Countess Karnstein, which he did | |
effectually, so that in a little while its site was quite forgotten." | |
"Can you point out where it stood?" asked the General, eagerly. | |
The forester shook his head, and smiled. | |
"Not a soul living could tell you that now," he said; "besides, they say | |
her body was removed; but no one is sure of that either." | |
Having thus spoken, as time pressed, he dropped his axe and departed, | |
leaving us to hear the remainder of the General's strange story. | |
XIV | |
_The Meeting_ | |
"My beloved child," he resumed, "was now growing rapidly worse. The | |
physician who attended her had failed to produce the slightest | |
impression on her disease, for such I then supposed it to be. He saw my | |
alarm, and suggested a consultation. I called in an abler physician, | |
from Gratz. | |
"Several days elapsed before he arrived. He was a good and pious, as well | |
as a learned man. Having seen my poor ward together, they withdrew to my | |
library to confer and discuss. I, from the adjoining room, where I | |
awaited their summons, heard these two gentlemen's voices raised in | |
something sharper than a strictly philosophical discussion. I knocked at | |
the door and entered. I found the old physician from Gratz maintaining | |
his theory. His rival was combating it with undisguised ridicule, | |
accompanied with bursts of laughter. This unseemly manifestation | |
subsided and the altercation ended on my entrance. | |
"'Sir,' said my first physician, 'my learned brother seems to think that | |
you want a conjuror, and not a doctor.' | |
"'Pardon me,' said the old physician from Gratz, looking displeased, 'I | |
shall state my own view of the case in my own way another time. I | |
grieve, Monsieur le General, that by my skill and science I can be of no | |
use. Before I go I shall do myself the honor to suggest something to | |
you.' | |
"He seemed thoughtful, and sat down at a table and began to write. | |
"Profoundly disappointed, I made my bow, and as I turned to go, the other | |
doctor pointed over his shoulder to his companion who was writing, and | |
then, with a shrug, significantly touched his forehead. | |
"This consultation, then, left me precisely where I was. I walked out | |
into the grounds, all but distracted. The doctor from Gratz, in ten or | |
fifteen minutes, overtook me. He apologized for having followed me, but | |
said that he could not conscientiously take his leave without a few | |
words more. He told me that he could not be mistaken; no natural disease | |
exhibited the same symptoms; and that death was already very near. There | |
remained, however, a day, or possibly two, of life. If the fatal seizure | |
were at once arrested, with great care and skill her strength might | |
possibly return. But all hung now upon the confines of the irrevocable. | |
One more assault might extinguish the last spark of vitality which is, | |
every moment, ready to die. | |
"'And what is the nature of the seizure you speak of?' I entreated. | |
"'I have stated all fully in this note, which I place in your hands upon | |
the distinct condition that you send for the nearest clergyman, and open | |
my letter in his presence, and on no account read it till he is with | |
you; you would despise it else, and it is a matter of life and death. | |
Should the priest fail you, then, indeed, you may read it.' | |
"He asked me, before taking his leave finally, whether I would wish to | |
see a man curiously learned upon the very subject, which, after I had | |
read his letter, would probably interest me above all others, and he | |
urged me earnestly to invite him to visit him there; and so took | |
his leave. | |
"The ecclesiastic was absent, and I read the letter by myself. At | |
another time, or in another case, it might have excited my ridicule. But | |
into what quackeries will not people rush for a last chance, where all | |
accustomed means have failed, and the life of a beloved object is | |
at stake? | |
"Nothing, you will say, could be more absurd than the learned man's | |
letter. | |
"It was monstrous enough to have consigned him to a madhouse. He said | |
that the patient was suffering from the visits of a vampire! The | |
punctures which she described as having occurred near the throat, were, | |
he insisted, the insertion of those two long, thin, and sharp teeth | |
which, it is well known, are peculiar to vampires; and there could be no | |
doubt, he added, as to the well-defined presence of the small livid mark | |
which all concurred in describing as that induced by the demon's lips, | |
and every symptom described by the sufferer was in exact conformity with | |
those recorded in every case of a similar visitation. | |
"Being myself wholly skeptical as to the existence of any such portent | |
as the vampire, the supernatural theory of the good doctor furnished, in | |
my opinion, but another instance of learning and intelligence oddly | |
associated with some one hallucination. I was so miserable, however, | |
that, rather than try nothing, I acted upon the instructions of | |
the letter. | |
"I concealed myself in the dark dressing room, that opened upon the poor | |
patient's room, in which a candle was burning, and watched there till | |
she was fast asleep. I stood at the door, peeping through the small | |
crevice, my sword laid on the table beside me, as my directions | |
prescribed, until, a little after one, I saw a large black object, very | |
ill-defined, crawl, as it seemed to me, over the foot of the bed, and | |
swiftly spread itself up to the poor girl's throat, where it swelled, in | |
a moment, into a great, palpitating mass. | |
"For a few moments I had stood petrified. I now sprang forward, with my | |
sword in my hand. The black creature suddenly contracted towards the | |
foot of the bed, glided over it, and, standing on the floor about a yard | |
below the foot of the bed, with a glare of skulking ferocity and horror | |
fixed on me, I saw Millarca. Speculating I know not what, I struck at | |
her instantly with my sword; but I saw her standing near the door, | |
unscathed. Horrified, I pursued, and struck again. She was gone; and my | |
sword flew to shivers against the door. | |
"I can't describe to you all that passed on that horrible night. The | |
whole house was up and stirring. The specter Millarca was gone. But her | |
victim was sinking fast, and before the morning dawned, she died." | |
The old General was agitated. We did not speak to him. My father walked | |
to some little distance, and began reading the inscriptions on the | |
tombstones; and thus occupied, he strolled into the door of a side | |
chapel to prosecute his researches. The General leaned against the wall, | |
dried his eyes, and sighed heavily. I was relieved on hearing the voices | |
of Carmilla and Madame, who were at that moment approaching. The voices | |
died away. | |
In this solitude, having just listened to so strange a story, connected, | |
as it was, with the great and titled dead, whose monuments were | |
moldering among the dust and ivy round us, and every incident of which | |
bore so awfully upon my own mysterious case--in this haunted spot, | |
darkened by the towering foliage that rose on every side, dense and high | |
above its noiseless walls--a horror began to steal over me, and my heart | |
sank as I thought that my friends were, after all, not about to enter | |
and disturb this triste and ominous scene. | |
The old General's eyes were fixed on the ground, as he leaned with his | |
hand upon the basement of a shattered monument. | |
Under a narrow, arched doorway, surmounted by one of those demoniacal | |
grotesques in which the cynical and ghastly fancy of old Gothic carving | |
delights, I saw very gladly the beautiful face and figure of Carmilla | |
enter the shadowy chapel. | |
I was just about to rise and speak, and nodded smiling, in answer to her | |
peculiarly engaging smile; when with a cry, the old man by my side | |
caught up the woodman's hatchet, and started forward. On seeing him a | |
brutalized change came over her features. It was an instantaneous and | |
horrible transformation, as she made a crouching step backwards. Before | |
I could utter a scream, he struck at her with all his force, but she | |
dived under his blow, and unscathed, caught him in her tiny grasp by the | |
wrist. He struggled for a moment to release his arm, but his hand | |
opened, the axe fell to the ground, and the girl was gone. | |
He staggered against the wall. His grey hair stood upon his head, and a | |
moisture shone over his face, as if he were at the point of death. | |
The frightful scene had passed in a moment. The first thing I recollect | |
after, is Madame standing before me, and impatiently repeating again and | |
again, the question, "Where is Mademoiselle Carmilla?" | |
I answered at length, "I don't know--I can't tell--she went there," and | |
I pointed to the door through which Madame had just entered; "only a | |
minute or two since." | |
"But I have been standing there, in the passage, ever since Mademoiselle | |
Carmilla entered; and she did not return." | |
She then began to call "Carmilla," through every door and passage and | |
from the windows, but no answer came. | |
"She called herself Carmilla?" asked the General, still agitated. | |
"Carmilla, yes," I answered. | |
"Aye," he said; "that is Millarca. That is the same person who long ago | |
was called Mircalla, Countess Karnstein. Depart from this accursed | |
ground, my poor child, as quickly as you can. Drive to the clergyman's | |
house, and stay there till we come. Begone! May you never behold | |
Carmilla more; you will not find her here." | |
XV | |
_Ordeal and Execution_ | |
As he spoke one of the strangest looking men I ever beheld entered the | |
chapel at the door through which Carmilla had made her entrance and her | |
exit. He was tall, narrow-chested, stooping, with high shoulders, and | |
dressed in black. His face was brown and dried in with deep furrows; he | |
wore an oddly-shaped hat with a broad leaf. His hair, long and grizzled, | |
hung on his shoulders. He wore a pair of gold spectacles, and walked | |
slowly, with an odd shambling gait, with his face sometimes turned up to | |
the sky, and sometimes bowed down towards the ground, seemed to wear a | |
perpetual smile; his long thin arms were swinging, and his lank hands, | |
in old black gloves ever so much too wide for them, waving and | |
gesticulating in utter abstraction. | |
"The very man!" exclaimed the General, advancing with manifest delight. | |
"My dear Baron, how happy I am to see you, I had no hope of meeting you | |
so soon." He signed to my father, who had by this time returned, and | |
leading the fantastic old gentleman, whom he called the Baron to meet | |
him. He introduced him formally, and they at once entered into earnest | |
conversation. The stranger took a roll of paper from his pocket, and | |
spread it on the worn surface of a tomb that stood by. He had a pencil | |
case in his fingers, with which he traced imaginary lines from point to | |
point on the paper, which from their often glancing from it, together, | |
at certain points of the building, I concluded to be a plan of the | |
chapel. He accompanied, what I may term, his lecture, with occasional | |
readings from a dirty little book, whose yellow leaves were closely | |
written over. | |
They sauntered together down the side aisle, opposite to the spot where | |
I was standing, conversing as they went; then they began measuring | |
distances by paces, and finally they all stood together, facing a piece | |
of the sidewall, which they began to examine with great minuteness; | |
pulling off the ivy that clung over it, and rapping the plaster with the | |
ends of their sticks, scraping here, and knocking there. At length they | |
ascertained the existence of a broad marble tablet, with letters carved | |
in relief upon it. | |
With the assistance of the woodman, who soon returned, a monumental | |
inscription, and carved escutcheon, were disclosed. They proved to be | |
those of the long lost monument of Mircalla, Countess Karnstein. | |
The old General, though not I fear given to the praying mood, raised his | |
hands and eyes to heaven, in mute thanksgiving for some moments. | |
"Tomorrow," I heard him say; "the commissioner will be here, and the | |
Inquisition will be held according to law." | |
Then turning to the old man with the gold spectacles, whom I have | |
described, he shook him warmly by both hands and said: | |
"Baron, how can I thank you? How can we all thank you? You will have | |
delivered this region from a plague that has scourged its inhabitants | |
for more than a century. The horrible enemy, thank God, is at | |
last tracked." | |
My father led the stranger aside, and the General followed. I know that | |
he had led them out of hearing, that he might relate my case, and I saw | |
them glance often quickly at me, as the discussion proceeded. | |
My father came to me, kissed me again and again, and leading me from the | |
chapel, said: | |
"It is time to return, but before we go home, we must add to our party | |
the good priest, who lives but a little way from this; and persuade him | |
to accompany us to the schloss." | |
In this quest we were successful: and I was glad, being unspeakably | |
fatigued when we reached home. But my satisfaction was changed to | |
dismay, on discovering that there were no tidings of Carmilla. Of the | |
scene that had occurred in the ruined chapel, no explanation was offered | |
to me, and it was clear that it was a secret which my father for the | |
present determined to keep from me. | |
The sinister absence of Carmilla made the remembrance of the scene more | |
horrible to me. The arrangements for the night were singular. Two | |
servants, and Madame were to sit up in my room that night; and the | |
ecclesiastic with my father kept watch in the adjoining dressing room. | |
The priest had performed certain solemn rites that night, the purport of | |
which I did not understand any more than I comprehended the reason of | |
this extraordinary precaution taken for my safety during sleep. | |
I saw all clearly a few days later. | |
The disappearance of Carmilla was followed by the discontinuance of my | |
nightly sufferings. | |
You have heard, no doubt, of the appalling superstition that prevails in | |
Upper and Lower Styria, in Moravia, Silesia, in Turkish Serbia, in | |
Poland, even in Russia; the superstition, so we must call it, of | |
the Vampire. | |
If human testimony, taken with every care and solemnity, judicially, | |
before commissions innumerable, each consisting of many members, all | |
chosen for integrity and intelligence, and constituting reports more | |
voluminous perhaps than exist upon any one other class of cases, is | |
worth anything, it is difficult to deny, or even to doubt the existence | |
of such a phenomenon as the Vampire. | |
For my part I have heard no theory by which to explain what I myself | |
have witnessed and experienced, other than that supplied by the ancient | |
and well-attested belief of the country. | |
The next day the formal proceedings took place in the Chapel of | |
Karnstein. | |
The grave of the Countess Mircalla was opened; and the General and my | |
father recognized each his perfidious and beautiful guest, in the face | |
now disclosed to view. The features, though a hundred and fifty years | |
had passed since her funeral, were tinted with the warmth of life. Her | |
eyes were open; no cadaverous smell exhaled from the coffin. The two | |
medical men, one officially present, the other on the part of the | |
promoter of the inquiry, attested the marvelous fact that there was a | |
faint but appreciable respiration, and a corresponding action of the | |
heart. The limbs were perfectly flexible, the flesh elastic; and the | |
leaden coffin floated with blood, in which to a depth of seven inches, | |
the body lay immersed. | |
Here then, were all the admitted signs and proofs of vampirism. The | |
body, therefore, in accordance with the ancient practice, was raised, | |
and a sharp stake driven through the heart of the vampire, who uttered a | |
piercing shriek at the moment, in all respects such as might escape from | |
a living person in the last agony. Then the head was struck off, and a | |
torrent of blood flowed from the severed neck. The body and head was | |
next placed on a pile of wood, and reduced to ashes, which were thrown | |
upon the river and borne away, and that territory has never since been | |
plagued by the visits of a vampire. | |
My father has a copy of the report of the Imperial Commission, with the | |
signatures of all who were present at these proceedings, attached in | |
verification of the statement. It is from this official paper that I | |
have summarized my account of this last shocking scene. | |
XVI | |
_Conclusion_ | |
I write all this you suppose with composure. But far from it; I cannot | |
think of it without agitation. Nothing but your earnest desire so | |
repeatedly expressed, could have induced me to sit down to a task that | |
has unstrung my nerves for months to come, and reinduced a shadow of the | |
unspeakable horror which years after my deliverance continued to make my | |
days and nights dreadful, and solitude insupportably terrific. | |
Let me add a word or two about that quaint Baron Vordenburg, to whose | |
curious lore we were indebted for the discovery of the Countess | |
Mircalla's grave. | |
He had taken up his abode in Gratz, where, living upon a mere pittance, | |
which was all that remained to him of the once princely estates of his | |
family, in Upper Styria, he devoted himself to the minute and laborious | |
investigation of the marvelously authenticated tradition of Vampirism. | |
He had at his fingers' ends all the great and little works upon | |
the subject. | |
"Magia Posthuma," "Phlegon de Mirabilibus," "Augustinus de cura pro | |
Mortuis," "Philosophicae et Christianae Cogitationes de Vampiris," by | |
John Christofer Herenberg; and a thousand others, among which I | |
remember only a few of those which he lent to my father. He had a | |
voluminous digest of all the judicial cases, from which he had extracted | |
a system of principles that appear to govern--some always, and others | |
occasionally only--the condition of the vampire. I may mention, in | |
passing, that the deadly pallor attributed to that sort of revenants, is | |
a mere melodramatic fiction. They present, in the grave, and when they | |
show themselves in human society, the appearance of healthy life. When | |
disclosed to light in their coffins, they exhibit all the symptoms that | |
are enumerated as those which proved the vampire-life of the long-dead | |
Countess Karnstein. | |
How they escape from their graves and return to them for certain hours | |
every day, without displacing the clay or leaving any trace of | |
disturbance in the state of the coffin or the cerements, has always been | |
admitted to be utterly inexplicable. The amphibious existence of the | |
vampire is sustained by daily renewed slumber in the grave. Its horrible | |
lust for living blood supplies the vigor of its waking existence. The | |
vampire is prone to be fascinated with an engrossing vehemence, | |
resembling the passion of love, by particular persons. In pursuit of | |
these it will exercise inexhaustible patience and stratagem, for access | |
to a particular object may be obstructed in a hundred ways. It will | |
never desist until it has satiated its passion, and drained the very | |
life of its coveted victim. But it will, in these cases, husband and | |
protract its murderous enjoyment with the refinement of an epicure, and | |
heighten it by the gradual approaches of an artful courtship. In these | |
cases it seems to yearn for something like sympathy and consent. In | |
ordinary ones it goes direct to its object, overpowers with violence, | |
and strangles and exhausts often at a single feast. | |
The vampire is, apparently, subject, in certain situations, to special | |
conditions. In the particular instance of which I have given you a | |
relation, Mircalla seemed to be limited to a name which, if not her real | |
one, should at least reproduce, without the omission or addition of a | |
single letter, those, as we say, anagrammatically, which compose it. | |
Carmilla did this; so did Millarca. | |
My father related to the Baron Vordenburg, who remained with us for two | |
or three weeks after the expulsion of Carmilla, the story about the | |
Moravian nobleman and the vampire at Karnstein churchyard, and then he | |
asked the Baron how he had discovered the exact position of the | |
long-concealed tomb of the Countess Mircalla? The Baron's grotesque | |
features puckered up into a mysterious smile; he looked down, still | |
smiling on his worn spectacle case and fumbled with it. Then looking | |
up, he said: | |
"I have many journals, and other papers, written by that remarkable man; | |
the most curious among them is one treating of the visit of which you | |
speak, to Karnstein. The tradition, of course, discolors and distorts a | |
little. He might have been termed a Moravian nobleman, for he had | |
changed his abode to that territory, and was, beside, a noble. But he | |
was, in truth, a native of Upper Styria. It is enough to say that in | |
very early youth he had been a passionate and favored lover of the | |
beautiful Mircalla, Countess Karnstein. Her early death plunged him into | |
inconsolable grief. It is the nature of vampires to increase and | |
multiply, but according to an ascertained and ghostly law. | |
"Assume, at starting, a territory perfectly free from that pest. How | |
does it begin, and how does it multiply itself? I will tell you. A | |
person, more or less wicked, puts an end to himself. A suicide, under | |
certain circumstances, becomes a vampire. That specter visits living | |
people in their slumbers; they die, and almost invariably, in the grave, | |
develop into vampires. This happened in the case of the beautiful | |
Mircalla, who was haunted by one of those demons. My ancestor, | |
Vordenburg, whose title I still bear, soon discovered this, and in the | |
course of the studies to which he devoted himself, learned a great | |
deal more. | |
"Among other things, he concluded that suspicion of vampirism would | |
probably fall, sooner or later, upon the dead Countess, who in life had | |
been his idol. He conceived a horror, be she what she might, of her | |
remains being profaned by the outrage of a posthumous execution. He has | |
left a curious paper to prove that the vampire, on its expulsion from | |
its amphibious existence, is projected into a far more horrible life; | |
and he resolved to save his once beloved Mircalla from this. | |
"He adopted the stratagem of a journey here, a pretended removal of her | |
remains, and a real obliteration of her monument. When age had stolen | |
upon him, and from the vale of years, he looked back on the scenes he | |
was leaving, he considered, in a different spirit, what he had done, and | |
a horror took possession of him. He made the tracings and notes which | |
have guided me to the very spot, and drew up a confession of the | |
deception that he had practiced. If he had intended any further action | |
in this matter, death prevented him; and the hand of a remote descendant | |
has, too late for many, directed the pursuit to the lair of the beast." | |
We talked a little more, and among other things he said was this: | |
"One sign of the vampire is the power of the hand. The slender hand of | |
Mircalla closed like a vice of steel on the General's wrist when he | |
raised the hatchet to strike. But its power is not confined to its | |
grasp; it leaves a numbness in the limb it seizes, which is slowly, if | |
ever, recovered from." | |
The following Spring my father took me a tour through Italy. We remained | |
away for more than a year. It was long before the terror of recent | |
events subsided; and to this hour the image of Carmilla returns to | |
memory with ambiguous alternations--sometimes the playful, languid, | |
beautiful girl; sometimes the writhing fiend I saw in the ruined church; | |
and often from a reverie I have started, fancying I heard the light step | |
of Carmilla at the drawing room door. | |
* * * * * | |
Other books by J. Sheridan LeFanu | |
The Cock and Anchor | |
Torlogh O'Brien | |
The House by the Churchyard | |
Uncle Silas | |
Checkmate | |
Carmilla | |
The Wyvern Mystery | |
Guy Deverell | |
Ghost Stories and Tales of Mystery | |
The Chronicles of Golden Friars | |
In a Glass Darkly | |
The Purcell Papers | |
The Watcher and Other Weird Stories | |
A Chronicle of Golden Friars and Other Stories | |
Madam Growl's Ghost and Other Tales of Mystery | |
Green Tea and Other Stories | |
Sheridan LeFanu: The Diabolic Genius | |
Best Ghost Stories of J.S. LeFanu | |
The Best Horror Stories | |
The Vampire Lovers and Other Stories | |
Ghost Stories and Mysteries | |
The Hours After Midnight | |
J.S. LeFanu: Ghost Stories and Mysteries | |
Ghost and Horror Stories | |
Green Tea and Other Ghost Stones | |
Carmilla and Other Classic Tales of Mystery | |
End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Carmilla, by J. Sheridan LeFanu | |
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